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backgrounds. After the robbery, Wriggles had commandeered the convenience store clerk’s vehicle when his own car had stalled in the parking lot. He then stopped at the McDonald’s on Ponce for a cheeseburger, the very McDonald’s that happens to be one block from the cop shop. Just so happened three of Atlanta’s Finest came in for lunch. Wriggles didn’t get halfway through his Big Mac before he was arrested. Given his weapon of choice and becausehe had no priors, the judge set bail. Tyrone had guaranteed it. Wriggles didn’t show up for court. There was no known address.
    “Is this all you’ve got?”
    “Is that all? Oh come on, Keye. I saved this for my best tracker.”
    I took the box of Krispy Kremes from the front seat and handed them over.
    “Thanks.” He opened the box. “There’s only eight. Dang, girl. You gonna have a huge booty.” He tore one in half and stuffed it in his mouth, licked the sugar off his fingers. “Your eye is twitching. You know that, right?” He shoved the other half in his mouth with no apparent concern for the size of his own booty. “It’s kind of creeping me out.”
    I got in my car and slammed the door.
    “What?” he yelled, as I pulled out of the metered space. “Hey, wait.
    What’d I say?”
    T he door slammed behind me when I walked back into my office. I went to my desk, wished yet again I had walls instead of a big wire fence. Neil spun around in his overpriced desk chair and squinted at me. “Anything I can do?”
    Most days, I am at peace with where my life is now. I’m sober. I’m making a living. I’m in love. I own my own business. I’ve been luckier than most in this economy. But sometimes there’s a big hole where meaningful work used to be. I needed to buck up and take it like a man. There are consequences for actions. I torched my career, drank it away. I thought about Miki, about her awards, her soaring success. It never seemed to matter how much she drank or how many drugs she played with or how many times it had interrupted her work. She was so wildly talented, she was always welcomed back. I loved my cousin. I wanted the best for her. I wanted to celebrate her accomplishments … deep down. But some days, it was a very bitter pill to swallow.
    “Where are you on Miki’s boyfriends?” I asked Neil, and logged in to one of the programs we use to assist us in skip traces. I started a search for Steven T. Wriggles, Tyrone’s bail jumper, the mucus guy. A dispossessory had been filed a couple of months back and he’d been evicted from an apartment off Briarcliff Road, his last known address.I located his mother, jotted down her address and anything else that might lead to Wriggles, including a first cousin.
    “As far as I can tell so far, it would have only worked logistically for one of them. The country singer, Cash Tilison. He has a house up near the lake.”
    “The Lake” is what Atlantans call Lake Lanier. Not only is it the main source of water for the metro area and a major recreation area, it’s where the well-off build waterfront homes and dock their boats.
    “He made an appearance at the children’s hospital yesterday. Fund-raiser from six to eight. He would have had plenty of time to get to Miki’s before she came home.”
    “He also fits the body type for the guy in the window,” I said. “Hey, I’m sending you info on a guy named Wriggles. See if you can dig up a current address before I have to go knocking on his mother’s door.”
    I called to check on Miki. Voice mail. I paid a few bills and pulled up the receivables program. Billing. It was mind-numbing. But a necessary evil. I worked for a few minutes, tried Miki again. No answer. Maybe she was still sleeping. Maybe she slept all day and partied all night. I had no idea about her routines. I knew one thing: I was dreading going home to another confrontation.
    “Bingo,” Neil said, and spun around, smiling at me. “He wrote a check for eight hundred and