“SO: HAVE YOU finally got this arrest plan sussed out, Fearless Team Leader?” McDonough said, fingering through the papers covering the desk.

“Just finishing up,” I said. “I was working on an ass-covering rider at the end in case the Sun King doesn’t stick to the script. How does this sound? ‘If necessary, we will immediately alter from the original plan and effect as safely as possible the arrest as referred to herein.’”

“That’s good,” McDonough said, squinting up at the ceiling tiles. “But also add something like, ‘We will neutralize the adversary in the quickest, most effective, most efficient, and safest manner that presents itself at that point in time.’”

I shook my head as I typed it into my Toshiba.

“I like it, Church Boy,” I said. “If that’s not some prime slinging, I don’t know what is. You’re actually not completely witless, which is saying something for a guy who went to Fordham.”

Having gone to Manhattan College, I couldn’t let a chance to get a dig in on any graduate of Manhattan’s rival, Fordham-the Bronx’s other Catholic college-slip by.

McDonough shrugged his broad shoulders.

“I wanted to go to Manhattan College like you, Mike, but it was so small I couldn’t find it. And silly me, I looked for it in Manhattan, when all along it was inexplicably hidden in the Bronx,” he said. “But, my impeccable Jesuit training has got nothing to do with slinging it. I’m a DEA agent, baby. I have a BA in BS.”

“A bachelor’s degree in bullshit? You must have gotten a four-point-oh,” I said as I continued typing.

“This is true,” McDonough said, closing his eyes and leaning his broad-shouldered bulk back in the office chair until he was almost horizontal. “And yet somehow I find myself unable to hold a candle to your law enforcement prowess. Seriously, bro, I’ve tagged along on some of these rides, and this is as major-league as it comes. This is one world-class bag of shit we’re about to grab, and to think it’s all because of little old you.”