Alice picked up an aluminum sheet and slipped it into the vice, her reflection blurred by the metal’s patina. She looked Japanese, like her mother, but was as much a product of New York’s genetic blender as ancestral lineage. She’d been cute for a cop, but back in reality was just another girl in a city where looks were cheap and the years grew hard. Leaning forward, elbow to the metal, Alice pushed down to fold the plate into a long L .