correct block. Quickly she parallel parked between an SUV and a dusty pickup. A muffled rhythmic bass thump from the country bar down the block shivered through metal and skin as she killed the engine, slightly out of tempo with the headache throbbing in her temples. Focus. She checked the car's clock and found that she had fifteen minutes to spare before eleven. She turned off the dome light and made sure everything she needed was ready, including the digital camera, though Borden had told her she wouldn't need it.
Then, because she had nothing else to occupy her head, she thought about what might have happened to land Ben McCarthy in the prison hospital, and what that significant pause on the other end of the phone had meant when she'd asked about any other injuries.
This was her fault. Her fault for letting him down, for not pushing his case to the top of the list. For not turning down these crazy assignments. Watch a woman park and walk to her building? What the hell was that about? They could've gotten anyone for that. They didn't need her. And she'd let other things get in the way, too. What right did she have to be out talking and laughing and eating Arthur Bryant's barbecue when her best friend, her partner, was getting the hell beat out of him and...
She shut her eyes, sucked in a hard, hurting breath, and deliberately let it go.
At just before eleven - minutes before - she saw a couple walk out of the cowboy bar down the block and stagger to a truck parked across from her on the right side of the street. They managed to get doors unlocked with a minimum of giggling and groping, and wove off down the road, hopefully to a destiny that involved flashing lights and DUI citations. She was considering phoning in a tip when headlights turned the corner behind her, and she saw a car coming, moving slowly.
It slowed even further as the driver spotted the empty space and executed a smooth parallel-parking maneuver.
Black Toyota Celica, furred with a light coating of road dust. As Jazz watched, the driver opened up a vanity mirror, and as the light bathed her face, Jazz saw an attractive middle-aged woman with dark, shoulder-length hair checking her lipstick. That didn't take long. The driver opened her door and stepped out of the car.
Jazz let her get a few steps away before noiselessly opening her own car door and crossing the street, keeping out of the harsh pools of light near the corner. The woman was wearing a dress, and her high heels tapped concrete as she walked up the street. She had a notebook in her hand, and a penlight, evidently consulting an address. As Jazz hung back in the shadow of a large truck, the woman scanned building numbers, spotted the one she was looking for, and headed decisively in that direction.
Jazz checked for anyone watching or following, but the night was quiet and the street was clear. She was the only tail in sight.
She moved carefully as the woman jogged up the steps to 1428 Legacy Drive and pressed buttons. Jazz got close enough to see which one was pressed - bottom left.
The access gate buzzed. The woman entered.
Well, that's it, Jazz thought, and watched the door snap shut again behind her. Whatever they thought would happen, didn't. Obviously.
She watched for a while longer, waiting to see if anything interesting would come along, but apart from a few more amorous couples exiting the dance club, nothing popped.
She went back to her car and checked the time.
Eleven-fifteen.
"Five thousand dollars," she said aloud as she backed out of the parking space and headed home. "You people are totally insane."
She stopped off at a bar on the way back, and after a few shots, she no longer felt the raw ripping edges of fear over what she was going to see at Ellsworth in the morning.
It was worse than she'd thought, and better than she'd hoped. Ben looked different, lying in a hospital bed with tubes in his arms and splints and bandages all over him, but not that much different. His smile was the same, even through puffy, bruised lips. Cool blue eyes, brush-cut medium-brown hair that looked longer than she remembered. Some gray in it, maybe a bit more than the last time she'd been by.
"Jazz," he said. His voice sounded muffled and indistinct. She could hear him breathing. "Sorry about