Jose nodded slowly. "Okay."

They stared at each other for a minute. Jose took another sip.

"You want to tell me something?" Ken asked.

"You want to tell me something?" Jose asked. "You're the one acting strange."

Ken winced and looked at him hard. "They found your aunt and the other woman, dead. Execution style, Jose. No struggle. And right there with them? That little popgun you own. The one you keep in the crack of your ass."

Jose felt his mind casting free, dizzy from the night before and this news, but he gripped his legs under the table and dug in with his fingertips.

"What about the others?" he asked, thinking of Isodora and the baby.

"Others?" Ken said, studying him.

"A woman and her baby girl," Jose said. "What about them?"

Ken shook his head. "If you're trying to distract me, don't. I'm doing my best to make this easy."

Jose paused, but only for an instant, and said, "I'm a serial killer all of a sudden, right? A basement full of bodies somewhere?"

"You admitting to the two?"

"Of course I'm not," Jose said. "You're not serious. I'd leave my own gun there?"

Ken just stared.

"You giving me a chance to run?" Jose asked. "That your help?"

"You know it's not," Ken said. "I told you and told you, back in the day. You can't play on the edge. Sooner or later, you lose your balance. It just happens. I just thought it could be you and me and make it easy that way, not taking you down like some banger in the street."

"Cup of coffee and a friendly surrender, huh?" Jose said. "You're a pal."

Jose flicked the coffee without warning, blinding the cop, whipping out his automatic, and clipping Trent with a backhand across the temple. Jose grabbed him under the arm so he didn't fall to the floor, scanning the cafe over his shoulder. One woman looked, her mouth agog, but when her eyes met Jose's, she raised her newspaper. The rest kept their phone calls going.

Jose propped his old friend up against the wall. A small trickle of blood seeped down along his hairline, draining into his ear. Jose turned again, scanned the cafe, stashed his gun, and slipped out the back.

CHAPTER 53

THE OTHER PATRONS AT WHO'S WHO NUDGED EACH OTHER AND stared at Casey. Paige, her big blonde mane radiating, glared around the deck until they dropped their prying eyes and the buzz of conversation recommenced. With a curt nod Paige grabbed hold of her burger with two hands and took a bite. The big diamond on her hand flashed, blinding Casey for a moment with a dash of sunlight.

After swallowing, Paige dabbed her lips and said, "Honey, I got one chit and one chit only, with Mrs. Cavanaugh. You telling me I need to use it?"

"I can't think of any way to get to her except through you," Casey said, sipping her Diet Coke. "Especially with everything going on."

"It's awful," Paige said before falling silent.

"I'm sure she's not keeping score," Casey said. "This isn't that big of a deal for her."

Paige shook her head violently. "When I stepped down at the Bovine Ball so her daughter could win that crown, she told me point-blank in the French Room Bar of the Adolphus Hotel and I'll never forget it, she said, 'You'll get one favor from me for this. Don't you dare ask for two.'"

"This isn't much of a favor."

"She's an old German," Paige said, wrinkling her nose. "Her husband is the Cavanaugh. One is one with her."

"I'm sorry," Casey said.

Paige patted her hand across the table. "No, don't be. I just wanted to make sure you really needed it, honey. You know there's nothing I wouldn't do. Especially now, with that so-called senator and don't even get me started about Taylor Jordan. He'll be passed over on some holiday parties if I have anything to do with it. You can believe that."

"Mandy Chase needs to know this is totally private," Casey said. "Everything is confidential. I'd like to talk with her in a little more detail about some of the things she told Jose."

Paige frowned and clutched Casey's hand again. "And I am so sorry about that. And me the one telling you to sleep with a Mexican, my God. The men last night after you left? My God, you should have heard them carry on about it when I told them I encouraged you. Told me we both got just what we asked for, and I'm supposed to be your friend."

Casey clamped her lips tight, stared at the table between them, and said nothing.

Paige sighed and finished her burger, urging Casey to at least take a bite from her own.

"I'm not really hungry," Casey said. She'd told Paige that before she ordered the sandwich, but her friend insisted on buying it anyway.

After wiping her mouth, Paige took out a small mirror and touched up her face before putting in a call to Mrs. Cavanaugh's personal assistant and arranging for an emergency meeting to discuss the favor.

Casey rode with Paige in her little green Aston Martin at Paige's insistence that it would look better when they arrived at the Cavanaughs' great stone mansion. A butler showed them into a sitting room with lush satin curtains and what looked like a genuine Renoir above a white marble fireplace. A maid brought them a silver tray with a pitcher of iced tea and small sandwiches, which they both simply looked at. It took another half an hour before a young woman came through the double doors in a pin-striped charcoal suit, tortoiseshell glasses, and her dark hair pulled into a tight bun.

Paige craned her neck to see into the hall. When the young woman closed the doors behind her, Paige frowned. The woman introduced herself as Shelly Frye, Mrs. Cavanaugh's personal assistant, and sat down across from them with her back to the broad windows overlooking the garden.

"You'll need to tell me exactly what it is you need from her," Shelly said, poising a Montblanc pen above her clipboard.

"I said on the phone," Paige said, thrusting out her chest so that it strained against the cream linen dress, "I'm here about the favor."

"Yes," Shelly said, blinking. "What favor? She'd like to know."

"The one favor she promised me in the French Room Bar at the Adolphus Hotel the afternoon before the Bovine Ball. She said not to ask for two, so this is the one. You can write that down."

"She'll still want to know what it is," Shelly said. "I'm sorry, that's my job."

"I'm sorry, she'll have to hear it from me," Paige said.

Shelly looked at Casey, but she gave away nothing.

"So," Shelly said, looking down at her pad, "the favor you want is to talk with her without telling her what the subject is."

"No," Paige said, her red nails digging into the embroidered armrest of her chair, "the favor isn't to talk to her. I want to talk to her about the favor."

"You'll have to make an appointment to do that," Shelly said, apologetically, but with great comfort. "She has a full schedule today."

Paige looked at the woman for a moment and Casey thought she heard a low growl from her friend's throat.

"Don't you even try to do this with me," Paige said, her voice lower and softer than before. "You go tell her I'm here to talk. You tell her that trashy little columnist from the Star has been after me for three years to confirm the rumor about that Bovine Ball and her daughter ending up with the Hunt fortune. You tell her I don't go back on my word, unless someone else goes back on theirs. Then you check her schedule."

Shelly peered at Paige for a moment through her dusty glasses before nodding and leaving the room. Paige exhaled and fanned her face and drank some tea.

"Wow," Casey said.

Paige set her glass down on the tray. "Damn right."

The door opened several minutes later and without looking at either of them Shelly said, "She'll see you, but you'll have to talk while she works."