Cage’s bravado is slow to drift away, but it drains from his face finally and he stammers. “Wha . . . what?”

I aim quickly and fire. I’m not fucking around. And I shoot Cage in the testicles, so that he’s not fucking around, either.

He screams bloody murder, even more than I’d expected, and then he drops and flails on the floor in shock and agony.

I walk over to him and pour Grey Goose over the hands covering his bloody crotch. Then I drop the bottle on the floor next to him. Vodka pours from it.

“Put that on your junk.”

It takes Cage another five seconds before he takes the bottle, and then he rolls over onto his stomach, writhing around on the cold glass like he’s humping it.

“Kill me! Just kill me!” he screams.

I kneel next to him and speak in a slow and measured tone. “The people you assist in the government. They are the ones who saved your miserable life today. You need to go back to work for them with the exact same intensity and effort as before . . . or you know what will happen.”

“Kill me now, you sick son of a bitch!”

“I’ll never kill you. I’ll just return and take away more of what you hold dear. This time it’s your manhood. Next time . . .” I see a framed portrait of Cage with his family in the bedroom. It’s lying on the floor, the glass broken. I set it up next to where he’s writhing.

“Next time . . . who knows what I’ll take from you.”

I’m bluffing. His wife is probably in on it, but I’m not a detective, so I don’t know, and I would never harm anyone’s kids.

And now, when I look into Cage’s eyes, I realize he believes I will do what I say I’ll do.

He’ll comply, he’ll keep working for the Agency, with or without functioning balls.

I rise to my feet again. “Keep the vodka on your nuts till the paramedics come. It will slow the bleeding.”

I turn and head for the stairs. Into my mic I say, “I’m coming out the front.”

“Roger that,” Rodney responds.

A few seconds later I meet him by the pool. He’s been shot through the thigh; the round went through and through, but he’s already bandaged it tightly.

He looks me over. “Dude. Your shoulder.”

I turn and stare at the knife there. “I hadn’t noticed.”

Rodney laughs. “Better leave it in till you get to a hospital.”

“What happened in there?” Kareem asks.

“I let Cage live.”

“Why would you leave him alive?”

“Trust me, I took all the fun out of it for him.”

Kareem sits on a planter by the back door. “Wish the cops would hurry the hell up.”

Rodney lowers to the ground next to him. Both men look utterly smoked.

But I don’t sit. “Guys, I’ve got to try and run.”

Both older men nod, but Rodney says, “Get out of here, brother. Good fighting with you. We’ll see you around.”

Kareem adds, “Yeah, in the yard at Pelican Bay.”

All three of us laugh at this.

It’s the only supermax prison in California, and the only reason we’re laughing is that, right now, none of us really gives a shit. We did our jobs today, and we know what we did was righteous.

“When LAPD gets here,” I say, “tell them to send a paramedic to the second floor of the pool house. There’s a wounded man, an innocent, and he needs help.”

“What the hell do you mean, ‘innocent’?”

I shrug. “I don’t make the rules. I just follow them.” I pause, then say, “Sometimes.”

* * *

• • •

Three minutes after this I’m climbing up a steep incline to a street a block north and a hundred feet higher up the hill, my left arm useless at my side. I’ve pulled my mask down over my face, so if I run into anyone dumb enough to be out on the street I’m going to look pretty scary, but at least the TV choppers above won’t show my mug on the evening news.

I make a turn and see a gaggle of police cars, twenty-five yards ahead. I can just make out Roxana there, standing next to a squad car with two other women. I recognize Talyssa by her bright red hair, and by the fact that she and her sister embrace so hard it looks like they are trying to crush each other. I don’t know who the other woman is, but after several seconds Roxana turns to her and punches her in the face, dropping her to the ground.

I suddenly have no doubts about her identity.

A cop on a bullhorn tells me to drop to my knees on the street, but I just turn away from the roadblock and begin walking back down the hill.

The guy keeps shouting at me, but I’m unconcerned.

I guess it’s possible I’ll be arrested by the local five-oh, but I have a sinking suspicion I won’t.

You’re the Gray Man, you can just slip away, I tell myself.

But I’m wrong.

A pair of vans appears around a turn below me on the road, and I’m sure they’ve already crossed a police line to make it this high up on the hill. As they approach, I stop, look at a densely wooded property next to me, and consider making a run for it.

But I don’t. Instead I just let out a long, tired sigh.

The vans stop alongside me and the side door of the closest one slides open.

Zack Hightower looks me over, up and down. “You look like shit, kid.” He sees the hilt protruding from just below my collarbone. “But on the bright side, looks like you won a free knife.”

I don’t speak, I just climb into the back of the van and it begins rolling off. Armed men all around search and cuff me while Zack looks on. When they’re finished, he reaches over to me and puts his hand around my back. Hightower knows I keep a handcuff key secreted under a belt loop, so he grabs it, then tosses it out of the van.

He pulls out his phone as we start driving off.

“Sir? I’ve got him. No trouble, but half of Hollywood is on fire.” He waits a moment then says, “Yes, sir.”

Zack holds the phone to my ear. I know it’s Hanley.

I’m right. He says, “Subtle, Violator. Real subtle.”

I just look out the window.

He adds, “I want to break your fucking neck.”

“Get in line, boss.”

“Is he alive?”

“He is.”