"You two close? Share each other's secrets? That kind of thing?"

"Charlie," I said, "are you tailing me?"

He made a compromising noise from his throat, like I was overreacting. "I'm protecting my investment."

"Don't," I said.

"What do you tell her about us?" he asked.

"I don't. I don't tell her anything about what we're doing."

"You're sure."

"I'm sure that you better stop tailing me, Charlie."

"Listen, kid." He spoke out of the side of his mouth. "I know she's a great piece of ass, and I know you want to show her what a swell guy you are. But I'm telling you, women? They come and go. What's a secret today is something she'll tell all her friends tomorrow. And who knows? It ends badly? Maybe she calls a reporter or a cop or something."

"Charlie, I don't want you-"

He waved me off. "You want me paranoid, kid. You need me that way. And I need you that way. Just make sure Shauna doesn't have any idea what goes on between you and me. Don't make her a liability."

He clapped his hand on my shoulder. "Hey, all this seriousness. I really just wanted to give you that present. You deserve it. There's gonna be a lot more where that came from."

He headed for the door.

"Don't go near Shauna, Charlie," I said.

He waved as he walked out the door.

"Don't give me a reason to, kid," he said.

38.

THE WEATHER OUTSIDE WAS DELIGHTFUL, BUT MY mood was rather frightful. Christmas Day. The air was crisp and the temperatures low. The sun was making an occasional appearance that lit up the light blanket of snow. All in all, it was a nice day outside, which sort of pissed me off. I went for a pretty good run through the quiet neighborhood streets of the city. When I got back, spent and sweaty, I had nothing else to do with my day.

So I got in my car and went for a drive. Talia and I used to do that on weekends. We'd drive around the various neighborhoods and check out their vibe, look at homes for sale and even walk through their open-house tours. Thinking about our next place to live, something I couldn't afford on an assistant county attorney's salary at the time, but it was fun to dream.

I thought of Charlie's friendly visit last night, letting me know he was watching me. I checked my rearview mirror but there was pretty much nobody driving. I wasn't being followed.

I drove in a different direction than usual this time. I drove to the southwest side. It was exceptionally quiet, almost barren, on Christmas Day. The area was overwhelmingly Latino and, therefore, overwhelmingly Catholic. Nothing was open. The housing was humble. Small and packed tightly together. I drove past Liberty Park, the scene of Ernesto Ramirez's death, a shiver passing through me. Then I turned left-south-and drove a couple of blocks, then west for another couple, then south again and looked for the signs for 6114 South Hastings.

Ernesto Ramirez's family lived on the bottom floor of a three-story brick building. Beyond a waist-high fence and a very tiny garden, dormant this time of year, was a concrete walk-up and side-by-side red doors, one for the Ramirez family and the other for the staircase leading to the upper floors.

From my view in my car, I could see a Christmas tree in the window of the Ramirez apartment. A tiny figure passed by, a head full of dark hair and pigtails. Presumably the daughter, the six-year-old, Mercedes. I got out of the car, went through the gate, and took the walk-up to the front door. I could hear them from my perch, the muffled sounds of children shouting and adults laughing inside the apartment. I was glad, almost relieved to hear it. This couldn't have been a good holiday for the Ramirez family. I poised my finger over the button for RAMIREZ but decided against it. I left the shopping bag on the stoop and walked back down. I was walking around to the driver's side of the car when I heard her voice.

"Hello."

I turned around. Essie Ramirez was standing where I'd just stood, her arms folded to keep warm. She was wearing a forest-green turtleneck and blue jeans. Her breath lingered in the frigid air outside.

I waved to her. "Merry Christmas."

"Same to you." She looked down into the shopping bag. "Presents?"

"For your kids," I said.

"Come in," she said.

"I shouldn't."

"Come in."

I hesitated, then shook my head. It wasn't that I didn't want to intrude. I just didn't want to do the family-at-Christmas thing, especially with someone else's family. "Another time," I said.

She paused, watching me, rubbing the arms of her sweater for warmth. Her dark hair hung past her shoulders. If memory served, she was in her early thirties, but she looked more like early twenties.

"How are they doing?" I asked.

She bobbed her head around. "Kids are better than adults," she said. "Good days, bad days. Today is a good day for them."

"For them," I repeated. "Not for you."

She paused. "Holidays are the hardest. It's supposed to be the best time of the year but that makes it even-well, it's hard. Are you married?"

I didn't know how to answer that. "No," I said.

I looked through the window again. I could see the boy now, too-Ernesto, Jr. He looked like a miniature version of his father, a stocky build and proud chin.

"Come in," she said again.

"I have to go. I just wanted to-just wanted to drop those off."

She watched me for a moment. Then she said, "I got a call from my landlord last week."

I nodded. "Wishing you a merry Christmas?"

"In a manner of speaking, yes." She smiled briefly. "I'd been getting calls from him for some time now. We've fallen behind on our rent here. Usually when he calls, he threatens me. But not this time."

I could see where the conversation was going.

"It was you, wasn't it?" she asked. "He wouldn't tell me. He said he was sworn to secrecy."

I thought about denying it but didn't.

"Why did you do that?" she asked.

I shrugged my shoulders. "I made a lot of money at my old law firm. I didn't have anything else to spend it on."

That was partly true, partly false. I was getting low on the residual money from when I was raking it in at Shaker, Riley. But it was true that I didn't have anything else to spend it on.

"And?" she said.

"And, nothing."

"And you feel responsible for Ernesto," she said. "And therefore, his family."

I didn't answer.

"So you paid for his family's rent for a year and it made you feel better?"

"A little, yeah."

"Why keep it a secret?"

"Because you wouldn't have accepted it," I said.

She couldn't disagree with that. "I can't pay you back. Not now, at least."

"Not necessary. Ever."

She thought for a bit. "All right then. I'll accept it because my kids need a roof over their heads. It was a very nice gesture. Thank you." She took a long breath. "But I am not a charity case. And you are not responsible for what happened to my husband. The people who killed him are."

"And I'm going to find them."

"I didn't ask you to do that."

"I know you didn't."

"If they killed him, they could kill you."

"Then I'll have to be careful, won't I?"

Her eyes narrowed. She wasn't going to win this argument. "Don't do this for me."

"How about I do it for Ernesto?"

The mention of his name moved her. I hadn't intended to upset her. But whatever it was passed quickly; she snapped out of it with a curt shake of her head. "He wouldn't want you to get hurt because of him."

But he got killed because of me. He lost everything because of my pursuit of him.

Essie Ramirez uncrossed her arms and walked down the stairs toward me. I wasn't entirely sure what she was doing, but I walked around to the curb side of my car. She put her hands on my arms, reached up, and kissed me on the cheek. "You're a good person," she said. "Don't lose your way." She went back inside, leaving me in the freezing cold with the fruity scent of her shampoo and something weird floating through my chest.

39.

I WAS SUMMONED TO THE U.S. ATTORNEY'S OFFICE THE day after Christmas. That was somewhat unusual for this stage of the investigation. I'd have expected a covert meet at a diner or the offices they were renting in my building-Suite 410. But not this time. They wanted me on their turf.

Not a friendly discussion planned, I assumed.

I knew I was right when I saw the look on Lee Tucker's face when he met me at the elevator. He acknowledged me but didn't make much eye contact, and I could feel his anger coming off him like heat. The place was largely deserted. A day off for most, maybe for the whole office.

But not for Lee Tucker. And not for Christopher Moody, who was sitting in the conference room with a sour look on his face.

Tucker was in jeans and a sweatshirt, which wasn't all that different than I'd seen from him. But I'd never seen Moody out of uniform. He had a button-down checkered shirt and khakis. It almost made him look human.

"Why the long faces?" I said. "You guys didn't get what you wanted for Christmas?" I took a seat and kicked up my feet on the table. They'd brought me here, home territory, to establish power. I wanted to take some air out of them.

"Boys," I said, after a long silence, "I thought you'd be singing my praises. I just made your lives easier. I just-"

"What the hell are you doing, Jason?" said Lee Tucker. I was his responsibility, so he would handle the conversation. He was still standing, pacing in anger. "This audible you called with Cimino?"

He meant the new idea I'd proposed, which Cimino had accepted. We wouldn't go after companies seeking new contracts before the PCB. Instead, we'd extort the companies that already had state contracts and would want to keep them. Higher probability of success, lower risk, and far more efficient.

I opened my hands. "A better way to shake down companies for campaign donations."

"A different way," Tucker replied. "A different way. A way that doesn't include the PCB."

That was true enough.

"We build this case the way we want to build it," said Tucker. "Not the way you want to."

I held a stare on him and slowly shook my head. "We're improving our efficiency, Lee. Cimino will commit more crimes. More counts to the indictment."

"But you're keeping the board out of it," he replied. "The PCB doesn't have a say in this. And we want those guys. All five of them. Greg Connolly and the bunch. You're turning this into a two-man operation. Now it's the Charlie and Jason Show."

I laughed. "You should listen to yourself," I said. "You're disappointed that more people don't get to participate in the crimes. Like the whole goal is simply to rack up as many scalps as possible. That's your problem, you know that?"

"Oh, now I have a problem?" Tucker took a moment to contain himself. He preferred the image of the cool FBI agent. And it fit his personality. He didn't like balling me out, I could tell. It wasn't his way, plus it meant he wasn't controlling his operative. "You don't know everything, and you don't need to know everything. You are part of an operation, Kolarich. Okay? Just one part. That's why we tell you what to do, and how to do it. So everything stays consistent." He dropped into his seat and stared up at the ceiling. "I mean, first you go off and do a hard sell on Cimino-"

"Which worked."

"-and now you change the entire game plan-"

"Which will also work."

Tucker watched me for a long time, running his tongue over his cheek. He removed his tin of tobacco and dumped a pinch in his mouth.

From my take, Tucker wasn't prone to anger. He was a relatively easygoing guy. And more than that, I was his project. He had to work me. He seemed to have made the calculation that I was a bit harder to tame than most people in my position, and he had to take his subjects as he found them. But he was pissed. And I wasn't sure why.