"Ouch," he said, and reached out for her and pulled her down to him so that she was lying with her face on his chest and her leg thrown over him.
"This is probably not a very smart thing for us to do," she said.
"I disagree absolutely," he said.
"What are the Brownes going to think?" she asked.
"We could tell them we had car trouble. Do you really care what the Brownes think?"
"No," she said, after a moment. "Okay. We'll tell them we had car trouble and not give a damn whether or not they believe us."
He chuckled and tightened his arm around her.
"Are you going to feed me, or what?" she asked.
"I'd rather 'or what,' " he said.
"You're boasting," she said. "Idle promises."
"See for yourself," Matt said.
She raised her head an inch off his chest.
"I'll be damned," she said. "Isn't that amazing?"
There were two Highway cops sitting at the counter of the small restaurant in the Marriott Motel on City Line Avenue when Matt and Amanda walked in.
He didn't recognize either of them and saw nothing like recognition in their eyes, either. Both looked carefully at Amanda and him, however, something Matt ascribed to Amanda's good looks, her lowcut evening dress, and the disparity between that and the tweed sport coat and slacks he had put on to go to work; or all of the above.
He was wrong. As soon as they had sat down in one of the booths, he saw alarm in Amanda's eyes and looked over his shoulder to see what had caused it. Both Highway cops were marching to the booth.
And they were, Matt thought, in their breeches and boots, their Sam Browne belts and leather jackets, intimidating.
"Seen the papers, Payne?" the larger of the two asked.
"No."
"Thought maybe not," the cop said.
How the hell am I going to introduce these guys to Amanda? That's obviously what they want, and I have absolutely no idea what either of their names are.
He was wrong about that too. The second Highway cop carefully laid slightly mussed copies of theBulletin, theLedger, and theDaily News on the table and then nodded to Amanda.
"Ma'am," he said. By then the first cop was halfway to the door.
"Hey!" Matt called. Both cops looked at him, "Thank you."
Both waved and then left the diner.
"For a moment there I thought we were going to be arrested again," Amanda said.
"We weren't."
"Call it what you like," she said. "Are they all like that?"
"Like what?"
"So, what's a word? Those two looked like an American version of the Gestapo."
"They're Highway," Matt said. "They're sort of special. Sort of the elite."
"That's what they said about the Gestapo," Amanda said.
"Hey, they're the good guys," Matt said.
"How is it they knew you?"
"I guess they know I work for Inspector Wohl."
"What does Peter Wohl have to do with them?"
"He's their boss, one step removed. He commands Special Operations. Highway is under Special Operations."
A waitress appeared with menus.
"Isn't that awful?" she said, pointing at the front page of theDaily News.
Matt looked at it for the first time. Above the headline there was a half-page photo of Anthony J. DeZego slumped against the concrete blocks of the stairwell at the Penn Services Parking Garage.
MAFIA FIGURE MURDERED SOCIALITE WOUNDED IN CENTER CITY SHOOTING
"Let me see," Amanda said, and he slid the tabloid across the table to her and turned to theLedger. The story was at the lower right corner of the front page, under a two-column picture of Miss Penelope Detweiler:
By Charles E.Whaley,
Ledger Staff Writer
Phila-Miss Penelope Detweiler, 23, of Chestnut Hill, was seriously wounded, apparently by a shotgun blast, in the Penn Services Parking Garage, on South 15th Street early last evening. She was taken to Hahneman Hospital where she is reported by a hospital spokesperson to be in "serious but stable" condition.
Miss Detweiler, whose father, H. Richard Detweiler, is president of Nesfoods International, was en route to the Union League Club on South Broad Street for a social event when the shooting occurred. A family spokesperson theorized that Miss Detweiler had just parked her car when she found herself in the middle of a "gangland Shootout."
Police Captain Henry Quaire refused to comment on the shooting, saying the case is under investigation, but he did confirm that Miss Detweiler had been found lying on the floor of the roof of the garage by Miss Amanda Chase Spencer, of Scarsdale, N.Y., and her escort, as they parked their car. The couple were also guests of Mr. and Mrs. Chadwick T. Nesbitt III at the Union League dinner to honor out-oftown guests for the wedding (tonight) of Miss Daphne Browne of Merion and Lieutenant C. T. Nesbitt IV, USMCR.
"It is absurd to think that Miss Detweiler was anything more than an innocent bystander," the Detweiler family spokesperson said. "It is a sad commentary on life in Philadelphia that something like this could happen."
Matt slid theLedger across the table to Amanda and then became aware that the waitress was still standing there.
"Amanda, would you like to order?"
"I think I lost my appetite," she said.
"You have to eat."
"Can I get a breakfast steak?" she asked.
"Honey, anything your heart desires, we got it," the waitress said.
"They're running a special on me," Matt said. "I'm specially marked down for the occasion."
"Breakfast steak, medium-rare, eggs sunny-side up, toast, tomato juice, and coffee," Amanda said.
"Twice," Matt said. "Thank you."
Matt turned to theBulletin. It used two photographs on the front, placed side by side. One was the same photo theLedger had used of Amanda. The other was of Anthony J. DeZego scowling at the camera from above a board that read PHILA POLICE DEPT and carried his name and the date. Under these the caption gave their names and read, "shooting victims."
MAFIOSO KILLED: SOCIALITE
By Michael J. O'Hara
A shotgun blast to the head killed Anthony J. "Tony the Zee" DeZego, a Philadelphia underworld figure, and a second blast critically wounded Penelope Detweiler, socialite daughter of H. Richard Detweiler, president of Nesfoods International, shortly after seven last night on the roof level of the Penn Services Parking Garage on South 15th Street in downtown Philadelphia.
Miss Detweiler is in "critical but stable" condition at Hahneman Hospital. She was struck by "many" pellets from a shotgun shell, according to a hospital spokesman.
Off-duty Police Officer Matthew M. Payne discovered first Miss Detweiler, lying in a pool of blood, and then DeZego's body when he went to park his car. Payne, who is special assistant to Staff Inspector Peter Wohl, commanding officer of the Police Department's Special Operations Division, last month shot to death Warren K. Fletcher, 31, of German-town, endingwhat Mayor Jerry Carlucci termed " the reign of terror of the Northwest serial rapist."
Miss Detweiler, Payne, and Miss Amanda Spencer, of Scarsdale, N.Y., who was with Payne in his silver Porsche, were en route to the Union League Club on South Broad Street to attend a dinner being given for out-of-town wedding guests by C. T. Nesbitt III,Nesfoods International chairman of the board, whose son is to marry Daphne Browne of Merion at seven-thirty tonight at St. Mark's Church, near the site of the shooting.