As Lucky sat in her booth at the Mermaid and listened to the news, she realized there was only one option left for her. She left her money on the table, exited the still swinging door, and hailed a cab out on the street.

As the cab neared 7th, she began to grow more nervous. The cab pulled to the curb, and she saw the light in the office window above. "Drive around the block once, would ya?" she asked the driver. By the third trip around the block, the cab driver was looking in his rear-view at her, and she relented. "Okay, here's good." she said, and got out of the cab.

Shaking, she walked up the stairs and down the hall to the office door. The peeling letters on the glass spelled out the same "Blake Madison- Private Detective", but she knew things were not the same, and maybe they never would be. She knocked, and getting no answer, knocked again. Finally she spoke, "Dammit, Madison, I know you are in there. I can smell that cheap whiskey from here. Open up the gawdamn door."

When he opened the door, even with the obvious relief washing over his face, she still wished from the look of him that she'd had just stayed dead.
"Nance? Is it really you?" Lucky nodded and stepped inside the office, and inside the circle of Blake's arms. "I wasn't sure, that night in the hospital, and then all the news and legal proceedings, I thought I had just imagined it all.." he let her go, then stepped back to look at her again.
"Blake, they've killed Theet and Marshall. This has to stop." Lucky said. "I'm not sure about much, but I think I at least know how to save our asses."
"And Condolezza? Afteh?"
"Fuck'em." Lucky said "This has gotten to be about as much fun as a sack full of spider monkeys in a meth lab. It's either you and me, or it's just me. Take your pick, but I'm not waiting around to be on that slab for real."

They got into the waiting cab, the driver still looking in the rear-view. He was already wishing like hell he'd left this crazy woman waving on the sidewalk, now she drags along a bum in a cheap suit? "Where to?" he asked
"1890 Monticello" said Lucky

It was nearly midnight when the cab pulled in the long circular drive. The porch lights were on, but the house was dark. Lucky and Blake got out of the cab and waved the driver off before going to the door. Lucky peered in the downstairs windows while Blake pounded on the door. A few minutes later, a light went on upstairs, and a few moments after that, a large man in a silk dressing gown answered the door.
"What the hell is going on here?" asked the man
"Judge Ellow," Lucky pushed her way onto the porch, "My name is Lucky Day."

The three sat in the judge's office, each nursing a scotch, and each really not believing what they were hearing from the others.
"Well," spoke Ellow, "You make sense," he nodded to Blake, "A simple security job for an entertainer, I can understand that. But you," he turned his gaze to Lucky, "Why in the world is there a murder case in my courtroom for a woman who is not dead?"
Lucky set her drink down, and cradled Blake's injured hand in her own. "The nearest we can figure, as strange as it sounds, is this: We're all being duped. Condolezza might have thought she 'was' having me killed, but she's not exactly the swiftest horse in the herd. Someone wanted that bug put in her ear. Sure, at first we thought Theet, but he's dead now too, and the only guy who could possibly answer me as to why, well, he's dead as well. On the one hand, we have these anonymous corporate backers that seemed to be pumping money into both Condolezza, and into oil. Then we have government agencies that don't seem to know what they want. At first it seemed like my 'death' would be something to clear up the case, but they were just using me to nail Condolezza. Why? Maybe they wanted the oil for themselves, maybe they wanted Condolezza's next album to be 'the Herone's Hits From Alcatraz'. I dunno, and I don't care, the whole thing is your typical governmental clusterfuck, and all I can tell you is that she didn't kill me, I'm not dead."

Judge Ellow stared at Lucky. "Seems to be grounds enough for mistrial...except for one small problem, Condolezza Schwartz escaped from the county jail this afternoon."
"No offense sir, but that sounds like your problem, and not ours." said Lucky. "I just want it to be clear that the charges against her were a crock. How you choose to proceed is your own business. I'm, that is we're, going home."

The jet touched island soil just as the sun was coming over the horizon. Lucky and Blake had dozed the entire trip, and the initial pull of rubber on asphalt tugged them both out of sleep and into morning. They walked the short distance from the airport to a broken-down little bar on the beach. The hand painted sign said "Lucky's", and Blake gave her a questioning glance that she shrugged off as she climbed the stairs to the apartment above. "We can talk about it later, Mr Spade, we don't have a thing now but time."