He sets a magnifying glass on the table and smiles without opening his lips. “Maxine, I’ll pay any reasonable amount to take you to my bed.”

“The answer’s still no. You’d crush me.”

“I’ve been told I can be overwhelming in a good way. Huge is huge.”

My LASD staff acquaintance ran a records check on Cavore. Among other things, he has raped. Got her in the backseat of a car and let his body weight almost suffocate her while he did his thing. Suspected in two others, but never charged. This was a while back, for what little that matters. The first time he propositioned me was at his warehouse, and I put Cañonita against his gut and cocked her. At that moment, standing pretty much face-to-face with him, feeling like I was in the backseat of a car about to get smothered in fat and raped-I would have shot him. I wanted to shoot him. Cavore had understood.

“I’ll just have to believe it, Jason. Let’s get down to business, okay? I’ve got things to do.”

If I knew a fence who paid better than Carl, I’d go to him. In this business it takes decades to build up the right associates. I’ve had about eighteen months at it. Carl pays good dollar, such as the 10 percent he offered for all this lovely ice, because he moves a lot of product. The other L.A. diamond guys, they’ll give you 5 percent, maybe 8 or 9 for the big stones. Greedy. Diamonds are easy to sell again because only a very few out of millions can be identified.

I bring my satchel to my lap so I can get what I need without taking my attention away from Cavore for more than half a second.

I lay the Colt.45 on the table, stare straight into Carl’s small, quick eyes, then fan out the papers facing up and away from me, so he can read the labels. I set the satchel on the floor. He reaches out and presses down lightly on the two-carat masterpiece, his finger circling the paper. His knuckles have dimples and they are hairless.

“You going to palm my best rock?”

“Just feeling the nipple through the blouse.”

“Eighty-one stones,” I say. “Mostly round, but some nice princess cuts. Uniformly fine clarity, colorless, excellent cuts. The smallest are one-third of a carat and the biggest is that poor thing you’re crushing under that hand of yours. Jason, take your goddamned hand off my diamond right now.”

He flinches just a little. Then pulls away his hand and reaches into his shirt pocket and lays the calculator on the table beside the papers. Gives me what he thinks is an injured look.

“Good man,” I say. I pick up the envelope to make sure he hasn’t pulled some kind of magic trick on me. I can feel the big rock inside. I look at it just to make sure. My heart slows down a little.

“Maxine,” he says in mock disappointment.

“It’s out of respect for your cleverness,” I say.

“I’ve never even tried to cheat you. And when you leave, I drive this lonely city, thinking about you.”

Shifting my gaze quickly between Carl and the papers, I unfold them slowly, one at a time, to reveal the treasure. Carl’s eyes move as he watches my hands, but the rest of his mass is pale and damp and still.

When I’m done, Carl sits up straighter and leans forward with the magnifying glass. I look at him and he smiles and brings the glass up to enlarge his big gums and little teeth. He wiggles his fat tongue and laughs and the glass steams up, then clears.

“You probably scared the girls with lizards,” I say.

“Toads. I’d throw them as high as I could into the air, and when they hit-”

“Yeah, yeah.”

“Graphic. And the sound was unexpectedly loud, because they fill up with air when they’re scared. The smaller ones lasted longer-five, six throws.”

“Never learned the difference between scary and disgusting, did you?”

“I was not popular.”

Cavore looks through the magnifying glass in his left hand and with his right hand slides a gemstone paper directly under the lens. He studies the rocks, using the tip of his right little-actually big-finger to reposition certain diamonds, then others. Then without looking he reaches out with his right hand and taps at the little calculator resting on the table by his elbow. He pushes the buttons by feel. I can hardly see the calculator beneath his big mitt of a hand. He deftly moves the packet to his right. Outside I hear the voices of a family trying to get into their vehicle, not six feet away from where I’m sitting: “Wait until I unlock the doors, Cody. Cody, wait!”

Cavore examines and taps, examines and taps.

He lingers over the two-carat trophy. “You wonder where they come up with the ratings.”

“They’re quantifiable.”

“This isn’t SI2 clarity. It’s less.”

“Smarter people than you say it’s SI2, Jason. They’re professionals, not thieves.”

I expected him to criticize the product, but I’m not in the mood to indulge him.

“This is four hundred and fifty thousand dollars’ worth,” I say. “If you want to come up with my forty-five grand, I’ll be on my way.”

“Ten percent for this quality?”

“Jason, that was the agreement.”

“Contingent.”

I lean back in the little folding chair and look straight at him. “A gemologist rated those stones.”

“But I’m buying them. I’ve been doing this since you were ten years old. This is not four hundred and fifty thousand dollars’ worth of stones, Maxine. It’s four hundred, even. Quantifiable. The quality varies from good to only fair. The slight inclusions? I see them at only five-times power, when you know that ten-times is the GIA standard. Don’t try to fool me. I’ll give you eight percent-thirty-two thousand. They’ll be hard for me to sell because of the quality, and I am not eager to have them. But a deal is a deal. This is my best and final, pretty woman.”

This is a new obstinance from Carl. He always starts low and comes up.

“I’ll take forty-two thousand.”

He shakes his head. No smile. Just the little eyes sucking at me like he’s draining a pond to see what’s at the bottom.

“Talk to me, Jason.”

“How did you manage this? Why? Everybody is talking. MS-13 is very unhappy about those stones. And the Asian Boyz hate to lose anything. They’re asking questions everywhere. They’re looking. They’re listening. Someone always knows something. Someone always sees. Someone always talks. Maybe tomorrow or maybe already. They’ll discover your sources and stomp your luck flat. The diamond market people won’t buy the stones together as they are. Not at five percent, not at any percent-I’ve talked to them-try them if you don’t believe me. They’re afraid of the same things you should be afraid of. They’ll turn you over to the MS or the Boyz. I can’t imagine what they would do. There are rumors of Lupercio.”

“Explain Lupercio.”

He gave me half a chuckle.

“Mara Salvatrucha, OG, original gangster, Maxine. Then he left them, dramatically. A lot of blood was spilled but Lupercio endured. Mara Salvatrucha offered the truce. They say he can see in the dark. They say he’s the devil himself.”

“He’s a little guy with a machete.”

“It’s more than a machete.”

“More how?”

Cavore shrugs and yawns. “I wasn’t told. Magical powers, no doubt. Did you hear about the Indian brothers in Valley Center?”

“No. Why?”

“Nothing,” he says. “It was nothing.” Cavore keeps his small-eyed stare on me. I know he can’t link me to Valley Center so I stare back. But I wonder at his thinking, the way he put things together so quickly.

“So, Maxine, what are you going to do? Take it or leave it. I can deliver you to the money in under ten minutes. Thirty-two thousand dollars for something you found like litter in the souls of ten dead men.”

“Your spirituality moves me.”

“I’ll add five hundred for you-know-what, right now, back there.”

I watch Carl as I fold and collect each gemstone paper. I square and riffle them like a deck of cards before the shuffle, then slide them down into my satchel without taking my eyes off him. I pick up the gun and stand.