"Hennessey, Mike - Dan Healey - The Screwdriver Solution" - читать интересную книгу автора (Hennessey Mike)

"Geez, Mac, you're not going to send me in naked?"

He pointed to my stomach. "I notice you're not missing too many meals. That extra padding will absorb a lot of fire power."

"Added muscle," I said, flexing just to show him.

"Wow," he said. "Donut muscle. Ready?"

I nodded and he picked up the phone and went through his drill. I could hear and feel the anger in Lester's voice, then Mac soothing him, chilling him out.

"He'll be here any minute," Mac was saying. "Don't hurt the boy."

The voice on the other end of the phone was strident, demanding. Mac was good at this work. I'd seen him once talk a man holed up with enough food and ammunition to last a week right out onto the street empty-handed in only two hours. I'd teased him that he'd bored the poor guy into surrender, but I knew the value of what he did.

"Any hope you can talk him out?" I asked when he broke the connection.

"Not Shorty Lester. Not this time. He'll bargain, but what he wants we'll never give him. And he knows it."

"Well then," I said. "Come on, let's go."

"Wait."

"He'll hurt the boy."

"He knows the boy's his ticket out. He won't hurt him. Let him wait a bit. I want him nervous."

"If he's as nervous as me he's cleaning himself up already."

"You look about as nervous as an old farm horse. You'll be fine."

I'm always cynical about the confidence of those not at the sharp end. "Easy enough for you," I said.

Mac studied me. "You think so, Dan? Really?

"No," I admitted. "I'm just letting off steam."

"I know," he said and looked at his watch. "Okay, everyone," he said, a little louder. "It's showtime, folks."

He picked up the phone and spoke heartily. "What'd I tell you, Shorty? We got an electrician here, and he's on his way in."

The phone squawked.

"No," Mac said. "He's not one of my men. He's a real electrician. Here he comes."

He gave me a shove out into the darkness. "Go get him," he muttered.

I shone the flashlight ahead of me as I walked up the path, feeling there was a great big bullseye on my chest. The smell of early fall was in my nostrils, leaves and grass from a remembered past, certainly not from the asphalt surroundings, and I breathed deeply. But I'd never felt more alive, more eager. I didn't even try to understand it.

I stopped at the door and called out, "Is the door unlocked?" trying for the right note of nervousness. Trying? Hah!