Kurtz had tossed the windshell back onto the guest bed and gone out to the main room of the penthouse to eat dinner.
"Normally we'd have wine," said Angelina, lighting a candle, "but we're not going to mix that with the pills I'm going to give you when you wake up."
"Wake up?" said Kurtz, glancing at his watchthe only thing other than his wallet that he'd kept.
"You need to sleep a couple of hours before we leave tonight."
"You're going?" said Kurtz. It had been agreed that the Gonzagas and the Farinos would "each contribute two people" to the night's foray, but Kurtz hadn't heard Angelina or the other don specify that they were going.
Now Angelina just raised an eyebrow at Kurtz. Finally, as she was passing the steak, she said, "It wouldn't be much of that promised bonding experience if Toma and I didn't both go, now would it?"
They ate in silence at the polished rosewood table near the freestanding fireplace. Angelina's penthouse filled the entire top story of Marina Towers and there were few viewblocking walls in the central living and dining areas. Over the woman's shoulder, Kurtz could see the lights of ships out in Lake Erie and entering the Niagara River, and behind him, the electric skyline of Buffalo became brighter as the drizzle ended and the clouds lifted. By the time they were finished with desserta flaky apple cobblerKurtz could see the stars and crescent moon between the scudding clouds.
She led him to a corner on the Lake side where another gas fireplace burned. The chairs and a broad couch here were in a conversation cluster, but Angelina tossed the couch cushions onto the thick carpet behind the couch, pulled a pillow and two blankets from a cupboard, lay one blanket on the broad couch and set the other on the back. "It's only a little after eight," she said. "You need to get some sleep."
"I don't" began Kurtz.
"Shut up, Kurtz," she said. Then, more softly, "You don't know what a fucking wreck you are. My life may depend on you tonight, and I can't trust a zombie."
Kurtz looked at the couch doubtfully.
"I'll wake you in plenty of time," said Angelina Farino Ferrara. "Right now I have to take the elevator down one floor and decide which of my merry men gets to go with me on our half-assed expedition tonight."
"What are your criteria?" asked Kurtz. A long, lighted ship moved slowly toward the southwest out on the Lake.
"Smart but not too smart," said Angelina. "Able to kill when he has to, but also able to know when not to. Most of all, expendable." She gestured toward the couch as she walked away. "In other words, I'm looking for another Joe Kurtz."
When she was gone, Kurtz thought for a minute, then took off his new Mephisto boots, set the alarm on his watch, and lay down on the couch for a minute. He wouldn't sleepa couple of hours would just make him more tiredbut it felt good just to lie here for a few minutes and let the pounding in his head back off a bit.
Kurtz woke to Angelina shaking his shoulder. His watch was buzzing but he'd slept through it. He looked at the glowing dial11:10. Kurtz wasn't sure he'd ever felt so groggy. He tried to focus on the woman, but she was now also wearing all black, and all he could see in the dim firelight was her glowing face.
"Here," she said, offering him a glass of water and two blue pills.
"Don't worry about it. Just take them. I was serious about you needing to be conscious enough to be worth hauling along tonight."
He swallowed the pills, put on his boots, and went into the guest room bathroom to use the facilities and splash water on his face. When he came out, wearing the wind-breaker shell with his cell phone in the pockethe'd left Gonzaga's at the officeAngelina was holding a 9mm Browning semi-auto.
"Here," she said, handing it to him. "Ten in the magazine, one already up the spout." She handed him two extra clips and an expensive belt holster, its leather the smoothest Kurtz had ever
felt.
Kurtz slipped the extra magazines into the windbreaker's pocket and attached the holster on the left side of his belt under the unbuttoned windshell, the Browning's grip backward where he could reach across his body for it. It was his fastest pull.
They drove to the rendezvous site in two SUVsAngelina driving one and the goomba she'd chosen, a lean, serious-looking bodyguard named Campbell, following in the other. Kurtz had asked for one van or SUV to use as an ambulance if he got Rigby back alive. Or as a hearse if he didn't .
"Shit," said Kurtz. He'd forgotten to call Arlene to tell her to forget the Aysha pickup. Something didn't feel right about that rendezvous, although Kurtz couldn't think what.
Whatever it was, it wasn't worth risking Arlene for. He'd figure out this little puzzle without the Yemeni girl.
It was 11:23 when he rang Arlene's cell phone, and he got a busy signal. That wasn't like her. He kept hitting redial until they reached their destination, a large industrial and storage complex near the tracks less than two miles from Brie County Medical Center. Gonzaga owned the complex and Kurtz had asked for the proximity to the hospital. They'd humored him.