It was only half a smile, but with that mouth and that lipstick, it would have got a rise out of an archbishop.

Cotton candy had nothing on the sound of her voice. “Isn’t there some other arrangement we can make?”

I grinned, sighed. “If it was just me…”

Then she shoved me, hard, and her fella shoved Messina, and they both took off, down the midway, bulldozing fairgoers aside (“Hey!”), and rounding the corner down another sawdust pathway.

I was on my ass; Messina hadn’t gone down-buildings don’t topple, just ’cause you shove them.

He helped me up. Apparently he wasn’t holding a grudge.

“What now?” he asked thickly.

“We go after them, you lamebrain!”

And I was running. Messina, huffing and puffing like a steam-engine train, was bringing up the rear.

“I’ll take the girl!” I yelled.

“I’ll take the boy!”

What a fucking imbecile.

She was faster than her boyfriend, but I was faster than both of them, and I brought her down with a flying tackle that sent us tumbling onto the grass under the shadow of a Ferris wheel. It was fun, for a while. She was a sweet-smelling bundle of blonde hair and soft curves and silky-stockinged legs, but when a little hard fist went flying toward my nuts, I gave her the side of my leg to hit, and slapped her, once, hard.

The boy was still running.

Messina had stopped, and was standing there, bent over, hands on his thighs, trying to catch his breath; muscular as he was, the beer belly had stopped him.

“Get him!” I yelled.

And then Messina did something that damn near made me dirty my drawers.

He drew that pearl-handled revolver from its holster.

I was hauling the bundle of pretty pickpocket to her feet, and getting to mine, when I called, “No…”