A decision on whether to arrest Joey Silva is above my pay grade.

It’s above Nate’s and my pay grades combined, even if you throw in Jessie’s salary and the money I made for those ridiculous paid talks I gave before I got back on the force.

There are two people who would have to be convinced to make such an arrest; first Captain Bradley, and then the prosecutor. Both would have to sign on. If we can get Bradley to back off, then the prosecutor will never even get to participate in the decision. But Bradley is going to be very difficult to persuade; it’s rarely in a police captain’s interest to decline to arrest a mob boss when the evidence is there.

Nate and I are waiting in Bradley’s office when he arrives at 8:00 A.M. Nate called him last night at home, updated him on recent events, and they arranged the meeting.

We start by playing the tape of the phone call from Lewinsky. As I listen to it again, I try and picture someone standing in the room, holding a gun on him as he talks. I still think I’m right about the circumstances, but I can’t be 100 percent sure.

Once the tape is concluded, Bradley says, “We got Silva. This is enough to charge him.”

We could let it go at that, and not tell Bradley what we think. He’ll take it to the prosecutor, the decision will be made, and that will be that. No one could ever look back on this and say we did the wrong thing by making the arrest.

I don’t know if I had a conscience in the past and have forgotten about it, but I have one now, and it’s causing me to tell Bradley the truth.

“I think it’s bogus,” I say. “I think Lewinsky said what he said under duress.”

Nate adds, “Major, serious duress.”

“Why?” Bradley asks, and we tell him. We describe all the circumstances that make us believe that Lewinsky was saying exactly what he was told to say.

Bradley seems less than impressed. “You’re advancing a theory, and this tape is a fact,” he says, and he’s right about that. “You’re saying we let Joey Silva walk on a theory?”

I nod. “I’m saying we let Joey Silva walk, for the time being, based on our instincts and experience.”

“Experience? You can’t remember what you had for breakfast. You wouldn’t know your experience if it walked into this room and bit you on the ass.”

I decide not to punch him in the face for bringing that up; maybe I am maturing after all. “You put Joey away, and you’re playing into their hands. We’ve been—I’ve been—playing into their hands since the day Shawn showed me the damn scrapbook.”

He thinks for a few moments, not wanting to move quickly and do something stupid. “Okay. Tell me what you think is going on.”

I nod. “Look, there are two possibilities here; Lewinsky was either telling the truth in that call, or he was being coerced into lying. I don’t think he was telling the truth, but if he was, then we can arrest Silva whenever we want and hopefully put him away for years.

“Silva’s not a flight risk; we always know where he is, and we can get him at our convenience.

“But let’s say that Lewinsky was lying. Then two things can happen. One is that we figure out what the hell is going on and we get the real killer. The other is that we don’t. But I think we have a better chance if we don’t arrest Silva.”

“Why?” Bradley asks.

“Because it shakes things up, and whoever is calling these shots gets thrown off their stride. They want to put Silva away, to get him out of the way, and they’ll have to figure out another way to do it. Maybe we can watch and maybe intervene, but we can find out who benefits by him being put away, other than society.

“The way I figure it, it’s one of two people. One is Salvatore Tartaro. First his guy Shawn’s head wound up in the park, then Tony Silva’s landed on a Dumpster. Now Silva gets set up to take the fall on this Lewinsky murder, and Tartaro goes underground, we don’t know where.”

“Maybe Tartaro is making sure he stays in a safe place until Silva is put away and peace breaks out. Or maybe Silva has already hit him; we won’t know until we know. But Tartaro might stand to gain from Silva taking the fall.”

“And the other possibility is Philly DeSimone?” Bradley asks.

“Exactly. It’s no wonder they made you captain.”

“Be careful,” Bradley warns. “You may not remember what a prick I can be.”

I nod. “Thanks for the reminder. But yes, Philly DeSimone. He’s the number three man. Number two got his head chopped off, and now number one may go to prison. It’s all working out pretty well for old Philly.”

Nate asks, “With Lewinsky gone, the Silva family no longer has someone to get them the drugs. How does Philly gain by that?”

“Maybe he thinks it’s done anyway. We’re all over them, and we were all over Lewinsky.”

“And the sixteenth?” Bradley asks.

“Unfortunately, that’s where I run out of ideas. But I think we may have been making a mistake connecting whatever that is about with the drug dealing from the hospital supply. We connected the two because there is a Vegas connection to both, but maybe it’s just an example of Tartaro and Silva working on two separate things.”

“Okay,” Bradley says. “You’ve convinced me. But I’ve got to share this with the chief.”

“Will he overrule you?” Nate asks.

Bradley shakes his head. “He’s better at complaining after the fact than making proactive decisions.”

“What about Wiggins and the Feds?” I ask.

“I have to tell them about this, but Silva is our jurisdiction, not theirs.”

“So we do nothing?” I ask.

Bradley stands up and nods. “So we do nothing.”

I nod. “Good move.”