of my neck. I was finished way before she was. But when she got done, she jumped up and ran out of the room.
Before I could even think about why she did that, she was back.
“This is Albie’s phone,” she said, handing a cell to me. “It’s got a 305 area code. That’s Dade County. Miami.
“Every town in the part of Florida where Jessop’s supposed to be living, that would be an 863 area code.”
“Would he recognize your—?”
“Not mine. Albie’s.”
“What good does that—?”
“Wait,” she said, “see this?” Holding up a little metal case. “Watch.”
She hit some button. The case she was holding said, “New work. Same place. Tomorrow night at eleven. Leave message, in or out?”
The voice sounded like it was in the room. Thin and strong at the same time, like piano wire.
“That’s Albie,” she said. “I’ve got a couple of dozen different messages from him on this.”
The next afternoon, we kept arguing all the way back.
“If he recognizes you—”
“He won’t see me, Sugar. Just you.”
“Yeah? And how are we going to get that Lincoln out of the garage?”
“Just drive in and take it. What’s the big deal? We’re not doing anything illegal.”
“Albie told you to get out of that house and never come back.”
“I won’t ever come back.”
“What if they’re waiting?”
“They wouldn’t do that. They only come after dark, and they never stay long. To them, it’ll look as if I already disappeared.”
“I don’t like it.”
“You don’t know them. They’re … machines, not people. And I know things have been going wrong the past couple of years. Things they planned, I mean. Not crime stuff, like Albie did with those others. But … something. Something bad. I don’t know why anyone would want Albie’s blue book, but that note—that says Solly’s a traitor, straight out. I’m sure, if I showed them that, they’d know who’d been talking to the wrong people.”
“I still don’t like it.”
“We already agreed to do it, Sugar.”
“Me, I agreed to do it. I didn’t agree to do anything with you.”
“Would you listen for just a second? If Jessop doesn’t see that Lincoln, he’s going to spook.”
“I know.”
“Do the math, damn it! Two cars, we need two drivers.”
“You got stubborn confused with smart, Lynda.”
“I don’t have anything confused.”
“Yeah, you do. Starting with me.”
She sulked all the way. But when I told her she had to park the Caddy in the airport lot, way in the back, and lie down in the back seat with the windows up and the doors locked, she turned into a fucking volcano.
“If I don’t fry to death, I’ll run out of oxygen.”
“You’ll be uncomfortable, that’s all. This thing’s not airtight. You can even crack the far-side window a little bit, if you want. But once you get down, and I throw these jackets and stuff over you, you have to stay like that, understand?”
“You think, just because it’s dark, I can’t bake to death? It must be over a hundred, even now.”
“Stop all the damn drama, Lynda. You’ve got a water bottle, and I’ll be back before you know it.”
“What if—?”
“I don’t know what this Jessop’s going to be driving. But if he doesn’t see Albie’s Lincoln, he’s going to turn around and make tracks, right?”
“Yes,” she snapped at me.
“So, if that happens, you just climb into the front seat and go back to Tampa.”
“Sugar—”
“Zip it. I’ve got the key to the Lincoln and the button for the garage. That’s all I need, except for one thing.”
That one thing was the address of a little mall not so far from where the house was. The cab driver didn’t even try and make conversation. He was an older black guy, and I guess he figured it wasn’t worth working a guy who looked like me for a tip.
I went into the mall with my carry-on bag in one hand and walked through until I found the last exit.
The bar was a couple of blocks away. I went in. And, like Lynda said, it was full of just what I told her I needed. Albie probably had the whole town mapped for people like them.
I sat down at the bar, ordered a beer. It was loud: some kind of crash-pound-boom noise from the jukebox, people trying to shout over it.
All the punk with “88” tattooed on the back of his shaved head knew was that I was there to do a job on some kikes who were contributing way too much money to the wrong people. He was down with the cause.