“Abso-”

“We’ll take your car,” Frank says to Mouse Junior. No sense in burning upmy gas, he thinks, the prices at the pump these days.

Even in the rain, Frank loves the view of San Diego from the harbor.

The lights from the tall downtown buildings reflect red and green on the water, and on the horizon, the Coronado Bay Bridge’s lights shine in the night sky like the diamonds of a necklace on an elegant woman’s neck.

The rain just makes everything sparkle all the more.

He loves this city.

Always has.

They have no trouble finding a parking spot, or the slip where Vena’s cabin cruiser is docked. Walking down the floating dock, Frank reminds them, “Remember, leave everything to me.”

“But we could help,” Mouse Junior says.

“If anything goes down,” Travis clarifies.

“Don’t help me,” Frank says.

Where do they learn to talk like this? The movies, I guess, or television. Anyway, the only thing that’s going to “go down” is Vena’s percentage, which will drop an automatic ten points just by virtue of me being there. He knows what Vena’s move will be-try to get Frank alone and tell him that if he makes Mouse Junior give up forty points, he’ll cut Frank in for five.

And I’ll turn the offer down because it’s a boss’s kid, which Vince will understand; then we’ll get down to the realhondeling. Another word Herbie taught me, God rest.

He finds the boat, theBecky Lynn. The name tells the story-two guys finally get their wives’ permission to buy a boat together and name it after both wives so they don’t get jealous. Not of each other, of the boat.

Which never works, Frank thinks.

Women and boats mix like…

Women and boats.

He steps down off the dock onto the afterdeck. The cabin is all shut up against the rain, but the lights are on and Frank can hear music inside.