CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

Jeanette saw her leave the apartment building, striding down the sidewalk at a brisk pace that only the person who had frightened her would recognize as a near-run. To anyone else, the girl named Allison could have just been late for an appointment or worried she'd miss a bus.

A heavy duffel bag swung at her side, and this disturbed Jade. Was Allison, or Steffi, or whatever she wanted to call herself, splitting altogether? Leaving town? Was she worried she'd miss a bus? A Greyhound to another state?

But Allison didn't matter. Scoot was what mattered.

By five o'clock, evening was descending over the city like a flight of dusky moths. Most of the shops in the neighborhood were closing. Jade returned to her car, waited until the bulk of the street and sidewalk traffic had eased, and then calmly set about breaking into the thrift store.

She wasn't concerned about setting off an alarm, and didn't need to be. The back door, which was marked 'Emergency Exit Only' and opened onto an alley, had a cheap lock that broke after only two hard strikes with a hammer from the toolkit in the trunk of her car. No braying sirens split the air, no lights flashed. Who would bother installing an expensive system to protect a bunch of donated junk?

The store had been closed all day and there was the slim chance that it was because the proprietor was doing inventory. However, once Jeanette was inside, she found the place utterly deserted.

The scent of it brought back her childhood again, that unwelcome rush of memories. Musty upholstery. Harsh, cheap detergent. The poor-sweat of customers who'd handled the items on display. Rust. Mildew. She could almost see herself here, that younger Jeanette, pushing the cart for her mother while Mitchell kicked and squalled in the seat and Carrie and Deena pleaded for naked Barbie dolls in plastic bags, or threadbare stuffed animals. Their mother would be loading the cart with school clothes for them … mostly with the knees out or the cuffs frayed or splotched with bleach stains or missing buttons.

Shuddering, she forced those thoughts out of her mind and set about a purposeful search. The overhead fixtures were out, but enough light came in through the wide front windows to allow her to make her way through the store easily enough. Her petite stature made it easy to duck down unseen behind the stacks of cookie tins, wicker baskets, board games and holiday decorations on the shelves that topped the racks, if any pedestrians should happen by.

In the ladies' wear section, she selected the best outfit that she could assemble from the choices. The idea of putting on the clothes turned her stomach, but she had been seen by too many people in the black track suit, and it wasn't right for what she needed now.

She started with dark grey slacks, in the middle ground between dressy and casual. They were too long, but she found a pair of nearly-new black suede slouch boots to tuck them into. A plain white blouse with fake pearl buttons went under a vee-necked sweater in a green, white and grey diamond-shaped pattern, one sleeve bearing a cigarette burn on the inside of the elbow.

In all her younger years she had never once gotten lice or ringworm from thrift-store clothes, the thought of such vermin nagged persistently as she dressed in the plywood stall of the changing room. She stuck the track suit and hooded warm-up jacket on a spare hanger and jammed them onto a rack. The sneakers, she shelved with the other shoes. Everything that had been in her pockets went into a black purse with a strap she wore crossing her body from shoulder to hip. She suspected that she would carry her purses like that from now on.

By the time she was done changing, no police cars had been summoned by any silent alarm or keen-eyed passerby, so Jeanette let herself out the same way she had come in. Instead of returning to the car, she walked down the alley toward Dunley, behind the ugly backsides of the 6th Street businesses.

She saw two stray cats and a homeless woman, and then she was back on Dunley across the street from the used bookstore. She had watched Allison long enough to see the girl enter the bookstore, and remembered how the wheelchair-bound clerk had sounded so protective and fond of her.

Strange. He had struck Jeanette as an intelligent, literate guy. Not the sort who would run with a brain-dead slut like Steffi. Nor had Allison seemed much like Steffi in person. So what was she doing with Bigfoot? Or had it all been some sort of weird mix-up that Jeanette couldn't yet fit together?

The bookstore was dark, the 'Closed' sign in the door. Jeanette headed for the apartment building, moving like she knew where she was going and belonged here as much as anyone.

Getting in wouldn't be a problem … an elderly man with his pants hiked up to his armpits had propped the front door open with a rolled newspaper as he exerted himself into a stroke lugging groceries from a beat-to-shit old station wagon illegally parked at the curb.

Jeanette stood back out of his way as he went past, arms trembling to support a box full of canned goods – creamed corn, stew, soup, tuna. "It's … for … my … sister," he said. "Food … bank. She's … a shut … in. Fourth … floor."

"Let me get the elevator for you," she said, darting around him to thumb the button. In the wall, gears groaned and cables creaked, and before the doors even slid open, Jeanette knew that she wouldn't get in that thing if her life depended on it. The prospect of plunging down the shaft wasn't nearly as daunting as that of being trapped in the claustrophobic little cage, unable to get out, having to wait for rescue.

"Thanks!" wheezed the old man. "Going … up?"

"I'll take the stairs," she said, smiling and giving him a cheerful little wave.

Allison's apartment was on the second floor. Jeanette got out, nose wrinkling at old, familiar smells not much better than those of the thrift store. A cat box, diapers, the yellowed-newspaper stink of old people, stale cigarette smoke, frying onions.

The only person in the hall was a little boy, sitting on the carpet playing with a toy garage and a bunch of Matchbox cars. The door behind him was open, and the source of the frying-onion smell as well as the sound of a Seinfeld rerun on the television.

"Hello," the little boy said.

"Hi."

She didn't linger, kept on going. When she glanced back, the kid had lost interest in her and gone back to his cars.

The row of intercom buttons out front had shown an 'Arnold Kaminski' in 211 and an 'A. Montgomery' in 206, and no other A-names. 206 lined up with Jeanette's orientation of where she remembered the balcony being, and moments later she was at the door.

Now she had to move fast. The kid wasn't much of a witness, only two or three years old and paying more attention to his cars, but even he was bound to remember if the nice blonde lady took too long getting through the door, or had to do something as dramatic as kicking it down.

This lock, though, opened readily enough after a few pokes with a slim strip of metal that Jeanette kept with her for just such an occasion. She let herself in, glanced back again, saw the kid trying to drive his cars up the wall, and shut the door.

Allison's apartment was dark and quiet, and the smell of carpet shampoo hung in the air. Jeanette drew the drapes across the window that gave onto the balcony, then switched on the lamp.

She saw what was missing first. No television. And an odd sense of absence to the furniture, as if some large piece should have been present but wasn't. A sunburst clock hung askew on the wall, the hands pointing almost straight up and down as it ticked its way toward six.

Bigfoot had been here. Had been shot here. That was why the place smelled of wet carpets and shampoo. That was why some of the furniture was missing, either broken in the struggle or hauled away later with bloodstains. Jeanette had seen plenty of gunshot wounds and knew all too well how they bled. There was a lot of what Rayburn liked to call 'the claret' in a person.

But what, what had Bigfoot been doing here in the first place? What did Allison have to do with Steffi have to do with Scoot?

She was missing something. Overlooking some vital part of all this. And it was driving her crazy.

The tape cassette was not in the recorder. Scoot had listened to it, she was sure. And the fact that he'd taken it out suggested that he had either given it to the police, or hidden it for his own reasons. Had he hidden it here?

Hastily, she tossed the apartment. She found nothing to suggest that the girl who lived here was involved with any guy, let alone a stoner like Bigfoot. She examined a collection of small trinket boxes, some of which were very nice, expensive and imported. Some of the pieces of jewelry were quite good as well, and that in itself made her wonder all over again what this girl was doing involved with Bigfoot. Why hadn't he yet ripped off her good pieces and hawked them to support his drug habit?

The furnishings, though, could have come right from the thrift store. The clothes likewise, though there were some nicer outfits.

The books were mostly thrillers and mysteries – J.A. Jance, James Patterson, Jonathan and Faye Kellerman, Sharyn McCrumb, Janet Evanovich, Tami Hoag, the ubiquitous King and Koontz – with a few fantasy and romance standards by Anne McCaffrey, Robert Jordan, David Eddings and Katherine Kurtz. By the look of them, they had been purchased at the used bookstore.

She found a letter in with a stack of mail, and read the childlike printing with growing curiosity.

Dear Allie, I miss you, when are you coming home? David is going to tennis camp this summer and Steven to music camp so it will be boring here. Mom says it won't because I will have Danny to play with but Danny is a baby and he bites me. I drew you a picture so you remember who I am. Love, Missy.

In with the letter was a fairly skillful drawing showing a large house and a family, and a red-haired girl with sad eyes.

The envelope was embossed, with an ornate calligraphy M and the return address stamped into the upper corner in gold leaf. That was when Jeanette's brow really furrowed. She knew that neighborhood. It made Palmyra Hills look like tract housing and her own gated community look like the ghetto.

What in the world was a daughter of that kind of wealth and privilege doing living in a place like this? How had she gotten hooked up with a loser like Bigfoot?

Most of all, what was she, Jeanette, missing? The more she learned, the less it all added up.

She flipped through a bunch of celebrity gossip magazines in a wicker rack, more in the interest now of trying to get a handle on who Allison really was than for anything else, and froze when she uncovered a manila folder.

Hardly daring to blink for fear it would vanish like a mirage, she snatched it up and opened it.

Benedict Westbrook's bronzed, smiling face looked up at her.

The information! It was here, all of it, the papers that Rayburn had given her, the photographs, the addresses, the times and places!

A wave of dizziness went through her head and she had to brace herself against the wall. She clutched the folder to her chest to assure herself that it was real.

The folder was here. It had not been turned over to the police. The gun was in their hands, yes. After the shooting, it would have been taken. But not the folder. She put it in her new black purse.

The tape was gone … did that mean the police had the tape? Or did that mean the tape had been hidden?

And what about the money? If anything, that was what the shooting had been about. Probably the reason behind the lumpy purple mess of the girl's face, too. No attempted rape, but a disagreement over the cash. Twenty-five thousand would be a tempting pie, with everyone wanting the bigger slice.

Except … damn it, that didn't make sense either, if Allison was a rich girl. Unless she was disowned. Did people still do that? She had no idea.

A sudden voice made her twitch to a state of wary, catlike alertness. It wasn't in the apartment, which was a single room with a puny bathroom, but it was close. A moment later she realized it was coming from the other side of a sliding door, and was accompanied by the sounds of running water and sliding drawers.

"—a mistake to have anything to do with him," the voice said. It was a woman, textured with a slight Spanish accent. She sounded tired and irritated.

Distantly, a male voice responded, but Jeanette couldn't make out the words. She thought one might have been 'brother.'

The woman with the Spanish accent said, "But I am your sister, Hector, doesn't that mean anything to you?"

Hector!

Pots and pans clattered. "I would think after last night you would know better," the woman said. "You could have gone to jail. Why did you have to shoot him? There must have been some other way."

Jeanette drew her gun and held it against her thigh as she approached the door. She saw that it would be easy to open – throw the bolt, slide the door, and she'd be in. She'd get some actual-damn-answers, instead of just more questions.

Cupboards opened and closed. Ice clinked into a glass. There was the unmistakable hiss-pop of a soda can, and a fizzy gurgle. "I just don't know what all that business was that he was saying," the woman said. "Purse-snatchings and women with guns –"

The sound of the pouring soda had covered the metallic rasp of the bolt, and Jeanette flung the door aside at the word "guns."

**

CHAPTER THIRTY

Jamie listened to every word without interrupting, his only response being an intrigued, interested look that grew more pronounced with each revelation.

When she was done, Allison sat back and regarded him with wary expectation. "Well?"

"Wow," he said.

"Wow? Is that all?"

"You've got to give me a minute to let it all sink in."

"Okay." She needed a minute herself, really. She already felt better for having gotten it all out, but at the same time was wondering what she had been thinking to tell him so much. He wouldn't let her walk away now. He'd insist on being with her, on helping. He couldn't leave her to face this alone.

It would, she thought, serve her right if that was exactly what he did. If he gave her a hearty commiserating clap on the back and said, "Gee, Allison, that's a hell of a tale, thanks for sharing, thanks, see ya, bye." It would be just what she deserved.

"So you think this woman – Jade – killed someone this morning," he said after a long, thoughtful pause.

"Yes," Allison said.

"You should call the police."

"But I'd have to tell them how I got myself into this mess."

"Yeah, they'd probably like to know."

"I'd be arrested! I stole her purse –"

"For God's sake, Allison, do you really expect her to press charges?"

"What about all the other purses?"

"Slap on the wrist," Jamie said, and he sounded mildly annoyed with her, as if she was quibbling over petty meaningless details and ignoring the bigger picture. Which, in fact, she was. "If they even care about that at all. You'd be giving them a murderer. A serial killer."

Allison shivered. "A serial killer?"

"Well, maybe not," he amended. "She doesn't sound like a psycho, like the ones you hear about on the news. But a repeat killer, at the very least. A multiple-murderer. An assassin. You can't possibly believe that this is the first time she's done this. From everything you told me about the tape, and your conversations with her, it sounds like she's done this plenty of times before. If you can hand the police a way to tie up who-knows-how-many unsolved murders, the last thing they'll care about is you swiping a few handbags."

"It isn't that easy," she said, though she knew he was right. "I don't really know anything about her. She didn't leave her driver's license in her purse."

"Fingerprints, her voice on tape, and you've seen her. More than once. Are you telling me you couldn't describe her? That'd give them a good place to start."

"What if they don't catch her, though? She knows who I am. She knows where I live. She'll come after me." Allison touched her bruised cheekbone. She already didn't feel safe in her own home, and to have a professional killer mad at her was enough to ensure she might never feel safe again, anywhere.

"We're not going to let that happen," Jamie said. "The police will catch her. They'll protect you. Besides, you have other places you can go."

"I don't want to bring Uncle Bob any more into this than I already have. And my family … I don't want them to know at all."

"There's me."

"You've done too much already."

"Don't push me out of this, Allison. Don't even think that." He squeezed her hand almost hard enough to hurt.

"Jamie …"

"And you have a lot of friends in this neighborhood," Jamie said. "You know how they rally 'round."

"Oh, sure," Allison said. "When it's something like Needles breaking the arms of that pervert, or even the way they supported Hector for shooting Jon … because those were bad guys. Bad guys getting what was coming to them. And when Mrs. Oberdorfer, or Needles and Tisha, or anybody else finds out what I've been doing, they'll think that I'm a bad guy, too. That if some killer shoots me in the head, I'll be getting what's coming to me, too."

"They won't."

"They will! And then I won't have anywhere to go, anyplace I can call home."

"Allison." He took her by the shoulders and made her look at him. "I'm sorry to say it like this, but … this isn't about you."

"What?"

"If you don't go to the police, that woman is going to get away with what she's done. She's going to get away with murder. What if she does come after you, and kill you? Then she'll get away with that, too. And she'll go whack this Westbrook guy and he'll die, and even if she leaves him alone, what about all the other people after him? You think she'd quit? She'd just move on to the next job. And you'll be responsible."

She blinked at him, feeling thunderstruck, and the only thing that came out of her mouth was incredibly childish and inane. "Well, if I'm dead, I won't care, will I?"

"Won't you?" he countered.

"What, is this an afterlife thing? God's going to punish me?"

He shrugged. "Nobody knows for sure."

"I never would have guessed you as the religious type," she said, thinking that if anything, he should have refused to believe in, or outright turned away from, any good Lord so merciful as to stick him in that awful wheelchair.

The corner of Jamie's mouth lifted in a slantwise grin. "It's a miracle I'm even alive, so who am I to doubt? I should have died in that accident."

Her gaze shifted to his legs, which looked so normal. A little thin, maybe, the muscles not as toned as the rest of him. Then, feeling guilty for staring at him like that, she blushed.

"You've never asked how I ended up on wheels."

"I thought it'd be rude and nosy." And, though she couldn't bring herself to say it, she'd always just figured he had been born that way.

He smiled. "You'll steal and paw through some stranger's purse, but it's rude and nosy to ask a friend about himself?"

"Well … I …"

"Remember the other day, you came over and caught me watching adventure racing? I used to do it."

"You did? With the … rock climbing and the kayaking and the freezing your butt off in the remote wilderness?"

"Yeah." Jamie's smile softened into a faraway expression, part nostalgia, part bitterness for what was lost, part exhilaration. "It seems like such a long time ago. I was outdoorsy as a kid. Hiking with my dad, mountain biking, white water rafting. Mom hated it, thought he was going to get both of us killed. She was a city girl. The funny thing was, that was what killed them. The city."

"The city killed them?"

"They were mugged one night coming home from a restaurant. It was their twenty-fifth anniversary. I was in college. The way I heard it was that Dad thought he could take the robber. But as fast as he was, he couldn't beat a bullet."

"Oh, Jamie, I'm so sorry!"

"School seemed meaningless after that," he said. "I wasn't learning anything that I couldn't learn from books. So, with the insurance money and what I got from selling the house, I dropped out of school and became an adventure racer. Bought all the highest-tech gear. Flew all over the world. South America, New Zealand, Russia, everywhere. I was getting pretty good. Good enough to compete. My dream was to get on a team for the Eco-Challenge, the big one by Mark Burnett."

"The Survivor guy, sure," Allison said, recognizing the name.

"Then, my luck ran out," Jamie said.

"You don't have to tell me –"

"I know."

"Okay," she said. "If you're sure."

He got that faraway look again. "It was a biking leg. I was with my girlfriend and her –"

Allison jumped a little, and Jamie laughed. She started to blabber some apology, but he gestured her to silence.

"Yes, I even had a girlfriend," he said. "Kirsten. Another racer. She and her brother Kevin were rising stars on the circuit, and we all sort of fell in together. Kevin was the driving force, though. We all saw what we were doing as a personal challenge, but Kevin really had a conquer-the-world thing. Nothing was ever good enough. He was the one who had to go higher, faster, more extreme. But even when he was being Captain Ahab, he had a way of encouraging us to go to lengths we would have thought were impossible."

"Was she pretty? Kirsten?" She was disgusted with herself to find that as Jamie revealed his tragic past, what most hooked into her like cat claws was jealousy at this mention of a girlfriend.

"Honestly? Not really. Tough, healthy, tanned, strong, fit … but not really pretty. It didn't matter, though. There are so few female racers that any of them are considered a good catch."

"Like in skateboarding," Allison said. "A lot of groupies, not many girls who actually get on a board."

"It was late," he said, and she could tell that he was seeing another place far removed from this musty book-smelling back office. "Sunset. Gorgeous country. We were up in the Canadian Rockies, in a part of the world where you could almost believe you were the first explorers on a new planet. The only signs of civilization we could even see were the contrails from jets. Kevin wanted to make the next marker by dark, and we'd had some delays along the way. A rockslide that we had to get off our bikes and climb over, carrying them. Winds, some snow."

Allison felt awestruck by his simple words, and at the knowledge that Jamie Tremayne, pleasant Jamie from the bookstore, had once led a life far more filled with risks and thrills than her own. She also felt juvenile and stupid. What was Scoot and a skateboard compared with this?

"So we pressed on," Jamie said. "At twilight, at that elevation, everything was unearthly. The snow on the mountains seemed to glow like moonlight, though the moon wasn't up. The first few stars were out, and the last of the sunlight was this clear gold that made all the colors and details leap at you. The air was icy-crisp and sharp as a scalpel. I was bringing up the rear, behind Kirsten. My front tire hit a rock, and when I bounced over it, I came down on a patch of ice. That was it for me."

"What happened?"

"I don't remember," he said hollowly. "I remember everything right up until that point. How the stripes on Kirsten's suit were this iridescent green, almost neon. How my leg muscles ached, but it was a good ache, the kind you get from exercise, the kind full of pride and accomplishment. I remember how hungry I was and how much I was looking forward to stopping for the night. Then there was the rock, and the ice, and darkness."

"What about Kevin and Kirsten?"

"They heard me go over. They told me later that my bike flipped, then slid, and went into a ravine. I hit at least three trees, and the last one kept me from going over a forty-foot drop. The bike did go over. I saw it later and it looked like a metal rag some giant had wrung out."

"Oh, my God," Allison murmured. To think that he could have died … long before she even had the chance to meet him …

"I was in a coma for nineteen days," Jamie said. "Kevin and Kirsten got down to me, called for help, and waited with me. They had me airlifted out by helicopter. I'd broken both legs – the left in two places, the right in four. Crushed three vertebrae. Broken one arm and dislocated the shoulder. Nine ribs, one of which punctured a lung. And to top it all off, I fractured my skull. My helmet was cracked clean in two."

She put her arms around him, and though she knew those injuries had been years ago, and had long since healed as much as they were going to, she did so carefully. As if she would hurt him. Her eyes were wide and her chin was quivering with retroactive fear and shock for what had happened to him.

"The doctors didn't think I would ever come out of the coma, or that if I did, I'd be so brain damaged that I would have been better off dead. They got in touch with my closest relative, an aunt on my father's side, and started sounding her out about organ donation."

"You're kidding!" Allison gasped.

"Hey, they move fast when they've got a live one," Jamie said. "So to speak."

"They would've …"

"Harvested me," he said. "Heart, kidneys, corneas –"

"That's revolting!"

"I was a young guy, prime of health except for being a human jigsaw puzzle. No sense letting all that good material go to waste, if it could have helped some other people live a better life."

"It's so … vulturish. Were they trying to get your aunt to pull the plug?"

He went grim. "Kirsten told me later that they were leaning on her pretty heavily. Poor Aunt Sarah had only met me three times, one of them at my parents' funeral, and she didn't know what I would have wanted. She took so long to make up her mind that I came out of the coma and ruined the harvesting team's hopes."

"Good!" Allison said vehemently.

"I spent another month in the hospital, had a bunch of surgeries. Then eight months of rehab and physical therapy." He spoke lightly, glossing it over, but Allison was sure that those had been months and months of raw torture and sheerest living hell.

"Jamie, I'm so sorry."

"It could have been worse. I lived. I surprised everyone by not being a vegetable, by not showing any lingering signs of brain damage at all. But they told me I'd never walk on my own again. In a way, it would have been better to be brain damaged, because I wouldn't have known what I was losing."

"Don't say that," she said, holding him tighter, as if she could somehow undo his pain with her embrace.

"The kid I was then thought so, anyway," he said. "For that Jamie, it was the end of everything. No more races. Stuck in a wheelchair for the rest of my life. Not even able to stand upright without help. It was worse than being dead. I came pretty close to suicide a few times."

She squeezed her eyes shut, hardly able to bear thinking about it. "And … and Kirsten?"

"Kirsten couldn't handle it," he said, and she heard the buried heartache beneath his mild tone. "She stuck with me until I got out of the hospital, but the more people kept telling her how brave and devoted she was, sticking with me despite the fact that I'd be a cripple for the rest of my life, the more it got to her. So she left me. I hated her for it at the time, but I understand now. If it had been me, the Jamie I was then, if our situations had been reversed, I probably would have done the same thing."

"So she just … just dumped you? What did you do?"

"There wasn't much I could do. I survived. I went through those months of physical therapy. Everyone kept saying how lucky I was to be alive, and eventually I came around to believing them. I thought I'd take the miracle a step further, and prove the doctors wrong by regaining full use of my legs. That didn't work out. I did get back more use than they thought. I'm not totally dead from the waist down, thank God."

"Thank God," she echoed, and blushed again.

He paused and gave her a raised eyebrow and an evaluating look.

"Um. You were saying?" she asked.

"The hospital bills ate up most of what I had left from my parents," Jamie said. "Aunt Sarah invited me to come and live with her, but I felt like I'd been too much of a burden on her anyway, and I wasn't up to getting to know a bunch of cousins when I was still so mad at the world. I'd done a lot of reading, and discovered I could escape from things through books. So, with the money I had left, I bought the bookstore. Three years later, I'm still here. And there you have it. The story of Jamie Alan Tremayne, in a nutshell."

"Your middle name's Alan?"

"Yes. What's yours?"

"Danielle. For my father."

"Allison Danielle. That's pretty. Are you all right?"

"Why?"

"You're so pale," he said.

She placed her hands along the sides of his face, brought his head down, and kissed him, a light, brushing kiss that hurt with bittersweet tenderness on her bruised lips.

"I'm glad that you survived," she murmured. "I'm glad you're here."

"And I'm glad you're here," he said. "I'm overdue for some good things in my life."

They kissed again, him being careful and her striving against him, throwing pain to the winds. What was her pain compared to what he'd suffered? She clung to him and turned it into a deep and searching kiss that left them both breathless. When it was done, she leaned her forehead against his and shut her eyes. A familiar sensation of excitement and adrenaline was tingling through her. Here was a risk she hadn't taken in a long time, a thrill that wasn't going to get her killed or land her in jail.

"So," Jamie said, sounding a little unsteady himself. "Now you know all about me."

"Not quite," she said. "You promised …" She reached behind his head and undid the black velvet ribbon.

His hair fell loose, framing his face in honey-gold waves, and the tingle shot through her again – excitement colored with smoking lust. She almost threw herself on top of him. Never mind anything else.

He must have seen it in her eyes, because he drew back from her with what looked like true regret. "As great as this is, Allison, there's still Jade to think about. She's expecting to talk to Scoot when?"

"Seven o'clock tonight."

"And it's after six now."

"Is it?" she asked, shocked. Her gaze followed his to a clock on the wall, and sure enough, the hands stood at ten after six.

"We need to decide what we're going to do."

**

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

The cleaners had been and gone, as promised. The recliner was missing, leaving a conspicuously empty place where it had been. The television was gone, too, and the shards of broken screen vacuumed up. The carpet was still damp and smelled faintly of rug shampoo. The scattered books, trinket boxes, and knickknacks had been picked up and put back on the shelf, though of course not arranged the way they had been.

It gave Allison a strange feeling to know that other people, people she'd never met, had been in her apartment going through her stuff. It was for the best of reasons, of course … not with any bad intentions. Still, it creeped her out.

She supposed that it was only poetic justice. Didn't she get her main thrills in life by going through other people's stuff? And with intentions far less benign?

Her throat hurt worse than ever despite another dose of ibuprofen. At lunch, while Uncle Bob and Joe Peters gorged on mushroom-bacon cheeseburgers and endless baskets of seasoned steak fries, she'd supplemented the milkshake with clam chowder to avoid causing herself any more pain. The soup, combined with her lack of sleep and the stress of the trip to the police station, had left her sleepy. All she wanted to do was crawl into bed and nap for about five or six hours.

First, though … first she had some calls to make.

She'd promised Jamie Tremayne that she would get in touch when she got home. Normally, especially since their dinner and that kiss, she would have been eager to talk to him. Now, though, she was dreading it. She wanted to see Jamie, wanted to hold him and have him put his arms around her.

But she didn't want him to see her like this. She looked like shit. She should've taken Uncle Bob up on his invitation and stayed hiding out at his house until the bruises faded and she was halfway presentable again.

It wasn't just concern over her looks, either. She hated this sensation of being in way over her head. And of feeling things, sharklike things with lots of teeth, swimming around in the depths.

Bad enough that she'd gotten herself into this situation. Worse to think that she could be endangering the people she knew and cared about. She had already dragged Eva and Hector Cesare into her drama, not to mention Uncle Bob. The last thing she wanted was to get Jamie mixed up in it as well. She was glad she'd chucked the purse. It had been an impulsive move, but at least now it was out of her apartment. Out and gone. When the trash men came on Tuesday, it'd be gone forever. Good riddance.

The rest of it had to go, too. She'd found, to her relief, that the folder with the information on Westbrook was still tucked in among her magazines, looking undisturbed and undiscovered by both the police and the clean-up crew.

"I'm done," Allison said to the quiet apartment. "Quits. Finito. I don't want anything to do with this. He can look out for himself, whoever the heck he is. Screw civic duty. I just want my life back."

So resolved, she would tear up that folder and dispose of it first thing tomorrow. Same with the tape, which she still had in her pocket. She didn't care what might or might not happen to Benedict Westbrook. By now, he would have heard from the police and it was not the problem of Allison Danielle Montgomery. Allison Danielle Montgomery was not going to get involved. She was through. Let the rest of the chips fall where they may, she just didn't give a damn.

All she had to do was convince someone else of that.

Going out on the balcony to get away from the smell of the rug shampoo, she placed her call before her resolve could falter or her bravado could fail.

The phone rang in her ear.

At the same instant, from the alley directly below her, she heard a sudden jingling chime.

She leaned over the rail and looked down.

A pair of disbelieving jade-green eyes looked back up at her.

The phone rang again.

There by the trash cans stood a petite blonde in a black track suit, black running shoes, and warm-up jacket with the hood pushed back. Her platinum hair shone in the sun, the brightest thing in the alley. She was in the chain-link enclosure, the buttercream leather purse dangling from her hand.

Neither of them moved. They stared at each other. Allison felt like she'd been turned to stone, paralyzed by Jade's gaze as surely as if Jade had been a Gorgon straight out of Greek myth.

The phone rang for a third time.

Slowly, Jade's free hand dipped into her pocket. She raised the phone to her ear, thumbing a button. "Hello."

Allison heard it twice, once from the woman and once through the ear-piece, in a curious sort of sound-doubling that only added to her whirling sense of unreality. She couldn't bring herself to speak.

"Your name's not Steffi at all, is it?" Jade asked with bitter chagrin and accusation clawing through her voice.

"I … um …" Her mouth worked, but she could not seem to form words.

"Is it, Allison?"

"Oh, shit," Allison whispered.

"Oh, shit indeed. I think you'd better start talking."

"Um …"

"What really happened here last night?" Each of Jade's words cut like a razor honed from glacial ice. "You were in on it, weren't you? All three of you."

"What?"

"But it went wrong, didn't it?"

"I … I don't know what you're …"

"Spare me the bullshit. You just give a message to Scoot for me."

Allison staggered. For an instant she thought she might drop the phone straight off the balcony and onto Jade's head. She clung to the rail, her knees weak. "A … a message? You …"

Had she heard that correctly? Was she understanding what she thought she was understanding? It couldn't be.

"Tell him," Jade continued relentlessly, enunciating each word with crystal-clear precision, "that I know who he is, and I want what's mine."

"You … you what?"

"I know who he is," she repeated, as if she thought Allison might be thick in the head.

Not that Allison, stammering like a dolt, was giving her any evidence to the contrary. "You … you know who … who Scoot is?"

"That's right. And I don't care what sort of deal you and Jon had with him, or how it went sour. We can put all this behind us, forget the whole thing, as long as he gives me back the rest of my things."

"Which things?"

Jade flapped her hand in irritation. "Don't play games with me. Not the gun; I know the police have that. I want the rest. The money, the tape, the folder."

"Wait a minute," Allison said, still trying without success to make sense of what she was hearing. It was as if Jade were speaking some language tantalizingly familiar to, but not quite exactly, American English. "How do you –?"

"Just tell him, and give him that phone. I'm done dealing with you. I'll talk to Scoot directly."

"But –"

"I'll call him tonight, at seven o'clock."

"I can't do that!" Allison cried.

"You'd better. You must know by now what kind of person I am."

"Yes, but …"

Jade snapped the phone shut, and although they were only a few yards apart, looking right at each other, easily within earshot of ordinary conversation, that decisive snap ended Allison's fumbling attempts to speak.

Those green eyes were still fixed on hers. They were narrowed into deadly, hateful slits. Then Jade turned in a swirl of disheveled platinum-blonde hair. She strode out of the alley.

Allison stared after her. She was on that mental patch of black ice again, wheels spinning without getting any traction.

This was absurd. This was insane!

She went back inside and flopped on the bed.

What had just happened?

Somehow, Jade had come here … how? Why? She knew that Allison had been 'Steffi,' but not that Allison was Scoot. She thought that Scoot was someone else. Some guy. But who? How could Jade be so close to the truth and still so wrong?

It was an impossible mess, a quagmire, and Allison didn't know how to get out of it. Give the phone to Scoot by seven o'clock? Scoot had the phone, had it right this minute! But what else was she going to do? Admit to Jade that she, in fact, was Scoot? How well would that go over? Jade wouldn't believe her … and if by some miracle she did, what then?

A woman like that wouldn't appreciate being tricked or fooled any more than she had already been. She'd kill Allison as much out of spite as out of a desire to snip the loose ends.

The only other crazy idea that popped into the whirling confusion in her mind was that she could get someone else to pretend to be Scoot on the phone. But the only one she could trust enough to ask would be Jamie, and that was not something Allison was about to do. Not Jamie.

She could run. Just cut and run. Leave all her stuff here and go. Somewhere. Anywhere. New York. California. Orlando, Florida. Montreal. Mexico. She had a passport and twenty-five thousand dollars of an assassin's money to spend. Paris. Cairo. Tokyo. Maybe the moon or Mars would be far enough to run.

How about home? Home to the big house, to Daniel and Marian, to Missy and the twins and the country club?

A shudder wracked her. Home? That wasn't home. This was home. Dunley and 6th. She didn't want to give it up. This was her real life.

You must know by now what kind of person I am, Jade had said.

Yes. She did. Jade was the kind of person who would murder a man for money. Jade was the kind of person who would rush out after a phone call, expecting to find 'Steffi' wherever Jon parked his bike, and when she didn't find Steffi there, would shoot a guy named Weasel in the head. What would she have done if she'd found the elusive Steffi? Shot her, too, probably.

Scoot would be as good as dead no matter who Scoot turned out to be. But what would Jade do if Allison didn't come through?

"I have to get out of here," she mumbled. "Right now."

Where to go? Not back to Uncle Bob … he had been understanding, but she wasn't about to drag him deeper.

She thought of Officer Flyte, or Detective please-call-me-Tori Bryland, both of whom had been sympathetic and might listen. But they had only been sympathetic when they thought they were talking to a naïve young woman who had been beaten up, who had been ignorant enough of the law to buy an unlicensed, stolen gun. That was forgivable. The real story would not endear her to them.

Definitely not her parents. Not her brothers. Not her ballerina sister. Absolutely not Missy, who should never hear about any of this.

Eva?

Eva was her friend, and already partly involved. She owed Eva a little more honesty.

She got off the bed, went through the kitchen, and knocked on Eva's side. No answer. So much for that.

Except …

On a Sunday afternoon after everyone's sleep had been interrupted, the rest of the building was somnolent. Not even Mr. Kaminski's television was on. Allison tried the door and it slid obligingly open to reveal the tidy, quiet room on the other side. Eva was a kind, trusting person. Eva didn't lock her side of the kitchen.

And Eva had no idea that Allison had given her an envelope containing the price of a new car.

It was sitting in plain sight on top of the dresser, on a crocheted doily. It made an odd addition to an alabaster candle holder, a statuette of Christ with eyes uplifted in prayer, a silver-framed photo of a teenaged Eva in a white dress, a pad of note paper shaped like a dolphin and a red ceramic pot full of pens and pencils.

Allison felt more like a thief than ever as she tip-toed across the room to retrieve the envelope. The masking tape was still stuck shut and it felt as packed with cash as ever – and she got a twinge of shame that she could possibly have suspected Eva of opening it, let alone taking anything from it.

She tore the top sheet from the notepad and scribbled a quick note to Eva. Dear Eva, thanks for hanging onto it for me, I had to go out for a while, see you later and thanks again to you and H. Your friend, A.

Now that confiding in Eva was not feasible, Allison felt better. She hadn't really wanted to tell this sort of thing to Eva anyway.

However, she did have to talk to someone. Not to get help. Just to have a friendly ear, and maybe to get some advice. There was only one other person besides Uncle Bob that she knew she could trust.

Ten minutes later, she was in front of the Readmore Bookstore, with her duffel bag in hand, just like she was on her way to the junkyard to change into Scoot. She entered the musty, papery-smelling dimness and blinked as her eyes adjusted from the glare of the afternoon sun.

"Allison!" Jamie wheeled toward her, then quit pushing and coasted to a stop as he saw her face. His expression flickered through a multitude of emotions.

In the aftermath of her encounter with Jade, she had almost forgotten. She turned her head away and yanked the elastic band out of her hair, letting it fall in concealing waves over her puffed, purple cheekbone.

"No," Jamie said, and reached out a hand that she could barely look at, let alone take. "Don't, Allison. Don't hide from me."

"I warned you I didn't look so hot," she said, her voice made even hoarser by impending tears. It hadn't been the shock and horror he'd shown that had done that … it was the concern … and something else.

The Readmore closed at five o'clock on Sundays. Now, at quarter 'til, it was already empty but for the two of them. Jamie rolled past her, flipped the sign from 'Open' to 'Closed,' locked the door and lowered the blind, and came back.

He stopped in front of her. "Allison …"

"Jamie, I'm in trouble," she said. "I'm in so much trouble."

"What can I do?" He reached out again.

When she still didn't take his hand, he rolled closer and took hers. He had considerable strength in his upper body, which shouldn't have surprised her as much as it did. Hadn't he pulled her right into his lap the other day?

Jamie drew her two faltering steps toward him. She dropped her duffel – it clunked when it hit the floor, weighted down by her skateboard and all her gear – and put her other hand over her battered face. Her breath caught. She sniffled.

God, she was on the verge of tears! She hadn't expected that. Didn't want to break down and cry in front of him.

"Allison," he said in a soft tone.

He thumped first one leg and then the other to the floor. With his left arm, he pushed hard on the armrest of his chair. Shakily, he levered himself upright. At last he was leaning heavily on the counter but standing, standing in front of her.

She gaped at him through a watery veil of tears. "Jamie … but you can't …"

"Come here." He drew her against him.

Allison let him do it. She felt his arms encircle her and it was the last straw. The remnants of her will crumbled. She put her forehead on his shoulder and wept while he stroked the loose spill of her hair.

"I'm so sorry for what happened," he said, tilting his head against hers. "I wish I had been there to help you. I never want to see you hurt, Allison, never."

"It isn't that," she said between sobs. "There's something else … something worse. I don't know what to do."

"Whatever it is, I'm here for you," he said. "No matter what. I promise."

She looked at him – looked up at him, because standing, even leaning in that awkward scarecrow stance, he was taller than she had expected. "I … I didn't know you could …"

"I can. Sort of. Sometimes. I have metal leg braces and crutches that I can use, but most of the time I don't bother. They make me look like a … cyborg or something. Scary. A clanking robot, lurching along. In the chair, I'm just a cripple."

"You're not," she said. "You're a hero."

"Some hero," he said wryly. "Look at me. I'm standing here with my arms around a beautiful girl, and I'm about to collapse."

"My hero, anyway."

"Again, some hero. I wasn't there when you needed me."

"Please, Jamie, sit down. I don't want you to hurt yourself."

"And I don't want you to hide your face from me. Agreed?"

"Agreed."

As he lowered himself into the chair, she bound her hair back in the ponytail again.

"You don't have to do that," he said. "Your hair is pretty. I don't think I've ever seen it loose."

"I've never seen you without your ponytail, either," she said.

"Later, I promise. Here, come in the office. You can tell me what's wrong."

The bookstore's back office was reached via a wide doorway behind the counter. A large desk that looked like a mahogany door with table legs screwed to the corners was stacked high with cardboard boxes, milk crates and shopping bags full of traded-in or donated books. A library-style trolley, half-full of paperbacks, sat at one end. The only available seating was a futon with a denim cover.

A pair of old-fashioned wooden crutches leaned against the wall. Jamie saw her look at them and nodded. "I keep them here in case I need help getting up off the couch," he said. "Have a seat."

She did, and he maneuvered himself from the chair to the futon beside her. His arm went around her again as if it was the easiest and most natural thing in the world.

"You might not want to do that when I tell you what I have to tell you," she said, loathe though she was to give up the welcome, warm comfort.

"I don't think there's anything you could tell me that would make me feel that way."

"We'll see about that," she said, and told him the whole story.

**

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

Jeanette stared into the cop's mirror shades and felt her life flash before her eyes. Seeing once again how miserable, sucky and empty it had been only made her more determined to cling to it.

Her gut reaction was to floor the gas pedal and burn rubber out of the lot where she'd pulled over to call Rayburn. Or of drawing the gun she'd used to shoot Weasel and letting the cop have it right between the eyes … then flooring it.

He was a recruiting-poster perfect young officer, with a dusky complexion and a jaw Tom Cruise might've envied. His long, lean body could have been designed to show off his uniform. He was hatless, black hair cropped short. The brass tag affixed to his pocket read "Avery."

Behind him, idling, was a patrol car. A chunky older cop filled the passenger seat, observing through the windshield as he ate not a doughnut but one of those nutritious energy-bar things. By the look on his face, he found it to be about as appetizing as a piece of cardboard. He would be slow, too slow to get his lard ass behind the wheel in time to give chase if she roared away. They might already have noted down her plates. She could change her plates. Could ditch the entire car.

Officer Avery rapped on the window again. She could see his eyebrows over the sunglasses, raised inquisitively. He smiled. It wasn't Rayburn's smile. Avery's teeth were the tiniest bit crooked, which was probably why he had been forced to resort to a career in law enforcement instead of modeling. Maybe, once he had earned the money for some cosmetic dentistry, he would trade the beat for the catwalk.

The smile, even with its minute imperfection, was open and friendly. Her apprehension ebbed, but only a little.

She rolled down the window. "Yes?"

"You okay, ma'am? I saw you sitting here with your head down and got worried."

"Fine," she said, hesitated, then added with a heaving sigh, "Well, not so fine, really." She held up the phone. "I just had an argument with my boyfriend."

His handsome face creased into lines of sympathy. He doffed the shades, revealing eyes as warm and dark as cocoa. "Oh, hey. Sorry to hear that."

"Am I blocking the way?"

"No. I wanted to check and make sure you were all right, that's all."

"That's very kind, Officer." She mustered what she hoped looked like a brave it-hurts-but-I'll-get-through-it smile.

"I'd arrest him for you if I could," he said. "It ought to be a crime to upset a pretty lady on a nice day like this."

Holy God, was the cop flirting with her? Seeing her as a freshly dumped blonde and thinking to score on the rebound?

It was all Jeanette could do to keep from screaming with laughter, and she wondered what the hell had happened to her lately. Always, she'd prided herself on being cool, being in control. And now, all because of Scoot, her composure was shattered and her nerves were twanging like banjo strings. Her emotions kept bounding from one wild extreme to another.

"Thank you, Officer," she said. "I shouldn't keep you from your duties. You've probably got dangerous bad guys to catch."

"Guess so," he said, and slid the sunglasses back on. To hide a touch of disappointment in those cocoa eyes? "Hope you and the boyfriend work things out." He almost sounded like he meant it.

"I'm sure we will."

Jeanette could hardly believe it when he sketched her a dashing little salute, then turned and ambled back to the car, whistling. He got in, said something to the other cop. The other cop snorted and looked over at Jeanette. She waved. Both of them waved back, and then drove off.

"Jesus," she murmured, resting her forehead against the upper curve of the steering wheel. "That, I did not need."

She waited until the patrol car was good and gone before starting up her engine. The close call and surge of adrenaline had left her starving, so she made a sandwich shop her next stop. A large diet cola, a chicken club wrap, and a bag of chips later, she was on her way once more.

It was after three when she reached her destination. After taking a slow cruise through the neighborhood, Jeanette parked half a block from Dunley Street, in a lot between a bowling alley and a thrift store. She locked her car – she always drove the anonymous late-model Honda Civic on these trips; it was a medium-beige that could pass for white, tan, gold or light green depending on the lighting.

With her keys and phone tucked in the pocket of her track suit, and her gun staying in the audio book case under the seat, she set off down the sidewalk.

The thrift store should have been open, but was dark and the sign was turned to 'Closed.' Glancing in, she saw the usual racks of used clothes, the usual ugly furniture, the usual broken, crappy toys. It reminded her of her childhood, of having to wear those clothes and sit on that furniture and play with those toys, and she angled across the street to get away from the unwelcome nostalgia.

On this, the south side of 6th Street, was a place called Needles & Nails, offering "tattoos and body piercing while you wait." Jeanette frowned. Of course it was "while you wait;" what the hell else would someone do? Drop off their skin to be tattooed and come back to pick it up later?

Next door to the tattoo parlor was the Luv Shak, with crotchless panties and see-through nighties and miniature bull whips on display in the window. Then a cigarette store … class all the way here on 6th Street.

Everybody she saw looked equally poor and disreputable. This was the world she had wanted so badly as a child to get away from. To rise above. Kids in hand-me-downs, alcoholic men with tempers, women overweight from only being able to afford cheap, greasy food.

It wasn't like Prewett. Prewett was sleazy but defiantly proud of it. As if there was a certain sneering joy in seeing how low you could sink. This neighborhood had the feel of desperation, of mostly decent people fallen on hard times and trying with varying degrees of success to brake their slide. A lot of the people looked old, fixed-income and dispirited.

The cross street was Dunley. Weasel had said Jon was shot over on Dunley, and the news had mentioned him breaking into an apartment. She could see three apartment buildings. One was directly across the street, old and dismal. The other two, closer to Pine than to Dunley, were newer and nicer.

She looked both ways, up and down Dunley. A 99-cent emporium, a diner, a dog groomer, a locksmith, a used bookstore, a hot dog stand and a junkyard. Straight ahead on 6th, she saw a bar, a teriyaki place, and a psychic.

Maybe she should ask the psychic how to find Scoot.

Scoffing under her breath, she wandered around looking for evidence of a break-in and a shooting. There was no helpful yellow police tape in evidence on any of the apartments in the vicinity, and she finished up at the used bookstore. It was open, with a few people browsing the stacks.

Jeanette pretended to do the same while she listened in on their conversations. She reasoned that the event would be a hot topic among the locals, excellent gossip fodder, and she was right. Within ten minutes, she'd learned that the crappy corner apartment building was where it had happened, and that the intruder had been shot by someone named Hector.

Hector.

No wonder Scoot went by a nickname. What sort of parents in this day and age tagged their kid with Hector?

"How is he?" a white-haired lady with a sweet, dimpled face asked the wheelchair-bound guy behind the counter. "The police aren't giving him trouble, I hope."

"He had to go to the station and talk to them again today," the young man in the wheelchair replied. He was handsome in an appropriately bookish, unconventional way, with dark-blond hair pulled back in a ponytail, but his mouth was set in a grim line and his eyes smoldered with anger. "I don't think they're going to charge him. They'd better not. All he was doing was defending Allison."

"Eva says that the man who attacked her is lucky to be alive." The old lady shook her head and clucked her tongue. "Poor Allison. Have you heard from her? Is she all right?"

"She called me from Bob's last night. God, it makes me sick!" He slammed a fist on the counter, causing books to fall over and a small cloud of dust to arise. "If I'd been there, that jerk wouldn't be so lucky."

"Now, Jamie –"

"Please don't 'now, Jamie' me, Mrs. O. You didn't hear her. She could barely talk from him throttling her, and Eva said she was beaten to a pulp."

Peeking at them from the mystery section, idly running her finger along a row of book spines, Jeanette frowned.

What the hell was this? Allison? Who was Allison?

All right, yes, Bigfoot Jon was a hairy ape and a pig and ten other kinds of animal, and she could easily see him knocking a woman around, even raping one if he thought he could get away with it. Aside from providing drugs to the brain-dead Steffi or renting the strutting disease-factories on Prewett, that might be the only way someone like him could ever get any sex.

But why last night, of all nights? Why, when he'd been so close to finding Scoot, had he taken time out to go after this Allison? Crime of opportunity? Had the dumbshit broken into the wrong apartment? Caught some pretty girl in her underwear and just gone berserk with lust? He was a brute, but was he that stupid?

"How could something like this happen?" Mrs. O. fretted. "We try to keep things nice, just a few nice and peaceful blocks in the middle of all this city with its noise and crime. Our little haven. Our little corner of the world. Everybody knows everybody else. We all do our part to look out for one another. And then some horrible stranger comes along."

"If I'd been there …"

Mrs. O. gave him a kindly look that Jeanette could read all too well, even from here. It said, without coming right out and putting it into words, that it was nice of him to feel that way but what, really, could he have done? Him being in that chair and all.

What she actually said out loud was, "What matters is that Allison will be fine, and Hector too. I am no fan of violence, of course, but it would be a real shame if Hector got in trouble for doing what was only right. It's like with that dirty man who frightened my granddaughter so. He got his arms broken, and maybe that was wrong, but I'd stand before the throne of the Father Almighty and say he deserved it."

Jeanette wished they would quit with the speeches and tell her how to find Hector.

The damage was most likely already done. The gun and everything else would be in the hands of the police. They would have contacted Westbrook. They'd be trying with every means at their disposal to figure out who the owner of the purse was. Who the people on the tape were.

Still, there was a slim chance that Hector hadn't been entirely honest. He wouldn't want to confess to a career in purse-snatching. He might have spun some yarn about where he got the gun.

No matter what, she had to know. Had to find him. It was this not-knowing that was driving her crazy. This sense of not being in control. She couldn't walk away and leave it like this. Even if nothing ever came of it, she'd spend the rest of her life with her mind worrying at it like a dog with a bone.

"Is Hector still staying with you?" Mrs. O. asked Jamie.

Jamie shook his head, dashing Jeanette's spark of hope even as it ignited. "I offered, but he said he was going to go home."

"He's tried so hard, that boy. The family he comes from, it's a wonder he isn't mixed up with crime or drugs."

Jeanette stifled a bitter laugh. Not mixed up with crime? Since when?

"He said he had never picked up a gun before in his life," Jamie said. "But if he hadn't, who knows what might have happened? That son of a bitch would have killed him, and Allison too."

"It's like we aren't safe in our own homes anymore," Mrs. O. said, and sighed with the weight of all the world on her stooped, frail, elderly shoulders. She shuffled off into the dusty stacks, leaving Jamie rearranging the books on the counter with perhaps more force than was strictly necessary.

Jeanette left the bookstore a few minutes later and headed back toward the corner. As she neared the Dunley Apartments, she saw a car pull up and let out a tall, slim girl with a chestnut-colored ponytail. The girl was moving slowly, with an invalid's stiffness, and as she turned to say something in through the open door to the driver, Jeanette saw that her face and neck were blotched with fresh bruises.

This, she surmised, had to be Allison. Even in a neighborhood like this, she doubted there would be more than one beaten, half-throttled girl out and about on the streets. Jon had really done a number on her.

Allison reached into the back seat of the car and got out a heavy duffel bag. The man behind the wheel tooted the horn and drove off. Allison waved. Then, with a quick glance around – Jeanette watched sidelong, pretending to fix her attention on the view visible through the dog groomer's window, a chubby young man wrestling a soapy mutt – the girl ducked her head and hurried toward the apartment building. She moved like she wanted to get inside before any of her neighbors saw her. No wonder. It couldn't be fun, being the talk of the town.

Despite the recent trouble, no efforts had been made to beef up the building's security. Jeanette passed by and took a cursory look. The front entrance had a lock that could be jimmied with a paper clip, if it even bothered to latch shut at all thanks to a warped frame. The fire doors at the end of the downstairs hall and the bottom of the stairwell were both propped open by doorstops, no doubt in direct violation of code.

Inside, the small lobby was threadbare brown carpet and peeling paint. It was stylishly furnished with a couple of large fake plants in terra cotta pots, a vinyl couch mended with strapping tape, a coffee table listing toward one uneven leg, an untidy pile of the Sunday paper, two mismatched chairs, a row of mailboxes and a large corkboard for posting messages.

Jeanette saw the girl, Allison, disappearing up the stairs. A quick scan of the intercom buzzer buttons mounted by a speaker on the wall beside the front door revealed no Hectors. There was a "Vance, H." on the fourth floor, though. Hector "Scoot" Vance.

An alley ran around the back of the building. Balconies jutted out over it like fungal growths, those shelf mushrooms that sprouted on rotting logs. A chain-link surround enclosed a bunch of large metal trash cans with the lids off, and burst-open bags suggested that some of the tenants tried their luck hoping to score a basket rather than bother with walking all the way down the stairs, disposing of their trash, and walking all the way back up.

So this was where Scoot lived.

She started on her way, meaning to come back later when she would be at less risk of attracting attention, then stopped short. Her gaze was drawn back to the garbage cans.

Something looped down over one of the rims. A strap. A familiar buttercream-colored leather strap.

Forgetting caution, Jeanette unhooked the latch on the chain-link gate and pushed it open. It squalled on rust. A thin, scruffy cat streaked out of the space behind the cans, hissing balefully. She ignored it.

The strap belonged to her purse. She pulled it out from under a few plastic bags of kitchen trash, none of which had yet broken open or split and spilled their festering contents. The purse was clean aside from a few specklings of coffee grounds and one Popsicle wrapper pasted to the side.

The zippered opening gaped wide. It was not, as Jeanette had expected it to be, empty. She dug through the contents feverishly. Compact, lipstick, tape recorder, other personal effects. But the manila folder was gone. The envelope of cash was gone. The envelope with the gun was gone.

She experienced a moment's jubilation at the discovery of the miniature tape recorder, a moment that lasted until she realized that the tape inside was gone.

Scoot must have listened to it. And what? Decided to hide it? Decided to destroy it?

Hoping for the latter, hoping to find a crushed case and loops of filament-thin tape tangled through the garbage, Jeanette bent over the cans again.

Movement above her made her glance up. Someone had just come out onto a second-floor balcony.

It was the girl, Allison. That bruised face was impossible to mistake. She was holding something small in her hand, poking at it with an outstretched finger. It looked like a cell phone.

Jeanette didn't move. She couldn't yet figure out how this girl was connected to Bigfoot, or to Scoot. All she knew was that she'd be hard-pressed to explain why she was digging through the trash.

Allison held the phone to her ear, her bruised face wearing the expectant, apprehensive look of someone waiting for a call to go through.

With a bright electronic chirping, the cell phone in Jeanette's pocket began to ring.

**

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

She burst through into a kitchen smaller than her own walk-in closet, where the makings of spinach salad sat on the counter and fresh fish rested on a cutting board over the sink.

The woman with the Spanish accent had Spanish looks to go with it, dark and shapely with a lot of black hair up in a bun. She was barefoot in paisley shorts and a halter top, and Jeanette had the barrel of the gun at her temple before she'd begun to turn.

"What was that about women with guns?" Jade inquired.

Beyond the little kitchen was another sliding door, standing open to reveal an apartment identical in size and shape to Allison's, but much neater. A dusky-skinned young man had been sitting at a desk in there. He leapt to his feet in alarm.

"Hector, look out!" the woman cried.

"Move and I'll shoot her," Jeanette told him. "Then you."

He went as motionless as a kid playing statue-tag. His face was a mask of distress. "Eva …"

"It's all right," the woman said with a steadiness of tone that Jeanette would have admired under other circumstances. At the moment, she found it annoying. Steadiness was not going to serve her purpose. Terrified would have been better. Easier. People talked when they were terrified.

But something was still wrong here. Getting more wrong all the time.

"Who are you?" Hector asked. "What is this? Let go of my sister!"

"Hector, calm down," Eva said. Her voice was still steady, but Jeanette had her by the scruff of the neck and could feel her trembling.

Eva was taller than Jeanette and outweighed her by at least forty pounds, but guns had been the great equalizer since the time of the Musketeers. Presumably, antiques expert Benedict Westbrook could have told her the exact year that power had shifted from the steel edge of a sword to the deadly potential of gunpowder.

Something, though … something was very wrong here.

There was no recognition in Hector's eyes, that was one thing wrong.

And Hector, too, was wrong.

She remembered a tall, lanky figure on a skateboard. Fair skinned, long-limbed. Hector was short, almost as short as Jeanette herself. He was stocky with muscle. His skin, like his sister's, was dark.

"Please," Eva said. "Tell us what you want. We don't have much, but –"

"Shut up," Jeanette said. She stared at Hector.

He wasn't Scoot. Not even close.

"What the hell is this?" she hissed. "Where's Scoot?"

"I don't know what you mean," Eva said. "Who is Scoot?"

"Don't play with me. You, Hector, come here."

"No," Eva whispered, and now there was terror. Not for herself. "No, please, whatever this is, leave him out of it. He's my little brother."

"If he cares about you, he'll step right there into the doorway but not one inch further," Jeanette said. "And he'll tell me what went on here last night."

"What's it to you?" Hector's brows drew together.

Jeanette did not let the gun waver from Eva's head. "I'm waiting."

Hector looked to his sister, and Eva nodded almost imperceptibly. He looked then to the gun, and to Jeanette's cold eyes, and she saw his throat move as he swallowed hard and took a deep breath.

"It was very late," he said. "We were sleeping, and woke up hearing shouts and crashes from Allison's apartment. So I broke through the door – you can see, there, the new bolt was attached. Someone was attacking her. A man, big and red-haired, on top of her, trying to strangle her."

"Where did you get the gun?"

"They had knocked everything over and there was a gun on the floor," Hector said. "An old gun, like something from a cowboy movie. I picked it up and yelled for him to get off her. When he did, he came for me. I had to shoot him. I didn't even know if the gun was loaded, but it was, and I shot him in the chest."

"The gun was in there?" She jerked a thumb over her shoulder. "In Allison's apartment? You didn't have it?"

"No," Hector said. "It was on the floor, with other things, like it had fallen from her purse."

A light was going on in her head, but it stuttered and winked like a strobe, and what it revealed in its flashes was so outrageous that she couldn't believe it.

"The man," she said. "Did you know him?"

"I never saw him before in my life," Hector said.

"He was a stranger to us," Eva said. "Allison said he had been following her, that she had only seen him around but did not know him either."

"Do you know anyone called Steffi?"

Blank looks from them both.

"Or Stephanie? Is that Allison's middle name, maybe?"

"Her middle name starts with a D.," Eva said, more puzzled than ever. "Please, what is it that you are trying to learn? We do not understand."

"Neither do I," muttered Jeanette. Except that she was beginning to. Or, really, she did understand but her mind kept rejecting it. "What else can you tell me? What else happened last night?"

"The police came, and the paramedics," Eva said. "I had performed the first aid on the man, and I went with them to answer their questions."

"What about Allison?"

"She went to stay with her uncle," Hector said. "We have not seen her since then, but Eva was working and I was visiting our family."

"All right," Jeanette said.

She curled her lip, and Hector blanched. He probably thought that she had gotten what she wanted and was now going to kill them both. And the thought had crossed her mind, no mistake about it. When she had believed Hector to be Scoot, the one who had caused her all this trouble. But she couldn't bring herself to gun down innocent, decent people, even if Hector had done her a disservice by shooting Bigfoot.

That did leave her in a sticky situation, though. They had seen her. Hector more than Eva; Eva had only gotten a fleeting glimpse if that before Jeanette had whirled her around with the gun pressed to her skull.

She didn't like walking away and leaving more witnesses, not with Bigfoot in the hospital running his mouth and spilling his guts to the police. But, in the end and though she knew she should, she couldn't just shoot them.

"All right," she said again. "Listen, I don't want to have to hurt you. I'd like to walk out of here with no more trouble. What you did last night was brave, neighborly, and noble. But if you decide to play the hero again, Hector, you won't come off so lucky. Understand?"

"Yes," he said.

"Neither will your sister."

"I understand."

"Same goes for you, Eva," she said. "No coming after me. No calling the police. Because I will get away, and if I have to do that, I'll come back."

"We understand," Eva said. "Believe me. We both do."

Jeanette eased the gun away from her head and stepped back. Eva did not move or turn around. She stayed stock-still in the middle of the kitchen with her hands fisted at her sides. Hector was similarly immobile in the doorway. The space was so confined, and full of weapons – there was a wicked-sharp little knife right on the cutting board – that if they wanted to make her life more difficult, they could. But she would be able to shoot at least one of them, and neither of them wanted to risk it.

Leaving the kitchen door open so she could hear if they moved, she went quickly through the apartment and out into the hall. The kid was still there, playing with his Matchbox cars. Jeanette put her gun in her purse but kept her hand on it, ready to shoot through the side of the purse if Hector changed his mind about being heroic.

No other doors opened, and Jeanette didn't linger. She shed her sweater as she went down the stairs, wadding it up and stuffing it into a trash can in the lobby. Then, slinging her purse crosswise once more, she did what they wouldn't expect her to do – she stayed in the neighborhood instead of booking it as far and as fast as she could go.

There was a bar on the other side of 6th, a bar that seemed to exist solely to cater to the crowd from the upstairs pool hall. It was called the Eight Ball, and the Sunday evening crowd consisted of two men playing darts in the back, a trio of women who looked like they'd just gotten off-shift at a grocery store, and four men ranged along the bar munching peanuts and watching ESPN.

She ordered a Bloody Mary and took a small table by the front windows, which offered her a view of the apartment building's entrance. A couple of the men at the bar turned to give her a hopeful once-over, but she frostily ignored their looks.

Stirring her drink with the celery stalk, she watched the apartments and waited. No police cars came screaming up. Nor did Hector and Eva leave in a hurry with all their personal possessions. It was business as usual over there. She was a little disappointed. She hadn't expected a S.W.A.T. team or a mass exodus of panicked senior citizens, but the lack of any activity whatsoever came as something of a letdown.

It didn't matter, though.

What mattered was what she'd finally figured out.

Chagrin at her many mistakes brought heat to her face. She had leaped from one erroneous conclusion to the next, and made the entire mess more complicated than it really was. She'd blown it up into a conspiracy, given her adversaries far more credit than they deserved, and been entirely on the wrong track all along.

Ten minutes passed. It was six-forty.

A wheelchair rolled into the intersection. Walking beside it was a tall girl with a chestnut-brown ponytail and a bruised face.

Jeanette's teeth crunched crisply through the celery stalk. She spat the green stub into a napkin without taking her gaze from the window.

Hello, Scoot.

So, she was heading for home, was she? With her dashing bookstore boyfriend. Surprising. Jeanette would have thought that she'd be miles away by now.

A cool smile played about her lips. She watched the pair go inside. Let them try to manage that clunky old elevator with his wheelchair. That was a task she didn't envy.

Six-forty-five. Any minute now, Allison would be getting quite the earful from her neighbors. She'd discover that the folder was gone.

"Pardon me, miss." One of the men from the bar had decided to try his luck after all, frosty demeanor or no frosty demeanor. "That blouse looks nice … but do you know what would be better on you?"

He was pushing forty, on the chunky side, wearing dark brown slacks, a yellow shirt with the sleeves rolled up and the collar unbuttoned, and a loosened red-yellow-tan striped tie. A fancy watch showing the time in three different cities, the tide, and the phase of the moon took up most of his wrist, and a gold varsity ring sparkled on one finger in a desperate effort to cling to long-gone youth and fitness. His hair was medium-brown and worn in a curly Michael Bolton mullet that made Jeanette flinch. She wondered if he had escaped from the used car lot over on Prewett.

"What?" she asked, meaning 'what did you say?' and not 'what would be better on me?' because she didn't think she had fully understood him.

The mullet-man took it as 'what would be better on me?' and beamed. He had a glass of beer in his hand, half-full. "Me."

It took her a few moments to figure out this exchange, and when she did, she thinned her lips and gave him the subzero glare.

"Bad line, huh?" He dropped into a chair at her table without an invitation. "Yeah, I know. Cornball. I thought about trying 'did it hurt when you fell from Heaven?' or maybe 'does your face hurt –'"

"I'm not interested," she said, using the same aural liquid nitrogen she used on telephone solicitors and petition signature gatherers.

"Come on, cut me some slack."

"Why in the world should I?"

"It's hard meeting people these days," he said. "I figure, why not take a chance? By the way, I'm Larry. And you are …?"

"Not interested," she said, inwardly fuming. Of all the times for some loser to try picking her up …

Six-fifty. By now, Allison would have heard about Hector and Eva's visitor, would know that Jade had been in her apartment. Would she notice that the folder was gone?

"Hey, it's not easy for us guys, you know," Larry said, putting on the wounded-puppy act. "Try to get to know someone, and –"

He must be a car salesman, because he could not give up. And she was supposed to place a call in a few minutes … she couldn't very well do that with him hanging over her shoulder the whole time.

She got up.

"Oh, don't go away mad," Larry said.

Just like that, she wanted to shoot him. To haul out her gun and drill him right between the eyes. Public service. Maybe not as worthy of a key to the city …

What had happened to her? Where was the cool, calculating, emotionless Jade?

Instead of plugging him, instead of even throwing the contents of her drink in his face and leaving him sputtering with tomato juice and vodka dripping from his mullet, she stalked out of the Eight Ball and into the twilight.

Six-fifty-five.

"I'm sorry. I'm a jerk."

Dear holy God, he was following her!

She felt his hand fall on her shoulder. Shaking it off, she tried to continue on her way without a word.

"I'm trying to apologize here!" Now he was getting all indignant, like it was her fault. Like she was the rude one.

"Get away from me," she said, biting off each word.

Across the street, a man who looked uncannily like Johnny Depp had paused on porch steps beside a sign reading "Palms – Cards – Dreams – Past Lives" to watch the drama unfolding. He even had Depp's bemused little smile. A couple of teenage girls on the sidewalk had been sneaking surreptitious glances at him, but now turned to see what he was looking at. A beefy older man loitering at the foot of the stairs leading up to the pool hall stubbed out his cigarette and snorted a smoky laugh, maybe at Larry the mullet-man, maybe at Jade.

Great. Now she was attracting all sorts of attention.

"Can't a guy get some credit for apologizing?" Larry the mullet-man whined.

Six-fifty-eight.

The age of chivalry truly was over. Here she was, attractive woman being hounded by an asshole on a busy street, and nobody intervened.

She walked faster. Not saying anything. Because if she spoke, she'd start to swear, and once she started swearing, she feared she'd lose her tenuous hold on her temper.

"Stuck-up bitch!" Larry shouted after her. "I said I was sorry!"

Six-fifty-nine. The low heels of her suede boots clacked on the concrete. She was passing the Greenview Apartments, which were much nicer than the dive where Allison lived. On the corner up ahead was a karate school with wide windows. As she came up even with it, seeing a bunch of mommies and a few daddies looking on with indulgent smiles while their kindergarteners pranced about in cunning little white outfits, her watch beeped the hour.

Seven o'clock.

**