"You said before they're middle-aged-"

"They coming down. I got to go," Jerome said. He put away his cell and picked up his beer.

They came in the kitchen with men's and women's watches, some jewelry, and laid them on the counter where Jerome was sitting. Art got beers from the fridge saying he thought Virginia would go for that Lady Bulova. Carl got a fifth of Canadian Club from the liquor cabinet and poured a couple, not asking Jerome if he wanted one. It was okay, he'd rather watch these two than get high. He said, "What would you do if the people that live here walked in the door?"

"It's like a home invasion then," Art said. "What you do is strip 'em and tie 'em up." He sniffed the air, looked at Jerome and said, "Somebody's smoking a joint," sounding eager.

Jerome offered the roach.

Art seemed about to take it, but said, "Shit, not after you nigger-lipped it."

Jerome let it pass for the time being. He said, "How come you guys never get caught? You don't seem to care who sees you. You leave tracks every place you go. How come you don't get picked up?"

"We could get caught," Carl said, "but we don't."

"We work under contract," Art said. "So far we've whacked six people."

"Eight," Carl said, "the two before we teamed up."

"You count those?"

"Why not?"

"How many's that?"

"I just told you, eight."

"You count the bodyguard?"

"No, I didn't. That's nine."

"Nine we've whacked," Art said, "without getting caught."

"Except the first two," Carl said.

Jerome watched them throw down their shots of Club and make faces.

"We use semi-automatics," Art said. "Use 'em one time only. Throw 'em away and get new ones for the next job. All the contracts are drug dealers."

"A couple weren't," Carl said.

"No, but all the rest were," Art said. "We don't give a shit what they do. It just happens they deal drugs."

Jerome said, "You do this for money, huh?"

"Fifty gees a pop," Art said.

"Man, that sounds high. How you get jobs like that?"

"Drink up," Carl said, "we're outta here."

Art wanted to take some of the booze and Jerome said he'd like to run upstairs, have a quick look around. Carl gave him five minutes.

Jerome went straight to the master bedroom hoping, looked in the drawers of the night tables on both sides of the bed, nothing, then under the king-size mattress along the edge and found a pistol: Sig Sauer three-eighty, loaded, seven in the magazine. He wrapped it in a dark red scarf he got from the bureau he could use as a do-rag and shoved it in the back pocket of the cargo pants falling off his ass.

Driving south on Woodward again toward Eight Mile and Detroit, Art called home.

He listened to Virginia and said, "Honey, nobody from the lawyer's office calls me on the house phone, I never gave 'em the number. If the woman called ain't selling something she's likely the police." He said, "Now don't get nervous on me-Jesus. What you do is walk up to Rite Aid on Campau and buy a pack of cigarettes. See if there's anybody sitting around in a car. Virginia? Look without them noticing you're looking. I'll call you later."

Jerome, sitting behind them, listened to Art and heard Carl say, "Shit," and Art say, "I'll check on Connie, see if anybody's been there."

He said, "Hey, Con, how you doing? It's Art." He listened and said, "Yeah, the old man's busy driving. We got you another couple bottles of vodka." He said, "Oh, is that right?" and listened for a couple of minutes before saying, "Here, I'll let you tell Carl."

Jerome watched him hand Carl the phone.

Carl said, "Hi, sweetheart, what's going on?"

Jerome heard him say yeah and uh-huh a few times as Carl listened to Connie, Carl finally saying, "They come by again, tell 'em you have no idea where I'm at, 'cause I sure as hell don't know where I'll be. I'll call you later on, let you know."

He said to Art, "They took the vodka bottle, the one from the old man's house. These others come in the back with their guns out. She tell you that?"

Art said, "There's no fuckin way they could be on us."

Jerome watched Carl turn his head to look at Art and say to him, "That fuckin Montez. He gave us up."

They were both quiet now staring at the road, coming up on Eight Mile, the city limits.

Jerome said, "Now where we going?"

Neither one answered him.

23

The sound was Detroit hip-hop, a gritty energy that wrapped itself around Kelly walking into Alvin's, the crowd wall-to-wall waving, bobbing their heads in that funky way as if they were plugged in, wired to the hypnotic beats coming out of a white emcee called Hush, guys prowling the stage in wife beaters and sock hats delivering their message, in-your-face lyrics that got Kelly's attention. Big security hunks in black T-shirts faced the crowd looking mean, daring anybody to get out of line. The scene made her think of Fat black bucks in a wine-barrel room, from a poem in a schoolbook her dad had kept, Boomlay, boomlay, boomlay, boom, but couldn't think of what the poem was called. She moved through the pack to stand behind two young guys at the bar in caps turned backwards, Kelly waiting for the bartender to see her. The young guy on her left pressed his chin against his shoulder and asked how she was doing. Kelly raised her voice to ask him what they were playing. He said, "'Get Down,' from Hush's album Roses and Razorblades." Kelly shrugged. "He's okay." The other guy put his chin on his shoulder and said, "You like to come here?" Kelly said, "I'm here, aren't I?" He asked if he could buy her a drink. Kelly said, "Scotch with a splash would be nice." The first guy turned on his stool to ask if she knew Hush's dad was a homicide cop. She said, "Really?" He told her the other emcee up there was Shane Capone, does the track with Hush on Detroit Players. And asked if she'd seen Bantam Rooster here. Kelly said one of the guys in that band worked at Car City Records, where she bought her tunes, but the only punk in her book was Iggy. The other guy at the bar handed Kelly her scotch. She thanked him. The first guy offered her his seat. Kelly thanked him too and that was the end of the bar conversation. She said, "I'm meeting someone," and left them, moving into the crowd.

She found Montez on the other side of the stage from the entrance, came up behind him, stuck her finger in the small of his back and said, "Stick 'em up." Montez came around and Kelly was looking at herself in his sunglasses.

He said, "Don't ever do that to me, girl." And said, "Why you want to meet here? Watch these white boys trying hard to be black."

She said, "Did you get it?"

"This morning soon as they opened the bank. It's a stock certificate."

Shouting at each other, frowning to hear in the heavy beat pumping out of the stack of woofers.

"For what?"

"I just told you, a stock certificate."

"What's the company?"

"Out in Texas, I think it's oil."

"How many shares?"

"Twenty thousand. It says it in statements the old man put in with the certificate."

She shook her head. "I didn't hear what you said."

"Come on," Montez said, taking her by the arm away from the stage to the wall along the side. "We can't talk in here. Let's go to your place. Hear some of those dirty girls doing their rap? Have us a beverage?"

Kelly saw one of the security guards, his back to the stage, watching them. A big white guy with a beard.

She said, "I worked all afternoon getting ready for a fashion show, I'm too tired to party. All I want to do is go home-" She stopped. "You brought it, didn't you?"

Montez, still holding her arm, put his free hand on his cashmere coat. "Got it right here."