The Bone Collector (Lincoln Rhyme 1)

"Who you talking to here?" Dellray grinning devilishly. "I'm the Chameleon. I can smile'n be happy or I can frown and play squeezie."

"No, man, no," the Scruff squealed. "Shit, that hurts. Cut it out."

The bartender looked over at them and a short glance from Dellray sent him back to polishing polished glasses.

"All right, maybe I know one thing. But I need help. I need--"

"Squeezie time again."

"Fuck you, man. Just fuck you!"

"Oh, that's mighty smart dialogue," Dellray shot back. "You sound like in those bad movies, you know, the bad guy and the good guy finally meet. Like Stallone and somebody. And all they can say to each other is, 'Fuck you, man.' 'No, fuck you.' 'No, fuck you.' Now, you're gonna tell me something useful. Are we all together on that?"

And just stared at the Scruff until he gave up.

"Okay, here's what it is. I'm trusting you, man. I'm--"

"Yeah, yeah, yeah. Whatcha got?"

"I was talking to Jackie, you know Jackie?"

"I know Jackie."

"An' he was telling me."

"What was he telling you?"

"He was telling me he heard anything anybody got coming in or going out this week, don't do it the airports."

"So what was coming in or going out? More 16s?"

"I told you, man, there wasn't nothing I had. I'm telling you what Jackie--"

"Told you."

"Right, man. Just in general, you know?" The Scruff turned big brown eyes on Dellray. "Would I lie to you?"

"Don't ever lose your dignity," the agent warned solemnly, pointing a stern finger at the Scruff's chest. "Now what's this about airports. Which one? Kennedy, La Guardia?"

"I don't know. All I know is word's up that somebody was gonna be at a airport here. Somebody who was pretty bad."

"Gimme a name."

"Don't got a name."

"Where's Jackie?"

"Dunno. South Africa, I think. Maybe Liberia."

"What's all this mean?" Dellray squeezed his cigarette again.

"I guess just there was a chance something was going down, you know, so nobody should be having shipments coming in then."

"You guess." The Scruff cringed but Dellray wasn't thinking about tormenting the little man any longer. He was hearing alarm bells: Jackie--an arms broker both Bureaus had known about for a year--might have heard something from one of his clients, soldiers in Africa and Central Europe and militia cells in America, about some terrorist hit at the airports. Dellray normally wouldn't've thought anything about this, except for that kidnapping at JFK last night. He hadn't paid much attention to it--it was NYPD's case. But now he was also thinking about that botched fragging at the UNESCO meeting in London the other day.

"Yo boy dint tell you anything more?"

"No, man. Nothing more. Hey, I'm hungry. Can we eat somethin'?"