Night Prey

TV3."

"When the fuck did the TV start running our investigations?" Lucas asked.

"Jesus, Lucas-we're entertainment now. We're cheap film footage. We sell deodorant and get votes. Or lose votes. It's all a big loop; I've been told you were the first guy to realize that."

"Christ, it wasn't like this," Lucas said. "It was more like one hand washing the other. Now it's…"

"Entertainment for the unwashed."

As Lucas walked out the door, Roux called, "Lucas. Hey-don't kill this old guy, huh? When you talk to him?"

They took a company car, all three of them, Greave sprawled in the back.

"Let me do the TV interview," he suggested to Lucas. "I did them all the time when I was Officer Friendly. I'm good at that shit. I got the right suits."

" Youwere Officer Friendly?" Connell snorted, looking over the seat at him. Then, "You know, it fits."

She said it as an insult. Lucas glanced at her and almost said something, but Greave was rambling on. "Really? I thought so. Go into all those classrooms, tell all the little boys that they'd grow up to be firemen and policemen, all the little girls that they'd be housewives and hookers."

Lucas, moderately surprised, shut his mouth and looked straight out over the wheel, and Connell said, "Fuck you, Greave."

Greave, still cheerful, said, "Say, did I tell you about the deaf people?"

"Huh?"

"Some deaf people went into the St. Paul cops. They saw the thing on TV, you know, that Connell fed them? They think they saw the guy at the bookstore the night Wannemaker was taken off. Bearded guy with a truck. They even got part of his license tag."

Connell turned to look over the seat. "Why didn't you say something?"

"Unfortunately, they didn't get any numbers. Only the letters."

"Well, that'd get it down to a thousand-"

"Uh-uh," Greave said. "The letters they got were ASS."