"You imagine?" Chub wheezed with glee.

Bode refrained from reminding him that the lottery proceeds were to be used strictly for militia building. There would be a better time for that conversation.

"Little Amber," Chub was saying. "You shoulda seed her face when I tole her about the money. All of a sudden she wants to go for a walk in the woods tomorrow, just her and me."

"Aw, shit," Bode said. He should've seen it coming. "What all did you tell her?"

"Only that I's worth fourteen million dollars. You might say it changed her opinion a me."

So would a bath, Bode thought.

"That look she give me," Chub went on dreamily, "like she could suck a golf ball through a garden hose."

"Careful what you say to her. Understand?"

With a hiccup Chub thrust the paper bag to his face.

"Knock that shit off!" Bode said. "Now listen: Pussy's fine, but there's a time and a place. Right now we're in a battle for the heart and soul of America!"

Chub made a noise like a tire going flat. "Hilton Head," he rasped euphorically.

"What?"

"I wanna buy Amber and me a condo up at Hilton Head. That's a island, too, and it beats the hell outta thisone."

"You serious?"

But later, after Chub had nodded off, Bode Gazzer caught himself warming to his partner's fantasy. Strolling a sunny Carolina beach with a half-naked Hooters girl on your arm sounded much more appealing than sharing a frigid concrete pillbox with a bunch of hairy white guys in Idaho.

Bode couldn't help wondering what Amber's attitude toward him might be if she knew that he, too, was about to become a tycoon.

22

When JoLayne Lucks woke up, Tom Krome was sighting the shotgun across his kneecaps. That's when she realized the screaming wasn't part of a dream.

"What do you see?" she asked in a low voice. "Honey, don't forget the safety."

"It's off." He squinted down the barrel, waiting. "Did you hear the shots?"

"How many?"

"Five or six. Like a machine gun."

JoLayne wondered if the rednecks shot the waitress. Or possibly they shot each other while fighting overthe waitress.

As long as the waitress didn't shoot them.Not until I get my Lotto ticket back, JoLayne thought.

Tom said, "Listen!"

His shoulders tightened; he moved his finger on the trigger.

JoLayne heard it, too – in the woods, something running.

"Wait, it's small." She touched Tom's elbow. "Don't fire."

The rustling got closer, changed direction. Krome followed the noise with the barrel of the Remington. The movement came to a halt behind an ancient buttonwood trunk.

JoLayne grabbed the flashlight and crawled out of the makeshift blanket. She said, "Don't you go shooting me by accident. I blend in pretty good with the night."

There was no stopping her. Tom lowered the gun and watched her sneak up to the tree. She was met by an unearthly, high-pitched chittering that descended to a low snarl. Tom got goose bumps.

He heard JoLayne saying: "Now hush and behave." As if talking to a child.

She came back holding a runty-looking raccoon. There was a smear of blood on the breast of her sweatshirt; one of the animal's front paws had been grazed by a bullet.

"Assholes," said JoLayne. With the flashlight she showed Tom what had happened. When she touched the coon, it growled and bared its teeth. Krome believed the animal was well-equipped to rip open his throat.

He said, "JoLayne – "

"Could you get me the first-aid kit?"

She'd bought a ten-dollar cheapo at the grocery store before renting the boat.

"You're going to get bit," Tom said. "We're bothgoing to get bit."

"She's just frightened, that's all. She'll settle down."

"She?"

"Could you find the bandages, please?"

They worked on the raccoon's leg until nearly daybreak. They both got bit.

JoLayne beamed when the animal scurried away, feisty and muttering. As Tom dressed a punctured thumb, he said, "What if she gave us rabies?"

"Then we find ourselves somebody to chew on," JoLayne replied. "I know just the guys."

They tried to light another fire but the rain swept in, harder than before, though not as chilly. Huddling beneath the boat canvas, they worked to keep the food and the shotgun shells dry. Soon after the downfall stopped, the damp blue-gray darkness faded to light. JoLayne lay down and did two hundred crunches, Tom holding her ankles. The eastern rim of sky went pink and gold, ahead of the sun. They snacked on corn chips and granola bars – everything tasted salty. In the dawn they moved the Whaler out of the mangroves to a spit of open shore, for an easier getaway. From camp they gathered what they needed and began making their way to the other end of the island.

When Mary Andrea Finley Krome stepped off the plane, she thought she was at the wrong airport. There were no news photographers, no TV lights, no reporters. She was greeted only by a brisk, sharp-featured man with prematurely graying hair. He introduced himself as the managing editor of The Register.

Mary Andrea said, "Where's everybody else?"

"Who?"

"The reporters. I was expecting a throng."

The managing editor said, "Consider me a throng of one."

He picked up Mary Andrea's bag. She followed him outside to the car.

"We're going to the newspaper office?"

"That's right."

"Will the media be there?" Mary Andrea, peevishly twirling her rosary beads.

"Mrs. Krome, we arethe media."

"You know what I mean. Television."

The managing editor informed Mary Andrea that the interest in her husband's tragic death was somewhat less avid than anticipated.

She said, "I don't understand. A journalist gets burned to smithereens – "

"Tell me about it."

The managing editor drove at excessive speed with one hand on the wheel. With the other he poked irritably at the radio buttons, switching between classical music stations. Mary Andrea wished he'd settle on something.

"I know it's made the papers," she persisted, "all the way out to Montana."

"Oh yes. Even television," said the managing editor, "briefly."

"What happened?"

"I would describe the public reaction," he said, "as a mild but fleeting curiosity."

Mary Andrea was floored. A despondency settled upon her; it might have been mistaken for authentic grief, although not by those aware of Mary Andrea's background as an actress.

The managing editor said: "Don't take it personally. It's been a humbling experience for all of us."

"But they should make Tom a hero," she protested.

The managing editor explained that the job of newspaper reporter no longer carried the stature it had in the days of Watergate. The nineties had brought a boom in celebrity journalism, a decline in serious investigative reporting and a deliberate "softening of the product" by publishers. The result, he said, was that daily papers seldom caused a ripple in their communities, and people paid less and less attention to them.

"So your husband's death," said the managing editor, "didn't exactly generate an uproar."

Gloomily Mary Andrea stared out the car window. If only Tom had made it to The New York Timesor The Washington Post,then you'd have seen a damn uproar.

"Was he working on something big?" she asked hopefully.

"Not at all. That's part of the problem – it was just a routine feature story."

"About what?"

"Some woman who won the lottery."

"And for that he got blown up?"

"The police are skeptical. And as I said, that's part of our problem. It's far from certain Tom was killed in the line of duty. It could have been a robbery, it could have been ... something more personal."

Mary Andrea gave him a sour look. "Don't tell me he was doing somebody's wife."