Still on the edges of Hollywood, not too far from the Sunset Strip.

Before I rolled to meet with Arizona I had dumped the cellular outside Club 360.

That was as far as I wanted them to track me.

The hunted had flipped the script and become the hunter.

They would pick the time, but I would pick the place this shit jumped off.

Sid Levine had said the range on the GPS was about a hundred yards. I parked a few blocks away, closer to Hollywood Boulevard, took my time walking over from there.

I was outside a supposedly twenty-one-and-over club, a rave joint that stayed open after hours, a club that played techno, had access to the customer’s drug of choice, and charged megabucks to get on the other side of the velvet rope. Looked like it might’ve been free up until a certain time, maybe had a discount on admission for the early birds—the long line told me that.

Music bumped out of the open doors, loud enough to shake a few leaves off the trees and draw the people in. Women were bareback, showing off their legs and erogenous zones, tugging their Lycra skirts back down below their panty lines, most of them shivering with their arms folded over their erect nipples. A cool breeze brought the hint of some strong and potent marijuana. Kids. Their parents were probably at home holding their third double martinis, wondering how their kids got so fucked up.

The lion appeared, think he had been down in this area prowling for a while. This time he wasn’t rolling in that Expedition, didn’t have forty large in rims spinning underneath his chassis. That damn near caught me off guard. He was in a 1964 Deuce-and-a-Quarter—an Electra 225, that 425 motor humming. Bland colored, no bling anywhere. A dull ride that didn’t stand out like the bling-on-wheels cruising the boulevard. Something that would’ve thrown me. They’d gotten me used to seeing the pimpin’ Expedition and switched up.

Even if I hadn’t seen his profile when he passed by, I‘d’ve recognized the shape of his O.J.-sized head when a car’s headlights hit him from the back. Didn’t have to see his tiny teeth or that smooshed nose. His shadow was ugly to the bone. I wondered how his momma felt, how her eyes bugged when the doctor pulled that out of her and laid it across her breasts. Bet she passed out. Bet his daddy screamed for them to put it back in the oven until it was done.

He was a few feet from where I had dumped the phone. Lisa’s locator was on point, better than Sid Levine had said it was. I shook my head at how easy it was for her to track me.

Her bullyboy slowed down and double-parked that gas-guzzling boat in the shadows.

I shook my left leg, corrected that wardrobe malfunction again.

The lion pulled out and cruised the block twice before he found a spot facing the club. He was on his cellular. He kept missing me because I was tucked across the street, almost a block down between two gum trees. He whipped into a space and turned off his lights. But the fool kept his foot on his brakes, so his taillights were lit up like it was the season for giving.

Then once again he pulled away from the curb.

I didn’t move. Stayed rooted on sidewalk that smelled like old urine and fresh fertilizer.

The jackal was out there somewhere. That made me jittery because I didn’t know if he was trailing the lion, maybe rolling in another car, or if he was in the Hummer with Lisa.

I stayed sandwiched between the trees.

I wouldn’t have heard him over the noise from the club. He would’ve been on top of me before I had any idea that he was keeping low, moving military style, creeping up behind me.

But his cellular rang, the tune “Play That Funky Music, White Boy” gave him away.

When I jumped around, the jackal was standing a few feet from me, dressed in his throwback gear, Minneapolis Lakers. Face hard to the bone. Slanted eyes. Pock-faced, thin man etched in penitentiary muscles. Markings up his neck to his throat. He’d been doing the same thing, keeping to the shadows, stalking for me.

My suit coat was already off, left it in the car.

My sleeves were rolled up, my warrior tattoos on display.

I was back on the yard.

His hands were empty. No shank in sight.

No words were needed. We knew how this went.

The motherfucker charged at me, raised his leg when he jumped up in the air, caught me off guard, planted a karate kick in my gut, made me lose my wind and stumble back toward traffic. A car zooming by at forty miles an hour almost clipped me. I got my balance, shoved the pain aside, and went after him full throttle.

The motherfucker was bouncing around in steel-toed boots like they were ballet slippers.

I gruffed, raised my hands, faked like I was about to rush his ass. He came at me with another kick, caught me in my ribs. He was so fast I didn’t see that steel toe coming up, just saw it going back before I felt the pain. I stumbled, damn knee went south, and I fell against a car.

My jaw tightened. He came toward me while I struggled to get balanced.

He threw another kick, his foot coming at me hard and strong.

I caught his leg this time. It hurt like hell because his round kick hit my rib cage like a hammer. I’d left my arms up, sacrificed my ribs and gave him that as a target. He was quick but I brought my forearm down hard and caught his foot between my rib cage and arm, struggled with him and fought my own pain, held his leg like it was in a vise grip. Trapped. His eyes widened. He tried to flip the other leg around and heel kick me, but I dragged him backward, stole his balance while I recovered mine, then drew my leg back to Ohio and treated him to a strong kick in the groin. My hard shoes bull‘s-eyed the fleshy part between his legs.

I had to let his leg go and deal with my own pain.

He didn’t go down, just stumbled back. I went after him the desperate way Sugar Ray went after Tommy Hearns in their first battle, like I was a warrior behind on all the scorecards, went after him hard, threw blow after blow, missed most but managed to land a hard hook to his temple. That should’ve taken him out, but it just staggered him. Then I landed an uppercut. Those two blows used to take much larger men off their feet, make them fly. I had been hit harder and didn’t hurt, not like this, not in a way that had me scared. I was pissed off at myself for being this out of shape. Driving people around for the last six months had left me soft.

I threw another uppercut, then a left hook that sprung my wrist.

Both of my hands were hurting. Hitting a man hurts the fists like hell.

He came at me again, his own pain slowing him down to a speed I could damn near handle. He threw a couple of wild punches, hay-makers that missed the target, then another kick. Slower. The kick was much slower. Slow enough for me to catch that leg again.

He cursed me and my mother.

Then I did it again, kicked him in his love sacs, let the square toe of my shoe lift and separate his family jewels, did that two more times, bull‘s-eyed the same spot. He wheezed with each blow, exhaled hard, eyes tried to pop out, then he crumpled and fell where he stood. He pulled his knees together, moaned some kind of a prayer. Blood and spit rivered from his mouth.

He held his nuts and struggled while I stood over him, wheezing my-damn-self.

I told him, “Don’t get up. Get up, you’re really gonna get hurt.”

“Fuck you.”

“Let it go, man. Let. This. Shit. Go.”

“Fuck you.”

Then he got on his elbow and reached under his shirt. The fight had been fair so far, but a street fight was all about winning. I didn’t have time to conjure up a weapon. I jumped on top of him, rolled around, socked him in his head, threw elbows and demonic blows, tried to beat him to whatever he was struggling to grapple from his waistline. Blood stained his face and he wouldn’t give in. I felt the handle he was struggling to get a decent grip on. I held it down, jammed my fingers in his eyes, then did a Mike Tyson move and bit the tip of his nose as hard as I could. Tried to make my teeth meet. He screamed like an old woman. I bit him again. He kicked and his scream came out ragged and deranged. He had to choose between his nose and his gun. He followed the pain and let go of the burner. A snub-nosed .38. The screams didn’t end. I’d never heard a man shriek so loud, his song out of key with that horrible techno music.

A few people looked our way, saw nothing but parked cars and shadows, then went back to trying to get to the other side of that velvet rope. No sign of the Deuce-and-a-Quarter.

The music had covered most of his wails.

I was sweating strong, breathing hard. My arms ached, hadn’t pumped any real iron in too long, skin burned, felt scratched up from where he had dug his claws into my skin.

I got a grip on his burner, threw the snub nose up high and hard. It landed on the roof.

He told me, “You. A. Dead. Man.”

He was bloodied, beaten, and still threatening my life.

“Play That Funky Music, White Boy” came on again, his cellular blinking in neon colors. He’d dropped the phone. It had landed close to him. Bullyboy was calling. Jackal scampered toward that song. I stomped down on his knee, heel first. Gave him something to sing about.

He howled out his own chorus, a low out-of-breath howl that went into the pavement.

I leaned against the wall, tried to catch my breath.

He grabbed his leg and gurgled, his mouth filled with saliva. The way we were situated, nobody could see us in the shadows. I turned and walked away, chest heaving, only made it a few steps, stopped to rest, catch my breath, my bad knee still giving me grief, but not as much.

“Dead.” He moaned, and sent me an evil smile. “You. Dead. Motherfucker.”

“Shut. The. Fuck. Up. Nigga.”

“Be a shame if your brother had an accident tonight. Be a shame if they found him in that house all burned up because he was caught on fire.”

My rage took over, put fire behind my eyes. I balanced myself on the brick wall, raised my foot, tried to bring my knee up to my chest, then brought my foot down on the side of his head. Went Klingon on his ass until he shut up and went into his private siesta. Rage wouldn’t let me ease up. Kept trying to stomp him into the concrete until I thought I heard his neck snap.

I staggered away, my shirt torn to shreds, halfway on, halfway off my body. I yanked that rag off me. Stood with my top bare. Exhausted, eyes wide, sweat raining from my head.

He’d issued one threat too many. He didn’t know me. I didn’t own a mansion. Or a Cessna. Didn’t have the keys to a Lamborghini. Wasn’t a soft-ass limo driver.

I was Reverend Daddy’s oldest son. I was East Side. Had done time like a man, and beat down many men since I was born. I was my brother’s keeper.

Nobody threatened my family. Nobody threatened my brother. Nobody.

That music bumped loud in the background, loud enough to drown out the last two minutes of fights and moans on this side of the street. The world went loud, but the space between me and my enemy was as quiet as Inglewood Cemetery at sunrise.

I couldn’t tell if he was breathing, saw no rise and fall in his chest.

If death came tonight, I wasn’t going to ride through those burning gates alone.

“Play That Funky Music, White Boy” played again. I stomped the phone to pieces.

A red dot moved across my chest, my eyes settled on its rise and fall. The beam moved up across my nose, did that to make sure it had my full attention, then went back to my heart.

Lisa had come up on me, moved through the shadows, the night breeze kicking up like she had demanded the commotion, like she was Storm, winds whipping her white linen dress left and right. Angelic head to toe. She had an Egyptian shawl wrapped around her head, looking all dolled-up like she did the night I’d seen her at Back Biters. Her stone face made her look evil enough for me to have doubts about trying to bum-rush her. Couldn’t run now if I tried.

I caught my breath the best I could, my eyes on the source of the red dot.

I asked, “I see. You got. Your Glock.”

She said, “Not the Glock. It’s a new toy I picked up at a trade show.”

“Heard. About. That. Toy.”

“Got it at the Taser International Booth.”

“Right.” I opened and closed my aching hands. “Las. Vegas. With. Wolf.”

She pulled her scarf away from her head and neck, winced, made a sound like that simple move hurt her down to the bone. She wanted me to see the red and purple bruises, all the marks and fingerprints I had left behind. My fury had marked up her skin, left her hurting pretty bad.

She asked, “Ever been blasted with fifty thousand volts?”

“Not. Lately.”

“Like being hit by a hundred lightning bolts. I volunteered at the show. Got zapped.”

“Don’t. Do. This. Lisa.”

“Pretty cool. Compressed nitrogen gas shoots electrode-tipped wires out at a hundred miles an hour. The prongs harpoon in your skin. You couldn’t shake it loose if you tried.”

“Lisa.”

“I can zap you two hundred times. No gunshot. No echo.”

“Don’t. Lisa.”

“With that loud music across the street, hell, I can watch you dance all night.”

She lowered her stun gun, moved it down, pointed it at the ground. Old emotions had taken root. She didn’t have the Glock at her side. She didn’t want me dead, not here, not now.

People talked when they didn’t want to kill. People joked when they didn’t want to die.

I told her, “You had set me. Up.”

Her shoulders softened, the flame in her eyes lowered. “Are you okay?”

“From the get go. Your boys. Would’ve killed me before. The next sunrise.”

She knew what I was talking about. The camera in Wolf’s office told me the truth about her intentions. She knew about it. Anything I had done would’ve been caught on tape.

She stayed ten, maybe fifteen feet away from me, no doubt the length of the copper wires in that gun. If she backed up, the barbed prongs wouldn’t reach me.

I moved a foot away. She followed.

I moved toward her. She backed up.

“What did you want, Lisa?”

“To be loved by someone. I loved you, Driver. I really did.”

I coughed, got my wind. “We had no connection. Police would’ve found the tape. Out-of-work felon down on his luck. Or out-of-work black man robs rich white man on Christmas Eve. Take your pick. End of story. End of my story. Would’ve ... would’ve closed the loop.”

She sounded so tender. “You think I would do the things I did for you if I didn’t love you? That tape would’ve been for my own protection, not for the police. My insurance.”

I straightened up the best I could, looked down at the battered and twisted jackal.

It bothered me. What I had done bothered me.

The bloodied body of the jackal didn’t faze Lisa, didn’t disturb her at all.

She said, “Ask yourself why you’re not already dead. I could’ve had this done the day after you reneged on our agreement, could’ve made a phone call the moment I walked in and saw you working at my business. Didn’t.”

“Why didn’t you?”

“Part of me wanted you there. A big part of me hoped ... I had hopes, Driver. What I feel for you is deeper than you’ll know. I never lied to you. I love you and I hate you for using me like that. The way you just ignored me. Why did you pick that stripper over me?”

I didn’t answer. She had her own version of what was going on.

“I told you I wanted you to give me babies. You said you loved me.”

The music kicked up across the street. Headlights hit us. Her bullyboy came out a couple of blocks down, was coming this way, creeping down the block, looking for us.

“I pull up in the parking lot at Back Biters and I find you all over some young ass, tight-eyed half-breed. You were standing in the middle of the lot kissing her.” Lisa paused, cringed like she was trying to focus. Looked like too many conversations were going on inside her head. Her voice splintered. “Why did you push me, reject me, and go see that stripper whore?”

Still no answer. I wanted to ask her if this three-day shit was because of Arizona, or Panther, but I think it was all of the above. The green-eyed chickens had come home to roost.

“Playa, Playa, Playa.”

“Stop. Calling me. That.”

“Playa. Playa.”

The Deuce passed by, still on the other side of the block.

“I threatened to tell Wolf. You came to work. I pulled a gun on you. You came to work. I destroyed everything you owned. You came to work. I did the same with your whore. You. Came. To. Work. Why didn’t you leave? You had nothing to pack. Why didn’t you just leave?”

I could’ve told her that Reverend Daddy never taught us how to run, taught us to hold our ground and fight. But I didn’t have the breath to waste on words that would make no difference.

Lisa’s eyes went to her bullyboy, the one I’d left sleeping on the ground.

He wasn’t moving. Might as well put two pennies over his eyes.

I said, “End it here. Walk. Away.”

“I think about you all the time, Driver. Thoughts of us and what was, what wasn’t. I knew what I wanted. Now I need to figure out who I am without you next to me. It’s hard. Never done anything this hard in my life. I guess we had the right love at the wrong time. Maybe me loving you was too much for you. And you not loving me wasn’t enough for me.”

“Lisa. Just. Walk away.”

“Can‘t, Boo. We’ve gone too far to back it up now.”

Her cellular was in her other hand. She lowered the stun gun long enough to hit her speed dial. She raised the phone to her face. Hesitated, stared in my eyes before she said, “Found him. Across the street from the club. Just make a U-turn.”

She hung up. Lowered her cellular. Her tongue moved over her lips in a tense motion.

Headlights came right up on us, then turned off, sent us back to darkness.

Lisa took a step toward me. “I’m going to ... I’m going to miss you, Driver.”

She raised the stunner, put that red dot on my body. Every part of me ached, but my adrenaline was pumping. Had to get at her. Tried. But she pulled the trigger. Before I could bob or dodge to my left, the barbed prongs had harpooned my skin. Felt like a high-voltage power line had been routed through my body. Fifty thousand volts. I growled, refused to fall.

It hurt too much to scream.

She pulled the trigger again, sent electricity in bursts, searing pain that made my muscles contract uncontrollably. Disrupted the messages to my brain and took me to my knees. Muscle control was gone, body went hysterical. Confusion and disorientation crawled all over me.

Darkness tried to swallow me up. Every sound was a hundred miles away.

Voluntary muscles wouldn’t cooperate, but still I fought to get up off my knees. In my mind I was getting up. I was swinging. In reality, I hadn’t moved an inch. They stood over me and I couldn’t do a damn thing. Lisa pressed that trigger again, opened up my nerves, took me flat to the ground. I crashed hard. I struggled in my mind, but my body wasn’t fighting.

I fell into a warm pool of darkness.

My chest rose and fell. I stared at Lisa, at her softness. Licked my lips.

If I did this, all would be well. No damage to Panther’s life. Rufus would be safe.

She turned around and walked toward my bedroom, one hand over her head, the other on her waist, her pear-shaped frame moving with slow and easy sway, with feminine pride.

Music came on. Lights went off.

Her silhouette moved across the room, got on top of my bed.

I took my glasses off, took off my tie, eased toward the bedroom, taking my time.

“Get naked, Driver. Hurry.”

“What’s the rush?”

“Wolf will be looking for me.”

I took off my suit, all my clothes, dropped them where I was.

“Be honest, Driver. You want me in your bed every night.”

I nodded, gave in and admitted my strong desire for her. Her lips were full and wet.

“Come here. I want to take you in my mouth.”

I let her feed. Then I got in the bed with her, touched her between her thighs; her sex was like Seattle in April. Ran my fingers over her backside and the curve in her hips, her small waist.

Her body was Panther’s body.

Lisa said, “Do me every way you can imagine.”

“Beat your chest, sex me the way I deserve to be sexed, do it nonstop.”

“Get your manumit. Come get your manumit.”

Then she laughed. Her voice turned British and African, like Folasade.

Her knees moved away from each other, showed me her gloom.

She said, “One moment I want to kill you, then ... then ... I want to feel you inside me.”

I gave her everything she wanted.

She groaned. “This. Was. All. You. Had. To. Do.”

Over and over I entered my friend’s wife like this pussy was mine for the taking.

My friend. No. My former friend.

Lisa owned a barbaric expression, that desperate look that came when the orgasm felt so good. She tumbled into that ecstasy, held the sheets like she was trying to break her fall. She trembled, her back arched. I fucked her hard, showed no mercy, yanked her back into me over and over. A thousand waves passed through her. She kept jerking. Like I was stunning her.

My big hands went around her little neck. I choked her as hard as I could. No matter how hard I choked her, all she did was smile. Smiled and sang and came over and over.

Everything came back to life. Everything hurt from my head wound to my ankles.

I was in the fetal position. The small space I was in was cramped. Felt like I had been beaten and tossed in the Adjustment Center. There was a lot of bouncing, like I was riding a coffin down a bumpy road. Then my hearing came back. Loud music. Couldn’t move my hands. Or my feet. Something over my head. Could hardly breathe.

Other cars roared.

More bumps. Each one hurt to go over. She was taking me down Route 666.

Lisa said, “He’s moving.”

I was in the trunk of that Deuce. Large trunk. Bad suspension. The smell, the way the engine roared, and the way it rode told me that. They needed shocks and the brakes squealed like they were fifty thousand miles overdue for new pads. The stench of spilled oil and dust and battery acid thickened and poisoned the little musty air I could get.

“Maybe I should check on him.”

The car stopped. Somebody pulled up next to us, music loud enough to send the vibrations through me. The music moved ahead of my prison, bumping hard and fading fast.

Chest rising and falling, air thin, I tried not to panic, but that claustrophobic feeling had me terrified. Had to think. In The Hole. I was back in The Hole, a place where seconds moved like hours. Every vehicle that passed, its noise was on the left. We didn’t pass anybody, not that I could tell. I was on my right side. My own sweat became a river that flooded my right ear. All I knew was that the car I was in kept to the slow lane, maybe doing the speed limit, maybe a little over, had bad shocks, needed a new muffler, and was trying not to draw any attention.

Sweat puddled in my eyes. I struggled, kicked. Wrists were tied in front of me. Something was wrapped tight around my knees, cut off my circulation. Lisa didn’t tie me up. I wasn’t hog-tied LAPD style. I kicked my feet. What covered my mouth muffled my yelling.

Cars and SUVs whistled by. No eighteen-wheelers. With all the stop and go, we weren’t on the freeway. Freeway was all stop or all go, lots of lane changing, more cars passing by.

The sound of city traffic faded.

Thought I heard an airplane taking off. All flights took off going west, then turned and found their bearings. We were heading west. That meant we were heading toward the ocean.

Then my weight shifted toward the front of the trunk. They were going downhill.

All I could smell taste feel was my own fear.

These would be the last voices I heard.

The car rode a moment, slowed down, squealed to an easy stop. My heartbeat sped up. Sweat rained. The stench from his cancer stick made it that much harder to breathe. The car was dilapidated. The backseat had to be ragged enough for smoke and sounds to come through.

My feet were as numb as my hands. Pain muted by whatever they had tied me with. I breathed with the pain, chest expanding like a woman in labor, short puffs through my nose.

“Unless you want me to get some gas. Brought some just in case. ”

“He’s beat down, but your boy ain’t no joke. All I have to do is tie him up with some duct tape, take him out, drop him in the ocean. Three minutes later gurgle gurgle and we’re heading toward Jerry’s Deli. Unless you want to make it last a while. We can play with him.”

“Just ... Just ... just get it over with. ”

I imagined.

Imagined Rufus sprinting across the beach, sand kicking up behind him, his colorful locks flying behind him like Superman’s cape, that gun I had given him extended, scowling like he was the Punisher from the comic books, barrel blazing, bullets flying, taking out the lion.

“You getting out?”

She paused. “No.”

Or Arizona appearing out of nowhere, naked like she was the night I searched her, her streamlined beauty, long hair, and golden skin catching the lion off guard long enough for her cunning smile to disarm him, then to use her switchblade to cut him every way but loose.

The lion said, “Give me the stun gun.”

Imagined Freeman showing up and throwing books like missiles, those bobbleheads charging and attacking the lion and Lisa, taking them down, tying them up like Gulliver.

“I‘mma zap him a few times, soften him up.”

Panther. Imagined her running across the beach in boy shorts and thigh-high boots, her long hair flying behind her, tears in her eyes, wailing like a banshee, gun extended like she was on her way to be the lead in Kill Bill.

None of that was gonna happen.

After a long hesitation, Lisa told the lion, “I’ll get out too. I’ll see this through. ”

“You don’t have to, Lisa.”

“I have to.”

I got my leg to move. Struggled and got my swollen hands to my ankle. Panther’s gift was still there. They hadn’t seen the ankle strap. Too busy trying to rush me inside this Deuce to search me. My fingers found the .380. Heartbeat was drumming between my ears.

I was blind. A gun in my hand and living in Stevie Wonder’s world, a world devoid of a sense that I needed right now, a world not to be taken for granted.

The car door opened, heard them get out of the car, all of their words muffled. But they kept talking. I focused on that. Their words. Their sounds. That was all I could do.

Each breath that came out of me was hard and uncertain, my last breath over and over.

I did something that I hadn’t done in years. I prayed.

That’s what I had been doing all along.

Not imagining. Praying.

A key went into the lock. The lock clicked. The trunk creaked open. It felt like the world had opened up too. Cool air flooded this tomb. Salty air filled up my damp pores.

Couldn’t play possum and wait because they might zap me again. Hands aching, I squeezed the trigger. First I aimed at their voices, then I shot at their screams.

Pop. Pop. Pop. Pop.

Felt like I had missed. I raged, tried to get up, tried to hear where they were.

Pop. Pop. Pop. Pop.

Lisa screamed again, wailed like a Gaelic female spirit. My death had arrived.

Then a hundred lightning bolts went through my body.