“Homemade number. Could have picked up the components anywhere. I forgot to ask him how the damn thing was detonated.”

Decker started to redial, but put down the phone when he saw the police artist walking his way, Clementine behind him. Decker and Marge met him halfway across the room.

“What do you have, Larry?” Marge asked.

He handed her the composite of the Blade.

“Holy shit!” she said.

Decker grabbed the picture. “This is the Blade?” he asked Clementine.

“As best I remember,” the pimp answered. “Like I tole you all you white boys look alike.”

“That’s Dustin Pode!” Marge exclaimed.

“Goddam if it isn’t,” agreed Decker.

“Then who the hell is the boy in the movie?” she asked.

“I’ll see that question and raise you one better: Whose bones are lying in the morgue?”

Decker sat at the table in the Century Plaza Bar and played with the swizzle stick in his glass of club soda. Dustin was on his third whiskey sour, Cameron was nursing a gin and tonic. Things were going smoothly; Pode hadn’t made him as a cop. Neither of them had batted an eyelash when he ordered plain soda. Probably thought he was an alkie on the wagon. Pode began his initial pitch:

“The initial investment will most likely net a fifteen-and-a-half percent return on a buy-in at five thousand K per unit. That in itself is a handsome return. But the big pay-off, Mr. Cohen, is the capital appreciation.”

Dustin Pode straightened his Countess Mara tie, smoothed his cashmere blazer, and handed Decker a four-page glossy. The color phots included pictures of ruddy men with white hair and flabby chins dressed in gray flannel suits, and several views of spanking new structures—apartment buildings, condos, motels. Next to the photos were profit/loss statements, earnings for the two previous years, and projected earnings for the next fiscal year.

“You can see here, Mr. Cohen, average time of investment holdings is about five years, and figuring the rate of return based on projected earnings, you should be able to walk away with a long-term gain of at least twenty-five percent per year.”

“Guaranteed,” Smithson Junior added.

Dustin chuckled nervously at the statement.

“Nothing is guaranteed,” he corrected. “But this is as close to a sure thing as anything around.”

Dustin sipped his sour. Nothing but ice left in it now. Decker smiled encouragingly and Pode continued:

“Of course, you, Mr. Cohen—being the sophisticated investor that you are—don’t have to be reminded about the inherent risks in any syndication—”

“I like risks,” Decker interrupted.

“No gain without some pain, right, Mr. Cohen?” said Cameron.

Pode flinched and produced a sickly smile.

Decker tried not to stare at Pode, but it was hard. He couldn’t imagine this unctuous salesman—when you got down to it that’s all brokers were—associating with someone like the Countess. But then again, the repressed ones were usually the kinkiest.