“You’re in great shape,” he exaggerated.

“Bull’s out crowning every tooths in North of America,” Ehrhart answered, sliding his hands up more. “You know why he nicked his name Bull? It’s not because of the general he thinks he’s relations with, Lonnie.”

“I thought maybe it had to do with the stock market.”

“The reason is because of . . .”

“I’ve really got to go, Mrs. Ehrhart.”

She pressed his large, strong hands against her, finally cupping them over her very small breasts.

“What’s the oldest older woman you once ever had before?” she whispered.

“I guess my eighth-grade teacher,” he said.

“What was that have been?”

“When I was in the eighth grade.”

“My, you must have been bigger for your age then.”

“Mrs. Ehrhart, I’ve gotta go so I’m not late for my appointment. Your husband’s really hard to schedule. Well, I guess I wouldn’t get in at all if it wasn’t for you.”

Lelia Ehrhart removed his hands. She angrily grabbed a towel and wrapped it around her neck.

“So what’s the next place where we go from here?” she demanded as all her phobias and insecurities roared at her.

“You haven’t done squats,” he said.

29

GOVERNOR FEUER NEATLY folded the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, USA Today and the Richmond paper. He stacked them on the black carpet and stared out the tinted window at pedestrians staring at him.

Everyone knew that a black stretch limousine with 1 on the license plate was not Jimmy Dean or Ralph Sampson. It was not kids going to the prom.

“Sir?” Jed said over the intercom. “I’ll just shoot over on Tenth, cut across Broad to avoid all that traffic, then wind around the courthouse onto Leigh and get on Belvidere. From there it’s pretty much a straight shot into the cemetery.”

“Ummmm.”

“If that suits, sir,” added Jed, who was obsessive-compulsive and needy.

“That’s fine,” said the governor, who had worked his way up from attorney general to lieutenant governor to governor, and therefore had not navigated Richmond’s streets alone for more than eight years, but rather had watched his travels throughout his beloved Commonwealth from a back seat through tinted glass, police escorts leading the way and protecting his rear.

“I’ve got the package,” Jed said loudly in his two-way, secure radio. “Going to be turning on Tenth.”

“Gotcha covered,” the lead car came back.

The altercation between Patty Passman and Officer Rhoad had gone beyond a squabble or fit of pique that might have been reasonably resolved, forgiven or perhaps forgotten.

Cars were double-parked and parked on an angle and within fifteen feet of a fire hydrant and on the wrong side of the street and on the sidewalk along 10th. Drivers and pedestrians had gathered around a fight in progress as police cruisers with sirens screaming and lights flashing raced in from all directions.

Passman had Rhoad on hold. He was running around in circles, screaming “MAYDAY” into his portable radio while she twisted and squeezed.