"Two neighbors came to our front service desk in March, complaining about a drug dealer who had just moved into one of the luxury condos on the top of the building. You've seen that building?"

They both nodded.

"Okay, so you know the deal. It's this old building, been there forever. Most of the tenants are rent-stabilized. Also been there forever. Then Sam Sparks buys up the roof s.p.a.ce, stacks a few multimillion-dollar apartments on top, and calls the place 212. Two totally different kinds of tenants, now sharing one elevator and one lobby. You get your culture clashes."

Ellie felt her cell vibrate against her waist but let the call go to voice mail.

"And where did these two neighbors fit into the clash?" she asked.

"The old ladies who eat dinner at four thirty at the corner-diner side. They'd lived a good century and a half between them. And I'm telling you, they were a hoot. Watched Law and Order and CSI reruns all day long on 'the cable,' as they called it. They had the lingo down: skels, perps, mary jane, CIs, gun run. I mean, you name it, and they knew it. They were ready to sign up as CIs themselves. But let's say that as confidential informants go, they weren't the most reliable profilers when it comes to detecting drug dealing. Dirty old men? Not pushing the garbage all the way down the chute? That, I would trust them on. But they were the kind of sweet innocent citizens who think anyone who's got friends coming and going at all hours of the night must be up to no good. Let's call it a generational divide."

"So why do you have a DD5 on the apartment?"

"Because the sweet biddies wouldn't go away. G.o.d love 'em, they kept coming in and harping to the front desk with all their cop slang, cracking up everyone in the house but also being a major pain in the a.s.s. So eventually the poor sacks in the community policing unit got dragged in to calm them down. You know what those guys are all about-it's appeas.e.m.e.nt. So finally they put the old birds to work on a citizen-driven search warrant."

"How come Boyle didn't tell us about this when we called you guys at the end of May?"

"Because half the time when we start a citizen-driven warrant, the oh-so-concerned citizens get lazy and let it drop. We don't bother logging anything onto a DD5 until they come back with all their paperwork. In this case, that didn't happen until June."

"What exactly is a citizen-driven warrant?" Rogan asked.

"No time in Narcotics, huh?" He said it as if no qualified cop could make it into Homicide without pulling duty in the drug squad. Given that Ellie made it to her current position after only five years in uniform and one as a detective in general crimes, she was thankful the question hadn't been aimed at her.

"Major Case Squad, then SVU," Rogan said.

"Okay, so a citizen-driven warrant is this thing we came up with, but it's really a community policing tool. You know, after nine-eleven, we've got these ads all up and down the MTA, telling people, 'If you see something, say something.'"

"But we're not always talking about the next Zacarias Moussaoui."

"No, knock on wood, not in most cases. Instead, we get these nosy neighbors convinced that someone's up to something. So the citizen-driven warrant puts them to work. They write down every suspicious thing they see. They turn in the pages to us. If it adds up to probable cause, we ask for a warrant. If not-"

"You a.s.sure them you did everything you could, and then tell 'em to pound sand."

"Pretty much. So that's what we've got here on the DD5. The two ladies walk in to the help desk in March. A couple weeks later, after a few more streetwise Laurel and Hardy routines downstairs, they hook up with the community policing liaison, who tells them about the citizen-driven warrants. We take a look at it after a couple months, and there's nothing there."

"You're sure?" Ellie asked.

"No doubt. You work drugs a little while, and you get super-honed spidey senses. Homeboy's getting his party on like any other single man with that kind of money in Manhattan. And so we could say we did everything we could, my partner and I even did a little knock and talk with the guy. That's the entry in June there. Truth be told, I just wanted to score a peek at the place."

"And?" Rogan nudged.

"The condo was sweet. Marble floors. Floor-to-ceiling windows-"

"The resident. Drugs? Dealing?"

"Nah. Dude's Eurotrash, buying up Manhattan real estate while the dollar's in the toilet. Goes clubbing every night. Picks up bridge-and-tunnel s.k.a.n.ks looking for a short-term sugar daddy, a place to party for the night. Had no problem letting me search. The place was clean but for some personal-use marijuana in the nightstand. He didn't seem fazed that I found it, and I really didn't want to process him for it, so he flushed it. No hard stuff. No paraphernalia. No packaging materials. No cash or books."

"No dealing."

"No dealing."

"You got a cell number in case we need you to nail this down for court?" Ellie asked. "Sparks's lawyer made it sound like Pablo Escobar lived next door."

She jotted down the number in her notebook, and they began to make their way out of the squad room. Guerrero had been blowing smoke with his claims of a drug operation going down across the hall at the 212, but she still wondered how the lawyer had even known about it. Then she realized the likely source.

She turned toward Carenza. "Hey, you don't happen to know Nick Dillon, do you?"

"Sure. My brother's on the job, too. He and Dillon were in the Major Case Squad before Dillon sold out to the man. We play cards sometimes. Takes my money big-time."

"Any chance you mentioned this whole citizen-driven warrant thing to him?"

"Yeah. He used to work Narcotics, too, you know? I thought he'd get a kick out of his boss's neighbors practicing their slang over mah-jongg. Hey, that didn't cause any problems for you, did it? I mean, there was nothing to it, so-"

Rogan waved him off. "Don't sweat it, man."

Rogan caught Ellie's eye on their way out of the precinct. "The man's got ears, right? That guy makes a friend, he keeps a friend."

"Well, being his pal didn't save me from a jail cell. Maybe next time you can be the one who does our time."

"Would never happen," he said, holding open the precinct door for her to exit. "I'm way too pretty for central holding on some chippy contempt rap. Someone like me goes down, it's got to be major. I would need some serious federal corrections facility-golf course, croquet..."

"Rogan, you were raised in Brooklyn. Do you even know what croquet is?"

"I know it involves a round thing called a ball, which means it's yet another sport a brother could dominate if we only gave it a shot."

"When you're done, you think you might get around to letting me in?" Ellie tugged on the Crown Vic's locked pa.s.senger handle to make her point.

Inside the car, she flipped open her phone and saw a new voice mail from Max Donovan. Opting to wait for some privacy, she clipped the cell back to her waist.

The drive from Chinatown was slowed by end-of-day traffic. Even with the a.s.sistance of wigwag lights, they didn't pull up in front of the Thirteenth Precinct until nearly six o'clock.

Ellie was about to log onto her computer when she caught sight of Max Donovan through the open slats of the blinds that covered Lieutenant Robin Tucker's office. Tucker stood, walked to her office door, and poked her head into the squad room.

"Good timing, you two. A quick word?"

Rogan shot Ellie a look that made her wish she'd checked Max's message in the car. "This can't be good."

CHAPTER THIRTEEN.

6:00 P.M.

"ADA Donovan has an update for us on the Sparks case." Robin Tucker leaned back in her chair and smiled in Ellie's direction. "We should thank him for the special attention he's shown by coming here in person to deliver the news."

Ellie knew it was a dig from her lieutenant about her personal relationship with an a.s.sistant district attorney-a relationship that was undoubtedly behind Max's decision to make the trip from the courthouse.

"Apparently yesterday wasn't a big enough win for Sparks. I got papers delivered to my office this morning from Ramon Guerrero."

"What more could they possibly want? Our motion for access to Sparks's files went down in flames. I got smacked with a contempt charge."

"They f.u.c.king slaughtered us," Rogan said.

"Well, Guerrero wants another pound of flesh. His motion demands access to all evidence gathered by the NYPD in relation to the death of one Robert Mancini."

"That's ridiculous," Ellie said.

Rogan chimed in. "Tell them to take their motion and stick it up-"

Robin Tucker made a T sign with her hands. "Will you two let the man speak? He's trying to tell you where things stand."

"Well, of course the motion's frivolous," Donovan said. "The mere fact that Sparks has a connection is insufficient to give him any claim to access to the investigation. And they can't rely on public records laws because it's obviously an ongoing investigation."

"So is this just a big-firm lawyer trying to run up his bill?" Rogan asked.

Max ran a hand through his already tousled brown hair. "No, or at least, that's not the only reason. Guerrero's good. He knows he's got a judge who wants to please him."

"But supposedly Bandon's solid," Rogan said. Judges earned reputations with law enforcement. Bandon was known as a straight shooter-tough on crime, but fair to both sides.

Max nodded. "That he is, but for a reason. Bandon's not the kind of guy whose career ends with the state trial court. He was a major player in DOJ in the nineties, then got a sweet special counsel hookup at a major law firm. He's only pulling duty as a local judge to perfect his resume for the federal bench, and rumor is, his name's finally coming up. No more elections. Better cases. Higher prestige. It's basically every lawyer's dream gig. So, yeah, for three years, he's been as solid as solid comes. But for our purposes, on this case, at this particular time, he might be a little too solid. Someone like Sparks's got the ear of the machine that pulls those political appointment strings."

"So he's just going to turn over our entire case to Sparks? That's blatantly illegal."

Max shook his head. "No. Bandon knows there's no merit to Guerrero's motion. In fact, his clerk called me this morning right after the papers were served and basically said the whole thing is bulls.h.i.t. But then something must've changed his mind, because Bandon's clerk called back again about"-he looked at his watch-"a little under an hour ago."

Rogan threw Ellie a worried look as she was already picturing a loose-lipped Kristen Woods, with freshly arched brows, dishing to her boss about this afternoon's surprise fishing expedition.

"So what exactly are we looking at?" she asked.

Max frowned. "Bandon wants to throw Guerrero a bone. I figure he's trying to send a message to Sparks that he did all he could."

"Which is?" Rogan asked.

"Bandon wants a briefing, under oath, about where things stand. And then from there he wants updates on the case."

Ellie and Rogan were only two people, but from the cacophony in Tucker's office, they could have been the entire studio audience of The Jerry Springer Show.

"Can he do that?" Rogan finally demanded.

"Not typically," Max said. "There's a separation of powers issue. We're the executive. He's the judiciary. He has no claim to a general right to access information that we possess in an investigation."

"Okay, so once again, tell them where they can stick that motion."

Max looked at Ellie, and she knew what was coming. "He says this isn't a typical case. He says there's at least a colorable claim that the NYPD is hara.s.sing Sam Sparks-"

Rogan was already shaking his head, but Ellie held up a hand, wanting to hear the rest of the explanation.

"Bandon says it's a colorable claim, that's all. And that in light of the jurisdiction he has over the matter given Guerrero's demand for discovery, he's ordering this process as temporary relief. It's basically a middle ground. The way he explained it to me, he's essentially protecting us-you, really, the police"-he looked again at Ellie-"from a hara.s.sment suit by intervening."

"Tell him to bring it on," Rogan said. "He's gotten kid gloves compared to anyone else who'd be in his position. Bring it the f.u.c.k on. Let him sue."

Rogan looked to his partner for validation, but Ellie just stared at the speckled earth-tone linoleum of Tucker's office floor. If Max was here, instead of the courthouse, it was because he had already tried to fight on her behalf.

"I already ran it up the chain," he said, confirming her suspicions. "Knight thinks it's best if we play along." Knight was the chief prosecutor of the trial unit at the district attorney's office and was also Max's boss. "It's just a matter of meeting with Bandon in chambers-in camera-no Sparks, no Guerrero, not even a court reporter-and then I'll informally notify him of any further material developments. Like I said, it's really just for show. Bandon comes out looking good to Sparks. Nothing on the record shows he's doing some rich a.s.s a favor-"

"And we're going to play along," Rogan said. He didn't bother to hide the sarcasm.

Ellie finally spoke up. "Donovan's right. Bandon's probably helping us out."

Robin Tucker looked at Ellie with raised eyebrows. It was a look of surprised approval.

"And Rogan should be the one to do the in camera session with Judge Bandon."

"What? So I can serve some time, too?"

"So I won't be an issue. So Bandon will see we've dealt with Sparks on the up-and-up."

"That's a good idea," Max said quietly. "Thank you."

"Okay, so we're all done here?" Tucker said. "Happy campers all around?"

No one looked happy, but no one was protesting. "That was easier than I thought. Now get out of here. I've got a kid waiting at home for dinner."

Rogan didn't bother waiting until they were back to their desks before reconstructing the events that must have led to Judge Bandon's phone call to Max Donovan that afternoon.

"Your girl Kristen Woods gave us up," he said once they had both crossed the threshold of Tucker's office.

"I a.s.sumed the same thing."

"So much for the sisterhood of the traveling pantsuits," he said.

"Well, Woods is more of a miniskirt and stiletto heels type anyway." Ellie tried to muster a smile as she lowered herself into her worn vinyl-upholstered desk chair. "Given the timing, she must've called Sparks the second we left her on the street."

"And then Sparks makes a call to Bandon."

"Or, more likely, he calls his lawyer, and then Guerrero calls Bandon. That way it at least looks like an actual legal process."

"Instead of the bulls.h.i.t rich-boys club that it is."

Ellie felt a hand on her shoulder and looked up to find Max Donovan smiling down at her.

"I'm gonna get my gear from the locker room," Rogan said.