THEY FOUND ROMAN FALLOW sipping a latte at Caf� Society in the Point. He sat with a woman who looked like a model-kneecaps as sharp as her cheekbones, eyes bulging slightly because the skin on her face was pulled so tight it looked like it had been glued to the bone, nice off-white summer dress with those spaghetti straps that made her look sexy and skeletal at the same time, Sean wondering how she pulled that off and deciding it must be the pearl glow of her perfect skin.
Roman wore a silk T-shirt tucked into pleated linen trousers, looking like he just stepped off a soundstage of one of those old RKO movies set in Havana or Key West. He sipped his latte and leafed through the paper with his girl, Roman reading the business section, his model thumbing through the style section.
Whitey pulled a chair over to them and said, "Hey, Roman, they sell men's clothes where you got that shirt?"
Roman kept his eyes on his paper, popped a piece of croissant in his mouth. "Sergeant Powers, how you doing? How's that Hyundai working out for you?"
Whitey chuckled as Sean sat down beside him. "Looking at you, Roman, you know, in this place, I'd swear you were just another yuppie, ready to get up in the morning and go do some day trading on your iMac."
"Got a PC, Sergeant." Roman closed his paper and looked at Whitey and Sean for the first time. "Oh, hi," he said to Sean. "I know you from somewhere."
"Sean Devine, State Police."
"Right, right," Roman said. "Sure, I remember now. Saw you in court once testifying against a friend of mine. Nice suit. They're stepping things up at Sears these days, huh? Getting hip."
Whitey glanced over at the model. "Get you a steak or something, honey?"
The model said, "What?"
"Maybe some glucose on an IV drip? My treat."
Roman said, "Don't do that. This is business, right? Keep it between us."
The model said, "Roman, I don't get it."
Roman smiled. "It's okay, Michaela. Just ignore us."
"Michaela," Whitey said. "Cool name."
Michaela kept her eyes on her newspaper.
"What brings you by, Sergeant?"
"The scones," Whitey said. "Love the scones in this place. And, oh yeah, you know a woman named Katherine Marcus, Roman?"
"Sure." Roman took a small sip of his latte and wiped his upper lip with his napkin, dropped it back on his lap. "She was found dead this afternoon, I heard."
"She was," Whitey said.
"Never good for the neighborhood rep when something like that happens."
Whitey crossed his arms, looked at Roman.
Roman chewed another piece of croissant and drank some more latte. He crossed his legs, dabbed at his mouth with the napkin, and held Whitey's gaze for a bit, Sean thinking this was one of the things that had begun to bore him the most about his job-all these big-dick contests, everyone staring each other blind, nobody backing down.
"Yes, Sergeant," Roman said, "I knew Katherine Marcus. Is that what you came here to ask?"
Whitey shrugged.
"I knew her, and I saw her in a bar last night."
"And you exchanged words with her," Whitey said.
"I did," Roman said.
"What words?" Sean said.
Roman kept his eyes on Whitey, as if Sean didn't rate any more acknowledgment than he'd already given.
"She was dating a friend of mine. She was drunk. I told her she was making a fool of herself and she and her two friends should go home."
"Who's your friend?" Whitey said.
Roman smiled. "Come on, Sergeant. You know who it is."
"So say the words."
"Bobby O'Donnell," Roman said. "Happy? She was dating Bobby."
"Currently?"
"Excuse me?"
"Currently," Whitey repeated. "She was currently dating him? Or she had once dated him?"
"Currently," Roman said.
Whitey scribbled in his notebook. "Goes against the information we have, Roman."
"That so?"
"Yeah. We heard she dumped his doughy ass seven months back, but he wouldn't let go."
"You know women, Sergeant."
Whitey shook his head. "No, Roman, why don't you tell me?"
Roman closed his section of the paper. "She and Bobby went back and forth. One minute he was the love of her life, the next he was cooling his heels."
"Cooling his heels," Whitey said to Sean. "That sound like the Bobby O'Donnell you know?"
"Not at all," Sean said.
"Not at all," Whitey said to Roman.
Roman shrugged. "I'm telling you what I know. That's all."
"Fair enough." Whitey wrote in his notebook for a bit. "Roman, where'd you go last night after you left the Last Drop?"
"We went to a party at a friend's loft downtown."
"Oooh, a loft party," Whitey said. "Always wanted to go to one of those. Designer drugs, models, lots of white guys listening to rap, telling themselves how 'street' they are. By 'we,' Roman, you mean yourself and Ally McBeal over here?"
"Michaela," Roman said. "Yes. Michaela Davenport if you're writing it down."
"Oh, I'm writing it down," Whitey said. "Is that your real name, honey?"
"What?"
"Your real name," Whitey said, "is Michaela Davenport?"
"Yes." The model's eyes bulged a little more. "Why?"
"Your mother watch a lot of soaps before you were born?"
Michaela said, "Roman."
Roman held up a hand, looked at Whitey. "What I say about keeping this between us? Huh?"
"You taking offense, Roman? You going to go all Christopher Walken on me, try to come on strong? Is that the idea? Because, I mean, we could go on a drive till your alibi clears. We could do that. You got plans for tomorrow?"
Roman went back into that place Sean had seen most criminals go when a cop came down hard-a recession into self so total that you'd swear they'd stopped breathing, the eyes looking back at you, dark and disinterested and shrinking.
"No offense, Sergeant," Roman said, his voice a flat line. "I'll be happy to provide you with the names of everyone who saw me at the party. And I'm sure the bartender at the Last Drop, Todd Lane, will verify that I left the bar no earlier than two."
"Good boy," Whitey said. "Now what about your pal Bobby? Where can we find him?"
Roman allowed himself a broad smile. "You're going to love this."
"What's that, Roman?"
"If you're liking Bobby for Katherine Marcus's death, I mean, you're really going to love this."
Roman flicked his predator's glance in Sean's direction, and Sean felt the excitement he'd felt since Eve Pigeon had mentioned Roman and Bobby wither.
"Bobby, Bobby, Bobby." Roman sighed and winked at his girlfriend before turning back to Sean and Whitey. "Bobby was pulled over on a DUI Friday night." Roman took another sip of his latte, drawing it out. "He's been in jail all weekend, Sergeant." He wiggled his finger back and forth between the two of them. "Don't you guys check these things?"