Forty-Eight

Weiss raced the darkness across the San Rafael Bridge. Pushing the Taurus to seventy-five, sluicing left and right through the gaps in the swift, steady traffic, he broke out of the rain and glimpsed the last light of sunset over the hills ahead. But the clouds came after him, pressed down from above, pressed in on the water at either side of him. The storm was following fast and night was coming.

Weiss drove faster. His thoughts were fragmented, jumbled. Bishop…Cobra…The girl…Ideas flashed into his mind, disjointed. She wouldn’t have left the safety of home if she were still afraid of Cobra…She wouldn’t have left if there were not still money to be had…Cobra must’ve had a stash…Cobra…He couldn’t quite string it all together.

But it didn’t matter. He pressed the gas pedal down harder. Rushed into the red taillights crowded ahead of him as the white headlights, glaring in his rearview, crowded behind. Because he felt as if that cold line of premonition on his neck had turned to ice. He felt as if it had seeped into him through his pores and spread in his blood through his whole body. Maybe it was pure intuition—his sense, his feeling for the character of Honey Graham. Or maybe he’d actually reasoned out her motives and just wasn’t conscious of it yet. Either way, he knew that if Honey had left home, she would head for the clubhouse, for the money. He knew that she would bring Bishop with her.

And he knew that Bishop was a dead man—that he’d be murdered, as soon as darkness fell.

He sped west, the lightning on his heels. He pressed the speed-dial button on his phone again.