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table.”
    I looked around. It wasn’t true. In fact, the place was emptying out. I wanted to say, “They must have tasted your food and gone to McDonald’s,” but I swallowed that down.
Be cool, Tom. You don’t have your grease gun or your climate-simulator rods to back you up.
I could have probably created a little air storm and knocked him on his butt, but then what? I’d have to run for it. Ruin my stakeout.
    I tried to get into his mind. It was a mess. He was annoyed at having to wear the red clown nose. He thought he looked stupid. I imagined him thinking,
Is this what I went to school for, to wear this stupid nose and deal with creeps like this little kid?
    Could I really be tuning this in? Or was I just imagining it?
    Either way, I felt a little bad for him.
    â€œI’m sorry, sir,” I said. I tried hard to look sorry but wasn’t sure I was doing it. I didn’t feel that sorry. “I’m waiting before my
. . .
violin lesson.”
    He glanced at my violin case, and I could sense his mind shifting. So I tried to put a thought into his head: They make me take the lessons. I hate ’em.
    I imagined his thought:
Give the kid a break. He has problems too.
    â€œOkay. We get more customers and you gotta move.”
    â€œThanks.” I smiled at him.
    He smiled back.
    I felt a surge of good feelings. We were both happy and I had gotten what I’d wanted. By being nice! That was a strange new feeling for me. But something didn’t feel right. And then it hit me: being nice was so Eddie.
You’re supposed to be bad,
I told myself.
Hey, man, sometimes being nice can be bad, especially if you’re not sincere.
    I focused back on the house across the street. The Burger Clown manager put a soda in front of me but I never got to drink it. I thought I heard Ronnie’s high voice screaming.
    Across the street, two construction workers in white hardhats and work boots were carrying a long metal pipe. They stopped in front of the house. They heard the screaming too. They looked at each other, then back at the house. They were wondering what to do. I could hear them wondering!
    I created a thought and imagined it as a laser beam splitting just before it entered their heads, right through their hardhats.
    Throw that javelin through the window and save the screaming kid.
    The men hoisted the pipe, turned, and hurled it right at the picture window. It shattered the glass.
    The tall, vicious dogs jumped the fence and ran away. The construction workers looked at each other, then ran away too.
    By the time I got across the street to the house, Ronnie and Buddy had leaped through the broken window and were racing toward me.

Nineteen
    TOM
    SOMEWHERE IN NEW JERSEY
    2012
    Â 
    â€œE DDIE !” Ronnie yelled at me. “I knew you’d find me.”
    â€œSorry to disappoint you,” I said. “Follow me.”
    â€œOh. Tom.” He did sound disappointed.
    He followed me around the house to the driveway. I opened the door of the first black SUV. Just as I figured, the keys were under the mat. I had read about this on a secret website for carjackers. Cops want their keys handy for quick getaways but not too handy, such as in the ignition.
    â€œYou drive,” I told Ronnie. “Like you did when you busted us out of the insane asylum last year.”
    I ran to the second SUV, found its keys, and pitched them into the bushes. That would block the third car and give us a few extra minutes.
    By the time I got back to the first car, guys in suits were running out the door, guns drawn. But Ronnie had the motor running and the police radio on. He was kneeling on the front seat. He still couldn’t see over the wheel and reach the pedals at the same time. Buddy was taking up the passenger seat, growling, just daring me to push him off. Ronnie lifted one of his floppy ears and whispered something. The dog gave me a dirty look and went into the back. I