Where It Hurts by Reed Farrel Coleman Page B

her palms up. “Well?”
    “Well what?”
    Casey smiled. “What about dinner?”
    “We better stop this or it’s going to turn into a version of ‘Who’s on first?’”
    “What?”
    “No, he’s on second.”
    “Who is?”
    “Never mind.” I laughed, shaking my head at her. “Would you like to go to dinner sometime?”
    “Very much.”
    “Listen, Casey . . . I’m not sure I’ll be very good company.”
    “Nothing is sure.”
    I thought of my son and said, “You’re right about that. Nothing is.”
    “What’s your number?”
    I pointed at the hotel. “Call the hotel and ask for me.” Then I stopped being mysterious and gave her my cell number. “My schedule is kind of screwy, but—”
    “You already trying to back out on me?” She wagged a finger.
    I shook my head. “Scout’s honor. C’mon, I’ll walk you back to the club.”
    “No,” she said, smiling. “I don’t think so. I’ve got what I came for.”
    “Your car, then.”
    Casey threw a thumb over her shoulder at the old blue Honda Civic behind her. “You already have.” She put her hands on my shoulders, got on her toes, and kissed me softly on my cheek. “I’ll call in a couple of days.”
    Stunned, I watched her get into her car and drive off. As her taillights turned into small red specks and then disappeared, I thought ofall the questions I should have asked her, of all the warnings about me I should have given her. But it was too late now. As I turned to limp back to the club, I noticed that neither my leg nor arm hurt quite as much as they had only fifteen minutes before. Then, about four strides short of where I would’ve made the turn around the corner to the Full Flaps, something else came out of the darkness at me. Something cold and hard and far more deadly than Casey’s voice. I stopped in my tracks. The feel of gunmetal against your neck will do that to you—stop you from moving. Stop the world from turning.
    Before I could react, two massive, powerful hands clutched my elbows and squeezed my arms together behind me. Another hand, the free hand of the man pressing the gun to my neck, reached under my jacket and removed my old service weapon from the holster on my right hip. Suddenly, I was being moved along toward the space between a parked cargo van and a black Escalade, my feet barely touching the ground beneath them. I was a dead man. I smiled at the absurdity of it, for there had been so many times during the last two years I wouldn’t have cared. That I would have relished an end to all the pain and constant grief. It was different now. Was it as simple as having met a woman other than Annie whose lips I found I wanted to kiss? Was it that Tommy Delcamino’s murder had given me a sense of purpose beyond mourning my loss? I couldn’t say. All I knew was that I desperately wanted to see the sun rise again.

18
    (FRIDAY NIGHT)
    I didn’t know about the guy pressing the gun to my neck. I didn’t have to. The thing in his hand had bullets and went bang. I wouldn’t hear the bang . . . or would I? I would find out soon enough. I knew all I needed to know about the other guy, the one squeezing the life out of my arms. He was country strong. I wasn’t exactly a small man and he was pushing me along to a spot between a black Escalade and a van as if I were made out of papier-mâché. I didn’t have a whole lot of options besides stalling and begging. I was willing to stall. I figured if I stalled long enough, my guys from the club would come looking for me. If that didn’t work, I guessed I was fucked. I could envision myself begging for Krissy’s life. For Annie’s, too, in spite of everything. But not for my own life, no. The last two years had left me with precious little pride and I planned to hold on to whatever small bits of it remained in me even if it meant taking it to the grave.
    As we approached the back bumper of the Escalade, I said as calmly as I could manage, “You guys know I’m