Safe House

say. Then we both ante up. Deal?”

“There isn’t much time.”

“Don’t spread it on so thick,” I told him. “There’s always some slack in the rope in these matrimonial things. We can stall the divorce papers, put the whole thing on hold.”

“That’s not the only—”

“Forty-eight hours. A little more if you want the meet to be after dark.”

His neck stiffened. I glanced behind him. Crystal Beth was approaching, slowly. I waved her over. She took her seat meekly, eyes downcast.

“Call her,” I said, jerking my head briefly in Crystal Beth’s direction. “Just tell her the place and the time. I’ll be there. And then you’ll decide.”

“All right,” he said.

“Can I drop the act now?” she asked, walking next to me in the street.

I reached behind her, grabbed one of her pigtails, pulled it sharply. She let out a little gasp. “You know who’s watching?” I asked her.

“No.”

“That’s your answer,” I said.

“Do you know why women always used to walk three paces behind their men?” Crystal Beth asked me as she pulled the jersey turtleneck over her head.

“Because they were property?” I offered, watching the black bra standing sharp against her dusky-rose skin.

“No. And not because they were submissive either. My mother explained it to me. Her people, the ones who didn’t go to the cities, they still do it that way.”

She untied the drawstring at the waist of the long skirt, let it fall to the floor. Then she hooked her thumbs in the top of the black tights and pulled them down. The black panties and bra looked like a modest bathing suit. “They usually had a child between them,” she said. “It was to make a box, to protect the child. If the woman turned around, they would be back-to-back, do you see?”

“Yeah. Like walking point and drag.”

“I don’t know what that is.”

“In the jungle, military, you walk a column. The trails aren’t wide enough for more. You put the sharp man ahead, to watch. But you put the heavy firepower at the end, in case they close up behind you.”

“The woman had the harder job,” she said. “Looking behind you is always hardest.”

“Maybe you’re right.”

“I am right,” she said, reaching behind her to unhook the bra. Her breasts were wide and round, not sticking out much. The small nipples were dark in the candlelight.

“If I get you a nice hanger, will you take off that beautiful suit?” she asked, walking over to where I was sitting.

She kept the black panties on until right near the end. Moving so slow, kissing and whispering, never impatient, holding my cock like she was taking its temperature, waiting for the right time.

“Can you hear that whistle now?” she whispered against my face.

I entered her then. Or maybe she took me in.

“Did I do it right?” she asked me later, propped on one elbow, looking down at my face, fire-specks of light from the candle playing across her tiny teeth.

“There is no ‘right,’ ” I told her, wishing women wouldn’t always pull that number when sex was done.

“Not . . . that.” She laughed deep in her throat. “I could tell about that. I knew it even . . . before.”

“Before . . . ?”

“Before you did,” she said, flashing a smile. “I meant with Pryce. In the restaurant.”

“Yeah, you did fine.”

“He’s a scary man.”

“There’s two pieces to that,” I said. “There’s the gun. And there’s pulling the trigger, understand?”

“I think so. I thought about that too. What good would it do him to . . . ruin people? It would be too late to stop us—we’d have already done it, right?”

“You know what loan sharks are?” I asked her.

“Sure,” she replied, cocking her head with a question she didn’t ask.

“You know why they break legs?”

“So people will pay.”

“What if the borrower’s broke? I mean, dry-well broke. Tap City. Nobody to touch, nothing to borrow against, nothing for the pawn shops. Every bridge burned. Say he’s already crippled from the last beating. Maybe got cancer too, okay? Maybe he’s ashamed of himself, for what he did to his family. Maybe the only thing he’s got left is some life-insurance policy. Maybe he wants to die and just doesn’t have the guts to do it himself. Any reason to kill him then?”

“Of course not. What good would it—?”

“It’s good for the reputation,” I said quietly. “Word gets out they totaled a guy for not coming up with the cash, it makes all the others pay attention. One killing is worth a lot of beatings, see?”

“So you think he . . . would do it anyway?”

“I don’t know him. But that’s the way he comes off. No way this is the only time he’s done this. Every working extortionist needs a head on a stake once in a while. It’s good advertising.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah. You know why he wanted that meet out in public?”

“No. I met him before, and he wasn’t—”

“He thought maybe you were gonna solve your problem.”

“I don’t—”

“Cut him down,” I said softly. “Take him out. He goes away, your problems go away too, right?”

“Kill him?”

“Sure.”

“I wouldn’t—”

“He doesn’t know that. I didn’t either, until we met. He’s an info-player, stacking up his chips. That’s one he doesn’t have.”

“But . . .”

“He’s going to call you. Then you’re going to call me. I’m going to meet him. And then we’re going to decide, you and me.”

“Decide what?”

“If there’s a way out,” I told her. “A way you can live with.”

Early the next morning I stood on the paved area just off the Hudson River across from Riverside Drive, the hood up on my Plymouth like I was having engine trouble. The sun was just making its move. Light downtown-bound commuter traffic flowed past on the West Side Highway. Summertime, this spot would be crowded: guys fishing, working on their cars, chilling with blunt-and-brew combos. But now it was deserted. The radio said it was fifty-four degrees, but it didn’t feel that warm to me.

I was lighting a cigarette when a street-hammered old Audi sedan pulled in a few spaces away. The driver’s door opened and she got out. Wolfe. I’d know her at a hundred yards, the long glossy dark hair with the two white