The Cold Spot

1

T hree A.M ., with only a glimmer of moonlight maneuvering between the slats of the blinds, Chase stood at the window staring at the house across the street thinking about the three corpses inside with all the hungry cats. How long before that became the stuff of urban legend and this town got put on the map by PETA’s newsletter? Images twisted at the back of his skull and he let out a soft grunt. He thought about dropping an anonymous tip, but then the cops would canvass the neighborhood and show up at his door asking if he’d seen anything suspicious, and that would just spook the shit out of Jonah.

Lila, he thought, I’m seriously fucking up here.

He leaned back against the dining-room table.

They couldn’t go to the motel now. There was still a chance the crew might make a try for him. They should take the loot and pull a fade, but maybe he’d made it personal enough for them to come take a poke. He hoped so.

He thought maybe the driver would show up at around midnight, gunning his engine in the driveway, flashing his high beams, and they could finish this thing the right way. Race against each other out in the streets, see who could stay on the road the longest. It was the only real shot he had left.

Which meant he had no shot at all. His mind was wandering again. The rage squeezed up and tried to take him over. He crossed his arms and tightened his hold on himself. He had no cool right now. He had no cold.

He’d played his hand poorly. He’d waited too long. He’d focused on the wrong things. The woman never should’ve been let go. He’d burned the bridge.

A stakeout at the merchant’s would’ve been dangerous but it might’ve worked. If the cops hadn’t spotted him. If the crew hadn’t spotted him.

He hadn’t thought it through clearly enough. He’d brought Jonah in too late. He shouldn’t have brought him in at all.

His grandfather had grumbled a little about not being able to score the crew now, but he fully expected his hundred grand from the sale of the house. It was a big payday for doing nothing. The old man could head back to White Plains with his girl and pull whatever score he had cooking there and just collect the cash when the time came. Chase would hand it over, thinking, Who cares?

The door to the guest room opened. The only light on in the house was the forty-watt bulb over the sink. In the dark, Angie padded to the refrigerator and started making another sandwich. She was naked. She stood there silhouetted, grabbing the last slice of cheese, a few wilted leaves of lettuce, a final squeeze of mustard. She ate quickly, gulping her food.

Her body was muscular and shapely, her ass streamlined. Chase wondered if the old man had sent her out here to test him. But no matter how he turned it over he couldn’t figure out what the test could possibly be for.

Or was Jonah just concerned with showing off? Saying, Look at what keeps me warm at night.

The gold hoop in her pierced navel gleamed. The grinning dolphin tattoo, poised as if leaping through the ring, was winking. He hadn’t caught that before. He also hadn’t noticed the light stretch marks. She’d had at least one kid. So where was it? With her aunt back in Florida? Did she hand it over to an adoption agency without even looking to see if it was a boy or a girl?

Angie knew Chase was behind her. She didn’t mind. She didn’t turn. He sensed her knowing attitude, the confidence in her stance even while she swallowed down her last bite and made for the water jug. As she bent, a soft ripple worked from her upper back to her shoulder to her arm. Her ass wriggled the slightest bit. She stood and started to sip, her breasts silhouetted in the dim fridge light, her throat working. With the back of her hand she wiped her mouth, then sighed and shook her hair out. She held the jug between her breasts and her nipples hardened dramatically. She turned.

Her eyes found him in the dark.

They burned with understanding. They stripped him down layer by layer. Chase could feel himself being peeled back and opened up until he was as naked as she was. He wondered if she would go deeper and get to his very center.

“You know,” she said, “he talks a lot about you.”

“Yeah?”

“Even before he got word from you. He used to go on and on.”

Chase stepped into the kitchen. “You’re kidding.”

“I don’t do kidding.”

No, of course she didn’t. “So what did he say?”

“Oh, about the scores you pulled together when you weren’t even a teenager yet. How good you were slipping into houses and, later on, behind the wheel. How all the strings respected you, even though you were only a kid. He says those few years when you were together were his happiest time in his whole bent life. He’s also sorry he didn’t come to your wedding.”

Chase looked at her. Angie was lying but he didn’t know why. Jonah might’ve talked about his past, told her some of the stories and given her the facts, but there wouldn’t have been any sentimentality. He wasn’t capable of it.

Who the fuck did she think she was kidding? Was she trying to spare Chase’s feelings or to make him feel tighter with Jonah in order to lull him?

Angie wasn’t grinning but the dolphin was. The damn thing distracted him more than her bikini wax. She took another sip of water and a dribble escaped down her chin. He knew he was supposed to lick it off. She tried to put a smile in her eyes, but he read only a hint of fear and impatience.

Then he knew she was trying to humanize the old man. Make him seem less hard, even a touch loving. And weak. Not invulnerable. She’d over-played her hand but he didn’t want her to realize it. Angie was ready for the next thing and had to make some kind of a move in order to get out. Now that the score hadn’t gone down, she was ready to cut free of Jonah.

And she wanted Chase to kill him.

It made him realize how imposing Jonah still was. Here was a woman who laid him, saw him go naked into the shower, slept beside him. Who could press her.25 to his head at any time she liked if only she could overcome her terror that he might wake up at that exact moment. And she still couldn’t do it. Which is what had saved her so far.

“He loves you, you know,” she told him.

“Sure,” Chase said.

“In his own way. In the only way he knows how, being who he is. What he is.”

“Yeah,” he said, sounding like an idiot even to himself, which in this case was good. Maybe it would get her to underestimate him.

“You’re the only one he loves. Everyone else he destroys. More than you know.”

Where was she leading him? She was trying to drop subtle hints now so that later she would really have him hooked. What wasn’t he picking up on?

Chase tried to see it, wondering if he ever did pop Jonah, and Angie was right there beside him, how long would it take her before she put the Bernadelli in his ear and vented his brainpan? Would he make even ten seconds? No, five tops.

She said, “Don’t feel too upset about what happened over there.”

“What?”

“I can see it’s eating you up. He only did what you invited him here to do, right? What you couldn’t do yourself. It’s what you expected, isn’t it? What you were hoping for?”

He nodded because there was nothing else to do.

He had known. He must’ve known that when Jonah had turned away from Rosso and said, All right, but let’s wipe this place, the old man was lying. The old man had never conceded on anything, had never said all right. Chase hadn’t believed him about anything else, so how could he have trusted him about that?

Chase hadn’t. He’d known when Jonah had drawn the knife that there was no way the kid would ever be let go, no matter how dumb he was.

Chase was fast. He should’ve been able to reach his grandfather. But he hadn’t even tried.

“I can make you feel better,” she said, and eased toward him, her tits bouncing lightly, her body expectant. She tried smiling again and this time made it. She wet her lips. “Even if it’s only for a little while, I can make you feel good again.”

“No,” he told her, “you really can’t.”

2

L ila sat with his mother at the kitchen table. There were bagels and cream cheese. Steam rose from two coffee cups and wavered in the air.

It wasn’t the kitchen in this house. The table setting was familiar but he couldn’t place it. Maybe they were in Mississippi, or maybe this was where his mother was murdered. He couldn’t remember.

They were talking quietly together, in deep conversation. There was an air of importance to it all. Lila’s tone grew more urgent. He kept waiting for her voice to rise and call out for him, but she continued in the same hushed manner. It bothered the hell out of him, knowing they were sharing secrets. Was there anything more awful than your mother and wife trading info about you? Christ. There was that whole sisterhood thing. They’d talk about shit that would send guys screaming out of the room.

His mother responded with a strange calm, her expression almost smug. The two of them going back and forth, being a little petty about it now since they were both pulling faces. Chase, struggling to move nearer, was unable to do so. He tried to speak but couldn’t hear himself.

Both women looked up with a start. They stared at him with real worry. His mother’s features quickly shifted into a frown, and Lila gazed at him with loving concern.

He’d made another mistake. What had he done wrong?

The dead will find a way. They’ll make you listen.

He tried to speak again and this time heard himself say, “All right, I’m listening.”

In weak and unrecognizable voices, they began to speak

Angie stood at the foot of the bed, gripping the toe of his shoe. He’d slept in his clothes again.

“You were moaning,” she said. “You woke us.”

Chase cleared his throat and said, “Sorry.”

Behind her, Jonah stood wearing nothing but briefs, looking well laid and rested, holding his.38. There wasn’t an inch of sag on him, his muscles were still large and cut. His chest was thatched with thick white hair. His numerous scars were even more marbled. A couple of old bullet wounds, some knife slashes, a lot of beatings. You looked at his body and you couldn’t figure out how anybody had survived all that. He glanced at Chase but said nothing. He silently receded and half a minute later there was the sound of the shower.

“What were you dreaming about?” Angie asked.

Chase sat up and scrubbed his face with his hands. “I don’t remember,” he told her, wishing it was the truth.

He finally noticed she was dressed in Lila’s clothes. A rose silk blouse he’d bought her for their first Christmas in Mississippi together, and black leggings that Lila only tried on once and said made her ass look too big. They hadn’t. They didn’t make Angie’s ass look too big either. They held tight and really drew the eye, which seemed to be the reason she’d chosen them. The.25 must be in the waistband at the small of her back.

It meant she’d gone through the drawers while he was sleeping. He shouldn’t have been so out of it, but the lack of sleep had finally caught up with him, and the nightmares were getting worse.

He looked at her, trying not to show anything.

“I hope you don’t mind,” Angie said. “I wear the same size your wife did.”

“So I see.”

“She had good taste. Not exactly mine, but very nice anyway. We had to leave most of my stuff back in Aspen when the last score went bad, and I haven’t had a chance to do any shopping.” She checked herself in the mirror. “Does it bother you?”

Chase fought to smile. He was glad he couldn’t see the result. “Not at all. You look wonderful in them.”

“Thank you for that. All women like a passing compliment, even me, and I never put too much stock in them.”

“Why not?”

“Too many guys use them just to fuck you. Fuck your cunt or fuck you over. But they’re still nice to hear.”

He didn’t quite get that one, but let it slide. He got a change of clothes and used the three-quarter bath to take a quick shower. When he got out, the old man was just finishing up in the other bathroom. Jonah had spent a hell of a long time in there. He hadn’t put the fan on and the steam burst into the corridor. Maybe he’d needed to loosen up, his muscles bothering him after all the sneaking around through the neighbors’ yards last night.

After Jonah got dressed, Chase took them out for breakfast. He drove by the Nicholson house without glancing over at it. Jonah was looking nowhere and everywhere, and Chase knew his grandfather must be wondering if he’d soon drop an anonymous tip. If Chase would be able to take the idea of a house full of bodies right across the street.

The dream had helped him on that point. Chase already had his own house full of bodies, he didn’t need to sweat another one.

The Chevelle wanted to roar and he wanted to with it, really let it rip up the street. But he tamped the need down, holding on to it. There’d be another time. He knew right then, there was still one last chance. He held on to it the way he gripped the steering wheel. With dead-white knuckles.

At the diner, while they ate, Angie slid a slice of raisin-bread toast almost between her teeth and left it perched while she asked, “So what are you going to do now? Go back to teaching?”

“No,” Chase said.

“Start stealing cars again?”

Chase let it sit out there and didn’t answer. Jonah chewed his eggs and bacon, watching him without watching him. He’d talk about the house money pretty soon, just to make sure Chase hadn’t forgotten about his promise.

“Then what?” Angie said.

“It’s not entirely over yet,” he told her.

“No? What do you mean? What else is there?”

“One last shot,” he said.

Jonah looked up. “Cleveland.”

“Yeah.”

Jonah shook his head, his eyes black and endlessly steady. “That’s no help. They were running a game on that idiot.”

“Yeah, but that piece of it rang true. The two crew members talking. One a little drunk, a little too loud. It sounded like a slip to me.”

“Not to me. They’re too good.”

Chase shrugged.

“You still owe me a hundred grand.”

“I know.”

Angie fluffed the shoulders of her blouse. Chase was sure it was just so he’d take another look at her rack. It was a good head game, wearing Lila’s clothes. Angie was young but she’d picked up a lot of hard-fought insight. Working with Jonah had just refined her own natural facility.

“Are you still with me on this?” Chase asked his grandfather.

“There isn’t anything anymore. You had a thread and let it go. I told you that you were playing it wrong.”

“Yeah, you did.”

Chase stood and paid the check. He didn’t say anything on the way back. He found himself in the rearview and thought that perhaps he had changed just enough to go the rest of the road alone.

3

W hen they got back to the house, Chase expected the old man to pack up and take off without another word. But Jonah sat on the couch and started watching the tapes again. Maybe he really did have a thing for Marisa Iverson.

Chase went out to the garage and worked on the Chevelle a little more. Fifteen minutes later Angie came out. She leaned against the passenger door and he heard the thump of the.25 clocking the metal. She watched him milking the carburetor and timing chain for every last second he could pull from it.

She said, “You get overzealous too.”

“I like things clean.”

Angie said, “You really going to pay him a hundred g’s for doing nothing?”

“Yes.”

She looked at him like he was an idiot, and said, “You’re an idiot.”

Chase let it slide. He was letting more and more slide and wondered when it would stop, and what would happen right after that.

“How much of a cut will you walk away with?” he asked.

“Full partners. I get half. But I can’t walk away.”

“You could always go back to Miami.”

“I’ll never go back to Miami.”

“Then what are you complaining for?”

“Are you really as thick as you seem, or are you pretending?”

“I’m pretending.”

She frowned and turned aside, and in profile Chase saw the surgery scars more prominently, but somehow he seemed to like them even more. It was a good metaphor-one minute you saw one thing, the next something else. It all depended on the light and the angle.

She was mad he was going to pay out and not get into an argument with Jonah, something that might lead to them pulling guns on each other. He wanted to ask her what the old man had done to turn her against him like this.

Had his grandfather been the one who’d given her the scars? He couldn’t see Jonah as the jealous type and figured his grandfather would’ve let her walk away if she wanted to go. Did she have something on him? Or did she just not understand that Jonah wasn’t like other men and wouldn’t give a damn if she left? Did it all break down to her just thinking he’d be bitter if she dumped him, that he’d hunt her down and try to get her back? She fucked him but didn’t know him.

Or maybe there was something else to it.

He asked, “Why do you stick with him if you hate him so much?”

“What makes you think I hate him?”

“Every word you say.”

Her expression hardened. “Where else could I go?”

“You could go anywhere. Jonah doesn’t care what happens to you.”

“I know that.”

“Then what’s the problem.”

“He won’t let me take Kylie.”

Chase got out from under the hood, thinking maybe he heard wrong with the engine humming.

“Kylie?”

Nodding, Angie gave him a look that told him, This is why Jonah has to die. “Our daughter.”

Stupid to think it, but the idea of Jonah having a kid kind of startled Chase. The fact that Chase’s own father was Jonah’s kid didn’t seem to enter into it. He just couldn’t see Jonah sticking around a child for long. Changing diapers, reading Dr. Seuss, all that. Was this any different because Angie was a partner in the bent life?

“She’s twenty-four months,” Angie said. “The happiest baby in the world. Never cries, never frowns. Has a head of wild curly blond hair. Where she got it from, I have no idea. Dark eyes and golden hair. She walks and talks like a champion.”

Chase thought, Does family get any stranger than this? He had a snuffed mother, a suicided father, a murdered wife, a heartless grandfather, and a two-year-old aunt. “Pictures?”

“I had to leave them in Aspen when things went south.”

“Where is she?”

“In Sarasota with my sister, Milagro. Milly. She’s three years older than me, has a kid of her own. I told you I left my aunt’s house as soon as I could. She pretty much did the same. She got married to a professional surfer before she graduated high school. He doesn’t have much brains, been smacked in the head with his board too often, but he’s got a good heart and he likes children. He has to tour a lot, goes to Southern California, out to Hawaii, even Australia. But he makes good money and I left them with a wedge of cash to watch over Kylie. We go back to visit when we can, at least two or three times a year.”

Chase stared at her. He toyed with the Chevelle’s idle so the noise would drown their voices. He moved closer to her. “I still don’t get it. So why don’t you leave him?”

“He thinks it’s important. Blood. Family. He’d let me go in half a second, but he’d never let me take Kylie.”

It surprised Chase. He couldn’t imagine Jonah ever caring so much about anything, except money.

Angie said, “He’d pull her out of my sister’s house and take her along on scores, like he did with you.”

“Don’t let him.”

“I won’t.”

It was always a gamble, being open and honest, in the straight life or the bent one. The knife was sharp enough to ease inside without you sticking your belly out to meet it. But they had somehow arrived at the place where the truth had to be spoken and had to be heard. He couldn’t figure out how it had happened or why he was willing to take the risk. There was no reason at all, except he was thinking of the baby he and Lila had never had.

He said, “Is Jonah the one who beat the shit out of you so badly you needed the plastic surgery?”

“No.”

“Would he ever hurt the kid?”

“No,” Angie told him. “I don’t know. Maybe. I can’t be sure. I can’t take the chance. Not with him. Not with my little girl.”

He nodded, thinking, of course not. Where Jonah was concerned you could never take the risk. “I’ll help however I can, but don’t ever try to work me again like you did last night.”

“All right.”

“I won’t kill him.”

“Then you can’t help me,” she said.

“I can set you up with some cash.”

“I’ve got cash. I can always get cash, but there isn’t enough money in the world to make him quit coming after us.”

It was true, and he’d have to think about that. If the old man really did think blood was important, what went on inside of him where Chase was concerned? Strange, but Chase wanted to know and he didn’t want to know.

“Did Jonah ever really talk about me?”

“Yes. Mostly about the things I said. How good you were behind the wheel. How all the strings respected you even though you were so young. He did say he was sorry he didn’t come to your wedding. I think he was touched that you’d invite him after not seeing him for all those years.”

Jesus Christ, Chase just couldn’t believe it. This had to be a setup. Probing Angie’s gaze, he hunted for the slightest sign of a lie. He didn’t find any. But there had to be more to it. He leaned back against the grille and let the thrum of the engine work into his chest, preparing him. “What else?”

“He thought about tracking you down and killing you after you left him. You actually managed to hurt him. You’re lucky you ran. If he’d found you, you’d be dead and buried in some lime pit.”

Chase worked on the car for another half hour after Angie left. He got the grease solvent, stepped inside, and washed up. The television was only a blue screen, the heist tape having run out.

Jonah said, “I’ll make some calls. Maybe I can turn something up on this outfit.”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“You might call the wrong person. Someone you pissed off somewhere down the line who knows the crew and can alert them.”

“So what? Maybe it’ll rattle them. They’re already gone. There’s nothing left to lose.”

“Are you in or out?”

“And I can say out and you’ll still sell the house and pay me the money.”

“We’ve been through that. Now it’s time for you to tell me if you’re still going to help me or not. If not, load up and go.”

Chase thought about the crew and how loyal they’d been to one another. Marisa Iverson taking a beating, a gun to her head, and still not giving up the driver.

And here Chase was asking, repeatedly, after promising to pay a hundred k to his own blood, if his grandfather was going to help him. And the old man still not saying anything.

Jonah stared at him, dead-eyed. “I’ll stay. But if you don’t want me calling anyone, then how are you going to find out anything about these crew members who might’ve grown up in Cleveland?”

Chase said, “I’m going to talk to the cops.”

4

W hen Chase walked into the squad room of Lila’s old precinct he spotted Hopkins immediately. The cop was filling out forms on his desk, writing so slowly that it seemed the pen was hardly moving. He looked nervous, jumpy and pale, like he hadn’t slept well in weeks. Chase could tell he’d been taken off active duty, probably because everybody including the police psychiatrist could see he was falling apart.

Chase wondered if he’d ever been a reliable partner for Lila. If for one stupid reason or another it was Hopkins who’d inadvertently made some mistake that had gotten her killed. The thought of it moved through him, gaining heat and strength, until his vision turned a gleaming red at the edges and his chest was tight.

“What are you doing here?” Hopkins said.

“I came to talk to Murray and Morgan.”

“About what?”

“About whether they’re making any progress tracking down the ice heisters.”

Hopkins gave him a look that said he’d never really seen Chase before in his life. This wasn’t a grease monkey schoolteacher in front of him anymore, and he was wondering where that guy had gone.

“If they had any information, I’m sure they would have phoned to let you know.”

“Have you heard anything?”

“No.”

Hopkins’s body language gave off all the wrong signals. He smelled of peppermint gum and a hint of scotch, a pretty disgusting mix. No more fucking cake and coffee. Hopkins wasn’t even slick enough to drink vodka on the job so that nobody would pick up on it. He was one of those mooks crying out to be caught and helped because he needed the attention. Chase felt a powerful wash of pity and loathing.

Scanning the desk, Chase noticed there were no photos. He pulled open the top drawer and Hopkins let out a frustrated grunt from the center of his chest. Inside the drawer were three framed photos of his wife and daughters, and a snapshot of Lila taken at one of the barbecues. The photo was ripped down the middle and Chase, who’d been sitting beside her, had been torn out.

He tapped the photo against the desktop, staring at Hopkins, trying to figure out if the guy was worth anything to him. Maybe he could still be put to use, or maybe Hopkins was too damaged for that now. He had to think about it.

With his lips crawling, Hopkins went, “Look, I’ve been meaning-”

Chase tossed the photo down, turned, and made his way to the other side of the room to where Murray and Morgan were each talking into a phone.

They both looked up at his approach and each of them frowned. He got close and listened in on their conversations. Murray was talking to his wife, telling her he was sorry he had come home so late last night and hadn’t woken her the way she’d made him promise. But he had to put in the extra hours, the chief was breaking his ass. He pulled a face and glared at Chase, trying to spook him off. The vibe got ugly fast. That was all right. Chase continued standing there.

Good to see that Morgan was actually working the case. There was an intensity about him. He had two days of gray beard stubble and was bracing somebody hard over the phone, trying to get a line on somebody else. He scrawled in a notebook. He nodded, his chin bobbing. The next time he looked up at Chase he narrowed his eyes and tried to sort of climb away, hugging the phone to him. Chase stepped closer.

He was talking about some hooker and her pimp and a couple of gangbangers who’d hit a couple of banks in Roosevelt. It wasn’t the right crew, but at least he was doing something. The cops would have a lot of misleading information. The manager of the diamond merchant’s was in the morgue. Having Marisa’s face on camera was worthless. Everything else would lead them to a dead end, and the aggravation would only get worse.

Murray told his wife he’d bring home her decongestant and hung up. He looked at Chase, sighed and said, “What can I do for you?” Doing the Fuck off, twinky thing again, but not having as much fun with it this time. He was tired and frustrated and seemed resigned to dealing with numerous pains in the ass this afternoon.

Might as well lay it on the line.

Chase asked, “Do you have any suspects who were born in or have some kind of a home base in Cleveland?”

“What?”

“Cleveland.”

“Yeah, what about it?”

“You got anybody who might have been based there?”

“Why the hell are you asking about Cleveland for? What is this?”

Murray stood, stepped up, and tried to get in Chase’s face. One heavy paw with a lot of liver spots lay on Chase’s chest, pushing. Chase resisted, turned aside, and focused his gaze on Morgan.

Hanging up the phone, Morgan looked at him the same way that Hopkins had. With a lot of confusion and a little respect. He squinted at Chase, trying to get a bead on him. Raised his chin a little and scratched his stubble.

“You look like crap,” he said.

“I haven’t been sleeping much.”

“Neither have we. What do you want?”

“A name,” Chase said. “Or maybe two names. A husband-and-wife team? Possibly from Cleveland. Maybe working with another pro, also from there.”

They remained like that for a solid minute. Morgan in his seat, staring, reading Chase’s eyes and seeing something new. Murray with his hand on Chase’s chest, intermittently attempting to shove him away, then relaxing. Then pressing. His aggression was almost a postscript. His wife was clogged.

They were three men of openly deep thoughts, saddled by convention, indignation, and a lack of results. This was Chase’s last chance. He held his desperation inside and tried to plant it in the ice, keep it cool and under wraps, but he could still feel it trying to break free. His breathing grew deeper. The moment stretched. His vision grew red again. Murray shoved. Chase set his teeth and thought, Once more and I’m going to have to knock him down, and that will not be good at all.

“You stole the security tapes and file copies, didn’t you?” Morgan asked.

“No,” Chase said. He could barely see through the red.

Morgan said, “Sure you did,” and started to go through his paperwork. He tossed manila folders aside, flipped through pages. “Cleveland. Not husband and wife, but brother and sister. Earl and Ellie Raymond. Grew up there, still have ties. Very sharp customers. They’re heisters for certain, but they’re nowhere near New York, so far as we know.”

“They work with anybody with a scar on his forehead?”

Morgan stared even harder at him, tamping his teeth together, his wheels turning. Chase really didn’t like that look.

Chase nodded, turning the name around in his head. Ellie Raymond. Murray backed away and said, “So what? We’ve got six sheets of suspects from all over the country. There’s no more of a line on them than on a dozen other possibles.” His tie was loose and he had ring around the collar. He turned to Chase and pointed a finger now, which was so much more accommodating than the palm in the chest. “You. You’re trouble. I knew it first time I saw you-”

No wonder she wouldn’t give up the driver. He was her brother.

“Thanks,” Chase said and walked away.

On the other side of the squad room, he stopped off in front of Hopkins again. Since the guy was nothing but a desk jockey now, maybe he’d be bored or guilty enough to help. Chase couldn’t entirely trust him but he couldn’t trust anybody, so what the fuck.

Chase said, “My mother was murdered fifteen years ago. I want to check the case files.”

“You’ll have to send in the proper paperwork for a formal request, and you’ll have to read the file at the courthouse records office in the company of an officer.”

“Can you make copies?”

The question stumped Hopkins. Everything seemed to stump him. “I don’t know.”

“If you can’t, steal them.”

“What are you saying?” Hopkins’s face opened up, his eyes wide but not quite as wide as they would’ve been if he wasn’t drinking on the job. “I can’t do that.”

“Why not?”

“How am I supposed to steal records?”

“Slip them under your shirt, like you do with your flask of scotch.”

Hopkins’s expression buckled along its seams. “I don’t know if I can do any of that.”

He could feel Hopkins wanting to appease him. To be a friend, a buddy, a comrade. To do any damn thing to take his mind off his own misery. He wanted to throw back a few brews and talk about old times, except they didn’t have any. More than that, he wanted Chase to tell him tales of Lila. Who knew how much she’d shared with the guy, but whatever it was, Hopkins needed more.

So put him to use.

Chase said, “Then go through them, work the case like you would any other. There’s something wrong with how it was originally handled.”

“How so?”

Chase thought, Besides the fact that they never caught who did it? He said, “I don’t know, but maybe you’ll spot it.”

“My shift ends in an hour.”

“Then do it tonight.”

“I can’t.”

“You can get wasted afterward, Hopkins. Do this, and do it right. For Christ’s sake, be a cop.”

The tension rose. Chase had pushed him pretty hard today, and it looked like Hopkins might have had enough. His wife and kids were in the drawer for a reason. The corners of his mouth tightened and his eyes hardened for a moment, and then he went to pudding again. That didn’t matter, so long as he got the job done.

“Listen, about Lila-”

Same way he’d phrased it last time, but with something a little different working to the surface now. His voice firmer, a bit rougher.

Chase waited. “What about her?”

“I just wanted to let you know…nothing ever happened between us.”

Chase waited some more but that was apparently it. The guy revving himself up only to say that, like it was important. Pretending to come out with something of significance while he really held everything back.

Chase asked, “Your wife left you, didn’t she? Took the kids?”

“Yes,” Hopkins said. His breathing grew a touch more rapid, the peppermint-and-scotch aroma wafting to and fro. “How did you know that?”

“You’re guilty for all the wrong reasons. I know there was nothing between you and Lila. She was my girl. You want to swoon over her photos, go right ahead. But I think you’d be better off straightening your ass up and getting your family back. Now, are you going to go check the files for me or what?”

5

N ext step, Chase called the Deuce and gave him his credit card number again, told him to drop everything else, this was a rush.

Deucie called back three hours later. “Earl and Ellie Raymond. Live in Cleveland, play everyplace else. They’re troublemakers. They’re smart but a little too cowboy. Adrenaline junkies, they like it when they get into scrapes. They’ve put together strings with Kel Clarke, Slip Jenson, and Jason Fleischer. Those are the names I got.”

“Any have a scar on his forehead?”

“Who the fuck knows? Like I go bowling with these assholes?”

“Which is the driver?”

“No idea. I never heard of any of them before. They’re young, on a different circuit. This new breed, it’s not about the money for them, it’s just the juice of the action. With some fat, greedy bastard, you know he wants to get clear with the cash to spend it. This type? When they’re not pulling scores they probably go do that whatchacallit with the cliffs, the freebasing…no, base-jumping.”

“How about where they hole up?”

“All I heard was they use a fence in SoHo sometimes. Shonny Fishman. Has a pawnshop on West Broadway and Broome, I think. Or Spring. No, Broome. One of those. I know Shonny. Used to deal with him when I was first coming up. Little old Jew prick takes an extra two points off the top because he pays faster than the rest of the fences. The others, they won’t go into their pocket and pay at once, takes time to spread the merchandise around, especially if it’s got real heat on it. They pay out in six, twelve, maybe eighteen months. But Shonny, he’s got a bankroll could choke the fuckin’ Statue of Liberty. Takes him two or three weeks max. He’s got four brothers and something like eight cousins, all of them shysters. A couple of them work in the D.A.’s office, so he’s got good protection. If the shit ever comes down, he’ll fade to Israel and buy himself a McDonald’s franchise in Tel Aviv.”

“Is there a cage I need to be buzzed through?”

“Of course there’s a cage. Everybody’s got cages now. You know that.”

He didn’t know that. It meant he might need his tools to pull this off. “What do I say to show him I’m not there to buy a saxophone or a brooch for my grandmother?”

“How the hell should I know? I never had to hock a Rolex with him. Well, not since the Heidi Bowl, I lost my fuckin’ shirt that day. Anyway, you’ll figure it out. And try not to kill him, I always kinda liked Shonny.”

“No promises,” Chase said.

He called information and got the number for Fishman’s Loan Society and Trading Depot. Jesus Christ, pawnbrokers really went all out with naming their places, Shonny and Bookatee would’ve gotten along just groovy.

Shonny picked up and Chase asked what time he’d be closing. Shonny Fishman spoke with a rich and mannered voice. “Eight o’clock tonight, thank you for phoning.”

Chase laid it out for his grandfather and Jonah said, “They’ll be somewhere close to him. Probably in Jersey. They make a run into the city, grab their parcels of the payout, then go back and wait until the next one is due. If the crew hasn’t already broken up, they soon will. A couple will scatter with their caches and pick up the rest of their pay somewhere down the line. There’s five in the crew but maybe we’ll get lucky and a couple will have peeled off.”

They still had a few hours to kill. Angie had taken the van and gotten enough groceries to cook dinner. Chase sensed she was trying to be accommodating, maternal in whatever way she could considering the circumstances. Jonah didn’t notice. She tried to make small talk but Chase was too wrapped up in his own thoughts. He ate mechanically and tried to put his eyes anywhere except on Lila’s photos. He kept hearing her telling him not to do this.

Angie cleaned her gun again and started selecting others from Lila’s spread. Chase got out Marisa Iverson’s-no, he had to start thinking of her under her real name, Ellie Raymond, drive it in, Ellie Raymond-Ellie Raymond’s 9mm. Lila had extra ammo out in the cabinet in the garage and he pocketed two clips, and put several more in his knapsack.

He told Angie, “You don’t need to come along.”

“What?”

He said, “Stay here.”

“I’m a full partner, remember?”

“You’ll get your share.”

“Who said anything about that?” she asked.

Jonah said, “She’s coming.”

Chase shook his head. “I’m calling the play.”

“Not if you want it done right. Not this one, with my neck on the line. She comes along.”

“Your kid needs a mother.”

The fact that Chase knew about Kylie didn’t faze Jonah in the slightest. He ignored it. “We need at least a third person if we’re really going after this crew. There’s five of them. Even if we get the drop, we’re at a disadvantage. We’ll need to hit them hard and fast. We need firepower, and she’s a good shooter.”

“I am,” Angie said.

“I believe you,” Chase told her. “It’s not about that; aren’t you listening?”

Jonah stared hard and Chase knew why. It was stupid for him to have suddenly gotten soft, right now as they were heading out to finish this thing. But he couldn’t help it. He kept thinking of the two-year-old girl. There were enough lost children in his life already. His dead unborn sibling who had been taken out of the game before taking its first breath. The child he and Lila wanted and couldn’t have. The need for a kid was still all around him, rising within him. He might not have done anything else right, but he could make the effort to allow Kylie to be raised by her own mother.

Looking at Jonah he knew he might’ve already gone too far. His grandfather stood there, hard, mean, staring at Chase, who wasn’t hard enough or mean enough despite wanting to snuff the driver. He couldn’t make any sense of it himself, and Jonah, who didn’t put up with shit like this, was no more than a cunt hair away from going for his gun.

All right, maybe he’d fucked up, but he kept his eyes on the old man, letting him know, If you want it to be now, I’m ready.

Angie said, “Let’s go, it’s settled. I’m coming along.” She grabbed Chase by the arm. “You drive, it’s what you do best.”

On the Southern State Parkway, letting the Chevelle run just a little wild, shredding to ninety and then easing it back down to sixty, he asked his grandfather, “Were you really going to try to heist the rez casino?”

“You’re pretty fixated on that.”

“I can’t figure out any other reason why you’d be up in White Plains.”

“Even if the casino is owned by Indians, there’s got to be some mob kickback.”

“You were going to score some bagman? Isn’t that more trouble than it’s worth, getting on the mob’s bad side?”

“The syndicate’s been fighting among itself pretty seriously the past couple of years.”

Chase remembered thinking that after the Deuce told him a don’s son was looking for a wheelman. “Why?”

“Happens every twenty years or so, when the bosses get ready to retire and turn the reins over to their oldest sons. All their wingmen and consiglieres start feeling ripped off and make a play. Either they cap the don’s kid or they get aced after long service, which leaves the families even weaker. So the other mob crews start sniffing around, seeing if they can pick the meat from the bones, and then they start going to war over the juiciest pieces.”

“And you go in for the scraps.”

“Sure.”

The Southern State turned into the Belt Parkway and twenty minutes later they were crossing the Brooklyn Bridge. It would land them at the bottom of Manhattan practically on top of Fishman’s Loan Society and Trading Depot.

The feel of the city started to bring back memories. All the shows he and Lila had taken in. The times down at the South Street Seaport, looking out over the waves. Lila beating the crap out of the kid who’d tried to boost her wallet in the Penn Station waiting room. The hotel room where he’d helped to wipe down fingerprints, tossing butts in the john while Walcroft kicked open the closet door.

Chase said, “Tell me what happened down in Philly, with you and Rook and Buzzard Allen. How’d you get talked into trying to steal Renaissance paintings?”

Jonah’s mouth barely moved. “You’re in a talkative mood.”

“No,” Chase said. “I just want answers.”

“The Philly museum heist isn’t an answer to anything you want to know.”

“You’re right.”

You didn’t break into it slowly, there was no point. It was how normal people talked, not the way Jonah did.

“Then what are you pushing on about?” his grandfather asked.

Shutting his eyes, Chase ticked off three seconds, letting the car guide and strengthen him.

“What did Walcroft do?” he asked. “He wasn’t wired. So why’d you really ace him?”

Now, Jonah doing what he did best, giving back nothing at all unless it hurt. “He grabbed that tuna. Nobody needs a joker like that on a job.”

6

T hey sat at the curb outside the pawnshop in SoHo, watching Shonny Fishman through the bars of his front window. There were still three people in the store doing business. Shonny was smiling broadly, so something was working out for him in there.

Chase checked his watch. They still had about twenty minutes before Shonny would pack it in for the night.

Hopkins phoned and said, “I went to the Hall of Records and dug through your mother’s case. They had no serious suspects but set their sights on your dad, of course.”

“No prints or witnesses or anything?”

“No. I don’t know what you think is wrong here. I mean, I can’t find anything that sticks out. Your father was watched for a while because he acted so crazy afterward. They had surveillance on him for a couple weeks full-time, then off and on for a couple more after that. Says here he took you to your mother’s grave every day, even in blizzards? And that he actually gave you liquor. You were, what, ten years old? Jesus Christ.”

Chase thought of those long, terrible days at his mother’s grave, his father unconscious in the snow, and Chase drunk with ice in his hair, trying to keep his dad warm. The cops had been watching and nobody had bothered to help him. He tried to clamp down on the sick feeling pouring through him. “Forget that.”

“They almost dragged him in for it, but I guess they figured he’d suffered enough and wanted to cut a deal instead.”

Reaching out, Chase touched the steering wheel, finding a cool authority in it. “What deal?”

“They let him walk so long as he would persuade you to go on television and make the plea to the killer.”

“What?” His father had told him that he’d been approached by a newscaster to make the appeal, and the newscaster thought Chase should do it instead. “So it wasn’t his idea.”

“No, did you think it was?”

“Anything else?”

Hopkins’s voice became charged with delight. “Oh, and I called my wife. We’re going to have dinner and try to work things out. I think she-”

Chase hung up.

Jonah said, “What is it?”

“Nothing.”

“Those were the last customers.” Angie gestured from the backseat. “The place is empty now.”

“Yeah.”

“He’ll be closing up soon. If you go in too late, he’ll know it’s a smash.”

Chase had the 9mm and his tools in the pockets of his jacket. He slid out of the Chevelle and Jonah did the same.

The trouble would be the buzz gate. Shonny Fishman had dealt with thieves for too long not to recognize a couple right off. He’d never let them in. Even if they tapped on the security glass with the guns and acted like they’d shoot their way in, Shonny would just lam it out the back door or pick up a shotgun and blast them like fish in a barrel. Chase knew he’d have to pop the buzz gate.

He hit the door and got his tools out. He was still a little rusty, but after breaking into James Lefferts’s home, Ellie Raymond’s place, and the Nicholson house, he figured he could slip the gate in twenty or thirty seconds.

He told Jonah, “Block the view as much as you can.”

His grandfather moved beside him and started talking loudly, smiling, acting drunk. It’d make Shonny Fishman roll his eyes and be reluctant to buzz them in, but at least he wouldn’t be spooked yet. Jonah had perfect teeth even though he hardly ever showed them. His laugh was boisterous and booming. He was bullshitting about winning two grand on the game tonight. He didn’t mention what kind of game or who the teams might be, because who the hell knew, but he sold it well. The laughter would sound very real to anybody else, but hearing it sent a spike through Chase’s spine.

Under his breath, Jonah said, “Smart fucker, he’s not buying it anymore,” and the door popped.

One second the gun was hidden and the next it was in his hand as Jonah rushed inside and pointed it in Shonny Fishman’s face. He moved Shonny from behind the counter. He kept close, the gun tight in Shonny’s stomach so that no one could peer through the front window and catch what was going on.

Shonny had a bald head ringed by short white hair and covered with caramel-colored freckles and liver spots, a face like an old basset hound that just wanted to stay under the porch. He was short but wiry, with a kind of stable fortitude that would always get him through. The gun annoyed him more than it frightened him.

He said almost casually, “Damn it. I knew you two were up to something. That was very slick. That security gate cost me almost five grand.”

“You need an upgrade,” Chase told him.

“Security tapes,” Jonah said. There were at least two cameras trained on them.

Shonny sighed. “Under the counter.”

Most pawnshops would have the taping equipment in the back, running all the time. But Shonny’s other customers wouldn’t be happy with that. They’d want to see him shut everything off and erase the tapes right in front of them, so he kept the gear close and up front. Jonah motioned Shonny aside and Chase slid behind the counter, shut the equipment down, and popped the tapes.

Chase knew guys like Shonny cared more about their money than their own lives or the lives of their friends. It was a kind of sickness, but there it was, and half the guys he’d ever run into in the bent life were pretty much the same. So Chase wanted to appeal to him fast.

He said, “Shonny, we’re not here for your cash. We could tap-dance around each other for twenty minutes, but I’m all out of patience and time. I want Earl and Ellie Raymond. You deal with them. You still must have some payout for them from the double diamond merchant score. Just give me where they’re holed up and you might walk away from this.”

“‘Might walk away?’ From guys like you two? You’re lying to a dead man, and I’d say that’s simply unforgivable.”

“Maybe you missed the frenzy in my voice, Shonny.” Chase brought the butt of the gun down across Shonny’s bald head and opened a gash up. It wasn’t too hard a shot, but head wounds were notorious bleeders, and already there was a pint leaking down Shonny’s slightly aggrieved face.

Yanking him up by his collar, Chase stuck the barrel of the 9mm under Shonny’s chin. “Might walk away’s about as good as you’re going to get from me, and the longer you make me wait, the thinner your chances get. So how about it?”

You had to give it to him, he was holding on. Some of these old-timers, they figured they had one foot in the grave already so figured they could tell anybody to fuck off. “What do you want with them?”

“I want to sell them some aluminum siding,” Chase said and dug the gun in farther until Shonny let out an ugly “glckk” noise. He lashed his head to the side and a swathe of blood splashed against the floor.

Now maybe they’d get somewhere. Shonny Fishman held out another minute and said, “121 Pine Drive in Smithtown, out on the Island.”

That was Marisa Iverson’s-Ellie Raymond’s-address, the house Chase had broken into.

“You prick.” Chase smacked him in the head again with the barrel of the gun. Shonny cried out but not enough.

All right, it had to be done. Chase worked the guy’s ribs with four fast body blows. No matter how tough you thought you were, a broken rib would change your goddamn mind.

It happened so quick that Shonny Fishman didn’t even scream. He hacked up pink phlegm and started to slide to the floor, but Jonah propped him against the counter.

“Listen, Shonny,” Chase said. “I respect your loyalty, courage, determination, and all that. But next I’m going to shoot off your johnson. I’m not going to kill you, get it? You’re not going to die. But I’ll leave you in a very bad ugly mess, and even an old bastard like you doesn’t want to piss through a tube, right? So, in case you missed it, I don’t want your money. In this world, that makes me as righteous a soul as you’ve ever met. Now, where are they?”

Shonny Fishman’s eyes were brimming with worry now. Even if he wasn’t getting laid regularly or couldn’t get it up anymore a guy still liked to know he had a pecker.

Putting the barrel of the 9mm to Shonny’s crotch, Chase said, “It’s time. Where are they?”

“Foundry Street.”

“Newark?”

“It’s a run-down motel. I don’t know which number room they’re in.”

“How many? Who’s there?”

“Ellie and Earl and Slip.”

The Deuce had mentioned that name. “Slip Jenson. He have a scar on his forehead?”

Shonny had to use his knuckles to clear the blood from the corner of his eyes. “Yeah. The others, I don’t know their names, but they took their share of the initial payout and went to A.C. to blow it on hookers and Texas Holdem. That’s what Earl said.”

That didn’t matter unless one of them was the driver. Chase had to be sure. “Now just one more thing. Who’s the getaway man for their crew?”

“Earl. Earl does all the driving.”

There it was.

Checking out the counter to see if there were any watches or rings he might want to pocket, Jonah said, “If you don’t ace him, he’ll call them and they’ll run again.”

Finally, that got Shonny truly scared. Jonah could do it to you, no matter how solid you were. Shonny started waving his hands, jittering in place. “Wait wait, listen to me, you don’t have to do anything. I’m no trouble to you-”

The cold spot beckoned. Chase slid into it. He was hard and he was cool. Cool enough to know you didn’t snuff some prick just because he’d done business with the guy you really wanted. He couldn’t lose focus on the driver.

“Let’s go in the back.”

“I told you, I’m not a threat! You don’t have to do this!”

“Shonny, you get all uptight at the worst times.”

He slugged Shonny across the back of the head, a blow he figured would keep the guy unconscious for a few hours. It would be all over by then, one way or another. He could feel that now.

The icy breeze in the cold spot whispered the truth to him. There was an understanding about death and murder and the extent of blood and heartache. How grief could drive you out of your head, the way it threatened to do with him right now, the way it had done with his father. He had to hold steady.

Jonah said, “You’re still playing it wrong.”

Chase dragged Shonny Fishman to his back room. There was another cage back there full of jewelry and other high-end items he didn’t leave out front on the floor. He got Shonny’s keys out, tossed the guy inside, and started to close the gate. Jonah stepped forward and pulled a canvas bag from underneath his jacket. He cleaned the shelves and slammed the gate shut.

On their way out he threw the tapes in the bag too.

They walked to the Chevelle and Angie was in the driver’s seat. Chase glared at her and she slid away into the back. She’d played it smart. She’d been prepared in case something went wrong and they had to bolt out of there fast. But you never got behind the wheel of another driver’s car. Unless you were stealing it.

Chase pulled away from the curb and drove like a little old lady up through SoHo, heading for the Holland Tunnel. The engine wanted to scream. So did he.

7

N ot even nine-thirty yet and the motel manager’s office was locked. It was that kind of a place. Nobody needed to spend a night over in this part of Newark unless they were blowing through on a job or looking for a twenty-minute hooker. The manager would be some old man off getting a few beers around the block. He’d be back on deck in a half hour and then he’d go off again when he got too bored. The whores wouldn’t be out in full swing until midnight when they started pulling over tricks on the turnpike or Route 9a. It had once been a residential area and a few dilapidated houses remained. Foundry Street was a dead road in a dead part of a dying city.

Chase popped the door and checked the wall where the room keys were set on hooks. The motel hadn’t upgraded to computerized cards and never would. They’d raze the place first. Seven rooms were currently in use.

He drove slowly through the parking lot peering through the slits between drapes. He spotted some addicts getting wasted, a couple of teenagers watching television getting ready to jump each other, and some drunks with nowhere else to go. Only two rooms had the drapes completely drawn. They were side by side. Chase backed into a spot directly across from them.

He looked for a car that had some real muscle to it but couldn’t spot anything a wheelman would drive. That meant Earl Raymond either parked off site, wasn’t here at the moment, or the crew had already moved on.

“If they’re here, they’ll be in one of those two rooms,” Jonah said.

Angie had one of Lila’s.32s on her now, not quite as small as the Bernadelli but in a tight, closed room you wouldn’t need much more than that. “Or maybe both.”

“That means we have to go into both, at the same time,” Jonah said. “If you hadn’t left the pawnbroker alive we could’ve taken more time and checked things over for as long as we needed to. But this has to end tonight.”

“I want it to end tonight,” Chase told him.

“If you’re still in a talkative mood, get over it now. We go in fast and hard. You ice them or they’ll ice us. They’ve been smarter than you so far because you haven’t wanted to take this all the way. Are you ready to do that now?”

“Yes.”

Angie’s current was riding a little high. Chase could feel her ramped in the backseat. He found her eyes in the rearview and felt a flush of shame for having dragged her into this mess. The old man owed him but she didn’t. He wanted to tell her that she should stay behind, but he knew she’d just give him the whole full-partner spiel again. He didn’t want her baby daughter to grow up without a mother, stuck with a father like Jonah.

Jonah kept watching Chase another few seconds, trying to read the truth. Finally he turned away and said to Angie, “You ready?”

“Yep.”

“Let’s go.”

It was difficult turning the engine off. Chase pocketed the keys and felt the brutal weight of Ellie Raymond’s 9mm against his body. He thought, This isn’t how it should be. I just want the driver. Me and Earl, we should be doing this one on one, with nothing else except our cars. We should rip through the night shredding road, our tires smoking. We should get it up to triple digits and haul ass along empty highways, alone except for the engine and the radio.

Chase tried to hit the cold spot but every time he did he found Lila there, filling it with warmth.

Not much of a plan, really. Jonah took the room to the left, #19, and Chase the one to the right, #18. He got out his tools. He thought they should count to three and do it together, but before he could start he heard Jonah abruptly breaking down the door. So it was like that. No time to slip the lock.

Chase kicked the door in on #18. It wasn’t as easy to break down doors as they made it look in the movies. It hurt and it threw him off a step. Now he was three-four seconds behind, and by the time he got his bearings he saw, with a mixture of relief and revulsion, that he’d found them. Ellie Raymond and two men were inside, scrambling for their weapons.

And goddammit, his grandfather had been right. Chase still was in a talkative mood. He had things to say. The world sped up around him and he was fast enough to meet it, but he couldn’t get out all that was inside him. He heard gunfire next door and wondered if the other guys on the string had come back from Atlantic City early or if Jonah had walked into a drug deal or some shit like that. Ellie Raymond was bending forward, and Chase finally got a good look at her without the disguise. Lovely, firm, vicious, cool and cold, radiant with her lips flattened but her eyes alive with joy. She was an adrenaline junkie, she wanted it rough and wild. She recognized him and let out a heartwarming giggle. The sound of it knifed through his chest. His gaze slid sideways and he saw one of the men moving, digging for a gun under the bed. These people, they all had pistols clipped to the bed frames, they all wanted to cap whoever might fuck them. The guy looked a little scared, worried. His face was flat and ugly, and he had a terrible scar on his forehead. Slip Jenson. Chase checked the other guy and knew, right then, there, that’s him, that’s Earl, the mad-dog shooter, the driver. The guy was smiling, sure. He was all flash. He was handsome as hell, a hard-stepper like his sister, taking it as rough as he could because he liked it that way. Chase wanted to talk but had no idea what to say. Maybe he wanted to ask them their story, what made them this way. They all had their hands on their pistols now. If he couldn’t talk to Earl then they should at least meet each other’s eyes, make that connection, where they both understood that this is the moment to settle all accounts. But Earl was looking at Chase’s chest, bringing up a Glock. The Jonah in Chase’s head said, Fucking shoot them already. The Lila in his head told him, Sweetness, it’s time, it’s time. Of course it was. Chase started firing and so did they.

8

I t happened fast.

The room was small but large enough for two double beds, with a nightstand between them. Earl was behind the bed farthest away, Ellie between the two, Slip Jenson closest to Chase, so he was the one Chase popped first, even though he didn’t have anything against the guy. Jenson’s flat, ugly face got even flatter and much uglier, exploding in a cloud of gristle and bone chips. Chase went down for cover, but Ellie Raymond had her gun hand propped up on the mattress and she shot at Chase as he was moving. The bullet took him high in the right side, spun him around, and took a chunk of meat out from just under his ribs. She’d clipped the lung. He didn’t feel it yet but knew he would soon. Already his breathing changed and he had to suck wind. Chase fell on top of Slip Jenson’s corpse and the dead man spit blood across Chase’s throat.

Ellie Raymond was taking the fight to him. She dove on top of the bed, firing twice, three times, the bullets tearing up the carpet around him. He thought, How could she miss me? Then he realized this was her weakness. She wanted the juice to last so she stretched the action out.

The next one caught him in the lower leg and this time he felt it immediately and he couldn’t help but cry out. It made her toss off another giggle. Still grinning, Earl spoke one word. “Don’t.”

So maybe he wasn’t quite as crazy as his sister, or maybe he just didn’t want her to go it alone like this.

Chase stuck his arm under the bed and fired twice up through the mattress and heard Ellie scream.

He rolled and went for a different angle, trying for Earl across the room now. Earl dogged it into the bathroom, slammed the door, and Chase heard glass shattering.

All of this, and the fucker runs for it and leaves his own sister behind. Ellie showed such loyalty for this? Chase wondered if she’d understand her brother had left her to die.

He tried to stand but his wounded leg wouldn’t support him and he went down again. Son of a bitch. He made the effort again and managed to keep on his feet. He checked Ellie Raymond, laid out across the bed on her back. She was gut-shot and panting, her face slathered in sweat.

“That’s my gun,” she said, holding her bubbling stomach, her face tight with pain.

“Yeah,” he said, his voice strange because there wasn’t enough wind in it.

“I thought you didn’t like guns.”

“I don’t,” he gasped, and shot her twice in the heart.

Weird feeling, having only one lung inflate. Not enough air getting through. Felt like he was slowly drowning. Chase stepped out the door and checked Room #19. There was a businessman with no pants on cowering on the bed with an enormous naked black hooker sitting next to him.

Jonah was sitting in a pool of blood at the foot of the bed. He’d been shot in the back twice but his face didn’t register much pain.

Angie was lying just inside the room, dead. Most of her face had been torn off and flung onto the wall behind her. Chase could see what had happened. She’d made a move on the old man, trying to get out from under him. She’d put two into him and still hadn’t been able to put him down, and Jonah had killed her.

“Jesus fucking Christ,” Chase hissed.

And in Jonah’s face, even now, after clipping the woman who had been like his wife, the mother of his kid, the old man showed nothing. He said, “Give me a hand.”

“In a minute. It’s not over yet.”

Chase moved away, took three steps out the door, and fell on his face.

Lila was there. She came to him and gripped the sides of his face and raised his head. She said, “I didn’t want any of this for you, but we’re in it now. You’ve got to get up, love, he’s coming.”

A shriek of tires erupted from around the corner of the far end of the parking lot. Chase opened his eyes and tried to rouse himself. Earl must’ve parked his muscle in one of the driveways of the decrepit houses around them. A gutsy move being that far away from your wheels. Chase saw a flash of headlights reflected in the windows of the manager’s office a moment before Earl’s car appeared.

So they were going to get to race after all.

Chase stumbled out to the Chevelle and saw that Earl Raymond was driving a gorgeous 1970 Plymouth Superbird with the funky extended front end but without the high back spoiler. It was tuned up right. The 440 V8 damn near howled.

Earl slowed and came to a stop in the distance, checking the scene, trying to squeeze a little more action from it.

Settling behind the wheel of the Chevelle and splashing blood over the seat, Chase twisted the key and felt the power of the engine rise into him.

The Chevelle was ready. Its dark energy merged with his own.

He thought, This is how it’s supposed to be. Both of us in machines, ready to go running around the city. Or just sit back and play chicken, do this short and sweet.

Seventy yards separated them. No chance to build up any real speed, but still, there’d be enough.

They could play tag through Jersey, ripping up these roads, wheeling through residential neighborhoods, and breaking for the highway. They might shake and bump each other for hours, crushing car frames and bouncing loose the suspension, the exhaust systems, mile after mile. Earl occasionally hanging his left arm out and firing mad-dog style.

Where would they end up? The Pine Barrens? Atlantic City? Philly? Mississippi? Would either of them want it to end or would it just be too much fun letting the hammer down and running like that for the remainder of their lives?

Chase thought, This is what he’s thinking too. I can feel it.

Earl revved his engine. Such an old-school thing to do, but he probably couldn’t help himself. His stereo was turned all the way up, a nice speaker system pounding out an incredible bass track that pummeled the night. He was having a ball. Chase wasn’t. He was leaking out across the floor mat.

He waited. The Chevelle’s power burned through him. It worked into his bones, into the back of his skull, rattling away some of the pain but none of the rage.

Earl Raymond had killed Lila and Chase still wanted to talk to him, pull photos from his wallet, stick them in Earl’s face and get some kind of human reaction from him. At least hear his voice, the nuances, the inflections. Watch his eyes. Earl stood on the brake and the gas pedal together, the tires screeching insanely, smoking like a brush fire had been set underneath the Superbird. He dropped off the brake and tore at Chase, eating the space between them.

Chase moved into the cold spot. It frosted his burning mind. He saw what he had to do.

He opened the door and climbed out.

He walked away from the Chevelle.

A driver without any muscle but with plenty of drive. Chase doubled over and let out Walcroft’s noise. Then he straightened himself as his blood hit the asphalt.

He stood his ground as the Plymouth ripped toward him, edging past 30 mph, 40, 50. Earl hung his left arm out the window and blasted away.

A bullet took Chase in the collarbone and his right arm went dead. But he didn’t drop the gun.

He reached for it with his left and had to pry the numb fingers of his right hand from around the pistol.

There was still time, he could do this. He was fast. Even now, sounding like a busted bellows, his chest heaving. He closed his fist around the 9mm and lifted his left arm and started firing.

The Plymouth was so damn close now, the blazing headlights illuminating Chase with an icy intensity that met with his own inner cool. He fired blindly five times.

He missed. The grille was less than thirty feet away, the car hauling in at about sixty. Time maybe for one last pull of the trigger, or maybe not. The world was nothing but light. He snapped a final shot off.

Now the front end was no more than ten feet away, and Chase was going to die beneath three thousand pounds of Detroit muscle. It actually made him grin.

Earl cared for the car but wasn’t overzealous about it. If he had been, he would’ve restored it fully and put the funky back spoiler on even if it did make the Superbird stand out. He didn’t quite love the car enough.

There was a slight pull to the right and the Plymouth angled just enough to miss Chase as it roared past.

He got a good look. The last bullet had smashed Earl’s head apart and a nice red cascade had covered the dashboard and the inside of the windshield.

The Superbird’s side mirror caught Chase’s left hand and he felt three of his fingers break. It spun him around and he polished the driver’s door with the seat of his pants. He went down again and watched the car make a wild turn and plow into the front of Room #18, roaring over and crushing the bodies of the crew. The idle was stuck high and the engine kept screaming. Chase wanted to join it, but the Jonah in his head said, Get the fuck up.

His grandfather was there telling him, “Get the fuck up.”

9

J onah drove like shit. Chase could see why the old man always needed a getaway driver, and why during the Philly museum heist escape he’d nearly run over a teenage girl. Way too loose with the wheel, too heavy on the gas pedal, taking turns too tight. He swerved all over the road trying to get to the George Washington Bridge. Maybe the two bullets in his back had something to do with it, but still.

Clearly Jonah still knew his way around the area but not as well as Chase did, and the old man kept barking questions, asking if he should take a left or right here to get uptown, which way was quickest to the East Side. Chase tried to focus and keep his eyes on the road but his vision kept doubling, tripling. Racking coughs filled his mouth with blood. Even then, he couldn’t brush past the nagging feeling that he was staining the seat. The next thief who boosted the Chevelle was going to have his work cut out for him when it came to the detailing.

Way uptown on 203rd, right on the Harlem River, Jonah finally got them to a safe doctor, which meant the guy was a fucking butcher. He was also a junkie and looked high on speed or meth. He’d fallen from grace decades ago and stared vacantly but bright-eyed at Chase. The guy looked happy and genuinely deranged.

He gave Chase a needle and said, “This will kill the pain.”

It didn’t. Five minutes later, while the guy poked around in the bullet wounds, scratching at the collarbone, Chase wailed as loudly as he could, which wasn’t much above a whisper because of the collapsed lung. He tried to reach his good hand out to Jonah but the arm was nearly useless. Still, Jonah knew what Chase was doing, and Chase was surprised as hell when his grandfather took it. That meant something but he wasn’t sure what.

The doctor yanked on Chase’s arm and leg and felt around his ribs. No bones had been broken except for the fingers. The bullets had gone straight through. The doctor said he was lucky. Not much muscle damage. But the blood loss. The chance for infection. The lung. He got out needles and tubes and shoved them into Chase’s chest.

You get shot three times and somebody still has to come along and put more holes in you. Chase didn’t feel lucky. The doctor leaned forward and clasped the tube between his lips and started to blow. Chase felt his lung expanding but was suddenly worried about what kind of germs this dude was breathing into him. Chase vomited from the pain and passed out.

He dreamed of his sibling who had never been born. The baby sat at the kitchen table in a high chair. Chase couldn’t tell if it was a boy or a girl. The kid knew more answers than he did. The kid had been there the day his mother had been murdered and had died with her. Chase asked questions he couldn’t hear. The kid responded in Chase’s own voice, going, You already know all that, don’t you?

Once he came awake for only a few seconds and saw the doctor working on Jonah’s back, the old man’s skin and muscle held open by retractors. There was blood everywhere. His grandfather didn’t make a sound, the hard son of a bitch. It seemed impossible.

Now that the driver was iced, Chase realized that Jonah hadn’t done much in the way of helping him at all. He’d punched in the wrong door and wound up acing his own woman, leaving Chase to take down the three crew members by himself.

He whispered, “You know, you didn’t do shit.”

With the doc drilling for bullets around the old man’s spine, Jonah said, “You were two minutes from being dead when I got you here. Does that count?”

With a sluggish anger trying to overcome him, Chase wanted to say, Fuck no, that wasn’t the job, but he was already unconscious.

The next time he woke he was bandaged, his hand was in a cast, and he could barely move, but the painkillers had finally kicked in because he didn’t feel much. There were drains all over him. He was hooked to a couple of IVs and a blood bag. He didn’t even want to think about where the blood had come from. Jonah was sitting up staring out the window, where you could just make out the Grand Concourse in the Bronx across the river to the east.

Jonah said, “You’ve been out for two and a half days. Doc says you’ll be okay if your heart doesn’t stop.”

“Terrific.”

“Go easy on the lung.”

Chase had to wonder, How the hell do you go easy on a lung? No scuba diving? No marathons? No deep breaths? He tried to struggle up but nothing would work right.

His grandfather said, “It’ll be a couple more days before you can be moved.”

“How much is he costing us?”

“Nothing, I did a favor for him once.”

That made no sense. Jonah never did favors. All it meant was he’d crossed up with the doc at one point and hadn’t killed him. “What’s he on?”

“I’m not sure. Coke, maybe.”

“What’s he know about us?”

“He doesn’t know anything about anything,” Jonah said. “That’s why we can come to him.”

Sleep drew Chase down again, but he fought the tide, knowing he needed to think a few things through. Morgan and Murray would be on to him now. He’d practically lit the sky with a blazing neon arrow pointing to himself. Still, he didn’t think they’d press him too hard, but you never knew. Who cared exactly how a cop killer got taken down? They were macho hard-asses, they might like that Chase had handled this himself even if there were four bodies left behind. They could juggle the paperwork, take some of the credit for it, get their photos in the papers with some of the gropers. He figured Morgan would let it slide, but Murray might be trouble. It didn’t matter much, one way or the other. He’d done what had to be done, and if he had to go on the run with them chasing behind him, or if he wound up in the can for twelve to fifteen, or if they got him in a corner and made him draw, he’d do it for his girl.

Four days later, on the way home, lying in the backseat and still smelling the oil from Angie’s Bernadelli subcompact, Chase asked the old man, “Does it bother you that you she made a play?”

Jonah, too heavy on the gas, barreling through traffic on the parkway, said, “I expected it.”

“Why?”

“I always expect it.”

“Yeah, but do you ever understand it?”

Jonah caught his eyes in the rearview. The car shimmied. The old man hardly looked at the road, like he thought there would never be a curve ahead. “It happened once before. And for the same reason. Over a kid.”

“What? With who?”

“Another foolish woman.”

“Yeah, but who?”

Jonah said nothing for miles. Then, “Are you going to try me?”

“What?”

“She asked you to, didn’t she?”

“Why didn’t you just let her go?”

“She could’ve left anytime. But I need Kylie. Blood is important.”

As if the names on his scarred arms actually meant anything. “Since when?”

“Forever.”

“Do you love anything?”

The old man’s gaze held him in the mirror. You could spend your whole life trying to figure out what Jonah knew about love and grief, and you’d never get an answer.

Chase thought he should’ve tried harder to help Angie, to dissuade her from taking a run at Jonah, at least with a.32. Maybe a.44. Maybe Chase should’ve drawn on him. Yanked a gun or thrown at least one good punch if nothing else. Whatever happened afterward, it might’ve been worth it.

But then he remembered his grandfather gripping his hand in the doc’s office. That meant something. Anyone else, you might say it was a gesture of the heart. But the old man would always be beyond him. And always inside of him.

10

J onah didn’t plan to stay. He packed the van with his gear and kept pulling out whatever belonged to Angie and leaving it on the side of the garage. There wasn’t a lot. The little pile became a slightly larger little pile as he added a belt, a scarf. All that was left of the woman’s history, besides her child somewhere in Florida, could be fit into a shoe box.

Popping a handful of pills the doc had given him, Chase swallowed them dry. Painkillers and antibiotics, but they didn’t seem to be doing much good so far. He’d reached his limit and was covered in cold sweat. His bandages had soaked through and needed changing.

He leaned against the hood of the Chevelle, almost ready to drop, staring up at his grandfather through his damp hair.

Jonah said, “It’s a nice house. You shouldn’t sell it.”

“It’s over for me here. I’m leaving.”

“Any idea where you’ll go?”

“No,” Chase said. “But I’ll get you your money.”

“Forget that.”

Chase had been through a lot these last few weeks, but his grandfather’s voice now, the words he spoke, nearly took out his knees. He wavered.

“What?”

“After what I nabbed from Fishman the fence and scored off the crew, I made out all right.”

“The crew? When did you score them?”

“There was ninety grand in the closet of their motel room,” Jonah said.

“When did you have a chance to dig around in their room?”

“Before I pulled you out of there.”

Which meant that while Chase was dying in the lot bleeding out, and everyone in the crew was dead, and the Superbird was still roaring with a corpse’s foot jammed down on the pedal, the car wedged into the front of the room having crashed through the wall, Jonah had staggered around with two in the back after having just killed the mother of his child and dug among the bodies to find the cash.

The old man had finished packing the van.

He got to the door and said, “You know how to get in touch with me if you need to.”

Same thing he’d said ten years ago when they’d split up.

And then his grandfather pulled out of the garage and drove off past the Nicholsons’ house and was just as gone.

The Jonah inside Chase’s head said, Don’t ever trust me. I’m going to kill you one day.

11

T he weakness overpowered him for the next two days, but the next morning he felt much stronger. He got out of bed and cleaned up the blood in the Chevelle. He took more of the pills the doc had given him. Throughout the day he had freezing fits where he shook uncontrollably. His heart slugged against his ribs. The lung would work fine for a while and then his breathing would grow ragged and come in bites and gasps where he couldn’t get enough air.

He should’ve cut the car loose of it by now. The businessman and the hooker had seen it at the motel, but it was a long shot anyone had grabbed the license. The car owed him and he owed the car. You don’t soup this kind of muscle and not use it. The dark energy inside it still wanted out. He knew he’d have use of it farther on down the line.

He called a real estate agent to put the house up for sale. She showed up the next day and walked around the property, took measurements of the rooms and made lots of notes on her clipboard. They settled on a starting price, which was higher than Chase had expected.

Somebody finally got worried about Mrs. Nicholson and went over there and called the cops. It blew wide. The prowl cars stacked up in the road and the police canvassed the area. They came to his door and asked him questions about the Nicholsons. Animal control came along later that day with just as many vehicles as the cops had. It took four guys twenty minutes to round up all the cats.

The police wouldn’t be able to cross all the T’s but they’d have enough to satisfy them. They’d find out what Timmy Rosso’s real name was and discover he was just a bartender posing as a criminal. They’d figure correctly he was double-crossed by wiser minds. There wouldn’t be a high premium on the old lady and her retarded son.

In the morning, Morgan showed up at Chase’s front door. He stared into Chase’s eyes for a while and noted the bandages and the cast and said, “You look like shit.”

“Feel that way too.”

Staring some more, the hard-ass cop in Morgan wanted the entire truth, but didn’t want it that badly. He’d already figured most of it out anyhow. How could he not? It was more or less a straight line from his own desk to the motel.

Morgan nodded at the FOR SALE sign on the lawn. “You leaving?”

“Yeah.”

“Soon?”

“Yeah.”

“Good. Get the fuck out of here. Go far away. I don’t ever want to see you again.”

“You won’t,” Chase said.

12

Y ou moved into the night and the night moved into you.

Chase showed up at the Deuce’s chop shop. “That don’s son. He still need someone who can drive?”

“Yeah,” Deucie said, “but things are really ugly over there. I was an asshole to mention it to you in the first place. Infighting, mob-war bullshit. Between different families, in the same family, between New York and Jersey and Chicago, and the feds up everybody’s ass with a microscope. A lot of bodies are turning up in the East River, or not at all. They’re icing each other in restaurants, on street corners, wiping out girlfriends and kids like in the bad old days.”

“Make the call.”

Chewing the end of his cigar, Deucie frowned and stood there for a minute studying Chase. Then he let out a sigh of defeat and ran off to do it. Chase climbed back into the Chevelle and shut his eyes, the engine humming, crooning a love song to him.

The house was gone. Lila was buried twelve hundred miles away. He thought of Jonah out there, maybe with his baby girl and maybe not. The thought of the girl growing up in the life, following Jonah’s lead, as bent as him, made Chase’s stomach tighten. Sweat swarmed his back, but he was still too weak.

He figured there couldn’t be that many professional surfers in Sarasota with wives named Milagro, who they called Milly. He could find the kid one way or another, his two-year-old aunt Kylie. He’d track her eventually, when he had a choice to offer her. Jonah had been right about one thing. Blood was important.

Chase had questions. He wanted to know why his father had said that he’d asked to make an appeal to the killer, when the truth was the cops had backed him into doing it. Chase wanted to know why his mother had cried so much right before she died.

The dream returned in full force. His unborn sibling tugging at his hand, Chase listening intently to the child, who knew the answers. A couple lines repeating themselves.

Angie had said, Everyone else he destroys. More than you know.

Jonah had said someone else had tried to kill him over a kid.

Another foolish woman.

Chase couldn’t shake those words. They hummed and buzzed and bit at him.

He thought, Did Jonah murder my pregnant mother?

Waving a scrap of paper, Deuce returned and tried once more to talk Chase out of the job. Chase checked the name and address and said good-bye.

He cruised out of the shop and hit the street. He didn’t feel any fear or hope or excitement. Just a nagging curiosity about his own past that would sharpen within him and drive him forward into another, perhaps a more decisive, confrontation with Jonah. Chase had shifted gears again, and now his life was on a different road. He still had things to do. Soothing music on the radio promised escape and intimacy as he drove on into the darkness thinking, Here it is. Here I am.