Page 10 of Wild Oblivion

He did indeed.

"The next one won't be so benign. You have 24 hours to find and disable it. If I were you, I wouldn't dillydally.”

"Where should I look?"

"It's a small island. I'm sure a man of your experience can find the device. If not, I will have overestimated your abilities.”

"I need some kind of clue. This is a game after all, isn't it?"

“It’s under your nose, but not in plain sight, hidden inside the town’s best delight. Deep, thick, or thin, it all just depends, authentic and true, it never pretends.”

I let the words soak into my brain, processing everything. "Is that it? Is that all I get?”

"You have 24 hours, Deputy. Starting now.”

6

Itold JD and the sheriff, then called Isabella and asked her to track the call.

"I'll see what I can do," she said before hanging up. She sounded busy.

I had no doubt the caller had gone to great lengths to hide the origin of the call. Nobody would be stupid enough to call me directly from a cell phone without routing it through the Internet, using a VPN and multiple proxy servers.

"Deep, Thick, or Thin," Jack said. "Isn't that the name of an adult film?"

"It's pizza, you pervert," the sheriff grumbled.

Jack frowned at him.

“Big Tony’s,” I said.

My next call was to Tony Scarpetti. He was a reformed gangster who ran a high-stakes poker game at the SevenSeas on Friday and Saturday nights. He also owned a couple of the best restaurants in town.Anthony'swas upscale Italian, andBig Tony’swas authentic New York pie. You could get a whole pizza or by the slice. It never disappointed.

"You need to clear the pizza joint," I said to Tony after he answered.

"What!?"

"I don't want to cause panic, but there's been a bomb threat.”

He scoffed. "Who'd be stupid enough to do that?”

He had a point. Tony Scarpetti was not a guy you wanted to mess with. He may have been areformedgangster, but he still had a lot of contacts. One phone call, and you’d find yourself at the bottom of the ocean. I had no doubt about that.

Tony was one of those beloved figures. It didn't matter what he did, you couldn't stay mad at the guy. He was loyal to a fault, and he took care of his people. JD and I had gotten his daughter out of a bad situation once, and ever since then, we were family.

I told him we were on the way, and he said he’d get all the patrons and employees out of the restaurant.

By the time we got over there, Tony had the place evacuated. Patrons stood on the sidewalk across the street, still munching on slices of cheesy goodness.

Tony didn’t look happy.

Lights flickered and flashed as patrol cars screeched onto the scene. Deputies hopped out and cleared the perimeter,keeping onlookers at a safe distance. Without knowing how powerful the bomb was, asafe distancewas just an estimate.

The bomb squad arrived, and news crews followed.

Resources were stretched thin as it was. The department struggled to manage multiple simultaneous events.

Jack parked the Porsche. We hopped out and found Tony.