Two-Dollar Bill

Stone called Lance.

'Yes?'

'Thanks for sending Sandy back. Turns out, the alarm system had been disabled, but he fixed it. Do you have any idea what's going on?'

'It seems that Billy Bob has decided to make your life hell.'

'Why?'

'I would imagine, because you're making his life hell.'

'No, you are.'

'You're helping; he's seen you doing so. Because of you, his wife has kicked him out of her very nice apartment, and he can't go back to his own place. He's pissed off.'

'I suppose he is. Of course, he left a corpse in my house and stole fifty thousand dollars from me.'

'Billy Bob is a sociopath; he doesn't consider your feelings when he acts. His actions are taken only to gratify himself, and right now, he finds it gratifying to make you miserable.'

'I know about sociopaths; I dealt with a lot of them as a cop.'

'I doubt if you ever dealt with one as ingenious and as well financed as Billy Bob. The man has technical resources, too, so he's clearly not working alone. He's managed, in one fell swoop, to cause both you and Ms. Baldwin a great deal of difficulty. I imagine that a nude photograph of her is on half a dozen bulletin boards at the Justice Department by now. This could, conceivably, end her career, depending on how she handles it. You know how our Attorney General feels about exposed body parts.'

'How are you going to catch Billy Bob?'

'It might help if we had the cell phone number he called you from.'

'Don't start with that again, Lance. Tiff is now not speaking to me at all, so I can hardly get her to give it to me. Maybe her people can track him down with the number.'

'That is not what we want, is it?'

'Does it really matter who puts the guy in prison, as long as he ends up there?'

'They want him for financial crimes; we want to destroy an operation that is stealing military hardware and selling it to God-knows-who. Which do you think is more important?'

'I think they're equally important.'

'We'll see if you still think that after Billy Bob lobs one of his newly stolen grenades through your bedroom window.'

'You think he's that pissed off?'

'I don't know, and I don't want to find out the hard way.'

'What's your next step in finding him?'

'I've got every available man on the streets with several photographs of him; we're trying to track down the red Hummer.'

'How many red Hummers can there be in New York City?'

'We're going to find out, I assure you. By the way, I understand that Arrington Calder is back in your life.'

'What the hell do you know about Arrington and me?'

'Oh, everything, I should imagine. Do you think I would have signed you on without the most thorough investigation of your habits? And Arrington certainly seems to qualify as a habit. I understand there's some question about the paternity of her son, too.'

'You're unbelievable.'

'Would you like me to find out whether you or Vance Calder is the father?'

'You can do that?'

'Certainly.'

'How?'

'I don't think I should go into that.'

'Well, don't, please; Arrington is very sensitive about it, and I don't want to run her off. What else do you know about my life?'

'Stone, if you've lived it, if it's happened to you, I know about it. I know everything about everybody who works for me.'

'That's very scary.'

'Why? Isn't your conscience clear, Stone?'

'Of course, it is.'

'Maybe I should have allowed my people to put you through our polygraph program.'

'Thank you, no.'

'Are you refusing to take a polygraph, Stone? In the Agency, that's the first step on the road to perdition.'

Stone didn't want to know what the CIA considered perdition. 'I'm not refusing; I just would prefer not to do it.'

'You're lucky you're dealing with me and not some case officer out of Langley, you know. I don't think you would enjoy the rigors of full-time employment with us.'

'I cannot but agree.'

'Watch your ass, Stone; Billy Bob is dangerous.' Lance hung up.

Stone remembered that he had forgotten to go armed again. He went upstairs, opened the safe and strapped everything on. Then he took his mother's picture from the wall, wrapped it carefully in a bedsheet and tucked it away at the back of a closet.

33

STONE WENT to the kitchen and made himself a ham sandwich, his lunch having been interrupted. He was eating it when the phone rang. He let Joan pick it up. A moment later, she buzzed him.

'It's Arrington, on line one,' she said.

'You're sure it isn't somebody from the National Perpetrator?'

'There's no such publication.'

'Well, there should be.' He punched line one. 'Hello?'

'You're talking with your mouth full.'

He gulped down the bite of sandwich. 'There, is that better?'

'Much.'

'I'm sorry our lunch was interrupted.'

'So am I, but I know it wasn't your fault. At least, I'd like to believe that it wasn't your fault.'

'Thank you for that resounding vote of confidence.'

'You're welcome. Would you like to have dinner tonight?'

'I would. There's only one place we can go where we'll be safe from photographers.'

'Where's that?'

'Elaine's. The photographers are scared of her.'

'All right. My driver is bringing my car up from Virginia this afternoon; I'll pick you up at eight-thirty.'

'You're on.'

'Until then.' She hung up.

Stone hung up, too, hope renewed.

THAT NIGHT, Stone left the house and settled into the wonderfully comfortable rear seat of Vance Calder's dark green, long-wheelbase Bentley Arnage. Arrington kissed him lightly.

'Do you remember this car?'

'Yes, from LA.'

'It's a bit out of place in Albemarle County, but I couldn't part with it.'

'It'll be perfect for New York,' Stone replied. 'The traffic moves at an average of nine miles per hour here, and it's better being stuck in this English drawing room on wheels than suffering the broken-down backseat of a New