"So, Sam doesn't give you girls any sort of allowance?" Tommy felt awkward at the question the moment he asked it. He shouldn't put himself in the position of second-guessing Sam and Christy Sue.

But what's the point in being an uncle if you can't spoil your nieces? an evil voice whispered in his ear.

"Nah," said Lydia. "But if we need money, we just ask him. He never says no."

They'd just left a Mexican restaurant in Printers Row, where they'd had a late lunch. The two already had spent several hours together, and Lydia was noticeably more comfortable with him.

The restaurant was no random choice. They slowly were following the backtrail of the man Lydia had assaulted the day before. In the wee hours, Tommy had gone to the hospital in which the man, Louis 'Jake' Fleener, was still a patient and had gotten a whiff of him and a brief glimpse of the man's battered face.

As they'd moved through the city, following the man's scent, Tommy had engaged people in conversation at places he was confident Fleener had stopped. Few so far had remembered him, and none of those had found him in any way remarkable. The man had talked little and was a gin drinker.

As they'd made their way, casual to all outward appearances, Tommy had taken the opportunity to show Lydia the ins-and-outs of getting by in the city, everything from reading the bus schedule to how to spot and protect against pickpockets.

Earlier in the day, he'd stopped and bought her and Celia each a smart phone, so neither again would be out of touch, and so that Lydia could plot the day's course. The young woman was the day's navigator (it was yet another lesson), whose duty it was to keep track of where they were and what lay ahead of them.

He now pulled out a thick fold of money and slid it to her, palm down. "Keep that out of sight and don't spend it all in one place." Her eyes went wide, but before she could speak, he added, "That's just a little walking-around money. Keep it for odds and ends or for emergencies. Remember, always have money with you, always have your phone ...."

"And always be conscious of where you are," Lydia finished, repeating to him the first lesson of the day.

"Those are good rules for anywhere, especially the city."

"And I shouldn't have gone after that guy the other day," she volunteered. "I should've followed him ... or called Sam."

"We learn best from our mistakes," Tommy said in a light voice. As they walked, he pondered the patterns of Fleener's movements, and something unrelated occurred to him. "You wanted to kill him, didn't you?"

It wasn't a question a normal person would ask of one so young, but Lydia no longer lived in a child's world, hadn't done so for years.

"Yeah. I wanted to really bad."

"Why didn't you?"

"Because I worried about what Sam would think of me if I did," she replied simply.

"That's a good impulse. I think about that a lot, too."

He stopped again and looked around.

"This jackass stopped at three places that I'm sure of, and all were bars except for the place we just ate ...."

"And they sold beer," she piped in.

"Yes, they did," he thought aloud. "Did he smell like a distillery when you caught up to him?"

Lydia nodded while slightly curling her nose.

"It was Saturday," said Tommy. "He was bar hoping ... and it looks like he was coming from the west." He hated breaking his word to Rhonda, but ..., "let's you and me go on a pub crawl, kid."

They continued to follow Fleener's backtrail, which took them to a series of bars, pubs, and taverns westward out of the Loop. Once past I-90, the trail continued, but the number of drinking establishments evaporated. Lydia, after consulting the map on her phone, suggested they hop on a bus to take them to the next cluster of bars and restaurants a mile or more west.

Once aboard, they spent their time playfully elbowing one another back-and-forth across the seat.

Anyone seeing Lydia on the bus wouldn't have known her for the young woman who'd run amok in the city the day before. Tommy had stopped for a spot of shopping that morning, and with Philly's help, the young woman next to him was, for the first time, dressed and coifed like a young woman. Her wild mane was tamed and off her shoulders, her face had an imperceptible touch of makeup, and she was clad in sandals, stylish jeans, and a light peasant blouse. He even had thought to obtain sturdy athletic togs for her to wear beneath her cloths, on the off-chance she might again need to bolt.

After the briefest of bus trips, Tommy and his chic young partner again emerged into the July heat. The first thing visible as they got off the bus was a cherry red '69 Mustang. Several other vintage cars were parked up and down the street.

The nearest bar to the bus stop was the same Alhambra to which the lovely young 'Alhambra' had directed him the previous day. It was a large, two-story building with a parking lot that was vast by city standards. The lot was full of handsome automobiles, many of them classics. Taking Lydia by the hand, Tommy followed the still clear scent of Fleener to the bar's front door.

The cool and dark entryway was a refuge from the heat, and once Lydia's eyes adjusted, they took a place at the bar, which formed an island in the middle of the large central room. It was several hours past midday, and the place was busy but not crowded. Thankfully, it was not the kind of place that carded, and Lydia warily regarded the dark draught Tommy ordered for her before finally glancing at him in confusion.

"It's just a prop," he said, smiling. "You can try it if you like, but alcohol won't have too much effect on you."

The look that crossed her face after her first sip of beer reminded him of the look Sam often gave when vexed, as if she had just bitten into a sour grape.

"It grows on you."

"No, it won't," she said, pushing the pint glass a few inches aside and taking up the menu the bartender had provided. She began to peruse.

Hungry again, thought Tommy.

Watching the youngster, he was hit by a sudden and overwhelming surge of warm paternal love for her. He'd resisted that tug, even after seeing Sam's connection with the girls grow over the past year. But now, quite suddenly, as if from nowhere, his resolve crumbled as dust. Celia and Lydia were now his kin, as much as they were Sam's. The matter was completely out of his hands.

"Damn," he said, still looking at her.

She glanced up from the menu, resumed reading, and then looked up at him again. "What?" she drawled.

"Nothing."

Taking a hard survey of the room with all his senses, Tommy caught the scent of 'Alhambra'. It was quite fresh, and a moment's more searching rewarded him with a view of the lovely young woman through the window opposite. She was next to an older man in the parking lot, inspecting the engine compartment of what looked to be a mid-60s Lincoln.

There was nothing amiss in the room, at least nothing obvious. Fleener's scent was still fairly strong but it didn't permeate the place. The amount of time the man spent there was a mystery. Lydia ordered them some eats, so Tommy bided his time sipping his beer and hers, hoping to chat with 'Alhambra' before he departed. It might be his one chance to figure out her role in Camille's case, and there was always the chance she might know something of Fleener.

He looked up to see 'Alhambra' had entered the room, quickly taking up a place opposite where he and Lydia sat at the bar. Their eyes met.

"I never understood the attraction of the suicide door," he called to her casually.

The lovely young woman pursed her lips, as if trying to avoid a smile, but her eyes gave away her amusement. "You know, I said the same thing, once. If it was so damn great, it would have caught on." She finally allowed herself to smile. "What are you doing here, Tommy?"

"My friend Alhambra recommended it."

"Paloma," she corrected. Rising, the young woman walked around the bar to where he and Lydia sat and took his hand warmly. "Paloma Zielinski. Sorry about busting your chops yesterday."

To his surprise, Lydia turned and greeted Paloma with a toothy smile and an extended hand. She usually was content to allow Celia to talk for them both—one might have thought her mute in her sister's presence—but over the day, she'd become increasingly voluble.

"I'm Lydia," she said. "Pleased to meet you, and you can bust his chops all you want. It's sort of a family tradition."

"Your brother?" she asked.

"No, my uncle," she said in shocked amusement and added with a mischievous smile, "my bastard uncle from Arkansas."

Tommy nearly exploded, sensing Sam's humor behind Lydia's depiction.

Paloma's mouth flew open. "Oh, hon," she said to Lydia, "you definitely won the genetic lottery in your family."

Lydia's smile grew even wider. Few would consider her pretty, but she had that intense physicality and a warm and broad grin that both men and women found attractive. He noticed Paloma give her a quick look up and down as she'd done him the day before.

"And you," she said, turning to Tommy, "aren't you just a tad young to have a twenty-year-old niece."

"Arkansas," he said with a shrug.

As the three continued to chat, mostly about cars, Tommy noticed the frequency with which people in the bar greeted or looked to Paloma. He first thought her a regular, and then something dawned on him.

"Do you work here?" he asked her.

"No ... not really," she replied with a hint of hesitation. "My brother is a part owner, so I spend a lot of time here." The awkwardness in her reply convinced him it was no accident she'd referred him to a bar where the two again might meet. "It was sort of Cesar's love-child, this place," she said, referring presumably to her brother. She went on the tell them how her brother, and their father before him, had stirred her love of cars.

Before he could steer the conversation in the direction of Fleener, he caught something in Lydia's posture. Glancing to her, he saw her nervous eyes on him before they then flicked over his right shoulder.

While still listening to Paloma, who somehow had turned the conversation to the virtues of speed shifting, Tommy saw from the corner of his eye a tall man in a light jacket and ball cap. The man had short hair and a thick beard, as well as the hard features and erect carriage of a soldier. Tommy glanced back to Lydia with a nearly imperceptible nod and resumed listening to Paloma.

Their food soon came, and Paloma announced she had a few things to do in the back. The young woman seemed slightly gawky as she departed, but she did so with another warm smile and handshake to both he and Lydia. The tough girl, it seemed, had a gift for being gracious.

When he and Lydia turned to the bar to eat, the man Lydia had pointed out passed immediately behind them, two companions in his wake. Each had that look about him that screamed soldier. Tommy caught their scent sufficiently to follow them but heard no conversation from the men, either in Alhambra or out on the street after they'd left the building.

While casting about, he could hear Paloma speaking with a tall, attractive woman of about the same age near the back of the room. He opted not to eavesdrop, but glancing in her direction he did catch her gaze one last time. For reasons he could only guess, she blushed and smiled bashfully before disappearing into the back room.

Beyond her mild flirtations, there was something going on in this place, but he wasn't sure what it was.

Lydia was swinging her knife and fork like a professional, totally caught up in her meal. She paused and looked over at him, suddenly smiling and confident. "So, what are we doing?"

"We're gonna finish dinner, pay the bill, and do what we've been doing all day. Except, now, we have a new target. That was another bloke from The Range?" he asked quietly.

She nodded. "I don't know his name, though."

"Did you recognize the two with him?"

She shook her head.

"You might have a future in the spy business," he whispered to her delight.

Forty minutes later, they were walking west again. Before they'd departed Alhambra, Tommy had taken a quick picture of Lydia, smiling and holding a pint of dark in front of her, and sent it to Rhonda. He knew the scolding that would come when his gal found out how he'd spent the day—she always found out—and thought he would at least try to milk it for a laugh. It was sometimes difficult to beat Rhonda to the punch, but he thought he should try.

The heat of the day had abated noticeably, but neither of them would have been taxed by the effort had it not. The weather did prompt him to ponder why the man Lydia pointed out in the bar wore a jacket. When he did, he remembered the man had given off a faint smell of oil and gunpowder. The scent wasn't strong—it may have been from the man's earlier handling a firearm—but like as not, he wore the jacket to conceal a gun.

They walked less than two blocks before turning south. The trail they followed doglegged several times. After thirty minutes, they rounded a corner onto a street that Tommy recognized. A block ahead was the building that he and Sam had watched the day before, the same place where he had first encountered Paloma. The scent of their new quarry stopped near the building, as did the faint scent of Fleener, now masked by the overwhelming smell that permeated the building.

Whatever was going on with Lydia's former captors, Paloma was mixed up in it. He led Lydia to a bench a half block past the building, less to watch than to sit and gather his thoughts.

As Lydia sat beside him, she squirmed and after just a few minutes looked over at him with a look of intense curiosity. "What's a 'genetic lottery'?"