"Of course, whatever's necessary. Do you really think he fell overboard?"

"He's not on the ship; there's only one other place he can be, and it's being searched. You steer the car while we push."

Barbara got into the front seat, and saw Cupie's cell phone on the passenger seat. She switched it off and put it into her handbag. No calls to Ed Eagle today.

CUPIE SAT WITH BARBARA in a restaurant near their hotel, picking at his food. "I can't believe this," he said. "Are you sure you didn't see him again after we got out of the car?"

"No. I told you, I went to sleep."

"And why would he take my cell phone?"

"I don't know. Maybe his battery was low, and he wanted to make a call."

"I guess that makes sense. I've got to call Eagle and tell him what's happened." He looked around for a phone.

"Why don't you wait until you hear from the coast guard? You don't even know what to tell him yet."

"Yeah, I guess. Listen, there's something I have to talk to you about."

"What's that?"

"Vittorio and I talked about this today, before he… whatever he did. There's something wrong about this business with the kidnappers and the policia."

"Of course, there's something wrong," she said. "They're trying to kidnap me for my money."

"It's more than that. Three hundred grand isn't much to these people; they get multimillion-dollar ransoms. There's got to be some other reason why they're so interested in you. Tell me what it is."

Barbara looked baffled. "I don't have the faintest idea," she said. "Why would they want me for any other reason than my money?"

"You said you'd been to Puerto Vallarta before, right?"

"Yes, but that was years ago."

"This whole business started after we got to Puerto Vallarta. Did anything happen on your last visit that would have interested the police?"

"No, I came down with a girlfriend for a long weekend, and we liked it, so we stretched it into a week."

"What did you do while you were there?"

"The usual: we lay on the beach, drank margaritas, shopped, like that."

"Did you get stopped by the police for any reason? Help me out here, Barbara. Help me to protect you. Why do these people want you?"

"Cupie, this is crazy; the police here have no interest in me or, at least, not until I wired the three hundred thousand to the local bank. I think you were right: somebody at the bank tipped them off."

Cupie sighed. "All right. The car rental company will supply a new key in the morning. We'll start after we hear from the coast guard, and we should be in Tijuana by nightfall."

He didn't believe her, but he didn't know what else to do. One thing, though: he was going to watch his back for the rest of this trip.

Thirty-five

ED EAGLE WOKE FEELING FRESH AND READY FOR THE new day. He was looking forward to work, something he had not felt since Barbara's decamping. He showered and shaved, and as he looked in the mirror he thought again about the message from the county jail that Joe Big Bear was going to kill him.

It didn't make any more sense this morning than it had the day before. He thought of calling the police or the D.A., but what would he tell them? Joe had not told him the name of the man in jail who had been hired to kill him, and that must have been who made the phone call. And Joe was a free man only because of him, and people tended to be grateful for that kind of help.

He had breakfast and slipped into his suit jacket, and as he was about to leave he stopped at the front door. Better to be safe. He went back to his dressing room and removed the Terry Tussy custom.45 from the safe, slipped off his belt and replaced it with the wider, thicker gun belt, then threaded the holster onto the belt. He checked the magazine and made sure there was one in the chamber, then he cocked and locked the pistol and shoved it into the custom-made Mitch Rosen holster, which held the pistol high against his rib cage, making it easier to conceal. He left by the front door, picking up the Santa Fe New Mexican and the New York Times on the doorstep, and got into his car, tossing the papers onto the next seat.

He drove down the driveway and stopped, looking up and down the road. The pistol was digging into a rib, so he took it out of the holster and placed it on the passenger seat between the two newspapers, so it wouldn't get the leather seat oily.

He turned right and started down the mountain, driving in a leisurely fashion, thinking about the day ahead. As he came around a bend he saw a pickup truck pulled over onto the shoulder with the hood up, and he slowed. He'd see if the driver needed help. As he did, a man waving a hand stepped from behind the pickup's raised hood. The man looked familiar.

Then, as the man approached, Eagle belatedly recognized him. Joe Big Bear was smiling and waving with his left hand, seemingly relieved to have some help, and his right hand was behind his back. Eagle pressed the button that automatically lowered the passenger-side window, and as he did, something in the back of his mind told him he was making a mistake.

What came next happened very quickly and yet seemed in slow motion. Big Bear leaned over and put his face in the window, then his right hand came around with something odd-looking in it. A tool, maybe? Not a tool, not the kind needed to repair a broken pickup, anyway Eagle began to operate on pure instinct.

As the shotgun came through the window he grabbed at it as the first barrel fired, then he put a hand under the top newspaper, made contact with the pistol and, without pulling it out or aiming it began firing through the door, his hand coming up with each shot, while the shotgun fired again. The noise from the two weapons was incredible.

Simultaneously, Joe Big Bear's face winced in surprise, as the shotgun in his hand bucked. Eagle's last two rounds went through the open window and blew Big Bear backward, as if he had been jerked by a rope, and he disappeared from view.

Eagle sat, dazed, and tried to figure out what had happened. His windshield had a large hole in it and had crazed, ruining the view forward; there was something warm running down his neck, and he spat something out of his mouth into his hand. It was a single, double-ought buckshot the size of a garden pea and bloody. Eagle turned the rearview mirror so that he could see his reflection. There was a notch in his left earlobe and a black hole in his left cheek, and his face had flecks of black in the skin.

He got out of the car, spat blood, and walked around the vehicle, the.45 still in his hand and held out in front of him. With his left hand he found a handkerchief in his left hip pocket and pressed it to his bleeding ear. His ears were ringing, and the sound of the car door as he closed it seemed to come from far away.

Joe Big Bear was lying on his back, the shotgun near his right hand and his eyes open and staring blankly at the morning sky. Eagle bent over and felt Big Bear's neck where a pulse should be and felt nothing. He suddenly felt a wave of nausea and dizziness, and he vomited on the ground next to Big Bear's body. When he had stopped retching he leaned against the car and took deep breaths.

He regained his composure after a minute or so and clawed the cell phone from its holster on his belt, speed-dialing the district attorney's direct line.

"Martinez," a voice said.

"Bob, it's Ed Eagle," he managed to say before he had to spit blood again.

"Morning, Ed. You sound funny. Is anything wrong?"

"You remember my client, Joe Big Bear?"

"I'm afraid so."

"He just tried to shotgun me on the road, down the hill from my house."

"Ed, are you hurt?"

"Only a little, but Big Bear is dead. I'd appreciate it if you'd call the sheriff for me and get him out here with a crime scene team and two ambulances, one of them for me. I don't think I can drive."