“Corsco,” he blubbered. “Tony Corsco.”

“Who’s that?” asked Hardin.

Fat man looked up, stopped blubbering. “What do you mean who’s that?”

“I’m not from around here, asshole. Who the fuck is this Corsco?” Hardin bounced another rock of the fat man’s leg.

“Ouch! Fuck, knock that off! I’m fucking talking, OK? He’s the boss – Chicago, Milwaukee, St Louis, the whole Midwest.”

“Boss like mob boss?

“Yeah. What the fuck did you think?”

Not that, thought Hardin. “So what’s he want with me?”

“He wants you dead. That’s all I know. Gave me and Snake the picture, told us your car was in the garage there, told us to take you out.”

“What picture?”

The fat man pulled a sheet of paper out of his shirt pocket, unfolded it, held it up. Picture of Hardin at the rental counter at O’Hare. And they’d been waiting when he got to the garage – which meant they’d been looking for him since before the Oprah show aired.

“Where’d Corsco get the picture?”

“How the fuck should I know?”

Hardin zinged a rock into the fat man’s shoulder, just on principle. “When?”

“Fuck,” the fat man said. A huge bubble of snot hung down from his nose, the blood from his head now covering the left side of his face, soaking into his shirt. “Yesterday, right after lunch, OK?”

Hardin knew he should kill the guy. Hell, he’d killed plenty of guys. But something about plugging the fat man while he sat on his ass bawling in the middle of a ruin sat funny with him. Besides, other than Corsco’s name, Hardin still didn’t know shit. Leave the fat man around, and if he saw him again, maybe he’d know more. The fat man would be hard to miss.

“Give me your wallet,” Hardin said.

“Ah, man,” said the fat man. He shifted up on his side, fishing the wallet out of his back pocket, and tossed it to Hardin.

Hardin flipped it open. “Garbanzo? Really?”

The fat man shrugged. “Why you think they call me Beans?”

“I was thinking cause you fart all the time.”

“Hey,” the fat man said, all indignant suddenly. “I got a condition, OK?”

“Sure,” said Hardin, sticking the wallet in his hip pocket.

“Can I have the wallet back?” Garbanzo said. “I mean, you can keep the money and stuff. I got a picture of my mom in there. I don’t got a lot of pictures of her.”

Hardin flipped the wallet back open to a picture in one of those plastic sleeves. Fat woman with an Italian afro of gray hair, speed bags of chicken-skin fat hanging down off her arms. Hardin took the cash and cards out of the wallet and tossed it back to the fat man.

Hardin whipped one last rock at the fat man, right off his kneecap. “I see you again, you’re dead,” said Hardin. He took the keys from his pocket, got in the Grand Marquis and pulled away, the fat man in the rear view mirror still sitting on his ass in the gravel, not looking like he was in any hurry to get up.

OK, he thought. I needed a gun, now I’ve got two. Not a bad morning, aside from the whole mob-wanting-me-dead thing.

Beans Garbanzo hurt all over. He’d also shit himself. The gash on his head had stopped gushing and was just seeping now, but the side of his head was swollen up like he was one of them Special Olympics kids. His leg hurt bad, and his chest hurt when he breathed. It was going to be a long walk back to South Shore, and who the hell knew how long once he got there before he could find a phone. Fucking Snakes. He’d told him not to listen to this guy about the diamonds, and now look at this mess. He’d call his sister, he figured. She could drive in from Palos. Then he could get out some feelers, see how much shit he was in.

Up ahead, a gray Malibu pulled in off of South Shore and headed toward him. The car turned right about ten yards in front of him, blocking his path. The driver’s window slid down. Olive-skinned guy, hair slicked back neat, dark suit and tie. What the fuck? Did Corsco have somebody out on him already?

The man smiled. “Hello,” he said.

“Yeah, hi,” said Garbanzo.

“What is your business with Hardin?”

“Who the fuck are you, and what are you talking about?”

The man smiled again.” You and your dead companion abducted Nick Hardin from the Grant Park garage and drove him here. Sometime during that trip, he killed your friend and disarmed you. He then knocked you to the ground and threw stones at you until you told him what he wanted to know. Whatever trouble you may be in, and with whomever that trouble may be, you are already in it. I simply want to know what you’ve already told Hardin. And then I will be on my way.”

This actually made sense to Garbanzo. “Yeah, what the fuck. Tony Corsco sent us – Snakes DeGetano and me – to kill that Hardin fuck.”

“And who is Tony Corsco?” the smiling man asked.

“Jesus, second guy today hasn’t heard of Tony. Who the fuck are you people? Tony Corsco runs the goddamn mob.”

“I see. And what was his complaint with Mr Hardin?”

“Look, buddy, he don’t explain shit like that to me and Snake. He tells us kill some guy, then we kill him.”

“Thank you, you’ve been most helpful,” the smiling man said. Then he raised the .22 from his lap and shot Garbanzo three times through the forehead so quickly that Garbanzo hadn’t even twitched before the third round hit him.

Husam al Din drove back north up Lake Shore Drive. So the American mafia, too, had an interest in Hardin. With Stein dead, could Hardin be trying to sell them the diamonds? Had the mafia tried to steal them instead?

Al Din could not know. If not the diamonds, then some other business. But he did know this: guided by intel provided by Javadi from some asset with access to Chicago’s surveillance system, al Din had pulled into the garage just in time to see Hardin abducted by two armed professional criminals. They had searched him; Hardin had no weapon. Al Din had followed them south, and, by the time they arrived at the vacant land near the lake, one of the criminals was dead, Hardin was armed, and the other criminal was not. This Hardin was something more than an errand boy for television news people. It was fortuitous that al Din had learned this as a witness and not as an object lesson. He would have to approach this Hardin with care.

CHAPTER 15

When they were done with Telling, Lynch and Bernstein went back to the precinct, started going through red light camera shots from the intersection near the shelter. The problem was the camera only took a shot when someone ran the light, so they had to put all the shots in order, make a timeline, and see if they could pick out any likely cars. Lynch had the tech guy send up shots from the same time of day for a week before the shooting as well. Some of the cars popped up more than once. Had to be locals. They could rule them out.

Starting an hour or so before the game, each shot showed cars cruising the street, hoping to save the $35 it cost to park at the stadium. About forty minutes to tip-off, Bernstein got a clean shot of a Lexus backing into a spot and ran that plate. It was registered to a Harry Weber in Lisle.

“Christ,” Lynch said. “You park a car worth forty grand on that street, trying to save a few bucks?”

“No explaining people,” said Bernstein.

They flipped through the post-game shots, but the Lexus was gone about half an hour before the shooting at the shelter. Five minutes before game time, a black Escalade that had been parked one spot up from the shelter was gone, replaced by a medium gray sedan with a low roofline. There was an old Suburban in front of it, so they couldn’t make out much on the vehicle, just part of the roof and the top corner of the windshield on the driver’s side. Again, they flipped to the post-game shots. Somebody ran a light about ten minutes before the shooting and the car was still there. Next violation was twenty minutes later, and the car was gone.