“Sorry. I’m a bartender. I work nights.” He took a step toward the lot.

“Have you seen any weird activity around here lately?” Mac asked.

“Nothing any weirder than usual. I gotta go. Hope you find your friend.”

“Thanks.” Mac tucked the picture into his back pocket. He’d knocked on every door in Gianna’s building, and every door with a view of her apartment or the parking area. Now what?

He walked back to stand in front of Gianna’s unit, facing the rows of cars. A strip mall lined the road on the other side of the cracked asphalt. Tattoo parlor, Laundromat, check cashing. He walked across. Cool moisture in the wind promised another storm.

He stepped onto the curb on the other side. The streetlight was out, and darkness smothered the sidewalk. A shoe scraped on cement. Mac froze, his instincts on alert.

In the storefront window, he caught the reflection of two figures moving in the shadows behind him. Mac ducked into an alley between the buildings. The narrow space would force the men to attack him one at a time, if that was their intent.

Since they followed him into the alley, he assumed it was.

A hulk of a man rushed him, his beefy arm looping over his head. Mac whirled and focused on his attacker’s hand. A knife. The blade ice-picked toward Mac’s head. He side stepped out of the weapon’s path and caught the man by the wrist with both hands. Redirecting his assailant’s momentum, Mac guided the weapon down. Following the natural arc of motion, the point slid into the man’s thigh.

He howled. A second man rushed at Mac from behind the first. Small, lighter, more nimble. Ripping the knife free, Mac swept the first man’s leg out from under him and shoved him at the second. Number two tripped over his pal and went face-first into the cement. He got a knee under his body and turned back, blood streamed from his nose and triangled over his chin. With a roar, he scooped a broken bottle from the ground and charged.

Mac ducked the first wild swing. The bottle came back at his head, number two’s eyes were white-rimmed and wild. He slashed back and forth, the jagged edged of glass sweeping the air in front of Mac’s face.

Mac plucked the KA-BAR from his boot and reverse-gripped his knife.

Hands in front of his face, he dodged the swings and waited. Number two backslashed. Mac leaped forward and blocked the backswing with an upward sweep of the knife. The blade sliced number two’s forearm to the bone. Mac hooked the point of the knife over the man’s wrist, slammed a palm into the back of the man’s elbow, and armbarred him to the ground. Mac pulled the arm, stretching the man out on his belly and pinning him to the pavement.