An eight-wheel flower truck was parked on Columbus in the right-turn lane at the corner of 76th Street. Traffic was backed up and horns were blowing and people who wanted to turn right had to work their way slowly around the truck. I turned right with them and slowed it down even more, staying hidden behind the flower truck until the traffic had cleared ahead of me. I goosed the Taurus half a block down, then threw it into park in the middle of 76th Street and was out of the car and walking back up the sidewalk when the metallic-brown Chevrolet came around the corner. It wasn’t Ric.

The guy behind the wheel played it well. Traffic was backing up again and more horns were blowing and the other cars were putting on their blinkers and trying to get around the Taurus, so he put on his blinker and got into line to get around the Taurus, too.

I walked out into the street behind him and went up around his car and put the Dan Wesson in through the driver’s side window. “Surprise.”

He was a medium-sized guy in his early forties with a precise manner and a nice tan and thick hair. He kept both hands on the steering wheel, left in the ten o’clock position and right in the two o’clock position, just like they teach in driving school. He was staring at the gun. “Jesus Christ, put that away. Where the hell do you think we are, Beirut?”

Around us, drivers were blowing their horns and a fat guy with a three-day stubble called us assholes and told us to get out of the street and nobody seemed to mind too much that I was holding the Dan Wesson. Just another story in the naked city.

“Take out the wallet very slow. If you jerk, I’ll shoot you.”

He did it, still with his eyes on the gun. He said, “I don’t know what in hell you’ve got going on here, but it’s not worth pulling the trigger.”

“We’ll see.” I really know how to throw a scare into them.

I took the wallet and opened it. Nothing said MAFIA. Nothing said HIRED KILLER. What I saw was a California driver’s license in the name of one James L. Grady, address c/o James L. Grady Confidential Investigations, Los Angeles, California. I blinked at it a few times and then I blinked at James L. Grady.

James L. said, “Will you stop pointing that goddamned gun at me now?”

I didn’t stop pointing the gun at him. A pretty woman driving past in a white Mercedes gave us the finger. I said, “Who hired you?”

“Peter Alan Nelsen.”

“Peter Alan Nelsen, the film director?”