The Burning Wire

me to get the okay.”
    Rhyme and Sachs shared a look. The “teasing” reference was a bit of modesty on Dance’s part. She was a kinesics expert—body language—and one of the top interrogators in the country. But the testy relationship between the sovereign states in question was such that a California cop would have plenty of paperwork to negotiate before she could slip into Mexico for a formal interrogation, whereas the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency already had a sanctioned presence there.
    Rhyme asked, “Where was Logan spotted in the capital?”
    “A business district. He was trailed to a hotel, but he wasn’t staying there. It was for a meeting, Diaz’s men think. By the time they’d set up surveillance he was gone. But all the law enforcement agencies and hotels have his picture now.” Dance added that Diaz’s boss, a very senior police official, would be takingover the investigation. “It’s encouraging that they’re serious about the case.”
    Yes, encouraging, Rhyme thought. But he felt frustrated too. To be on the verge of finding the prey and yet to have so little control over the case . . . He found himself breathing more quickly. He was considering the last time he and the Watchmaker had been up against each other; Logan had out-thought everybody. And easily killed the man he’d been hired to murder. Rhyme had had all the facts at hand to figure out what Logan was up to. Yet he’d misread the strategy completely.
    “By the way,” he heard Sachs ask Kathryn Dance, “how was that romantic weekend away?” This had to do, it seemed, with Dance’s love interest. The single mother of two had been a widow for several years.
    “We had a great time,” the agent reported.
    “Where did you go?”
    Rhyme wondered why on earth Sachs was asking about Dance’s social life. She ignored his impatient glance.
    “Santa Barbara. Stopped at the Hearst Castle . . . Listen, I’m still waiting for you two to come out here. The children really want to meet you. Wes wrote a paper about forensics for school and mentioned you, Lincoln. His teacher used to live in New York and had read all about you.”
    “Yes, that’d be nice,” Rhyme said, thinking exclusively about Mexico City.
    Sachs smiled at the impatience in his voice and told Dance they had to go.
    After disconnecting, she wiped some sweat from Rhyme’s forehead—he hadn’t been aware of the moisture—and they sat silent for a moment, looking out the window at the blur of a peregrine falcon sweepinginto view. It veered up to its nest on Rhyme’s second floor. Though not uncommon in major cities—plenty of fat, tasty pigeons for meals—these birds of prey usually nested higher. But for some reason several generations of the birds had called Rhyme’s town house home. He liked their presence. They were smart, fascinating to watch and the perfect visitors, not demanding anything from him.
    A male voice intruded, “Well, did you get him?”
    “Who?” Rhyme snapped. “And how artful a verb is ‘get’?”
    Thom Reston, Lincoln Rhyme’s caregiver, said, “The Watchmaker.”
    “No,” grumbled Rhyme.
    “But you’re close, aren’t you?” asked the trim man, wearing dark slacks, a businessman’s starched yellow shirt and a floral tie.
    “Oh, close,” Rhyme muttered. “ Close . That’s very helpful. Next time you’re being attacked by a mountain lion, Thom, how would you feel if the park ranger shot really close to it? As opposed to, oh, say, actually hitting it?”
    “Aren’t mountain lions endangered?” Thom asked, not even bothering with an ironic inflection. He was impervious to Rhyme’s edge. He’d worked for the forensic detective for years, longer than many married couples had been together. And the aide was as seasoned as the toughest spouse.
    “Ha. Very funny. Endangered.”
    Sachs walked around behind Rhyme’s wheelchair, gripped his shoulders and began an impromptu massage. Sachs was tall and in better shape than most NYPD detectives her age and, though arthritis often plagued her knees and lower extremities, her arms and hands were strong and largely pain-free.
    They wore their working clothes: Rhyme was in sweatpants, black, and a knit shirt of dark green. She had shed her navy blue jacket but was wearing matching slacks and a white cotton blouse, one button open at the collar, pearls present. Her Glock was high on her hip in a fast-draw polymer holster, and two magazines sat side by side in holsters of