Hard Stop

FIFTEEN

I HAD TO WAIT ALMOST an hour at the coffee shop for Sullivan to show up. I killed the time reading a book Randall gave me called something like Computers for Aging Morons. The subject had come up way too often lately to ignore. The content wasn’t that challenging, but the terminology had changed a lot in the last ten years. At least it was a decent distraction from all the noisy coffee drinkers.

Randall’s book made me feel like a monk leafing through the Kama Sutra. “You can do that?” I kept asking myself, in amazement.

“Welcome to the twenty-first century,” said Sullivan, dropping down into the seat across the table.

“I could’ve used one of these back in the day,” I said, holding up the book. “Would’ve saved a lot of time.”

Sullivan scoffed.

“The more of this shit people have, the less time they got.”

“The law of unintended consequences.”

“Oh, it’s intended all right. Get everybody strung out on something that costs you more every year. Worse’n crack.”

I slapped the book shut.

“Whew,” I said. “That was close.”

He pointed at my coffee.

“Is that the cup?”

“It’s in the truck.”

I got up from the table, forcing him to follow. We scooped up Eddie and found the pickup.

“While I got you in a good mood,” I said, after giving him the cup, “I’m hoping you can let Honest Boy Ackerman back into town.”

The storm clouds behind his eyes darkened another shade.

“That chump.”

I told him about the encounter up island and the subsequent conversation.

“And you believe him?” he asked.

“I don’t know. But I can’t see the harm. I don’t have to tell him anything I don’t want to.”

He just walked away, shrugging his meaty shoulders.

“Come to dinner with us,” I called to him. “At the Pequot. Seven-thirty. You and Honest Boy can catch up on old times.”

I think I heard him say something like, “Yeah, maybe. We’ll see,” but I wasn’t sure. Though I felt a gentle stir in the vibe currents left in his wake, telling me to secure a big enough table for the three of us and the inevitable incursions of the proprietor and his idiosyncratic daughter.

I killed the rest of the day in my shop trying to stay ahead of the projects I’d promised Frank, and had to hustle over to Sag Harbor so I wouldn’t be late to meet Ackerman for dinner. I was afraid to leave him alone with the regular Pequot clientele without an introduction.

The parking lot was full of pickups and ragged Japanese compacts, but no black SUVs. I let Eddie clear the lot of invisible antagonists, then lead the way into the restaurant. While he hit up the usual suckers for clams and French fries I grabbed a table next to the kitchen. Save Hodges a few steps.

“Did you know they flavor this stuff now? Lemon, orange, raspberry,” said Dorothy as she dropped my Absolut in front of me. “The salesman just talked my father into buying a case of each.”

“I thought you had a shotgun behind the bar.”

“That’s for mortal threats.”

“Exactly.”

I told her to bring an extra menu for a guy recently canned from the security department at my old company. She stood there waiting for me to flesh out the story, but after thinking about it, I didn’t know how.

“It’s involved,” I told her.

“It always is,” she said, taking a final half-hearted wipe at the table and going back behind the bar.

Eddie greeted Honest Boy at the door, delighted with a newfound relationship: “Cool, this guy is, like, everywhere!”

For his part, Honest Boy looked somewhere between repelled and vaguely alarmed. The Pequot often had that effect on people. Once they got to know the place, the repulsion wore off.

“I didn’t know they let dogs into restaurants,” he said as he pulled up a chair.

“Eddie rejects those artificial social barriers.”

“I thought it was the health department,” he said, looking around the joint.

“You’ll have to take that up with them.”

“Judson said you had mental problems,” said Honest Boy, half to himself, then realizing what he’d said, quickly added, “Not that I think that.”

Dorothy arrived in time to hear.

“I don’t believe you,” she said to him.

“He has to tell the truth. His name’s Honest Boy.”

Dorothy looked impressed, not an easy thing to achieve.

“Get out of here.”

“That’s the handle. Honestly,” he said, for the fourteen millionth time. She reached out to shake. He looked at her hand, taken aback by the fingerless glove that went up well past her elbow. Then he took it, tentatively.

“Glad to meet you, Honest Boy. I’m Dissembling Dorothy. Not officially. What’re you drinking?”

“She’s the official bartender,” I said.

“Any imported beers?”

Dorothy continued to look at him like he hadn’t said anything. He looked to me for help.

“From as far away as Wisconsin,” I told him.

“Sounds just right,” he said, smiling at Dorothy’s back as she strode through the double doors into the kitchen, black leotard–covered hips in full swing.

“Unusual girl,” he said.

“I think she likes you.”

“That’d be a first.”

“Keep your insecurities to yourself. She’ll smell it on you like a dog smells fear.”

“Sometimes it’s hard to imagine you ran Technical Services and Support from almost nothing to, what, a billion dollar enterprise?” said Honest Boy, eager to change the subject.

“A billion point two,” I said.

“Not that I’m criticizing. I’ve spent a lot of time with the big dicks that run Con Globe. Bunch of uptight, self-serving, humorless pricks.”

“Pricks or dicks. You have to make up your mind.”

“It’s no wonder they’re afraid of you.”

I laughed at him. It surprised both of us. I don’t laugh a lot. Not built for it.

“As the fox fears the rabbit,” I said.

He smiled broadly.

“Right. Like I said, it’s no wonder they’re afraid of you. Crazy like a fox.”

Dorothy showed up with a mug and a can of Budweiser, which she poured for Honest Boy, something I’d never seen her do before. He thanked her warmly. Before things got out of hand, Eddie intervened, whining for French fries and his regular bowl of water.

“Okay, handsome, keep your fur on,” she said to him.

“What kind of dog is this, again?” Honest Boy asked, scratching Eddie’s head.

“A Zen retriever,” said Dorothy. “Knows where the stick is going before you throw it.”

“Make a good bird dog,” said Honest Boy.

“Not if you ask the birds,” she said. “You want anything to eat? We got imported burgers and local fish. With imported tartar sauce and imported French fries.”

“Pommes frites, my mother called them,” I added. “She was French-Canadian.”

“You people obviously know what works here and what doesn’t,” he said. “You decide.”

“He wants the fish,” I said to Dorothy. She nodded, of a mind.

“I’ll take a burger,” I called to her as she headed back to the kitchen. The front door opened loudly enough to cause Honest Boy to turn around and look. A half dozen smelly crew off one of the sportfishing boats crowded through the narrow entrance, leading with their beer bellies, coats open and baseball hats turned to the back, proud of their hard-won, rugged ignorance.

No one else in the place took much notice, but I caught Honest Boy tapping his chest under his left arm.

When Dorothy came out of the kitchen they started to chant “Dot-ty, Dot-ty!” and only stopped when she told them to shut the hell up, which they did, immediately. Though not soon enough to evade the notice of Paul Hodges, who followed his daughter out of the kitchen, wiping his hands on his off-white apron, his eyes bristling with irritation.

“Goddammit, Pierre, I told you,” he yelled at the lead meatball, “you’re allowed to be drunk when you leave. Not when you come in.” Pierre looked sheepish.

“We’re not drunk, Mr. Hodges,” he said. “Jez happy from the catch today. She’z big, like the customer tips.”

Hodges looked over at me.

“I’m not responsible for every Canuck who comes into the place,” I said to him as I slid my chair around the table and grabbed Honest Boy by the throat, reaching my other hand into his sport jacket and plucking a little snub-nose out of its shoulder holster. I slid it into my jeans pocket.

“Hey.”

“House rules,” I said. “I’ll give it back when we leave.”

The boat crew settled down after Dorothy passed out drinks and took orders. Eddie sat next to their table trying to get in on the action, but she shooed him back over to us.

“Judson didn’t tell you anything, did he?” asked Honest Boy, when things finally settled down.

“He told me about the Mandate of ’53, meant to keep Con Globe independent in perpetuity. He implied that members of the board thought Donovan wanted to break the mandate. That’s pretty much it, none of which has anything to do with me.”

Honest Boy sat back, looking self-satisfied.

“I knew you’d say that,” he said.

Before I could respond Dorothy and Vinko came out with our meals. Honest Boy studied the slice of lemon sitting atop the white mass on his plate.

“So what sort of fish is this again?” he asked.

“North Sea fin tail,” said Dorothy. “Caught off Hog’s Neck, right here in Noyac Bay.”

“Really,” said Honest Boy, looking suspiciously at his plate.

“Why’d you say that?” I asked him.

“I like to know what I’m eating.”

“Why’d you say ‘I knew you’d say that’?”

“’Cause I knew you would,” he said.

“Say what?”

He took a bite of the fish and smiled approvingly.

“I’ll have to get some of this when I’m home.”

“That’d be a neat trick. Did Judson tell you something different?”

Honest Boy scoffed.

“I told you what he told me. Nothing.” He pointed his fork at me. “You can belittle me all you want, but I’m a trained investigator. I’m actually capable of finding things out on my own.”

“Okay, that’s fine. I still don’t know what the hell you’re talking about.”

Sensing a slight upper hand, Honest Boy took his time with the next mouthful of fish. I pretended I didn’t mind. Dorothy came over to ask about the food, which led to a discussion of North Sea fin tail, which Dorothy insisted was far flakier than talapia, a close relative. So it took a while to get back to the conversation.

“Marve’s convinced that you’re involved with Donovan’s plot to void the Mandate of ’53. An opinion shared by Mason Thigpen, who by the way Marve reports to, officially, not the full Board of Directors like he wants you to think. Marve says there’s no other reason why you’d go from ultimate corporate dead man to Donovan’s pet project. Why else would he hire outside counsel to examine your severance agreement?”

“I haven’t talked to anyone from TSS since I left. And I didn’t know anything about that mandate until I heard it from Marve.”

“Have you heard about the big patent settlement? Don’t insult me with a denial. Just keep the straight face. You’re good at that.”

My ex-wife used to say the same thing about me, though in less complimentary terms.

“How many people are talking about this?” I asked.

“Don’t worry, very few.”

I knew I shouldn’t be surprised that some version of the recent connection between me and Donovan had surfaced, however far-fetched. In fact, it was probably a good thing they’d jumped to conclusions. People are always more inclined to concoct a myth than bother with the facts.

“So what’s your stake in this?” I asked. “And don’t insult me by saying it’s only curiosity.”

He smiled.

“I was telling the truth. There’s a lot I still don’t know. But there’s more to it than that. If I’m right about what I do know, I know which side to be on.”

“Who said there’re sides?”

“Oh, there’re sides all right. More than two. I just want to be on the one that sees to it that Con Globe is blown to smithereens and scattered on the wind. When I got fired it struck me like a revelation from God. I hate the bastards who run that place. I have for a long time, I just didn’t know it. Including George Donovan. But if he’s going to be the agent of their destruction, he’s my friend. Him and anybody he brings in to help do the deed. And there’s nobody on the face of the earth better suited to that role than the guy I’m sitting across from right now. So here’s to you,” he said, raising his beer, “and to hell with Consolidated Global Energies.”

Honest Boy’s triumphant defiance was dampened by the timely arrival of Joe Sullivan, which also quieted down the noisy fishing crew.

He sat next me and across from Ackerman. Neither tried to shake hands. They stared at each other until Eddie stuck his nose in Sullivan’s lap, disrupting his concentration.

“Hey, Joe,” Honest Boy finally said, “long time no see.”

“Not long enough.”

Ackerman looked over at me. I shrugged.

“Wait’ll he has a beer. It mellows him right out.”

Which it did. That and the next two. And the usual distractions from the Hodges family and the general flow of the evening. Dorothy in particular made her presence felt, hanging around the table and salting the conversation with an occasional non-sequitur. After a while, Sullivan and Ackerman were chatting up a storm, like a couple of regular barflies ensnared by their own random nonsense.

As a signal that things had truly degraded, Paul Hodges brought out a tray full of shots with a bowl of lemon slices. After a lot of yelling and cracking of shot glasses on the pine tables, some civility returned, though less articulate.

By now Eddie was sound asleep with his head resting on the bar rail and Dorothy was sitting in Honest Boy’s lap, fussing with the thin remnants of hair at his temples and seeming to listen to his tales of undercover adventures in the Third World. Her father was over with the fishermen, arm-wrestling and tossing gutting knives at a knot in the pine paneling above the neon Bud sign. Sullivan eventually fell asleep, snoring a duet with Eddie, leaving me alone with a bucket of ice and a bottle of Absolut Citron, which I forced down as a favor to the local vodka distributor, an enterprise worthy of conditional support.

This is how I left them. I had to roust Eddie with a gentle nudge of my boot. He stood up, shook out his coat, and followed without complaint. Outside it was cool and clear. The moon was struggling up from the horizon, a bloated red and nearly round. I watched Eddie lope across the parking lot, stopping to pee on the oversized tires of Ackerman’s SUV, and then over to the Grand Prix.

I let him in the car and headed back to Oak Point. As we negotiated the hilly curves of Noyac Road on the way home from Sag Harbor a set of headlights came up fast from behind and filled the rearview mirror. My first thought was Ackerman, but the lights were too low to the ground to be an SUV. I rarely pushed the big old car much past the speed limit whenever curves were involved, often frustrating the carloads of overachievers pouring in from East Hampton and Sag Harbor on the way back to the City. So I could hardly blame the tailgaters. I kicked it up a little, but then the car behind me tucked up even closer, until the headlights nearly disappeared under the Pontiac’s massive trunk.

Since that was all the thanks I got, I dropped back to the speed limit. He could sit there and stew until I turned off, or take his chances passing around a curve, which is all there was on Noyac Road.

He backed off a little, then pulled in close again, even closer than before. I sighed. Intimidation of any kind never sat that well with me, though lately I’d been striving mightily to control how I handled it. With calm forbearance. Maturity and reserve. An almost pacifistic turning of the other cheek. This is how I strove, not always successfully.

I waited until we hit a short straight patch of road and yanked the steering wheel to the left, putting the Grand Prix into the empty oncoming lane. Then I slammed on the brakes. The car behind shot by on the right. It was a new Mustang, black, the color of choice among automotive intimidators. I pulled the Grand Prix back into the proper lane and fought another little battle with myself.

When I was younger I’d be inclined to bring the four-mile-long nose of the Grand Prix up to about two inches off the Mustang’s rear bumper and keep it there all the way to the guy’s house, where I’d either let him slink back into his real life as a frustrated, ineffectual asshole or wait for him to get out of the car so I could stick my fist down his throat.

But I was older now, more mature. I regretted a lot of things I’d done, however satisfying they might have seemed at the time. I understood now I’d been merely acting out of my own sense of offended righteousness, that my anger wasn’t actually directed at the apparent object of antagonism, but rather an expression of my manifold disappointments and thwarted expectations.

While I was congratulating myself for evolving to a higher level of self-awareness, the Mustang driver stood on his brakes and slammed a hard left, gunning the rear wheels into an impressive power spin that had him flying past me in the opposite direction before I half realized what he was doing.

That’s when I thought this might not be an ordinary asshole. And probably not that ineffectual.

“Aw, shit,” I said out loud. I gripped Eddie’s collar and pushed him down into the foot well of the front passenger seat, downshifted into second and stuck the accelerator to the floor. The ten-ton hunk of Detroit iron leaped forward like a cat, the nearly bottomless torque suddenly awake and engaged.

I didn’t know the handling characteristics of the new Mustang, but I guessed they were better than what I had available. The Grand Prix wasn’t what you’d call a European touring car. All it knew how to do was accelerate rapidly in a straight line. I figured it would take a few seconds for the Mustang to pull another 180 to get back in pursuit. So I tightened my grip on the ugly plastic steering wheel and held on hard as I experimented with the limits of the big car’s suspension system.

I’d done what I could with beefy after-market shocks and modern tires, though you can’t do much about the ballistic energy of all that unbalanced weight being flung through hairpin turns.

I was mostly worried about Eddie. I hoped he didn’t think this was a cool new game and jump back on the seat to take it all in. As I held a death grip on the steering wheel I reached through the centrifugal force to stroke his head and ask him to stay where he was like a good boy.

The Mustang was back on my rear bumper in less than five minutes. I could hear the throaty roar of the fuel-injected V8 above the wind noise, and the solid scream of tires over macadam, sticky and secure to the road.

Then I heard a strange little metallic pop, and saw a spider web blossom across my windshield. At first I thought, great, what a time to get hit by a rock. But when the second web opened up I knew what it was.

I hung the next right, hurtling down a primitive sand road toward the Little Peconic Bay. I knew the neighborhood well, having jogged through there a hundred times in the last few years. The Mustang was still hard on my tail, but he was holding his fire. The headlights bouncing in my rearview told why—the closer we got to the bay the more the road resembled an amusement park ride. I tightened my seat belt, slouched as low as I could into the leather-covered bucket seat and fought to control the steering wheel.

Somehow I started to open up some air between me and the Mustang. Though sprung like a drunken goose, the sheer mass of the old Pontiac held it closer to the earth than the new Mustang. As long as the struts, springs and tie-rod ends could withstand the punishment. To say nothing of the driver.

The curves were getting tighter, and as the gap opened up I could see the chaotic dance of the Mustang’s headlights lighting up the woods. It gave me an idea.

After careening like a psychotic porpoise through a particularly tight turn, I shut off the lights, eased up on the accelerator, jammed the transmission into first and stepped hard on the emergency break. The rear wheels locked up, sending the front end into a barely controllable frenzy, which actually helped to slow and eventually stop the big car. I checked again to make sure Eddie was wedged down in the passenger seat foot well, banged the shifter into reverse and floored it.

The concussion knocked the breath out of me, as if a fist the size of a Volkswagen had hit me in the back. Or more like a new Ford Mustang as it exploded into the vast, heavy-metal trunk of the Grand Prix.

The sound was more startling than the impact—a subterranean thud mixed with the wet spray of glass and the scream of rending sheet metal.

It was a jarring moment for me and Eddie, but a lot worse for the guys in the Mustang.

From the crouched position I took before the crash I reached for Eddie, feeling around for injuries. His ears were back, and when he jumped up on the seat his tail was down, but otherwise he seemed okay. He barked out a single, emphatic bark, which I knew meant, “What the fuck was that about?”

I dug a small flashlight out of the glove compartment and pushed open my door, shutting it quickly behind me to keep Eddie in the car. I stayed low and tried to adjust my eyes to the darkness—the Mustang’s headlights having followed the rest of the front end into oblivion. Its windshield was also blown out, so I could clearly see the driver sitting behind the wheel. His head was resting on the top of the deflating airbag, his face hidden behind a mask of blood. Another guy was more out than in, his body flopped across the mangled hood, twisted into a shape that could only be comfortable if you were past feeling it.

Panning around with the flashlight, I saw an automatic nestled in the accordion folds of the Grand Prix’s freshly compressed trunk. I picked up a stick, slipped it in the barrel and plucked it free of the mangled metal. I dropped it into my jacket pocket and went to take a closer look at the driver.

My entire rib cage, front to back, felt worked over, but the adrenaline kept me alert. I opened the door of the Mustang and shot the flashlight in the driver’s face. His eyes blinked open.

While I kept him in the light, I fumbled around my jacket for the cell phone to call 911. I told the dispatcher to call Joe Sullivan, who was probably only halfway to Hampton Bays by then. I could only give a rough description of the location, but when I asked if anyone had reported a loud explosion in the area, she had our exact position.

“Please don’t leave the scene of the accident before the officers arrive,” she said.

“No danger of that.”

I heard a faint sound from the driver. I reached in and gently pulled away the empty airbag. Tiny crystals of glass rained down, pattering against the dashboard and steering wheel. Some remained, glimmering like jeweled studs on the guy’s brown sport coat and black turtleneck.

“Don’t move,” I said to him.

His eyes stretched open so that the whites encircled the pupils, made even more stark by the blood streaming down his face. I moved in closer to look for the gusher, which I found—a deep slice an inch below his receding hairline. I pulled a crumpled paper towel out of my back pocket and stuck it on the wound.

“Who you working for?” I asked conversationally, like I was asking who he bet on to win the Eastern Conference playoffs.

The injured man closed his eyes, then opened them again, and seemed to smile.

“El Cerberus,” I heard him say, the words wet with blood.

“Cerberus? You’re kidding.”

“¿Muertos chiste?” he whispered.

Do dead men joke?

“Why try to kill me? What the hell did I do?” I asked.

He leaned his head back on the seat and smiled again. I smelled the sticky sweet smell of alcohol in the car, though I assumed the man’s tranquility had more to do with shock.

I went back to the Grand Prix and got a roll of duct tape out of the glove compartment. I used it to tape some more paper towel to the guy’s head. Then I walked around the other side of his car for a closer look at his buddy. What I found wasn’t the kind of thing you’d want to study too closely. Likely he was doing the shooting, while leaning out the window, which is why he’d unsnapped his seat belt. Proves there’s never a good reason to neglect proper safety procedures.

I went back to the driver, who was now staring out of the destroyed windshield and looking a little less comfortable.

“How you doing?” I asked him.

“Just a little headache. I stop drinking coffee last week. Doctor say it’s bad for my heart. It’s bad for my head when I stop, I want to tell him.”

“So, this Cerberus. Who’s he?”

He turned his head toward me.

“Is that how you say in English? You know who he is. I’m declaring the fifth amendment.”

He spent the next few minutes coughing up globs of oily blood.

“Good command of the U.S. Constitution,” I told him.

He nodded.

“The fifth is a good amendment. In Venezuela the only right you plead for is your life. You think the ambulance is coming? I’m not feeling too good.”

“It’s coming. They’ll get here as soon as they can.”

He nodded again.

“Good doctors here, too. Even if they’re all from India. The U.S. likes to hire Indians. And Indios from Venezuela, like me. Pretty soon Yankees won’t know how to do anything.”

“Except beat the Red Sox.”

I sat watching his breath slow almost to a stop. I couldn’t move him, even though I knew he was going into shock. The way his arms lay limp against his body said he might be paralyzed. Maybe temporarily, and one false move would make it permanent. On the other hand, he did try to kill me, somewhat attenuating my sympathy.

“Were you supposed to scare me or kill me?” I asked when his eyes opened again and he looked over at me. “And if so, why?”

“Make it look like an accident. It was Marcello who lost his cool and start off with the gun. Dumb gordo.”

“Hey, no disrespecting the dead.”

“Marcello dead?” he asked, genuinely surprised, even though the evidence was only a few feet away.

“Yeah. Sorry, man. Went out the window.”

He rocked his head back and forth where it lay against the headrest.

“That’s, like, not what I want to hear.”

“You might be dead yourself. Why don’t you help out your soul and tell me what this was all about?”

“What’re you, a priest?” he asked.

“No, an engineer. We only take confessions based on solid data.”

“Whatever. You one crazy fucking engineer,” he said, which turned out to be his last words. I felt a little bad about that, since he probably would have preferred to thank his mother, bless his children and plea for mercy from the Holy Mother, but that’s timing for you.

Ten minutes later the ambulance roared on to the scene, but all they got to do was certify that the two guys in the Mustang were dead, then wait around for the cops, detectives and forensics people to show up.

Joe Sullivan got there first.

“I’m sure there’s an explanation,” he said, dropping out of his Ford Bronco and adjusting his sport jacket over the unofficial cannon he kept in a shoulder harness underneath.

“Is this an accident or an act of self-defense?” I asked him.

“Oh, Christ.”

“I’ve got the gun, holes in the glass and, with luck, a slug in the dashboard. I’d really rather stick to the truth this time, as strange as that sounds.”

“What’s the motive?”

“If we knew that we’d be done here.”

“What do they say?” he asked, looking over at the Mustang.

“I don’t know. They’re dead.”

“Terrific. Ross’ll be up your ass a mile.”

“Good. A little more interest by local law enforcement would be a nice change. Present company excluded.”

Sullivan shot his flashlight in my face.

“Are you hurt or anything?”

“I’m fine, but I need to get Eddie checked out.”

As if to punctuate the thought, a bark came from inside the crumpled Grand Prix.

“Ross’ll want me to bring you in.”

“Me and Jackie’ll be there tomorrow. Have him warm up the ashtray.”

I flipped open my cell phone and called Amanda. I didn’t give her a lot of details, though the word “accident” was enough to get her out of the bathtub. While I waited for her to come get me, I called a vet I knew in the Village. He said he’d meet me at his clinic.

“Oh my God, are you hurt?” Amanda demanded as she burst out of her station wagon, her eyes fixed in horror at the unnatural mating of a souped-up Mustang and the ass-end of the Grand Prix.

“I’m fine. A lot better than my car.”

“Where’s Eddie?” she said, near hysteria.

“He’s fine, too. But I want to take him over to Eng’s for a look over. He said he’d meet us there,” I said.

“What about you? Don’t you need a look over?”

“You can do that. Later.”

I got her out of there before she could see all the human carnage, though I gave her the straight story on the way to Dr. Eng’s. Amanda was an adult. No point in hiding anything.

“Don’t think I’m foolish for being concerned,” she said.

I squeezed her thigh, then left it at that.

As promised, James Eng was at his clinic when we arrived. He opened the door to let Eddie run in, as he always did. The only dog in the known universe who liked going to the vet.

“This is why I agreed to do this,” said Eng, as Eddie jumped up and got his ears scratched. “Just to soak in the adulation.”

I described the night’s activities as well as I could as we wound though the hall to one of the examination rooms. Eng felt around Eddie’s body, checked his eyes, ears, nose and throat and let him lick his face.

“I don’t even let my own dog do that.”

After about ten minutes of this, Eng shrugged.

“I could do some x-rays, or hold him here for observation, but I don’t think it’s necessary,” he said. “The only condition he’s presenting is one of an exceptionally healthy animal.”

“It’s all the rotten crap he eats off the beach,” I said. “Builds up the immunities.”

“You’re not far wrong,” said Eng. “Eddie lived on his own for the first years of his life. You joke, but when I see a healthy stray, I see highly successful genes. What doesn’t kill you, makes you strong. Literally.”

“If that’s true, I’m going to live forever,” I said, and then tried to pay him, or at least thank him for the extra trouble, which he’d have none of.

“Go on, get out of here. And take your mutt. I’m always open for the good ones. Just don’t tell anybody, it’ll ruin my practice.”

After Eng lifted him off the table, Eddie did a little spin and wagged his tail, like this was the most wonderful moment of his life. I couldn’t stand much more of that, so I took Eng at his word and got the hell out of there.

“Eddie Van Halen, superstar,” said Amanda.

“He’s going to be insufferable.”

She thought it was my turn to get examined, but I felt fine except for a little soreness in my neck and the upper part of my back, which only bothered me when I took a breath. She pressed the issue until I was forced to propose a compromise.

“If we stop at the bar on Main Street and have a few drinks, will that satisfy you?”

I was still a little nervous about leaving Eddie alone in the car, but he seemed happy enough curled up in the back. It was almost closing time, though I knew bars well enough to know you could always linger through the cleanup. They usually like having a few people sitting there, talking quietly, while winding down the night. It makes me feel like a kind of mascot.

“You’re an impossible man,” said Amanda to kick off the conversation.

“Thank you, dear.”

“If you die of internal bleeding, it’s not on my conscience.”

“Just don’t get distracted by it. I need your concentration.”

“You think there’s a connection between the dead Japanese girl and what just happened?” Amanda asked.

“What do you think?”

“I think there is.”

“So do I.”

In an effort to ward off Amanda’s near-frantic look of concern over my physical state, I got us talking about the good old days at Con Globe.

As I remembered, Iku’s task was basic strategic planning, helping the corporation balance its portfolio of products and services—deciding which to invest in, which to milk, which to jettison. It’s a good consultant’s gig, to analyze the situation presumably free of biases, preconceptions or vested interests.

All she cared about was her report—a clinical analysis of the corporation’s financial and organizational health.

As long as she had the support of top management, she didn’t have to care if anyone liked her or endorsed her methodologies. She didn’t have to joke with colleagues, jolly along administrators or wish anyone a happy birthday. She didn’t care if you held the door for her or checked out her ass when you passed her in the hall. The job titles, perks and prerogatives, career ambitions, petty politics, personal dreams and paranoid fantasies of the company’s employees were no more important to her than the mindless behavior of a swarm of ants engulfing an orange peel on the sidewalk.

“Angel was interested in Con Globe,” said Amanda. “That’s the overlap.”

“A bold and trenchant analysis,” I said.

“Thank you.”

“No less so for my having considered it already.”

“Certainly not.”

“But Con Globe ain’t nobody’s target. The corporate charter won’t allow it.”

“Piffle,” she said.

“That’s Burton’s word.”

“Used advisedly. Burton would tell you that corporate charters are as substantial as cheesecloth, and not nearly so aromatic.”

“That’s because he doesn’t know Arlis Cuthright.”

“Who?” she asked.

“Donovan’s wife. Her family owns the largest block of Con Globe voting stock. Not enough to control, but enough to wreak havoc. She doesn’t care about the subtleties of corporate law. All she knows is Daddy wanted the company to stay intact in perpetuity, and bolstered by her interests in half a dozen other companies, she wouldn’t hesitate to tear Con Globe to pieces to preserve its independence. Most people think these big corporate decisions are based on calculation and greed. In fact, it’s mostly heart and soul. Raw emotion.”

“And greed,” said Amanda.

“And greed. Which is sort of my point. Marve Judson said some of the board members thought Donovan was trying to unravel the corporate charter. But why would he do that? What financial benefit could possibly justify a direct confrontation with most of the board, the executive committee and the controlling shareholders, who are controlled by his own wife? To say nothing of the legal implications and all the lousy press. Who in their right mind would do that?”

“Who said he was in his right mind? He was, after all, screwing his management consultant.”

“You say Donovan’s a fool in love, but does he have to be a fool?”

She took a sip of her pinot to help her readjust from scold to honored adviser.

“No,” she said. “He could string her along with delusions of financial conquest, if that was her game. Men have been known to do that sort of thing.”

“Can’t accuse me of that.”

“No, dear. Certainly not.”

“Or Donovan’s brain had simply migrated to his dick, just like any other poor idiot.”

“Rich idiot.”

I wondered, was that it? Was it that easy? Angel and Iku make a run at Donovan with a standard honey trap. They think they’ll be able to seduce, manipulate or extort him into breaking the charter, then set up a sale, before which Angel would have Phillip Craig take a big position, and subsequently they’d turn a gigantic profit. The ultimate special opportunity, and one that perfectly fit his modus operandi. Not just calling the play, but making it happen.

Iku’s angle? Money. Plain old money. And the rush of victory, like one she probably got from the oil deal. It’s impossible to overestimate how good something that big feels when you’re on the winning side.

Although she probably felt less victorious than Angel, at least financially. All she got from the deal was a paycheck, albeit a fat one, for her trouble. Nothing else would be possible without huge exposure to insider trading.

Was the Con Globe gambit a chance to make good on all that?

I shared all these thoughts with Amanda, whose focus had shifted toward a more fundamental question.

“What does all that have to do with people trying to kill you?”

Until that night, no one had ever tried to run me off the road and shoot me. At least not at the same time. It didn’t seem like much of a coincidence.

“I don’t know,” I said.

They finally threw us out of the joint, politely enough. Eddie was still alive when we got back to the car—and filled with his usual élan. I let him bark and run back and forth between the two lowered back windows all the way to Oak Point. Amanda held her thick hair to the nape of her neck and rode along in a fugue state of resigned indulgence.

I drove past my cottage and directly to Amanda’s house, bypassing anyone who might be waiting for me with a gun. I just wasn’t in the mood.

I walked Eddie around Amanda’s yard on the end of a rope, and after a foolishly tense search of her house, settled us in for the night.

Only Amanda and Eddie got fully settled. I stayed up and killed a dusty half-full bottle of Maker’s Mark from her sadly under-stocked liquor cabinet and brooded in front of the fireplace.

Ordinarily I’d attribute the wakefulness to nerves. But despite the fearful carnage of the evening, I was more angry than frightened. I’m always offended by the arrogance of people who think killing other people is a legitimate undertaking. I wonder, how do you get up in the morning and think to yourself, “Gotta do some errands, wash the car, and if I can fit it in, permanently snuff the lights out of someone’s beloved husband, brother, mother, sister, son”? I’ve never considered myself more deserving of life than the next guy, probably less, but at least take a second to think about it.

Altruism didn’t come naturally to me, but it was easier to apply this line of reasoning to Iku Kinjo than to myself. No willful murder is justified, but hers felt less an act of butchery than a surgical elimination. A tactical execution.

Maybe that’s all it was, a simple transaction. A line item on the profit and loss statement. Case closed. Meeting over. The ultimate hard stop.