“Maybe.” I clapped him on the shoulder. “Except if they’re going to be frightened of anyone, I guess that it’ll be you. Those were some good moves back there.”

“It don’t take much to slap down a few pussies like them,” he said, playing it cool.

“I’m surprised you broke that guy’s arm. You’re not usually as brutal as that.”

“You didn’t see the switchblade he pulled outa his pocket?”

“Too busy with Wetherby,” I admitted.

“Here,” he said, handing me a black-handled flick knife—old type, like something out of Rebel Without a Cause. “Memento for you.”

I slipped the knife into my jeans pocket. My mobile was ringing and I pulled it out.

It was Harvey.

“How’d things go with Wetherby?”

“Waste of time,” I said. “We’re going to keep looking, though. Couple other names in Miami I want to look up.”

“You might want to get yourselves back here first.”

“Problem?”

“No. A possible lead.”

“Who?”

“Not who: what. Walter’s liaising with the local PD on what looks like a hit that went wrong. The mark turned the tables this time.”

“He’s dead?” Part of me wished that was true, but another part was full of regret. After what he’d done to Imogen I still wanted my day with the killer.

“That’s the thing, Hunter. It looks like the man you’re after was the mark this time. He killed three men as quick as you like.”

It was just an expression, but in reality I would have said quite the opposite. I didn’t like this turn of events one bit.

Chapter 21

21

“Dry your eyes, Alisha. People are starting to notice you.”

Sitting looking at his wife, Luke Rickard wondered what to do with her. Right now she was baggage that he could do without. Ordinarily, he fed off the fear in her, but now it was too damn inconvenient. Her sniveling had grown so annoying that he considered doing her right there and then in front of the breakfast crowd in the diner.

She used a napkin to dab her eyes, lifting her sunglasses one lens at a time. “I . . . I’m sorry, Luke. I just can’t get those men’s faces out of my mind.”

Rickard took her wrists in his hands. “Don’t speak about that here.”

“When can we speak about it? You haven’t answered any of my questions.”

Rickard took a less-than-surreptitious look around. At a nearby table an elderly man was eyeing him back over the top of his coffee mug. Rickard stared directly at the man until the guy got the message and returned his attention to his eggs and ham. Rickard turned back to Alisha. “We can talk about it later.”

“You’ve been saying that for hours.”

Rickard lowered his voice. “They wanted to kill me, Alisha. Would you rather it was me lying dead back there?”