“I’ll try,” Jesse said.

“Carson got any next of kin out there?”

“Not that I know of, but I’ll find out, let you know.”

“Wish you would,” Buck said. “Friends, close associates?”

“Let me look into it,” Jesse said. “I’ll get back to you.”

“Sure,” Buck said.

“You know what detonated the bomb?” Jesse said.

“No. Best guess, someone trailed him and beeped it from a distance. Pretty empty stretch of road along where it went off.”

“Makes sense,” Jesse said. “If you wouldn’t mind, I’d like it if you talked only to me about this.”

Buck grunted.

“If you wouldn’t mind,” Jesse said.

“Hell no,” Buck said. “Your town, your department. Who’d you say you worked for in L.A.?”

“Homicide, Captain Cronjager.”

“Un huh. Well, I’ll go ahead and see what I can do at this end. Maybe you can give me a ring in a couple days, tell me what you know.”

“Glad to,” Jesse said.

“If I don’t hear,” Buck said, “I’ll give you a ring.”

“You’ll hear,” Jesse said.

Chapter 33

Jo Jo Genest sat in Gino Fish’s storefront office waiting for Gino, trying to impress Vinnie Morris.

“So I got this suitcase,” Jo Jo said, “with seven hundred large, you know, small bills. Thing weighs a freaking ton, and I’m supposed to take it to a bank in New York City, down around Wall Street someplace. You know New York?”

Morris nodded. He was sitting with his chair tilted back. He had a Walkman clipped to his belt and he was listening to music through the earphones.

“Guy I know arranged I could make the deposit in an account under a fake name, no questions asked,” Jo Jo said. “So I got this rental car and I’m trying to get there, and the traffic is out of control, you know. And when I finally get there I can’t find a place to park, and I’m riding around the block down by the World Trade thing, and the freaking bank closes. You believe it. I got a dirty seven hundred thousand in a suitcase and the bank closes while I’m riding around like a dildo looking for a parking space.”

Morris was looking at Jo Jo with no expression, his heels hooked in the bottom rung of his chair, his arms folded over his chest.

“You hear me okay?” Jo Jo said.

Morris nodded.

“Well, I figure the money’s okay, I mean, who’s going to mug somebody like me, you know? But I still gotta get it deposited, so I haul it back to the hotel. I’m staying at the Marriott in Times Square, and I ditch the car and next morning I get a cab and haul the money back downtown and it’s dandy. Cabbie drops me off right in front of the bank. I take the stuff in, go to the desk, and ask for the name they gave me, who’s going to count the cash and take care of the deposit and he ain’t there. He’s at another branch in freaking Queens, they gave me the wrong branch. So I go out with the suitcase, which is lucky I’m big and strong, because it’s getting heavier every minute and I try to find a cab and I can’t, so I get on the subway. I got a suitcase full of cash and I’m riding the freaking subway, and I’m boiling. And I go back to the hotel and get a cab there. You can always get a cab at a hotel, and I go over to Queens hauling the dough, and the guy is there, but he’s in a meeting. So I tell the slut at the desk that they better get his ass out of the meeting or else and she says, real preppy, ‘Excuse me?’ And I said get this guy’s ass out here, now. And I give her a real hard look and she gets up and goes in back and in a little while my guy comes out, and he’s nice as freaking pie. ‘Oh, sir, so sorry to keep you waiting, come right in to one of our conference rooms, blah, blah.’ And I got the money deposited. But is that a kick or what, I’m chugging around freaking New York with three-quarters of a million in cash for two days trying to get somebody to take it.”

“Scared hell out of that bank lady, huh?” Morris said.

Jo Jo didn’t much like the way Vinnie said it. He could never tell whether Vinnie was putting him on or not. Hard to figure Vinnie. He didn’t seem interested in anything. He never seemed in a hurry. He never had any reaction to anything, except to say things like “scared hell out of that bank lady,” which Jo Jo could never quite figure out.

Jo Jo thought maybe he ought to grab Vinnie someday and slap him up against the wall. Get his freaking attention. But there was something about Vinnie . . . Jo Jo stopped thinking about it. He sat straight upright on the other straight chair. He would have liked to cross his legs, but they were too thick. He probably ought to do more stretching, loosen everything up a little. Gino Fish came into the room, nodded at Vinnie, walked past Jo Jo, and got behind his desk.

“Sorry I’m late,” Fish said.

But he said it in a way that sounded to Jo Jo like he didn’t care if he was late or not. He could use a little shaking up too, Jo Jo thought. Involuntarily he glanced at Vinnie, as if Vinnie could know what he was thinking. Vinnie looked blankly at him or past him or through him. Jo Jo could never be sure.

“No problem, Gino. Been talking with Vinnie.”

Fish smiled without amusement.

“So what have you got for me, Jo Jo?” Fish said.

“Guy I know is looking for guns.”

Fish was quiet for a moment, his gaze heavy on Jo Jo.

“Who is this guy?” Fish said finally.

“He’d like to remain anonymous,” Jo Jo said.

“Wouldn’t everyone,” Fish said. “Is he IRA?”

“No, nothing like that.”

“Zealots are not good people to do business with,” Fish said.

Jo Jo wasn’t exactly sure what a zealot was. But he knew Hathaway wasn’t IRA.

“Can you do something for us?” Jo Jo said.

“What are you after?” Fish said.

“Automatic weapons, machine guns, mortars, handheld rocket launchers, grenades.”

There had been other things on the list, but Jo Jo hadn’t wanted to carry the list. It would be bad if he got caught with it, and he wanted Gino and Vinnie to think he knew more about guns than he did.

“In what quantities?” Fish said.

“Enough to outfit a regiment,” Jo Jo said. It was what he had been told to answer.

Fish smiled again without warmth.

“When I was of an age for the military,” he said, “I was in a different kind of government service.”

“I didn’t know you did government work, Gino.”

“I was in jail,” Fish said.

Jo Jo felt hot. He hated to look stupid in front of Vinnie.

“I knew that, Gino,” he said. “I was kidding you.”

“Well, don’t,” Fish said. “Vinnie, do you know what kind of weapons order you’d need to outfit a regiment?”

“Yeah.”

“Do we know anyone who could supply that amount?”

“Sure.”

Fish looked at Jo Jo.

“There,” he said. “Now what?”

“Can you get me a price?”

“Supplier will set the price,” Fish said. “I’ll add my commission.”

“Sure, Gino, of course. These are just, ah, whaddycallit, preliminary talks, you know.”

“So tell your principals it’ll be a few days, and I’ll be in touch with you. Before we go too much further, though, I will want to meet the principals.”

“They won’t like that, Gino.”

“I don’t care, Jo Jo. That’s the way it will have to be. I don’t do this kind of business with people I don’t know.” He smiled his joyless smile again. “I have had all the government service I care for.”

Jo Jo flushed again, feeling foolish about misunderstanding government service. He glanced sideways at Vinnie. Vinnie seemed oblivious.

“I’ll talk to them,” Jo Jo said.

“Fine. Now if you’ll excuse us . . .”

Jo Jo stood up, too quickly. He wished he had reacted slower.

“I’ll wait to hear from you,” he said to Fish.

He made a little punching gesture at Vinnie with his clenched fist, and went out of the office. When he was gone, Fish turned to Vinnie Morris.