It had been almost too easy. The two guards had been so intent on the woman and her ronin that they’d ignored their rear. A quick shot to the head for each from Yoshio’s silenced .22 was all it had taken. Then he had retreated to his vantage point to wait.

And calculate the death toll. Counting Alicia Clayton’s first investigator, her lawyer, and that arsonist Yoshio had seen Baker and his men immolate, these two tonight brought the number of deaths connected with Ronald Clayton’s secret to 252—at least that he knew of. How many more to come?

He wondered if the secret was worth it. Otherwise, Kaze Group was paying him for nothing.

He drummed his fingers on the steering wheel as he played through various scenarios in his head. If only he could be sure the Clayton woman had found some clue, then his course would be clear: Kill Muhallal and Baker, and close in on her. Clean and simple… but disastrous if she had nothing. He’d have revealed his presence for no gain.

Of course, he already might have done that by killing those two men back on Thirty-eighth Street, but he felt their deaths would probably be blamed on the Clayton woman’s ronin. At least Yoshio hoped they would. His job so far had been made so much easier by the fact that no one knew of his existence.

He watched Baker hanging well back as he followed a white sedan. Yoshio followed Baker, wondering when he would have to choose.

The ronin’s Chevrolet headed east, then uptown to the Fifty-ninth Street Bridge, where it crossed into Queens.

Leaving town. Interesting. That might be the sign he’d been waiting for. But shortly after he followed them onto the Long Island Expressway, heading east, the decision whether or not to act was made for Yoshio: a dark van pulled in front of Baker’s car. The same van used in the aborted abduction last week. The driver waved an arm out the window. Baker flashed his high beams.

Reinforcements? Yoshio wondered. It appeared that they meant business.

So now it was a four-car procession, with Yoshio bringing up the rear.

But then Baker and his men did something strange: the car and the van began dropping back… too far back, Yoshio thought.

Weren’t they afraid of losing her?

But then, perhaps they knew where she was going.

Yes, this was turning out to be a most interesting night—perhaps a decisive night. Yoshio had a feeling the best was yet to come.

Almost a shame to take money for this, he thought as he settled behind the wheel and kept driving.

13.

13.

I don’t think I like this, Alicia thought as Jack stopped his car across the street from a tiny ranch house on a gravel road in the middle of a sea of potato fields.