“It’ll warm up.”

We drove more.

I kept a casual eye on the rearview mirror, and about ten minutes into the trip I saw something I didn’t like. I said, “Jimmy, let’s stop for some coffee and a muffin. What do you say?”

He looked at me sideways. “Now?”

“Yeah. How about it?”

“I guess,” said Jimmy.

Some ambitious redneck had built a sandwich shop up against a Chevron station, so Jimmy pulled off the side of the two-lane highway and parked the truck. We took a booth in the sandwich shop. A teenage waitress with a Southern accent as thick as a slab of ham took our order for two coffees and a cheese Danish for Jimmy.

Jimmy poured sugar into his coffee and kept pouring. I thought maybe he’d dozed off, but he cut the flow and dumped about two cows’ worth of milk in after it.

“What are you making, cake batter?”

“Lay off.”

“Don’t get defensive.”

“Okay,” said Jimmy. “What gives?”

“We’re being followed. Don’t look around. Eat your Danish.”

He took half the thing in the first bite and said, “Bring me up to speed.”

“Mutt and Jeff in a black Ford Tempo.”

“Since when?”

“Since Gainesville. I thought I’d given them the shake.”

“Maybe not,” said Jimmy.

“They’re at the pay phone across from the pumps, waiting for us and pretending to make a call.”

Jimmy raised an eyebrow. “You sure?”

“No.” It looked like the same car.

“We got to be sure.”

“I know.”

Jimmy frowned. “We can’t lose them in the moving van.”

“No.”

“Well, shit.”

“Let’s pay for this and get going.”

“What about our buddies?” Jimmy asked.

“Like you said. We need to be sure.”

We drove for a while. The jokers in the Tempo stayed at a discreet distance, but they were definitely tailing us. They probably thought they were doing a good job.

“Pull into that Burger King up there,” I said. “I’ll get to the bottom of this shit.”

After Jimmy parked the moving van, I told him to sit in a window seat inside the Burger King so our shadows could keep an eye on him from the parking lot. I sat with him for a minute.

“What if they’re Feds?” asked Jimmy.

I’d thought of that, but it seemed more likely the Tempo on our tail were Beggar’s boys trying to track down those ledgers. I’d been thinking a lot about Alan Jeffers. He knew I had the books. I was supposed to bring them to him, but it looked like he was turning rat, willing to hand over the books to the FBI. But if that were the case, why hadn’t Agent Dunn put the squeeze on me? I kept chewing that question over in my mind, but only one answer even came close to making sense.

Jeffers was playing both sides. He told the FBI he was trying to get the books for them, and he told Beggar he was doing the same thing for him. In the middle sat Alan Jeffers, thumbing coke up his nose and wondering how he was going to pull his ass out of the meat-grinder.

So I didn’t think they were Feds following me, because Alan Jeffers hadn’t told them they should. I didn’t take the time to explain all this to Jimmy. I just told him to trust me.

“I’ll be back. Stay in the window where they can see you.”

“What for?”

“Because you’re decoy-boy.”

“What’re you going to do?”

“Just wait.”

Jimmy looked worried as I left him.

I high-stepped it out the other side of the restaurant and circled behind. From between two Dumpsters, I could see the goons in the Tempo. They smoked cigarettes and watched Jimmy through the window. I watched for a minute, but they didn’t look like they suspected anything. I continued my wide circle behind the gas station, all the time keeping an eye on the Tempo, but they didn’t notice me. I ducked into the gas station.

Inside, I bought a cheap pocketknife, a thick, souvenir Florida State Seminoles throw pillow, and a roll of duct tape. You can do abso-fucking-lutely anything with duct tape. Astronauts should take a dozen rolls on every shuttle mission.

The girl behind the register raised an eyebrow.

“Don’t ask.”

I locked myself in the men’s room around the side of the gas station. A quick glance on the way in told me Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum were still keeping watch on the Burger King. I cut a slit down the side of the Seminole throw pillow. I fished one of the automatics out of my shoulder holster and jammed it into the pillow, where it nested tightly in the heart of the stuffing. I wrapped the pillow in duct tape and kept wrapping until I’d used half the roll. The whole thing was now a tight wad of stuffing armored with several layers of tape. I dropped the knife into my pants pocket and threw away the rest of the tape.

The pillow looked like a misshapen, armadillo-skinned football. I tucked it under my arm and headed for the Tempo. They were either amateurs, or they let themselves get too comfortable watching Jimmy through the BK window. In any case, I came upon them and swung open the back door on the passenger side without any resistance. I slid into the backseat and slammed the door as they jerked around frowning at the surprise of me.

“What in the hell-”

“Shaddup.” I pulled the automatic out of the pillow and showed it to them. “Keep still, and do like I tell you. Get your hands up where I can see them.”

They put their hands up on the steering wheel and dashboard. “I don’t know who you think you are, but-”

“You’re even dumber than you look.” I let him feel the automatic’s cool metal on the back of his neck. He was the one in the passenger side. Clearly another low-forehead type in a cheap suit and three-dollar haircut. The guy behind the wheel was a stick figure with one of those Don Juan skinny mustaches and an overbite that gave him a rat look. “You just talk when I tell you, and we can all be chums.”

Before some passerby phoned the law, I brought the automatic down and stuffed it back in the pillow, keeping a loose finger on the trigger. Both of them faced forward waiting for me to speak. They didn’t look particularly worried, so I knew this wasn’t their first picnic. I’d need to get tough.

The one with the cheap haircut tsked at me. He was taking the hard line. “Pal, I think you need to reconsider your position. If you knew who we-”

I pulled the pistol out of the pillow again and smacked the barrel across the base of his skull. He grunted, bent forward and stayed there, moaning softly and rubbing his new lump.

“You dipshit,” said the other, “you just assaulted a federal officer. That’s five years hard time. You want to try for more?”

“What the fuck are you talking about?”

“Okay, now listen.” He said the words slowly, like he was talking to a dog or a retard. “I’m going to go into my jacket for my badge. No funny stuff. I promise.”

I pointed the gun at him. “Slow.”

He came out with the standard-issue billfold, flipped it open. A badge. An ID that said he was FBI Agent Nicholas Styles. He nodded at his buddy in the passenger seat. “He’s Agent Novak. He’d show you his ID too, but he’s not feeling so well.”

God damn. They were Feds.

“Now, how about handing over that gun, Swift? It’s really your only option.”

“Just hold on a second.” I’d really stepped in it this time. I had to think.

“The longer you wait, the worse it gets for you, Swift,” said Styles. “Just hand me the gun.”

“I said shut up a minute.”

Novak groaned. The knot on the back of his head was swelling good and quick.

“He might have a concussion.”

“So what?”

“So if he sustains some sort of serious injury because you prevented me from getting him to a doctor, and then he dies, I guess you can tack on a murder charge.”

I knew I hadn’t hit him hard enough for that, but I was getting flustered. I had to get control of the situation again. People were going in and out of the gas station, and I remembered I was waving a pistol around. I stuck it back in the pillow.