“Yes, sir.” No sense disagreeing. Men hated for another man to challenge their wives. Mahler stared at the polished, empty surface of Truro’s desk. Was Truro a next-generation no-paper guy? Everything stored on his phone, in the cloud?

Truro swung around to look at Mahler. “Mayor Ransom was just in here. Very intense woman. Do you know Marsha?”

“I’ve met her a few times.” Here comes the message, Mahler thought.

Truro smiled. “I like her energy. Great to work with, gets things done.” He sat and pulled himself to his desk. “Marsha’s concerned about this murder in the park. Thinks we should let the public know we’re on top of it. Press conference, community meeting, special task force—allay the public’s fears. That sort of thing. What do you think?”

“A press conference is probably a good idea, at least to confront the misinformation on social media, but we’ll need to be cautious. I don’t think we need a special task force. I could use a few more officers, on a temporary basis, to look at back cases and follow leads.”

Truro did not seem to hear him. “You know, Eddie, a crime like this—a homicide in a park—does a terrible thing to a community. Breaks the social compact. Takes away the sense of safety the public feels entitled to.”

Mahler nodded. This was the reason he was in the room. Truro was trying out a speech on him. He thought again of the early symptoms of migraine. He could buy himself a few more hours with ibuprofen. Four hundred milligrams every six hours. A bottle of pills sat on his desk, which, unlike the chief’s, was cluttered with folders and uneven piles of paper.

“This kind of case defines a department and its leaders,” Truro continued. “I’ve seen it in other cities. It’s what they all remember years afterward, no matter what else you do. What’s your caseload like?”

“We suspended all other cases. We’re on round-the-clock.”

“On this kind of homicide, what’s your average time-to-arrest?”

Mahler shrugged. “Varies. Sometimes it happens right away, other times longer.”

“On average. Realistically?”

“Couple of weeks, maybe longer.”

Truro studied Mahler’s face. “You all right? You look a little pale.”

It’s called white migraine. “I’m fine.”

Truro seemed to accept that. “I understand you were the lead investigator on the homicides in the same park two years ago. You get all the support you needed from this office?”

Right up to the betrayal. In his mind, Mahler saw the TV4 reporter waiting in a chair outside the chief’s office. “Chief Stone took an active part.”

“How about you? No judgments in hindsight, of course. But all of us can learn from the past. Anything you’d do differently?”