“I thought you had a plan,” one of the members shouted.

“I said I was working on a plan. No one is cooperating. What that means is no one is calling me back. I have four calls in to Mr. Hot Shot and four calls in to the leader of the Lobos. If we don’t hear back from one or the other in the next few hours, we’re going to have to leave here and split up. We’ll have to take the jewelry and pawn it.”

“Where do you think Mr. Hot Shot is, Al?” Mig asked quietly.

“My best guess would be he’s holed up in one of the empty apartments at Happy Village. Since he’s a part owner, he must have a master key. He said he was going to call, said he had our money and that he had one more job for us, along with the cash to pay for that job, too, whatever it is. That was hours ago. I don’t trust him any more than he trusts me. I should have plugged him the day we met him.”

“I wish you had. We wouldn’t be in this mess now if you’d put him down like a rabid dog. That’s what he is,” Mig said. “He turned us into serial killers for a pittance, and he walks free with millions of dollars. What’s fair about that?”

“The promise to get us into the Lobos. Once we’re accepted, we rule. That’s the fair part. I think he’s lying about convincing the Lobos to give us another chance. If he were telling us the truth, then the Lobos would have returned my calls. Hot Shot is doing what he always does. He’s using us. Think, Mig, he said he had another job for us. At this stage, what could that job be? Unless I’m having a stupid day today, and considering the current circumstances, I have no idea what kind of job he would or could offer us. You got any ideas?”

“He’s out there on his own, and he’s swinging in the wind, so it has to be he’s looking for us to protect him or he’s waiting for the Lobos to take us out. And then they protect him. I hate to mention this, Al, but we’re the only ones who know who Hot Shot really is. I’m not even sure he knows we know. He could still be thinking he’s a mystery man who hires us to kill people and pays us. To him, that would be enough. He thinks he’s covered his tracks. Sometimes smart people are pretty damn stupid, Al.”

“Damn it to hell, he should have called by now,” Alonzo said.