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With the Walther trained on Fitzhugh, Gabe backed up to where Lexi was standing and got as close to her ear as possible.

“Say your lines,” he whispered.

“Oh, shit,” she said. “I’m sorry.”

She turned to Fitzhugh. “We want the money.”

“You speak English?” Fitzhugh said.

“Of course I speak English,” she said. “What kind of a stupid question is that? I repeat. We…want…the…money. Now.”

“I’ve got five hundred in my wallet. It’s all yours. Let me just reach into my pocket, and-”

“You think we came all the way up here to get your wallet?” Lexi said. “We want the drug money. Open the safe.”

Gabe could feel his chest tightening. Open the safe was in the script. We want the drug money was not.

“Who the fuck are you?” Fitzhugh yelled. “Do you work for Monte? Did he send you?”

“We work for ourselves!” Lexi yelled back. “Now open the safe.”

“I don’t have the combination, and I don’t know anything about drug money.” He stood up. “And if you want to know what’s good for you-”

Gabe slammed him across the face with the butt of the Walther. Fitzhugh fell back in the chair, both hands pressed hard to his bloody cheek.

“Open the safe now or die!” Gabe screamed, waving the gun at him and hoping that the pain and the fear would prevent Fitzhugh from recognizing his voice.

Fitzhugh was moaning. “Okay, okay. Please don’t shoot. I got two kids.”

He dropped to his knees and wiped his bloody hands across his shirt.

“Keep watch!” Gabe yelled at Lexi, hoping that two more words wouldn’t make a difference.

Lexi went to the trailer window and parted the blinds with her fingers.

“There’s people walking out there,” she said. “Hurry.”

Fitzhugh opened the safe and backed up. Gabe looked inside. No weapons. No nothing, except for a gray metal lockbox.

“The key is in my desk drawer,” Fitzhugh said.

Gabe waved him toward the desk with the gun.

“Hurry!” Lexi yelled, stamping her feet. “I think someone’s coming.”

Fitzhugh opened the top desk drawer and took out a small key. Then he pulled the lockbox from the safe.

“There’s enough in here for three separate buys,” he said. “Let me give you a piece of advice. You take a bundle, and I guarantee you nobody will chase you. You take it all, and Monte will hunt you down, rape your girlfriend, slit her throat, and put her in a coffin. She’ll be the lucky one, because you’ll go in after her-still breathing. Then he’ll bury the box and forget where he left you.”

“Open it,” Gabe growled, more concerned with getting out than being recognized.

Fitzhugh unlocked the box and flipped the top.

Three neat stacks of bills. Hundreds on top of each stack. Not very thick, but drug bundles didn’t have to be thick. They’d all be hundreds.

“Trust me,” Fitzhugh said. “You really don’t want to take them all.”

The Chameleon picked up one of the packets, then hesitated.

“I’m not kidding, Gabe-hurry up!” Lexi yelled frantically from her spot at the window. “I swear to God someone is really coming.”

Fitzhugh stood up. “Gabe? The extra? The guy with the Kawasaki Ninja? Are you out of your mind? Do you really think you’re going to get away with this?”

The Chameleon had no choice. He pointed the Walther at Fitzhugh’s chest and squeezed the trigger.

“Shit, shit, shit, shit!” he bellowed as Fitzhugh fell backward onto the desk chair.

If Lexi had an ounce of composure left, it was gone. “Are you crazy?” she screamed. “People outside heard that. He gave you the money. Why did you shoot him?”

“You told him my name!” Gabe screamed back.

“No I didn’t. I swear.”

Gabriel grabbed the other two stacks of bills and shoved all three into the pocket of his windbreaker.

Then he yanked Lexi by the arm and dragged her to the door.

“Mask,” he shouted.

They each pulled off their ski masks and left the trailer.

They walked east toward Broadway. Ten minutes later they were sitting in the last car of the downtown D train.

“I’m sorry, Gabe. I’m sorry,” Lexi said, tears running down her cheeks.

“Do me a favor,” he said, barely parting his lips as he spoke. “Just shut the fuck up.”

Chapter 39

There was a large coffee and a box of Krispy Kreme doughnuts sitting on my desk with a note taped to the top.

Sorry about Spence. He means well. Xxx, K-Mac

Kylie was sitting at her desk munching on the last few morsels of a glazed doughnut. “I took one,” she said, washing it down with coffee. “The other eleven are all yours.”

“I appreciate the gesture, but don’t you think that’s profiling? Cops and doughnuts?”

“For the record, I did not give Spence your number,” she said. “He found it in my cell.”

“Did he share his theory with you, or shall I?”

“He laid it on me this morning,” she said. “The powers that be in Los Angeles come up with a devious plan to cripple film production in New York.”

“Devious and dastardly,” I said. “The kind of scenario where you definitely expect to see Lex Luthor.”

“I know it’s off-the-wall,” she said, “but at least you have to give him points for creativity.”

“Creativity? No wonder I can’t crack this case. Like an idiot, I’ve been trying to connect the facts.”

“That’s the difference between police work and the television business,” Kylie said. “As far as TV people are concerned, reality is highly overrated. They would never let it get in the way of their thinking.”

“Yesterday was only our first day working together,” I said. “But now that I have some insight into your husband, I’m wondering how many times a week you had to buy doughnuts for your former partners.”

“Believe it or not, you’re the first one Spence ever called.”

“I’m flattered. Sleep-deprived, but flattered.”

“You know Spence. He’s always been fascinated with cops, and he loves that you get to combine cop stuff with show business. He told me last night that you have the coolest job, and he’d trade places with you if he could.”

Spence Harrington wants to trade places with me? I didn’t know how to begin to respond. I never got the chance.

“Zach! K-Mac!” Captain Cates was striding toward us, barking orders as she walked. “Robbery-homicide, West Sixty-two between Columbus and Amsterdam.”

I knew the area well. It was a pretty quiet neighborhood. “What’s there?” I said.

Cates stopped in front of us. She looked like she hadn’t slept much last night either. “A film production trailer,” she said. “And a line producer with a bullet in his chest.”

Chapter 40

Gabe and Lexi crashed through the front door, knocking over the brass umbrella stand that she had picked up at a flea market for twelve bucks.

They hadn’t spoken the entire subway ride home. They had walked in silence to the apartment building, him fuming, her sobbing.

When they got to the lobby, she just stood there waiting for the elevator, shoulders slumped, eyes red, spirit broken.

Finally she spoke. “You’re never going to love me again, will you?”

She meant it. That’s how her mind worked. You fuck up; you get abandoned. Her parents had done that to her.

“Don’t be…” He swallowed the word stupid. “Don’t say things like that,” he said.

The elevator doors opened. She stepped in and stood in the corner, tears streaming down her cheeks, hands clenched at her sides.

“Lexi,” he said, following her into the elevator, “what happened, happened, and I’m a little freaked about it, but I love you. I’ll always love you.”