F. Paul Wilson - All the Rage

Trouble was, the man might get lucky.

Jack's first thought had been to tell Gia to call the cops and complain about two suspicious-looking guys lurking outside. That would chase them, but not far. They'd move, but they would not go away.

So he'd have to handle this but be careful as to how. His first reflex had been to take them out, permanently, leave the police to clean up the mess. Since they both work for Dragovic, everyone would write it off as a mob hit.

Everyone except Dragovic. He'd know why those two were there, and removing them would be like erecting a big neon sign over Gia's door saying, I'm involved.

No, this called for a more subtle approach. But what…?

Sal's voice jarred him back to Staten Island. "I don't know how many times I've watched it already, but I crack up every time." He popped the cassette out of the set and held it up. "How many copies do I make and where do we send them? Eyewitness News?

"No copies yet."

"Ay," Sal said, pointing to the new dual-deck VCR Jack had instructed him to buy. "Ain't that why I bought this? To make copies?"

"Right," Jack said. "But we need more. You've got to be on that dune to film the sequel at tomorrow night's party."

"I'll be there, but how about something better'n tires this time? How about glass? Yeah! I gotta shitload of broken glass around here."

He forced his voice to stay calm. "Tires are just phase one. Phase two is where he gets nailed."

"Nails?" He heard an unmistakable note of glee in Sal's voice. "You're gonna use nails? Now you're talkin'!"

Jeez. "No."

"Then what's phase two?"

"All in good time, my man. All in good time. Meanwhile, not to worry. I've got it all figured out."

"But we done tires. I don't want to do tires again. Tires ain't enough."

Jack chewed the inside of his cheek and resisted the urge to whirl and get in Sal's face and tell him if he didn't like what was going down he could take over and finish it himself.

That's the worry about Gia and Vicky, he realized.

It was getting to him.

He rose and stepped to one of the windows. Through the grime on both sides of the pane he could vaguely make out the mountains of old cars and scrap metal stretching behind the office.

"Gotta be something better than tires again," Sal whined.

"OK, Sal," Jack said, giving in. "Let's take a walk through your yard. If we find something better, we'll use it. If not—tires again."

And maybe I'll come up with a solution for Dragovic's goons.

As an ebullient Sal led him out into the sunny afternoon, Jack noticed a couple of men piling scrap metal onto the hydraulic lift on the rear of a battered old delivery truck, the same one Jack had used to deliver the tires to the Ashe brothers on Friday.

He watched the old truck's lift return to ground level after another load of scrap had been pushed into its interior. Its rear edge was beveled… like a knife…

That gave him half of an idea. Jack scanned the rest of the yard and spotted some battered and rusted cars lined up against one of the fences. He pointed to them.

"Any of those wrecks drivable?"

Sal stopped and looked around. "Yeah, I s'ppose. Not legal-like. A coupla them'll getcha from here to there, but probably not back."

"I don't need to get back."

"Whatchathinkin'?"

Jack was beginning to feel a little better now.

"I'm thinking I may take out some of my fee in trade after all."

12

"How long are we going to sit here?" Vuk Vujovic said, lighting another Marlboro.

All he'd done today was camp in this damn car in this rich neighborhood and smoke while they waited for this woman to show. He was stiff, restless, bored, and an unbroken chain of cigarettes had left his tongue feeling like soggy cardboard. The Lincoln was comfortable to drive, but he felt as if he'd moved into it. He checked his bleached hair in the rearview mirror. Dark roots were starting to poke through; he was going to need a touch-up soon.

"How many times are you going to check your hair?" said Ivo from the passenger seat. "Afraid it's going to fall out?"

"Not mine, old friend." He glanced at Ivo's dark but thinning hair. "I'll still have plenty when you're as bald as an egg."

"At least I won't look like a girlie-man."

Vuk laughed to hide his irritation at the remark. If anyone in this car was a woman it was Ivo—an old woman. "The ladies love the color."

Ivo grunted.

They'd met in the Yugoslav Army and later had gone through the Kosovo cleanup together. With the army and the country in shambles after that, they'd hired on with Dragovic.

Vuk stared at the woman's door. Look at this neighborhood. Elegant brick-fronted town houses on an almost private block that dead-ended at a little park overlooking the East River. No places like this back home, unless you were high in the regime. He tried to imagine what it cost to live here.

"I hate this waiting."

Ivo sighed. "Could be worse. We could still be in Belgrade waiting for our back pay."

Vuk laughed again. "Or waiting on line for a gallon of gas."

"Do you ever think about home?" Ivo said, his voice softer.

"Only when I think about the war." And he thought about that every day.

Such a time. How many woman had he taken? How many men, some KLA, most simply able-bodied males, had he marched into fields or stood against walls and shot dead? Too many to count. How powerful he'd felt—a master of life and death, surrounded by cries and wails and pleas for mercy, a master whose whim decided who lived and who died, and how they died. He'd felt like a god.

Vuk missed those days, missed them so much at times it nearly brought him to tears.

"I try not to."

Vuk glanced at his companion but said nothing. Ivo had always been soft, and now he was going softer. This was what happened when you lived in America. You went soft.

I'm going soft too, Vuk admitted. I used to be a proud soldier. Now what am I? A bodyguard to a gangster—a Serb by birth, yes, but more American than Serb—and sent on wild-goose chases like this one. But he knew he was better off than others of his generation still in Belgrade.

"Do you think this DiLawopizda has any connection with last night?" Vuk said, reluctantly moving their talk back from the past to the present.

"Could be," Ivo said. "But even if she is, she seems gone for the holiday, just like everyone else around here."

All they'd seen in their many hours on watch were a few children with their nannies. Vuk had checked in twice with the East Hampton house to report that nothing was happening, hoping they'd be called back. Instead they'd been instructed to stay right where they were.

"We're wasting our time," Vuk said.

"You got us into this."

"Me? How?"

"You had to identify the man on the video." He mimicked Vuk's voice: " 'I know him. He's the one we chased off the beach.' You never know when to shut up."

Vuk had turned, ready to give Ivo hell, when he saw him straighten in his seat.

A delivery truck with no markings had turned into Sutton Square. It rattled toward them, then angled sharply toward the curb.

"He must be lost," Ivo said, easing back into his seat.

Vuk agreed. The truck might have been white once, but now it was so dented and scraped and covered with grime he could only guess at the original color. The driver had a thick white beard and wore a baseball cap pulled low over his forehead. His features were blurry through the windshield. Vuk watched him pull out a map and look at it.

Dumb, Vuk thought. How do you get lost in a city where the streets and avenues are all numbered?

But the driver apparently found what he was looking for, because he began moving again, pulling head-on into the opposite curb. As the truck began backing into the second leg of a three-point turn, Vuk noticed that its rear loading platform was lowered and riding about two feet off the ground. But instead of stopping or even slowing when it had reversed to the middle of the street, the truck picked up speed and kept coming.