David’s eyes popped open.
He took a moment to orient himself. How long had he been out? Maybe five minutes. No more.
He had one more problem.
Payne.
To come through so much, to come this far, and not get Payne. It would all be for nothing. It would be dozens of broken eggs without an omelet to show for it.
David took out the cell phone and dialed.
* * *
Dante Payne fumed in the back of his limousine.
He drank Scotch and spilled some down his front. He cursed as if it were the Scotch’s fault.
They made him wait. Him. Payne built his organization from the ground up. In those early days, he’d gotten his hands dirty, and the men respected him for it. He had been feared.
Now he was treated like … what? Some delicate, milk-skinned prince? Yes, he had men to do his dirty work for him now, but to be treated like he couldn’t do it … like he didn’t have the stones …
His phone rang.
Payne grabbed it quickly off the car seat next to him. Maybe this was good news. Perhaps Yousef and the others had at last accomplished their mission.
He looked at the screen. It wasn’t Yousef. It was one of his men.
“Ramirez, where the hell have you been?” Payne said.
“It’s not Ramirez,” said a different voice. “I borrowed his phone.”
“Who is this?”
“David Sparrow.”
A pause. Then Payne said, “You have brass ones, my friend.”
“Your men are dead,” Sparrow said.
He could have been lying, but something told Payne he wasn’t. “I can get a hundred more men. And then you’ll be dead. Just a little later. That’s all.”
“I know,” Sparrow said. “I can’t beat you.”
Payne didn’t know what to say to that. Was Sparrow going to beg for mercy?
“That’s why I called,” Sparrow continued. “I can’t beat you, but maybe I can make a deal. But we finish this. Tonight.”
“What kind of deal?”
“I give you the flash drive,” David said. “But then you call it square. The DA’s office can’t prove anything without it, and there’s no other evidence. You go your way, and we’ll go our way, and you have my guarantee the DA doesn’t bring any more charges against you. Ever. For as long as my wife works there. Otherwise you’ll get us eventually. You’ve got power, money, influence. You’re holding all the cards. A deal is our only chance.”
Payne thought about it. “I suppose I’m to meet you in a dark alley, so you can give me the flash drive there.”
“I know you’re not going to fall for anything amateur,” Sparrow said. “I’m still in the hotel. I’ll leave it in a place out in the open. On the second-floor mezzanine there’s a big ceramic pot with a fern in it. I’ll leave the flash drive there. I’ll be all the way across the hotel.”
“Double-cross me, and you die,” Payne said.
“I’ll assume we have a deal.” Sparrow hung up.
Payne opened a compartment next to his seat and pulled out a nickel-plated .45 automatic. If Sparrow planned some kind of trap, he’d be ready. Dante Payne knew how to handle himself.
* * *
Amy was so nervous, her hands shook.
The only remedy was the eyeliner pencil. Her hands had to stop shaking or she’d put her eye out. David had warned her repeatedly not to use the thing in the car. She could almost hear his voice.
Hit a bump and …
She heard the door to the room open and turned expectantly. “David!”
He was back! Finally! She’d been so worried that her stomach hurt.
She ran into the next room to fling her arms around her husband and—
Amy’s eyes went wide, and she opened her mouth to scream.
A strong hand clapped over her mouth to prevent it. Another hand shoved an automatic pistol in her face.