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the
subservience, but she did like watching him walk around the motel
room.
    “ Here’s how I’ve saved your
life,” she said. “You didn’t know you were done as a courier until
I told you, right? Think about it: if Tony Braxton is setting you
up to get jacked, then you can’t go home, can you?”
    “ So let me see if I
understand who you are,” Cyril said. “Tony thought I was carrying money, and he
sent you out here to take it and then return home and split it with
him?”
    “ That’s pretty much
it.”
    “ It’s his money to begin
with, though, isn’t it?”
    “ No, mostly it goes to
someone called Top. Tony thinks he should get much more than he
does.”
    “ Why does Tony think you’ll
come back to him?” Cyril asked.
    “ He thinks I love him. He
actually thinks he’s irresistible to all women. He’s got, like,
three or four buzzing around. But he really, really thinks I’m in love with him. I
tell him as often as I can— you are my
world, I need to be near you , I love you like no other .
He thinks he’s Don Juan—like Don Juan of getting girls to throw
plastic toys at his nuts. And he thinks I’m his hunting dog, that
I’ll grab the money and bring it all back. Roll around at his feet
like a lovesick puppy.”
    Willow was now swaying with the
romance of it all.
    “ You really like working
that way?” Cyril asked.
    “ What way?”
    “ Nothing.”
    “ No, not nothing. You look
down on me ? You’re
a mule—that’s the lowest thing there is.”
    “ No, it’s not the lowest
thing there is.”
    Willow kept the gun at her side, but
she was angry now. He was trying to rattle her, but she’d stay
professional.
    “ How about you just tell me
where the money is before I shoot you in the thigh?”
    “ I wish I had money. I
don’t. I’m waiting to pick up right now.”
    “ Where is the
pickup?”
    “ I don’t even know yet. I’m
waiting for a phone call.”
    “ And how much money are you
picking up?”
    “ It’s not money, it’s dope.
Look, I don’t know the whole story, but we have to move something
around, and I guess Top doesn’t want the local guys out here
getting too chummy with each other.”
    “ So they have a guy drive
all the way from the East Coast to do a local courier
job?”
    “ I don’t argue. I just try
to do the job and get paid. You know?”
    “ How will you find out where
the pickup is?”
    “ The local guys call me
direct.”
    “ On this phone?”
    Willow took his cell phone out of her
pocket with her non-gun hand.
    “ Yeah, on that
phone.”
    “ The one you left in the
car?”
    “ Yeah.”
    “ You’re expecting the big
phone call for the big drug deal, and you leave the phone in the
car?”
    “ Yeah, that wasn’t
smart.”
    “ You missed three calls,”
she said, scrolling through the phone with one hand.
    “ No, I didn’t.”
    “ You want to
look?”
    Willow held up the phone.
    “ I can’t see.”
    “ Take exactly one step
forward.”
    Three Missed
Calls , he read off the screen.
    “ Can you check the number.
Please?” he asked.
    Willow checked.
    “ Nope, no number. No
messages. You missed three important phone calls?”
    “ They weren’t supposed to
call until tomorrow.”
     
    ***
     
    It was more than a week ago
that Tony told him about this job— go get
some money in cow country . Tony said to
start the drive Monday and wait for the exact address on Tuesday
from the locals. Details are nice, but that was enough to get the
trip started. Cyril had called Tony from the road three times. He
wanted to know how much he was picking up, and as he made it to
Illinois he started to worry he’d overshoot the location. But Tony
wasn’t responding to anything. Next thing he knew, a girl had a gun
pointed at his chest.
    Cyril looked up at Willow.
    “ You’re right,” he said.
“It is a good
thing I met you. My whole organization is burnt up. Who knows what
would have happened if I did the pickup.”
    “ No, you’re still doing it.
If