Michael slept hard and woke to the sound of the television. When he opened his eyes, he saw Elena perched on the end of the bed, wrapped in a blanket. The clock said it was almost noon. She was watching CNN. “They’re talking about us.” She did not turn, and Michael threw off the covers, scrubbed two hands across his face, and moved to sit beside her. The image on the screen was from the day before: the restaurant, burning. He watched firefighters assault the blaze, then the camera angle cut away, and the reporter was interviewing a man and a woman, both middle-aged and white, both nervous. They described a man who looked like Michael. They spoke of automatic weapons and people screaming, people dead. They described Elena, and it was a very good description.
“Black dress and long legs… very pretty…”
The wife tugged on her husband’s shirt, interrupting.
“She was holding his hand, running. They got in the same car.”
At the bottom of the screen, a grainy surveillance photo of a dark Navigator appeared with the caption, POLICE ARE SEARCHING FOR THIS CAR. Below the photo, they gave the license plate number.
Michael rose to check the parking lot. When he came back, the couple had disappeared, replaced by images of smoke-stained firefighters and paramedics bent over bodies. They showed a row of vinyl bags, wounded people that were blank-eyed and in shock. When the reporter began her recap, Michael heard the words “possible terrorist attack” on three occasions.
Elena stood and did not look at Michael. “The police think I’m involved, don’t they?”
“I don’t-”
“They’re looking for me.”
Michael nodded sadly. “Yes.”
“They think I killed my friends.”
“They don’t know what to think,” Michael said. “They have your description and mine. They have the car and a lot of questions. That’s it. That’s all. They don’t have our names; they know nothing about us.”
“Police want to arrest me and your friends want to kill me?”
“I won’t let any of that happen.”
“I’m going to take a shower.” She gestured at the television screen. “There’s more. You should watch it.” She hesitated at the bathroom door, still refusing to meet his eyes. “I’ll be in here for a very long time. Please, don’t come in.”
She closed the door. The lock dropped and Michael watched the television: “Sources close to the investigation indicate that organized crime may be involved…”
The television cut to an image of the old man’s town house in Sutton Place. Police cars lined the street. Yellow tape. Barricades. Cops moved in and out of the front door. Body bags rolled on wheeled gurneys and were hoisted into ambulances with dark lights.
“… the Navigator identified leaving the scene of the explosion has been traced to this address. Initial reports indicate seven bodies were discovered here just minutes before the explosion in Tribeca…”
Michael glanced at the bathroom door. His name was not mentioned, though Stevan’s was. The cops wanted to talk to him. They showed his picture.
And Jimmy’s.
Michael turned off the television and checked the parking lot again. The day was blue and flawless. He called the front desk, got an older man with a smoker’s voice. “What’s the best place to shop for clothes?” The man gave directions to the local mall. Michael wrote them down, then pulled on the same clothes from yesterday. He tied his shoes, ran fingers through his hair, then wrote a note that read, WENT OUT TO BUY CLOTHES, ETC. BACK SOON. PLEASE DON’T LEAVE. She wouldn’t, he was sure, not after last night. There were too many questions, too much to say.
Outside, the air was hot and tasted of traffic. Michael drove ten minutes into Richmond, then got off the interstate and found the big shopping mall exactly where he’d been told it would be. He parked the car and entered near the food court. Shopping as quickly as he could, he bought three changes of clothes for himself and for Elena. He kept it simple when it came to his own needs: jeans, casual shirts, good shoes. A light jacket with a zipper would hide the gun.
Michael knew Elena’s sizes, the kinds of shoes she liked. He spent lavishly and paid cash for everything. Back in the parking lot, he took the plates off the Navigator and switched them with a dark blue pickup parked in the far, back corner. The last store he visited was a drugstore two blocks from the hotel. He bought toothbrushes, shaving gear, whatever he thought they’d need. At the motel, he did a slow drive through the lot and saw nothing that alarmed him. The place was like a million others.
He parked and went inside.
Elena was sitting in one of the chairs, wrapped in a towel. “I couldn’t bear to put the same clothes back on,” she said. “They felt soiled.”
He put the bags on the floor. “You’ve done nothing wrong.”
Elena said, “You should take a shower.”
Michael turned the shower on as hot as he could bear it. He lathered and scrubbed and shaved, so that by the time he came out, dressed in new jeans and a blue shirt, he was fresh as he thought he could be. “You look better.” Elena’s gaze lingered. She wore expensive jeans and brown leather boots with low heels and buckles at mid-calf. She stood, uncomfortable. “Can we walk?”
“There’s not much out there.”
“I just need to move.”
Michael put on the jacket and clipped the nine millimeter back onto his belt. They slipped out of the room, Elena in front. The parking lot had few cars. Large, metal-sided buildings could be seen down a slight incline. Storage. A boat retailer. Used cars. A second motel pushed close to the feeder road that ran parallel to the interstate. Blank windows stretched in rows, looking out on the same parking lot. Next to the motel was a diner with brushed metal sides and booths behind the glass. On its sign was a giant coffee cup. Elena pushed her hands into the pockets of her jeans. “I feel like I should run.”
“Where?”
“Anywhere.”
Instead, she walked. She aimed for the back of the lot and seemed content to walk along the verge where scrub trees and chain-link fencing met. They walked in silence until the trees thinned and they could see rooftops across a wide gulley. Elena closed her eyes and lifted her chin as if testing the faint, acrid breeze with her nose. When she opened her eyes, there was a firmness to her mouth, an edge of decision.
He was going to lose her.
“How many people have you killed?”
The question caught Michael off guard. The words were matter-of-fact, but her face twisted, and fear, suddenly, inhabited everything around them; it gave urgency to the limbs that rattled and scraped, voice to the cars that screamed on the interstate, depth to the reflections caught in motel glass. It was fear of the next step, of crossing some uncrossed line and finding oneself trapped on the other side. Michael worried how Elena would react to the words he chose, and knew, too, the thing she feared. “One or a hundred,” Michael said, “does it really matter?”
“Of course it matters. What kind of stupid question is that?” She shoved her hands into her pockets, and together they watched a dog by the interstate. It loped along the verge, nose down, tongue lolling over brown, broken teeth. It looked once up the hill, then nosed a diaper that littered the roadside.
“With the exception of the man who raised me,” Michael said, “that dog is better than any man I’ve ever killed.”
Elena shivered at the certainty in his voice, the implications. “A man is not a dog.”
“A dog is usually better.”
“Not always.”
“I have good judgment.”
The dog pulled its snout from the diaper, and Elena wanted to scream; she wanted to run and vomit and carve great chunks from her heart. “What do we do now?”
“I take you to lunch.”
She shook her head. “I’m not hungry.”
Michael laid three fingers on her arm, and said, “It’s not about the food.”
The restaurant was an Italian bistro with white tablecloths and deep booths. Soft leather sighed as they sat. A waiter brought menus and filled their water glasses. “Anything else to drink while you’re thinking about your order?”
“Elena?” Michael asked.
“This is too normal.” Her hands found the white cloth and she pushed herself from the booth. “Excuse me.” She moved past the waiter and disappeared into the ladies’ room.
The waiter’s face showed his confusion.
Michael said, “I’ll have a beer.”
When Elena came back, they ate lunch, but it wasn’t easy. There was a reticence in her that went beyond the expected.
Back at the motel, Elena shut herself in the bathroom. When she came out, her hair was damp at the edges, the skin of her face pink from cold water and a rough towel. “I’ve made a decision.” She was resolute. “I’m going home.”
“You can’t.”
“I love you, Michael. God help me for that, I do. And I get it, okay? The whole childhood thing, what’s happened to you and how you turned into the man you are. It breaks my heart, truthfully, and I could spend a day weeping for the sad, small boys in that photograph you carry. But I have to put the baby first. This baby. Mine.” Both hands covered her stomach. “That means I can’t be with you. I’m sorry.”
“You’re not safe in New York. You’re not safe here, not without me.”
Her chin lifted. “I called Marietta.”
“Marietta who lives next door?”
“She has a key. She is sending my passport here by overnight mail. Tomorrow I will go back to Spain.”
“You gave Marietta this address?”
“Of course.”
“When did you call her?”
“What does it matter? I called her. She is sending the passport and I will leave.”
Michael caught her arm. “When?”
“This morning. While you slept.”
“What time?”
“Seven thirty, maybe eight. Ow, Michael. You’re hurting me.”
“Call her.” Michael released her arm and pushed his cell phone into her hand. “Do it.”
Elena dialed. “She is not answering.”
“Try her cell.”
Elena redialed and was shunted straight to voice mail. “She always has it with her. She always has it on.”
Michael knew this was true. Marietta worked in public relations. Her phone was her life. “Tell me the conversation.”
“She was going on about some corporate event-Mercedes, I think. I told her where to find the passport, in the cabinet above the oven. She said she would mail it first thing.”
“What else?”
“I heard voices. People on the stairs, maybe. She said she had to go.”
“Get your things. We’re leaving.”
“Why?”
“Marietta’s dead.”
“What?”
“We have to move.”
Michael checked the window. Outside, three men climbed from a dark green van. They were hard-looking men, one Hispanic and two whites. The Hispanic carried a duffel bag, and it was heavy. Michael did not recognize any of them, but knew at a glance what they’d come for. He took in the plates on the van, how their eyes moved, the way they carried themselves. “Too late.” He flicked the curtain closed, stepped into the bathroom, and started the shower. When he came out, he left the bathroom door cracked.
“What’s going on? What’s happening?”
A connecting door joined their room to the one next door. It had a brass deadbolt, but the wood was cheap and thin. Michael shouldered it open, wood cracking at the jamb, bright metal twisting. “Go.” Michael tipped his head at the door. Elena moved into the adjoining room, Michael behind her. He forced the damaged door closed, jamming hard to make it fit. At the window, he eased back the curtain. The men were across the lot, twelve feet away. They walked in a row, the center man eyeing the motel door, the two on the sides checking their flanks. “Elena.”
She eased up beside him. He wanted her to see, to understand. One of the men slipped a hand under his shirt, and Elena saw the dull show of black steel. “Jesus.”
She crossed herself.
Michael nodded toward the door between the rooms. “In ten seconds they’ll be in that room. You know how to use this?” He pulled the nine millimeter from the holster at his hip.
“No.”
She was truly frightened now. A different kind of fear. “It’s easy,” Michael told her. “Fifteen rounds. Semiautomatic. Just point and pull the trigger. If anyone comes through that door, you shoot him. Just keep squeezing the trigger. The safety is off.”
“What about you?”
He moved her back, against the wall. She had a clear line of fire at the adjoining door. “Anybody,” Michael said, then drew the forty-five and crossed back to the window. The men clustered on the sidewalk. The lot behind them was empty. They made a thorough check, then laid down the duffel bag and unzipped it, pulling out a thirty-pound sledgehammer. One last look around and the weapons came out. They kept them low against their legs, and when the hammer came off the ground they stepped back to make room for the swing. The man was large. He got his weight behind it, and when the hammer hit, the door didn’t stand a chance. It blew open with a tortured squeal. He dropped the hammer, and the other two entered first, the third right behind them.
Michael gave them exactly two seconds, then opened the door and stepped outside. The day was just as warm, but felt cool. Wind licked his face, and part of him felt regret. He took five steps down the sidewalk, then rounded into the room behind them, his feet light and soundless, his heart rate unchanged. All three had their weapons up, their focus on the bathroom door and the shower running beyond it. No one looked back. No one heard him. It took Michael two seconds to kill all three men.
Two seconds.
Three bullets.
The shots came so quickly, they sounded like strung firecrackers. Weapon leveled, Michael closed the door and checked the bodies. They were dead, no question: two in the back of the head, one in the side as he’d turned. Two of them had wallets in their back pockets. Michael checked the IDs, then tossed them in one of the shopping bags. He spared a glance at their weapons to confirm his suspicions, then gathered up spent casings and the bags of clothing. He made a last check and walked out of the room.
The men he left on the floor.
At the door to the adjoining room, he knocked. “It’s me.”
“Come in.” Her voice shook.
Michael found her crouched on the floor, weapon up and aimed at the door. “I heard…” She began to shake, and Michael took the weapon from her hands. She covered her face. “I thought… Oh, God.” She smeared her palms across her face, but there were no tears yet.
“We’re leaving,” Michael said.
“What happened?”
“They were amateurs.”
“How do you know?”
“They died easy.” Michael was moving quickly, re-holstering the nine millimeter, pushing the shopping bags into Elena’s arms. “Someone will have heard the shots.”
“They’re really dead? You-”
“I should have seen it.” Michael shook his head. “The plates threw me.”
“What do you mean?”
“The van was here when we came back. I saw it, but it has Maryland plates. I was looking for New York.” Michael checked the window. “They’re contract players, probably out of Baltimore. I didn’t expect that. Wasn’t looking for it. I say they’re amateurs because they are. The van is parked so that it could be easily blocked in. No one watched their backs. Their weapons were low grade and poorly maintained. Two of them carried ID.” He shook his head. “Amateurs. Are you ready?”
“Where are we going?”
“North Carolina.”
“Why?”
“To find my brother.”
She blinked, still stunned. “You killed them.”
Michael opened the door, took her by the hand. “I’m trying to quit.”
They got in the car and drove from the lot. Michael made a number of turns and kept an eye on the rearview mirror. “We’ll need a new car.”
“I’m going to be sick.”
“No, you’re not.”
“I’m going to be sick on you.”
Michael worked his way back to the mall. It swarmed with people. There were thousands of cars. He drove up one row of cars and down another. “This will do.”
“What?”
He tilted his head at a late-model sedan. “Nondescript. No visible damage.” He parked four slots away.
“And we’re stealing it?”
Michael grinned. “The window’s open. It’s like an invitation. You want to come?”
“No.”
“I’ll be right back.”
“Michael…” Her face caught the afternoon sun. “Those men you killed…”
“Those men were coming to kill us.”
“No innocents,” Elena said. “Is this what you meant?”
“More or less.”
“Marietta was innocent.”
“I didn’t kill Marietta.”
“Would you have?” She held him with the urgency of her question. “If things were reversed and it was you back in New York? Would you kill her to get what you want?”
“I guess it depends.”
“On what?”
“On how badly I wanted something.” Michael slipped out of the car. In three minutes he was back. “Let’s go. Keep your head up. Act normal.”
They unloaded their belongings from one car and carried them to the other. Elena stumbled twice but no one noticed. No one said a thing. In the other car and moving, Elena said, “I can’t accept your answer. I can’t sit here and accept what you said.”
Michael drove in silence, Elena tense and miserable beside him. On the interstate, he said, “Some people deserve to die, if not for one sin, then another. When it happens to people like Marietta, it’s unfortunate.”
“Unfortunate?”
“It’s a bigger word than you think.”
“She was my friend. She had parents, plans, and ambitions. A boyfriend. Jesus, Michael. She thought he was going to propose.”
“I’ve never killed a civilian.” Michael waited until she looked at him. “If you’re smart in this business, you never have to.”
“And you’re smart in the business?” She was angry, now, the fear fading. She wanted to lash out, and Michael understood. He’d felt it himself: survivor’s guilt, the first taste of how fast something bad could happen.
“Yes,” he said.
“What does that even mean?”
“It means I take precautions to keep the innocents innocent. It means I plan ahead.”
Elena laughed a desperate laugh, white splotches in the center of each cheek. “Plan ahead? What plan? Where?”
Michael sighed heavily, then reached into the inside pocket of his jacket. When the hand came out, it held Elena’s passport. The edges of it were crisp against his fingertips. He felt the sudden stillness in her, the parting of her lips. “There’s a direct flight from Washington. If you really want to go, I’ll take you there.”
She took the passport and squeezed as slow understanding twisted her features. “Marietta…”
Her voice broke, and Michael showed sympathetic eyes. He wanted to say that Marietta died easily, that she died a quick death, but that would be false. Jimmy would want to make sure. So would Stevan. “I’m sorry about your friend,” he said.
But Elena did not hear him.
She was drowning in guilt.
Traffic thickened as they neared the outskirts of Washington. Michael passed a station wagon-in it was a family with young kids. They were playing with toy guns, the guns shiny and small, the small faces intent. “Tell me the rest.” Elena kept her eyes on the kids. One of them waved, made a face. Elena touched her cheek once, then turned away. She still saw the kid, though: cross-eyed and puff-cheeked, nose pressed white on smeared glass as his sister aimed at his back and pulled the trigger.
“The rest of what?” Michael passed the car.
“The things you haven’t told me.” Elena’s eyes were smudged red. A pearl of blood rose from the crease of a torn hangnail. “Tell me all of it.”
“You won’t like it.”
“I will tell myself that they are only words.”
“Baby-”
“Please.”
So, Michael spoke of the things he’d done. He described life as he’d lived it: life on the streets, and then as the old man’s strong right arm, what it took to do the job and move on. He spoke of other things, too: the one man he could count on, the care he took and the times he’d almost died. He spoke of his love for the old man, and he spoke of her, Elena; how, with her, he wanted more. “A normal life,” he said. “Better reasons to live.”
By the time he finished, they were parked at Dulles International Airport. The sky above was clear. Jets split the air, impossibly large, and Elena was shaking her head. “It’s too much.”
“You wanted to hear-”
“I was wrong.” She looked at the terminal. People lined the sidewalk. Bags were being unloaded. She shook her head. “I can’t save you.”
“I’m not asking you to. Just to understand, to let me try.”
She fingered the passport, cleared her throat. “I need money.”
“I’m more than the things I’ve done.”
“Must I beg?”
She was breaking, and the sight of it killed something in Michael’s heart. This was not how it was supposed to be; not the way he wanted it. He gave her cash without looking at the amount. It was a thick sheaf. Thousands. Many thousands. He took a breath, and gave her the business end of things. “Going to Spain may not keep you safe. Stevan has money, connections. He can find you if he wants to.”
“And will he wish to?”
An ember of hope kindled in her eyes, but it burned small, brief and cold. She worried with her nails at the raw place on her thumb. The pearl of blood had dried to a small crust. “Love me or not,” Michael said, “the safest place is with me.”
“Safest but not safe.”
“No. Not completely.”
Elena nodded at this thing she already knew. She tucked both hands between her thighs, and said, “Do I look scared?”
“You look beautiful.”
“I’m terrified.”
It showed in her eyes, a quiet but utter panic. She opened the door, and Michael said, “Don’t leave me.”
“I’m sorry, Michael.”
“I can keep you safe. I can make this right.”
“How?”
“I don’t know, but I can. Please, Elena. I’ll never forgive myself if something happens to you.”
“And you think something will?”
“Stevan has a vengeful soul. It’s personal between us, now. He’ll want to make me hurt. Going through you is the best way to do that.” Michael’s voice was very intent, close to pleading. “The safest place is with me.”
“Then come to Spain. We can disappear-”
“Julian is my brother.”
His voice cut her off. She stared hard into his eyes, and there was no barrier between them. “So, you would choose between us?”
“It’s not like that.”
“Isn’t it?”
“I can protect you both.”
“I’m sorry, Michael.”
“He’s my brother.”
“And this is my baby.”
She touched her stomach, got out of the car, and even though he could no longer see her face, Michael knew she was crying. It was in the slope of her shoulders, the tilt of her head. She shoved money in a pocket, found the sidewalk, and hesitated. People jostled her. The sidewalk was crowded with women and children, with men in suits and jeans and sunglasses. Eyes flicked over her and moved on. People stood singly and in knots; horns blared where traffic snarled. Elena took one step, then stopped again. For long seconds, she stood still, shoulders rolled, head turning first left, then right. A man bumped her, and she shied, dropping her passport, then bending to retrieve it. A space opened in front of her, but she did not move. Michael got out of the car and jogged through traffic. He worked his way to a place behind her, and when he was close, he saw that the passport was bent double in her hand. He stepped next to her, and when she flinched, he said, “It’s just me.”
She kept her eyes on the crowd. A heavyset man pushed past. A punk in dark glasses watched her from beside a concrete column. “I’ve never been scared of people before.”
Michael scanned the crowd. “No one here is a threat.”
“How can you know?”
“I just do.”
“I don’t want to die,” she said.
“Come with me.”
“I’m scared.”
“I’ve got you, baby.”
“Say it again.”
“Will you come with me?”
She paused for a long time. “If you say it again.”
Michael put his arm around her shoulder. He kissed a warm place on the top of her head.
“I’ve got you.”