"Whatever you say."

I got the distinct impression he thought I was yanking his chain, but that was fine. Anything to keep him occupied while he scaled the entirety of a sixteen-foot story vertically, in a metal tube with not a shred of light.

"It"s an old-fashioned toy."

"Never seen one." Another three-word response. It was probably all he could get in between heaves and hos.

After what felt like an interminable amount of time just waiting for him to reach the top, he did in fact reach it. He reached it with a fumble and a slip that came perilously close to dumping him straight back down the chute. He didn"t tell me this, but I could hear it in the havoc of the phone turning and flipping in that pocket, and in the desperate scrabble of his feet on the metal, hunting for some purchase that wasn"t compromised by dust and the decay of decades.

"You make it?" I asked, once I was pretty sure that he had, in fact, made it.

"Yeah," he said with a gasp.

"Good job. Now like I said, just go left."

He did, and before long he"d worked his way up to the vent with the spinner, and thank G.o.d I was right-he dislodged it with just a couple of shoves. I could hear rusty metal giving way and a clatter as the rooftop wonder burst up into the open sky and into a faceful of rain.

I had no way of knowing if he"d made enough noise to summon anybody, so I said to him, "No time to dawdle. Run around the rooftop edge and see where they"re parked; then pick the farthest fire escape and let yourself down onto the ground."

"What?"

The phone had still been in his shirt. Out in the open, he couldn"t hear me that way. I repeated myself, and he said, "Yeah, I"m way ahead of you. Hang on."

The whistling of wind and the occasional patter of rain on the microphone made a strange symphony while he darted from corner to corner, keeping low and staying light-footed if he knew what was good for him.

"They"re parked out front, on the street. I don"t see any cars in the back."

"Then go down the back, but be careful. Put the phone back in your shirt. Let me know when you"ve got your feet on the ground."

"Okay."

Again I waited-always this G.o.d-awful waiting, where there was nothing I could do and I couldn"t even say anything to be helpful, because the kid would never hear me, and anyway, I"d only distract him.

I detected the wet creak of old metal, and bolts that were rusting into place.

A splash announced his landing, and shortly thereafter he had the phone back up to his face again. "I"m down," he told me.

"Right. Now I want you to walk away from the building at a swift but innocuous pace, all the way to the end of the street where the frozen yogurt place is, next to that coffee shop."

"Away from the building? But Pepper-"

"Pepper is either in one of those cars outside the building, or inside it very securely."

"And what does that word mean? Inno-something."

"Innocuous. It means try not to look like you"re running away. Listen, punk. When you get to the end of the street, I want you to go into that coffee place and buy some hot chocolate."

"Are you crazy?" He was on the verge of losing his whisper.

"And stop whispering," it occurred to me to tell him. "It makes you look guilty." Before he could interrupt me again I continued, "Go get some hot chocolate and then, nice and lazy and slow, I want you to stroll back down the street to where their cars are hanging out."

"Oh. Okay."

Good, he was catching on. "They don"t know what you look like, do they?"

"I don"t guess."

"Let"s a.s.sume they don"t. And let"s also remind ourselves that being a nosy kid isn"t a crime. So go get yourself some hot chocolate and mosey back over to the vehicles. Hang around and listen, if you can. See if you can overhear anything. But keep the phone up to your ear. Pretend like you"re talking to somebody."

Suddenly he sounded afraid again. "You"re not going to hang up on me, are you?"

"I am, in a minute. But only for a minute, while you go get the hot chocolate. I didn"t spring for an expensive phone, bucko. The battery on that thing isn"t going to last all night."

"Oh yeah," he said, and the proximity of his voice to the mike told me he was checking the display.

"I haven"t heard it beeping low battery, but still you want to conserve the thing. I"m going to go out on a limb and guess you didn"t take the charger when you ran?"

"s.h.i.t," he complained. "I should"ve thought of it. I should"ve grabbed it."

"Don"t worry about it," I said. "Only a crazy person would"ve thought that meticulously about evacuating a scene." By which I meant that I, personally, kept my chargers and all important electronics in my oversized purse-slash-messenger-bag. "It"ll be fine for a little while. Now I"m going to hang up, and I want you to call me back when you"re at the edge of the action, okay?"

"Got it. And Raylene?"

"What?"

"Thanks," he said before flipping the thing shut.

I"m not going to lie. It almost gave me a warm fuzzy.

I exhaled a huge breath-one that I hadn"t even realized I"d been holding. As if this elongated gasp were a signal, Adrian came swanning back out of the bedroom (how could he have heard it in there?) and into the dining area, where I was sitting just shy of a fetal position upright. I began to uncurl, letting my legs straighten out on the floor and putting my head in my hands-leaving the cell phone beside me.

Adrian said, "Dare I ask?"

Without looking up I said, "Ask away."

"What was that about?"

So I told him. I didn"t tell him everything; I mean, I"m not stupid stupid. I didn"t know him well enough to give him the address of the place or the finer particulars. But I filled him in on the kids, and I made my standard disclaimers regarding my place in their maintenance. I told him about the place that once was a factory, and now was my warehouse, and how it was at right that moment being swarmed over by federal agents-or special forces ops, or CIA dudes, or whatever those guys were. Guys like Peter Desarme.

Right around the time I"d finished explaining everything I felt like explaining, the phone rang again. I"d forgotten I was holding it, and when it began to yodel and vibrate I nearly had a heart attack, flipping the thing up into the air and catching it-miraculously without hanging up on Domino, who was calling me back.

"Kid," I answered, knowing it was him.

"Hey," he said in a casual voice that only trembled around the edges, a tiny bit. He was doing good.

"Where are you now?"

"Oh, I"m just on my way home, you know how it is," he told me, which also told me that there were other people within listening distance.

"Any sign of your sister?" I asked.

"No, not yet. I"ve checked all the obvious spots, but I can"t find her. And near as I can tell, n.o.body else has, either." Still level and cool, and now tempered with hypothetical relief. In the background I heard car engines and men talking, and I detected the drizzling patter of rain-which only made it a night ending in y y.

I did most of the important question-asking-type-talking, since he obviously couldn"t, out there where all the action was. "Were you able to look inside their vehicles?"

"Pretty much. Nothing to see there."

"Good. That"s good. Do you think they could"ve taken her away already?"

He slurped at something, the hot chocolate I a.s.sumed. Or maybe it was a latte with Irish whiskey in it. There really was no telling with that kid. "I doubt it. Man, there sure are a lot of people out here at this hour. And they keep arriving, too."

I nodded, as if he could see me or hear my head rattle. "They"re still incoming, and not clearing the scene, that"s what you"re saying."

"You got it."

Somebody came close, with a gruff "Move along, kid."

I could imagine the look Domino gave the speaker, and I didn"t have to imagine his response. "Hey, f.u.c.k you, a.s.shole! It"s a public street, I got a right to be here! What"s going on, anyway?"

"None of your G.o.dd.a.m.ned business, you little s.h.i.t," the somebody growled at him.

I almost laughed. One of these days, Domino may as well change his name to "Little s.h.i.t." But I said to him, "Don"t antagonize anybody, dumb-a.s.s."

"Ooh, a.s.shole"s got a baaadge," he said in a singsong voice.

"a.s.shole"s got a pair of handcuffs, too, and a big car over there. You wanna take a ride?"

"f.u.c.k you," Domino said again.

But I had an idea. I said, "Ask him what kind of badge it is."

The boy said, "For all I know that badge is a fake, anyway. Doesn"t look like any badge I ever saw."

"Good boy," I whispered.

"I don"t have to tell you anything. What are you, fifteen? You got any ID?"

"I don"t need any ID. I"m fifteen," he lied. He was fourteen, but he could run with it either way. "And my parents don"t care that I"m out, so don"t bother asking to call them."

"Maybe I"ll just throw you into the car."

"Maybe you can just suck your own d.i.c.k and flash your fake badge at somebody else, and see if it gets you anywhere. You"re not even a real real cop." cop."

"I"m worse than a real cop."

"What is he-like, a rent-a-cop?" I asked.

Domino read off the badge, answering both me and his interrogator, "CIA? Like I"d know what a real CIA badge looks like. For all I know you got that thing at Party City."

"Are you still talking on that cell phone?" asked the man with the badge.

"Yes, motherf.u.c.ker. What are you gonna do about it anyway? You big-a.s.s k.n.o.b-gobbling donkey-raping-"

There was a clatter and a crunch, and the phone went dead.

I sat there, stupidly holding my own phone up to my ear and listening to a whole lot of nothing. As soon as I realized I was doing this, I folded it up and let my hand drop to the floor. I said, "Wow."

Adrian was still there, un.o.btrusive in the arched doorway that led to the living area. "Is that good or bad?"

"Not sure," I confessed. "Probably...well. It"s probably okay," I told him, thereby telling myself.

"What happened?"

"The little s.h.i.t with the big mouth got his phone taken away."

"While he was talking to you?" He sounded worried. "Could they trace the call back to you?"

"I doubt it." I should"ve been worried, but I wasn"t. "Domino was doing a good job of acting like a low-life street punk. It wasn"t much of a stretch, I"ll grant you, but he was working it. I don"t think anybody suspected anything except that he was an adolescent douchebag, and I don"t think the officer-or whatever he was-actually took the phone. I think he broke it. Sounded like he smashed it against a wall, or stepped on it."

Adrian considered this, and then said, "I don"t know the little s.h.i.t, but I"ll take your word for it. I guess I have to."

Setting the phone down, I said, "There"s no reason for anyone to pick it up and try to put it back together except Domino. It won"t do him any good, but that"s all right."

"Don"t you need some means of contacting these kids?"

I put my head in my hands and rubbed at my temples. "Yes, but I"ll just express them another phone. I keep a PO box down the street; the kids have a key and they know to check it." The only thing that really worried me was Pepper, but if Domino didn"t see her captured anyplace, it was like I"d said-we might as well just a.s.sume that she"d holed up tighter than a turtle"s a.s.shole. She"d come out when the trouble was gone, and she"d calm her brother down, and maybe keep him from doing anything stupid.

Credit where it was due, the boy had handled things downright admirably.

I hate to revisit my a.s.sumptions; I prefer to let them lie and fester, but one of these days-when I have nothing better to think about-I might get thinking about it and decide there"s an off chance he"s not wholly irredeemable.

Adrian said, "Okay. Well, whatever. Now what do we do?"

I picked up the phone and opened it again. "Now we arrange for another disposable phone, call the airline to confirm our tickets, and start packing for Washington, D.C."

"Still? You"re sure about that?"

"Absolutely. And the sooner the better. They"re watching my place, man. They"re watching for me me, which means they think there"s a chance that I"m still in Seattle, and they don"t know for certain that I"ve skipped town. We need to hit this guy fast, before he figures out that I made a run for it."

11.

Twenty-four hours later we were at the Lincoln Memorial, me and Adrian. Not the most inconspicuous place to gather, no, and we sure as h.e.l.l weren"t alone. Tourists peppered the big white stairs and tried to make shadow puppets in the spotlights that lit the old guy, seated up there in all his stony glory. Security guards ambled fatly about. Children who really should"ve been in bed by now shrieked and shoved at one another, leading to at least one little girl"s head-crack on the stairs and subsequently to two fighting parents, debating who should"ve been watching her.