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joined her friends in the Old Red Barn and, as morbid as the notion was, he was rather glad that she'd avoided being a part of the whole big media sideshow. Her death might have been prevented—as, he was sure, the other twenty-two might have—had her problems been dealt with in a more supportive and loving fashion by her family. He wasn't blaming his parents; he knew he could have done more, too.
    The loss of his sister had not been brought about by rock lyrics, not even by drugs or a man and woman named John and Dara. It had been brought about by ignorance.
    J.R. turned away from the dark thoughts of his sister and tried to feel confident about facing those kids on Tuesday and the days to come. His eyes locked on one of the fat dark clouds in the sky as he stared out the window. Its puffy underside glowed with reflected neon. He frowned and stepped toward the window, watching the cloud slowly ooze across the sky. He hadn't been paying much attention, but he could have sworn that, just a moment ago, the cloud had been holding perfectly still, like a painted cloud on a stage backdrop.
    It was moving now, though, along with the others, moving at the speed of pouring honey.
    J.R. took a few steps back, leaned on the counter, and took another drink of beer, frowning out the window, but not sure why.
    His small apartment suddenly seemed rather cold….

Six

    Mrs. DiPesto was already hurrying down the walk in front of her house on Whitley Drive as the squad car parked at the curb. Officer Bill Grady saw her first as he got out from behind the wheel and shut the door.
    She was plowing toward them, her hips wider than the narrow path, her large, sagging breasts dancing beneath her green terrycloth robe. Curls of gray hair stuck out from beneath the black spider-weblike net she wore on her head, and one liver-spotted hand was pressed just below her throat.
    "What took you so long?" she panted. She wore big, round, thick-lensed glasses that had slid down her nose. "He coulda come back and raped me in the time it took you guys to get here!"
    "We got here as fast as we could, ma'am," Grady said, lifting a calming palm and giving her a reassuring smile. His partner, Harvey Towne, stepped up beside him.
    Grady was fifty-three years old, a tall, barrel-chested man with thick hair the color of desert sand. He planned to retire next year; he'd had enough, thank you very much. The last of his four daughters had graduated from college. All four of them had pretty much paid their own way through school, leaving Grady and his wife Marge a good-sized nest egg. They hoped to use that to find a place in Monterey.
    "You are Clara DiPesto, aren't you?" Grady asked.
    "Of course I am." She smelled of stale cigarette smoke and gin.
    Towne flipped open his notepad and held his pencil, ready to write.
    "You say you have a burglar, ma'am?" Towne asked, his voice mechanical and emotionless.
    Sounds like one of those clowns on Dragnet, Grady thought, wanting to chuckle. Towne was a rookie and had been assigned to him a little over a week ago.
    "Had," Mrs. DiPesto snapped. "He's long gone by now. I caught him on my back porch trying to break in."
    "Can you give us a description?" Grady asked.
    "Well…"
    "Try."
    "Umm, let's seeee, he was young," she said, closing her eyes to remember. "A kid, maybe sixteen. Had long hair, of course, dark brown, maybe, but it was hard to tell. And he was wearing one of those T-shirts—it was black—with the sleeves cut off? Torn off, more, like it," she added, opening her eyes. "I don't understand why they do that. It looks so sloppy."
    Grady patted Towne's arm with the back of his hand and said, "I'll go take a look around."
    He went to the car, got his long black flashlight, then walked between Mrs. DiPesto's house and her neighbor's to the alley that ran behind them. He shone the light first to the right, toward Ventura Boulevard, then to the left, and decided to go that way.
    Grady was in no mood for someone like Mrs.