The issues she had with Chain Bridge Road were typical. It was otherwise known as Route 123. This and other bottlenecks took her a visit to Virginia to get straightened out. But today, her second try, she was almost certain a building that had its back to the street, its main entrance in what should have been its rear, where it abutted a parking garage, was the one.

As she approached from the north, she again counted the buildings before and after it. It had to be 2070. She took the right turnoff, but too slowly; a Nissan gave a ferocious horn. In her fluster, Vera twisted wrongly along a service road, got trapped in a Pier I Imports lot with no exit leading the right way out again. She stared at the building, unreachable beyond a long, low wall. It had a fugly entrance. It looked like a gigantic—five-stories-high—toilet seat.

She had to drive out the way she’d come into the lot. Now she was headed in the wrong direction, at least for a stretch. She banged the steering wheel. As if to punish, her cell put out its cheep-cheep. She looked at it. It was the Metro editor, not Stanley, which was not good.

She’d been tempted to turn off her cell to keep interference to a minimum, but she knew that would only make them more slamzonied for her. Night cops, her beat, never had business in Tysons. Beats, as Stanley always said, kept her from roaming. She pulled over. She seemed to be a magnet for hurry-up drivers, two of whom were now honking her. She ignored these road racers, clicked on the emergencies, turned on her cell, and dialed the desk.

She hoped it wasn’t anything in Trinidad. The neighborhood had been homicide heaven in December. Fifth District had messed around with checkpoints, gotten war-zone metaphors up and running. She’d been so swamped with shootings, police-state yak, she’d had trouble getting traction on her pilot. She looked at her watch. It was 7:30 p.m.

“Hastings?”

“You texted me.”

“Where in God’s name are you?”

Confession would be long this week. “Out in Northeast, walking Trinidad with some ACLU guy.”

“Oh. Okay. Good idea.”

She shook her head at herself. The lies of the other paper’s bad black reporter burbled up at her. At least she wasn’t in a bar. She glanced at the brick boxes of Tysons II, Neiman’s squiggle on the largest building’s corner. She wondered where Stanley, her usual protector, had gotten to.

“One of the copy aides noticed the scanner’s got a shooting, 200 block of C Street Northeast,” the Metro editor barked.

Vera was relieved: not in Trinidad. What a blessing. Lord loved her. “Thank you,” she whispered.

“What?” he demanded.

“Nothing, just getting with somebody out here.”

“Oh yeah. Right. So smash on over there. It’s not Trinidad, but it’s something.”

“I’ll do that.”