TWENTY-EIGHT

When the woman answered the phone, Crissa said, “I have a message for Sladden.”

“There’s nobody by that name here.”

She was standing at the window, looking out on 42nd Street. It had stopped snowing during the night, and the streets were clear again. She’d heard the plows rumbling by as she lay in bed, sleepless.

“He knows me,” she said. “Take down this number. Tell him I’m trying to contact our mutual friend.”

“I’m sorry. I can’t help you with that.”

“Just take the number. It’s a new one he doesn’t have.” She read it off.

“You’re wasting your time.”

“I know,” Crissa said. “Just humor me.” The woman hung up.

She spread a towel on the desk, opened the tin of gun oil she’d bought. She unloaded the .38, oiled it until the action worked smoothly. Then she set the shells nose up on the desk, opened her pocket knife. She laid the blade across the tips, used the gun butt to tap X’s into the soft lead. Scored like that, the slugs would expand when they hit, increase the stopping power. She spilled more shells from the box, did the same to them.

As she was reloading, the phone buzzed. A number she didn’t recognize. When she answered, a man said, “Who is this?”

“Someone on the East Coast.”

“How’s that?”

“I told our mutual friend I wouldn’t contact him again. But things have changed.”

“None of this means anything to me, lady.”

“Tell him if he doesn’t call back, I understand. But if it wasn’t serious, I wouldn’t call.”

“I’m hanging up now. Don’t call this number again.” The line went dead.

An hour later, she was having lunch in the hotel coffee shop when the phone began to buzz. Another number she didn’t know, an area code she couldn’t place.

She hit SEND, brought the phone to her ear.

“Okay, Red,” Chance said. “Talk to me.”

*   *   *

When she pulled into the Turnpike rest area, Chance was at the far end of the lot, leaning on the fender of a dark blue Mustang. He wore the same field jacket she’d seen him in last, gloves. He had his arms folded, watching her. Behind him, a line of semis queued up at the gas pumps. Traffic rushed by on the roadway beyond.

She pulled the rental up beside him. He got in.

“After the other night,” she said, “I thought there was a good chance I’d never see you again.”

“Me, too. But I kept thinking how Wayne would have my ass if anything happened to you.”

“It’s not me I’m worried about.”

“You think this guy’s serious? About Texas?”

“I can’t take the chance he is. This needs to end.” She looked over at the Mustang. “Where’d you’d boost that?”

“It’s not boosted. All legal. In my name, too. This a rental?”

“Yeah.”

“We need another car.”

“That’s our next stop.”

“I’ve got tools if you need them.”

“Good.”

He looked at her. “You sure about all this?”

“I’ve thought it over. It’s the only way.”

“I don’t know. This guy’s already got two bodies on him, maybe more. No way he’d make any deal that leaves you alive afterward. And he’s got to know that you know that.”

“You’re right.”

“So why would he go along with you, take the bait?”

“Way I look at it,” she said, “he doesn’t have a choice.”

*   *   *

She returned the rental at the airport office, rode with Chance over to the long-term lot. He dropped her outside the gate and drove on.

She walked the rows until she found what she wanted, an older-model Toyota Camry with smoked windows. It was a car she was familiar with, reliable and innocuous.

She took out a small rubber doorstop, wedged it between the driver’s side window and door. It gave her room to work. She pulled Chance’s Slim Jim from her belt, slid it down past the weather stripping and into the door. It took her two sweeps to find the control rod. She pulled up, heard the mechanism unlock.

She slid behind the wheel, took out the rest of Chance’s tools, and spent five minutes working on the steering column. He’d given her a roll of black electrician’s tape as well, and she used that to braid wires, then jammed a short-handled screwdriver into the ignition, twisted it. The engine came to life. She gave it gas until it was running smoothly.

The windows were iced over, so she had to run the defroster for a while. While she was waiting, she flipped the visors. The automated parking ticket fluttered down to the seat. She was in luck. The car had come in the day before. It might be weeks before anyone came to claim it.

When the windshield was clear, she backed out, drove to the gate. At the exit booth she handed over the ticket, gave the clerk ten dollars and a smile, and pulled out of the lot.

*   *   *

They met up at the rest stop again an hour later. He got in, looked at the steering column.

“Nice job,” he said.

She handed him a folded piece of paper. “Directions. In case we get separated.”

He took them. “When are you going to make that call?”

“Soon as we get up there, get settled. Have I told you how glad I am you’re here?”

“Partly my fault we’re in this in the first place.”

“Where were you when Sladden called?”

“Philly.”

“I would have figured South America, the way you were talking.”

“Like I said, I had a bad feeling. Thought I’d better stay close.”

“It’s not too late,” she said. “You can still change your mind.”

He squinted, scratched his jaw. “Cold in Cleveland.”

“Cold here.”

“Yeah, but it’ll always be in the back of my mind this guy’s out there, running around loose. Better to deal with it now, I guess. Cleveland can wait.”

*   *   *

Eddie sat on the motel bed, fed shells into the shotgun. He pumped it once to chamber a round, pushed in another to replace it. He slipped the safety on, set the gun on the bed.

He’d slept less than a hour all night, and he could feel swollen veins in his temples, tightness in his neck and shoulders. His eyes stung.

The cell phone was on the desk, next to the canvas duffel bag he’d bought. He’d gotten all his money together, added what he’d taken from Terry’s place. He wasn’t coming back here. When he was done with the woman, he’d head south, figure out his next move. Get clear of New Jersey before Tino’s people got organized enough to look for him.

He pushed the laptop into the duffel, put clothes on top of it. It might be useful somewhere down the line. He pulled the drawstring tight.

The razor went into his front pants pocket, the shotgun into the gym bag, along with the loose shells and Stimmer’s Ruger. He put on his trench coat, dropped the reloaded Star in the right-hand pocket, Suarez’s cell in the left. For the first time, he noticed the brown spots that dotted the side of the coat. Terry’s blood.

He wet a thumb, rubbed at them. It didn’t do any good.