7

Levy picked Jack up on the corner of 72nd near the entrance to the Dakota.

"Isn't this where John Lennon was shot?" he said as Jack got in.

"Yeah. And where Rosemary had her baby, though they didn't identify it by name."

"Creepy-looking place."

Not creepy. Gothic. Jack would have loved to live in the Dakota. But even if he could afford it, the vetting process for all prospective tenants would keep him out. He'd never pass.

He pointed to his jacket pocket. "Everything you need is in here. Go on. Take it out."

Levy gingerly reached over and removed the baggy. He held it up to the light and smiled.

"Hair. Oh, perfect."

"It'll show that she's got the same father as Bolton and Thompson."

"She told you?"

"She doesn't know her father's name, but she told me enough to make book on it. But she's not telling me everything. She's holding something back. It may have nothing to do with anything else we're interested in, or it may. Maybe her fingerprints will tell."

Levy studied the baggy again.

"She handled the envelope?"

Jack nodded. "It'll carry her prints—and only hers. So don't waste your time looking ior mine."

Levy gave him a sidelong glance as he stuffed the baggy inside his coat.

"'tou don't trust me, do you."

Jack smiled. "When did that occur to you? When 1 wiped down all the door handles and window buttons before I got out?"

"We should have at least a modicum of trust between us, don't you think?"

Sounded like what he'd said to Christy.

"At the moment, doc, we happen to have parallel agendas. That allows us to cooperate. But as soon as we come to cross purposes—and we might—you'll hang me out to dry. And you can count on me doing the same unto you before you can do unto me."

"Mutual mistrust… hardly an ideal working relationship."

"Works for me."

Jack pulled a paper towel from his pocket as he opened the car door. He wiped off the inner handle, then gave Levy a little wave.

"Call me with the results."

Before Levy rolled away, Jack wiped off the outer handle.

Mutual distrust… nothing wrong with that.

As he watched Levy turn uptown on Central Park West, he wondered how on Earth he was going to break the news to Christy that the man she knew as Jerry Bethlehem was her half brother.

The question was—did he know he was dating his niece? Had to. Couldn't be a coincidence. So the next question was Why?

Looked like he was going to have to pay a visit to Casa Bethlehem after all.

8

Whap!

Hank pictured again the face of that phony fuck John Tyleski on the leather of the heavy bag, and bashed it with a left and a right. The impacts rattled his arms all the way up to his shoulders. Then he pounded it again. And again. Good thing he was wearing gloves, otherwise his fists would be raw meat by now.

Earlier he'd attracted a lot of attention chasing after Tyleski or whoever he was—unwanted attention. Some plainclothes cop—a detective named Au-gustino or something like that—had pulled him off the street and iD'd him, asking him all sorts of pointed questions about his state of mind. Probably thought he was mentally disturbed.

Whap!

Yeah, well, he'd been pretty goddamned disturbed at the time. Still was. And worst of all, he hadn't been able to tell the cop the real reason why. Couldn't report the theft of a book he didn't own, so he'd had to make up some bullshit story about a package being stolen and then describe the wrong kind of car. Promised he'd come over to Midtown North and fill out a report. Fat fucking chance of that.

Whap!

Took everything he had to keep from tearing into the cop and the gawkers who'd gathered around. Couldn't risk letting go. Any bad publicity from him would attach to the book and the whole Kicker movement. So he'd walked away as cool as could be.

Whap!

But that had been on the outside. Inside he'd been boiling, building a pressure that had nowhere to go.

Whap!

He'd needed a drink but knew if he went to a bar he'd only pick a fight with someone. So he'd joined this health club and got on the heavy bag. Didn't know shit about boxing but it just felt good to hit something.

Whap!

Hit the bag, don't hit people. Right. Except for John Tyleski. If Hank ever saw him again he didn't care where or when it was, he was gonna open a big can of whup-ass on the bastard. Wouldn't know what hit him.

Whap!

The book—the damn book had been put in his hands for a reason. It had come to him because of the Kicker Man. So weird to see that same figure inside. He thought he'd dreamed it up on his own, but there it was. He hadn't understood what the book had said about it. But that wasn't why the book was important.

It had answers—answers to questions he hadn't even thought of yet. He'd had only a short, short time with it but he sensed—no, somehow he knew—it contained knowledge important to the future, to his and Jeremy's, but most of all to the Plan.

If only he'd taken the time to go through it. But he'd been so busy, and he'd thought he'd have all the time in the world for it after this damn book tour was done.

And he needed that knowledge now more than ever. Because Jeremy had called this morning, so excited he could hardly speak because he thought Dawn was pregnant. All part of the Plan as their daddy had described it.

Whap!

But he hadn't described it enough. Not nearly enough. He'd got only so far and then he stopped coming around. Hank had looked for him and never found him. Dead and gone. Had to be. But had he left anything behind that would tell the rest of the story? Hank had found no trace.

Then the book had fallen into his hands and he'd known someone—Daddy, maybe?—was watching over him.

Now the book was gone.

Whap!

But he was gonna get it back. Oh, yes. One way or another he was gonna get it back.

9

Jack pulled to a double-parked stop outside the Tower Diner, wondering how he was going to check out Bolton's presence or absence.

He'd already been to Work. Not that he'd expected him there after last night's performance, but you never knew. He'd walked in, looked around, walked out. No Bolton.

He couldn't help but smile when he looked at one of the front windows of the diner and saw the man himself, sitting and sipping water.

Thank you, Jeremy Bolton.

Jack gunned the car and headed for Bolton's home. Christy's directions led him on a winding course but eventually he arrived in a brand-new upscale development of attached three-story townhouses in Rego Park. He cruised around, getting the lay of the land, and not liking the well-lit streets.

Bolton's house was number 119. It sat third from the end and Jack noticed that his row backed up to some woods.

That had potential.

He exited the development and explored some more. The woods weren't really woods. They proved to be little more than a hundred-loot-deep strip of wild oaks, elms, and underbrush that formed a buffer between the townhouses and a Woodhaven Boulevard strip mall on the far side.

Potential had become possibility.

He parked in front of a dojo and wandered over to the Italian restaurant/pizza joint that occupied the end unit. He pretended to read the posted menu while he scanned the vicinity. Assured that no one was about, he slipped around the side to the rear. No one there either, so he hopped the low retaining wall and made his way toward the townhouses.