The breeze grew stronger, blowing down from the north cool and insistent and powerful enough to tear a fistful of stuffing from the couch’s wounded arm.

  Tumbleweeds scratched over rocks, eluding yucca barbs, traveling south. The wind threaded small rips in the garbage bags, and they rose and fell like disembodied lungs gasping for breath.

  A voice seemed to whisper in Woodrow’s ear, a voice from that science fiction film he’d seen as a boy: People of earth, look to your skies for a warning. . People of earth, look to your skies for a warning. .

  Woodrow turned toward Mecca, knelt, and prayed. Perhaps it had happened. Perhaps, at last, he had seen the Mother of All Planes. Perhaps he had come face-to-face with the men who never smiled.

  If only he could remember.

  He rose and faced the wind, waiting, studying the desert by the spectral glow of the Saturn’s headlights.

  A garbage bag gave up a handful of moldy confetti that rode the night, fluttering above ironwood and mesquite, over yucca and garbage and broken furniture.

  A tumbleweed crackled by on Woodrow’s right, traveling the stream of darkness that flowed between the Saturn’s headlights. He turned and watched as it scrabbled over the Saturn’s hood.

  And then, quite suddenly, he didn’t care about the tumbleweed.

  He saw something else, something infinitely more interesting-a shard of yellow paper fluttering in the wind, one corner trapped by a windshield wiper.

  Woodrow hurried toward the car, thinking of Master Fard and the men who never smiled; and a space platform that would rain explosive death upon the world; and messages that would drop from the sky, written in Arabic, which would allow 154,000 Muslims to survive the carnage.

  He snatched the shard of paper from under the wiper blade.

  Suddenly, everything made sense. His disheveled appearance, his conservative clothes tumbling across the desert sands.

  Because the note was not written in Arabic, and the paper it was written on had been torn from Woodrow’s own notebook.

  It read:

  HEY NIGGER:

  I’MBACK!

  WOODY.

  TWO

  Woodrow stepped away from the motel office, holding the key to room 21 in his wounded left hand. He hoped the number was a good omen, for he was definitely due a change in luck.

  He did not know exactly why he had come to the Saguaro Riptide. Baddalach was here, of course-the clerk had let slip that a famous boxer was staying next door in room 22, saving Woodrow the trouble of any detective work.

  It was Woodrow’s job to kill that boxer. But in light of the revelation that had occurred in the desert outside Tempe, the execution of Jack Baddalach seemed suddenly unimportant.

  It was, however, quite necessary. Now, more than ever, Woodrow was determined to protect his professional reputation. It was the cornerstone of his identity, the one thing he could cling to in a trying time such as this.

  He drove past two cars parked in front of the motel proper. A battered Dodge Dakota with Arizona plates and a Range Rover with a Budget Rent-a-Car sticker. Woodrow guessed that the latter vehicle had most probably been rented by none other than Jack Baddalach.

  To the west of the motel stood a junkyard surrounded by a chain-link fence. A dirt road ran along the fence, stretching into the desert.

  Woodrow parked in the gravel lot at the side of the motel. Hopefully he would be able to execute the boxer somewhere other than his motel room. It would be preferable to force the pugilist into the Saturn at gunpoint, then transport him to a remote location where one could easily dispose of a corpse.

  Exhibiting no little care for his wounded left hand, Woodrow attached a silencer to the Combat Commander and returned the weapon to its shoulder holster.

  The coming dawn was beautiful. Not colorful at all, but beautiful just the same. A smear of ash along the horizon, the dull petrified earth below, soft light bathing all. He stared at it for a long moment, listening to his heartbeat, filling his lungs with cool dry oxygen.

  He felt surprisingly relaxed. Confident. Certain of his identity. He’d suffered a couple of blackouts, that was all. He’d killed a man-a man of hideous disposition whom he would have undoubtedly killed anyway. And he’d tossed his own clothes into the desert, and he’d written himself a note, signing it with the name he’d gone by as a callow youth. These were not events that should trouble him. They were nothing more than the result of a knock on the head-isolated incidents that would soon fade from his memory.

  The fact was that he felt much better now. The morning light didn’t bother him at all. A little rest, a little relaxation, and he’d be perfectly fine. No more bright lights. No more blackouts.

  Woodrow stepped out of the Saturn.

  He knew exactly who he was.

  And exactly what he had to do.

  He opened the trunk and withdrew a prayer rug. He unrolled it on the gravel at his feet, turned toward Mecca, and prepared for his morning salat.

  Woodrow Saad Muhammad prayed five times a day. To him, prayer was as important as breath. He knelt. .

  . . and prayed for guidance. .

  . . for freedom from his past. .

  . . opening himself to Allah. .

  . . and his concentration was interrupted by a dog barking in the junkyard.

  Woodrow turned, his wounded hand tensing automatically. A stubby little pit bull charged along the perimeter of the fence, tried to climb the chain link with its stubby little legs, ended up earthbound as a brick. Woodrow paused, stared at the dog, studied its fury. The animal was completely focused, the way he had to be right now, when only one thing was important-

  Another sound punctuated the dog’s barking. Crackling. No, crunching. Quick footsteps on gravel-

  Someone grabbed Woodrow from behind and dragged him him his feet.

  Automatically, Woodrow’s hand slipped under his coat. Fingers closing around pistol grips, index finger finding the trigger, he started to draw the weapon.

  He never made it, because the pain was explosive. Thermonuclear. A private little cold war erupted on his backside, just below his ribs. He knew he’d been kidney punched-that was all there was to it-but the pain was paralytic, and just as it started to pass there came another explosion, the epicenter of this one his backbone, and his legs went numb for an instant, and he never even felt his knees caving in.

  And then he was on the ground, gravel in his mouth.

  The dog was still barking, raking chain link with sharp teeth. Woodrow grunted. Something was pinning him to the ground. Someone’s foot, or knee. That someone leaned forward, putting his full weight on Woodrow’s spine. Woodrow’s coat was pulled back, and the butt of his pistol tore at his ribcage as it was drawn from his shoulder holster.

  Woodrow heard the slide rake back and forth as his attacker chambered a round.

  The man said, “Think about it.”

  Woodrow did.

  And that was when his skull caved in for the second time in two days, and suddenly he was falling. . falling. .

  . . into a bottomless pit of light.

  THREE

  Baddalach punched the Saturn’s gas pedal and frowned. Damn, but he hated cars that were named after astronomical phenomena. The Ford Galaxie, the Mercury Comet, the Chevy Nova. . and now the Saturn.

  Not that they weren’t okay automobiles-it was the old game of heightened expectations that bothered Jack. Some marketing guy in Detroit decides that people want to feel like Captain James T. Kirk of the Starship Enterprise when they climb behind the wheel and pretty soon you’ve got automobiles named for every heavenly body this side of Uranus, as if a metal box on four wheels could really send you soaring through the stratosphere.

  And what was worse was that people fell for it. All kinds of people. Even hit men.

  Jack laughed at that. He sure hadn’t expected the hired gun to show up in a Saturn. He’d expected something flashy and tanklike. A Caddy or something.

  But maybe the hired gun was smarter than the average bear when it came to such matters. No ostentatious Caddy ragtop for him. He’d picked a car that would make him look like Joe Suburbs. That showed a little more brainpower than Jack might have expected.

  So maybe the hit man was a thinking man. That didn’t worry Baddalach. Let the son of a bitch think all he wanted to. Thinking wasn’t going to change the fact that he couldn’t take a punch.

  The cat was a big mother, too. Not heavy. Pure ectomorph- the kind of body type Jack wished he had. Hell, he hadn’t felt any fat at all when he’d kidney punched the dude. Good muscle mass and low body fat. Jack would’ve never lost his title if he’d had a body like that.

  He’d kind of hated to clobber the guy while he was praying, though. That seemed like a low blow. But, hey, the guy was a dog-beater. What the hell did he deserve?

  Jack grinned. What a beauty of a punch it had been. Half uppercut, half hook-like slamming a brick under the guy’s ribcage. Hey, for Jack Baddalach, that spelled S-A-T-I-S-F-A-C-T-I-O-N. Rabbit-punching the guy and watching him go down was even better.

  First the chump dropped to his knees. Then he went face first into the gravel, sending up a puff of dust that looked kind of like a miniature Hiroshima.

  Yep. It was a real Kodak moment, all right.

  Jack hadn’t lingered, though. Other fish to fry, and all like that. But he did take the time to steal the hit man’s gun, wallet, and car.

  That’d teach the bastard to beat up on a guy’s dog.

  Jack wished he could have hung around to see the hit man come to. No car, no gun, pockets empty except for the key to his room at the Saguaro Riptide.

  Room 21. Right next to Jack’s room. Jack knew where the guy was. He also knew that he wasn’t done with him yet.

  The highway was clear of traffic, the road itself as straight as Jack’s right jab. Jack hit the gas and the Saturn lurched forward like a peg-legged man pushing a wheelbarrow.

  In other words. Jack had plenty of time to think things through.

  One of the first rules of boxing at the championship level-know your opponent. You watch films of a guy, see what he does over and over, figure out what you’re going to do to take the play away from him. You hire sparring partners that can approximate the guy’s style, and you go to school on them. You get in shape, you get your mind right, you stick to your plan. . and a lot of times you’ve got the fight won before you ever step in the ring.

  Jack glanced at his reflection in the rearview mirror. “Time for a little scouting report.”

  Okay, the hit man’s choice of wheels told Jack something. And Freddy G had told him something else-that the guy was a Muslim. Not some mystical kufi-wearing Muslim either. No, this guy looked like the old-fashioned kind, a throwback to the suit-and-tie era of the sixties when the heavyweight champ of the world had joined up, changing his name from Cassius Clay to Muhammad Ali.

  This guy looked like a real Fruit of Islam candidate. They were the A-1 badasses who protected the Muslim elite, kind of like the Nation of Islam secret service. To a man they were purer than pure and meaner than mean, and their hearts were made of stone.

  The hit man’s wallet lay on the passenger seat next to his gun-a serious enough looking piece. But Jack didn’t know anything about guns, so the pistol didn’t tell him anything.

  He reached over and opened the glove compartment. The contents told him plenty:

  1) A few cassettes, mostly jazz. That fifties be-bop shit where you couldn’t hold onto the melody with both hands.

  2) A brand new map of Arizona, folded so that it showed Pipeline Beach and its environs.

  3) A little notebook in which the hit man kept track of mileage and maintenance on the Saturn.

  Jack flipped through the notebook. He had to admit that he was impressed-the hit man actually changed the oil every three thousand miles.

  He tossed the notebook aside. The situation was pretty clear now. He was being tracked by an anal-retentive oil-changing dog-beater with a car named after a planet who liked to listen to the Jack Kerouac hit parade. Somehow, it didn’t seem like hate was too strong a word.

  Not that he was in a benefit-of-the-doubt kind of mood or anything, but Jack figured he’d make one more dip into the pond. He pushed the cassettes aside, fumbled the map out of the way, and came up with a cellular phone.

  If he’d been a cartoon character, a glowing lightbulb would have appeared above his head.

  He pulled onto the shoulder of the road. Pictured the hit man regaining consciousness back there in the motel parking lot-spitting loose chunks of gravel out of his mouth, his backside and neck electric with pain as he rose and stumbled to his motel room. Keying the lock like a drunk, cringing at the sound the door made when he closed it. Kidneys aching while he pissed. Then looking at himself in the mirror, figuring what a sorry way this was for such a smart guy like himself to start the day.

  Jack kind of felt sorry for the guy. He flipped open the hit man’s wallet and found his Visa card. Grabbed the phone. There was only one 800 number that he’d committed to memory, but he figured that one would be more than enough.

  He made a call.

  Okay. Fun was fun. . but now it was time to play some mind games of the mucho serioso variety.

  Jack phoned information. A minute later he had the number he needed. He punched it in. One ring later, he was through.

  “Pipeline Beach Sheriff’s Department.”

  Jack stared down at the name on the hit man’s driver’s license. “My name is Woodrow Saad Muhammad. I’m a guest at the Saguaro Riptide Motel. I’m staying in room 21.”

  “How may I direct your call, sir?”

  “Someone stole my motherfuckin’ wallet and my motherfuckin’ car,” Jack said. “Oh, yeah. . and he beat the motherfuckin’ shit out of me, too.”

  “All right, sir, let me transfer you to-”

  “And one other thing: the motherfucker who did it is a guy named Vince Komoko.”

  Woody’s head was feeling pretty fucked up when he answered the door.

  Two cops stood there.

  Two women cops.

  Two white women cops.

  Shit. Woody hoped that he was seeing double. Seriously.

  “Are you Woodrow Saad Muhammad?” the first cop asked.

  Woody almost laughed. Stood to figure that they were after the monk, the self-righteous prayer-sayin’ nigger who shared his head. They didn’t want him at all.

  Be a bitch explaining that one, though. So Woody just nodded.

  The second cop smiled. “Mind if we come in?”

  “Whatever pops your cherry.”

  Both bitches glared at him.

  The taller of the two entered first. Woody checked her out-blond hair pulled tight against her skull and a long braid that almost brushed her outstanding little ass. Her uniform shirt seemed tailored to show off a perky pair of titties. Put the whole picture together and she kind of reminded Woody of the Valkyrie from the old Incredible Hulk comic book.

  “We’re here to follow up on your phone call,” the Valkyrie said, her painted lips expressionless. “You’d like to report a robbery?”

  Woody didn’t say spit. This whole thing was fucked up. Like hearing the punch line without hearing the joke. Ever since he awoke that first time at the gas station, he’d been certain that he was tuned in to everything the monk said and did. Of course, it didn’t seem to work the other way around-the monk was real surprised to find out about him-but, hey, that was the monk’s problem.

  But this-Woody sure as shit didn’t remember the monk making any phone call. Especially not to the goddamn cops. He wondered how the monk had managed to pull it off. Maybe he’d underestimated the stiff motherfucker.

  “I’m waiting,” the Valkyrie said.

  “I was robbed,” Woody said.

  Shit. A man had to say something. Besides, Woody knew that it was the truth. The monk’s wallet was gone. His gat, too. Even that fucked up whitebread car of his. And all those stiff clothes that made the nigger look like he should be hocking a stack of Muhammad Speaks newspapers on some corner in Vegas.

  The Valkyrie didn’t say shit. She was busy following her pert titties around the room, checking things out. Woody figured that was okay. There was nothing to see. Everything had been stolen.

  Then he glanced at the bed. Shit. Rewind on that last part, homes. Because the monk’s shoulder holster lay on the cheesy spread, empty.

  The Valkyrie must have seen it, but she didn’t say a word.

  Woody decided that he’d better ease on over toward the open door.

  That was when the other cop crossed the threshold, closed the door, and leaned against it.

  This one was shorter. Her titties were actually larger than her partner’s, but her uniform shirt was way too baggy to show them off.

  “My face is up here,” she said.

  Woody blinked and found the woman’s eyes.

  Shit.

  Her eyes were blue and very angry.

  The Valkyrie said, “What’s your real name, anyway? I mean, you registered here at the Riptide as Woodrow Jefferson. But when you called our office, you said your name was Woodrow Saad Muhammad.”

  Woody blew a sour breath her way. The monk had really fucked it up. That’s how bad Woody’s note had rattled him. The church-goin’ motherfucker had actually written Woody’s name on a motel registration card. And that blew Woody’s cover cold. Man, just when he was ready to start off fresh, after all these years.

  “Don’t you understand, boy?” Big Titties said. “The sheriff means, What did your momma name you?”

  Both women stared at him, waiting for an answer, the heels of their gunhands resting on their pistols. Woody wanted to laugh. Seriously. Shit, he thought every word these bitches said was true. He hated all that Muslim crap. But these bitches thought that he was the monk. . and the monk wouldn’t appreciate talk like that.

  Man, this was sure as shit getting complicated.

  The Valkyrie smiled. “You can talk, can’t you?”

  Big Titties said, “Maybe he speaks Swahili or something.”

 

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