The passenger got out. He was carrying a duffel bag. He walked up to my side window and knelt down beside my car.

I lowered the side window and said, “Simon.”

He passed me the duffel bag. “My apologies for being late. There was an accident on the interstate.”

“Who’s that with you? Teru?”

“He guessed where I was going somehow. He insisted on driving.”

“Well. He’s a good driver if you need one. Are you both armed?”

“To the teeth. Would you care to brief me?”

I told him I had already checked all the access points from inside the apartment. There were only two doors into the apartment—the one off the front courtyard, which led to the gate off the street, and another one that opened into the garage. There was only one way into the garage, which was through the overhead door that also faced the street. So he could watch both sets of doors from where he was parked. There was no alley. Her building was surrounded on three sides by other buildings, each of which had walls along the property lines. So to penetrate the perimeter, they would have to sneak past us or else gain access to a neighboring property, scale a wall, and break in through one of her rear or side windows, which I had secured earlier.

I said, “Let’s trade phones.”

Simon handed me his cell phone and I gave him mine. Olivia had my number on her landline’s speed dial, so she only had to push one button, and it would ring. I had my phone set up to do the same with Simon’s number, so he could ring me just as quickly. I figured less than three seconds would pass between Olivia’s pressing the button on her phone and Simon heading for her door. I would be less than thirty seconds behind him. A lot can happen in half a minute—I had seen dozens of men die in a fraction of the time—but it was the best we could do.

I said, “If it’s possible to wait for me, do it. Otherwise, take action, and I’ll be right behind you.”

“Very good.”

“Don’t let Teru get in the middle of it.”

“No.”

He walked back to his car. I got out of the Bentley and looked back. They had come in Teru’s Porsche. I waved at him. He lifted a hand in response. I went into the building beside us, a bed-and-breakfast where I had reserved a room earlier that day.

The elderly couple who ran the bed-and-breakfast had hidden a key for me under a rock in a planting bed. It opened their front door and my room upstairs in the back. I put the bag on a chair beside the bed, opened it, and withdrew my shaving kit, which I carried into the small bathroom. I stared at my face in the mirror while I brushed my teeth, trying to think of anything I might have missed. The cut on my forehead from the attack in the mountains was healing. The swelling at my jaw from the beating in Pico-Union was completely gone. My pupils and my irises were still the same color, so my eyes still looked like a pair of empty holes. I would never understand what Haley could have seen in them. Maybe what she had seen in them had gone with her.

It felt wrong not to be downstairs watching over Olivia, but I knew it made more sense to take a break. I couldn’t watch her around the clock. If I tried, I’d lose my edge. Besides, based on Simon’s marksmanship the day Castro had tried to run us down outside El Nido, I had a feeling he was up to the challenge.

I set the alarm timer on Simon’s phone and put it on the bedside table. I took my keys and wallet out of my pockets and put them next to the phone. I pulled the holster off my belt and set it on the table too. It’s hard to sleep with a holster jabbing into your side.

It had been a long day. I checked the safety on M11 and I lay on top of the bedcovers, fully clothed, with my shoes on and my weapon in my hand.

46

The alarm went off four hours later. I rose, put the M11 in the holster, clipped the holster to my belt, splashed some water on my face at the bathroom sink, put my keys and wallet and Simon’s cell phone back in my pockets, picked up the duffel bag, and went downstairs.

Outside the sun was still an hour away from rising, and the drizzle that often passes for rain in Los Angeles hadn’t abated. I spoke Simon’s name softly and paused near a streetlight where he could clearly see me. When I heard him say, “Approach,” I walked to the passenger-side window of the Porsche.

“Anything to report?” I asked, kneeling down to Simon’s level by the window.

He passed my phone out to me, and I gave him his. He said, “I believe Miss Soto is present and correct.”

Beyond him sat Teru, still watching Olivia’s gate.

“You’ll get some sleep later this morning, as we discussed?”

“After Mr. Gold has gone to work. And I will return tonight at the same time, unless you contact me with different instructions.”

“I’ll be here too,” said Teru.

“Thanks for this, guys.”

Teru said, “They hit Olivia. We can’t have that.”

After he drove away, I went to the Bentley. At six thirty my phone rang. “You out there?” she asked.

“You bet.”

“All night?”

“Sort of. Simon and Teru stood in for a while.”

“I love your friends.”

“They seem to think you’re okay, too.”

“I’m making blueberry pancakes. Want some?”

“Just you try to stop me.”

That day went pretty much the same way as the day before. I followed her to the Montes’s place and parked under the same tree. The oak kept a lot of the drizzle off the car, but enough of it came dripping down through the leaves and branches to make me leave the windows up. Maids and gardeners came and went up and down the road. The exact same model and color of Bentley drove by again. I thought it might have been Jack Nicholson behind the wheel, but the beads of water on the side window made it hard to tell.

I had come prepared this time with a sack lunch from Olivia’s apartment. A banana, potato chips, and a ham and Gouda sandwich on sourdough, with sprouts. Also, a cold Coca-Cola. She had packed everything in a small plastic cooler. I answered the call of nature behind some bushes. It was good to be out of the car. I decided to stand beside the tree trunk and count birds. There seemed to be more crows that day. Maybe the drizzle brought them out. I watched them carefully, saw no trails of ashes, and decided my doctors would have been pleased. Every day, in every way, I was getting better and better.

At 5:05, Olivia came through the gate again, waved, and turned right, toward the canyon road. I kept her in sight all the way to Venice. We met at her gate again, and as before, I went inside first, with the M11 ready in my hand. All was clear. She came in and changed clothes. She emerged from her bedroom wearing full-length jeans this time. The rain had dropped the temperature. It was too cool for shorts.

In spite of the drizzle, we went for another walk, following the same route. I hung back again, although I didn’t like it. Across the neighborhood to Venice Boulevard, to the beach, to the pavilion, back up into the neighborhood, across the canals on Dell, then back to her apartment. If she wanted them to get to her, following exactly the same routine every day was certainly the way to do it.

After dinner I checked all of her windows again. I made sure her portable phone was charged and all set to speed-dial me. I reminded her to keep it within reach no matter where she was in the apartment. I also reminded her not to answer the intercom or a knock at the door unless she was certain it was me.