After the meal came the bedroom calisthenics, one for the road, and usually pretty slow after eating all that meat. But Amber was patient and kept up the moans and groans until it was over. Then she’d fall deep asleep, her soft smooth leg draping over his. He’d catnap but inevitably wake up, leaving her apartment as she squeaked and snored with that cute little grunt of hers every time she exhaled. He liked Amber. She didn’t cost him a whole lot of money, she wasn’t too demanding, and she didn’t have a whiny voice. It was sultry-low and hoarse, no doubt from the cigarettes, but still, it was sexy.

Yeah, Amber was all right, he thought as he left her place, walking down the empty streets of the city. But Sal was better. Sal was his true-blue friend who always showed up no matter how tough the going got. The night was warm and muggy, and Billy heard the constant hum of air-conditioning from all corners. Life was decent and would be even better as soon as Billy took care of this business. He couldn’t say for sure that it was his last job, but he did have other things in mind now that he was older. He had lived within a four-mile radius his entire life, his spectrum of experience limited to the dull city rhythms of his formative years. The same people, the same food, the same girls, the same thugs. He was tired of freezing his bones off in the winter, tired of battling mold and damp walls and wind tunnels and freezing pipes and hissing radiators.

He wanted to try out new things: someplace that was warm in the winter with an ocean nearby. He could picture himself and Sal driving down the East Coast to the Keys to visit his sister, Fiona, who was a big pain in the ass but was the only living relative he had who still talked to him. Her husband was a doofus but played a decent game of golf.

Surely he could do better than Fiona.

How about cross-country? A coast-to-coast excursion, just Sal and him and the open road. Maybe find some hot little spot in Ma-li-bu!

The heels of his shoes made a clacking sound on the sidewalk as he dreamed about his future.

Trouble was, the Malibu chicks liked those sardine-box sports cars-little two-seater numbers with souped-up motors and ear-blasting boom-box jungle-bunny stereo. No, no, no, anyone who couldn’t appreciate Sal didn’t stand a chance with him.

He took off his jacket and draped it over his arm and thought some more.

Those Malibu babes were fine numbers. He remembered that bathing-suit special about them on T V, all those luscious asses. So hey, if the girls wanted glitz, he’d get a Harley. He certainly could afford one after this job, that was for sure.

A Fed.

He really didn’t want to whack this Fed or any Fed. Feds had protection. Feds had nice families and went to church picnics and taught their kids how to play baseball… Well, not all Feds. He didn’t know a thing about the Fed Barton wanted him to take out. Maybe this Fed was a monster. Maybe he was that kinda self-righteous prick who would hide under the guise of being a law-abiding citizen, be all prim and proper but would be, in actuality, a secret diddler of little boys.

Billy thought about that as he made his way home. In his mind, he was picturing this guy-this Fed-coming in backdoor on some little six-year-old boy screaming bloody murder.

It always helped to demonize the enemy.

The Fed had a name: Benny Jacopetti. He was middle-aged, average height, average build, average face, just an average guy with nothing that distinguished him from any of the other working stiffs. The guy had a family that included a wife and a slew of kids. He lived in a spanking-new housing development in the middle of nowhere. That was a mixed bag-the city versus the burbs. In the city, Billy was a known quantity; the police were constantly on his ass. Also, town cops were much sharper than their suburban counterparts. But it was also bad, because that far into the burbs, the wilderness, really, there wasn’t any cover… nowhere to hide. Things got spotted and reported and gossiped about.

That meant the city wasn’t the ideal location, but the burbs weren’t any better.

He’d clean him on the road.

Mr. Barton hadn’t been lying when he said he had Jacopetti’s life down to the minute. After a few days of spotting, the guy’s routine was as predictable as sunrise. He left the house around seven to get in to work at eight, leaving Billy about an hour of commuter time to get the job done. The route broke down into the following legs.

Trek One:

This portion of the journey-about ten minutes-took Jacopetti from his house to a bypass road, traveling through suburban developments and past a couple of shopping malls. Wide-open spaces, no cover, and other cars on the streets. Meaning it wouldn’t serve his needs for the job.

Trek Two:

Tooling down a bypass road: another twenty minutes. This route meandered through the posh houses of the burbs: two-story brick estates sitting on lots of land. Most of the homes were perched on a knoll of lawn, obscured by mature trees and thick clumps of planting. The majority of the area was even devoid of sidewalks. No big commercial developments, only cute little Victorian houses that doubled as offices: One was a real estate agency, another rented to a law firm, and a hairdresser and nail salon took up a third. There were also a couple of small cafés and a Starbucks.

Wherever you went in America, there was a Starbucks.

Four dollars for a cup of java.

And the Feds accused the loan sharks of usurious vigs.

On this pathway, there was better coverage due to the trees. But because it was a bypass road, there was often tons of morning traffic. Plus, the road narrowed down to two lanes, making quick escape in a car damn near impossible. Also, good ole Sal would stick out among all the Mercedeses and Beemers that marched in the early-morning workers’ commute.

Billy scratched Trek Two as a possibility.

Trek Four:

Jacopetti’s route to his job ended with a twenty-minute ride on the highway. Billy was tempted to whack him while racing down the multilane roadway. Here, Sal would blend into the clump of morning traffic-just another hunk of steel chugging down the pockmarked asphalt. But there were other considerations besides fitting in. Billy would have to make a quick getaway. He’d have to make sure that no one saw him pull the piece.

That was the trick.

On the highway, there was always traffic, and that meant there were always possible witnesses. Also, what if there was an accident that caused vehicular backup? It would stink if he shot Jacopetti only to get jammed because of a bumper-to-bumper tie-up.

No, the highway was out.

Trek Three was the option of final resort:

For a lone ten minutes, Jacopetti turned off the first bypass road, detouring onto a smaller secondary bypass road-a bypass to the bypass-that twisted and turned but eventually led to the on-ramp to the highway. Sometimes the lanes got crowded. But at least half the time, traffic was light, almost empty, especially if Jacopetti got an early jump from the house. This small swath of asphalt had only two stoplights and, like the first bypass road, it meandered through large properties but for a major exception.

There was this one spot, a nature preserve that was filled with overgrown bushes and large trees. The parking lot to the forest was hidden behind foliage. It sat at the first of the two traffic light intersections, neither street having any visible road signs. You just had to know it was the first intersection in the bypass to the bypass.

Billy thought this looked promising, so he scoped out the surroundings.

About twenty yards from the lot-twenty feet into the park- stood a tall, lush pine tree next to a thick old cedar, forming a green wall of foliage and needles. Both trees fronted the road. Almost directly behind the cedar and the pine was an old oak that met up with an old sycamore, their branches melting into a leafy canopy. The spot was perfect: nestled and secluded, with a great view of the road and the parking lot. The topper was this little tiny service lane that started at the parking lot, snaked through the park grounds, then ended at the first bypass road across the street from a big mother brick colonial house.