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quickly. “It's me.”
    Without looking at Luther, he plugged his ear with a finger and moved away.
    A few seconds later, Doren Lomax's unanswered phone finally routed him to the voice mail system. Todd Todman sighed. There were days, he thought, and then there were days.
    Still feeling Luther's eyes on his back, Todd strolled to the quietest spot he could find, still pretending to be deep in conversation long after Doren's mailbox beeped and hung up on him.

4
    “HEY . That thing's not even loaded.”
    Andrew looked over a corner of the newspaper to find the snoop studying the gun on the coffee table between them. It seemed he'd finally noticed the hollow space in the base of the grip where a clip was supposed to go.
    “You know what they say.” Andrew turned to the next article, which he'd just found in the August 6 edition at the bottom of the woodbin: FOUL PLAY SUSPECTED IN TAVLIN DEATH. “Guns don't kill people. It's the bullets.”
    “I don't believe this.”
    “You'd feel better if I loaded it?”
    “I didn't say that.”
    Andrew was actually starting to like the guy he'd tied up on Caroline's couch, in spite of their rocky start. Travis Plum, according to the driver's license. So he chose not to add insult to bondage by revealing thathe'd left the clip and the box of extra rounds back at the bank.
    Andrew wasn't scared of guns, but he didn't particularly like them either. As far as he was concerned, every gun he'd ever met seemed to have a personality, and not the kind he cared to have around. So he generally avoided their company.
    The Glock on the coffee table was the first and only firearm Andrew had ever owned. He'd bought it on his way out of Baltimore from an aging Czech who ran a neighborhood bakery known for its kolaches and un-traceable small arms. It had been a last-minute decision, a reluctant concession to a lingering bit of wisdom an old crewhand had once passed along.
Better to have one and never need it.
    Andrew had always planned to toss the gun into the Pacific one day as a symbolic gesture. He kept telling himself he'd get around to it.
    “Listen, ” Plum said. “Would you mind if I asked you a personal question?”
    Somewhere outside, a car door slammed.
    “Hold that thought, ” Andrew said.
    After a few empty moments, the intercom crackled. A voice said, “Hello?”
    Andrew stood and went to the nearest wall unit. He thumbed the button. “Say your name.”
    “Benjamin. Benjy We talked on the phone.”
    “Anybody else out there with you, Benjamin?”
    “Benjy. Just me.”
    “I'm going to take your word on that.”
    “You can.”
    “Okay, Benjy. Look to your left, you'll see a gate. It's open. Come on up to the deck and follow it around. You can use the sliding door. That's also open.”
    “Gate, deck, sliding door.”
    “A-plus. We'll be waiting for you.” Andrew released the button, then turned back and pressed it again. “Benjy?”
    “Yes.”
    “Skip over the top step when you come up the stairs. I need to fix it.”
    Andrew buzzed out without waiting for a reply. He went to the tall windows overlooking Pacific Coast Highway and peeked around the edge of the pull shade. Down below, he saw a charcoal Town Car parked askew on the narrow brick-paved strip in front of the garage.
    He went back to the chair, sat down again, and nodded at Plum.
    “You wanted to ask me something?”
    The snoop had wrangled his way into a sitting position, arms still behind his back, bound legs kicked out to one side. As muffled footfalls climbed the stairs and crossed the deck outside, he looked at Andrew's face, seemed to reconsider, and finally said, “Never mind.”
    Andrew shrugged as a figure appeared in the open doorframe, backlit by the high morning sun.
    “Come on in, ” Andrew said.
    The silhouette stepped across the door track and became a sun-bleached, thirty-something guy in business casual attire: dark green polo shirt tucked into pressed khaki trousers, black dress belt to