identity. But she believed that less and less.
For a few years after taking over the agency, she’d felt good about the work. She’d been exorcising Fred’s spirit, becoming a PI in her own right to prove that she could. But business soon began to go sour, deteriorating into a petty grudge match between her and Barrera.
Despite her way with people, her contacts, her face-to-face talents, she wasn’t much of a businesswoman. She hated the Internet, computers, information brokers. She liked the human part of the PI business, and that part was disappearing. She was rapidly becoming a dinosaur.
She’d been contemplating quitting, in fact, the day a young man named Tres Navarre had walked into her office, looking for work. Something about him had reinvigorated her-made her want to teach him the trade. He had made the work interesting again, fresh, good. But now… she wanted an escape. She wanted to believe she could slip out from under Fred Barrow’s legacy, with Jem safely in her arms, and start a new life at age fifty-one.
Almost as soon as she made that wish, Will Stirman had reappeared in her life.
J.P. pushed his plate aside, took a long drink of wine. “All right. I lied.”
Erainya realized she’d been silent too long. “What?”
“I do want to know. Let me help. Tell me what’s going on.”
She wanted to. Her anger at Stirman had faded to a dull ache. Her confidence was starting to slip. The enormous Colt in her purse seemed ridiculous in this elegant restaurant, with the affluent people and the candlelight, the shrimp and fettuccine and wine.
“Not here,” she said.
“Will you come back to the house?”
The house. As if there were only one-with the bright yellow lights across the canyon, shining through the rain.
Ten years ago, this quarry had been the poorest neighborhood in San Antonio. Workers’ shacks lined dusty roads and dump trucks rumbled back and forth, hauling limestone to the rail depot. Now the quarry was a golf course, a clubhouse, a string of fashionable mansions around the canyon rim. Even the old factory with its smokestacks had been transformed into an upscale shopping center.
The very location of J.P.’s house seemed to suggest that anything was possible.
She decided she would tell him everything. She would postpone her hunt, at least until the morning. And if the worst happened, if Stirman got to her first, she would trust this man-a man she had known for such a short time-to do what was necessary to protect Jem.
“Back to our house,” she said. “That would be wonderful.”
His smile was the best reward, the only reward, she’d had for days.
A battered white Chevrolet was blocking the alley behind the restaurant. It idled at a crazy angle, headlights illuminating the dumpsters, fender almost kissing J.P.’s Lexus.
The man sitting on the hood was a Latino in his late twenties-lean and muscular, military haircut, beige shorts and a green camp shirt.
Nice legs, Erainya thought absently.
Two glasses of ’97 Brunello had taken the edge off her apprehension. It was hard to think about danger when J.P.’s arm was around her.
The young man looked at them sheepishly. It didn’t take Erainya long to see why. There was a deep gash in J.P.’s car door. The sideview mirror had been sheared off.
Erainya had warned J.P. not to park back here. The lane was too narrow, squeezed between the restaurant and the golf course fence, and it was completely shielded from sight, perfect for car thieves. But the front lot had been full, the alley was convenient, and J.P. cared as little about parking conventions as he did wine prices.
“I’m sorry, sir,” the young man said. “I was trying to get around the dumpster.”
He turned up his palms, revealing a crucifix tattoo on his inner arm.
The guy obviously wasn’t a Paesano’s customer. Probably an off-duty waiter, worried he’d get fired for bashing the Lexus.
J.P. looked pained. He knelt down to examine the damage. “Well, it’s fixable, anyway.”
“Really sorry,” the man said again. “Hope we can solve this without insurance.”
“I doubt you want to do that,” J.P. said. “Probably looking at a few thousand dollars.”
Erainya decided the young man wasn’t a waiter. Something about his tattoo was wrong, and the way he held himself-not really sheepish, after all. He was coiled like a spring, as if he were used to watching his back. He was staring at her, almost like he was trying to warn her of something.
“You’ll have to talk to my boss,” the young man said.
He slid off the hood of the Chevrolet and stepped aside.
Erainya realized, too late, what was wrong about him. He moved like a convict.
The Chevrolet’s back door opened.
The man who stepped out was tall, with a triangle of black hair, dark glasses, an expensive leather jacket and pale, pale skin.
He said, “Change of plans, Mrs. Barrow.”
The name froze her.
She should have reached for her Colt, but her hand wouldn’t obey. She watched the glint of the man’s pistol as it emerged from his leather jacket.
J.P. said, “No.”
Erainya tried to warn him, to stop him, but he stepped in front of her, shielding her. The gun fired.
The bullet ripped through the white broadcloth above his belt. Erainya wanted to scream. She wanted to move. But the Colt in her purse might as well have been at home.
J.P. crumpled to his knees.
And Will Stirman turned, pointing his gun at the center of her chest.
14
The last person I wanted to find in the Brooke Army Medical Center waiting area was a homicide detective.
Ana DeLeon was leaning against the reception desk, talking to a couple of uniforms and another plainclothes detective.
She might’ve been mistaken for a young professional-a hospital administrator being hit on by the three male cops-unless you noticed the sergeant’s badge clipped to her belt, or the shoulder holster under her blue silk blazer. Or unless you knew, like every guy in SAPD, that the last cop who tried to hit on Ana DeLeon pulled desk duty for a month and still had trouble sitting down without pain.
She saw me approaching, told her colleagues something on the order of: Here comes Navarre. Get lost or I’ll make you talk to him.
They got lost.
“I stayed at the office until seven last night,” she told me. “I keep wondering-if you’d showed, would we be here now?”
“What’s the word?”
“No change in condition. And no leads on the shooter, unless you’re bringing me something.”
I used to have a martial arts instructor who could press his hand very softly on the center of my chest, and no amount of effort could dislodge him. I’d swear he was barely making contact, but after thirty seconds, his touch left a bruise. DeLeon’s eyes were like that.
“I’m going upstairs,” I told her.
“No visiting hours for ICU.”
“The hell with visiting hours.”
She studied my face. “I suppose I’ll chaperone, in case you need arresting.”
After a few conversations with nurses and some badge-waving from DeLeon, we were admitted to the
