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laughing and yelling. Instead of trying to get the plate, like the trained law enforcement professional I was, I went another route. I hauled back and threw the bat as hard as I could at the car’s taillights. It clinked across the empty asphalt as they rounded the corner.
    I ran to the corner, but there was no sign of them. They’d gotten away. I was absolutely wide awake as I stood there in the dark. My adrenaline was definitely pumping. I didn’t care how old Flaherty was. No one messes with my kids. I really felt like killing someone.
    Brian came up behind me as I was retrieving the bat.
    “Was that the Flaherty kid, Dad?” he said. “Had to be, right?”
    “I didn’t see any faces, but it’s a pretty safe assumption,” I said.
    “I asked around about him, Dad. They say he’s bad news. Actually, his whole family is crazy. He has five brothers, each one badder than the next. They even have a pit bull. Someone said they’re Westies, Dad.”
    I thought about that. The Westies were what was left of the Irish mafia, latent thugs and gangsters who still ransome rackets on the West Side of Manhattan. One of their signature moves was dismembering bodies. And we’d apparently just gotten into a feud with them?
    Brian looked at me, worried.
    I put an arm around his shoulders.
    “Look at me, Brian,” I said, indicating my lack of attire. “Do I look sane to you? In the meantime, try to stay away from them. I’ll take care of it.”
    I wasn’t sure how, but I kept that to myself.
    Everyone, and I mean everyone, was awake and on the porch as we came back.
    Some joker from the cottage across the street gave a cat-calling whistle out the window at my shirtless bod as I stepped up the stairs.
    “Daddy, get in here!” Chrissy commanded. “You can’t walk around in just your underpants.”
    “You’re right, Chrissy,” I said, actually managing a smile. “Daddy forgot.”

Chapter 10
    I LEFT FOR WORK early the next morning. Which, if you’re vacationing in the ass end of Queens and want to avoid the traffic back into the city, means being in the car by a bleary-eyed five thirty.
    I hadn’t gotten much sleep thanks to the late-night cinder-block delivery from the Breezy Point welcoming committee. My guys were pretty shaken up, and though I didn’t want to admit it, so was I. The kid Flaherty really did seem kind of crazy, and I, more than most, knew what crazy people were capable of.
    After the incident, I had called the local One Hundredth Precinct, or the 1-0-0 in cop parlance, who’d sent over a radio car about half an hour later. We’d filled out a report, but from the shift commander’s ho-hum expression, I didn’t get the impression that finding the culprits was too high on his night’s priority list. So much for professional courtesy. The best we could do was have a guycome fix the window later today and hope that was the end of it.
    I checked my BlackBerry in the driveway before leaving and learned that the morning’s case meeting locale had been changed from NYPD’s One Police Plaza headquarters to the fancy new NYPD Counterterrorism Bureau on the Brooklyn/Queens border. Though I was glad I didn’t have to drive as far, I didn’t like how quickly the case was escalating. My dwindling hopes of salvaging the remainder of my vacation seemed to be diminishing at an increasingly rapid clip.
    As I was coming in, Miriam suggested we meet for breakfast at a diner near the Counterterrorism HQ beforehand to get on the same page. I arrived first and scored us a window booth overlooking an expansive junkyard vista.
    A muted Channel Two news story about the bomb threat was playing on the TV behind the counter. An overhead shot of the cop-covered public library was followed by another one of a pretty female reporter standing by a police barricade.
    A truck driver in the adjacent booth glared at me as I loudly groaned into my white porcelain cup. I knew this was coming. Media heat meant heat on the mayor,