But Ron heard his own voice whisper to him, “Then why is she staying with Dino now? Davey’s dead. She doesn’t need Dino’s help.”

He sat there, seeing her face in the darkness, hearing her voice, feeling her touch. He tried to hate her. “You never cared for me at all,” he said to her.

Then he thought of Dino, and he did hate. Dino had led the raid by the Chelsea gang. He knew all the strong points of the Gramercy headquarters. He knew Al’s defenses. Dino had planned the raid. He had triggered the trap. He had killed Al. And Davey too.

Dino was going to kill Ron now. Ron knew it. But he knew one thing more. He knew that he would kill Dino first. He didn’t know how he’d do it; he only knew he was going to kill Dino. He snarled like an animal, sitting there in his blackened cage. A few months in the City and Ron had turned into a hating, blood-thirsty animal, eager to kill.

Footsteps outside.

Ron scrambled to his feet, ignoring the pain and stiffness in his body. He had to feel along the walls to find the door, it was that dark in his cell.

From outside he heard a muffled, “Hey, what—” And then scuffling sounds. A thud. A moan. Finally, the rattling of a key in the door’s lock.

Ron flattened himself against the wall, next to the door. When they come in here, I’ll jump them.

But they didn’t come in. The door opened outward and somebody flashed a light into the cell. Ron was blinded.

“Hey you! C’mon out, quick! B’fore somebody sees us.” It was an urgent whisper.

Ron staggered out of the cell, rubbing his eyes. Squinting in the light from a bare bulb in the ceiling, he found that he was in a hallway. Two guys were standing next to him: strangers. A third guy, one of Dino’s pals, was lying face-down on the floor, out cold.

“C’mon, dummy. Move! We’re tryin’ t’ getcha outta here,” one of the strangers whispered harshly.

Puzzled, Ron went with them. They led him down the hallway, into a tiny bathroom. They crawled through a window into an alley. Then they sprinted, all three together—Ron and the two strangers—down street after street, staying in the deepest shadows.

After a few blocks, Ron saw a car parked at a corner. The driver must have spotted them at the same moment, because the engine coughed to life.

“Okay, here it is,” one of the guys said, panting for breath, as they came up to the car. The rear door swung open and the two guys more-or-less pushed Ron inside.

“Okay,” said the driver in a deep, rumbling voice. He handed something to the two guys, who were still standing on the sidewalk beside the car. It looked like a plastic package of white powder.

“This better be the good stuff,” one of the guys muttered.

The driver laughed. “It’s real, baby. We don’t cheat.”