“Finishes Princeton. Goes into the Army, picks the Rangers—mainly to piss off his father. When his tour ends, he comes back here. Joins the department, works the streets in a uniform—which is obviously his old man’s worst nightmare. He marries a beautiful young woman, VP of marketing at a winery. After two years, she can’t decide if it’s worse when he doesn’t talk about his work or when he does. Eddie makes detective, spends a year in Narcotics, but I think it had too many memories of Diane. Gets reassigned to VCI. After three years he heads the unit.”

“So it’s all about his father?”

“You’re the psychologist. You tell me. I’m just a tired, old cop who’s wasted his life trying to understand why one dirtbag in this town thinks it’s a good idea to stab another dirtbag. I’ve also raised two boys, but that makes me more a philosopher than a psychologist.” Rivas shook his head.

“From my time being around Eddie,” Rivas continued, “I think what’s inside him is something else. Eddie sees two sides of law enforcement. He sees guys who work in the community, like the cop who arrested and then tried to help Diane. Then there are the head-bangers, like the one who slammed Eddie into his car when he was a kid. Eddie’s all the time trying to work it out, how to do the job. That last kind of cop makes him skeptical of force, critical of some tactics. And it makes him, let’s say, unpopular among some fellow officers.”

“Which probably has repercussions for him.”

“You bet. Fast-forward to the Foss and Hart homicides in the park two years ago. Big cases for this town. We worked the Foss killing as hard and fast as any I’ve seen. And we were close with Partridge.”

“Tom Woodhouse told me the DA declined to indict. Then after the Hart murder, the DA and the chief blamed VCI, and Lieutenant Mahler, in particular, for not holding Partridge.”

“Yeah. It was the usual thing. Once Susan Hart’s killed, everyone’s looking for a goat. People in the department who don’t like Eddie decide it’s time to score some points. Hart’s father reads one of the press stories. Eddie shows up at the funeral, and he’s asked to leave by two of the victim’s uncles.”

“It’s like a public humiliation.”

“Big-time. Worst part was Eddie starts to actually believe it’s his fault. He didn’t do enough, fast enough. Eddie goes to a dark place for a while. Starts drinking at lunch. Breaks up with his girlfriend, Kate Langley. Gets migraines. Makes even more enemies in the department.”

“So why’s he stay?”