“No, I don’t. Not this weekend or ever again.”

“I’m sorry to hear that. I was hoping we could…”

“I’m afraid that, from now on, you’re going to have to do that to yourself,” she said, and hung up. She turned to Stone. “You heard?”

Stone nodded. “Not good.”

“What am I going to do now?”

“I’m thinking, I’m thinking.”

35

STONE AND HOLLY were already having a drink at Elaine’s when Lance arrived.

He settled himself at their table and ordered a drink. “So, how was sunny Florida?”

“Sunny,” Stone replied. “I don’t know how they stand it down there.”

“Yes, it’s a hard life. Holly, are you keeping the criminal elements of Orchid Beach in check?”

“Oh, that’s not hard. It’s mostly traffic and the occasional drug bust or burglary.”

“Aren’t you bored?”

“Funny you should mention that.”

“Oh, really?”

“I’ve told Stone I’m thinking about making a change. God knows, life is good down there, but it’s not very interesting.”

“Perhaps I can be of help,” Lance said. “Let me work on that.”

“Sure.”

Stone spoke up. “Actually, you can be of help on something else, Lance.”

Lance smiled. “Trini?”

“Right,” Holly said.

“I saw the news reports. When I heard that they’d taken Trini away in an FBI car I suspected they’d be hiding him. Is he back in the Witness Protection Program?”

“Yes,” she said.

“Have you spoken to anyone at the FBI?”

“Yes, but I’m never speaking to him again.”

“Holly, surely you know by now that the FBI is never going to stretch to help anybody in local law enforcement.”

“I knew that, but it’s been brought home to me afresh.”

“Perhaps your best move would be to humiliate the FBI into turning Trini over to you.”

“Humiliate them? That sounds like fun.”

“Of course, you’d be burning your bridges. They’d never return another phone call of yours.”

“Just tell me how to humiliate them.”

“I know a well-placed reporter at The New York Times. I’m sure he’d like a story about how the FBI is hiding a mass murderer, keeping him from being prosecuted. Would you like to meet the gentleman?”

Holly grinned and opened her mouth to speak, but Stone threw up a hand.

“Hang on,” he said.

“What?” Holly asked.

“This is a very big step.”

“Well, yeah, I guess it is.”

“I think you ought to give some thought to the consequences before you act on this. First of all, you’re going to enrage the FBI.”

“I’d like that,” she said.

“You might not. Suppose you need them on an important case. I mean, you still have to use their lab, their computer databases, their expertise. You might find all that suddenly unavailable to your department-not overtly, just in small ways. They might ‘misplace’ your lab samples, or your computer connection might suddenly go down.”

“Stone has a point, Holly,” Lance said. “If you go to the Times, it would be like a declaration of war on the FBI, and they could make things uncomfortable for you.”

“You still have to answer to your city council, don’t you?” Stone asked.

“Well, yes.”

“You wouldn’t want key members of the council to start getting phone calls from highly placed people at the FBI, complaining about you.”

“I guess not. Maybe I should just resign. That would fix all the problems you’ve brought up.”

“But then a whole new set of problems might arise,” Stone said. “God help you if you should ever get into some kind of trouble with the Feds.”

“What kind of trouble?”

“Oh, I don’t know. You might be caught up a tree, so to speak, and need the Bureau’s help, or at least their inattention.” He waited to see if the penny would drop about the tree. It didn’t.

“What do you mean, ‘up a tree’?”

“Just a figure of speech, but a pertinent one.”

The penny dropped. “Oh,” she said.

Stone turned to Lance. “Isn’t there something else you might be able to do to help Holly locate Trini-something that could be accomplished without tossing a grenade into the Bureau?”

“I’d need more to go on than I have,” Lance said. “If I had Trini’s name in the Witness Protection Program, for instance.”

Holly sat up straight. “Robert Marshall.”

“What?”

“That’s Trini’s name in the Program. I got it from… a source.”

“And how long have you known this?”

“Since not long after I came to New York.”

Lance pulled out his cell phone and dialed a three-digit number. “Robert Marshall,” he said. “New listing.” He took out a notebook and wrote down something, then hung up. He ripped the page off the notebook and handed it to Holly. “Eighty-eighth Street,” he said. “Two blocks east of here.”

“You’re kidding,” Holly said.

“Nope.”

“You’ve got a CIA thing that can give you that?”

“No, I called New York City information.”

“Four-one-one?”

“Exactly.”

Holly looked embarrassed. “Why didn’t I think of that?”

“I don’t know, why didn’t you think of that?”

Stone began laughing. “All this time and trouble, and all we had to do was call information!”

“Well,” Holly said, standing up, “let’s go get him.”

“Not until I’ve had dinner,” Lance said, picking up a menu. “There are preparations to be made.”

They ordered dinner, then Lance got out his cell phone again. “Write this down,” he said when the phone was answered, and he read out the address. “I want a car and two men on the building now. Check the mailboxes for a Robert Marshall and figure out which apartment it is. Check the file on one Trini Rodriguez for a description. Call me back when you’ve got it nailed.” He closed the cell phone. “We don’t want to just go strolling in there, do we?”

“I guess not,” Holly said.

36

AS THE WAITER was taking away their dishes, Lance’s cell phone went off. “Yes?” He listened for a minute or so. “Right. Soon.” He hung up. “Your boy came home five minutes ago. So kind of him not to disturb our dinner.”

Stone waved to a waiter for a check and signed it.

“Is everybody armed?” Lance asked. “Or do I have to think of everything?”

Stone and Holly nodded.

“Do you have cuffs, Holly?”

“Yep, two pair.”

“Then shall we?” Lance pushed back from the table and led them outside to his car. “Take a left,” he said to the driver, “then a block and a half straight ahead. One of our cars is there.”

The driver did as he was told, and they came to a stop beside another black car. Lance rolled down a window and waved at the darkened windows. A man got out and got into the front seat of Lance’s car.

“Tell me,” Lance said.

“Your man came home ten minutes ago. He matched the file photo, ponytail and all. He lives on the top floor front; you can see his lights.”

Lance looked out the window. “Mmmm, yes. The fire escape is on the front of the building. I’ll want your partner at the bottom. Then there’s the roof to deal with.”

“I’ve had a word with the super and a look inside. There’s a door and a stairway leading to the roof from the top floor.”

“All right, you go up to the roof and wait for somebody to come running through that door, and for Christ’s sake don’t shoot one of us. My friends would prefer to take the man alive, but don’t put yourself in peril to make that happen. We’ll give you a three-minute head start, then we go in.” The man got out of the car and went into the building.

“Here’s what I’d like to do,” Lance said. “The three of us go into the building and ascend the stairs to the top floor, front apartment. Holly, you knock on the door, then stand with your back to it, so he can see only the back of a woman’s head through the peephole. As soon as he cracks the door, Stone and I rush in, with you right behind. We’ll concentrate on Trini. It will be your job to keep anyone else who happens to be in the room from shooting Stone and me. That okay?”