Safe House

wings standing out so clear. I knew the dark blot that filled the passenger’s window too. Bruiser. A killer rottweiler who had been going to work with Wolfe ever since he was a puppy. He used to lie under her desk when she ran City-Wide. Now he rides shotgun, making the transition from law enforcement to outlaw as smoothly as Wolfe had. I didn’t close the gap between us, letting her come to me—Wolfe never locks her car and I could see the passenger window was down.

She was wearing a quilted orange car coat that came down past her knees, walking with a free and easy stride, like it was a country lane instead of garbage-strewn asphalt.

“Pepper said you wanted to see me,” she said by way of greeting.

“You want to sit in the car?” I asked her.

“No, it’s nice outside today. Makes me think spring’s almost here.”

She was being guarded, but that was her usual style. I got right to it: “You know a guy named Pryce?”

“Yes,” she said, no hesitation.

“I may be . . . in something with him.”

“With him?”

“No.”

“You want what I know, what I can find out . . . what?”

“Same menu?”

Wolfe gave me her enchantress smile. The same one that had lulled a decade of defense attorneys to their doom. “These are inflationary times,” she said.

“How much for what you know?”

“I know a lot,” she said.

“Figured you might. How much?”

“Five thousand dollars.”

“What?”

“Or,” she went on like she hadn’t heard me, “we could trade.”

“What have I got that you want?”

“I don’t know,” she said. “Not for sure. But you want the information for a reason. Something’s going on. Or something’s going to happen. Something with Pryce. That’s what I’ll trade you for.”

What do you know, you beautiful warrior-girl? I thought to myself. Wolfe already knew about the stalker—Crystal Beth had told me she was part of the plan. But had Crystal Beth ever mentioned Pryce to her?

“Even up?” I offered, nothing on my face.

“A thousand for what I have. Then you fill me in. And keep me updated.”

“How come you—?”

“Come on.” She smiled again. “You want to pay for that too?”

“They’re so lucky,” Wolfe said, looking out at a tanker going up the Hudson.

“People with jobs?”

“No.” She laughed. “People who get to be on the water all the time.”

“You like that stuff?”

“I love it,” she said quietly. “If I had my way, I think I’d live on a boat.”

“Like a cruise ship?”

“No, a sailboat. A nice three-master that I could sail with a small crew.”

“You could sail it?”

“Sure.” She grinned. “I captained a ship from Bermuda all the way back to Cape Cod once.”

“By yourself?”

“There were other people on board, but I was in charge.”

“Where’d you learn to do that?”

“I was a Sea Scout.”

“A what?”

“A Sea Scout. Like a Girl Scout, only we went out on boats instead of camping.”

“I’d be scared to death,” I told her. “The water . . .”

“You don’t know how to swim?”

“No. I mean, I guess I wouldn’t sink. We used to jump off piers when I was a kid. But it’s so, I don’t know . . . I mean, you don’t know what’s out there.”

“There’s worse things on land,” she said.

I knew she was right, but it didn’t make any difference. Once, when I was small, I went down to the river to see what I could hustle up. It was night—I always felt safer at night. A boat was there. Not a big one, some kind of sport-fishing rig. They had a shark up on a hoist. It was twitching, like it was going to break loose. The men were laughing, drunk, celebrating their conquest. I looked out at the black water. I thought about more sharks being down there. Men hunt them for fun. I wondered if the other sharks wanted revenge.

“Sure,” I said, getting back to it. “This Pryce, is he one of them? Those worse things?”

“I’ve run across his trail a few times over the years. Only met him once face-to-face. He said he was with Justice then, but when I tried a trace, it got lost in the maze they have down there. By the time I worked it through, he was gone. He tells people he’s with the Company sometimes. Or DEA, ATF, whatever. And by the time anyone can check, he’s moved on.”

“Transferred, maybe?”

“Not a chance. I think he’s sanctioned, but he’s on permanent-disavowal status.”

“What the hell is that?”

“Pretty much what it sounds like,” she said, combing both hands through her thick mane of dark hair as a river breeze came up. “He does contract jobs, but he works for cash, not on the books.”

“Active work?”

“I don’t think so. He’s an information guy, not hands-on. What he is, I think, is kind of a bounty hunter. A bounty spotter, if there’s any such thing. He doesn’t make collars, he doesn’t do wet stuff. He works the edges, tracking. And he manipulates situations. There’s no holds on him—he doesn’t have to play by the rules.”

“Could he get favors done?”

“From the feds? Probably. At least he could from certain agents he’s bird-dogging for.”

“And he doesn’t play for headlines?”

“I remember one thing he said to me. ‘I never take credit. Only cash.’ I think that about sums him up.”

“You had a beef with him?”

“Not at all. He was very polite, very respectful. Said he knew about a pedophile ring. A new twist—on-line molestation in real time.”

“Huh?”

“One of the freaks would get the little girl—they only used girls in this one—in his studio. Then he’d set up the cameras, notify the rest of them and flash her image over their modems. They could tell him what they wanted him to do to the little girl, and they could all watch as he did it.”

“And Pryce knew this how?”

“He didn’t say. But I got the impression that he had reached one of the freaks. Had him in his pocket.”

“Was he trying to make a deal, have this one guy roll over on the rest in exchange for a walk-away?”

“No. He doesn’t work for defense attorneys. It wasn’t anything like that. As near as I could tell, he was willing to let his own guy go down with the rest.”

“So what was the problem?”

“He wanted to get paid. Not a favor, cash.”

“How much did he want?”

“He didn’t say exactly. Six figures, anyway.”

“And you wouldn’t go for it?”

“No. I couldn’t. We don’t have a budget for things like that. Nobody posts a reward until there’s a victim, right?”