The Night Crew

'Yeah. Be careful.'

Life in Venice was getting better, but there'd been some tough times; still were. Their version of the Neighborhood Watch was a little heavier-duty than most, knowing that the cops would always take a while to get there. Jim would start a calling tree, which would branch out over the surrounding two blocks, and in five minutes there'd be people all over the street.

But she had to get through the five minutes.

A

Quietly. Like somebody had put pressure against it to crack it, and then tried to pick out the piecesbut at least one piece had fallen onto the kitchen floor.

Damn them. They'd hurt her house.

A

At the bottom of the stairs, A

Even if the posse arrived in the next couple of minutes, she didn't want to be trapped inside the house with some crack-smoked goof. She bunched herself in the arch, eight feet from the door. The hand with the light disappeared, and then, in the near darkness, she saw another movement. He was reaching far inside, trying to get to the deadbolt. She waited until the hand was at the door, then launched herself across the room, one big step with the whacker already swinging, and Whack!

Hit too high, and caught the window frame and the arm at the same time. And as she swung, she screamed, 'Get out!' and raised the whacker again, but the man outside groaned and jerked his arm back through the window, tearing out more glass.

She heard him stop once heavily on the porch, a ru

A

A

Pak Hee Chung, the Korean businessman from across the street, ran out of the front of his house carrying a shotgun, saw A

The man in black, now thirty yards away, spun, crouched. A

'Gun,' A

Hobie ran out of the house behind her and shouted, 'Get out of the way.'

A

Pak was on his feet again, ru

Like her dad's twelve-gauge, A

Then Hobie was there, next to her in his pajamas, fumbling shells into a revolver. 'Goddamn,' he said excitedly, 'I just shot the shit out of Logan 's garage. Don't tell them it was me, huh? Let them think it was the asshole, Logan 'd like that any way.'

'Yeah.'

Pak ran back, still carrying the shotgun: 'Everybody okay?'

'What happened to the guy?' A

'I don't know. Everybody was shooting, nobody got hit. Bet we scared the shit out of him, huh?' He looked back up the street and suddenly laughed wildly, a long scary cackle, and Hobie and A

Then three more men were ru

'Who's that?' the rifleman shouted.

'Pak and Hobie and A

'Everybody okay?'

'Yeah.'

'He came back that wayyou see him? He's stuck down Li

'Didn't see him this way.'

'Get the guys up here, get the guys up here.'

'Better get off the street,' Pak said. 'A

'Be careful,' A

Pak said, 'You're okay with me,' and jacked another shell into the shot gun and gri

Hobie was standing behind Pak and he winked at A

By the time A

'Like smoke,' Pak said. 'Must've swum the canal.'

When the last house was checked, they gathered at Pak's, wallowing in the scent of testosterone. Pak started a stream of instant coffee coming out of the microwave, and Pop-Tarts from the toaster; Logan, the old Vietnam vet, was saying, 'Like this night in fuckin' Dong Ha, man, pop-pop-pop a fuckin' firefight in the front yard, my garage is all shot to shit.'

He didseem pleased, A

The debriefingpartyat Pak's lasted an hour, and everybody went to look at the broken glass on A

'Pretty much good as new,' he said, as his wife rolled her eyes at A

'Good until I get it fixed,' A

As the party broke up, Logan said to someone else, as he walked away from A

Not then.