Page 131 of Bonded in Death

They cleaned it up, closed it up—which hurt more than the cleanout. When the MT loaded a pressure syringe, Eve put a hand on her weapon.

“For infection. You’re not going to do a follow-up, are you?”

“No.”

“Shouldn’t have a problem, but keep an eye for redness, for heat. Change the bandage in twelve, and keep the physical activity down to moderate for twenty-four to thirty-six.”

“Got it. Thanks. Ow,” she added as the pressure syringe gave her one more jolt.

When she got out of the van, Feeney stood on the sidewalk. He took a long look. “Too bad about the shirt.”

“Yeah.”

“We got him on some door cams. Got him turning, got the weapon in his hand. Fired twice.”

“Jacket took all the first one.”

“We got you jumping in front of the two civilians, and the tumble. How he caught you some? Pure bad luck. The jacket shifted just enough on the jump. You hadn’t moved, the woman on the right woulda been down, bleeding from a bullet in the gut.”

He paused, kept his eyes on hers.

“Just a graze. They fixed it.”

“Okay. What he did, he headed north at the corner, and got his head straight enough to move outside of cam range. We lost him. The team’s canvassing for wits, and we brought in some uniforms, but we lost him. That’s the fact.”

“I know it. I watched him walk into 186. I watched him go in.”

“With the woman. Arm-in-freaking-arm. We missed it. He duped us. That’s another fact.”

“He wouldn’t have gone into any building with a cam,” Roarke pointed out. “Or you wouldn’t have lost him. So a vehicle. He had one, got to it, or caught a cab. Or if panicked—”

“Subway, maxibus,” Eve finished. “Where there are more cams. We’llcheck that, but he had a car somewhere close enough. It’s raining, why walk, why take a cab that can, eventually, be traced?”

Frustrated, she shoved her fingers through her hair. “I need to talk to the woman, the Realtor.”

“Brendita Havanara,” Feeney told her. “Jenkinson took her, got her statement. He’s got her contacts.”

“That’s something, at least.” She stood in the rain, scanning the street and the people moving along under umbrellas.

“A guy pulls out a handgun and fires, and people just go about their business.”

“New York.” Feeney shrugged. “We got some who thought it was a vid shoot. And plenty who didn’t notice a damn thing. It’s rainy, it’s noisy. Just a couple bangs.”

“We’ll finish the canvass, then debrief at Central. But he’s gone. He slipped right through.”

He’d run like he hadn’t in decades. West, north, then east, lungs screaming, legs burning. He cursed the fact he’d parked three blocks east of his target—then in a panic had run in the wrong direction.

When he reached the lot, the car, he slid down in the seat while his breath whistled in and out. He pulled off the blond wig. With trembling fingers, he pinched the tinted film from his eyes that turned them blue. Then removed the appliance that gave him a slight but noticeable overbite.

Just precautions. More a kind of costume, he’d thought, almost for the fun of it. He thanked God he’d taken the time for them.

He took off his tie, shrugged out of the suit jacket. His hands still shook as he unbuttoned his collar, rolled up his shirtsleeves.

He got a tube of water from the in-dash AC, and relieved his desert-dry throat.

His heart continued to pound as he backed the car out of its slot. He had to back up again, reposition the car when he stopped too far away to reach the autopay. Then he nearly hit it, and had to stop, wait to gain some control.

He held up his ’link, waited for the comp.

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