"What the hell're you talking about?"

"Just gimme a thousand bucks and I'll take the rap," she said.

I stared at her, then said, "Are you out of your mind?"

"It'll save you a lot of trouble," she said, "and you won't go to jail."

"Why would I go to jail?" I said. "It was an accident you saw the whole thing, the way he came in here like a maniac. I'll just tell the cops the truth."

"It wasn't an accident," she said. "You went crazy and killed him."

"Bullshit," I said. "It was self-defense. He tried to stab me in the face. If I let him go he would've gone for the switchblade again."

"You know how hard you rammed his head into that door?" she said.

"Then all those times you kicked him, probably busting his ribs? That doesn't sound like self-defense to me."

"But you'll be here," I said. "You can tell them what really happened, how he was still coming after me, how…" I stopped myself, knowing it was pointless. I couldn't count on her to back up my story, especially when I wasn't even sure about the story myself.

"Trust me, it'll be a lot easier if I say I did it," she said.

"Ricky used to beat on me all the time he even busted my jaw once. I've called the cops on him tons of times they know all about us. I'll say I snapped I couldn't take it anymore. He came after me and I just grabbed him and went crazy on him."

I stared at the body on its side, facing away from me. I knew the logical thing to do was call the police, but I wasn't thinking logically. I was sweating and shaking and I couldn't concentrate. Like a hit-and-run driver, I just wanted to get away.

Don't be an idiot, I thought. Call the cops.

I input the 9 in 911 when Sue said, "Stop," in a way that told me that she meant it. I stopped dialing.

"Call the cops, I'll lie my ass off," she said. "I'll tell them I picked you up in the park and brought you back here. We were gonna fuck, but you didn't have enough money, so you had to go to the bank.

See, it all fits. Then, when you came back here, Ricky walked in on us. You two started fighting, then you flipped out and killed him."

"They won't believe you," I said.

"Bullshit they won't," she said. "Besides, it's against the law to go to hookers. You want that getting out?"

I looked at the cell phone, then at the door, then back toward Sue.

"I'm calling the cops," I said, "and I don't care what you tell them."

"If you call the cops you're going to jail," she said, "but do whatever you want."

I dialed the first 1.

"I'll say you were fucking me," she said. "I'll swear my ass up and down till they believe it. Go ahead make the call. I dare you."

I waited a few seconds, my thumb on the 1 button, thinking that the police could easily believe Sue's story over mine.

I pressed end and stood there for a while, trying to think it through some more, but my thoughts were jumbled.

"A thousand's nuts," I finally said.

"Thars the price."

"Five hundred."

"A thousand."

I shook my head, glancing at the body briefly and feeling nauseous.

"What if somebody heard something?" I said. "Your neighbors. What if somebody heard us fighting, or heard my voice»

"People in this building never hear anything," Sue said.

"But why should I trust you?" I said. "How do I know you'll really tell the cops you did it?"

"Because I want my money, that's why."

"But how do I know you'll keep your story straight?"

"I can't change my story," she said. "Once I tell the cops I did it, that's it."

I hesitated again. Everything was blurry and my hand holding the cell phone was sweating. Then a voice inside me screamed, Leavel and I said, "Fine," and headed toward the door.

"Meet me with the money tomorrow night at seven,"

Sue said. "Starbucks on Astor. You're not there, I'm turning you in.

I'm not fucking around."

I stepped by her and around the body and left the apartment.

The relief of being back outside, breathing in the cool, Manhattan air, was even greater than before. I walked up the block as fast as I could, at a pace equal to jogging. At the intersection of Avenue A and Seventh Street, there was a Don't Walk sign; rather than waiting for it to change, I walked alongside the traffic, then jaywalked diagonally across A, telling myself that I had to keep moving no matter what.

At Tenth Street, I cut over a couple of blocks to Second Avenue and headed uptown. People were giving me funny looks, and I realized that, in addition to my lower lip, which was still bleeding, my shirt was torn below the shoulder and some blood was seeping through. A few minutes later, as I continued up Second, I feared that I'd made a huge mistake. Ricky wasn't much taller than Sue, but he was stronger and had to weigh at least fifty pounds more than her; the police would never believe that she'd overpowered him.

In the crosswalk of Second and Fourteenth, I stopped, ready to turn back, but I decided it was too late. Sue had probably called the police already. They could be at her apartment right now, questioning her. She wouldn't be able to handle the pressure; she'd break down and tell them that I'd killed Ricky. I'd try to explain that I'd acted in self-defense, but after leaving the apartment that would be even harder to prove.

I leaned against a lamppost to steady myself, feeling helpless and stupid, when I had an epiphany.

Maybe it didn't happen.

I hadn't checked for Ricky's pulse or heartbeat. He'd looked dead, but it could have all been staged. I knew I'd banged his head pretty hard, but was it hard enough to kill him? They could all have been working together Sue, Ricky, and Eddie Lomack, the drunk from the bar. Maybe this was how they operated pick a guy's wallet, then see how far they could take it. If they could get the guy to think he killed somebody, they'd soak him for even more.

As I continued walking up Second Avenue, I became even more convinced that the whole thing was a scam. I felt like a real sucker and I decided I'd never tell anyone what had happened.

At the next corner, I stopped walking and took out my wallet. The picture of Barbara was still there, tucked in the window behind my driver's license. I slid it out and stared at it for a while, then replaced it behind the license and hailed a cab to midtown.

WHEN I ARRIVED at work, I went right to the bathroom and washed up at the sink. My face looked worse than I'd thought. My lower lip was swollen to about twice the size of the upper, and there was a small cut in it, making me resemble a boxer during a post-fight interview. The cut on my upper arm was superficial, though, barely piercing my skin. I cleaned up the best I could, then headed toward my office. Along the way I passed Amy Shumsky, who worked in Payroll, and Jenny Shaw, the personnel director. They asked me what happened, and I told them that I'd fallen but that it wasn't as bad as it looked. I purposely kept walking so they couldn't ask me any more questions, and then I turned along the corridor leading to the editorial department.

I sat at my desk and got right to work on my story. I always seemed to work best under deadline and I started writing as fast as my fingers could press the keys. After everything that had happened at Sue's apartment, I was very pissed off, and it came out in my writing. I blasted Byron Technologies' management, calling them "deceitful," and characterizing their accounting practices as "Enronesque." In reality, the company's management had been up front with investors, and a minor accounting error regarding the reporting of last quarter's proforma earnings had been quickly and publicly corrected. But I was on a roll, and the negative ideas kept flowing. I used a portion of a quote taken out of context from Kevin DuBois, an analyst who covered Byron's stock.