Two hours later, a yellow Econoline van pulled up in front of Henry’s house. According to the sign on the side of it, the van belonged to ALL-AMERICAN INSULATION amp; AIR-CONDITIONING REPAIR. According to the bulletproof tires, I had a sneaking suspicion that the van actually belonged to Sam’s friend Marci and her cohorts. It’s not every air-conditioning service that can afford Teflon-honeycombed antigun, antiexplosion, extreme-terrain experimental tires that I’d only previously seen in Iraq.
From the living room window I could see the van’s passenger door open and a woman of no less than six full feet of height step out. She wore a tan jumpsuit with a utility belt and held a clipboard, the universal uniform of anyone who wants to look nonthreatening. Though I had a slight twinge of fear that Henry might think it was also the universal uniform of the New World Order. Fortunately, I could still hear Henry snoring away. Well, snoring and intermittently shouting in his sleep.
Sam came up behind me and looked out the living room window. “That’s my girl,” Sam said.
“That’s a woman,” I said.
“You don’t need to tell me that,” Sam said.
“She’s a doctor?”
“Among other things.”
“What other things?”
“Geneva Convention prevents me from saying,” Sam said. He stepped away to open the front door and in walked Marci. She greeted Sam with a hug that practically lifted him off his feet and then she gave him a firm slap on his backside. It was… awkward. But Sam seemed to like it.
“What do we have here?” she asked. She walked into the living room, regarded me with nary a mention, and then sat down in the recliner and stared directly at her clipboard, as if she didn’t want to take in too much information other than what she was asking for. That or plausible deniability was big in her world.
“Big favor, Marci,” Sam said. “We’ve got a subject in the bedroom that we need to get off the grid.”
“Enemy?”
“No,” Sam said.
Marci wrote something on her clipboard. “Client?”
“Not in the traditional sense,” Sam said. He looked over my way. “Maybe you noticed another person in the room?”
“I don’t see anyone,” she said.
“Well, the person you don’t see, he’s a friend of mine named Michael,” Sam said. “We sort of-how should I say this-help people occasionally.”
“I’ve never heard of Michael Westen,” she said, which was interesting since Sam hadn’t said my full name.
“Right, great,” Sam said. “At any rate, the subject in the bedroom is, uh, emotionally unstable. We’re helping his son with some business regarding, uh, well, a gentleman named Big Lumpy and another gentleman named Yuri Drubich and, uh, we need our emotionally unstable client to get the help he needs in a secure facility and, uh, well, here we are.”
Marci looked up. “Did you say Big Lumpy?”
“I did,” Sam said.
“This house,” Marci said. “I expect that it will be cleaned after I leave?”
“Of course,” Sam said.
“No fingerprints, no hair, nothing?”
“Pro job all the way,” Sam said. “I’ll burn it down if you want me to.”
“And Yuri Drubich, correct?”
“Correct,” Sam said.
“I’ll get back to you on the burning. Where’s the asset?”
“Back bedroom,” Sam said.
“You mind if I drug him? We’re going to pile him in an insulation roll and people, especially crazy people, tend to get claustrophobic when wrapped in insulation.”
“Be my guest,” Sam said.
Marci finally turned my way. “Like your work,” she said.
“I haven’t done any in a while,” I said.
“Belgrade in 2001,” she said.
“Ah, yeah, that was fun,” I said.
“You single?”
“Uh,” I said. “Not really. Yes, in a way. It’s complicated.”
“Always is.”
“My ex-girlfriend is violent.”
“She get mean and beat you up?”
“It’s happened,” I said.
“I knew you looked like a good time.” She stood up, walked toward me and then stopped a few feet away so she could look me up and down. I actually misjudged Marci’s height when she got out of the van, because now that she was standing directly in front of me and the distance between us seemed to be closing incrementally with every breath, I thought she was probably closer to six foot three. Tall enough to cast a shadow on me, at any rate.
“Maybe some other time,” I said.
“You’ll be in a military prison some other time,” she said.
“Maybe,” I said. I tried to catch Sam’s eye, but he was busy staring at the floor. I couldn’t tell if he was jealous or, like Marci, wanted plausible deniability should Fiona learn about any of this. “Listen. I might need another small favor down the line with the asset.”
“Yeah?”
“Any way we might be able to get him declared dead?”
“Why?”
“Insurance,” I said, “against getting killed.”
“We can make him go away for a long time, but I thought he had a kid.”
“He does,” I said. “It’s insurance against him dying, too.”
Marci finally looked around the living room. She picked up a photo of Henry and Brent from the fireplace mantel. “Cute kid.”
“He’s older now,” I said.
“He know his father is crazy?”
“That’s why we’re working for him, Marci.”
“I like the way you say my name,” she said. “You like Italian food?”
“I’m more a Persian food guy,” I said.
“I like Persian food,” she said.
“I know a great little place in Fort Lauderdale,” I said. “Outdoor seating. Breeze from the ocean in your hair. Palm trees swaying in the wind. It’s like being on the Mediterranean.”
Marci licked her lips, which made me feel like I was watching a nature documentary. She might have been six foot four.
“Did you just ask me out on a date?” she said.
“I think you just made me ask you out on a date,” I said.
This got Marci to smile. Thank God. And then she made that same high-pitched squeal I’d heard earlier through Sam’s phone. “You live through this,” she said, “I’ll consider all of your propositions.” She pulled a walkie- talkie from her utility belt. “Come on in,” she said into it. “Bring the barbital and the insulation roll.”
10
Getting ambushed isn’t any fun. One moment you’re happily going about your normal life, worrying about
