Denny shouted over before the cops could talk first. “Panhandling ain’t illegal, officers. Not outside federal parklands, and last I checked, M Street ain’t no park!”

One of them gestured around at the snarl of traffic, Pepco trucks, and fire department vehicles. “You’re kidding me, right? Let’s go. Clear out.”

“Come on, man, you gonna deny a couple of homeless vets the right to make an honest living?”

“You ever been in Iraq, man?” Mitch added. People were starting to stare.

“You heard the officer,” the second cop told him. “Move along. Now.”

“Hey, man, just ’cause you got an asshole don’t mean you gotta be one,” Denny said, to a few laughs. He could feel the captive audience coming over to his side.

Suddenly there was some pushing. Mitch didn’t much like to be touched, and the cop who tried went down on his ass between the cars. The other one got a hand on Denny’s shoulder and, like a lightning bolt, Denny knocked it away.

Time to go.

He slid across the hood of a yellow cab and started toward Prospect with Mitch right behind.

“Stop right there!” one of the cops shouted after them.

Mitch kept running, but Denny turned around. There were several cars between Denny and the officers now. “What are you going to do, shoot a homeless vet in the middle of traffic?” Then he spread his arms wide. “Go ahead, man. Take me out. Save the government a few bucks.”

People were honking, and some of them yelled from their cars.

“Give the guy a break, man!”

“Support the troops!”

Denny smiled, gave the officer a crisp salute with his middle finger, and ran to catch up with Mitch. A second later, they were sprinting up Thirty-third Street and were soon out of sight.

Chapter 2

THEY WERE STILL LAUGHING when they got back to Denny’s ancient Suburban, parked in Lot 9 by Lauinger Library on the Georgetown campus.

“That was awesome!” Mitch’s doughy face was shiny with sweat, but he wasn’t even out of breath. He was the type whose muscles looked a lot like fat. “‘What are you going to do?’” he parroted. “‘Shoot a homeless vet in the middle of traffic?’”

“True Press, one dollar,” Denny said. “Lunch at Taco Bell, three dollars. The look on po-po’s face when he knows you got him? Priceless. Wish I had a picture.”

He plucked a bright-orange envelope from under his wiper blade and got in on the driver’s side. The car still smelled of chain-smoked cigarettes and burritos from the night before. Pillows and blankets were bunched up in a ball on one half of the backseat, next to a lawn-and-leaf bag full of returnable cans.