Certain Prey

man’s hand reached into the picture and picked it up. “I’ll tell you this,” the voice said. “When they come and ask for it, pay every penny. Every penny. Don’t argue, just pay. If you don’t, they won’t try to collect. They’ll make an example out of you.”
    “I know how it works,” on-screen Carmel said. “They’ll get it. And nobody’ll be able to trace it, because I’ve had it stashed. It’s absolutely clean.”
    “Then if you say, ‘Yes,’ I’ll call them tonight. And they’ll kill Barbara Allen.”
    Carmel, offscreen, had to admire her on-screen performance. She never flinched, she just stood up and said, “Yes. Do it.”
    The tape skipped a bit, then focused on a black telephone. “I’m really sorry about this, but you know about my problem. I’m gonna have to have twenty-five thousand, like, tomorrow,” the man’s voice said. “I’ll call and tell you where.” T HE TAPE ENDED. Carmel took a long pull on her coffee, walked into the kitchen, poured the last couple of ounces into the sink, and then hurled the cup at one of the huge plate-glass windows that looked out on her balcony. The cup bounced, without breaking. Carmel didn’t see it; she was ricocheting around the kitchen, sweeping glasses, dishes, the knife block, a toaster, silverware off the cupboards and tables and stove and onto the floor, kicking them as they landed, scattering them; and all the time she growled through clenched teeth, not a scream, but a harsh humming sound, like a hundred-pound hornet.
    She trashed the kitchen and then the breakfast area, and finally cut herself on a broken glass. The sight of the blood flowing from the back of her hand brought her back.
    “Fuckin’ Rolo,” she said. She bled on the floor. “Fuckin’ Rolo, fuckin’ Rolo, fuckin’ Rolo . . .”

FIVE

    For the rest of the day, Carmel worked her way through alternate rages and periods of calm; fantasized the painful end of Rolando D’Aquila. And finally admitted to herself that she was in a corner.
    She called Rinker, left a number and said, “This is really urgent. We’ve got a big problem.”
    The next day, a little after one o’clock in the afternoon, Rinker called on Carmel’s magic cell phone. She didn’t introduce herself, she simply said in her dry accent, “I’m calling you back. I hate problems.”
    Carmel said, “Hold on: I want to lock my door.” She stuck her head out into the reception area, said to the secretary, “I need ten minutes alone,” stepped back inside and locked the door.
    “All right . . .” she began, but Rinker cut her off.
    “Is your phone safe?”
    “Yes. It’s registered under my mother’s name—she’s remarried, and has a different last name. Like the Volvo. It’s good for . . . special contacts.”
    “You have a lot of those in your job?”
    “Enough,” Carmel said. “Anyway, I’m calling about Rolando D’Aquila, who is the guy who put me in touch with you.”
    “What happened?” Rinker asked.
    Carmel explained, quickly, then said, “I would have thought the people on your side would have been warned against this. You push somebody into a corner . . .”
    “What? What would you do?” Carmel could feel the warning edge on the other woman’s voice.
    “I’m sure as hell not going to turn you in, or talk to the police, if that’s what you’re worried about,” Carmel said, defensively. “But there has to be some kind of resolution. Rolo’s a junkie. If I give him every dime I’ve got, he’ll put it up his nose. When he’s got every dime, he’ll still have the tape, and he’ll start looking around for somebody to sell it to. Like TV. Then I’m gone—and you, too. The cops will put Rolo through the wringer before they give him any kind of immunity, and you can’t tell what’ll come from that.”
    “Maybe nothing,” Rinker said. “He’s off there on the edge of things.”
    “Bullshit. Sooner or later, he’ll give them the guy he called about you,” Carmel argued. “Then they’ll squeeze that guy. You know how it works. This is murder we’re talking about; this is thirty years in the state penitentiary for everybody involved. That’s a lot of squeeze. And believe me, I’m well enough known in the Cities that there’d be a hurricane of shit if this got out. This is not something the cops would let go.”
    “When are you paying him off? This Rolo guy?” Rinker asked.
    “I’m supposed to meet him in the Crystal Court tomorrow at five