The Second Life of Nick Mason (Nick Mason #1)(31)

He’d seen Sandoval sitting in his car a half hour ago, across the street from the town house. He’d just clocked him again in the restaurant parking lot. He knew he’d be walking through that door. Mason picked a table in the back corner, sat down so he was facing the door, and ordered a Goose Island.

He scanned the place while he waited, this restaurant where he was officially employed. It had once been a speakeasy, then they’d gutted the place and rebuilt it, leaving exposed brick on one wall. Another wall was dominated by the glassed-in wine tower, everything a contrast of old against modern, the natural cherry floors against the muted steel panels along the bar. There was a high cathedral ceiling, with pendant lights hanging from long braided cables. Red velvet upholstery on the chairs and in the booths, white tablecloths with votive candles. It all created an atmosphere of intimate sophistication. The windows overlooked Rush Street, where the streetlights were just starting to glow.

Mason knew this restaurant had to be a whole different world around lunchtime, with traders from the Chicago Stock Exchange, executives from the downtown banks, all walking up over the DuSable Bridge to sit at these tables, putting down their corporate credit cards and never thinking about the prices.

Right now, it looked like couples celebrating special occasions and some tourists out for a night on the town, maybe before catching a play at one of the theaters. There were a dozen high-end hotels within a few blocks of this place. Every concierge probably had Antonia’s near the top of his call list.

The kitchen opened right into the dining room, so Mason could see the long prep tables, the stoves and ovens and walk-in freezer. The waitstaff and the chefs were all moving together in a perfect choreography. Then finally, at the center of everything, he caught sight of Diana. This woman who seemed so reserved and self-contained at the town house. She was unleashed here in this kitchen, totally in control and directing every movement around her.

Mason smelled the steaks broiling on the open grill. He checked the menu again, saw the four different cooking options for rib eyes, aged twenty-eight to seventy-five days in the cellar with Himalayan rock salt. He thought back to the last meal he had eaten at Terre Haute. The gray mass they passed off as meat, with rice and vegetables and bread that somehow all tasted the same. A cup of water to wash it down.

From that world to this.

? ? ?

About two minutes later, Sandoval came in. He gave the place a quick scan and spotted Mason, came over and stood by the table for a moment. Then he sat down in the chair across from him.

“Remember me?”

Mason didn’t answer him. If his rule number three wasn’t enough—When in doubt, keep your mouth shut—the extra rule number ten was designed to hammer home the point—Never talk to a cop. Not one syllable.

The rule applied universally, no matter what the situation, guilty or innocent, to formal questioning or just shooting the breeze. Never say one f*cking word to a f*cking cop because talking to a cop gets you on the cop’s radar.

And once you’re on a cop’s radar, you will never get off.

“I arrested you,” Sandoval said. “Five years ago.”

Mason said nothing. Sandoval picked up Mason’s menu and started looking through it. “Looks like a nice place. Food any good? You do work here, right?”

Mason didn’t answer.

“Didn’t know you were in the restaurant business, Mason. Real high-end place, too.”

He looked at the menu again.

“Wow, fifty bucks for a steak,” he said. “That’s a little steep for a guy on a cop’s salary. Maybe on my anniversary.”

Sandoval leaned forward to take a closer look at Mason’s face.

“What happened to your face?”

Mason stayed silent.

“All right,” Sandoval said, putting down the menu. “You’re not a chatty guy, I get it. How ’bout I just talk and you listen?”

The waiter came and gave Mason his beer. He asked Sandoval if he’d like a drink. Sandoval said, “No, thank you.” The waiter left. Sandoval leaned forward on both elbows and looked Mason in the eye.

“Sean Wright,” Sandoval said. “You remember him? Name might have got mentioned at your trial once or twice. He was the DEA agent who got killed that night at the harbor. Most of the time, you know, cops and federal agents, working the same town, you butt heads sometimes. Whether it’s FBI, DEA, Homeland Security . . . they get in our way, we get in their way. Some of those guys are real jackasses, too. But here’s the thing, Mason. One of those guys goes down . . .”

He paused and shook his head.

“Now we’re the same,” he said. “Cops, agents, don’t matter. All the f*cking same. So my partner and me, we got to the harbor and they’re taking his body away. Wheeling him away with a sheet over him. They don’t want to leave a dead agent lying there in the road. But I saw the pictures later. Read the reports. Man didn’t even have his gun drawn. He gets out of the car and he’s already dead.”

Mason kept watching the man. He kept listening. He didn’t react in any way.

“I know there’s four of you in the trucks. Two trucks, two men each, one-in-four chance you pulled that trigger, right? One-in-four chance you gunned down a federal agent while you were running away. But you know it don’t matter. I don’t care. The law don’t care. You’re in the middle of a felony when he’s killed, so it’s felony murder. All four of you guys.”