She thought: He's Death.

She felt it deep inside her. With a chill. Death, Hades, a Horseman of the Apocalypse. The dark angel who'd fluttered into her father's hospital room to take him away. The spirit who wrapped his ghostly arms around Mr. Kelly and held him helpless in the musty armchair while someone fired those terrible bullets into his chest.

The lights flickered as the train switched tracks and then slowed as it rolled into one station. Then they were on their way again. Five minutes later the train lurched and they stopped again. The doors rumbled open. Waking him up. As his eyes opened he was staring directly into Rune's. She shuddered and sat back but couldn't look away. He glanced out the window, stood up quickly. "Shit, missed my stop. Missed my stop." He walked out of the car.

And because she kept staring at him shuffling along the platform as the train pulled out, Rune saw the man who'd been following her.

As her gaze eased to the right she glanced into the car behind her. And saw the young man, compact, Italian-looking.

She blinked, not sure why she remembered him, and then recalled that she'd seen somebody who looked a lot like him someplace else. The loft? No, in the East Village, near Mr. Kelly's apartment…

Outside Mr. Kelly's apartment the day she'd broken in. Yes, that was it! And it was the same guy who'd ducked into the deli when she'd been on the street in front of Washington Square Video.

Pretty Boy, wearing the utility jacket. Sitting on the doorstep, smoking and reading the Post. Or was it?

It looked like him. But she wasn't sure. No Con Ed jackets today.

The man wasn't looking her way, didn't even seem to know she was there. Reading a book or magazine, engrossed in it.

No, it couldn't be him.

Paranoid, that's what she was. Seeing the man with the yellow eyes, seeing Death, had made her paranoid.

It was just life in a city of madmen, dirty screeching subways, fifteen hundred homicides a year, a thousand police detectives with close-together eyes. U.S. marshals who like to flirt.

Paranoia. What else could it be? Hell, she thought, get real: it could be because of a million dollars.

It could be because of a murder. That's what else it could be.

The lights went out again as the train clattered through another switch. She leapt up, heart pounding, ready to run, sure that Pretty Boy'd come pushing through the door and strangle her.

But when the lights came back on the man was gone, was probably standing in a cluster of people by the door, about to get off at the next stop.

See, just paranoia.

She sat down and breathed deeply to calm herself. When the crowd got off he wasn't in the car any longer.

Two stops later, at Bay Ridge, Rune slipped out of the car, looking around. No sign of any Pretty-Boy meter readers. She pushed through the turnstile, climbed to the sidewalk.

Glancing up and down the street, trying to orient herself.

And saw him. Walking out of the other subway exit a half-block away. Looking around-trying to find her. Jesus…

He had been following her.

She looked away, trying to stay- calm. Don't let him know you spotted him. He pushed roughly through crowds of exiting passengers and passersby, aiming in her direction.

Trying to look nonchalant, strolling along the street, pretending to gaze at what was displayed in store windows but actually hoping to see the reflection of an approaching taxi. Pretty Boy was getting closer. He must've shoved somebody out of the way: she heard a macho exchange of "fuck you, no, fuck you." Any minute he'd start sprinting toward her. Any minute he'd pull out the gun and shoot her dead with those Teflon bullets.

Then, reflected in a drugstore window, she saw a bright yellow cab cruising down the street. Rune spun around, leapt in front of a pregnant woman, and flung the door open before the driver even had a chance to stop.

In a thick Middle-Eastern accent the driver cried, "What the hell you doing?" "Drive!" The cabbie was shaking his head. "No, uh-uh, no…"He pointed to the off-duty lights on the top of the yellow Chevy.

"Yes," she shouted. "Drive, drive, drive!"

Rune saw that Pretty Boy'd stopped, surprised, not sure what to do. He stood, cigarette in his hand, then began taking cautious steps forward toward them, maybe worried that the scene at the cab would attract some cops.

Then he must have decided it didn't matter. He started to run toward her.

Rune begged the driver, "Please! Only a few blocks!" She gave him an address on Fort Hamilton Parkway.

"No, no, uh-uh."

"Twenty dollars."

"Twenty? No, uh-uh."

She looked behind her. Pretty Boy was only a few doors away, hand inside his jacket.

"Thirty? Please, please, please?"

He debated. "Well, okay, thirty."

"Drive, drive, drive!" shouted Rune.

"Why you in a hurry?" the driver asked.

"Forty fucking dollars. Drive!"

"Forty?" The driver floored the accelerator and the car spun away, leaving a cloud of blue-white tire smoke between the Chevy and Pretty Boy.

Rune sat huddled down in the vinyl, stained rear seat. "Goddammit," she whispered bitterly as her heart slowed. She wiped sweat from her palms.

Who was he? Symington's accomplice? Probably. She'd bet he was the one who'd killed Mr. Kelly. The triggerman-as the cops in Manhattan Is My Beat had called the thug who'd machine-gunned down Roy in front of the hotel on Fifth Avenue.

And, from the look in his dark eyes, she could tell he intended to kill her too.

Time for the police? she wondered. Call Manelli. Call Phillip Dixon… It made sense. It was the only thing that made sense at this point.

But then there was the matter of the million dollars… She thought of Amanda. Thought of her own perilous career. Thought of how she'd like to pull up in front of Richard and Karen in a stretch limo.

And decided: No police. Not yet.

A few minutes later the cab stopped in front of a light-green-and-brick two-story row house.

The driver said, "That's forty dollars. And don't worry about no tip."

She stood on the sidewalk, hidden behind some anemic evergreens, looking at the row house that was, according to his lawyer's Rolodex, Victor Symington's current residence. A pink flamingo stood on one wire leg on the front lawn. A brown Christmas wreath lay next to a croquet mallet beside the stairs. An iron jockey with black features painted Caucasian held a ring for hitching a horse.

"Let's do it," she muttered to herself. Not much time. Pretty Boy would be looking for a pay phone just then to call Symington and tell him that he couldn't stop her and that she was on her way there. It wouldn't be long before Pretty Boy himself d show up.

She thought she could handle Symington by himself. But with his strong-arm partner, probably a hothead, there'd be trouble.

She rang the doorbell. She had her story ready and it was a good one, she thought. Rune would tell him that she knew what he and Pretty Boy had done and that she'd given a letter to her lawyer, explaining everything and mentioning their names. If anything happened to her, she'd tell him, the letter would be sent to the police.

Only one flaw. Symington wasn't home. Goddammit. She hadn't counted on that.

She banged on the door with her fist.

No answer. She turned the knob. It was bolted shut.

Glancing up and down the street. No Pretty Boy yet. She clumped down the gray-painted stairs and walked around to the back door. She passed a quorum of the Seven Dwarfs, in plaster, planted along the side of the building, then found the gate in a cheap mesh fence around the backyard.