“Actually it belongs to my Negro friend,” I said.

They had not planned on being approached by two people at the same time from opposite directions. They should have divided the chore. Two look at me. Two look at Hawk. But they hadn’t decided in advance, and therefore didn’t know, which two should look at whom. Training is good, but sometimes innovation is better.

“I know you,” Horn Rims said.

“And a better man for it,” I said.

Hawk and I kept coming. Horn Rims put a hand on the radio at his belt and turned his head and spoke something into the microphone clipped to his epaulets. Then he unsnapped the flap of his holster.

“Stop right where you are,” he said.

“Here?” I said.

For a moment all four of them were looking at me. When two of them looked back at Hawk, he had put the car between him and them and was resting the big.44 on the roof with the hammer back.

One of them said, “Jesus Christ” and all four looked for a moment at Hawk. When two of them looked back at me I had the Browning out and cocked and pointed.

“You guys got to be better organized,” I said. “Move away from the car.”

Horn Rims glanced toward the driveway. He was expecting reinforcements. I stepped closer and hit him with a left hook that staggered him into the road. Then I got in the car and fumbled the keys down from the sun visor. Hawk remained with his gun on the security guards.

“You’re a dead man,” Horn Rims screamed at me. “Wherever you run, whatever you do, even if you kill some of us, we’ll run you both to ground and kill you.”

From up the long driveway I could hear the sound of cars coming. More than one. I started the Jaguar.

I heard Hawk say, “Watch this.”

There were two big booms from the.44 and in the rearview mirror I could see the Jeep settle forward on its rapidly deflating front tires.

I heard Hawk say, “All of you on the ground, facedown.”

Then Hawk was in the front seat. I stomped on the accelerator and the Jag lunged forward spinning up gravel from the road shoulder. We lurched up onto the road surface and screeched away. I could smell the tires scorching and there was some small-arms fire, but nothing hit us. Hawk slammed the door shut as the car stabilized and smoothed out.

“We going to have to do something about these guys,” Hawk said.

I was driving as fast as the Buxton Road would let me back toward Beecham. Hawk had the cylinder of his.44 open and was feeding in two fresh rounds that looked about the size of surface to air missiles.

“I’ll bet they’re back there saying the same thing,” I said.

CHAPTER FIFTY

I had the mystery ride all put together. Until I figured out exactly what Hawk and I were going to do about Last Stand Systems, Inc., I wanted the time I spent with Susan to be covert. I was in a profession where getting threatened was part of the deal. So was Hawk. But Susan was not. So I left Hawk to look out for himself for a long weekend and took Susan for a few days to Lee Farrell’s empty condominium at Sanibel Island on Florida’s west coast. It was late June, and as out of season as you could get. But I was pretty sure no one would shoot at us while we were down there.

It was all right on the plane, and in the car rental office, and the car we rented was air-conditioned. The walk from the car to the elevator and the ride up in the elevator was not air-conditioned, and we were near collapse by the time I got Farrell’s door unlocked. The condo was roasting. It had been closed since Farrell’s last vacation. I staggered to the thermostat and turned the air-conditioning on high. In a few minutes the crisis had passed and we were breathing normally again.

“I don’t want to disappoint you,” I said to Susan after she had unpacked and hung up all her clothes and joined me at the little bar in the living room for a cocktail. “But Farrell made me promise there would be no heterosexual carnality in here.”

“Is this your way of telling me you want me to dress up in a man’s suit again?” Susan said.

“Lee says it’s in the bylaws of the condo association – hetero-sexuality is prohibited.”

“Oh boy,” Susan said. “Finally a real vacation.”

“Gee,” I said. “Usually when someone tells you that you can’t do something, you want to do it immediately.”

Susan sipped on the Bellini I had made her and looked at me and frowned thoughtfully.

“You know,” she said, “you’re right. That is how I am. The hell with the condo association. Let’s fuck.”

“That’s the Susan I know,” I said. “Did you say something about a man’s suit?”

“Just a little humor,” she said.

“How about maybe just the shirt and a tie,” I said.

“Stop it,” Susan said and got up and walked toward the bedroom. I followed.

“How about just the tie?” I said.

Susan unzipped her shorts.

“How about less talk and more action,” she said.

–«»-«»-«»-

LATER THAT NIGHT we had dinner at The Sanibel Steak House. The dining room was small and pleasant with glass at the far end looking out over some greenery. We both had martinis. They were excellent. We both ordered steak. For Susan to order steak was a breach of self-discipline comparable to masturbating in public. Salads arrived first. They were excellent. The steaks arrived shortly thereafter. Susan recovered herself sufficiently to cut her steak into halves and put one half aside.

“I guess we showed them,” Susan said as she chewed on a small piece of steak. “Sex, martinis, and steak. How much more carnality is possible.”

I took a bite of my steak. It was excellent.

“That can be our project while we’re here,” I said. “See how much carnality is possible.”

“Would you care to tell me exactly why we are here?”

“Haven’t been away in a while,” I said. “Lee offered.”

“Lee’s a cop,” Susan said. “He doesn’t spend all winter here either. Why now at the end of June?”

“Sure it’s out of season,” I said. “But everything’s air-conditioned.”

“I’m not complaining about the heat,” Susan said. “And so far I’m having a lovely time. But I think that there’s something lurking behind the arras.”

“A rat, maybe?”

“Or Polonius,” Susan said. “Shakespeare aside, I know you nearly as well as you know me. What’s up?”

I finished my martini, and in a burst of unbridled carnality, Susan finished hers. The waitress noticed our situation and came over. We ordered red wine. She went to get it. And brought it back and left.

“You remember Beecham, Maine?” I said.

She shook her head. I told her, all of it. She listened as I talked as she always did, with full attention, her eyes fixed on me. I could feel the charge in her. I could feel the energy between us. It made talking to her a lush experience.

“And you obviously believe them,” Susan said when I finished.

“That they’ll try for Hawk and me? You remember Clausewitz on war?”

“I should,” Susan said, “by now. You keep quoting him.”

“And what is the quote?”

“Something like ‘you must prepare for the enemy’s capability, rather than his intentions.’”

“Yes.”

“So you have to assume they might try.”

“If I assume they might try and I’m wrong, I’m inconvenienced. If I assume they won’t try and I’m wrong, I’m dead.”

“Which is why you brought me here. Because if we were to spend time together you wanted it where I wouldn’t be in danger by proximity.”

“Yep. I figure they follow us down here in late June and their bullets will melt.”

“And you still don’t know their connection with Amir?”

“Only that they sent a plane for him. And warned us away from him.”

“It’s the first time in this case that you’ve run into people who seem like they could have killed Prentice Lamont,” she said.

“Yeah, I noticed that too. Don’t know if they did, but at least we can assume they would.”