win.'
He was still the wolf. He had gone to get Frank Tosca, and so Tosca was dead. But his exhaustion today was disturbing. He wasn't the same as he had been. Time had gone by and he hadn't noticed, but it had still gone by.
He wanted to rest and recover, but it was time to get out of Phoenix. He packed his small suitcase and turned on his laptop computer. He made a plane reservation from Tucson to Houston in the name Charles Ackerman and a hotel reservation for the next two nights at a hotel he knew near the Astrodome.
As he passed the front desk, he left his checkout card and key in front of a clerk who was on the telephone and went outside. He got in his rental car and drove to a bank not far down the street in Scottsdale. He rented a safe-deposit box and paid three years' rent in advance. He opened the box in a small windowless room and put in the pistol he had taken from the dead sentry and the extra magazine and the knife he had used to kill Tosca.
The route to Tucson was flat, straight, and easy to drive. He passed a prison crew in orange jumpsuits working on a weedy patch along the highway under the eyes of a guard with a lever-action. 30-30 rifle like a movie cowboy would have used. It reminded him of something else Eddie had told him. 'One thing we have to do is stay out of jail. A lot of the guys we deal with spend half their lives getting in or getting out. It's something between a religious retreat and a family reunion. They've got old friends, cousins, and in-laws in there. And half of the rest of the place is people who want to suck up to them, including the guards. If you go in, there will be people who knew somebody you killed. There will be people who want you to kill somebody in there for them, and others who want you to kill somebody when you get out. There will be guys so crazy they want to know what makes you so tough so you have to kill them to show them.'
The speed limit was sixty-five, so he went sixty-five, going faster only in the stretches where the rest of the cars did and a slower car would have stood out. He never stood out. He had always dressed neatly and conservatively, and since he had been in England he had been forced to replace his clothes gradually, so he had the wardrobe of a man of Meg's social level. He could stand close inspection without raising suspicion, but he had perfected his pose of the taciturn American husband. He had good manners and a smile, so there was little scrutiny. People paid attention to the beautiful and lively Lady Meg Holroyd, but less to her husband. It was simply a new version of the way he carried himself in the United States. He was a master at being the one the eye passed over in a crowd.
He arrived at the Tucson airport two hours early, returned his rental car, and rode the shuttle to the terminal. He bought a newspaper and sat in the middle of a crowded waiting area. He pretended to read the paper, but devoted most of his attention to the people around him and the people walking past on the concourse.
There, as soon as he looked, was the short, stocky shape of Mickey Agnoli walking along in a Hawaiian shirt and a pair of tan slacks, his shoes a pair of topsiders with no socks, looking as calm as though he had stepped off a yacht into the Tucson terminal. There seemed to be nobody with him.
As soon as Agnoli had passed and gone on along the concourse, Schaeffer got up, folded his newspaper and stuck it under his arm, and followed at a distance. Agnoli walked on the right side of the concourse so Schaeffer stayed on the left side, moving against the flow of people but a few paces inward so he wouldn't meet anyone head-on.
He had seen Agnoli from a distance on the ranch last night and had studied him for a moment before turning away to avoid him. He had looked very happy and prosperous, standing just outside the conference room. Agnoli had been a Strongiolo soldier in Miami since he was about nineteen, but over the years he had grown up a little. He had saved the money his crew picked up on their regular business of stealing luggage from airport baggage claims and selling fake tickets to cruises, and he bought parking lots. Ten years ago he had already been the parking king of Miami.
Schaeffer had met him on one of the worst nights of Agnoli's life. Agnoli's brother Jimmy had been found in a Dumpster behind one of their parking lots. Mickey had sent word up the ranks in the Strongiolo family that he wanted revenge. The response was a torn scrap of paper with a telephone number on it. He called the number, and a week later he met Schaeffer in a small Italian restaurant near the ocean.
They sat in a booth at the back of the dining room. Agnoli was a broad, short man, and he nearly took up the whole side of the booth that faced the wall. Schaeffer could see he'd been crying. Agnoli said, 'Thank you for coming to see me. I've heard you're a busy man and don't like to spend a lot of time talking.'
'I heard about your loss. I'm not in a hurry. If you want to talk, I'll listen.'
Agnoli was surprised. 'I didn't think you'd be… I don't know. So human.'
Schaeffer's face showed nothing.
Agnoli's eyes widened. 'I'm sorry. I should have said you're a decent guy and then shut up.'
'I'm not a decent guy. A decent guy wouldn't be much use to you.'
'No, I didn't ask you here to insult you. Even if I feel like committing suicide, this isn't the way I wanted to do it. I want to hire you.'
'You already have. Mr. Strongiolo sent me a retainer, or I wouldn't be here. Tell me who I'm going to see.'
'Three weeks ago a Cuban named Montoya came to my office and said he represented a syndicate of investors who wanted to buy a fifty-one percent share of the parking business. I said, 'How much?' and he said, 'Twenty grand ought to be enough,' and I said, 'I've got six lots, and each of them is worth ten times that. Maybe you have my company mixed up with another one.''
'What did he say?'
'He said he knew all that. He said I was just resisting because I didn't know who he represented. He works for Hektor Cruz.'
'Do you know who Hektor Cruz is?' Schaeffer asked.
'He's in the drug business. There are lots of people in Miami in the drug business.' He took a deep breath and let it out. 'I said, 'I've heard of Mr. Cruz. Please give him my regrets. My partners and I aren't interested in selling out.' And just so there wasn't any misunderstanding I said, 'One of those partners is Victor Strongiolo, and the others are close associates of ours.' It was true. Mr. S. gets a quarter cut of my action. You know how things work.'
'I do.'
'I made it clear who I was, and who my silent partners were. I mean, this guy might just not know who he was talking to. It could be an honest mistake. And I was polite. There was no reason to rub his face in it. I even stood up and held out my hand to shake. He stood too, but he didn't take it. He just gave a little wave and said, 'I'll be talking to you very soon.''
Schaeffer could see Agnoli had come to the hard part because his eyes had started to water. 'The next day we found my brother Jimmy dead. He was shot nine times and dropped in the Dumpster.'
'How do you want this done?'
'I want to keep it simple. You get Hektor Cruz.'
'Just Cruz?'
'Cruz is not easy. These guys are never alone. But once he's gone, the rest will be disorganized, scared, indecisive. We'll erase them over a period of a few days.'
'What does this pay?'
'Two hundred thousand.'
'Don't start your war until I tell you Cruz is dead.'
'You have my word.'
He stood up. 'I'll talk to you after it's done.'
'Wait,' Agnoli said. 'Don't you want half up front?'
He smiled for the first time. 'No need. Nobody forgets to pay me.'
He had located Cruz by finding a newspaper photograph of him and then waiting outside Montoya's office until he appeared. He followed him home, then watched him from a distance for two nights. He was a short man with wavy black hair and big brown eyes who wore light-colored tailored tropical suits and traveled with two bodyguards who looked a lot like him. They spent each night moving from one club to another in a black Lincoln limousine, dancing and drinking and picking up women. The women might stick with them for hours, or just ride with them to the next club, or come out with them to the parking lot, kiss them good-bye, and then go back inside. But Cruz was never alone.
