Jeffers thought of the '59 pink Cadillac Eldorado that Redhawk drove.

It was his pride and joy, despite the razzing he received from the

men.

He treated it the way a man did his mistress.

"Not your car."

Jeffers stole a piece of peppermint candy out of an open-mouthed jar

Detective Chambers kept on his desk.

According to the sign-out board, Chambers was on stakeout.

Jeffers popped the candy into his mouth as he walked by.

"Take a damn chasm before that car'd disappear.?t Graham sidestepped an

officer ushering a scantily clad young woman off to be fingerprinted.

She looked no older than seventeen and as yet was missing that jaded, worn look that was so often the stamp of a hooker.

He wondered if she had anyone who cared enough to save her.

"I don't like driving my Caddy in rough terrain," he told Jeffers.

He stopped before the captain's door and took another long swallow of

his coffee.

Graham took a deep breath as the hot brew inched its way through his veins, systematically waking up everything in its path and bringing it to attention.

Not that he wasn't alert without it, but it helped.

Graham opened the door and let Jeffers walk in first.

Slipping in, he closed the door quietly behind him.

"You wanted to see us, Captain?"

He leaned a shoulder indolently against the doorjamb, still nursing his

coffee.

There were two extra chairs in the small room, but he remained where he was.

Graham preferred standing to sitting.

It took less time to spring into action that way.

Jeffers took a seat closer to the wall.

Martinez threw down the report he was wading through and rubbed his

face with his hands.

It had been eighteen months since he'd had a real vacation and he was about twenty-four months overdue.

It never got easier.

"Took your sweet time getting your tails in here," Martinez observed

gruffly.

The commissioner was leaning on him and that never improved his mood.

"As of seven this morning, we have ourselves another homicide.

Victim went down between Sunflower and Alameda. No ID on him. Two

sets of track marks on his arms."

"What a surprise," Graham commented into his mug, tilting it as he drained the remainder.

"And it was such a nice morning, too."

Martinez was accustomed to Redhawk's sarcasm.

The man was a maverick who fitted in only when he chose to.

When push came to shove, Martinez knew he'd rather have a squad of

Redhawks backing him up in a dangerous situation than a building full of by-the-book detectives. Martinez thought of the long, drawn-out meeting with the commissioner the previous afternoon.

The unsolved cases were escalating.

"Might get nicer if we figured out who did it."

Graham had long ago given up the itch to solve each puzzle, close each

case.

Some stayed with him longer than others and his record was better than

most, but he didn't wear blinders when it came to reality.

Life had ripped the blinders from him at a very young age.

He knew most cases went unsolved.

"Odds, Captain?"

Trust Redhawk to point out the downside, Martinez thought, keeping his

impatience in check.

"Are against us, usually," he agreed.

He tapped a copy of the call that had come into 911 earlier.

"But this time we've got a witness."

Graham arched a brow as he exchanged looks with Jeffers.

He'd written down too many statements from eyewitnesses who swore the

same man was five foot nothing and six-three to get excited.

"Reliable?"

Martinez glanced at the information the dispatcher had taken down upon

routine questioning.

"Young, Caucasian female, shopkeeper, well-to-do family. No criminalrecord-not even a parking ticket. No glasses or contacts."Deep-set, mud brown eyes swept over the two men in his office."I'd say probably as reliable as we're lucky enough to get."

At least he could hope.

Twenty-two years on the job and he could still hope.

He thought that might be some kind of record.

"I want you to go and take down her statement."

Jeffers groaned.

Martinez directed a steely gaze in his direction.

"You've got a problem with that?"

That it was futile to protest was a foregone conclusion, but Jeffers