The Cold Spot

somebody else and now I’m with him.”

“You don’t sound too happy about it.”

“Sometimes I am, sometimes I’m not.”

“You can always move on.”

“No, I can’t.”

He decided to drop that. “What happened to the somebody else?”

“He left.”

“On a gurney or by his own free will?”

“He made a mistake and died for it.”

“Who snuffed him?” Chase asked.

The smile again, the near-invisible scars adding some mystery and strength to her features, and something else he couldn’t name but which made the muscles in his back tighten. “Who do you think?”

5

J onah poured the last of the scotch in a glass and took a deep bite. He didn’t look the least bit interested in helping Chase. “What’s in it for me?”

At least he put it on the line, first thing. Chase had expected him to say that. He’d assumed from the beginning that he’d have to offer money up front on top of a possible score. At the time, the idea of it hadn’t offended him, but now that he was staring into his grandfather’s face, he found that it did. It stung knowing that the man would never do anything except for a payday, not even for someone whose name was tattooed into his flesh.

And Lila had once asked Chase if Jonah had ever really loved him.

“I’m selling my house,” Chase said. “The price of real estate is still shooting up on the island. I should clear at least a hundred grand, maybe more.”

“And I get it all?”

“Sure.”

“You’re not even going to try to talk me down, see if I’ll do it for less?”

“You’ll cost whatever you cost.”

“And when do I get it?”

“The house isn’t on the market yet. A few months, I guess.”

“And I trust that you’re good for it?”

“I’m good for it. Whether you trust me or not is up to you.”

Jonah showed nothing. “Let me think about it.”

“No,” Chase said. “I need an answer now. If you shake off then I go it alone.”

“How much time do you figure you’ve got left?”

“Almost none. The fence has had over a week to start moving the ice. He’ll have sold some of it by now, and he’ll have a small amount of cash to hand over to the crew. The woman, Marisa Iverson, didn’t cut and run when she should’ve. I think they’re going to score the same diamond merchant again.”

“So they’re close.”

“Yes.”

“Maybe closer than you think.”

Chase frowned and said, “What does that mean?”

“It means you never should’ve given them your address.” Jonah stepped back into the living room and clicked on the video. “If they were smart they would’ve hit you immediately. When did you brace the woman?”

“Four days ago.”

“So they’re good but not that good.” He paused the video where Marisa Iverson was getting shoved.

“She’d have to hide out after you worked on her. She could call in sick for a couple of days, stay away from her house. But if they want to go through with scoring the merchant a second time, they’ll want her back in play. If they’re worried about you fouling the deal, they’ll have to move on you first.” His gaze roved across the TV screen. “She’s got to be fucking the manager of the shop.”

“What makes you say that?”

“Because it makes sense.” Jonah rewound, hit play, and pointed out the manager. A puffy guy in his mid-fifties with a bad toupee who stood around looking mildly irritated the entire time the heist was going down. “She’s the insider for the crew and he’s the inside man for her. Feeding her information on when the diamonds are due, what the safe combination is, all that. He’s probably married to a cow and nailing this piece on the sly. Look at him. He only gets upset when the crew pretends to rough her up. He thinks he’s in love with her. She’s driven him out of his head.”

Chase hadn’t considered the possibility of a second inside person. He hadn’t been able to get into the head of a lonely, middle-aged white-collar guy.

He thought about Marisa Iverson moving in his arms, forcing her blood-smeared mouth against his. The manager, yeah, he’d enjoy that taste.

“I see it now,” Chase said.

Jonah leaned over and tapped the TV screen.

“You can tell. Everything in his life is an annoyance except for when he’s in bed with her. She takes him to a whole new place, and he’s desperate for that feeling now. He never wants to go back to what he was before. The straight citizens, most of them are so bored they want to snuff themselves.” Chase looked at the manager being annoyed, wanting out, barely able to contain himself with Marisa in the same room. “The cops will work on him, but right now he thinks he’ll go to the pen before he gives her up. Never underestimate the desperation of a man who has everything.”

The manager would be a liability now. She’d have to get back into play and deal with him. “He’s going to want to run with her.”

“They’ll cap him this time, on their way out, before he spills to the police. If the crew wants that second score they’ve got to go in fast. But they can’t move quick because of you. They know you’re watching, and since you were stupid enough to tell them where you lived, and they were stupid enough to wait, that means they’re watching you.”

His grandfather was right, Chase had been stupid. He’d been so caught up in his own grief and anger that he figured they might want to come at him the same way he wanted to go at them. Head to head. It hadn’t occurred to him that they might be more subtle and monitor him for days.

“You think they’re somewhere nearby this minute?” he asked.

“Sure,” Jonah said. “They should’ve punched your ticket already but they think you’re on to them, baiting a trap. They believe you’re a pro because you got this close. By now they’ve aced one of your neighbors and have somebody installed.”

A crew that would murder a civilian in his own living room, just to keep an eye on somebody. Maybe the driver wasn’t the only wild dog. Marisa Iverson was at least a little crazy, going through what she had for the sake of the driver, who’d popped a cop. Chase had been thinking too positively. He wasn’t going to get the driver without taking them all down.

He glanced at Jonah, who was staring back at him.

“You didn’t think anybody else might get hurt in this fight of yours?” his grandfather asked.

Chase said nothing.

They moved to the front window together and peered through the blinds. Jonah pointed across the street on the diagonal. “Who lives there?”

Sarah Corvis and her kids. They’d sent over a roast after Lila’s funeral. “A middle-aged woman, has a teenage son and daughter.”

“Too many to take out and keep quiet.” Jonah pointed to the house opposite it. “There?”