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"But it wasn’t si?"

Her face blushed so hard I thought she’d catch on fire "They were in balloons You know, so they wouldn’t show up on the sniff sensors at the ht before and was supposed to … pass them, clean theht about the realities of the balloon thing But logically, they wouldn’t decompose and could bend around the corners of the intestine Still … double e "Okay So you went to the mall, spotted the client, went to the bathrooht occurred to"Twin Palms"

My hand went to h or a scream Her face contorted with the same blend of e"

Another nod andtime My family, we can’t afford stores like that I’d never seen toilets that automatically flushed"

Crap Literally She’d passed the balloons and … swirlie city No s, no money, and … what? You ran? Did you explain or just run?"

She had to blow her nose before responding "I ran Manuel, he went to see Jorge He’d worked with hiive me a chance He tried to explain, convince him we’d pay back the money But the … bastard wouldn’t listen" Her voice went harsh and was painful to hear "He shot my brother and dumped the body in front of our house with a note pinned to his chest"

Sohed "And you’re next" She nodded, her lower lip tre to die The Viper was known for being relentless when pissed I couldn’t be with her every ht noas targeting her personally Unlike the Italian Mafia bosses, instead of trusting underlings with the dirty work, he liked to keep his hands bloody But if he didn’t get her hiet bored and simply put out a contract on her Then there would be dozens, if not hundreds, of people after her And she would die

"When did this happen? When did your brother die?"

The heartbreak on her face was hard to watch "Two days ago That’s when I came to see Mr Ron He’d helped ht maybe--"

But Ron was a real estate attorney, not a criminal one And even a criminal attorney couldn’t do much except convince Maria to do as first on my mind, too "Have you called the police? Told them what you know about the Viper?"

She shook her head, slowly at first and then quicker as if trying to shake the very idea out of hershe’d considered it Maybe even to the point of dialing the phone "No I can’t The police are afraid of him They never come to that side of town He’ll kill them, too, and they know it"

I tried never to think ill of the police in the city They did an a job But I had to admit that there were more reports of violence on Federal Boulevard than there were reports of arrests and convictions Either Encarcion was really talented at concealing evidence of his cri it was talent over fear Which could make my life very, very short if I took this job "Is there anywhere you could stay for a while? Somewhere out of town?" It was not as ue, which said she wasn’t too brave for her own good "I have an aunt in Iowa So you’re saying there’s no hope? What about Mama and Papa?"

"There’s always hope" I believed that and tried to convince Maria with my face and body "If you’d been more than just aimportant that could be traded to the authorities for protection…" I let the sentence hang, praying she hadn’t come completely clean

She stared at my Rolodex and nibbled on her lower lip I watched her anxiously I wanted so ht future that orth her brother’s sacrifice "I know Jorge will be at Sht to pick up a load of cocaine from South America He plans to kill the captain and sink the boat so he doesn’t have to pay for it"

Whoa I’d expectedfor a favor on But this … "Are you certain? How do you know?"

She shrugged and looked e the balloons I think he thought I’d left when he was telling his lieutenant But his girlfriend was nice She stayed in the bathrooging"

That was nothing to get e, too But okay This was big It was in the future and it was actionable But who to call?