Goldberg cleared his throat. “Exigent circumstances, Spenser. We haven’t had time to map this out precisely. We don’t have a warrant. We’ll need some reason to go on Alvarez’s property.”

“So there needs to be some emergency, some threat to human life.”

“Exactly,” said Goldberg. “We’ll be waiting at several points just off the property line. Something happens, we need a pretext to go in. A gunshot, broken glass, loud shouts, something. We don’t hear anything, you’re on your own.”

“Got it.”

“Give him this.” Goldberg handed Healy a small walkie-talkie. Healy passed to it Hawk.

“Worst case,” Goldberg said. “Call us.”

“Okay,” I said. “But I won’t be reporting in every five minutes. It stays off unless I turn it on. I don’t want to be discovered because you feel the need to check on us at the wrong time.”

“Spenser, we’re improvising here. When you do that, a lot can go wrong in a hurry. The whole thing can turn to shit pretty quick. Do you understand?”

Healy sighed. “He understands, Goldberg. You pretty much just described his entire career.”

Healy and Goldberg told us where the FBI and state troopers would be staging. It was quarter past six when we backed out of the parking lot and headed off to Alvarez’s farm.

HEAVY CLOUDS CONCEALED the moon. The thermometer inside the car read 18 degrees. Better out than in. Days-old snow banked the sides of the road.

We parked alongside the long driveway and extinguished the headlights.

“How do we play it?” Vinnie said.

“We sneak up to the house and wait,” I said. “Watch for sentries and try to count the guns on-site tonight.”

“You think the fireworks start right away?” Hawk said.

“No,” I said. “He probably waits until dinner or after, when all the guests are settled and relaxed. If he needs to stage this to make it look like he’s a victim, he needs this to be a nice, normal party, until it’s not.”

“Once it starts, how we gonna stop things from the outside?” Vinnie said. I looked at Vinnie in the rearview mirror. He was testing the action on his Glock.

“We wait until dinner. Cocktails will most likely be in the living room to the left of the front door. It has big picture windows on the front and side. A big archway leads from there into the dining room. That has French doors to the deck on the back of the house. When the guests move to the dining room, Hawk and I go in and cover the archway and the door to the kitchen. Vinnie, you stay outside and cover the French doors. Keep your eyes on Carmen. Hawk and I will deal with anything else.”

Vinnie nodded.

“And when something start to happen, we move in,” said Hawk.

“Any idea what the something might be?” Vinnie said.

“No,” I said. “My guess is a robbery. Healy thinks Alvarez will try to stage his own kidnapping—he disappears, and Carmen gets killed in the crossfire. All we think we know is that Alvarez needs to look like the victim.”

“Think the guests are in on this?” Hawk said.

“Probably not all of them. Carmen said she doesn’t know everyone invited, but some are social acquaintances Alvarez isn’t particularly close to. He likely needs some authentic guests to sell this to the police afterward,” I said.

I waited a moment. Then, “Game time.”

I had switched off the overhead light. We left the car in darkness and walked back up the road along the tree line to the driveway.

Cars were arriving, mostly limousines, letting out women in furs and men in evening clothes. There was a man in livery opening the car doors and a butler opening and closing the large front door. The pillars were festooned with fir garlands, the door frame draped with boughs. A huge wreath with a red velvet bow was hung in the center.

From our vantage point on the driveway we were able to see the Great Hall each time the butler opened the door. A huge crystal chandelier hung from the ceiling, and the polished floor glowed.

“My, my,” Hawk said. “How the rich folk live.”

“So Masterpiece Theatre,” I said.

“You did say handguns only,” Vinnie asked.

“Yes. And no shooting if we can help it. We want to get Carmen out of there and leave Alvarez for the Feds. No need to do more.”

“And Slide, if he show up,” said Hawk.

“There is that,” I said.

We spread out and made our way to the house. No guards were visible. No more cars came. We could see the guests in a room to the left of the Great Hall, drinking their martinis. I looked at my watch. Ten after seven. I looked back up and saw that the room was emptying out and guests were headed for the dining room. Vinnie moved into position around the back of the house. Hawk and I stayed by the windows to the dining room and watched. The cold and the tension pressed sharply up against me.

The dining room was ornately decorated, with a large oval table in the center. Sixteen guests were seated around it. The walls were covered with textured rose-colored fabric. There were two heavy silver candelabras on the table, each with eight candles. Each place was set with four crystal goblets, and tiers of silverware. Alvarez sat at one end of the table, resplendent in black tie and tails, flanked by two women with expensive faces talking animatedly across him. He was trying to look interested.

Carmen sat at the other end of the table. She glowed in an emerald-green gown, tastefully low cut. She wore diamond drop earrings that swung when she moved her head. There was no trace of the Carmen I knew, the tomboy who bit her fingernails and served tennis balls like bullets. I watched her talk to the man on her right and then after a few minutes turn to the man on her left. She laughed at their jokes and talked to them with ease.

I looked at the guests at the table, remembering that they might not all be guests. Everyone looked prosperous and slightly dowdy, as befitting old Boston money. Which one of these is not like the others, I thought. My gaze picked up on a youngish couple near Carmen’s end of the table. They were in their forties, and they definitely did not fit the mold. Maybe it was the designer clothes, his five-hundred-dollar haircut, and what appeared to be her inability to make conversation with the distinguished older man next to her. They had to be plants.

Hawk slid back to my side. I signaled him and wordlessly pointed out the faux guests. He nodded.

We waited. I could hear footsteps followed by low Spanish-speaking voices coming from the front of the house, and moved down the side of the house to take a look. There were five of them, wearing kerchiefs for masks. Three of them had rifles and two had pistols.

Hawk had moved up behind me.

“Some militia,” Hawk muttered. “Deer hunting.”

They trooped inside. We drew our guns and followed in behind them. They marched directly through the Great Hall and the parlor and into the dining room, and pointed their weapons at the stunned and by this time tipsy guests. We stayed back, at the edge of the parlor, waiting for Vinnie to appear outside the French doors on the other side of the dining room.

One of the women guests giggled. One of the intruders walked over and slapped her across the face. She screamed. The rest of the guests froze, and the room fell silent. Two of the men held canvas bags and went from guest to guest demanding money and jewelry. Everyone complied except Alvarez. He stood and bellowed, “Who are you? Stop this immediately!” His protests had the air of summer-stock theater.