"d.a.m.n. I almost wish...At least I'd know he's still there."

"Well, maybe he's just lying low. Or maybe your knife did the trick."

"Don't I wish."

"So, how are you feeling?"

"Scared. Other than that, I guess I'm all right. Recuperating."

"That's good. Look, you'd better let me know where you're staying. If something breaks, up this way, I'll want to let you know."

"Sure. I'm at the Desert Wind, room three sixtytwo."

Carl wrote it down.

"I meant to call you yesterday, but...couldn't get myself to do anything. Felt like crawling under a rock."

"That's all right, Lace. Perfectly understandable."

"Anyway, I'm better now."

"Glad to hear it. Look, is there anything I can do for you?"

"Just keep me posted, is all."

"Sure thing. Take care of yourself, now."

"I'll try. So long, Carl."

He hung up. Across the room, one of his reporters hunched over a typewriter working on the lead story for tomorrow's edition. Otherwise, the office was deserted. "Jack?"

The reporter looked up, raising his eyebrows.

"See if you can't hunt down Chief Barrett. Try to talk him into letting us release the details of the Hoffman and Peterson murders."

"He's already refused, Carl."

"Try him again. Tell him a blow by blow description would be in the public interest, make them more aware of the danger. Maybe he'll go for it."

"Okay," Jack said, sounding reluctant. He pushed his chair back, stood up, and stretched. Then he headed for the door.

The moment he was gone, Carl dialed the telephone.

"Spiritual Development Foundation."

He gave his name, number and level.

"Very good, Mr. Williams."

"Let me talk to Farris. It's urgent."

Farris's voice came over the phone. "We've been waiting for your call," he said.

"Sorry. I just received the information. Miss Allen's at the Desert Wind Hotel in Tucson. Room number three six two."

"Excellent. I'll notify our personnel in the area. Your next step is to join her."

"Right."

"Do that at once."

"I'll leave right away."

As he hung up, a voice from behind asked, "What was that all about?"

Carl swiveled around. Alfred, standing in front of the restroom door, looked at him with suspicion. "You told where Lacey is. Who'd you tell?"

"Chief Barrett."

"What'd you want to do that for?"

"She asked me to." Turning back to his desk, Carl pulled open the top drawer and removed a letter opener. "Bring me Jack's story," he said.

Alfred walked toward Jack's desk, his head low and shaking. "I don't think you should've done that," he said.

"You're not paid to think."

"Well..." He gathered two pages from the desktop, and walked slowly back toward Carl.

Carl got up from his chair. With the letter opener behind his back, he reached out his left hand for the papers.

"Here they..."

Carl grabbed Alfred's wrist, jerked him forward, and plunged the slim blade into his belly.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN.

A strolling guitarist stopped at their table. "A song?" Scott nodded. "How about 'Cielito Lindo'?" he asked Lacey.

She dipped a tortilla chip into hot sauce. "Fine." With a smile, the white-clothed Mexican began to strum chords and sing. Lacey sat back, munching her chip and sipping her margarita as she watched him. He stood with his back arched, his head thrown back, his dark face writhing as if the song called up unbearable sorrow. His plaintive voice pushed Lacey's mind back to a strolling minstrel in Nogales, only a few days before her break up with Brian. One of their last good times together. The next week, back in Oasis, he brought a man to the house and insisted the three of them go at each other. Lacey refused, and he beat her. No more Brian. No more men, at all, after that.

For a moment, she felt the void and sank into it. No man, no love, no babies, only empty darkness. She was cut loose and drifting. Starting to panic.

She took a long drink from her margarita, and managed a smile for Scott.

Get off it, kiddo, she told herself. A h.e.l.l of a time to worry about becoming an old maid. You should live so long.

The singer finished his song, and Scott handed him a dollar.

"Gracias," the man said. With a slight bow, he turned away.

"Are you all right?" Scott asked.

"Just beweeping my outcast state."

Scott raised an eyebrow. "Troubling deaf heaven with your bootless cries?"

Lacey grinned. "Yup."

The waitress set down plates in front of them. They had both ordered Dinner #6: a chimichanga, refried beans, rice, and a taco. Lacey took a deep breath of the steam rising from her meal. Her mouth watered.

"Plates are hot," warned the waitress. "Will there be anything else for you?"

"Want a beer?" Scott asked.

"I'll stick with margaritas."

"That'll be it for now," he told the waitress, and she left.

Across the candle lit room, the singer began "The Rose of San Antone" for two lean men in business suits. One of them saw Lacey watching. He met her gaze, looked her over, then turned away and spoke to his friend. The other man glanced at her. She looked away, embarra.s.sed, certain they were wondering about her appearance. In her plaid blouse and corduroys, she felt shabby: all right for McDonald's, but barely good enough for a restaurant of Carmen's quality.

She should've found time to buy a dress. When Scott escorted her back to her suite that afternoon, though, he gave her strict orders not to leave it without calling him. She hadn't wanted to drag him around Tucson in search of eve ning wear, so she'd simply stayed in her room until he picked her up for dinner. Now, she regretted it.

She swallowed a mouthful of rice, and said, "What's next?"

"Find a good piano bar..."

"I mean, tomorrow and the next day and the day after that."

"Depends on you."

"Are we just going to wait? I mean, I could stay at the hotel for two weeks, as I planned, and nothing happen, and the minute I step in to my house back in Oasis, wham."

"You think he's at your house?"

"He could be anywhere: in my house, at the hotel, even here. He might even be dead, but I think that's too good to hope for."

"So you don't want to wait around? You'd rather go on the offensive? Good. That's just what Charlie Dane would suggest."

"Are you willing?" she asked.

"I was planning to suggest it, myself."

She cut into the chimichanga with her fork, and scooped a bite into her mouth. The fried tortilla crunched. She chewed slowly, savoring its spicy meat and cheese.

"So tomorrow, we'll go to your house."

"That'd be great." Lacey took another bite. Then she picked up her handbag and set it on her lap. She opened it. She took out the can.

"What's that, paint?"

"There's something you have to know. You may decide I'm crazy and call the whole thing off, but I have to tell you the truth. This afternoon, when I explained the whole situation to you, I left something out. It's why I have this paint. I told you the man was wearing a mask. That's my story for public consumption, but it's not quite the truth. I told the truth to the police and my editor, and they didn't believe me. I don't really expect you to believe me, either. But here goes. The man who killed Elsie Hoffman and Red Peterson, the man who attacked me-he's invisible."

Scott stared at his plate. He forked a huge bite of chimichanga into his mouth, and chewed slowly, frowning. He swallowed. He finished his margarita and refilled the gla.s.s and took another sip. "Invisible?" he asked, as if he thought he'd misunderstood.

"Not a ghost or apparition or hallucination," Lacey said. "It's a man. But you can look right at him and see right through him and never know he's even there. He's invisible."

"How?" Scott asked.

"He didn't tell me. 'A little miracle, ' he said."

"A miracle, all right."

"That's what the paint is for. It'll adhere to him, and he won't be invisible again till he gets it off his skin."

"Invisible," Scott said, shaking his head.

"Do you believe me?"

"Let me put it this way: we'll proceed as if I do. h.e.l.l, if it's true, I might get a whizz-bang story out of this. Another Amityville Horror. Who knows?"

Back at the hotel, Scott drew a Colt.45 automatic from the shoulder holster under his sport coat.

They searched Lacey's suite, walking behind chairs, feeling inside closets and under the beds, stepping into the shower stall. At last, Scott sighed and sat on the couch. "If the guy's invisible," he said, "there's no way we can be sure he isn't here."

"He hasn't attacked," Lacey said.

"Maybe he's waiting for me to leave. So I guess I'd better stay." He patted the couch. "This'll do fine."

"You're really going to stay?"

"I can't do much protecting from the end of the hall."

"Well, I guess it's all right. I won't let you sleep on the couch, though, with two beds in the other room."

"You sure?"