“You sure we have to print this?” Cardoza said.
“Absolutely,” Cab Mulcahy replied.
“Then go ahead,” the publisher growled, “but when the calls start pouring in, remember—I’m out of town.”
The crusty businessman in Cardoza—which was to say, all of Cardoza—immediately thought of selling the newspaper, getting out before they straitjacketed the whole building. Just last week he’d had an excellent offer from the Krolman Corporation, makers of world-famous French bidets. A bit overcapitalized, but they’d cleared thirty million last year after taxes. Cardoza had been impressed by the bottom line—thirty mil was a lot of douching. Now the Krolman boys were looking to diversify.
The publisher’s fingers were flying through the Rolodex even as he hung up on Cab Mulcahy.
Reed Shivers pounded loudly on the door to, the guest room. “Young man, I want to speak with you!”
“Later,” Keyes mumbled.
“No, not later. Right now! Open this door!”
Keyes let Shivers in and met him with a scowl. “Open this door right now! What do I look like, the Beaver? Gee, Dad, I was only trying to get some sleep.”
“That’s enough, Mr. Keyes. You said you were going to be gone for one hour last night—one hour! The housekeeper says you got in at six.”
“A situation came up. I couldn’t help it.”
“So you just run off and forget all about my daughter,” Reed Shivers said.
“There was a squad car at each end of the block.”
“All alone, the night before the big parade!”
“I said I couldn’t help it,” Keyes said.
Kara Lynn walked in wearing a shapeless pink robe and fuzzy bedroom slippers. Her hair was pinned up and her eyes were sleepy. Without makeup she looked about fourteen years old.
“Hi, guys,” she said. “What’s all the racket?”
Right away she saw that Brian had slept in his street clothes. She stared at the sticky brown stain on his clothes, somehow knowing what it was. She also noticed that he still wore his shoulder holster. The Browning semiautomatic lay on a night stand next to the bed. It was the first time she had ever seen it. It seemed unwieldy, and out of place in a bedroom.
“The Cuban’s dead,” Keyes said flatly.
Reed Shivers rubbed his chin sheepishly. It occurred to him that he had underestimated Keyes or, worse, misread him entirely.
“Bernal kidnapped Garcia last night and I had to shoot him,” Keyes said.
Kara Lynn gave him a long hug, with her eyes closed. Keyes stood there stiffly, not knowing how to respond in front of her father. Reed Shivers looked away and made a disapproving cluck.
Keyes said, “I expect there’ll be some police coming by a little later to ask me some questions.”
Reed Shivers folded his arms and said, “Actually this is extremely good news. It means all those damn Nachos are dead. According to the papers, this Cuban fellow was the last one.” He tugged his daughter safely back to arm’s reach. “Pumpkin, don’t you see? The parade’s going to be wonderful—there’s no more threat. We won’t be needing Mr. Keyes anymore.”
Kara Lynn looked up at Brian questioningly.
“Let’s play it safe, Mr. Shivers. I’ve got my doubts about that helicopter crash. Sergeant Garcia and I agree that everything should stay the same for tonight. Nothing changes.”
“But it was on TV. All these maniacs are dead.”
“And what if they’re not?” Kara Lynn said. “Daddy, I’d feel better if we stuck to the plan. Just for tonight.”
“All right, cupcake, if you’ll sleep easier. But as of tomorrow morning, no more bodyguard.” Reed Shivers marched down the hall, still wondering about that hug.
Brian Keyes closed the door quietly and locked it. He took Kara Lynn’s hand and led her to the bed. They lay down and held one another; he, hugging a little tighter. Keyes realized that he had crossed a cold threshold and could never return to what he was, what he had trained to be—a professional bystander, an expertly detached voyeur who was skilled at reconstructing violence after the fact, but never present and never participatory. For reporters, the safety net was the ability to walk away, polish it off, forget about it. It was as easy as turning off the television, because whatever was happening always happened to somebody else; reality was past tense and once removed, something to be observed but not experienced. Two years ago, at such a newsworthy moment, Keyes himself would have been racing south with the wolf pack, jogging through the hammock to reach the jetty first, his notebook flipped open, his eyes sponging up each detail, counting up the bullet holes in the corpse, by now gray and bloodless. And two years ago he might have gotten sick at the sight and gone off to vomit in the woods, where the other reporters couldn’t see him. Later he would have stood back and studied the death scene, but could only have guessed at what might have happened, or why.