and out into the alley, where they will get into a Suburban and go to La Famiglia.”
“Clever,” Matt said.
“With a little luck it will work,” Nevins said.
Casimir Bolinski, L.L.D., Esq., whom Matt had never met before, turned out to be a very nice guy who would have been perfectly happy to stay in an anteroom off the dining room with Matt and Terry-whom he knew-during the banquet, had not his wife found him.
“Honey, we’re going to La Famiglia after this. I don’t want to eat any of that fancy French food…”
“You’re going to go in there and sit next to the cardinal and the monsignor, you’re going to drink only water, and when they introduce you, you’re going to hand him this.”
She handed him an envelope containing a check.
“Jesus Christ, Antoinette! That much?”
“You graduated West Catholic,” Mrs. Bolinski said. “You owe them. They tossed Mickey and Stan out. They don’t. Anyway, it’s deductible.”
Mrs. Bolinski, looking not unlike a tugboat easing an aircraft carrier down a river, had then escorted her husband into the dining room.
Terry Davis again smelled delightfully in the Porsche on the way from the Four Seasons to La Famiglia, but there he couldn’t park the Porsche in front, and instead had to take it to the adjacent parking lot.
There were red plastic cones-the kind used to mark lanes on highways-in the first half-dozen parking places by the entrance.
But Terry held his hand as they walked from where he finally found an empty slot, which he decided was more than enough compensation for the inconvenience.
At dinner, he found himself seated beside Casimir Bolinski, Esq., and across from Michael J. O’Hara, who, sensing they had an appreciative audience in Terry Davis, entertained her with stories of their time at West Catholic High School.
The cardinal had not come to La Famiglia, but Monsignor Schneider was there, sitting beside Stan Colt.
More than once, during a meal that began with an enormous antipasto and ended with spumoni onto which a shot of Amaretto had been poured, Miss Davis’s knee brushed against Matt’s. Often enough to allow himself to think it wasn’t entirely accidental.
And there was another indication of good things to come at the first of the two goodnight and farewell sessions. The first was held inside the restaurant.
“You’re just going to have to come to the coast, Matt,” Stan Colt said. “You make him come, Terry.”
“I will,” Terry had said, and squeezed his arm again.
Matt was surprised when they actually left the restaurant that the Classic Livery body wagon with darkened windows wasn’t waiting on the sidewalk for Colt and party, but then he saw Sergeant Nevins and half a dozen men he knew to be detectives discreetly lining the path to the parking lot.
When they got there, Matt saw that the body wagon, Mickey O’Hara’s Buick Rendezvous, a black Oldsmobile, and three unmarked cars were in the spaces that had been blocked off by the red lane markers.
There was a second goodnight and farewell session there. Monsignor Schneider seemed reluctant to say good night, making Matt wonder how deep the cleric had gone into the wine.
But finally everybody was loaded into the vehicles, and they left. Terry took Matt’s hand again and then leaned against him, suggesting an arm around her shoulders would not be unwelcome. They walked through the parking lot toward the Porsche.
The only problem now seemed where to go:
My apartment’s a dump to begin with, and a mess after that quick shower and jump into the dinner jacket. And there’s probably something, hair, lipstick on a towel, whatever, that’ll give away that Olivia-screw her! — has been there.
Terry’s staying at the Ritz-Carlton, but if we go there, she may not want them to know I went to her room, and it will be a brief kiss and I had a lovely time.
Can I suggest another hotel?
Screw it. The apartment it is.
He opened the door to the Porsche for her, then got in and started the engine. He saw that the parking slot in front of him was empty.
If there’s not a concrete block in the way, I can just drive through.
There was not and he did.
He turned left-the only entrance/exit was where he came in, and he would have to drive to the end of the line, and then out that way-and flicked the headlights onto high.
“What the fuck is that?” he asked aloud, and then he accelerated rapidly and braked as quickly.
“Oh, my God!” Terry said. She had seen what he had.
There was a man propped up against the rear of one of the parked cars, his legs sprawled in front of him. A woman was kneeling beside him, wiping at his face. He was bleeding from the mouth.
Matt jumped out of the car.
“What happened?”
“What does it look like?” the woman snapped. “We were mugged.”
“I gave him my wallet, why did they have to do this?” the man asked, and spit. What looked like part of a tooth came out of his mouth.
“Have you got a cell phone?” the woman demanded. “We need an ambulance.”
Matt reached for his cell phone.
“My God, they’re coming back!” the man said.
Matt saw where he was looking.
At the extreme end of the parking lot, there were two young men in dark clothes.
“You’re sure that’s them?” Matt asked.
“That’s them, that’s them, that’s them,” the woman said.
“Stop right there,” Matt called, loudly. “I’m a police officer.”
The two started running.
One of them had what could be a sawed-off shotgun, or a softball bat.
“Where the hell were you when we needed you?” the woman asked.
Matt ran back to the Porsche and got in. He tossed his cellular into Terry’s lap.
“What the hell are you doing?” Terry asked.
He had the car moving before the door had closed.
He wound it up in first, and touched the brake only as he reached the end of the lane of cars. As he turned left, the windshield of the Porsche suddenly reflected light all over.
There was a boom.
“You cocksucker!” Matt said, slamming on the brakes.
The object in the man’s hand obviously was not a softball bat.
There was another boom. Part of the windshield fell out.
Matt dove out of the car, and half rolled, half crawled, between two parked cars.
He pulled his Colt Officer’s Model. 45 from the small of his back and worked the action. A cartridge flew out. He’d had one in the chamber.
That leaves five.
He ran between the cars, dropped to his knees, and peered very carefully around the bumper of one.
The two were climbing the chain-link fence at the end of the parking lot.
Matt stood up, held the pistol in both hands, and called out, “That’s it. Just drop to the ground.”
One of them dropped to the ground and one didn’t.
For a moment, Matt didn’t know what to do.
Then the second one dropped to the ground, reached into his jacket, and came out with a semiautomatic pistol and started firing it wildly.
And then there was another boom, immediately followed by the sound of heavy lead shot striking metal and glass near him.
Matt fired four times, taking out the shotgunner first, and then the man with the pistol. The shotgunner went
