“This will be hard for me, mahn,” Clarence said. “It would be better if I did the—”
“Well, you
“It is not right,” the islander said, trying to push his will past hers. “It is my job to . . .”
“What?” I asked him, trying for edgeless calm. We were too close to the flashpoint now to play around.
“I am the man,” Clarence said. “And Michelle is—”
“What?” she asked this time, the honey gone from her voice.
“My sister,” he said quietly. “My little sister. Who I love so much.”
Michelle stood up. Walked around the side of the booth and kissed Clarence on his ebony cheek. “Little sister’s gonna be just fine, baby,” she said calmly. “You just show me how to do it, and I’ll make you proud.”
“If I knew the frequency, I could jam it,” the Mole told me, standing next to Terry in his underground bunker.
“But we don’t have—”
“This is a scanner,” the Mole said, holding up a box with a few rows of square LEDs. “I think I know the type of transmitter they must be using. If the range is narrow enough, maybe . . . but he has to have it armed. If he waits to arm it until the last second, there is no chance.”
“We can’t risk it,” I said.
“But Michelle . . .” the Mole said softly, fear driving the science from his voice.
“What is Mom gonna—?” Terry asked, picking up the Mole’s fear like it was forest-fire smoke.
“It’ll be fine,” I told the kid.
He ignored me, looking to the Mole.
“She will,” he promised.
“I have to be there,” the boy said. Only it wasn’t a boy speaking anymore.
I looked at the Mole. We both nodded.
Max was as angry as I’d ever seen him. No matter how many times I explained it, he chopped the air in a violent gesture of rejection.
“You know how it’s got to go,” the Prof said, agreeing with me. “We only get the one toss. We need a natural. And you can’t roll snake eyes with three dice.”
But when I signed that over to Max, his nostrils flared and his face went into a rigid mask of resistance. He wasn’t buying.
We went round and round. The mute Mongolian wouldn’t budge. Finally, he made a complicated series of gestures to Mama. She bowed and went off. When she returned, she had a stalk of green in her hand, some kind of plant I didn’t recognize. Max pulled out a chair, set it in the middle of the restaurant floor, pointed at it for me to sit down.
I did it. Mama licked the back of the green stalk and pasted it to the front of my leather jacket, right over the heart.
I sat there. Max walked up to me. I watched him carefully. Nothing happened.
Max held up the green stalk in his huge hand . . . the hand I’d never seen move. Making his point.
I held out my hand for the stalk. Gave it to Mama. “Put it back on me,” I told her.
She licked the stalk again, slapped it down over my heart.
I motioned for Max to step back. Further. Further still. Until he was at least ten feet distant. Then I made the gesture of rolling up a car window. Sat looking through the imaginary glass. Made a “Now-what?” gesture.
The warrior’s eyes narrowed to dark dots of molten lava, but he couldn’t penetrate the problem. And he knew it. If Max could get close, he was as unstoppable as nerve gas. But if they saw him coming, it was over.
He bowed. Not to me. To the reality we faced.
“We can’t bring no outsiders in on this. Family only,” the Prof said in his on-the-yard voice. “That means we ain’t got but three ways to play. The Mole don’t jam, you got to slam, Schoolboy. Otherwise, Michelle’s gonna—”
“I know that,” I told him.
“You got to be the monster, my brother. Wesley’s gotta be there, you understand?” Telling me there would be no El Canonero this time—he wasn’t family.
“I won’t miss,” I told him.
“You do, we’re all through,” the little man said, hand on my shoulder.
It was chilly on the roof, but I was colder inside. Sunday morning, three hours past midnight, the sun still a couple of hours short of Show Time. The primitive part of my brain pressured me to check in—howl at the moon just to hear the return cries and assure myself that my pack was close by—but I kept my hands away from the cellular in my coat. No traffic on the street, no traffic over the airwaves—that was the deal.
I made myself relax. Fall into the mission. Slow down. Think of something warm. Last contact with the other world: Crystal Beth, chasing Vyra out of the hotel bedroom with a hard smack to her bottom, giggling at Vyra’s squeal. Then coming over to me.
“It’s time,” she said. “You can do it now. I want you. Before you go, I want you.”
“I—”
“You
“What?”
“Your baby. I want your baby. I want your life in me no matter what happens. I swear to you, Burke. Listen to me: This is a holy promise. I will be a wonderful mother. I will protect our baby with my life. Our house will always be safe. Please, honey. Come on. No matter what happens, your child will have your name. You’ll never die.”
“Crystal Beth, you—”
“Two names on the birth certificate.
“I—”
“Maybe your baby’s already there,” she said softly, patting her slightly rounded belly. “Condoms don’t always—”
“I can’t make babies,” I cut her off. “I had myself fixed. A long time ago.”
A tear dropped from one almond eye down her broad cheek. “But you can still make love,” she whispered. “And that’s where babies are meant to come from, right?”
It was four-forty-five when the cellular throbbed in my chest pocket. I was alone on the roof, but I’d disabled the ring, just in case.
“Got ’em.” The Prof’s voice.
“All of them?”
“Full cylinder,” he said, ringing off.
A full cylinder was six. Where was the detonator man? Where was he? Where was this man who threatened everything sacred to me on this earth? The man who would burn my safe house to the ground? Where was the filthy motherfucking . . . ? Wesley called to me from beyond the grave and I filled in the blank: where was the . . .
