Detective

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At 10:35 P.M. on January 27, Malcolm Ainslie was halfway to the outer door of Homicide when a phone rang behind him. Instinctively he paused to look back. Later, he wished he hadn't.

Detective Jorge Rodriguez moved swiftly to an empty desk, where he picked up a phone, listened briefly, then called to Ainslie. "For you, Sergeant."

Ainslie set down a book he had been carrying and returned to his own desk to take the call. His movements were ordered and easy. At forty-one, Detective-Sergeant Ainslie was solidly built, a half-inch short of six feet and not too different in appearance from his days as a high school fullback. Only a slight belly bespoke the junk food he often ate a staple for many detectives, obliged to eat on the run.

Tonight, on the fifth floor of the main Miami Police Department building, the Homicide offices were quiet. In all, seven investigative teams worked here, each team consisting of a sergeant supervisor and three detectives. But the members of tonight's duty team were now all out, probing into a trio of separate murders reported in the past few hours. In Miami, Florida, the pace of human mayhem seldom slackened.

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