Now and then - By Robert B. Parker Page 0,31

me,” I said.

“But one of them pulled a gun,” she said.

“Good help is hard to find,” I said. “He got scared. Probably going to shoot at Hawk.”

“Vinnie can’t take that chance,” Chollo said.

Shooter camaraderie.

“No, he couldn’t,” I said. “None of you can. You protect Susan. Kill anybody you have to, as soon as you need to.”

I had just articulated Vinnie’s guiding principle. Still listening to his iPod, he almost smiled. Then he shot at me with his forefi nger.

“If you’re so safe,” Susan said to me, “why did you ask Chollo to come here?”

“I thought he might come in handy,” I said.

“I am very handy,” Chollo said. “I can shoot, I can speak Spanish, I can pick beans. And I am a very fun hombre.”

“And we’ve all missed you,” I said.

“Sí,” Chollo said.

“If you give me all the protection and go it alone,” Susan said, “and something happens to you, how will I feel?”

“And if I don’t give you enough cover, and something bad happens, how will I feel,” I said.

“He hard to kill,” Hawk said.

“What if they try to force him to give up the tapes?”

“He hard to force,” Hawk said.

“I can’t function unless I know you’re safe,” I said to Susan.

“She be safe,” Hawk said.

“But why not just give him his damned tapes,” Susan said.

“And wash your hands of it.”

“Couple reasons,” I said. “I’ve heard the tapes. Once he gets the tapes he’ll try to kill me.”

“And Doherty’s wife cheated on him,” Susan said.

“This needs to come out right,” I said.

“This being what happened to Doherty recently,” Susan said,

“or what happened to us years ago, or both?”

“Goddamn it, Susan, this is what I do. I don’t tell you how to do what you do.”

Susan nodded. Had he been capable of it, Hawk might almost have looked shocked. I had probably never raised my voice to Susan in Hawk’s presence. I wished I hadn’t now.

“I think your work and mine may be intermingled here,” she said. “But the problem is better dealt with by you than me.”

“I’m sorry I yelled,” I said.

“I know,” she said. “I’m sorry I kvetched.”

“I know,” I said.

Chollo looked at Hawk.

“I miss something?” he said.

Hawk shook his head.

“Long time ago,” Hawk said.

This is for Rose . . . always.

35.

Because he knew who I was, tailing Red was a little harder. I needed to drop off him more. And I periodically lost him because I was too far off. But I didn’t mind, I just wanted to talk to him alone, in a proper location where there was privacy and space. I knew where he lived. I always found him again. Mostly he drove Alderson places. Though never on dates. Sometimes I crossed paths with the Feds tailing Alderson. We ignored each other. The FBI guys weren’t clumsy, but it is hard to stay on somebody’s tail for a long time without getting noticed. I assumed Alderson knew they were there. My time came in a couple of days. Red drove Alderson out to Taft University in Walford. The FBI and my humble self were trailing along behind them. Red dropped Alderson in front of a red-brick building on the Taft campus. There were evergreen shrubs around the building. A small neat sign out front said Hanes Science Center. A big sign on the front door said something about a conference in the auditorium about

“Taking Back Your Country.” There was a list of speakers. Alderson was at the top. I wondered if it was because he was important or because his name started with A.

The FBI peeled off behind Alderson, hoping to catch him saying something subversive. I stayed behind Red as he drove around a corner and parked on the top level of a four-story garage behind the Hanes building. I went in behind him and parked three cars away. We got out at about the same time. He looked at me and did a small double take.

“Whadda you doing here?” he said.

“Came to chat with you, Darcy.”

He thought for a moment about my knowing his name. Then he said, “I go by Red.”

“My name was Darcy, I’d go by Red, too,” I said.

“You ain’t got red hair, asshole.”

“You sure?” I said.

He made a brush-away gesture with one hand and started toward the elevator. I stepped in front of him.

“We need to talk, Darcy.”

“You looking for trouble?” he said.

“Information,” I said.

“I got no information for you,” he said. “You looking for trouble, I’ll be glad to accommodate you.”

He tried to move past me to the