Coming from Bubba, this was high praise for my ethnicity. I said, “Where do we meet him?”

He was looking at Angie with something akin to awe on his rubbery face. “At his coffee shop on Prince Street. Ten tonight. How come you never told me you were connected?”

She flicked her cigarette ash on his floor. It wasn’t disrespectful; it was Bubba’s ashtray. “I’m not connected.”

“According to Freddy, you are.”

“Well,” she said, “he’s mistaken. An accident of blood, that’s all.”

He looked at me. “You know she was related to the Patriso mob?”

“Yup.”

“And?”

“And she never seemed like she cared, so I didn’t either.”

“Bubba,” she said, “it’s not something I’m proud of.”

He whistled. “All these years, all the scrapes you two been in, and you never called on them for backup?”

Angie looked at him through the long bangs that had fallen in her face. “Never even considered it.”

“Why?” He was genuinely confused.

“’Cause you’re all the Mafia we need, handsome.”

He blushed, something only Angie can get him to do, something that’s always worth the effort. His huge face swelled like an overripe grape and for a moment he looked almost harmless. Almost.

“Stop,” he said, “you’re embarrassing me.”

Back at the office, I brewed some coffee to counteract the vodka buzz and Angie played back the messages on our answering machine.

The first was from a recent client, Bobo Gedmenson, owner of Bobo’s Yo-Yo chain of under-twenty-one dance clubs and a few strip joints out in Saugus and Peabody with names like Dripping Vanilla and The Honey Dip. Now that we’d located Bobo’s ex-partner and returned most of the money he’d embezzled from Bobo, Bobo was suddenly questioning our rates and crying poormouth.

“People,” I said, shaking my head.

“Suck,” Angie agreed as Bobo beeped off.

I made a mental reminder to toss the collection job to Bubba, and then the second message played:

“Hallo. Just thought I’d wish you jolly good luck on your new case and all that rubbish. I gather it’s a splendid one. Yes? Well, I’ll be in touch. Cheerio.”

I looked at Angie. “Who the hell was that?”

“I thought you knew. I don’t know anyone British.”

“Me either.” I shrugged. “Wrong number?”

“’Good luck on your new case’? Sounds like he knew what he was talking about.”

“Accent sound fake to you?”

She nodded. “Like someone who’s watched a lot of Python.”

“Who do we know who does accents?”

“Beats me.”

The next voice was Grace Cole’s. In the background I could hear the assaultive human noise and babble of the emergency room where she worked.

“I actually got ten minutes for a coffee break so I tried to catch you. I’m here till at least early tomorrow morning, but call me at my place tomorrow night. Miss you.”

She beeped off and Angie said, “So, when’s the wedding?”

“Tomorrow. Didn’t you know?”

She smiled. “You’re whipped, Patrick. You do know that, don’t you?”