Cordova?

Checked his watch: about a quarter past midnight. In the past week or so that Jack had been shadowing him, Cordova had hit a neighborhood bar over on White Plains Road three times, and on each night he’d hung till 1 A.M. or later. If that was Cordova downstairs, he was home at least an hour early. Damn him.

Dumped the rest of the acid from the first bottle and sloshed the contents of the second over the pile, then left them atop the filing cabinet. Now to get out of here. Wouldn’t be long before Cordova detected the stink.

Opened the window and slid out onto the roof. Looked around. He’d planned on leaving as he’d entered—through the back door. Now he was going to have to improvise.

Jack hated to improvise.

Looked over at the neighboring roof. Pretty close, but close enough to…?

Through the open window behind him he heard Cordova’s heavy feet pounding up the stairs. Another glance at the neighboring roof. Guessed it was going to have to be close enough.

Hauling in a deep breath, Jack took three running steps down the shingled slope and leaped. One sneakered foot, then the other, landed on the opposing roof and found traction. Without pausing to congratulate himself, Jack used his forward momentum to keep going, his rubber soles slipping and scraping up the incline toward the peak.

A loud, whiny “Noooooo!” followed by a bellow of rage and dismay echoed from Cordova’s house, but Jack didn’t turn to look—didn’t want Cordova to see his face. Then he heard a shot and almost simultaneously felt the slug zing past his ear.

Cordova had a gun! Jack had figured he’d have one somewhere, but hadn’t expected him to shoot up his own neighborhood. Two miscalculations tonight. He hoped he hadn’t miscalculated on getting home alive.

Dove over the peak of the roof and slid down toward the gutter, the shingles shredding the palms of his latex gloves and wearing away the front of his nylon windbreaker like an electric sander. Halfway to the gutter he slowed his slide and angled his body ninety degrees. That slowed him a little more. Further angling around allowed him to get his foot in the gutter and stop altogether.

Not home free yet. Still two stories up with Cordova no doubt pelting down his stairs and heading for the street. Plus this house was occupied, probably with two families, since that seemed the rule around here. He could see the glow of lights turning on inside. He was sure the owners were dialing 9-1-1 right now to report the racket on their roof. Probably thought he was a clumsy second-story burglar.