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chairs, so McAllister reached behind her, pulled a Glock that sat low on her back, set the weapon on the counter, and hopped up beside it. She popped the tab on the Bud and took a long drink.
    With her head back, eyes on the ceiling, the Bud to her lips, I noticed that her other hand strayed to the Glock on the counter. This was not a woman who felt safe. I got theimpression she’d lived that way for a long time. And no amount of weapons on hand, or hours spent with the iron in the gym, would make her feel any safer.
    The envelope remained untouched.
    “Frost and Jones died to get you that envelope,” she said.
    “No, they didn’t,” I said.
    “How do you figure?”
    Jack got up and poured two mugs of coffee.
    “Before he died, Frost told me he had nothing on Marzone or the Morgue Squad. He knew they were keeping a tail on me because of the Hernandez case, and that’s why he set up the meeting. I guessed that Frost wanted Marzone to see us together. His theory was that Hernandez’s murder exposed Marzone in some way, and he wanted to make him itchy. Itchy enough to try to take me out. It was Frost’s plan. He wanted to catch Marzone making an attempt on my life. It backfired.”
    “Bullshit,” said McAllister.
    “I’m telling you the truth.”
    She put down the beer and studied me.
    “You’re trying to tell me that the head of IAB deliberately put a civilian at risk to catch a dirty cop? I don’t buy it.”
    “I’m not selling it. Frost said he had the real statistics on choke hold complaints in the NYPD and the evidence to show that those complaints, even when they’re upheld by the Review Board, don’t result in disciplinary action against the officer. That doesn’t tie Marzone to a crime, but it’s useful for the Hernandez case. What did Frost tell you?”
    “Not much. I’ve only been in Internal Affairs three months; transferred in from Robbery Homicide. I’m trying for lieutenant, so I need the IAB detail to work up my application. I’ve got a decent amount of time on my badge, and I was new. Frost wanted a senior officer he could trust. He told me you could connect the dots from the Hernandez killing to the Morgue Squad. Exactly what that connection might be, I don’t know. He wouldn’t tell me. It sure as hell wasn’t to put a target on your back. Jones told me you might not even know what you have, so we wanted to set up an exchange of information. You show us what you got, we show you ours.”
    “What is the Morgue Squad?”
    Her eyebrows went north, as if somebody pulled the skin taut on the back of her head.
    “You don’t know?” she said, and turned to direct the question at Jack and me.
    “No,” we said together.
    She leapt off the counter, lifted her weapon, and slipped it into her waistband.
    “Then I’m wasting my time. And Frost wasted his life,” she said. She leaned over to grab the envelope.
    “Wait. We might have something that helps you nail Marzone. Maybe it’s like Frost said. We might not know we have it. You can appreciate we’re a little nervous,” I said.
    I told her about Roark choking me in Jack’s car. The ultimatum to take the settlement or a bullet.
    McAllister picked up the envelope and emptied a half dozen manila files onto the table. She flicked through them, found a file, and flipped it so that I could see the cover. A photograph was pinned to the top left-hand corner of the file.
    “That’s the guy,” I said.
    “According to Frost, this guy is Marzone’s right hand. The Morgue Squad don’t take on work unless Marzone and Roark both agree to accept it.”
    “What kind of work?”
    “You really don’t know, do you?”
    “No, we don’t,” I said.
    “Let me put it this way—the Morgue Squad run a cleaning service on contracts.”
    Jack and I exchanged glances. Neither of us got it.
    “What kind of contracts?” said Jack.
    “The kind that get people killed,” said McAllister.

 
    Chapter Fifteen
    Like all of the most lucrative