“I don’t give a damn about Hansen,” quiet Lincoln Rhyme had said, sitting in his motorized throne, with a body that didn’t move and eyes that flickered like dark flames, exactly like the eyes of her hawk. She hadn’t told Rhyme that she, like him, would never name a hunting bird, that she’d called the haggard merely “the falcon.”

Rhyme had continued. “I want to get the Dancer. He’s killed cops, including two who worked for me. I’m going to get him.”

Still, she’d sensed there was more. But she hadn’t pushed it. “You’ll have to ask Brit too.”

“Of course.”

Finally, she’d said, “All right, I’ll do it.”

“Thank you. I—”

“But,” she interrupted.

“What?”

“There’s a condition.”

“What’s that?” Rhyme lifted an eyebrow and Percey had been struck by this thought: once you overlooked his damaged body you saw what a handsome man he was. And, yes, yes, realizing that, she felt her old enemy—the familiar cringe of being in the presence of a good-looking man. Hey, Troll Face, Pug Face, Troll, Trollie, Frog Girl, gotta date for Saturday night? Betcha don’t . . .

Percey’d said, “That I fly the U.S. Medical charter tomorrow night.”

“Oh, I don’t think that would be a very good idea.”

“It’s a deal breaker,” she’d said, recalling a phrase Ron and Ed had used occasionally.

“Why do you have to fly?”

“Hudson Air needs this contract. Desperately. It’s a narrow-margin flight and we need the best pilot in the company. That’s me.”

“What do you mean, narrow margin?”

“Everything’s planned out to the nth degree. We’re going with minimum fuel. I can’t have a pilot wasting time making go-arounds because he’s blown the approach or declaring alternates because of minimum conditions.” She’d paused, then added, “I am not letting my company go down the tubes.”

Percey’d said this with an intensity that matched his, but she’d been surprised when he nodded. “All right,” Rhyme had said. “I’ll agree.”

“Then we have a deal.” She’d instinctively reached forward to shake his hand but caught herself.

He’d laughed. “I stick to solely verbal agreements these days.” They’d sipped the scotch to seal the bargain.

Now, six-thirty on Saturday morning, she rested her head against the glass of the safe house. There was so much to do. Getting Foxtrot Bravo repaired. Preparing the nav log and the flight plan—which alone would take hours. But still, despite her uneasiness, despite her sorrow about Ed, she felt that indescribable sense of pleasure; she’d be flying tonight.

“Hey,” a friendly voice drawled.

She turned to see Roland Bell in the doorway.

“Morning,” she said.

He walked forward quickly. “You have those curtains open you better be keepin’ low as a bedbaby.” He tugged the drapes shut.

“Oh. I heard Detective Rhyme was springing some trap. Guaranteed to catch him.”

“Well, word is Lincoln Rhyme is all the time right. But I wouldn’t trust this particular killer behind a dime. You sleep decent?”

“No,” she said. “You?”

“I dozed a couple hours back,” Bell said, peering with sharp eyes out through the curtain. “But I don’t need much sleep. Wake up full of git most days. Havin’ youngsters does that to you. Now, just you keep that curtain closed. Remember, this is New York City, and think what’d happen to my career if you got yourself winged by some gangsta shootin’ stray bullets in the air. I’d have the dry grins for a week, that happened. Now how about some coffee?”