“This is how we do it, old-school, where I am from. Do you see?”

“Are all Serbian women like you?”

“Yes.”

Pike glanced at Yanni, still with the bag of ice on his face. Yanni nodded.

Pike looked back at the woman.

“Maybe you should come with me. I can put you someplace safe.”

“I don’t know nothing about you, and I got a lot of work to do. I will stay with my friend.”

Pike holstered the Python. He took her Ruger from his pocket. It wasn’t a fancy gun, but it was serviceable and deadly. He took out the magazine, then worked the slide to unload the chamber just as he had at the hospital. He thumbed the loose cartridge into the magazine, then tossed the gun and magazine onto the couch. They bounced against her thigh.

She said, “You aren’t going to call the police?”

“No. I’m going to help you.”

When he took out his cell phone, Rina jumped up.

“You say no police!”

“I’m not calling the police.”

Pike called Elvis Cole.

Chapter 16

16

MICHAEL DARKO. Pike now had a name, but he knew nothing about Michael Darko, and needed to know more. It was important to understand the enemy before you engaged him, and impossible to find him without knowing his patterns and needs.

When Cole arrived, Yanni was seated on a dinette chair, holding a bloody towel to his head. Rina was dressed, but the Ruger was still by her on the couch. Pike introduced them by pointing at each and saying their names.

Cole eyed Yanni, then the gun, then Rina. Rina eyed him back, cool and suspicious.

“What is this one, another used-to-be policeman?”

“He’s a private investigator. He’s good at finding people.”

“Then let him get started. We have wasted much time.”

Cole took a seat near the couch as Pike sketched out everything Rina had told him about Darko, how the baby came to be with Ana, the kidnapping, and Rina’s intention to take back her child. When Pike was recounting that part of it, Cole looked over at Rina. When Cole looked, she tapped the pistol nestled against her leg.

Cole said, “What’s your son’s name?”

“Petar. Peter.”

“You have a picture?”

Pike thought her face darkened, but she stared at Cole glumly until Yanni mumbled something in Serbian.

Pike said, “English. I’m not going to tell you again.”

Rina pushed up from the couch.

“Yes, I have picture.”

She went into the bedroom, dug through her bag, then returned with a snapshot. It showed a smiling baby with wispy red hair. The baby was on a green carpet, reaching toward the camera. Pike didn’t know much about babies, but this one didn’t look ten months old.

She said, “When I leave apartment, I leave fast. This is only picture I have. You cannot have it.”

Pike said, “He doesn’t look almost a year old.”