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“I don’t have a minute, you idiot,” Honcho said, going into his pocket and slapping a knot of hundreds into her hand as the wide-eyed white guard watched. “Pick out whatever, OK? I need to be in a cab. If I keep my boss waiting any longer, he’ll cut my dick off. I’ll call you later.”
“No, you must come,” lliana said as she stamped a Louboutin. “How can I pick out my engagement ring by myself?”
“But isn’t it bad luck?” Honcho said.
“No, that’s just the dress, you moron. C’mon,” she said, pulling him inside.
Honcho avoided the gaze of the intense guard as a vampire-pale redheaded female clerk stepped up to them. She reminded Honcho of the curvy carrottop from Mad Men, only instead of being plus-size, she had cheekbones you could chop lines of coke with.
“Hello, I’m Rebecca. May I help you?” the clerk said.
“We want to see some diamonds,” Iliana said.
“Well, you’ve come to the right place,” the clerk was beginning to say, when suddenly all hell broke loose by the front door behind them.
“FBI!” someone screamed. “FBI! You with the blonde! Hands up now if you don’t want to die!”
Honcho stiffened and began turning around slowly. He caught a glimpse of two men wearing navy Windbreakers and bulletpro
of vests with badges around their necks. They were standing in the jewelry store’s open doorway, guns drawn.
“Hands!” one of the FBI agents said. “Don’t move! Don’t you move!”
Honcho ignored him and dropped down on his knees, digging into the Kate Spade bag for his Beretta. The gunshot that followed was deafening in the tight interior of the store. Honcho fell facedown on the carpet.
Over the next thirty seconds, it was hard to tell who was screaming more loudly, Iliana or the redheaded clerk.
“Oh, man. I think you got him,” Honcho heard as the intense guard, Galarza, was suddenly kneeling over him.
“You wish!” Honcho said, rolling over and pressing the Beretta to the guy’s chin.
As Honcho stood, the two “FBI agents,” Beast and Slick, already had the door closed and their guns trained on Tenero and the other male clerk.
Iliana took her own piece out of the bag and placed it between the redheaded clerk’s wide green eyes.
“Keys to the front, now!” Iliana screamed as Slick slipped the bolt closed on the door.
CHAPTER 68
I WAS HEADED TO the squad room when I heard it. I was stopped at a red light on Broadway and Great Jones Street in the Village when the cruiser’s radio suddenly blew up with about fifteen staccato calls.
I listened intently. Someone had just pulled the silent alarm at Wooster Fine Diamonds on Prince and Wooster!
“That’s five blocks away!” I yelled at myself as I hit the siren and peeled out through the intersection and then pinned it south down Broadway.
“We are on foot pursuit. Caucasian male running east on Prince. No, scratch that. North on Mott! North on Mott!” said the radio as I ran another red light.
I shrieked through the next red light at Houston, almost running over a muscular bike messenger in the intersection before flooring it east to Mott Street. Just as I arrived, a lean white guy with a bulging backpack shot gazellelike straight across all four lanes of Houston and continued north on Elizabeth.
I raced up and shrieked left onto Elizabeth straight after him, staring at his blue backpack as he ran along the sidewalk on the west side of the street.
And almost slammed head-on into the back of a parallel-parking moving van!
I added my horn to the shrieking siren to move the van, but to no avail.
“Screw it,” I said, popping the door and leaving the cruiser stopped dead in the middle of the street as I took off on foot.
My new wing tips were starting to cut the hell out of my feet when the guy reached the end of Elizabeth and went left onto Bleecker. When I got to the corner, I could see that the suspect was all the way west near the corner of Lafayette, where Con Ed had a manhole open.
