Vin Stone decided to take a diiferent route home from the baseball game that night and discovered a side of the city that was completely new to him. Normally he walked with his friend Boe, on bright, familiar streets, but on this night he felt like he needed a change. He got a change, but it wasn't anything like what he expected. Gunshots on dark, misty streets. Punks on streetcorners. Homeless in an alley. Maybe he should have walked with Boe.
Vin was a good walker. Thirty or forty blocks were nothing to him. When he was in the zone, he could catch all the traffic lights without breaking stride. He knew the city well and had an instinctive sense of how long it would take him to walk to any client. If they were outside a reasonable walking distance, they wouldn't become his client. They could find another accountant.
He knew the city well, but he didn't know this part of it. It wasn't the sort of place where clients of his would be, so he had no reason to come down here. It was run-down, and on this damp night, it was dark. Long before he would get home, he would learn a few reasons to not come this way again, especially in the dark.
