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attention to the taxicabs closest to the hotel entrance. He stepped to the next store's window.

She fished something out of a side pocket of the gym bag, then twisted around to look back at Stephen. The big man was absolutely packed under the vehicle. Bits of gravel clung to his beard, and a smudge of grease marred his forehead. His face expressed miserable distress. He spread his hands and opened his eyes wide, as if to say, What are we going to do?

She signaled him to stay put. Behind him, Allen was making emphatic hand movements at her, shaping his hand into the form of a pistol and jabbing it toward the killer: Shoot him! She gave Allen the stay-put signal as well. She crawled on her belly until her head was even with the front bumper. The car in front of her was a taxi. The killer had just stepped to the next store window when she made her move: she crawled out from under the car, staying low; then she turned onto her back and pushed herself under the taxi. A few moments later, her head popped out from under the vehicle on the street side. As she expected on this hot day and with the engine turned off, the cabbie's window was down.

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'Hey,' she whispered sharply. When there was no reaction evident in the elbow that protruded from the window, she tapped on the door. The elbow disappeared, and the car rocked a bit as the cabbie looked around.

'Down here!'

The door opened just a crack, and a startled face looked down at her.

'What the—?' he began, but she stopped him by displaying her badge and photo ID.

'Shhhhh,' she whispered. 'I'm a federal agent.' She flipped her credentials case closed and raised the other hand, which held a wad of cash. 'Take this, close your door quietly, and I'll tell you what I need you to do.'

He hesitated briefly, then did as she had instructed.

While he was counting the bills, she whispered, 'Don't look my way. Just do what you were doing before I got here.' She lowered her head to see that the killer had reached the hotel and was scanning the area. She tucked her head under the car before a passing vehicle took it off. She whispered louder.

'Okay, listen. Give me fifteen seconds to get out from under here, then burn rubber outta here. Make a U-ie and haul down the street as fast as you can. Don't stop for anything—lights, traffic, anything. Got it?'

The whispered voice floated down from the cabbie's window. 'Lady, you only gave me forty-seven bucks.'

'It's all I have. If you get in trouble with the cops, with your boss, the Bureau will straighten it out. All you have to do is push it for about five miles, and you're forty-seven dollars richer. Deal?'

'Yeah, yeah. Fifteen seconds.'

She backed away from the edge of the cab. Then she saw the killer and froze. He had a valet by the hair, bending him back and gripping his neck with a gauntleted hand. She knew too well what that felt like. She was reaching for her pistol when the cab's engine roared like a waking beast. She moved away fast, banging her head on the muffler. She'd just rolled onto her belly and slipped back under the other car when the cab screeched in reverse, slamming into hers. Grime rained down on her. She wondered frantically if the cabbie had misunderstood or was trying to annoy her, then realized that he had to pull away from the cab in front of him to get out. The rear tires started spinning on the blacktop, generating an unbelievable amount of smoke and sound.

The cab shot out into traffic, cutting a semicircle across three lanes, and sped away in the other direction. Horns blared and wheels locked in a chorus of wailing tires. Several cars smashed into each other.

And the killer did precisely as she had anticipated.

He dropped the valet and galloped into the street after the cab. His feet flashed by Julia's hiding place. She turned to watch his progress, but he was instantly out of sight, lost among the traffic. She heard cars a block away sounding their horns and locking their brakes. The cabbie was doing quite a job for forty-seven bucks.

She was out from under the car in seconds, chunks of greasy dirt falling from her hair and clothes.

'Allen! Stephen! Move it!'

She draped the gym bag's strap over her shoulder and stood on her tiptoes. The killer was two blocks away, only a half block from the cab. He stopped. Julia's breath wedged in her throat—she knew what he was doing. The back window of the cab shattered, shot out by the killer's silenced weapon. The cab veered and bounded onto the sidewalk.

I got him killed!

But it kept moving, coming off the sidewalk and swerving around a parked car. It made a sharp turn and disappeared. It took the killer a full ten seconds to reach the same spot and disappear himself.

Sirens warbled around the corner where the bank stood, then stopped. Witnesses would soon inform the police of the direction they had fled.

Allen and Stephen reached her side, congratulating her for a brilliant move.

'It's not over yet,' she said. 'Stephen, you going to make it?'

He touched his side and grimaced. 'Yeah. Nothing a tight Ace bandage and some ibuprofen won't ease.'

'Good enough.' She ran to the first taxi in line.

forty-four

After they'd climbed in, they waited for the driver, who was standing outside his open door, looking in the direction of his apparently berserk colleague. 'Driver, we're in a hurry!' Julia called.

He slid in behind the wheel, hooked an arm over the seat back, and glared at them. 'I ain't going to do what Frankie just done,' he said.

'We don't want you to,' Allen said. He held his hand open to Stephen, who pulled the envelope out of his back pocket, groaning when he twisted, and placed it in Allen's hand. Allen pulled out a hundred-dollar bill and held it up. 'Will this get us to Maryville?'

Julia was squeezed between Stephen and the door. Through the back window, she'd caught a glimpse of the killer darting between cars, moving quickly toward them.

'Let's go!'

'I can get you there,' the driver said slowly, seeming to talk to the money, 'for this here tip plus the fare there and back.'

'Sounds good.'

The hundred dollars disappeared into the driver's shirt pocket. He settled himself in behind the wheel and started the meter.

The killer was a block away. His arms pumped like an Olympic sprinter's—an Olympic sprinter with a really big gun.

'Go!' Julia pulled her pistol from its holster under her arm but kept it hidden beneath her jacket.

'Look, lady—'

'Another hundred,' Allen said, digging in the bag, 'if you do what the lady says. Now!'

The driver slammed the shifter into drive and punched the accelerator.

The killer stopped to aim. Leveling the pistol at the taxi, he jerked toward the sound of squealing tires behind him. He leaped to avoid being struck by a car, came down on its hood, and flipped off, disappearing from Julia's view. When he reappeared, he jumped on top of the car's hood. From that vantage point, he raised his gun again.

Julia caught the glint of the laser's ruby sparkle. Then the cab veered around the corner at Locust Street and roared toward the highway a block away. She holstered her weapon.

Allen tossed the hundred into the front seat, where it disappeared into the driver's shirt pocket. He turned to Julia. 'Since when are killers resurrected?' he whispered. It sounded like an accusation.

Stephen groaned and said, 'What are you talking about?'

'She said that guy back there was the one she saw shot to death last night!'

'Obviously someone else.'

'It was the same person,' Julia said.

'Same clothes maybe,' suggested Stephen. 'Same team of assassins, even. That would make sense if they were recruited under the same criteria: big, bold, tough as nails.'

'No. It was him.' She touched a sore spot on her neck where his fingers had dug in. 'I don't know how to explain it.'