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was the one she extracted under duress. If Jimmy was willing to be strong-armed, he could give up a partial truth and hold back the most important parts.
    Commoro clomped across the dry ground wearing thigh-high rubber boots and rubber gloves, cursing to himself, accompanied by a stoop-shouldered man with a backpack.
    “I need to get my samples before you disturb the body, detective,” called the stooped man, his voice reedy and eager. You’d think he was at a birthday party, ready to blow out the candles on the cake. He was a few years older than Commoro, a pencil-neck in hiking boots, khaki shorts, and a denim shirt with double-decker pockets, his hair a nest of unkempt curls.
    “Just don’t take all day, professor,” said Katz. “Make sure you get photographs first.”
    The professor took a 35-millimeter camera from the backpack and started taking photos of the corpse from every angle, moving closer, leaping from rock to rock until he was right next to Walsh’s body. He perched there and finished out the roll, ignoring the flies swarming around him. The camera returned to his pack and he pulled on a pair of surgical gloves, then bent down over the body, knobby knees wide, his face inches from the putrefying flesh. Sunlight flashed on the stainless-steel tweezers in his hand as he plucked something off and held it up for examination. It wriggled.
    Jimmy looked at Katz.
    “Professor Zarinski is a bug doc who wants to be a consultant,” Katz explained. “He’s a pain in the ass sometimes, but he doesn’t charge the department anything, and besides he buys coffee.” She nodded to where B.K. was talking to an older cop. “The doofus there says you took one look at the floater and made a beeline for the trailer.” She punched him lightly in the kidneys, more of a love tap. “What were you looking for?”
    “A phone. I wanted to call it in to the proper authorities.”
    Katz smiled. “The proper authorities—who’s that, the
Drudge Report
?” She stared into the koi pond again, cocking her head to get a better look. “Hold that thought, Jimmy. Okay, Commoro, time to take a dip.”
    Commoro shifted from one foot to the other.
    “Get in there,” ordered Katz. “There’s something just under the surface, right near the head. I can see it catching the sunlight. See that gray rock?
That
one. Hurry up, the fishies won’t bite you—they already hit the smorgasbord.” She laughed. It was a nice laugh too, a sweet laugh, a private joke on a summer day.
    Commoro gingerly entered the pond, dark blue circles spreading under the armpits of his uniform. The bottom of the pool varied in depth, the scummy water rising to his knees as he made his way to where Katz pointed. He tried not to make waves, but he sent ripples across the pool with every step, banging Walsh’s body against the rock the professor knelt on. Commoro stuck his hand in the water, his head turned away.
    “What were you looking for in the trailer, Jimmy?” asked Katz, still watching the water.
    “The things that a reporter learns from a source. That’s privileged information, but at the same time,” Jimmy hurried, sounding nervous, “I feel an obligation to help your investigation. We’re on the same side.”
    Katz laughed.
    Commoro fumbled around the gray rock, the water filling his rubber glove. He shuddered, trying not to breathe, as the body bobbed against him.
    “A word of advice,” the professor murmured to Commoro as he picked through Walsh’s scalp with the tweezers, his voice barely louder than the flies that buzzed around them. “Take
deep
breaths. It will make it easier. It’s called sensory overload. Once the nasal receptors fully fire, well, it’s really quite tolerable.”
    “Take off your glove, Commoro,” ordered Katz. “Okay, Jimmy, show and tell.”
    “Okay.” Jimmy was going to tell her the truth, as much as he needed to anyway. “In exchange, I’d like a heads-up on the autopsy report before you release it.