"It's only for a couple of days," Steve went on. "We'll both be okay if we just stick together."

"Right," I said, and kissed him harder than I ever had.

Five minutes later, my heart and my head still at war with each other, I was alone in the virtually empty park with my brand-new best friend. Watching Steve's Jeep blend into the smoggy haze of the avenue made me feel like half of me had just disappeared into another dimension.

"So that's that," I declared finally, turning back and taking a deep breath. I had to find Sarah before something else truly horrible happened to her. And the one thing I was de­termined to do was keep Steve as safely distant from my search as I could, even though it meant I was going to be terribly lonely for the next few days. "When can we leave?"

"Hey, get real." Dupre choked, whirling around. "We can't go today. Case you hadn't noticed, there's a storm coming. If you really want to go . . . and I mean really want to, then maybe in a day or so. Preferably when Steve—"

"I don't want to drag him into this," I said evenly. Truth­fully, I was sounding braver than I felt. But then I remem­bered once going down into the four-hundred-year-old sub­terranean harem quarters of the Red Fort in Agra, seemingly miles underground and pitch black, with nothing but a flash­light, surrounded by screaming bats and knee-deep in guano, for no better reason than I was determined to see how the women there once lived. So how much scarier could this be?

"Well, I say no way," Dupre told me. "Not today. Correc­tion, make that no fucking way." He had removed his aviator shades and was cleaning them with a dirty hanky. "Besides, I don't think you have any business going up there in the first place. If you're not scared shitless, you ought to be."

"Alan, I think you 're the one who's afraid to go."

He almost reached for another cigarette, but then stopped himself. "I will definitely plead guilty to a deep-seated dis­quiet about the people who rule this placid paradise. But if it'll square things with Steve, then I'll take you up to have a quick look, for my sins. But it's got to be after the weather clears."

I finally realized he was already thinking about his next loan. Steve, beware.