Federal Building. A beat-up old Plymouth GTO.
The car pulled out into traffic and was soon lost from sight.
Morris stepped up alongside him.
“Is he permitted to carry?” the chief asked.
“Yeah. Class Three.” Weeks knew what Morris was really asking. “You think he did the two guys in the Saint building?” Which was, of course, exactly what Jimmy thought.
Morris didn’t respond for a moment.
“If that man insists on playing cowboy in my city, I’ll have him arrested, and if he resists, I’ll have no choice but to authorize the use of lethal force.”
He turned to face Weeks again, and Jimmy saw he was deadly serious. Just as serious as Castle had been.
People were going to die. A lot of them.
The important thing, Jimmy Weeks decided, was to make sure he wasn’t one of them.
Excusing himself as quickly as he could, he made a call on his cell, to a number he had dialed all too frequently over the last few months.
“How is he still alive?” Howard Saint leaned back in his chair, put his feet up on the desk, and shook his head. “I don’t know. I can’t answer that, Quentin. I wasn’t there.”
Glass stood there, hands behind his back, flushed with embarrassment.
He deserved the long, hard stare Howard Saint was giving him right now. He’d fucked up. He should’ve known better. The only thing that angered him was that he
At least John was getting the same treatment he was— normally Howard let his son off much easier. This time, Quentin was happy to see, he’d called John in as well to discuss how—and why—they’d failed at their mission.
The three of them—along with Lincoln and Cutter— were in Howard’s office in the mansion. Normally, Howard didn’t conduct business at home, but, once again, these were not normal times.
Saint’s gaze went from Glass to his son, and then he waved a hand dismissively.
“The how of it, though—that’s all in the past.”
Both Quentin and John nodded. Glass breathed a quiet, barely audible sigh of relief.
They’d been forgiven.
“Why is he still alive, this Frank Castle—now that’s a more interesting question.”
John Saint frowned. “What do you mean, Pop?”
“Maybe he’s still alive because he was meant to suffer even more.”
Quentin Glass smiled. “I think that might be the case indeed, Howard.”
He would certainly welcome a chance to contribute to Castle’s suffering. That was the problem with moving up in the organization the way he had—he never got a chance to use his knife anymore. Last time was with Reston, and that was—what, back in June? Months, now. And Reston’d been half dead before Quentin even got there.
“But we can’t make him suffer if we can’t find him, Quentin.” It was the elder Saint’s turn to frown now. “By now he’s in a witness protection program somewhere.”
John stepped forward. “No, Pop.”
“Castle refused witness protection,” Quentin said. Weeks had called in barely an hour ago with that juicy little piece of information. “He rented an apartment in North Tampa. Dial four-one-one, you’ll get his number. He’s daring us.”
“No. He misses his family, and he wants to die,” Howard replied. “He’s asking for help, so let’s give him some.”
Glass could feel the handle of the knife in his palm already. “It’ll be my pleasure, Howard.”
Saint shook his head. “No.”
“Howard—”
“Quentin, no. I appreciate it, but with what went down today at the Tower, with the governor’s race . . . anything goes wrong, I can’t afford any more bad publicity. I want to bring in someone from out of town.”
Glass nodded, trying to keep the disappointment he felt inside from showing on his face.
“Anyone in particular you have in mind, Howard?”
“The Caiati brothers, Pop,” John suggested. “They do good work. A little messy sometimes, but—”
“No. I want somebody not connected to us at all. A real pro. You make some calls, all right, Quentin?”
Glass nodded. “It’s done.”
“Okay.” Saint put his feet down, and leaned forward on the desk. “So. Damage control. Who’s talking to the press?”
“Rebecca’s going to do it herself,” Glass replied. “Give a written statement tonight, be available for questions tomorrow morning.”
“I saw the statement,” Saint nodded. “Tell her I want to change the numbers. We only lost one million out the window, okay?”
Glass frowned. “Howard, the police already returned three million to us. How’s that gonna play?”
“Who cares?” Saint shrugged. “I just want that smaller number floating around out there, so, come the election, when whoever I’m running against starts in with commercials saying I’m a wealthy asshole who’s completely out of touch with the way normal people live . . . I can say that reports of my wealth have been greatly exaggerated.”
“Great idea, Mr. Saint,” Cutter said, stepping forward from the shadows a second. “If I might be allowed to say so.”
Howard smiled. “You might.”
Glass rolled his eyes. Ass kisser.
“Okay. What about the Toros?” Saint asked. “Have the Toros called?”
Quentin sighed. Not only had they called, he, unfortunately, had been the only one available to answer the phone. Mike and Joe had heard what had happened to their money, and they were not happy. They had no qualms about letting their displeasure be known: they’d kept him on the line a good ten minutes before finally hanging up, in the process calling him—and then Howard—every name in the book that Glass had ever heard, and a few that he hadn’t.
“Oh, they called.” Quentin nodded. “They’ll be here in the morning.”
Saint’s eyes widened. “You invited them to my house?”
“You know I would never do that, Howard.” Glass shook his head. “They invited themselves.”
TWENTY-EIGHT
The sauce was bland. The cheese was stale. The pepperoni tasted like ham, and the crust wasn’t cooked all the way through.
Dave had ordered from Mr. P’s again. Stanley had told him time and time again not to order from Mr. P’s, but Dave just didn’t listen to him. Stanley didn’t know why. Not only was their pizza the worst in the city, their drivers were terrible, too. By the time the pizza arrived, it was ice cold.
Still, Stanley thought, it was pizza. And it was Wednesday, so they got three for the price of one. Maybe that was why Dave always ordered from Mr. P’s.
Come to think of it, on Wednesdays so did he.
Stanley started in on slice number nine, just as the commercial on Channel 14 ended and the big EYEWITNESS NEWS banner floated across the screen.
“Our top story—two men, employees of Howard Saint, were gunned down in the lobby of the Saint Capital Holdings building during morning rush hour. Outside, the building commuters were experiencing something our own Accu-Weatherman could’ve never predicted—a hailstorm of cold cash.”
Cold cash. Stanley liked that phrase. It made money sound so . . . refreshing. Good enough to eat, almost.
“Fifty million dollars was thrown from the tenth floor of the same building. Authorities investigating the scene are unclear as to whether the incidents are related, who the money belonged to, or any motive involved. No arrests have been made at this time. . . .”
