Oh, no. No, Lord, please don’t let her be there when I turn around.

Mac peeked over his shoulder, and…sure as shit…there she was, pointing a snub-nosed revolver straight at Pennyworth and looking like one of Charlie’s Angels as she advanced into the room.

“Goddamnit, Eve!” Bill roared, and Mac winced as the words echoed around the space, bouncing off the wood-paneled walls and against all the clutter. “I told you to stay in the vehicle!”

“Yes,” she barely spared him a glance, keeping her eyes and her weapon trained on Pennyworth like maybe the pudgy guy was about to perform some sort of magic trick that would miraculously make Mac and Bill’s weapons disappear. It was quite funny when Mac thought about it. Although…he cocked his head…she was handling that snubbie like a pro. “And I’ve decided,” she licked her lips, stepping over the feet of a life-sized Captain America doll as she continued to move toward them, “ to stop doing everything people tell me to do.”

“Well, you picked a hell of a time to start that!” Bill shouted, and Mac worried the dude might burst an aneurism. “Jesus! Put down the gun before you accidently shoot me or Mac.”

“Or me,” Pennyworth added, his Adam’s apple bobbing beneath his double chin.

“Oh, for Pete’s sake!” Eve stomped her foot. “I know what I’m doing, so will you just…” she made a little waving motion with the revolver, “get on with it?”

Bill hesitated, his jaw ticking. Then he rolled his eyes and turned his attention back to Pennyworth. “Okay, Dale,” he sneered the man’s name. “I’m going to ask you a series of questions. If you don’t answer them honestly, I’ll end you. If you try anything funny, I’ll end you. If you so much as twitch in Eve’s direction, I’ll end you. And lest you think I’m bluffing, let me first inform you that I did two tours in Iraq and three in Afghanistan. I killed and maimed my enemies, and I did it all with a song in my heart. So rest assured, I have no problem pulling this trigger and turning your greasy head into nothing more than spatter patterns.”

And holy crow! After that little speech even Mac was ready to spill his guts. He glanced over to find Eve blinking rapidly and gaping at Bill. Pennyworth just swallowed, nodding eagerly.

“That’s good,” Bill smiled, but the gesture didn’t reach his eyes. His eyes said he was tempted to beat the information from the man like candy from a piñata. “Now, you want to tell us where you were the night of August 28th?”

“You mean the night Eve’s apartment caught fire?” Pennyworth asked, his gaze not on Bill, but on Eve, a deep frown making his chubby face wrinkle like a Shar Pei’s.

“That’s the one,” Bill confirmed, the promise of slow death in his tone.

“I’m sorry I wasn’t there, Eve,” Pennyworth’s eyes were pleading. “I was away at a comic book conference, but if I’d been here, I would’ve—”

“You weren’t in the city that night?” Bill cut him off.

“No,” Pennyworth shook his head. “I was in Detroit, but I—”

“Do you have proof?”

“I—” Pennyworth made a face then pointed toward the messy coffee table. “I think I still have my Amtrak ticket and my hotel receipt. But I don’t understand…Wh-what is this all about?”

“Hey, partner,” Bill motioned with his chin toward the papers strewn across the coffee table, “see if our odiferous friend here is telling the truth, will you?”

“On it,” Mac said, grabbing the pen lying on top of the mess—no way was he touching anything in this place with his bare hands—in order to dig through the various documents and trash that passed as Pennyworth’s filing system. Ten years as a federal agent had given him a bullshit gauge that was damn near unerring. And right now the thing was pointing firmly in the green. Then his instincts were proved correct when he located the railway stub right before he found the receipt for the MGM Grand Hotel in downtown Detroit. He squinted at the dates. “He’s not lying.” He shook his head at Bill. “He was in the Motor City the night the fire was set.”

“Wait a second,” Pennyworth said. “I thought the blaze was an accident. I thought—”

“Thoughts?” Bill raised an eyebrow, ignoring Pennyworth.

Mac shook his head and voiced four words Bill didn’t want to hear, “He’s not our guy.”

“Then what the hell was he doing stalking that pretty little nurse?”

“I wasn’t stalking her,” Dale insisted with a whine. “Why does everyone always think that? I was just making sure she made it to the bus stop all right. This isn’t the best neighborhood, you know?”

Bill glanced down at the man’s perspiring face, looking as if he was trying to see the truth in his words. He must’ve found whatever he was looking for because he blew out a frustrated breath before holstering his weapon. Digging into his hip pocket, he pulled out a wad of hundred dollar bills and thumbed off a couple of Benjamins.

“For getting your door fixed,” he told Pennyworth, dropping the bills on the overflowing coffee table. But when Pennyworth pushed into a seated position, Bill slapped a hand on the man’s shoulder and shoved him back in the recliner, leaning down until they were nose-to-nose.

Lord almighty, dude, you better hold your breath, Mac thought.

“I don’t want to hear about you following Eve anymore, you got me?” Bill growled. “If I do, I’m going to come back here to plant a boot in your ass and a fist in your teeth.”

“I-I won’t,” Pennyworth breathed, and Mac wrinkled his nose, wondering how Bill could stand being so close to the man. “I thought she needed my protection. She seemed so fragile, so…” Pennyworth’s eyes rolled toward Eve who continued to draw down on him, somehow despite her frilly blouse, managing to look tougher than a one-eared alley cat. “But she’s not. I can see that now. She doesn’t need my guardianship.”

“Guardianship?” Bill straightened, eyes narrowed at Pennyworth.

In response, the man pointed at his weird body suit then toward the corner of the room where a rubber face mask that resembled Batman’s without the pointy ears sat on a wire rack. “That’s what I call myself when I patrol the streets at night.”

“Jesus Christ,” Bill shook his head like a dog shaking off water. Then he dragged in a breath like he was praying for patience…or maybe just perseverance…and slowly spread his lips in a smile that Mac figured was supposed to put Pennyworth at ease. Unfortunately, in Mac’s opinion, all those white, shiny teeth just looked feral. Pennyworth must’ve agreed with his assessment, because the man shrank farther into his recliner. “I’m going to give you some free advice,” Bill told Pennyworth. “You going to listen to what I have to say?”

Pennyworth hesitated then vehemently nodded.

“What you’re doing, your intentions are good,” Bill stressed. “Misguided, but good.”

Pennyworth sat up a little straighter, his chest puffing out with hope and maybe a touch of pride.

Then Bill’s next words deflated him quicker than a tire punctured by a five-inch nail. “But you’re liable to get yourself and these women you think you’re protecting killed.”

“But, I—”

“No.” Bill held up his hand. “No buts. You don’t have the training or the physical stamina to fight off an attacker if one were to actually go after any of these women. If you tried, you’d undoubtedly just make a bad situation worse. You want to be a real superhero?”

Again Pennyworth nodded.

“Then lose some weight. Take some defense classes. And volunteer at a shelter for abused women.”

Pennyworth recoiled, frowning fiercely. “But I want to wear the suit,” he pointed down at his ridiculous outfit. “And I want to—”

Bill cut him off by shaking his head exasperatedly, turning to Mac and saying, “I tried.”

“I know you did,” Mac replied, fighting a smile.

“Now let’s get the hell out of here before I sock him one just for being a smelly moron.”

Mac rolled in his lips, nodding for Eve to precede them out the front door. He’d just stepped over the threshold when he heard Bill add, “And if I were you, Dale, I wouldn’t waste my time calling this in and reporting it. Not only am I best buds with some pretty powerful folks in the police department, but I also have a clean record. The same can’t be said for you. So let’s not get into a your-word-against-my word thing, huh?”

“N-no,” Mac heard Pennyworth sputter. “O-of course not.”

Tromping down the stairs and piling into the Hummer took barely a minute, but the three of them were silent for a long time after Bill cranked over the big engine and put the vehicle in gear. Then, finally, while stopped a red light, Bill muttered, “For shit’s sake, is it just me, or is that guy more than a French fry or two short of a McDonald’s Happy Meal?”

And Mac couldn’t hold it in any longer. He started laughing so hard he had to grab his stomach. “No, no,” he shook his head when he could finally speak, wiping away a tear. “It’s not you. I have a feeling there’s a manifesto hidden somewhere in all his junk, but instead of rantings and ravings, it’s filled with stories of him roaming the streets of Chicago, saving helpless damsels in distress from imagined fiends.”

“It’s not funny,” Eve muttered from the back seat.

“Yeah,” Mac nodded. “It really is.”

“No, it’s not,” she insisted. “Because this means my would-be killer is still out there.”

And that sobered him instantly.

* * *

Black Knights Inc. Headquarters

10:24 p.m.

“What fresh hell is this?” Bill grumbled as he pulled up to BKI’s big iron gates only to find a Chicago Fox News van blocking the way.

Why in God’s name hadn’t Toran warned them of the waiting ambush so they could reenter the compound through the secret river tunnel? He glared at the man sitting in the guardhouse even though he knew Toran couldn’t see him through the Hummer’s tinted windows. And then it occurred to him…

He and Mac had set their phones to “silent” before following Delusional Dale down the block. Digging into his hip pocket, he yanked out his iPhone and…sure enough. He had three missed calls and two waiting text messages. All from Toran…

Can’t a guy catch one friggin’ break today! Is that too much to ask?

Apparently. Because Kristin Avery, Fox’s bottle-blond news reporter turned in their direction and began marching toward the Hummer with a microphone in hand and cameraman following close on her designer heels.

“I thought you said Samantha Tate gave up when she couldn’t convince you to have Eve come out and answer her questions,” Mac muttered, as Bill slammed a palm down on the Hummer’s horn. The loud hooonnnkkk didn’t do much in motivating the news van to move.

“I guess she was just gathering the troops,” he growled, suppressing the urge to jump out of the SUV and shove that microphone straight into Kristin Avery’s ear. Rolling down the window, he yelled at the approaching television reporter. “Get the hell out of the way! You can’t block entry to a place of residence!”

“I just have a few questions for Eve Edens!” Ms. Avery called breathlessly when she crossed the final few feet. She didn’t hesitate to stick the mic through the open window, angling it toward the back seat. “Bernard, can you get a shot?” she asked the bulky black behemoth who was her cameraman.

“Getting a partial,” Bernard responded, his camera lens jutting through the open window, barely an inch from Bill’s cheek.

Bill had never considered himself necessarily bloodthirsty—yes, he’d killed in the name of the flag and freedom, but, despite what he’d boasted to Dale, he’d taken no joy in it—but he would be surprised if the smile that spread across his lips at that moment didn’t come complete with a set of fangs.

“You better get that goddamned camera out of my face before I shove the entire thing up your ass,” he growled. And even though Bernard must’ve been used to threats in his line of work, his expression said he knew this particular warning wasn’t an idle one.

Kristin Avery missed it though, as she was too busy shouting questions at Eve. “Are you seeing one of the mechanics who works here, Miss Edens? Is there romance in the air? Or have all your recent misfortunes led you to seek the comfort of a place that boasts twenty-four-hour surveillance? And, if so, what does your father have to say about that?”

“No, no, no, and who the fuck cares what Patrick Edens thinks?” Bill answered for Eve as his ulcer began spewing acid. He ignored the urge to reach for his travel-sized bottle of Pepto. “She’s simply here visiting friends. Friends who are sick and tired of watching her get hounded by the motherfucking press at every motherfucking turn!”