two, three. Lift.”
They heaved.
Nothing.
Mickey took a long breath. “Okay, we’re just not putting enough into this.”
“Excuse me. I was. I put everything into that lift. Aren’t you supposed to know how to do this? Can we just teleport it, or something?”
“Transport. And that only works in Star Trek.”
“I’m losing faith in you, Mickey. I didn’t think this was going to work, but I told myself, ‘No, if anybody can hypothesize her way out of this, it’s you.’ I was wrong.” Beth, when tired, got mouthy.
Mickey, who had no patience for tired, mouthy women, shot her a warning look. “Shh. One more time.”
They got in place again.
“One, two, three. Lift.”
Somewhere in the dark they heard a noise.
“What was that?” Mickey asked, her heart pounding wildly.
Beth looked down below. “A cat.”
“One more time.”
“Maybe we could just break it?”
Mickey cased the joint, considering the idea. Everything was too quiet. “Nah. Somebody might hear us.”
“Can we try the front door? Maybe it’s unlocked.”
“You have no imagination.”
“Logic, Mick. It’s called logic.”
Beth had a point. Mickey abandoned her short life of crime. “Okay.”
They climbed back down and entered the building’s lobby. John’s apartment was on the second floor, right at the top of the stairs. Mickey handed the flashlight to Beth and tried the doorknob.
Locked.
Beth stared at Mickey’s hand, her mouth open. “You’re wearing gloves?”
“I didn’t want to leave any prints.”
“And what about me?”
Mickey had researched that, too. “Your prints aren’t on file. No worries.”
“What? You’ve been arrested before?”
“No. Anybody that handles plutonium gets printed and filed in the national database. Procedure.”
Beth got a little wide-eyed. “You really work with plutonium?”
“Nah. Just a little prison humor.”
Beth wasn’t amused. “Can we go now?”
A long beam of headlights lit up the window off the stairwell.
“Somebody’s coming,” Mickey said, and then took off up the stairs to the third floor. “Up here. If it’s John, he won’t see us.”
Beth followed right behind, a streak in black spandex and sweater. Very stylish. Silently they waited for the door to open below.
The door eased open and an old man creaked his way into the foyer. Mickey began to breathe again. “False alarm.”
“Look, this isn’t working. You need to hire Dominic.”
Oh, hell.
Mickey leaned against the rickety stair rail and faced the whole truth. Sadly, her life as she knew it was pretty much screwed unless she got that tape back, and Dominic Corlucci, mob guy extraordinaire, seemed the best answer.
Somewhere upstairs, a stereo cranked up. Loud, discordant and really, really bad music.
Mickey sighed. “Oh, all right.”
“Want to get a beer?”
“Soft drink for me,” she answered. She was still paying for the aftereffects of her last binge.
“I’ll buy.”
Mickey stuffed her gloves in her pocket and studied her own attire. Black sweatshirt and matching knit pants. Passable, but barely. “You think we should change?”
Beth shook her head. “Nah. Black is very in.”
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