L stairs. I looked at them helplessly through the Mercedes’ smoky windows. They stepped around Rodney—I suppose he looked like a drunk they couldn’t bear to touch, lying there in my vomit and all.
“What were you doing at Olympia’s club tonight?” Anton asked.
“Looking for the Body Artist. Karen Buckley. You know her? She’s disappeared.”
Anton laughed, an ugly sound. “Don’t worry yourself about little Karen. She knows how to look after herself, first and last. Don’t imagine her as the scared little girl she pretends to be.”
“Yes,” I said, “I know you and she go way back, back to when Zina was still alive. Why did she change her name?”
“She was thinking she could hide from me, but no one is that smart or that lucky. When I want to find them, they get found.”
“So you know where she is now?”
“I don’t care where she is now.”
“What about her website? You don’t care about that anymore?”
Anton laughed again, this time more loudly, almost like an operatic stage laugh. “I fixed that problem. Now you are my new problem. Why are you caring about these people?”
In the warmth of the car, I was starting to feel the place in my abdomen where Rodney had kicked me.
“Which people?” I tried to sound alert, but I could tell that my voice was thick with fatigue. I tried to imagine how Anton would react if I simply fell asleep. He wouldn’t like it, I decided.
“These stupid Mexican girls who get themselves killed, in Iraq, in Chicago.”
Konstantin and Ludwig were watching Anton, and Anton had his back to the street. I didn’t tell them someone hiding behind the L stairs was stretching an arm out to dig into Rodney’s pockets.
“Get themselves killed? Is that like getting yourself pregnant all alone with a turkey baster in the basement? They stand in front of someone like you who’s holding a gun and say, ‘Shoot me’?”
Anton thought that was funny. “These girls are behaving like that. ‘Shoot me. Blow me up,’ maybe they should all wear signs, put that message on them. Now, you will tell me where you are hiding the papers.”
The figure had disappeared from the L stairs. Through the Mercedes’ whisper-proof windows, I could just hear another train roaring in, and then a loud report, right below us. A second shot sounded. The driver floored the accelerator, but halfway down the block, the sedan spun to the right and slammed into an L girder. An oncoming car honked furiously and swerved out of the way.
Konstantin, or maybe Ludwig, opened his door. I put everything I had into my right shoulder, shoved against him hard enough to knock him out of the car. I rolled over on the seat and followed him.
Three people were pounding toward us up the middle of Lake Street. I got to my feet and swung my arms wildly. Behind me, I could hear the front door of the Mercedes open.
“Vic! Vic! Is that you?”
My cousin’s voice, high-pitched, terrified, more welcome than an angel just then.
I shouted to her to get out of the road, to get out of the way. “Anton has a gun. They all have guns. Get down!”
I was ducking behind a parked car as I shouted. A door opened in a building behind me. A couple of men in waiter’s aprons came outside to smoke. I yelled at my cousin that I was going into the building. A moment later, Petra arrived, with Tim Radke and another man, one I didn’t recognize. All three were out of breath.
Inside, a jazz combo was playing an old Coltrane piece, or sawing at it. In the dim reddish light of the room, I saw that only half the tables were occupied and that no one was paying much attention to the music. A young man came up to us and asked if we wanted a table.
“There’s a ten-dollar cover whether you sit down or not,” he said when we shook our heads.
I stuck a hand into my pocket, fishing for my wallet. My gun was there. The thugs hadn’t patted me down, that was how ineffectual I’d looked to them. I found the wallet and took out two twenties, then cracked open the door.
The Mercedes was listing toward its right side, both tires completely flat. As I watched, Anton’s driver flagged down a passing cab. He held the door open for Anton and climbed in next to him. Konstantin and Ludwig started to get into the front seat, but apparently Kystarnik didn’t