Текст книги "The Two Deaths of Daniel Hayes"

Автор книги: Marcus Sakey

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Текущая страница: 17 (всего у книги 19 страниц)

Would they hide it here?

He didn’t think so. Too many variables. The cleaning woman, the VIP-ers. With Daniel wanted and Laney supposed to be dead, they wouldn’t risk running into someone they knew. A costar, a C-lister, a paparazzi. The kind of folks who would hang out here.

Bennett went back downstairs, wandered through the main floor. It was a cavernous room hung with speakers. Bars ran the length of both sides, and Tattoo and another man were moving the liquor boxes behind them. Thousands of crystals hung like stars above the dance floor.

The men’s room had marble floors and a drop ceiling painted black. The faucets and towel dispensers and even the trash can were plated gold, or something meant to look like it. He checked the first stall, found nothing. Likewise the second and third.

In the fourth, duct taped behind the toilet tank, Bennett found the gun. He smiled. He did love predictable people.

Careful not to tear the tape, he peeled the edges from the bottom and freed the pistol. A Sig Sauer P250 Compact. A nice weapon: modular, precise, small. He ejected the round, caught it onehanded. Forty-five ACP. Excellent stopping power.

Not a bad little plan, Daniel’s. Get here early, plant the gun. Then he could walk through the metal detectors without a worry. When everything went down, Daniel would be armed and Bennett wouldn’t.

Unfortunately for them, they weren’t the only ones who’d seen The Godfather.

He could take the gun, but when they got here and found it missing, they’d panic. Better to keep them calm, let them think they were a step ahead of him.

Bennett slotted the round back into the magazine, then replaced the Sig and smoothed the tape down. Let them have it if it made them feel safe. Now that he knew what they were planning, the pistol wasn’t a threat. People who watched a lot of movies tended to equate holding a pistol to winning a fight. He knew better. Besides, he didn’t intend to let Daniel keep the gun long.

He stopped to wash his hands, dried them on his pants, and stepped out, whistling.

“You find it?” Tattoo stood behind the bar.

“Yeah,” Bennett said. “I found it.”

5

The suit was Armani. Gray, lightweight, single-breasted, 41R. Daniel slung it over his arm, moved to a long row of bins holding oxfords in every imaginable color. They glowed in the shadowless light of the department store. A rainbow of fabric, every shade vibrant. Green like sea glass smoothed by a decade of waves. Blue the color of a nursery ceiling. Yellow of lemon sorbet on the first really hot day of summer.

The world was so beautiful. There was magic everywhere, even in the most mundane bits.

He glanced at his new watch. Five-twenty-seven. Jesus. He must have looked at the thing a hundred and fifty times, and only an hour had passed.

He picked a blue shirt with delicate gray stripes, took two sizes.

“I think I’m ready.” Laney had come up behind him, a handful of dresses draped over her arm.

Chamber music drifted from somewhere. The air bore traces of a hundred perfumes. Glass display cases caught the light and made it dance. He followed Laney, watching the graceful sway of her hips. He could have walked behind her all day, all night, all the rest of his life, considered himself a happy man.

A saleswoman counted their garments, opened two changing rooms for them, hovered long enough to make sure they went into separate ones. Daniel began to undress, pulling off his T-shirt and laying it on the bench. Sliding his pants down his legs. Stepping out of his shoes. Cognizant of every feeling: cool air on his chest, cotton moving across his thighs, the firm weave of the carpet under his socks.

He looked at himself in the mirror. The same way he had in a tiny shithole hotel in Maine not long ago, when he had stared, praying for recognition. When the man in the mirror had seemed a doppelganger, known and unknown at once. The face of a man who had lost everything, even himself. Who had tried to end his own life. Air-conditioning made him shiver. Just days ago he had wanted to die, to throw his life away. And now he was facing that again, and now his desire to live was at an almost cellular level.

People thought about their mortality all the time, made a late night exercise of it, a philosophical discussion. Tried to grasp the idea that someday they would cease to exist. And, worse, the most painful betrayal of all: the world would continue.

But it was a very different thing to stare in the mirror and realize that the question wasn’t someday. It was right now, today, tonight.

Keep it together. She needs you. You have to believe you’re going to win.

You have to believe that at the end of the night, you will be holding a loaded gun—and Bennett will not.

Glanced at his watch. Five-twenty-nine. Daniel pulled the pants from the hanger and began to dress.

When he stepped out of the dressing room, an angel of cream and gold stood in front of the mirror. Laney wore silver sandals and a peach dress that looked like it had been cut just for her. It was backless but fell below the knee, and when she spun, the hem whirled out. She caught him catching her legs, and smiled.

“Wow.”

She popped a hip, put her hands at her sides. “You like?”

“Wow.”

“And you,” she said, “look like James Bond.”

“Connery?”

“Craig.”

He laughed. “You’re missing something.” From his pocket he took the necklace, stepped behind her. She lifted her hair so he could fasten the clasp.

They stood side by side in the mirror. The two of them staring into it, and the two of them staring out of it. Such a long time to wait. And such a short time to live.

“I’ve got an idea,” she said.

5

“Where are we going?”

“You’ll see.”

“Laney . . .”

“Turn left.”

“We don’t have time—”

“Park over there.”

“The beach?” After they’d paid, she’d led him out to the car,

tossed him the keys. Then she’d steadfastly refused to tell him anything beyond directions. But “over there” was a wide parking lot at the foot of broad expanse of sand; Manhattan Beach, he guessed, not that it much mattered. The western hundred yards of the whole coast was bright sand, one beach blending into the next. He pulled into a parking space. “Now what?”

Laney reached in the backseat for her purse, slung it over one bare shoulder—man, that dress—then opened the door. “Come on.”

His first instinct was frustration, the sense that this was a waste of time. Then he remembered how very little time they might have left, and he followed her.

She walked fast, designer sandals flashing on the pavement. The air smelled of salt and sun. The sky was all the colors of autumn. He caught up to her just as she reached the sidewalk fronting the beach.

“Now what?”

Laney bent one knee, reached down to undo the strap of her sandal, then repeated it with the other. What the hell. He unlaced his new shoes, pulled off his socks, and then joined her on the beach. It was cool beneath his feet, and good. He wriggled his toes, took in the sensation of sand moving between them. The world is so beautiful.

“Ready?”

“For what?”

She smiled. “Go!”

And then she was sprinting, hair whipping behind, the hem of her dress flapping, one hand up to hold her purse strap to her shoulder.

He leapt after her, a dress shoe in each hand, bare feet digging deep into the beach. Every planted step dug to the cooler sand beneath. The wind pressed against him, constant and sweet. His slacks tightened at his knees, the tie flipped over his shoulder like a tail, and there was something so ridiculous about running on the beach in a new thousand-dollar suit that he found himself laughing without a sound, that inner laugh that was a soul’s cry of joy, and he gave himself over to it, leaned into the run. The soles of her feet flashed, and the dress, backlit against the burning sky, clung to the curves of her hips. She looked over her shoulder, mouth wide, eyes sparkling, a moment straight out of an advertisement or a dream. Light like melted butter burnished the air, and the sound of his breathing, and the scruff-scruff of the fabric on his legs, and it was perfect, the rest of the world forgotten. Laney was angling for a faded lifeguard stand the color of seafoam, and he pushed harder, not to win but just because it felt so good to throw himself into this moment, to have nothing but this, to hold it full and complete and wondrous and yet fleeting as a drop of rain.

She beat him to it by a second or so, slapping the wood with one hand, then raising her arms high. “Victory!”

“Oh yeah?” He stepped forward, hoisted her up over his shoulder. She squirmed and laughed, hair whipping around his waist, hands beating on his back and thighs. Ten paces took him to the hard-packed sand and pewter lace of the surf.

“You’ll wreck your suit,” she warned.

“I don’t care.” He stepped into the water, the cold of it lovely shocking, running up over his feet, his shins, his knees. The fabric of his trousers swirled in the surf. “In you go.” He braced himself.

“No!” Her hands went from batting to grabbing, snatching handfuls of his clothing. “No.”

He laughed, then lowered her down gently, feet first. The next wave slapped at his calves, splashing around them. She shrieked and danced back, pulling him with her, until they were only ankle deep. Daniel put his arms around her and kissed her as the Pacific rolled in and out, endless.

Finally, she lay her head against him and spoke to his chest. “You know what this reminds me of?”

“Yes.” Sand slid over and under and around his feet. “I just wish I remembered it myself.”

“You will. But until you do . . .” Laney pulled back, slid her purse to the crook of one elbow. She dug for something, came out with her hand closed. “Until you do, we’ll just have to make new memories.”

She opened her fingers. A silver ring glinted. He looked at it, at her.

“Daniel Hayes, will you stay married to me? Even though you don’t know who you are, and I’m dead?”

He looked at her, this woman he had lost and found and for whom he was risking losing everything again. Then he took the ring and slid it on his left hand. With its presence he was conscious suddenly of the absence that had been. A piece of himself, returned. He spun it on the finger. “I will.” Then he looked up and smiled. “So long as you don’t start to smell.”

5

They lingered as long as they could. There were a few others on the beach, but enough sand and distance separated them that they could pretend to be alone. The sun vanished and the sky darkened and the water turned from silver to slate. The wind never let up, and Daniel found himself thinking about how far it had come. All the way across the ocean, just to blow against them.

Finally, he couldn’t pretend any longer. “We—”

“I know.” She sighed. “Time to go.”

He rose, brushed the sand from his pants, held a hand down to

her. They walked up the beach together. When they made it to the sidewalk, Laney looked around, said, “I’m gonna run to the bathroom. No point dying with a full bladder. Hold my purse?”

“Sure.” He leaned against the low wall separating the parking lot from the beach. It never got truly dark in L.A., but he could see a few stars, and the wind felt so good that it was a pleasure just to sit here. To soak up every sensation.

“Ring, sweetie.”

It was a man’s voice, and familiar. Daniel whirled, looked behind him. No one.

“Ring, sweetie.”

The top edge of her purse was lit from within. Her cell phone. Someone was calling her. The voice was Robert Cameron’s. Her ring tone.

Who would be calling?

He reached into her purse and pulled out the phone. The display had no name, just a string of digits. Wrong number? He put a finger on the button to reject the call, then decided to let it ring through to voice mail on its own. The phone vibrated again, Robert Cameron spoke one more time, and then the call dropped, leaving the recent calls list on-screen, this number at the top of it, and below—

The world tilted. Daniel reached down with his other hand to steady himself. The wind knifed through his clothing. His throat tightened.

He looked up. She was still in the bathroom.

There was a roaring in his ears. He looked at the phone again, sure he must have imagined it.

Bennett

310-209-0415

Yesterday, 3:12 pm

Yesterday, 3:12. That would have been . . .

In the hotel.

Shortly after they’d made love. When she was taking her endless

bubble bath. The one he’d interrupted.

He’d opened the door, and almost leapt out of his skin to see her aiming the pistol at him. She’d been standing at the sink, still wet, skin flushed with heat. Her purse on the counter—

–and her cell phone beside it.

The screen was lit up. You didn’t notice at the time, not really, but some part of you did.

She had been talking to Bennett. And she’d lied to him about it. Lied and smiled and asked him to order her a salad.

That sudden mysterious errand, her “friend” that might be able to help . . .

The way she freaks out at any mention of the police . . .

The tiny hesitation that’s flickered in her eyes a dozen times . . .

The way she keeps wanting to pay Bennett off, despite everything . . .

Muted by the cinder-block walls, he heard the institutional roar of a flushing toilet. Daniel closed the call list. Grabbed her purse, stuffed the phone inside. He slid his sweating hands into his pockets. The wind had grown cold and smelled of rotting seaweed.

Laney came out of the bathroom shaking wet hands. Dynamite in a designer dress and mussed hair and a television smile. “Ready?”

Daniel looked at her. “As I’ll ever be.”

S

potlights crissed and crossed, searching fingers scraping the low bellies of purple clouds. It was eight-thirty, early by Los Angeles standards, but even so, the parking lot for Lux had a good crowd of cars. Bennett ignored the valet, rolled down the lane, found a spot near the exit, did a quick three-point turn to pull the Jaguar in facing forward. He took a deep breath, rolled his shoulders, cracked his knuckles.

He pulled the Colt from his belt, locked the safety, tucked it beneath the front seat. From the duffel bag on the passenger seat, he took the cheaper of his camera bodies and attached a fixed 500mm lens. Though the shake was bad, it let him read a license plate across the lot. Good. He grabbed the parabolic and a pair of earbuds, and then started for the club.

Lux looked better at night. The gold paint shimmered and sparkled, some sort of metallic flecks in it. Not sophisticated, but it made for a nice backdrop to the red velvet rope line, and the oversized framed posters for the movie.

The line was still manageable at this hour. He stood behind a couple of shiny girls in short dresses, both of them posing and preening, pretending the cold wasn’t bothering their bare legs. Every time someone walked into the club, a bite-sized blast of music poured out.

“You press?” The bouncer’s chest strained the seams of his suit. “Freelance.”

The bouncer nodded, said, “Can you take off the camera and hand it to him, please? And that thing too. What is it?”

“It’s a microphone.” Bennett handed both to another bouncer, this one Hispanic but otherwise indistinguishable.

“I’ve done some work, never seen a mic like that. Raise your arms, please.” The bouncer ran a handheld metal detector up Bennett’s legs, around his back, down both arms.

“You’re an actor?”

“Mostly stunt work so far. I had a part in that last Tobey Maguire film.”

“Speaking?”

“Don’t you fucking move.”

“Huh?”

“That was my line. ‘Don’t you fucking move.’ I was Enforcer number two.” The metal detector beeped. “Lift your shirt, tilt out your belt?”

Bennett showed him the belt buckle, his belly behind it. The other bouncer took off the camera’s lens cap, peered through the viewfinder.

“Tobey and I hit it off, though. He’s going to use me in his next picture.”

“I bet he is, dumb fuck.”

“Huh?” The guy’s eyes narrowed.

“I said I bet he is. Good luck.” He smiled blandly. The bouncer shook his head, said, “Give the paparazzi his gear.” Bennett slung the camera, moved for the door. From behind, he heard the guy say, “And I better not catch you crashing the VIP. That’s invites only.”

“Yep.” He opened the door. The bass line hit him square in the belly, thoom-thoom-thoom-thoom. The chandelier blazed above, the light making the red velvet draping the walls richer. A staggeringly hot blonde asked if he was with the movie party; when he said no, she charged him $25, told him the VIP room was closed for the night.

That’s okay, sister. I have different VIPs in mind.

Bennett walked past the staircase and through the broad double doors into the main bar. Several hundred people milled about, scattered between the bars on either side of the room and the café tables placed in clusters. The dance floor had maybe twenty people on it, that usual crew of near-professional dancers who came to be watched. Tight spotlights flashed overhead, sharp stuttering white beams. Every time light struck one of the thousands of crystals, the glass showered down rainbows. The effect made it seem like the air itself was sparkling. The beat came from everywhere, surrounding him, compressing him, ringing through the soles of his feet and the skin of his arms. He didn’t recognize the tune, a dance remix of some rap song, probably one of Too G’s.

He kept to the side, and found an unclaimed table with a good view. Daniel and Laney had said nine-thirty, an hour from now. He scanned the crowd to be sure—it wasn’t yet at the humid, shoulderto-sweaty-shoulder press that would come by eleven—but didn’t see either of them.

Bennett leaned back, drew his anonymity around him like a hood. Just a man at a table. He put the parabolic mic on a chair, ran the earbuds up under his shirt. Entertained himself by aiming the mic up at the VIP lounge, where Too G’s movie folks would later be partying.

“—heard his agent got him three for the picture.”

“Too made three, huh? Well, good. After all he been through.”

“Hard life.”

“That’s truth.”

Bennett smiled, flipped the off switch. He leaned back, eyes moving, sorting, categorizing. Marking the bouncers, the security by the bar. The employee exit that would lead to a storage room, an office maybe, probably an exit. Gauging the crowd, looking for threats.

His body tingled, and he rolled with it, that in-the-moment tingle that let him feel the flow of blood through his veins, sense the shifting weight of each body in the bar, anticipate the flicker of spotlights.

Killing time.

5

“Are you okay?” Laney had stopped just outside the doors to the main bar, her face marked with concern.

She’s lying to you. She has been since the beginning.

The woman you made your home, the wife you’ve gambled everything for. She’s lying to you.

“I’m fine,” he said.

“You were so quiet on the way over.”

“Just thinking.” Lying lying lying lying lyin– “Come on. Let’s get ready. He could be here any minute.” He stepped into the room before she could argue.

The club wasn’t crowded yet, but there were more people than Daniel would have liked. So many faces, a blur of eyes and mouths. Lying lying lying.

He took a breath, glanced at his watch. A few minutes to nine. A thousand lifetimes had passed in the past hours.

“Do you think he’s here yet?” Laney was radiant. The rainbows that fell from the ceiling bounced off the necklace and lit her skin with fire. Lying lying ly—

“I don’t know.” He stood in the entrance to the club, letting his eyes get used to the dim light. Taking in the surroundings, the same and yet so different from the room he had seen this afternoon. His pulse thudded as loud as the beat but faster, and his armpits were clammy cool. “Get us a space by the bar.”

“Daniel.”

He turned, and she stepped forward. Took his hand and stared into his eyes. “I love you.”

He made himself smile at her. “Get us a seat.” He squeezed her fingers, then fought his way toward the bathroom. Snatches of conversation as he passed.

“—two-picture deal at Paramount, with back end—”

“—should see this place, it’s magic. Maybe after we have a drink—”

“—so I said, ‘Look, I don’t care what role you played in My Fair Lady, you’re not cut out to—”

“—I mean, this girl was unbelievable. She had these eyes, man, just hypnotized me—”

“—it’s Pretty Woman meets Requiem for a Dream—”

“—get me another, yeah? Ketel, up, clean, dry, blue—”

The door to the men’s room was heavy. The space was all marble and gold plating. A Spanish-language tape played over the sound system, a resonant voice saying, “¿Puedo afilar mi lapis?” and then, a second later, “Can I sharpen my pencil?” A couple of the stalls were filled, but not his. Given the choice, men generally took stalls at the end over the middle. Daniel stepped inside, fumbled with the lock. The Sig Sauer was still strapped behind the toilet tank. He peeled the tape away. The gun was wonderful and terrible in his hands.

“Me siento enfermo . . . I’m feeling sick. Me siento enfermo . . . I’m feeling sick.”

Daniel dropped onto the toilet. The porcelain was cold through the thin material of his slacks. He buried his head in his hands. The gun pressed hard against his temple.

She’s lying to you.

But why?

Was she working with Bennett? Could this be some sort of elaborate scam?

It didn’t seem possible. No one could have planned on his vanishing, his amnesia.

So what happened leading up to that?

The parts of his life he could remember, it all glowed. But it was mostly history. Of the week or two leading to her “death” and his dash to suicide, he’d gotten nothing but the briefest of flashes. What he could remember was confusing and painful. There was guilt and shame and sickness, he knew that. Something terrible had happened. He’d assumed that was the arrival of Bennett.

But what if he was wrong? What if it was something else?

What if you discovered something that changed the way you felt about her?

What if she turned out not to be the person you thought?

An urge to retch, cry, scream tore through him. He clapped his hands against his head, hard, the hit of the gun blunt and painful.

Ever since Maine, he had put his whole trust in Laney. He’d rebuilt his identity, such as it was, around her. Even when he’d thought her dead, he’d defined himself through her.

What if she’d been the problem from the beginning?

He had a powerful impulse to get up, walk out of the bathroom and the club and the city. To just go. Pick a direction and leave all this behind, all these questionable certainties and uncertain questions. To forget figuring it out, and just start again as someone new, somewhere else.

But as who? Where? Why?

You are who you choose to be. But does that mean you can choose again and again and again? Does nothing matter?

No. You’ve made decisions. Live or die by them. Besides, maybe there’s an explanation. Ask. Give her a chance to explain.

And then do whatever you have to do. One way or the other, it ends tonight. All of it.

Even if it means the end of everything.

He prepped the Sig, then tucked it in his waistband and climbed up on the back of the toilet tank.

5

From his shadowed table, Bennett watched Daniel walk out of the washroom. The man did not look good. Pale and shaky and wound too tight, ready to explode with the slightest touch.

His suit was nice, though. Gray and slim. The jacket buttoned. Hayes threaded his way through the crowd to the side bar, where Laney waited. She looked great, her dress cut for cleavage but longer at the leg, that balance that kept it from going slutty. The blond hair wasn’t really her; skin like that worked better with her natural brown. But there was no denying the sex appeal of the string of diamonds dripping down her neck.

Daniel slid in beside her. She smiled thinly. Her hands fidgeted with the strap of her purse. Hayes took the bag from her, hung it on the back of a chair, then said something to the bartender, who nodded.

Had he put the gun in her purse?

Bennett rested his camera on the edge of the table for stability. The digital display glowed as he focused. The lens magnified the image, brought him as close to Daniel’s midriff as if he’d been standing beside the guy.

No. There’s the bulge, on the left-hand side. The same place Hayes had tucked his gun before. People were predictable.

He slipped in the earbud and turned on the microphone. 5

“Chardonnay and a Booker’s neat, double.” The bartender set them down.

Daniel nodded, laid a couple of twenties on the bar. “Keep the change.”

“Thanks.”

“For luck?” Laney held her wineglass by the stem.

“Something like that.” Daniel raised his heavy rocks glass, took a swallow. The Sig felt strange tucked into the front of his pants, heavy and intimate. The sights dug into his flesh. He leaned back against the bar, glanced around. The place was filling up, and the flashes of glowing light reduced the crowd to anonymity, just teeth and shoulders and hair and sweat.

“Did it—”

“Yes,” Daniel said, and nodded to her purse, where he’d hung it over the back of the chair. “Just like we planned.”

He tracked her eyes, saw the panic in them. She hated guns. At least, he thought she did. That could be a lie too. “Can I ask you something?”

She looked up at him.

“Is there anything I don’t know?”

“What—how do you mean?”

“I have this feeling there’s something really important I’m missing. I keep almost getting it, but not quite. You know when you’re trying to remember somebody’s name, you know it starts with R, and you just keep thinking Robert, Ryan, Rick, Randy, Roger . . . Roger . . . Roger . . . I feel like that.”

“Well.” She shrugged. “You have amnesia.”

“I know,” he said. Come on, baby. Please. “But I feel like there’s something specific.”

“You haven’t slept in a week. You’re exhausted. Your head is probably playing tricks on you.”

He was tired. God, was he tired. Could that explain things? Paranoia and exhaustion were a dangerous combination. Daniel took a swallow of bourbon, didn’t taste it. You know what you saw on her phone. “Bennett will be here soon, and then we’re all in. Win and live or lose and die. And I guess I’m just asking if there’s anything you think I need to know.” He turned to her. “Anything at all.”

Laney sipped the Chardonnay, her lipstick leaving kisses on the rim of the glass. “What are you getting at, Daniel?”

“I’m not sure.” He stared. This is it, baby. This is your chance. Our chance. “I’m hoping you’ll tell me.”

For the tiniest fraction of a second, she hesitated. He let himself hope. Hope that it wasn’t all a lie, that she wasn’t tied up with the monster in their lives. That he hadn’t saved his life just to learn it was a ruin.

Then she said, “I’m sorry. I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Daniel stared at her. Kept his face smooth and still, while behind it, everything fell apart.

It was all for nothing.

All of it.

“But I hope you know,” Laney continued, “that I love you. More than you can imagine.”

“Me too,” said a voice from behind him. “I love you both.”

5

There was a reason he worked alone.

Bennett had listened in on their conversation, amused. Poor Daniel, knowing just enough to suspect he was being lied to, and drawing the wrong conclusion. Poor Laney, trying so hard to protect her man. Both of them pure and true and on a collision course. Neither the iceberg nor the Titanic had evil intent, but they still made for a hell of a smashup.

It was good TV. But he was on a timeline.

So he’d slipped out the earbud, set the camera on the chair beside the microphone, and given both a quick wipe before walking away from them. The crowd had grown, and he threaded his way between party people, Daniel and Laney now in sight, now out of it. He’d come up just in time to hear Laney’s proclamation of love.

“Me too,” he said, smiling. “I love you both.”

Laney started, took a fast breath in. But Daniel seemed almost calm as he turned, wearing the unsurprised look of a man who’d been expecting the worst. “You’re early.”

“I’m a go-getter.” Bennett glanced at Laney. “Lovely necklace.”

“Take it,” she said, one hand moving to her throat.

Daniel said, “Not here.”

No, you’ll want to go somewhere quiet, won’t you brother? “Where?”

“There’s an exit over there,” the man gestured across the crowded dance floor, “behind those curtains.”

“It might be alarmed.”

“It’s not. I checked this afternoon.”

“Why not just go out the front?” Bennett curious what kind of a lie the man would come up with.

“Too many photographers out that way now. If anyone notices Laney, we’re in trouble.”

“All of a sudden you don’t want the crowd?”

“I know you don’t have a gun. That was the point.”

Which you think I’ll read as an amateur’s overconfidence, since of course I don’t need a gun to take care of the two of you. So now I’m supposed to feel so pleased about the fact that you’re willing to walk into a deserted alley with me that I never stop to wonder if you have a gun yourself. Kinda slim, brother. You should respect your opponent more. Bennett said, “All right. Before we go, I want you to know. It was just business.”

“Die screaming.”

“I guess that covers the formalities. Shall we?”

“I want your word that you’ll leave us alone afterward.”

“I promise.” Bennett stuck out his hand.

One of the neat things about people: hold out your hand long enough, the person opposite will take it. Daniel stared at him with disgust. But after a long moment he returned the shake.

The moment their hands touched, Bennett clenched down hard, and then with his left hand jerked open Daniel’s suit and snatched the Sig Sauer. The gun was his before the button torn from Daniel’s jacket hit the floor. He thumbed the safety off and put the barrel to the man’s belly.

“You don’t mind if I hold this, though, do you?”

Daniel’s mouth fell open. The blood rushed from his face.

“There are enough people here that I can shoot you both and walk out while everyone is busy panicking.” He kept his face calm, the mask of ease that hid everything. “But I don’t want to do that. Okay?”

“What.” Daniel coughed. “What do you want?”

“First, I want your beautiful wife to give me my necklace.”

Laney had gone pale. Slow as a reluctant bride, she reached up, unclasped the necklace. Held it out to him. “Here.”