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said. “I’ll get a cab and be there in twenty.”
    Wally stepped out of the taxi at the corner of 41 st Street and Dyer, finding the entrance to Harmony House mostly dark. The front door was locked, but through the all-glass doors she could see a security guard sitting at a desk inside the lobby—a middle-aged Hispanic man with the arms and chest of a power lifter, his muscles bulging underneath his black polo shirt. The man must have been expecting her because he buzzed Wally in before she even had a chance to ring the bell.
    Before pushing through the door, Wally hesitated—she had the strange feeling that she was being watched. Quickly scanning the street, she clocked a large sedan parked across the intersection at Tenth Avenue, a streetlamp throwing just enough light down to reveal two men sitting in the front seat. The car was similar to an NYPD detective unit, but her time on the street had left Wally with pretty good instincts; the two men didn’t vibe like cops. So who were they and why were they staking out Harmony House at three in the morning?
    With these questions still nagging her, Wally entered the lobby to find Candace Chen waiting for her there.
    â€œGood to see you, Wally,” Candace said with her usual buoyant smile, which now seemed kind of macabre given the circumstances.
    Really? Wally thought to herself. She’s perky even now? It was the middle of the night, and Candace had been sitting up for hours with a drugged-out assault victim. What did it take to bum this woman out?
    â€œGood to see you too, Candace. He’s still here?”
    Candace nodded. “He’s in with our nurse.”
    They walked down the main hall and into the infirmary, where Kyle was stretched out on the exam table. He had an IV drip attached to the back of his left hand and an empty plastic barf tray resting on his chest. Wally leaned over him to find that his face was severely swollen and bruised, with a couple of open gashes that the nurse had closed with butterfly bandages.
    â€œHi, Kyle.”
    At the sight of her he turned his head away, looking pained.
    â€œWhat the fuck are you doing here?” His voice was a little slurred. Whatever drugs were in his system hadn’t yet been cleared. “Go away.  . . . ”
    â€œWhat did you take?” she asked him.
    â€œI didn’t take anything,” he practically spat the words at her. “I bought some weed from these guys near the Port Authority and we smoked it together.”
    Wally looked to the nurse for confirmation and she shook her head “no.”
    â€œMaybe you got more in the weed than you bargained for,” Wally said. “It was the dealers who put this beating on you?”
    â€œNo! They weren’t dealers; they were just guys. And then I started feeling sick and they brought me here.”
    â€œThen who hit you?”
    â€œThe cuts and bruises are at least twelve hours old, I’d say,” the nurse said.
    Kyle kept his face turned away, neither confirming nor denying what the nurse had said. Wally turned to Candace.
    â€œCould I have a minute with Kyle?”
    â€œTake your time,” Candace said. She and the nurse exited the room, leaving Wally and Kyle alone.
    â€œYou went home to your father?” Wally asked. “That’s how this happened?”
    Again, no answer.
    â€œOkay.” She needed to try a different tack, and the memory of the two security types in the car outside Harmony House returned to her. “What you said before—when you first came to see us. That you knew things about your father. Things he’d done?”
    Kyle looked Wally in the eyes now.
    â€œThen tell me this: your father—you never told me his name . . . ?” Kyle remained silent, still turned away from her, refusing to answer. “Whatever. If he thought he couldn’t trust you, how far would he go to prevent you from blowing up his