"Ed, you're not going to bleed to death or anything before anybody can get there, are you?"

"No, Bob, but please ask them to hurry."

"I'll call you back in a minute. You're on your cell phone?"

"Yes."

Martinez hung up, and Eagle sank to the ground, sitting cross-legged and leaning against his car. His cell phone rang.

"Yes?"

"It's Bob. They're on their way, and so am I." He hung up.

A SHERIFF'S CAR was there in four minutes, by Eagle's watch, and two ambulances and Bob Martinez were right behind him. Eagle insisted on walking them through what had happened before he got into the ambulance.

"You hit him with all four shots," Martinez said, "from his right knee to his belly to his chest."

"I wasn't even aiming," Eagle said.

AT THE HOSPITAL a young resident did something to his earlobe and stuck a swab into the hole in Eagle's cheek, then he poured some liquid into a small cup and handed it to Eagle.

"Mr. Eagle, I know this is going to sound like an odd treatment, but I want you to take some of this into your mouth, close your lips tightly and spit it out the hole in your cheek."

Eagle did as he was told, and a stream of clotted blood and antiseptic shot out the hole. It would have hurt like hell, he thought, but for the local anesthetic the man had injected into his cheek.

Then, in short order, an oral surgeon appeared and stitched up the wound inside Eagle's mouth, and a plastic surgeon was next, carefully suturing the wound in his cheek with tiny stitches.

"I want you to keep this on your cheek for as long and as often as you can stand it," the plastic surgeon said, pressing a wrapped ice pack against his face. "It'll help prevent swelling, and you'll look more normal." He put a square of flesh-colored tape on the stitched wound.

When the medics were done, Bob Martinez, who had watched the treatment with interest, drove him home, so that he could change his bloody clothing.

"I had your car flat-bedded to the dealer in Albuquerque," Martinez said. "The windshield will have to be replaced, and the door fixed, and the interior will need some attention. Do you have a second car?"

"Thanks, Bob, I've still got Barbara's Range Rover."

"Where's Barbara?"

"Gone, and for good. There's something I can tell you, Bob, now that Joe Big Bear is dead."

"What's that?"

"My witness at Big Bear's hearing, Cartwright, was wrong about something. I don't think it was deliberate, but he said that Joe had been at his house the whole time the car was being repaired. I didn't remember it until later, but at our first meeting, Joe told me he had had to leave the job to go to Pep Boys on Cerrillos for a fan belt."

Martinez's eyebrows went up. "Ah, opportunity," he said. "That matches up nicely with motive and means."

"Yes, it does. I think Joe did the three murders."

"Well, I can clear that case," Martinez said as he pulled into Eagle's driveway.

Eagle got out, thanked Martinez again, and went inside. He called Betty and said that he wasn't feeling well and wouldn't be in that day, then he stripped off his bloody clothes, took another shower and got into bed. He didn't wake up until Susannah Wilde called in the late afternoon from the Centurion jet to say that she'd be landing in Santa Fe at six o'clock.

Thirty-six

EAGLE MET THE CENTURION GULFSTREAM IV AT THE SANTA Fe Jet Center, feeling like shit, hurting all over as if he had been beaten up. The ice had helped, but his face was still swollen, and his left eye was black.

When the jet taxied up to the ramp, Eagle walked out to meet it as the door opened, and several people came down the airstair. Susannah was first off, followed by a rather handsome, if elderly, man.

"Oh, Ed, what happened to you?" she asked, looking alarmed.

"Just a little accident; nothing to worry about."

"Ed, let me introduce Rick Barron, the chairman of Centurion Studios."

"Ed, how are you?" the elderly man asked.

"Very well, Mr. Barron."

"Please call me Rick."

"Thank you."

"Susannah, it looks as though you don't need a lift into town," Barron said.

"No, I'm fine, Rick. Thank you so much for the ride; it's so much easier than flying commercial to Albuquerque and driving from there."

"Any time. We're returning Sunday evening, if you need a round trip."

"No, I'll be staying to get my new house in order." She kissed him on the cheek, Eagle took her luggage from a flight attendant and they walked to the Range Rover.

As soon as they were in the car, before he could even start it, she put a hand on his arm. "All right, now tell me what really happened. Did you get into a fight?"

"In a manner of speaking," Eagle replied. "I want you to understand that incidents like this are not a normal or regular part of my life."

"Understood. Now what happened?"

"A man, a former client, tried to kill me with a sawed-off shotgun. Fortunately, it didn't turn out as he had planned." He explained the circumstances as fully as he could.

"You should be at home in bed," she said.

"I spent the day in bed, and I'm just fine, thanks."

"I expect you could use a drink," she said. "So could I; let's get going."

HE PUT HER THINGS in the guest room. "Do you want to change?"

"Nope, I'm okay as I am. Where's the kitchen?"

"This way." He led her there and poured them both a Knob Creek on the rocks.

"Now, you sit here," she said, pushing him onto a barstool. "I'm going to cook dinner."

"That's really not…"

"Don't argue with me," she said, taking a swig of her drink and opening the refrigerator door. "What have we got here?"

"There are some steaks and salad makings."

"Got it," she said, starting the grill on the Viking range. "Dinner in half an hour."

THE FISHING BOAT MADE IT into Cabo San Lucas well after dark. Vittorio sat on a beer cooler, a dirty blanket around his shoulders, and watched as the boat was eased into her berth, then he pressed five hundred dollars on its captain and jumped onto the dock.

Vittorio could not swim, but he could float. He had floated for the better part of an hour, terrified of growing tired and sinking, before the fishing boat appeared and heard his shouts. They had even rescued his hat, which was floating alongside him.

When he had gone over the side, he had been stunned by his uncontrolled impact with the water and frightened that he was under it for what seemed like minutes. He broke the surface just in time to see her turn away from the rail and walk away. He had been too out of breath even to shout, before the ferry was a hundred yards away. He had taken deep breaths, arched his back and he thanked God that the sea was flat.

He had had time to contemplate the end of his life before it was saved by the fishermen and to plan what he was going to do to Barbara if he ever got his hands on her. Once aboard the boat he'd tried to call Ed Eagle, but his cell phone had been ruined by the salt water.

Now, as he walked into the town, angry and damp, all he wanted was food, tequila and a bed. Then he remembered that he had the key to the Toyota. He found a cab and negotiated a price for the ride to Mazatlan. The cab ride was over an hour, and on arrival he went directly to the ferry terminal. As he had suspected, the Toyota was parked there. He retrieved his luggage from the trunk and found a hotel.

He ordered from room service, then he rinsed the salt water out of his clothes so they would dry properly, flushed out his.45 Colt as best he could and soaked in a hot tub until the food came. A quarter of a bottle of tequila later, he fell soundly asleep, grateful to be alive.