He thought about the woman he'd spent so much time with. "Leslie's a bit of an enigma. She's rough around the edges, very argumentative. She admitted she'd always been jealous of her sister. But she seemed legitimately sorry for that now. I didn't get the impression that she'd want to hurt her, but then I didn't know her back then. Maybe she was trying to protect Marisa from Vinnie, from marrying someone involved in that kind of thing."

"Maybe," Garrison said. "But why not tell the truth when the FBI stepped in? Like I said to Marisa, it would have helped us a lot if we'd known."

"It's possible she was afraid Marisa wouldn't forgive her. Even if it had been inadvertent, she got Vinnie killed."

"You believe that?"

Nate couldn't seem to force words past the niggling suspicion in his gut.

"It's possible."

Garrison didn't sound convinced, and Nate wasn't either. Leslie might have helped clear her sister's name, if she'd been honest. She hadn't done anything illegal, and surely putting up with her sister's anger would have been better than never seeing her again. Even if she hadn't come forward at first, when suspicion turned to Marisa, Leslie could have given the cops more information, kept her sister out of their crosshairs. But she hadn't. Nate couldn't help but think they were missing a big piece of the puzzle.

Nate waited for the former FBI guy to at least hazard another guess. Instead, Garrison remained silent for the rest of their walk.

The body shop wasn't far from the entrance to the Lincoln Tunnel. Hell's Kitchen was like a plumber at a cocktail party. Manhattan might need its goods and services, but she hoped her guests wouldn't get a glimpse of the crack in their sophisticated facade. Although they were just a handful of city blocks from the New York Times building and Times Square, this corner might have been in a different city all together. A warehouse on one side, a couple of unmarked brick buildings on the other, and in front of a backdrop of skyscrapers, a one-story brick building with a blue-and-white sign above that read Acme Auto Body.

"Whenever I hear the word Acme," Garrison said, "I think of Wile E. Coyote."

Nate could picture the coyote beside an Acme invention—and the explosion that often followed. "Not the image you want of the place fixing your car."

"No kidding." Garrison stopped in front of the door. "Look, let me do the talking, okay?"

"Why?"

"Like you said, I have an instinct for people."

"You said that. I think you just got lucky. And I have an instinct, too. I interview people for a living."

"I've been collaring criminals for nearly twenty years. Trust me, okay?"

Nate started to argue, but this wasn't a competition. "Fine. What's your strategy?"

"Ask a bunch of questions, hope for the best."

Some strategy.

They pushed through the door of the Acme Auto Body.