He studied it again, making sure his lips didn't move as he read it.

'MacQuaid's is obviously another bar.' He looked at her expectantly and she nodded wearily.

'It's one of the places I used to meet Dixie. Okay. Happy now?'

'Who's 'J'?'

She just shook her head.

'Okay, I'm going to assume that two days ago you had to meet somebody called 'J' at MacQuaid's. Either that or you sent somebody else to look for him there.'

'Jesus Christ, Evan. Why's everything got to be connected to everything else? I suppose if you'd found my grocery list you'd be expecting to get it all served to you for your dinner in one go. It's just a few notes to myself.' She sounded almost as sick of talking to him as he was of her.

He didn't believe her for a second. He laughed, putting the piece of paper back in his pocket. 'That's an even worse assignment than I got. At least I got a whole name. Some other poor sap had to go in and say pardon me, I'm looking for somebody called 'J'?'

'I have to use the bathroom,' she said, not bothering to respond to his complaint. 'You don't have to wait for me. You've got work to do.'

She gave him a tight little smile.

For once in his life, he bit his tongue and headed off to try to find the elusive Dixie. Sadly, he got the impression that if he just sat still long enough, Dixie would find him.

Ellie went into the bathroom and waited until she heard him close the door before coming back out. Her eyes flicked all round the room and came to rest on the water glass that he'd left on the nightstand. She crossed to the closet and found a plastic laundry bag in the bottom. She carefully picked up the water glass, dropped it into the laundry bag and put the whole lot in her handbag.

Chapter 36

Chico heard the ping of his phone. He looked at the message and laughed out loud, despite himself: I've lost him. We met up with a guy called Evan Buckley. The two of them gave me the slip. What do you want me to do? He knew Dixie's hand at work when he saw it, although he wasn't sure he knew what he was trying to achieve. He ought to feel insulted that Dixie thought it would fool him. Unless he'd sent it as a joke.

He closed his eyes and leaned his head against the headrest. The whole situation made him sad more than anything; he was really going to miss the guy. After his initial rage had subsided, he'd started thinking about all the good times they'd had—or at least he'd thought they were good times—and how things were going to be very different in future. He'd miss the humor, although now he thought about it there'd always been a hard caution in his eyes even when he was laughing. He'd miss the confidence, the loose, wary way he had of carrying himself and the fact that you only had to tell him something once. And every time he looked at Ricardo he'd think it all over again. He opened his eyes and looked at his shredded palm and laughed softly to himself—if he'd been a younger man he'd have been reminded every time he knocked one out too. He shook his head at how much things had turned around in the space of a few days.

It was obvious Dixie had done something with that idiot Crispy. It made him wonder why he kept him on. How had he ever thought Crispy was up to the job? Had Dixie killed him or just put him out of action somehow? It didn't really matter one way or the other. The end result was the same—Dixie was out there without his minder. The fact that he'd done something with Crispy and was using his phone also meant he knew Chico was keeping tabs on him.

Or did he? Was he jumping to conclusions based on what Alvarez had told him? It was the reference to the investigator that puzzled him. Ellie had claimed that Buckley told her he was looking for Dixie. Chico was well aware that the golden rule was don't believe a word the bitch says, but now Dixie—if it was him who sent the text—had brought Buckley into it again. Who the hell was he? Was he was working with Dixie? Or with Ellie? Or were all of them in it together? It made his head hurt thinking about it all.

He knew he wasn't going to get anywhere just sitting around thinking about it. He had to make something happen. There was no reason why he shouldn't carry on with the texting game. He needed to think of something to say that might worry Dixie (although that was easier said than done). He leaned his elbows on the desk and dropped his chin to the heel of his hand and stared at his phone.

It came to him in a flash of genius. He tapped away with one finger, a satisfied smile on his lips, and after a couple of minutes sent a reply that he hoped would give Dixie something to think about: No problem. Come back here. We've got Ellie. We're picking up the money now.

He couldn't help laughing to himself as he hit send. Two can play at that game. Like all good lies, it was as full of the truth as it was full of shit. It would give Dixie a couple of things to think about. It would be interesting to see what he would do. Come back to rescue poor Ellie? Not if he had any sense. But the fact that Dixie was out there on his own, most likely going after the money himself, meant they had to get things moving.

He opened his desk drawer and got out the piece of paper that Ellie had scrawled the details on. The writing was shaky which wasn't surprising since she'd almost had a breast sliced off, but it was still perfectly legible. He imagined that would make most women's handwriting suffer. He must be getting old; back in the day he'd have just got on with it, rather than give her a little scratch. He swallowed thickly. Well, maybe not so old, he thought, feeling something stir appreciatively south of the border.

He almost felt sorry for the woman whose name and address was written on the paper. She had a nice name, an old fashioned biblical name, the sort of name he'd have given his daughter if he'd had one, although he knew his wife would have insisted on Maria. (Ricardo would never know how close he came to being called Jesús.) Chico was something of an Old Testament man himself, particularly when it came to crime and punishment. There were some great ideas in there that had sadly slipped out of favor—the death penalty for bestiality, for instance, or for being light in your loafers, had a lot to recommend it, although death for screwing a woman on the rag was a bit harsh.

He tried to think back to his studies at the seminary, tried to remember what the name meant in Hebrew. Was it princess? He couldn't remember, it had been almost fifty years ago, but it didn't sound right. Maybe something else, then. It didn't matter. He laughed to himself and wondered if any of those old Hebrew names meant stupid or dead meat. She probably had no idea what she was getting herself into when she agreed to look after a bag for her friend. She'd have caught on pretty fast if she'd looked inside, that was for sure. She was collateral damage, that's all, which was the Army's fancy way of saying: Into each life some rain must fall.

He turned to look at Juan and José and felt another twinge of pity for her. She didn't deserve these two. José in particular, leaning against the wall, picking at his nails with his knife. There was something evil that lived behind his eyes, something you didn’t want to look at.

'Go see this woman,' he said, giving Juan the piece of paper, 'and get my money back.'

'I thought Ellie was getting it.'

Chico shook his head sadly like Juan was a dog he couldn't teach to beg. 'You didn't really think I'd let her go and hope she'd get it and bring it back like a good girl, did you?'

Juan's face creased into a frown. 'So why did you let her go?'

'Because she's our best chance of finding Dixie, dickbrain,' Chico said, forgetting about the cuts on his hand and slamming his palm on the desk. It started to bleed again. 'She might not want to give the money back, but I get a feeling she's happy to hand him over—or kill him herself if she gets the chance. If they're in this together, she doubles her share at the same time.'