Chapter 96

“You bet. Bye, Pita.” He stepped back and I got into the Corvair and rolled down the window.

“I always knew you were a big softie!”

“Excuse me?”

It was a good thing the exit gate was on sensor and would open as soon as I approached it. I grinned and drove off while the getting was good.

* * * *

My cell phone rang at 8:02, “That’s What Friends Are For,” and I grabbed it up. “Paul! How’s Spike?”

“Oh, God, babe, I don’t know. I haven’t seen him since eight yesterday morning.” And now it was almost thirty-six hours later. “I tried and tried calling him, and it goes right to voicemail, and none of his friends have seen him, and no one at work knows any—” His voice cracked. “—anything.”

I knew why he was so upset, beyond the fact he loved Spike. One of our boys had gone out one night and hadn’t come home. Less than a week later his body had been found in Fort Washington, and what had been done to him before he died….

“Is Vince there?”