John Lescroart - The Vig

Rusty got to the hard sand near the water and turned, backtracking, up toward Hardy. But that area had pretty much cleared with everybody coming up to see what all the excitement was about. Rusty ran along, silhouetted against an orange evening sky on the nearly deserted stretch of beach.

More firecrackers seemed to be going off everywhere, and Rusty cut into the water, back up, running with his legs high.

Another burst cut a line in the sand coming up to him, and he stopped, abruptly. He started to raise his hand up, his other hand, the one in the sling. He half turned, and a string of cherry bombs went off fifty yards up the beach to Hardy's right.

Rusty Ingraham lay in a heap. When Hardy got to him, Mantrillo and Glitsky were kneeling on the sand. The lieutenant had turned him onto his back, and the wash of a wave was retreating from him in a pink foam.

"The dumb shit," Glitsky said.

Hardy took the weight off his hurt foot and went down to one knee.

Rusty opened his eyes. He stared at the sky, gradually focused on Hardy. "Hey, Diz," he said, "don't let 'em tell you gamblers always die broke." He tried his courtroom smile.

"I'm loaded."

"Where is it, Rusty?" Hardy asked. "The money?"

He closed his eyes, opened them. "I tell you, I lose the leverage," he said. He started to laugh, then coughed once.

His face froze in that rictus, and then his eyes, still open, weren't seeing anything.

Marcel Lanier put a leg over the corner of Abe Glitsky's desk. "You'll be happy about this," he said.

"What's that?"

"Louis Baker."

Abe put his pencil down. "Louis is back at Quentin."

"Yes, he is."

"That makes me happy?"

"No. What'll make you happy is you know how the D.A. didn't go on the Holly Park thing-no evidence he killed Dido?"

Abe suppressed a small smile. "Yeah, justice prevailed."

"And you don't think he did it anyway?"

Abe shrugged. "Evidence talks, shit walks. Not that I'm burning a candle for Louis Baker, but he looked better for Maxine Weir than he ever did for Dido."

Lanier got a little defensive. "He looked okay for Dido."

"Well, hey, Marcel, this is America. Let's pretend if you can't prove it, he didn't do it, huh?"

"Well, he didn't, is the point."

Abe leaned back in his chair. "No shit."

"Nother guy, street name of Samson, took over Dido's cut and seems he stepped on a runner-this kid called Lace. Where these people get their names, Abe?"

"They make 'em up, Marcel. So what happened?"

"So Lace evidently got this guy's gun, Samson's, and being aced out of the cut, had no place to go, so he shoots Samson. No mystery, does it in front of about forty people, two of whom remember seeing something about it. But two's okay. I can live with two."

"And?"

"Ballistics matches the gun with the one did Dido. So how do you like that?"

"Lace-the kid-killed Dido?"

"No. Samson did. It was his gun. He did it to take over the territory. Timed it slick, figured we'd lay it on Baker."

"Which we did."

"But didn't nail him for it, did we? Score one for the good guys."

Abe looked out the window at the October fog. It was late in the day. He tapped his pencil on his desk. "If you say so, Marcel. If you say so."

The trees across the street, at the border to Golden Gate Park, bent in the freshening wind. Hardy pulled a Bass Ale for a customer and limped up to the front of the bar where he'd put his stool, where Frannie sat with a club soda.

She looked at her watch. "Ten minutes. Where's my brother?"

Hardy reached over and took her hand. "He'll be here. He's always here."

Hardy had been back three weeks. He had told Jane. Jane had met someone in Hong Kong and was going to tell him. They had laughed about it. They had also gone to bed, cried about it, put it to rest. Friends. No doubt forever. Maybe.

He squeezed Frannie's hand. She was showing now. Still radiant, blooming. Sometimes, lately, Hardy hadn't known at all what to do with it. "How are you feeling?" he asked.

"Okay. Nervous. Do you think he knows?"

He squeezed her hand again. "I think he suspects."

"Do you think it's too soon?"

"Nope."

"I'm glad you're sure. I kind of need you to be sure."

Hardy watched the wind bend the trees some more. The fog was swirling ten feet away outside the picture window in the near dusk. The Traveling Wilburys were on the jukebox, singing 'bout last night. Hardy thought of last night at Frannie's just kind of wondering if she would like to be married to him.

Remembering how she had answered him, he slid off the stool and stood on his good foot and leaned over the bar, kissing her. "I'm sure," he said.