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not committing the crime. In theory, at least.”
    “Any other noncriminals in the system?”
    “Sure. Soldiers and firefighters—sometimes helps identify bodies if faces are damaged beyond recognition. People think all that’s done with DNA these days, but prints are still a lot faster and cheaper.”
    “Anybody else?”
    “Gun buyers,” he said. “Teachers and child care workers—background check to make sure they’re not sex offenders.”
    He pulled the penis out from under the hood and laid it on an absorbent paper pad on the counter. Then he gently patted it dry with another pad. “I think the best way to capture these prints would be to press this flat under glass and photograph them,” he said.
    “You don’t lift them with tape?” I asked.
    “LCV doesn’t lift like powder,” he said. “The photos should work fine, though. Besides, we’ll still have the prints themselves. I can pop Little Johnny Doe in the freezer and he’ll stay fresh for years. I can’t wait to show this to a jury in court.”
    “Well, I’m happy to leave it in your capable hands,” I said. “Just write me an evidence receipt so Jess Carter doesn’t ream me out for losing her penis.”
    “Jess? Is she still filling in as ME up here?” I nodded. “Well, if you do lose her penis, I suspect Jess could lay her hands on another one just about anytime she wanted to.”
    “I suspect if she heard you say that, she might lay her hands and her scalpel on yours.”
    “I don’t doubt it,” he said. “She’s a feisty one, that’s for sure. Take a mighty gutsy cowboy to climb into that saddle. Big cojones or a death wish, one.” For emphasis, he pointed at me as he said it. With the purple-spotted penis he still held in the forceps.
    “Hmm,” I said.
    What I didn’t say was that Jess was coming to my house for a drink and a steak in a couple of hours. As I rode the elevator down from the second floor and walked out of KPD, Art’s comment kept looping through my mind, and I couldn’t help wondering: Who was having whom for dinner to night? I found Jess intriguing, admirable, and exciting—she was smart, competent, confident, and funny, and she was good-looking, too: wavy auburn hair, green eyes, and a petite but athletic-looking build. But there was an edge to Jess that I found intimidating. I hadn’t dated in de cades, and the prospect of dating made me nervous even in the abstract. In the concrete—in the flesh, rather, of Jess Carter, who projected a take-no-prisoners toughness—the idea seemed downright perilous. Not so perilous, though, that I’d declined when she suggested I cook dinner for her. Just perilous enough, perhaps, to keep me on my toes. And according to Miranda, who was pretty smart herself, maybe it was time for a woman to keep me on my toes.
    CHAPTER 5
    THE WESTBOUND LANES OF Kingston Pike were as clogged as a fat man’s arteries as the late afternoon traffic crept into the bedroom community of Farragut. I reminded myself of the oath I’d taken years before—never never never go to Farragut between 3 P.M. and 7 P.M.—but deep down, I knew I had no choice today unless I wanted to find myself a new accountant.
    I was on permanent probation with my accountant, and with plenty of cause. I was undoubtedly his worst client. For one thing, I tended to take a grocery bag full of receipts and deposit slips to his office every year around the first of April—early enough for me to feel virtuous, but far too late for him to have any hope of filing my tax return on time. For another, anytime he chastised me for sloppy record-keeping or dumb investments, I tended to say, “Don’t act smart with me; I used to change your diapers.”
    My accountant was my son Jeff. His firm, Brockton & Associates, included two other CPAs and several seasonal tax accountants. They specialized in medical practices and rich physicians, so besides being his worst client, I was probably his poorest, too—a minor but meaningful