AHEAD, THE BMW WAS stopping. With a half-block separating them, Kane braked the Buick to a stop. Now the BMW’s passenger door was swinging open. The man was getting out, holding the door for the woman, Carley Hanks. The couple was smiling and waving at Diane Cutler, still inside the BMW. Now, as the man turned to a vintage red Mustang parked nearby and opened the passenger door, the BMW was backing up and then stopping, its front bumper aligned with the rear bumper of the Mustang. When the Mustang pulled out, Diane would take the parking place, a block and a half from the apartment.
Kane put the Buick in gear, checked the mirrors, then drove forward, past the BMW and the Mustang. At the corner, he turned right onto Noe. Her apartment building was midway in the block. He passed the building, made a U-turn at the next intersection, came back on the opposite side of the street. He pulled into a double driveway, to face her as she came walking toward him. He switched off the Buick’s headlights, set the handbrake. Already, he calculated, she would be parked, would be walking toward the corner.
In minutes, it would be settled. Finished. Daniels’s empire, secured.
And for him a fortune. Daniels with his checkbook open, he with his hand at Daniels’s throat.
Should he restart the engine?
Yes, start the engine, let it idle. Play the percentages.
Twisting the key, his fingers were trembling. His fingers, his legs, the pit of his stomach, everything. On Cape Cod, there had been no trembling. On Cape Cod, he’d—
Ahead, a figure was turning the corner, coming toward him. A woman. Diane. Surely Diane. Looking to his left, he verified that, yes, the window of her apartment was dark. No one was expecting her, watching for her.
Was the engine running? Yes, slowly ticking over. Soon the engine would be his single salvation. The engine that propelled the car, the arm that swung the pipe: there was nothing else. Nothing more. Nothing less.
Seconds, now, as she came steadily closer.
With his left hand, carefully, he tripped the door latch, began pushing the door open. On the other side of the street, she was coming closer—closer. The pipe was in his right hand, grasped so tightly that it was part of himself.
Closer—closer—
When she was directly across the street, he would—
The light.
The car’s interior light, exposing him.
Should he draw the door shut again, switch off the light, making himself once more invisible in the darkness? Or should he get out of the car, commit himself?
The minutes were gone; only seconds remained.