F. Paul Wilson - Hosts

Topside, Stan and Joe each took a different side of the street and gave him a block lead as he headed west along Seventy-first. Waste of effort. The kid was in his own world, loping along without a single look back.

Stan had joined up with Joe at the corner of Riverside Drive where they hung back as the reporter ambled into the park.

Stan tried to show Joe the bright side.

"This might be something. If you remember, we set up quite a few meetings in parks in our day."

Joe rubbed his stubbled chin. "Come to think of it, I do. So how do we work this?"

Stan surveyed the landscape. Riverside Drive ran at a higher level, bordered on its west flank by a low wall overlooking the greenery that sloped away below it.

"We split," Stan said. "You take the high road and I'll take the low road—"

"And I'll be in wherever-it-is before ya."

"Scotland. Keep your cell phone on and I'll call you if I think he's made me or I see him heading back up to the street. Then you pick him up and—"

"Shut up!" Joe hissed. He grabbed Stan's arm, his fingers digging in like claws. "There he is!"

"Who? Where?"

"Over there. Two blocks down. See him? In the baseball cap, leaning on the wall, watching the park."

Stan saw an average-looking guy. Nothing striking about him. Looked relaxed as all hell, taking a little fresh air while killing some time.

"You think that's our guy? Could be anybody."

Joe hadn't moved a muscle. His eyes were fixed on the baseball cap like a dog on point.

"It's him, Stan. I see him in my dreams, and I've been dreaming of this moment. You don't know how I've been dreaming of this moment." His breath rasped through his teeth. "The fucker! The fucker !"

"Easy, Joe. We've got to be sure. We—"

"/'m sure. God damn fuck am I sure! Know what he's doing? He's casing the park, watching this reporter make his entrance and checking him for a tail. If you'd gone down there he'd've spotted you and that would've queered it all. He disappears and the meet is off. But he's a dumb fuck. Figures if someone's tailing the reporter, whoever it is doesn't know what he looks like. Thinks he's sittin' safe and pretty up there with his bird's-eye view. But we know what he looks like, don't we, Stan. We know."

The longer Joe talked and the longer Stan looked, the more familiar this guy at the wall became. Stan was almost afraid to believe it was him, afraid he'd fool himself because he so very much wanted it to be him. Not as much as Joe, maybe, but still, some heavy debts cried out for payment—with tons of vig.

"You know, Joe… I think you might be right."

Joe was still staring. A heat-seeking missile that had found its target.

"Course I'm right." He reached into his jacket pocket. "I'm doin' him, Stan. Gonna splatter his IQ all the way to the river then take his head home as a souvenir! Make a soup bowl out of his skull and eat from it every fucking night!"

Stan gripped his brother's arm before he could pull his .38. The area was crawling with people.

"Too many witnesses, Joe," he said quickly. "What good's doing him if it's going to land us in the joint? Like you said before, we've got to send a message here. This is the guy that blew up our stash, our cash, and our reps. We got to do him in kind. Blow him to hell. A public blow. And then we can say, remember that guy who got blown to chili con carne back in June? That was the guy who blew our farm and wrecked Joe's hand. We found him and did him. Did him good."

He felt Joe's arm relax as he nodded, still staring at the guy.

"Yeah. All right. And not just him, but him and everything he owns and everyone around him. You don't mess with the K Brothers."

Stan knew it would never be the same. They'd never completely salvage their reps, but at least they'd have evened some of the score. That counted for something.

"How you want to handle this?"

"He's looking for someone tailing the reporter. But we'll be tailing him. We find out where he lives, then we do him. And no waitin' around, Stan. We do him tonight!"

8

Sandy checked his watch: 12:30. He'd been wandering around the park for half an hour now. The message had said same place, noon. The noon was clear enough. And Sandy had assumed "same place" meant same bench. So he'd waited there for a while, but no Savior. He wondered if he should call the Savior "Jack." He didn't know if that was his real name, but it was better than the Savior.

After fifteen minutes on the bench he'd got up and wandered around. Maybe "same place" had meant the park in general. But another fifteen minutes of trudging up and down a ten-block length had yielded no sign of the man.

Looked like he'd been stood up. What now? He'd threatened the Savior with the drawing, told him he hadn't got rid of them. Not true. He'd torn them up and flushed them down a toilet in one of The Light's men's rooms. But he could print out another from the computer in minutes if he wanted to. But did he want to?

He remembered what Beth had said about To Kill a Mockingbird . Did he have a right to drag Boo Radley into the spotlight just for a story?

But the analogy didn't hold. He was here to do the Savior a favor—the biggest favor of his life.

Sandy checked his watch again. He'd give him another fifteen minutes, then—

"Hey!"

Sandy jumped, looked up, looked around—the Savior stood by a tree twenty feet away. He cocked his head down the slope toward the highway.

"Wait a minute or two," he said, "then meet me in the underpass."

Sandy watched him walk off, waited the requisite time, then followed. He found him waiting in the shadows of a concrete arch that supported a short span of the West Side Highway. Noise from the traffic above rumbled through the space.

"Look," Sandy said, approaching him, "before we go any further I just want to say—"

The Savior held up his hand for silence and scanned the park behind Sandy.

"If you're worried about my being followed, I wasn't."

"Probably right," he said. "Didn't see anyone tail you into the park, but you can never be sure about these things."

After a moment of narrow-lidded surveillance, he turned to Sandy. "What's the story, Palmer? We gonna play games, is that it? I thought we had an understanding: you get your interview, I never hear from you again."

He sounded pissed, and had a right to be, but Sandy had figured the best way to play this was not to allow himself to be put on the defensive.

"No games," he said. "I just don't think you were playing straight with me. I don't think you're working for the government, and I'm not so sure you were ever a Navy SEAL, either."

"True or not, what's the difference? You got your story, the paper's selling out—"

"How do you know that?"

His mouth twisted. "Had to go to three newsstands before I found a copy. Which means your bosses must be happy. You're a big shot now. Where's your gripe?"

Sandy resisted the urge to wipe his moist palms on his pants. This was a dangerous man and he had to be careful how he spun this. He'd mentally rehearsed his spiel for the last hour. Now it was show time.

"No gripe at all. It's just that I figured out the real reason you don't want your face in the papers, why you don't want anyone to know your name: you're a wanted man."

Bingo. The Savior had been scanning the park again, but when he blinked and stared at Sandy, he knew he'd struck pay dirt.

"You're nuts."

"Hear me out. I figure it had to be a felony. A misdemeanor wouldn't put you into hiding. So you're either wanted for a crime or you've jumped bail or escaped prison."

"Got it all figured out, don't you."

Sandy shrugged. "What else can it be?"