The White Gold Score

A Daniel Faust Novella

by Craig Schaefer

Copyright © 2016 by Craig Schaefer.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, write to the publisher, addressed “Attention: Permissions Coordinator,” at the address below.

Craig Schaefer / Demimonde Books

2328 E. Lincoln Hwy, #238

New Lenox, IL 60451-9533

www.craigschaeferbooks.com

Publisher’s Note: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are a product of the author’s imagination. Locales and public names are sometimes used for atmospheric purposes. Any resemblance to actual people, living or dead, or to businesses, companies, events, institutions, or locales is completely coincidental.

Cover Design by James T. Egan of Bookfly Design LLC.

Author Photo ©2014 by Karen Forsythe Photography

Craig Schaefer / The White Gold Score — 1st ed.

ISBN 978-1-944806-00-2

Contents

The Daniel Faust Series

Introduction

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

6.

7.

8.

9.

10.

11.

12.

13.

14.

15.

16.

17.

18.

19.

20.

21.

22.

23.

24.

Afterword

1

The Daniel Faust Series

1. The Long Way Down

2. Redemption Song

3. The Living End

4. A Plain-Dealing Villain

5. The Killing Floor Blues

2

Three weeks passed between the events of The Long Way Down and Redemption Song. This is what happened.

1.

Greenbriar was the kind of guy who treated poisoning your food as a basic business-negotiation tactic. He was also the kind of guy who had watched The Princess Bride twenty-seven times and expected everybody else had too.

“Don’t you wanna switch bowls with me, Dan?” He couldn’t hide the worry on his pinched rat face.

We sat side by side at the glass-topped bar inside Umami, the Monaco’s latest foodie magnet. The little restaurant nestled right off the casino floor, done up in beechwood and bright orange lacquer. The theme was “Japanese street food meets gourmet fusion,” which was a nice way of charging seventeen bucks for a bowl of ramen. To be fair, this wasn’t the convenience store junk I’d bought ten for a dollar when I was a kid: the bartender brought us two steaming bowls piled with noodles and broth, cloudlike wisps of scrambled egg, and blood-drop constellations of Thai chili, topped off with a candy-bar-shaped chunk of fried pork belly.

“Do I wanna what?” I asked. I’d ordered a “road soda” on the side—gin, sake, and a tart splash of lemon—and two swallows had hit my brain like a warm, friendly bullet.

Greenbriar licked his wormy lips, his greased-back hair and scraggly mustache glimmering under the hot lights as he nodded at our bowls. “Switch,” he said. “You know, for your safety.”

I thought about it. Then I picked up a ladle-like spoon, fished up a dollop of steaming broth, and swallowed it down. Spicy, sweet, perfect.

“Nope,” I said.

Greenbriar looked at his own bowl, crestfallen. Then he waved over the bartender and shoved it his way.

“What the hell, man? This isn’t what I ordered. I said the shrimp ramen. Did I not say the shrimp ramen?”

The bartender hustled, picking up the bowl and scooting off with a muttered, “Sorry, Mr. Greenbriar.”

“That’s right,” he said to the man’s retreating back. “Show your boss some goddamn respect.”

I sipped my drink and ate my ramen. He was buying, after all. “Free” is my favorite style of cuisine.

“So, uh,” he said, “thanks for meeting with me. I got a…a job offer for you.”

I shrugged amiably. “One you’re going to pay cash for, I presume. Instead of offering me the antidote for whatever was in that bowl.”

“I got no idea what you’re talking about.”

“We’re playing pretend now? All right. I’ll be the cowboy, and you can be the magical pony princess.”

Greenbriar looked pained. He always looked pained—a pained, stunted rodent with a coal-black widow’s peak—but today, more than usual.

“It wasn’t easy for me to call you, you know. I’m really swallowing my pride here.”

“Right,” I said, “the director of special security for CMC Entertainment reaching out to the Vegas underground for help. What happened, Greenbriar? Somebody finally manage to take the money and run? Did they hit a jackpot the easy way and split town with the loot?”

Greenbriar leaned a little closer, lowering his voice.

“We got a guest upstairs, in one of the penthouse suites. He checked out…” He drew a hand across his throat, a slow slash from ear to ear. “But he won’t leave.”

Not his usual line of work, then. More like mine.

Sometimes novices ask, if magic is real, why aren’t all magicians rich? Why don’t we just go to the dog track or buy a lottery ticket and enchant our way to a nice fat payoff? Well, some of us do, but it’s more of a pain in the ass than it sounds—and the bigger the purse, the more likely it is that some other sorcerer in the crowd is working her own mojo in the exact opposite direction.

Then there’s Vegas.

The occult underworld and organized crime have always worked arm in arm, and organized crime built Las Vegas. Ever since Bugsy Siegel hired a strega from the Old Country to help guide his vision of a jewel in the desert sands, there’s always been somebody on every casino’s board of directors who knows the real score. Even after the ’80s, when the feds pushed out the mob and the corporations moved in, certain traditions remained.

And that was how you ended up with a guy like Greenbriar, whose job was to be the firm hand on your shoulder the day you decided to use magic to cheat in one of his boss’s casinos. Guiding you into the back room for a little chat about ethics with his large, unfriendly pals. If it was your first time and you seemed the type who could learn from experience, they’d probably be nice and not mess up your face too badly. Push it and you got blacklisted for good, sorcerer-style.

That meant you got a psychic lobotomy from Greenbriar and a one-way bus ticket to some random city back east, where you were officially no longer Vegas’s problem.

Me and my friends, we didn’t gamble on the Strip. We also didn’t like Greenbriar very much. That was fine. He didn’t like us either.

“Got a dead man overstaying his welcome, huh?” I asked him. “What makes you think so?”

“Guy dropped dead of a heart attack. Since then we’ve rented that room three times. Not one guest manages to stay the whole night. They’re having hallucinations, getting woken up by a guy screaming in their face then disappearing into the damn wall—people are starting to talk, Dan. My bosses can’t have this.”

“And you want me to do what about it?”

“Banish it. I know you’ve done work like that before. I heard something just went down—you cleared some dead broad’s ghost out of the storm tunnels, right?”

I frowned into my drink and tossed back two swigs more than I needed.

“Word gets around fast.”

“It’s my job to hear stuff,” he said. “I’m right, aren’t I? Somebody had a ghost problem and you handled it.”

I remembered the wraith of Stacy Pankow, screaming in the darkness beneath the city streets, and swallowed down a little bitterness with my next spoonful of ramen. A familiar and unwelcome spice.

“Yeah,” I said, “I handled it.”

“So handle this, and I’ll pay cash money. I just need you to go up there and clean it up. I’m not…I’m not equipped for this kinda thing. My magic is all about life, and growth, and nature.”

I lifted my glass halfway to my lips and arched an eyebrow at him. “You were a disciple of the Order of the Septic Blossom, until they kicked you to the curb. You work with mold and fungus.”

“Which are living things, thank you very much. At least I have a pedigree.”

I thought it over. Most ghosts—unlike Stacy—were nothing but psychic imprints. Snatches of emotional pain burned into the world, about as dangerous as a 3-D movie. I could take care of Greenbriar’s problem, and it wouldn’t be too hard a job. More importantly, I didn’t have any plans for the night.

The question then becomes, I thought, how much can I squeeze out of him?

“You said…this happened in a penthouse suite?”

He jerked a thumb toward the ceiling. “Top floor. It’s sort of a boutique hotel-inside-a-hotel thing for the high rollers, up on twenty-eight. Every night we can’t rent that penthouse my bosses are losing money, and there’s a big convention coming up in a couple of weeks. We gotta get this fixed pronto. Look: you get it done, I’ll pay you two grand. Cash.”

I’d heard of Hotel 28, but I’d never had a chance to visit. A penthouse suite, I thought. Imagine that.

“All right,” I told him, “I can get started right away. Thing is, this isn’t a quick procedure. To do a thorough job, I need to spend the night in that penthouse.”

“The whole night?”

I nodded. “Did the deceased order room service the night he died?”

Greenbriar shrugged. “I think so, sure, why?”

“I need to follow his footsteps. Trace the events that led to his death and determine what’s making him linger on this plane of being.” I put a finger to my temple. “To break the ghost, I must become the ghost. So you’ll comp my room-service bill.”

“You’re making that up.”

“Oh,” I said, “I’m sorry, are you suddenly an expert on ghost removal? Because I can get up and leave. I’ve got stuff to do tonight—”

He waved a hand as I started to rise. “Hold on, hold on. Fine. Get room service if you have to. Whatever you gotta do, as long as it’s gone by tomorrow.”

“Come find me in the morning, and it’ll be done.” I paused. “But not before ten a.m.”

*     *     *

Greenbriar escorted me across the casino floor. Past the sirens and clangs and the cascading electronic lights, hot machines calling out like carnival barkers to grab every passing eye, each one louder than the one beside it. Drunken cheers rang out from a craps table, some lucky tourist on a winning streak. The top floor had its own private elevator with a bold 28 embossed across its cherry-red steel doors. Key-card access only. Greenbriar used his. He didn’t offer me one.

The elevator whisked us up to the top of the Monaco, smooth as silk, and opened onto blissful silence.

Hotel 28 was an oasis of regal calm, the entrance a cool corridor done up in rich dark wood and quilted brown leather, Italian marble gleaming under my wingtip shoes. It opened onto a rounded lobby, where a tree made of glass—its big square leaves lit up and gleaming icy white—cast an electric glow across the room. A woman in a prim vest rose from behind a small, businesslike desk as we arrived.

“Mr. Greenbriar?” she said. “We have another problem. The housekeeping staff is refusing to set foot in—”

He held up a placating hand. “All handled, honey. This is Mr. Faust. He’s gonna fix our, ah, room with the leaky plumbing.”

“I’m here to help,” I said.

She gave me a key card and a nervous smile.

Greenbriar led me to the end of a long, dimly lit hall. We stopped outside a pair of double doors, where a brass 2804 hung over the card reader.

“I’ll be back at ten sharp,” he told me. “You fix this mess, you’ll walk outta here with an envelope of cash. My word on it.”

His word was worth about as much as mine. Still, I figured I had the better part of this deal. Only one of us was sleeping in a penthouse suite tonight.

I slotted the card, listened to the locks click as the light on the reader flickered from red to green, and pushed open the double doors.

Time to erase a ghost. Easy job. Nothing to it.

2.

The problem with hunting ghosts—be it a genuine lost soul or just a scrap of psychic residue—is that they’re not obligated to show up and perform on demand. The dead man’s specter might have been happy to terrorize tourists and housekeepers, but he wasn’t waiting behind the penthouse doors to jump out and give me a scare. For the moment, as far as I could tell, I was alone in paradise.

My entire shoebox apartment could have fit into half of the marble-floored living room. My gaze drifted from the theater-sized wall-mounted flat-screen, across a plush sofa long enough to seat twelve, over the vintage pool table, and to the opposite wall where three more televisions stood side by side. In case I had a burning desire to watch four shows at once, apparently. A wet bar bristled with curvy bottles in exotic colors, next to a thousand-dollar espresso machine imported straight from Italy.

“Honey,” I called out, my voice echoing through the cavernous suite, “I’m home.”

No response. That was all right. The ghost could hide if he wanted. I went exploring.

Tall glass doors led to the bedroom and a feather mattress bigger than a California king. And another pair of flat-screens. The bathroom brought the total to seven when I poked at a random button on the wall, looking for the lights, and one of the mirrors erupted with a cable television gunfight. I blinked at the video-mirror and poked the button again. The picture and the explosions vanished, silence flooding back to fill the empty space.

“Damn,” I said once I finally found the lights. The bathroom sported a party-sized Jacuzzi and a glass-walled shower that could fit everyone I knew—plus guests—under its chrome waterfall spigots.

Somehow, I managed to keep my clothes on. I’m a professional. Instead I drifted through the penthouse, clicking off lights, drawing shades, plunging the suite into darkness. As much darkness as I could manage with the white-hot lights of the Vegas Strip pulsing beyond the floor-to-ceiling windows. The room took on an aquamarine glow, the shadows radioactive.

I waited in silence and listened. Closing my eyes as I stood at the center of the suite, turning slowly with my arms and my mind stretching out, feeling for another occupant. For a life, for the trace of a life, for a scrap of drifting memory.

Nothing.

So I switched on a couple of lights—and three TVs, all tuned to the nightly news—and poured myself a drink from the wet bar. Cognac on ice. I had plenty of time to corner the hotel’s pesky phantom, and the job wasn’t going to stop me from having a good time on Greenbriar’s dime. I was still pleasantly full from the ramen, but the room service menu was at my fingertips.

“Hi,” I said into the phone, “this is Daniel Faust in twenty-eight-oh-four. Can I get an espresso crème brûlée?”

While I waited for dessert, I shot a round of pool. I was rusty, a long way from my hustling prime. Still, I had all night to practice.

And all night was a long time. As the minutes ticked on, and the afterglow of a top-notch crème brûlée slowly faded, my initial elation faded right along with it. What fun was paradise if you didn’t have anyone to share it with? Without my friends around, I was just under house arrest in a swank, comfortable prison cell, waiting for a ghost that might or might not bother showing up.

So let’s turn it into a party, I thought and called Caitlin. It felt weird, in my head, calling her my girlfriend. We hadn’t been dating long, still getting to know each other. Getting some sense of what it meant to be a couple, and trying to figure out just how serious we were about making this work.

And she wasn’t human. That was a new wrinkle to deal with.

“Hey,” I said when she picked up the phone, “guess who has the best room at the Monaco tonight. I’m thinking you, me, caviar and champagne, a hot tub…”

She sighed. “And any other night I’d be there with bells on. Other garments optional. Alas, I’m working. A pair of feral cambion are causing trouble, and I’m not to rest until they’re dealt with. My prince’s orders.”

“Not to rest—literally?”

“Sleep is a luxury for me, not a necessity.” She chuckled. “Besides, I’ve got their scent. I expect to have them found and flayed by dawn. Why are you at the Monaco?”

“I’m playing ghostbuster. One of their patrons had a heart attack, and he’s not going quietly. Wait, did you say flayed?”

“Mm-hmm. The process is remarkably quick when you get a little practice. Or remarkably slow. It’s going to depend on how aggravated I feel when I catch them, to be honest.”

As the right hand of a demon prince, Caitlin’s mandate was enforcing hell’s laws and running down any threats to her boss’s regime. A certain cavalier cruelty came with the territory. It was her job. She did it well.

“Be safe out there,” I said. “I’m just waiting for Casper to show up. Death from natural causes usually means it’s just a psychic imprint, not a genuine lost soul. Once I pin it down, I can scrub the room clean and spend the rest of the night in a California king, compliments of the house.”

“I’ll call you if I finish up early. Shame to let a good bed go to waste.”

“My thoughts exactly. Catch you later, Cait.”

I made the rounds on my phone but came up empty. Voicemails all around except for my buddy Jennifer, who picked up in the middle of a thumping house party.

“Jen,” I said, “Greenbriar is paying me to stay in a penthouse suite overnight and do ten minutes of work. Come help me spend his money.”

“Aw, sugar,” she said, her Kentucky drawl barely audible over the booming bass, “any other night I’d be on that like Elvis on a peanut butter and banana sandwich, but I’ve got my own thing. Entertainin’ a couple of lobbyists.”

“Lobbyists? Why?”

“You see what happened to black-market pot prices in Cali once medical marijuana went legal? If medical sales come to Nevada, I need to be first in line for a dealer’s permit—and folks on my payroll need to be second, third, fourth, and fiftieth, get that whole market on lockdown—or I’m gonna lose money hand over fist. So I got these fine gentlemen some twenty-year-old scotch and some twenty-year-old ladies, and everybody’s having a grand old time.” She pitched her voice lower. “Between you and me, I’m not convinced the scotch or the ladies are that old, but whatever.”

“Well, good luck. I’ll give you a call tomorrow.”

“Make it tomorrow afternoon,” she said. “I’m plannin’ on being real hungover.”

I put away my phone and sighed at the empty penthouse.

Nothing on TV I wanted to watch, nothing to do but kill time. Greenbriar had mentioned guests being woken up by the ghost. Maybe I’d have to go to sleep to get it to show. The idea of being jolted awake at three in the morning by an apparition screaming in my face didn’t sound like much fun, but it was more annoying than dangerous. I didn’t like jump scares in movies, and I sure as hell didn’t like them in real life. But fair was fair, and I was getting paid to do a job. I killed the last of the lights.

I was too keyed up to sleep. After tossing and turning on the cloud-soft mattress, I tugged aside the covers and trudged into the bathroom, choosing between the shower and the hot tub. I didn’t feel like waiting to fill up the tub, so the shower won. It had a “color therapy” setting, and at the touch of a button, panels in the ceiling blossomed with soft, shimmering veils of color mimicking the flow from sunrise to sunset and back again. Shrouding the room in psychedelic tangerine and midnight blue. Then the water roared down, gusting from the rainfall showerheads, drenching me in a warm, misty torrent.

I stood, tranquil in the glowing colors and the swirling water. Breathing deep, losing track of time as my muscles relaxed and my tension ebbed away. Once I finally felt tired enough to sleep, I poked my head out of the downpour and rubbed a hand across my eyes, blinking away droplets and squinting through the glass cage of the shower.

A man stood in the bathroom doorway.

My jaw tensed, my knees bending as my arms curled at my sides, instinctively getting ready for a fight. He just stood there, his face and form lost in shadow, hovering at the edge of the dim raspberry glow from the panels above my head. Motionless, silently blocking the only way out.

The ghost, I thought, steadying my nerves. Time to earn my pay. Still, I didn’t like it. Usually, with an apparition, you get some clue that what you’re seeing isn’t entirely on the up-and-up. A hazy glow, or translucent “skin.” The man on the threshold looked as solid, as real, as I did. Like he’d just let himself into the penthouse, watching me shower, waiting for me to notice him.

A thought occurred to me: if Greenbriar or his casino bosses had decided to get proactive, bumping off some of the more notorious members of Vegas’s occult underground before we could cause them any headaches, he couldn’t have laid a better trap.

I killed the water. The last few drizzles spattered down, running across my back in rivulets that turned ice cold. I pushed open the glass door and stepped out of the shower.

Then I looked down and saw the gun—a stout nine-millimeter with a black matte sound suppressor—in his right hand. My feet froze on the wet tile floor.

“Listen,” I started to say, “if Greenbriar sent you, you need to know—”

But those weren’t the words that came out of my mouth. I thought them, but they got twisted and tangled on the way to my throat and what actually burst from my lips was, “Don’t hurt her. Promise me you won’t hurt her.”

The shadow raised his gun and pulled the trigger twice. The first shot went wide. The second punched through my rib cage, splintering bone, and sent a jagged chunk of metal slicing into my heart.

I collapsed to the floor. My back to the hot tub, clutching my chest as I struggled to breathe through sudden, roaring agony. My hand came away wet and smeared a trail of crimson across the tile. The man with the gun stood over me, impassive.

My phone. My phone was on the nightstand. I tried to get up. Couldn’t. So I flopped onto my belly and pulled myself one burning inch at a time toward the bathroom door, every strained breath feeling like a serrated knife twisting in my chest. I left a slug trail of blood behind me. My vision went red, then gray. Then it went black.

The last thing I felt was my cheek against the cold, wet tile, and my final breath shuddering free of my body.

3.

Daylight.

Daylight pushed through the heavy curtains, drifting through the silent penthouse and resting its gentle hands upon my skin.

I opened my eyes.

I lay where I had fallen, sprawled naked on the bathroom floor, and I pushed myself to my knees with a groan. No blood. No bullet, though I poked at my chest with questioning fingers to make sure. I ached all over—ached about as much as I’d expect after falling on a porcelain floor and sleeping there—but the wounds I’d suffered only lingered in my mind.

No, I thought, stalking into the bedroom and reaching for my pants, not just in my mind.

I’d heard two shots. Felt one. I pulled on my clothes and dug a penknife from my pocket, turned around and marched right back into the bathroom. I paused on the threshold, where the shooter had stood, raising my hand with my fingers pointed like a gun. Squinting at the far wall behind the hot tub.

I climbed into the empty tub, crouched down, and ran my fingers along the wall. There. A fresh square of plaster and paint, the color a near-perfect match. I dug in with my knife, scraping away chunks of plaster to get at the ugly truth under the penthouse’s skin.

A crumpled slug nestled in the wall, the tiny chunk of metal standing as a mute witness to the murder that had been committed in room 2804. A crime, I was damn sure, that Greenbriar hadn’t bothered reporting to the police. Bad press was worse than homicide.

“Died of a heart attack, huh?” I muttered as I dug out the slug and pocketed it. “You son of a bitch.”

Out in the lobby, a new receptionist was working at the check-in desk. She gave me a smile as I walked over.

“Good morning, Mr. Faust. Mr. Greenbriar said I should be expecting you, and that I should call him as soon as you, um”—she nodded up the hallway—“finish taking care of things.”

“We’re not quite there yet. The night the occupant in twenty-eight-oh-four died, who was working the front desk?”

“I was,” she said with a furtive glance over my shoulder. “But please, can we keep it down?”

I rested my fingertips on the desk, leaning in.

“Do you remember anything at all about that night, anything that struck you as unusual? Any unexplainable sounds, or people who shouldn’t have been on this floor?”

“No, not really.” Then she frowned. “Now that you mention it, there was something. Around eleven o’clock I heard two quick, loud slams, like someone having trouble getting their door shut. I poked my head up the hall, but I didn’t see anything so I just forgot about it.”

Two slamming doors. Like the sound of two bullets from a nine-millimeter with a cheap silencer.

“And when was the body found?”

“The next morning. One of the housekeepers found him. We called in Mr. Greenbriar right away, and he took care of…the arrangements.”

“Can I talk to this housekeeper?”

She shook her head. “She was transferred to another casino the next day. I’m not sure which one.”

Sure, I thought, with a bundle of money to keep her mouth shut. Greenbriar tidied everything up, nice and neat, no cops and no press.

“You know what?” I said. “Give Mr. Greenbriar a call. I’d like to have a word with him.”

I was waiting inside the penthouse when the doorknob rattled and he let himself in. I was polite enough to let him shut the door, right before I slammed him up against it.

“What the fuck were you thinking?” I snapped. Keeping my arm barred across his chest and standing almost nose-to-nose with him.

“What do you mean? H-hey, buddy, you seem upset.”

I grabbed him, one hand on his shoulder and one on the scruff of his neck, and marched him into the bathroom. Bent him up against the hot tub and gave him a real close look at the hole in the plaster.

“Recognize this? It’s the patch job where you covered up the second bullet. Know how I know that, asshole? Because I felt the other one. Your long-term guest made me relive his goddamn death last night.”

“Hey, hey.” His open hands fluttered and he forced a smile. “Now, I can imagine that’s got you a little upset, but c’mon, buddy. Pal. Friend. I hired you to clear out a ghost. What difference does it make how he died?”

I let go of him. He straightened up, shook out his sleeves, and dusted the lapel of his jacket.

“What difference does it make?” I asked, barely able to believe he’d said that. “It’s the difference between a psychic imprint and a lost soul that’s out for justice. See, not only was the vic gunned down in his penthouse, you went ahead and covered up the murder. That makes for one very, very angry dead guy.”

Greenbriar shrugged. “So? Can you get rid of it?”

“Not easily. Entities like this, they stick around until they’re satisfied. Which means your best bet is to call Metro, fess up, and let them investigate.”

“Ha ha—ooh, you’re not joking. No. No. Dan, c’mon. This isn’t the eighties. Vegas is a shiny happy family destination now, where everything is safe and fun and nobody gets shot in our penthouse suites, okay? Getting the cops involved is just not happening.”

I threw up my hands. “Well, then enjoy your brand-new ghost. He’s gonna be here a while.”

Greenbriar followed me to the door. He tugged an envelope from his inside breast pocket, opening it up and riffling his thumb across a stack of crisp green fifties.

“Look, Dan, hold up. This is the two grand I promised you—”

“Keep it.”

I reached for the door handle, and he jumped in front of me.

“What if,” he said, “what if we call this a retainer? Maybe, you know, you could investigate and find out who killed the guy, and figure out what it’s gonna take to make this little problem go away.”

“Me?”

“Sure! You’re a sorcerer, you know the streets, and I know you’ve been taking on contract work ever since you and Nicky Agnelli parted ways. So why not? You got something better to do today?”

“I don’t think you get what I do,” I told him. “I sell vengeance for hire. I’m not some kind of…magic detective.”

He arched a pencil-thin eyebrow at me.

“When you do jobs for people, do you use magic?”

“Well, yeah, but—”

“And these jobs. Do they require investigation? Research? Perhaps looking for clues and assembling those clues in the correct order?”

I shrugged. “Yeah, but that’s not the—”

He shoved the envelope at me.

“You’re a magic detective. Take my money.”

He had me there. I snatched the envelope from his spindly fingers and shook my head.

“Two hundred a day, plus expenses. All expenses.”

Greenbriar gestured to the bathroom. “Just make this go away. Soon, please? My bosses are already breathing down my neck.”

“I’ll get right on that, because your comfort is so very important to me. I need everything you’ve got on the victim: who he was, where he came from, autopsy report if you can get your hands on it.”

“Hey, not to worry. I can get anything.”

“Anything?”

He put his hand on my arm, all buddy-buddy.

“Sure. I got you, didn’t I?”

*     *     *

As expected, the vic was an out-of-towner. Not too far out of town, though. The name on his platinum AmEx was Monty Spears, and my first look at him came courtesy of his autopsy-slab photo. He’d been a big guy with a beer gut and a receding hairline, pushing fifty. His cholesterol count would have killed him if the bullet hadn’t. Greenbriar had bribed the coroner into delivering a bogus heart-attack verdict, but the original autopsy told the true story just like I’d lived it: one nine-millimeter slug to the chest, one explosively ruptured aorta.

I paged through the file in Greenbriar’s private office, a walk-in closet with a colonial cherry oak desk. His furniture was too big and too expensive for the room they’d squeezed it into, fitting about as well as his cheap suit. He hovered at my shoulder and tried not to act like he was hovering. A damp, moldy smell clung to the air, and a gluey congestion built up in the back of my sinuses.

“You’re sure he checked in alone?” I asked him.

“Sure as we can be. There aren’t any cameras up on twenty-eight, but here, look.”

A fat little monitor sat on the edge of his desk. He turned it on a swivel and leaned in to rattle his keyboard.

“This is the camera footage from his arrival. We send a courtesy limo for penthouse guests.”

I watched a black stretch Lincoln roll around to the front of the casino. A chauffeur hopped out and opened the door—for Monty alone—and grabbed his overnight bag from the trunk.

“Why?” Greenbriar asked. “You think the killer was somebody traveling with him?”

I thought back to the hallucination. The way my words came out as his when I tried to speak: “Don’t hurt her. Promise me you won’t hurt her.” I shook my head.

“He might not have been alone up there. He was worried about somebody. More worried about her than he was about his own life. Do we have any more footage of him from the casino floor? Maybe he met somebody after he arrived.”

“Yeah, I already pulled everything I could find, but there’s nothing to see. Here, I’ll show you.”

He walked me through about an hour of stale video. Monty walking the casino floor, alone. Playing craps and winning. Playing blackjack and losing. Hanging out at the bar and nursing a piña colada. My interest piqued when a working girl in a little black dress sauntered his way, but he wasn’t buying. They shared a couple minutes of conversation, and she went looking for another prospect.

Still, something was bugging me about the footage. “Back it up,” I told Greenbriar. “Back to the craps table.”

He had a good angle in that shot, tight on Monty as he rolled the dice for the cheering crowd. I squinted at the shot, told Greenbriar to rewind it one more time, and said, “Hold up. Freeze it, right there.”

Greenbriar clicked a key and Monty stood suspended in time, a pair of cherry-red dice arcing from his outstretched hand. I scooped up the autopsy report.

“What? Whatcha got?”

“Personal effects,” I said. “The M.E. lists clothes, wallet, keys, everything you’d expect to see.”

I tapped the screen. A watch clung to Monty’s left wrist. Not a cheap one, either: it had the sheen of white gold and the curves of a Rolex. I’d lifted enough watches to cultivate an eye for the good stuff. I couldn’t place the exact model, but I pegged his as retailing for seven, eight grand, easy.

“But not his watch,” I said. “A few hours before he ate a bullet, he’s wearing it. On the slab, he’s not. Was it found in his room?”

Greenbriar’s brows furrowed. “No. You think somebody killed him for his watch?”

“No. It’s a nice piece, but resale values are crap unless you’ve got a private buyer lined up. A pawnshop might give you two hundred for that one, if the owner’s in a generous mood. I do think the killer snatched it off his body. It’s worth keeping an eye out for. And we might need it to calm his spirit down.”

“The watch? Why?”

I nodded up toward the ceiling. “Monty’s haunting your penthouse because he can’t rest. Which is understandable, considering somebody murdered him, and then some other asshole—who will remain nameless—came along and covered it up. Stealing his watch is adding insult to injury. Sometimes angry spirits develop a connection to earthly goods. Like a fetish. If I can find the watch and put it on his corpse’s wrist, it might calm him down enough to move on.”

“You better move fast, then,” Greenbriar said. “His brother just flew the body back to LA for burial.”

I shrugged. “I’ll do my best. Just to be safe, though? Go buy a couple of shovels.”

4.

I ducked out of Greenbriar’s office as fast as I could, my congestion getting worse by the minute and an itching cough building up in my lungs. As soon as I got back out on the casino floor, even the wreaths of hazy cigarette smoke felt like cool fresh air.

Typical, I thought, the one druid in Las Vegas, and his specialty is mold and rot. The clanging and the lights of the slot machines helped me slip out of my conscious mind, drifting along with the tourist traffic and letting my senses flow. Running a quick pat-down of my own aura, checking to make sure he hadn’t left me with a tracking spell or a subtle whammy. I trusted Greenbriar to pay me when the job was done, but that was as far as my trust extended.

I was clean. As clean as I ever got, anyway. I took a cab to the place I called home, just off Bermuda Road where concrete lime-green cacti flanked a pair of dying palm trees. It’d been a motel until the sixties, when the new owners converted it to apartment space, and my room on the second floor still had most of the original, vintage furniture. Floral-print mattress, paper-thin dirt-brown carpet, and lamps with dusty shades. My two concessions to modernity were the laptop on the dresser and a mini fridge stocked with Jack Daniels, cocktail-sized cans of Coke, and occasionally—if I got around to it—actual food. I fired up the laptop and dug into the surface of Monty Spears’s life.

The watch was on my mind, but what I needed was a motive. Odds were, somebody had trailed Monty from LA to Vegas just to put a bullet in his heart. That took planning, from somebody who knew where he’d be and when he’d be there. Ask any homicide cop: nine murders out of ten, you’re looking at a spouse, a family member, or a business partner. Strangers can be trouble, but the person who puts you in the ground probably shook your hand or shared your bed last night.

A funeral announcement in the Los Angeles Times led me to the brother. Sparse, as memorials went. Monty wasn’t survived by loving parents or a loving spouse, or loving children for that matter. Sounded like his brother was the only family he had. That ruled out a murderous wife or a kid too eager for his inheritance.

Partners, though, those he had. Plural. Running Monty’s name came up with a fistful of press clippings from his life as an executive producer in the music biz. He’d come up the ranks working with EMI and Universal Music Group, gone indie for a while, then set up his own label two years ago.

“The music industry,” I deadpanned to the empty room, “that’s a relief. I was afraid he was involved in something sleazy.”

Coverage of Blue Rhapsody Records, his pet label, was a mixed bag of seedy accomplishments. Monty and company had made a name for themselves by poaching talent from other producers. They’d snagged acts from Roc-a-Fella, Geffen, and eOne, building a stable of hip-hop and R&B performers. In other words, he’d stolen a lot of bread from a lot of rival producers’ mouths and gotten away with it. The list of potential suspects had just gone from zero to at least two dozen.

Mostly gotten away with it, I thought as one article caught my eye. A piece in NME from last April, detailing a lawsuit from Curtis “Big Rig” Rake, one of Blue Rhapsody’s talents. Misrepresentation, misappropriation of assets, and dodgy accounting, he was throwing the whole book at the label. The piece was scant on details, though, and the quick follow-up breezed over the out-of-court settlement. Blue Rhapsody had canceled Curtis’s contract early, sending him packing with an undisclosed pile of cash and an agreement to keep his mouth shut.

I needed somebody who knew all the skeletons in Monty Spears’s closet, and it looked like I’d just found him.

*     *     *

When your surrogate dads are a pair of mostly retired con artists, finding an angle is just a phone call away. Or a visit to the homestead. The brass bell above the door to the Scrivener’s Nook jingled as I stepped inside, greeted by the scent of warm cedar and old books. The decor was more suited to an antique shop than a modern bookstore, glass-shaded lamps lighting shelves stuffed with fat tomes ranging from last month to the last century, all jumbled together with no seeming rhyme or reason.

Bentley, reed-thin and spry for his age, gave a wave from behind the antique cash register. “Daniel,” he said, “you missed quite the evening last night.”

“Sure, if you like being bored,” Corman grunted. The stocky man lumbered out of the back room, a stack of hardcovers in his arms. “Phantom, shmantom. Not one song in that whole musical worth dancing to.”

Bentley shot him a look. “It’s Andrew Lloyd Webber. And the vocal stylings of the lead chanteuse were simply divine.”

“As it happens,” I said, “I saw a phantom of my own last night. Trust me, yours was more fun.”

I gave them a quick rundown, pausing for Corman’s snort of derision when I told them who’d hired me.

“Greenbriar? Ain’t worth it, kiddo. If he’s hiring freelancers, it’s something too dirty for him to touch. And there’s not much he won’t touch. You know, that cult he used to run with—”

“Please,” Bentley said. “We were about to go to lunch. I’d like to keep my appetite intact.”

I shrugged. “Well, I’ve got two grand in my pocket telling me it’s worth checking out. I figure I take a few days, poke around, see what kind of trouble I can stir up. What’s your angle on the ghost? That routine he pulled, making me live his death—I’ve never seen that before.”

Bentley held up a finger and stepped out from behind the counter, probing through the stacks.

“The restless dead—as you learned not too long ago with that poor girl in the tunnels—are difficult to put in neat boxes. Their abilities are as varied as the tethers that keep them from moving on. Cormie, where did I put that von Karajan we bought last month?”

“Back corner, next to the Danielle Steele paperbacks,” Corman said.

Bentley met me at the counter with a dusty blue hardcover, thumping it down on the polished wood. Spirits and Their Kynde, by Emil von Karajan. He fluttered through the pages and drew a finger along a faded woodcut illustration, a ragged and eyeless phantom clinging to a diamond necklace.

“The watch you mentioned, Daniel—I think you’re right. There’s a good chance that returning it will lay him to rest. That or bringing his killer to justice.”

“Fat chance of the second one happening,” I said. “Greenbriar’s buried the truth. As far as the law is concerned, Monty Spears died of heart failure. Which he technically did, he just had help from a bullet. I figure I track down the shooter, get the watch back, and see if that puts Monty down for the big sleep. If not…well, then we’ll have to get creative.”

“Sounds like he had a lot of enemies,” Corman said. “What’s your way in?”

I spread my hands. “That’s what I came to talk about. I need to get up close and personal with some music-industry bigwigs and somehow get ’em to open up to me. Any ideas?”

Corman snapped his fingers, giving Bentley a smile. “The probate hustle.”

Bentley lit up. “I think I still have my business cards from the last time! I’ll go check in back.”

As Bentley scurried off, I tilted my head at Corman. “What’s the play?”

“Right now, this guy’s will is in probate. That’s where the lawyers prove his will’s legit, do property appraisals, inventory his stuff, and finally divvy up the goods. Usually it’s a pretty straightforward process.”

“But not this time,” Bentley said as he strode from the back room, brandishing a spread of cream-colored business cards like a winning poker hand. “According to an authority, that is, you, the deceased hired a new lawyer and rewrote his entire will just a month ago. The final version, if it truly is the final version, has…problems. Problems requiring an appointed legal investigator to question his family and business associates.”

He handed me the cards. Michael Green, read the crisp black type. Investigator, Cowrie & Jet Family Law.

“What sort of problems?” I asked.

Corman shook his head. “You can’t say, because it’d violate confidentiality agreements. Don’t even have to make up a story.”

“And everyone I talk to,” I said, getting the picture, “is going to think I’m there because they’ve been named in Monty’s will, even if I can’t officially say so. Which means if they cooperate, there could be money in it for them.”

“You got it, kiddo. Play it right and you can string ’em along nice and easy. Drop little hints about what the will might say, and steer the conversation toward the answers you need.”

“What about the real will, and the real lawyer?”

“Best to finish your inquiries and leave town before you cross paths,” Bentley said. “This is a handy ruse, but it has a very firm expiration date.”

“I’m on it.” I tapped the stack of cards. “Where does this number go?”

Bentley took out his ancient flip phone and held it to his ear. “Cowrie and Jet Family Law, how may I direct your call? Oh, yes, Michael Green? Our finest investigator. Yes, we absolutely vouch for him.”

“The firm’s a real company—on paper, that is—registered out in Sacramento,” Corman said. “We used it a few times back in the day. Some epic cons, too. Remind me sometime, I’ll tell you a story that’ll make your toes curl. I kept the registration up-to-date for sentimental reasons. Besides, you never know when you’ll need your own law firm.”

I pocketed the cards.

“All right,” I said, “I’m off to sunny LA. Wish me luck.”

Corman hauled me into a bear hug. “You don’t need luck when you’ve got skill. And we taught you skill. Go get ’em, kiddo.”

I was on my way to McCarran Airport, nestled in the cracked vinyl seat of a taxi, when Caitlin called.

“Hey,” I said, “I’m on my way to Los Angeles on a quick job. I’ll be back in a day or two, tops. How’d your thing go?”

“Just finished,” she replied, sounding pleased. “A job? What sort?”

I glanced at the taxi driver, stoic in the rearview mirror.

“The kind I do,” I said.

“Don’t leave without me,” she said. “Just let me hose off the blood and I’ll meet you at the airport.”

“Wait, what?”

“I’m coming with. I want to see what you do for a living.”

“Cait,” I said, a nervous chuckle on my lips, “you know what I do for a living. That’s how we met.”

“I said I want to see it. It’ll be fun. Besides, LA is as much my prince’s territory as Vegas is. I need to put in the occasional appearance and make sure the locals are behaving themselves. I’ll make hotel reservations. And dinner. Have you ever eaten at STK Los Angeles? I know the head chef. I’ll handle everything.”

And that was how my hunt for a killer and a dead man’s Rolex turned into a couple’s vacation. It was the weirdest thing to happen so far that week.

Things got weirder, fast.

5.

Something in Caitlin’s smile always threw me off my step. Something more than her graceful strength, more than her confidence. She had the eyes of a woman who gazed out over the entire world and liked what she saw. An air of perpetual, quiet amusement. Her clothes were casual chic today, her scarlet hair done up in a long, twisting braid, and she rolled a white leather Prada carry-on as she crossed the concourse to meet me.

I leaned in for a quick kiss that left me wanting more, and glanced down at the pale curve of her hand. “Ahem.”

She arched an eyebrow at me. I nodded downward, to the streak of rusty crimson splashed along her wrist.

“Oh.” She blinked and looked for the nearest washroom. “Missed a spot. Watch my luggage? I’ll be right back.”

So I watched her luggage.

“You know,” I said as we checked in at an electronic kiosk—and she promptly upgraded both of our tickets to first class, “you really don’t have to do this.”

“Have to? Who said anything about ‘have to’? Is it so hard to fathom that I might find your work interesting?”

“Kind of.” I shrugged. “It’s a little mundane compared to what you do.”

She laughed. “Daniel, ninety-nine percent of my career is paperwork, red tape, and bureaucracy. Sure, sometimes I get to spice things up with an invigorating bout of…corrective discipline, but it’s really not that different from any other corporate job. I make rules for a living and ensure they are upheld. You break rules for a living. It’s an intriguing notion.”

“Oh, I get it now.” I raised my chin, squinted my eyes, and did my best Clint Eastwood impression. “I’m a renegade. An outsider who lives by his own code. An American outlaw.”

She paused, looking me up and down.

“What?”

“I was just trying to imagine how you’d look on a motorcycle.” She shook her head. “Don’t buy a motorcycle. Not a good look for you.”

I didn’t do much flying, and when I did, it was generally coach seating. I had to admit, I could get used to a first-class lifestyle. Steaming-hot hand towels and a nice glass of red to make the flight go smoothly—it sure beat the hell out of stale peanuts. We touched down at LAX right around two, soaring in from a hazy yellow sky. Smog warnings were in full effect, but I didn’t need the signs posted at the airport doors to tell me: I felt it the second we stepped out into the hot, muggy afternoon air, like a splash of quick-set concrete drying in my lungs.

“So what’s our first stop?” Caitlin asked me, slipping on a pair of designer shades.

“Curtis Rake looks like my best bet. That lawsuit alleged all kinds of nastiness at Monty’s label, and they paid him to stay quiet before he could spill all the details. If I can get him to open up, it might tell me who had a genuine motive to take Monty out. Lots of possibilities out there, but there’s a big difference between hating somebody and hating ’em enough to commit murder.”

Caitlin wrinkled her nose. “‘Big Rig’ Rake? Ugh. I’ve heard his music. Dire twaddle. I’ll go take care of some local business of my own. Call me when you’re done and we’ll meet up for dinner.”

“Not a hip-hop fan?”

“Of course I am. From the eighties. When it was good.”

I tilted my head at her as we stepped into the cab line. “Somehow I can’t picture you getting down to Public Enemy.”

She adjusted her sunglasses, replying in a somber deadpan, “I am an old-school player.”

“I stand corrected.”

“Yes, well, you’d best recognize. See you tonight, pet.”

She had a point. Curtis’s big single, “Booty Thumpin’,” might have been burning up the charts, but the tune was as disposable as Styrofoam padding. What he lacked in deathless poetry, he made up for with sales acumen. Tracking him down was easier than I thought. I called up his rep, who put me through to a higher rep, who put me through to his personal secretary, who had his personal secretary call me back.

“Mr. Rake has had no contact with Mr. Spears since their lawsuit was resolved,” the admin told me, her tone like an iron wall. “He has nothing to say on the record and, in fact, is restricted from doing so by the terms of his settlement agreement.”

“This isn’t about the lawsuit,” I said. “It’s purely about Mr. Spears’s will and the distribution of his assets.”

“And Mr. Rake is…named in this will?”

“I can’t explicitly say that. I can say, however, that he’s material to the probate investigation. All I’m asking for is ten minutes of Mr. Rake’s time. No recordings, nothing in writing, completely off the record.”

A long pause. The sound of muffled voices, one hand cupped over the phone.

“Ten minutes,” she said. “Come to Mr. Rake’s home. I’ll text you the address.”

I let out a long, low whistle as my taxi took a turn off Mulholland Drive and cruised through the Hollywood Hills. Curtis Rake lived in Outpost Estates, where mansions sprawled in the sun behind towering walls, an armed guard at every iron gate. The kind of place where money became an abstract concept, no longer a measurement of what you could buy—because if you could afford to live here, you could pretty much have anything you wanted.

Including hired guns, I thought. I didn’t consider Curtis a prime suspect—his beef with Monty Spears had been loud and personal, but it had ended in what I could only imagine was a healthy payoff and a clean parting of the ways. Even so, nobody was off the hook until I’d checked him out personally.

Curtis’s estate was done up in the style of an old Tuscan villa, with low-pitched salmon roofs and stone-and-stucco walls, nestled safely behind a security perimeter that put the White House to shame. Guards met the taxi as it pulled up at the curb. One radioed ahead to the house, and the other gestured for me to raise my arms for a pat-down. I obliged, holding back my annoyance as he plucked the phone from my pocket.

“You get this back when you leave,” he said. “When Mr. Rake agrees to speak off the record, it’s off the record. No photos, no recordings.”

“That’s fine,” I told him.

He tugged my deck of cards from my back pocket. Cherry-red Bicycle Dragon Backs. He opened the pack, frowning.

“What’s this for?”

“Card tricks,” I told him.

He gave the deck back. Good. On the off chance that things went sideways with Curtis, I wasn’t unarmed. When I’ve got my cards handy, I don’t need a gun.

The guards drove me up to the house on a golf cart. Not to the main entrance, but to a side door and a long alabaster hallway lined with gold records.

I eyed the awards as we walked. “No platinum yet, huh?”

“You seen how his new single’s doing?” the guard asked. “He’ll get there.”

Curtis was hard at work in his home studio, headphones on and laying down a thumping track that echoed over ceiling-mounted speakers. He was a powerhouse of a man, built like a grizzly bear but with a kinetic energy that belied his bulk. On our side of the glass, a spindly kid in a Lakers jersey worked the console, fingers dancing over a row of sliders like a virtuoso. The kid spotted me and killed the music.

Curtis tugged off his headphones and shrugged. “What up?”

The kid gestured my way and leaned into a microphone jutting from the console. “That lawyer guy’s here. Besides, man, you’ve been at it for four hours. Take a break.”

“Be at it for eight hours, if that’s what it takes to make the track right.” Curtis pushed through the glass door, joining us in the mixing room.

“Yeah, and when you fry your voice, don’t cry to me about it.”

“Fair, fair.” Curtis looked me up and down. “Yeah, okay, why don’t you take a few laps in the pool or something. I’m gonna talk to this guy a little.”

He gripped my hand like a steel vise, a look of challenge in his eyes. Proving he was the alpha dog in the room. I let him believe it.

“Thanks for meeting with me, Mr.…Rig?”

He laughed. “Nah, call me Curtis. Big Rig’s who I am on stage. Gotta say, last thing I’d expect is a shout-out in Monty’s will. I agreed to meet outta curiosity more than anything else.”

“Well, I can’t officially say you’ve been named as a beneficiary, you understand.”

“Sure, sure.” He shook his head, flashing a smile as I gave him my business card. “Lawyers. Buncha shady motherfuckers. I oughta know. I’ve got three of my own on speed dial.”

“Speaking of lawyers, I understand there was some bad blood between you and Mr. Spears last year.”

“Uh-uh. That was between me and Blue Rhapsody Records. That shit wasn’t personal till his sheisty-ass partner made it personal.”

“His partner?”

“Dino Costa. You know the kinda guy who always goes in for the get-rich-quick angle? Won’t do a minute of hard work, but he’ll spend all day dreaming up new ways to get something for nothing? That’s Dino. Every problem at that label started and ended with him. Monty wasn’t a bad guy, but he had the backbone of a jellyfish. Just let Dino walk all over him. I jumped ship when I realized how bad things were getting over there. Missed out on a lot of opportunities along the way. I should have listened to Tanesha.”

That name rang a bell. If he meant who I thought he meant, I’d heard two of her songs in the cab on the ride over.

“Tanesha? The R-and-B singer?”

“Hell yeah. ‘Smoky Monday’? ‘Love Like Time’? That girl has pipes. She came up in the business with Monty—he produced her debut, took her all the way to her first gold record. Once he partnered up with Dino, she went her own way. She knew that guy was nothing but trouble. And she knew…” He sighed. “Man, Monty was a nice guy, all right? But with a weasel like Dino in the house, she needed a man who would stand up and fight for her. And nice guys can’t fight for shit. Even she didn’t know just how dirty things were getting at that label, though.”

“How dirty are we talking, exactly?”

He gave me a long, hard look. “Tell me something. Is there any chance that the reason you’re here is because Dino is doing something to screw with Monty’s will?”

I weighed my words carefully and nodded. “Since you agreed to speak off the record, I’ll do the same. I can’t go into details, but Dino Costa is…a source of concern for our firm.”

“Knew it. C’mon. Walk with me. I’ll help you out if it’ll knock that motherfucker down a peg or two. Don’t know what you can do with this information, but that’s your problem to deal with.”

I followed him down a back hallway. More personal decor on the walls here: rumpled flyers and polaroids from house parties and underground concerts, memories from before he’d made it big.

“I wasn’t supposed to know, but I found out the hard way.” Curtis gave me a sidelong glance as we walked. “Dino’s got his fingers in more pies than the music biz. See, I keep my business like I keep my life: clean and legit. I play at being gangsta. That’s just clowning to sell records. Dino, though, he’s the real thing.”

6.

Curtis led me to his den, a little sanctum in the back of his mansion. No phones, no windows to the outside world, just a marble grotto with a shag ice-white rug, a plush leather sofa, and a big-screen TV on the wall. A vintage Williams pinball machine flashed its lights in a corner, next to a well-stocked wet bar.

He walked to the bar, took down two glasses and a crystal-cut decanter, and glanced my way. “You allowed to drink on the job?”

“You gonna tell my boss?”

He chuckled and poured two fingers of whiskey into each glass, handing me one. The first sip burned down my throat like liquid lightning and left an aftertaste of smoke. Definitely not the cheap stuff.

“I was on tour,” he said, “promoting the Back at Ya album. Coast to coast, man, my first big blowup. Blue Rhapsody handled everything: the schedule, the tour buses, the venues. I just had to hit my stops and win the crowds. You ever been backstage at a concert? Know anything about that?”

I shook my head. “Never had the chance.”

“When we tour, we roll with a ton of gear, right? I ain’t no folk singer. Mics, amps, speakers, mixing boards—that’s just the start of the list. All that stuff gets packed up in roadie cases: they’re these big trunks on rollers, with padding inside. Makes it easy for the crew to set up and tear down at a new stop every night, and they keep our gear from getting banged up in transit.”

“I’m with you,” I said, taking another sip of whiskey.

“Some of the crew on that tour were my boys. Guys from the old neighborhood, the ones who stood with me before I became the Big Rig. We needed more help, though, so Dino brought in his own people. They got real protective around those cases. Doing all the work themselves, pushing my posse out. They said it was a union thing. I believed ’em, at first.”

“At first?”

“Yeah. Till one night before a concert, at sound check, I was having trouble with my microphone. I went to grab a backup and noticed the padding in the case was a little off-kilter. Underneath? Three fat keys of coke in plastic wrap. Dino Costa ain’t in the music business; he’s in the drug business. He sends artists out on tour with the goods stashed in their kit, and his ‘roadies’ make sales at each stop. He made me a goddamn coke mule and I didn’t even know it.”

“And if anyone found the drugs,” I said, “they could blame it all on you.”

“Damn right. That’s why I split with Blue Rhapsody. I went loud and public—not about the drugs, but anything and everything else I could throw at them—because I needed to go high profile. Make it hard for Dino to snuff me and get away with it. In the end, he paid me off to shut up and go away, and that’s just what I did.”

“So what about Monty? Was he in on this?”

Curtis swirled the whiskey in his glass and sighed.

“He knew about it. I went to him first, once I found out. Spine of a jellyfish, man. Said he was trying to convince Dino to knock off the shady shit and go legit. Trying. Like you can talk a guy out of that life by being nice and saying pretty please.”

“Dino must be pretty loaded, right? What did he even need Monty for?”

“Loaded last year, maybe. But from what I hear, right now he’s overextended on cash. He’s pouring all his money into this new start-up called Sonic Wave, a music-streaming service that’s supposed to out-Spotify Spotify. Typical Dino. News flash: it’s already been done.” Curtis paused. “In case you haven’t heard of it, it’s called Spotify.”

“And Monty was in on that too?”

Curtis nodded. “Monty’s job was PR. Massaging the talent and, most importantly, getting everybody on board with the new start-up. Not an easy sell. You know what artists get paid for streaming music? I make about half a penny per song, and my management and legal take half of that. Anyway, Monty’s been trying to sign anybody and everybody to bump up the catalog. Tanesha called me last week, said he sounded scared as hell. He knew this thing was gonna be a stone flop, but he couldn’t talk Dino out of it.”

“So he was trying to get Tanesha to come back to Blue Rhapsody?”

“Trying hard. Sounded like Dino was leaning on him. See, Tanesha’s contract with EMI is up. She’s a free agent with a number-one hit and people are lining up to buy an album she hasn’t even finished recording yet. You don’t get a hotter prospect than that.”

“Just what Dino needs to make his new venture a success.”

“You got it. If he could sign Tanesha to the label and make her music exclusive to the streaming service? Hell, he might actually get some subscribers. So he sent Monty to be his ambassador, seeing as the two of ’em had old history together. History Tanesha wanted to keep history, y’hear? She turned him down flat. But Monty…Monty didn’t always know how to take a hint.”

Something in the tone of his voice caught my ear. Something that said he knew a lot more than he was saying. And considering he’d already outed his former producer as a coke dealer, it had to be something juicy.

“Old history?” I asked.

He set his glass on the wet bar and folded his arms.

“Old history.”

“Any chance you could put me in touch with Tanesha? Anything I can learn about Monty could be useful.”

“Man, whatever you’re trying to dig up, it’s got nothing to do with her. Leave her be. What’s the big deal, anyway? Guy had a heart attack. It happens.”

“We still off the record?”

Curtis squinted at me.

“I am if you are.”

“Monty didn’t have a heart attack.” I looked him in the eye. “Someone broke into his hotel room and shot him.”

His mouth opened. He poured himself another splash of whiskey.

“Shit. Well, ain’t no shortage of suspects. Monty built Blue Rhapsody on poaching talent from other labels.”

“So I hear. But it sounds like he had a bigger threat a lot closer to home.”

Curtis looked me up and down. He took my business card from his pocket, read it, and tapped it with his fingertip.

“If I call this number, they’ll vouch for you, right? Say you’re their guy?”

“A field investigator, yes.”

“But if I go and get Monty’s brother on the phone and ask him the name of the law firm handling his will…I’m gonna bet it won’t match the name on this card.”

He fell silent, his fingertip sliding across the glossy face of the card. I held his gaze.

“Sure,” I said, “you could do that. Or you could take my word for it.”

“And why would I wanna do that?”

“Because whoever I am, and whoever I work for, I’m looking to find Monty’s killer. The cops won’t be. Just me.”

Curtis shrugged and looked away. “I ain’t even talked to the man since the lawsuit. He was nobody to me.”

“Maybe not,” I said, “but I don’t think you’re the kind of guy who likes the idea of a killer walking free. Especially not if they killed somebody who was somebody to you, once upon a time. I’m not asking you to stick your neck out. Just an introduction to Tanesha, then I’m out of your life forever.”

He didn’t answer at first.

“You think Dino did it?” he finally asked.

Life is like poker. You’re surrounded by players, and they’ve all got tells. Learning to read them is what changes a game of chance into a game of skill. That little eye twitch, the furrow of his brows—Curtis wore his worry on his face every time a certain name came up, and it wasn’t Dino’s. I answered his question with a question.

“Why are you worried about Tanesha?”

His gaze darted to the floor, then to the left, everywhere but on me.

“Wait outside for a minute,” he said. “I gotta make a phone call.”

I stepped into the hall, shut the door, and waited. He might have been calling Monty’s brother. Might have been calling the cops, for that matter. Still, it felt prudent to stick around. About ten minutes later the door cracked open and he nodded me back inside.

“Better you hear it from her than from me. Tanesha says she’ll talk to you. She’s out at her lodge in Mt. Baldy. I’ll hit you with the address. This is private info, understand? It ain’t on any Hollywood tours.”

“Don’t worry,” I said, “I’m not the paparazzi.”

“I don’t know what the hell you are.” He put his hands on his hips. “But something about you feels legit, and she thinks so too. Enough to take a chance on you. Do me a favor: don’t make shit worse, okay? If you can help her out, I’ll be grateful. If you can’t, just leave her alone.”

“I’m not sure what you hope I’ll help her with.”

“Better you hear it from her,” he said again.

*     *     *

On the other side of Curtis Rake’s gates, simmering under a blanket of heat in the Los Angeles sunshine, I got Caitlin on the phone.

“Hey,” I said, “I’m heading out of the city on a lead. Turns out Monty’s partner was bent, and there’s something else going on, something weird. Curtis put me in touch with this singer named Tanesha—”

“The Tanesha?” Caitlin asked. “‘Smoky Monday’ Tanesha?”

“From your tone, I’m guessing you’re a fan.”

“Most music recorded after 1990 is sewage. She is a rare and pleasing exception. When are we leaving?”

I smiled. “As soon as possible. She’s in Mt. Baldy. I guess it’s this little place out in San Bernardino County, about an hour northeast. Can you rent a car for us?”

I paced the sidewalk and ruffled my shirt to stave off the sweat, stewing in the afternoon heat. Twenty minutes later, Caitlin screeched up to the curb in a cherry-red Chevy Camaro SS.

“I paid extra for the GPS,” she said, leaning toward the open window. “Hop in.”

We left the city behind and drove for the mountains. They rose up in the distance, stoic in a hazy yellow sky, as the urban sprawl fell away at our backs. Ponderosa pines embraced the open road, filtering the sunlight through a sprawling, lush canopy. Curtis’s address took us to the edge of Mt. Baldy, off the beaten path and down a single-lane road beyond a sign marked Private Property.

A tidy lodge waited for us at the end of the line, behind a circular driveway and hedges so neat they must have been trimmed with a nail cutter. From the faux-rustic log cabin siding to the discreet footlights and alarm sensors nestling in the flowerbeds, it was the sort of wilderness retreat only serious money could buy: the beauty and solitude of nature, with none of the messiness of the actual wild.

Under normal circumstances, anyway. It looked like we’d just rolled up on a little unexpected messiness, in the form of two black Lincolns parked out front and a pack of men in unseasonably heavy jackets standing on Tanesha’s front porch. Caitlin and I shared a glance as the Camaro rumbled to a stop.

“Open up,” shouted one of the men, sounding annoyed as he slammed his beefy fist against the front door. “C’mon, Tanesha, we know you’re in there. We just want to talk, that’s all.”

I counted eight men. Then I counted three guns, shoulder holsters bulging. The leader of the pack didn’t carry a pistol; he held a tire iron in his right hand, fresh from the Lincoln’s trunk. I’d given that kind of “talk” to people once or twice myself. They weren’t fun for the person being talked to.

Caitlin and I strolled up the porch steps side by side. As our footsteps clacked on the smooth-sanded wood, the thugs turned our way.

“Hey, guys,” I said, “we’re with the Jehovah’s Witnesses. Don’t suppose I could interest you in a copy of The  Watchtower?”

The leader stepped up, going toe to toe, staring me down as his grip tightened on the tire iron. Anxious hands edged back, jackets inching open, chrome gleaming from the holsters underneath. I got the impression these guys weren’t big on surprises.

Too bad. They were about to get one.

7.

The thug with the tire iron had two inches of height on me and about twenty pounds more muscle. He leaned in like he could crush me with sheer force of gravity. The sort of move you see from somebody who intimidates people for a living.

“You need to get lost,” he said. “Now.”

“That’s a no on The Watchtower, then. How about a brand-new vacuum cleaner? Okay, okay, you’ve got us. We’re actually here to see Tanesha.”

“We got here first.”

“Yes,” Caitlin agreed, nodding. “But it doesn’t sound like she wants to talk to you.”

One of the thugs—one with his hand two inches from his gun and not bothering to hide it—got into her personal space.

“You need to mind your own business, bitch. The man told you to get lost. So do it.”

Caitlin looked over at me, mock pained. “Oh,” she said, “he didn’t.”

“Yep.” I took a deep breath. “He did.”

I sounded cockier than I felt. Even with the extra firepower Caitlin could bring to a fight, two against eight wasn’t the kind of odds I liked. I kept a placid smile on my face while I ran the angles, figuring out where the guns were, who looked like a tough customer and who looked jumpy, putting together something close to a plan in case we couldn’t talk them into leaving peacefully.

Besides, I wasn’t looking to kill anybody today. Back home in Vegas, I could make a corpse disappear without too much of a problem. Eight bodies three hundred miles away and on a celebrity’s front porch were a whole different kind of trouble. We didn’t need that, and neither did Tanesha.

“I’m gonna count to three,” their boss said. The tire iron twitched in his grip.

My left hand touched my hip pocket. A spark of raw magic danced from my fingertips, lancing into my deck of playing cards. Waking them up. The deck tingled against my skin, growing hot.

“Listen,” I said, “we’re not looking for a fight—”

“Well, you found one. Three.”

The tire iron swung up as fifty-two cards burst from my pocket like an explosion from a confetti cannon, bouncing off the flat of my hand and whipping across the porch in a chaotic whirlwind. The confusion bought me three seconds: one to drive my knee up between the thug’s legs, one to rip the tool from his fist as he doubled over in pain, and one to bring the tire iron whistling down on his buddy’s hand just as his gun cleared its holster. Cold metal met bone, shattering his wrist and sending the pistol scattering across the porch.

A spatter of blood hit my cheek, and a shrill scream sent birds winging from the pines as Caitlin grabbed another gunman’s forearm with both hands and snapped it like a turkey’s wishbone. His flesh tore, and bloody broken ivory jutted out from his jacket sleeve. She didn’t stop to admire her handiwork, shoving the crippled man aside and grabbing the next closest target, flipping him over her shoulder and sending him flying. He hit the asphalt driveway face-first.

I kept the cards swirling wild, using the pasteboard cyclone for cover as I swung the tire iron like a major-league batter aiming for the fences. Another thug went down, howling and clutching his smashed kneecap with both hands. I turned just as a fist sailed toward me, crashing into my left eye with an explosion of pain that sent me reeling. My concentration broke and the cards fluttered to the ground. I fought off the sudden disorientation, the black splotches in my vision, just in time to see the next punch coming. His fist met the tire iron with the satisfying sound of cracking finger bones. I followed up with a vicious lunge, driving my knuckles into his throat.

Caitlin moved like a serpentine blur, striking with ruthless efficiency and leaving writhing and groaning bodies in her wake. She could have killed them as easily as hurting them, but I guessed she had the same idea I did. Fewer headaches this way.

Fewer headaches for us anyway, the sting in my eyelid and the throbbing pain behind it notwithstanding. As the last thug dropped, hitting the blood-spattered beech planks like a sack of potatoes, I leaned against Caitlin to catch my breath. One of the men, one who could still walk, tried to tug his buddy to his feet. Another staggered over to one of the Lincolns, steadying himself against it with one hand and gripping his belly with the other as he threw up on the hood.

“You should leave now,” Caitlin told them.

“Yeah.” I took a deep breath, my lungs burning like I’d just run a marathon. “What she said.”

We stood silently as the battered men bundled themselves into their cars. No parting shots from their boss, no threats of vengeance. Just gritted teeth and muffled whimpers of pain as they made their getaway. The Lincolns were well on their way down the drive, slipping almost out of sight, as I stretched out my fingers. The cards, scattered across the porch and spotted with droplets of blood, leaped through the air and riffled into my palm. I gave them a thankful pat before shoving them back into my pocket.

The front door opened just a crack. A soft brown eye, like a perfect chip of amber, looked out at us.

“It’s okay,” I said. “Curtis sent us.”

The door opened a little wider. Even dressed in a casual sweatshirt and jogging pants, Tanesha looked like a queen. Regal, high cheekbones, her hair braided in immaculate beehive cornrows, and eyes you could fall right into. No missing the worry in those eyes, though.

“From the lawyer’s office?” she asked.

“Law is a rough business.” I nodded over my shoulder. “I don’t think those guys are gonna be back anytime soon.”

She opened the door all the way and stepped aside.

“I wish I believed that. Come in.”

Caitlin and I stepped into her foyer. She had the air conditioning running full blast, museum cold, and we stepped onto a span of polished dun tile as she shut the door behind us. She’d decorated the open, breezy lodge in southwestern style, all earth tones and rugs in Native weaves.

“Who were those men?” Caitlin asked her.

“You answer my questions first,” Tanesha said. “Who do you really work for? What are you after?”

I shrugged. Honesty wasn’t always the best policy—in my experience, it was highly overrated—but the probate-lawyer line was dead in the water.

“CMC Entertainment,” I said. “They own about half the casinos on the Vegas Strip. Including the one Monty Spears died at.”

“On the phone, Curtis said they lied. That Monty didn’t have a heart attack.”

“That’s right. He was murdered.”

She shook her head, torn between not believing me and believing me but not wanting to. “Then why aren’t the police involved?”

“Because CMC doesn’t want them involved,” Then I chased that little nugget of truth with a bald-faced lie: “At least, not until we’ve conducted an independent investigation. Given the high profiles of the people involved, and the risk of a media circus, my employer thinks this is a better way of getting at the facts.”

“Monty,” she said, looking lost. She drifted through the house and we followed, through the living room to a row of framed photographs on her rough stone mantelpiece. Family photos, vacations someplace tropical, a gap-toothed little girl who might have been a cousin or a niece. And one of Monty and Tanesha in a recording studio, in front of a mixing console. Both of them with thousand-watt smiles, Monty embracing her from behind. In her hands, a gold record in plastic wrap.

“That was the day,” she said. “That’s the day I knew I’d made it. My first single was blowing up all over the radio, album sales spiked, and I officially went from being Tanesha Brown to just…Tanesha. That was Monty’s idea, the one-name thing.”

“He was your producer, back then,” I said. “But not lately.”

She stared at the photo with something wistful in her eyes. A little distant, a little sad.

“Once I made it big, he couldn’t take me where I needed to go. He didn’t have the juice, didn’t have the industry contacts. Not back then. So we parted ways. He got the juice later on, but…”

“But he was keeping bad company. Curtis told me about Dino Costa, and the coke.”

Tanesha turned and looked our way. She took a deep breath and let it out as a weary sigh.

“Monty was a good man who made a whole lot of bad decisions. Working with Dino? Number one on the list. Everybody could see Monty was on the road to ruin. Everybody but him. I told him…”

She trailed off. Her eyes flicked downward. Caitlin squinted, just a bit, reading her like a book.

“You feel guilty,” she said. “Why?”

Tanesha met her gaze.

“Because I’m pretty sure I know who killed Monty,” she replied in a soft voice. “I did.”

I blinked. “Murder isn’t a subjective kinda thing. Either you did or you didn’t.”

“I don’t mean I did it with my own hands. But I made it happen. Look, you have to understand, Monty…he wasn’t too bright, but he had a big, big heart. And he carried a mile-high torch for me.”

“You were in a relationship?”

She shook her head. “Business. Friends. Nothing more than that. Didn’t stop him from following me around like a puppy dog, hoping for something he was never gonna get, but every time I said ‘no’ he heard ‘maybe someday.’ When we parted ways, he was determined to win me back. Thinking maybe if we worked together again, he’d have another shot with me. Blue Rhapsody? All those artists he poached, all those bridges he burned to make a name for himself in the industry? He did that for me.”

“Nothing drives ambition like desire,” Caitlin mused. “And the more foolish the desire, the more fervent the drive.”

“Got that right,” Tanesha said. “So my contract with EMI is up and I’m a free agent. Not one day goes by before he’s burning up my phone, trying to get me to sign with Blue Rhapsody.”

“Curtis said he sounded worried to you,” I said.

“Dino’s going all in with this streaming-music scheme of his. Sinking all the label’s cash into it. If it flops, Blue Rhapsody is finished. They need big names to give people a reason to subscribe.”

“Names like yours,” Caitlin said.

Tanesha turned. She took the studio photograph down from the mantel, running manicured fingernails along Monty’s smiling face.

“I told him I knew about Dino, about the smuggling and the blow. I wanted nothing to do with it. I told him, grow a backbone, and force that viper out. He could have done it. Monty had controlling interest in Blue Rhapsody. He could have bought Dino out and kicked him to the curb, if he’d just stand up for himself for once in his life.”

She looked up at us, silent for a moment.

“I finally told him I was done. Done with watching him let Dino drag him down. I told him, either be a man and fight back, or never call me again. Not long after that, Monty left a voicemail for me. He said he was going to do it. He was going to put Dino in his place and take his label back.”

She bit her bottom lip. A tear pooled in one amber eye.

“Two days later,” she said, “Monty was dead.”

8.

“Dino Costa murdered Monty,” Tanesha said, her voice quavering, “but I’m the one who made it happen. I’m the one who walked him to the firing line.”

Caitlin put a gentle hand on Tanesha’s arm. “You didn’t do anything wrong. Everyone makes their own choices. Monty made his.”

“You’re sure it was Dino?” I asked.

She nodded, taking a deep breath to steel herself. “Him or one of his thugs. You just met a few of them, out on my porch.”

“They seemed eager to have a word with you.”

“Dino’s not giving up on signing me to Blue Rhapsody. Except now, with Monty gone, he’s not asking nice anymore.” She sighed. “I should have brought my security team out here. I just wanted to be alone for a couple of days. Away from all the crazy. Been listening to the studio masters for my next album—best stuff I’ve ever done, no lie. When it was done, if he hadn’t ended up dead, Monty was going to be the first person to hear it.”

“Promise me you won’t hurt her” were the last words Monty Spears ever spoke. I remembered feeling the desperation as they spilled from his—my—lips, hallucinating his dying moments. The fear. Not for himself, but for someone else. Someone whose life he held more precious than his own.

For Tanesha. If I needed confirmation that Dino Costa was behind Monty’s murder, I’d just been handed it in spades.

She set the photo back on the mantel. A splash of light caught my eye. The white gold Rolex, snug on Monty’s wrist as he hugged her from behind.

“Weird question,” I said, “but did he always wear that watch?”

“Ever since that day, yeah. That was the day I bought it for him, to celebrate our success. There’s an inscription on the back: Forever Gold.” She tilted her head at me. “Why? What’s important about the watch?”

Bingo. A gift from the woman Monty was deeply in unrequited love with. Stealing a token like that off a dead man’s body was exactly how you ended up with angry ghosts in your penthouse suite.

“Nothing. Just a…pet theory.” I changed the subject. “So what are you going to do now? About Dino, I mean.”

She frowned, squaring her shoulders as she looked to the front door.

“Right now? Call up my bodyguards from my place in LA, get them out here, and tell ’em to hand out a world-class beatdown if his boys come poking their noses around here again. I don’t get scared, I get mad. Dino’s not making one dime off of my hard work. What are you gonna do?”

“Well,” I said, “I’ll be writing up everything we’ve learned and conveying it to my superiors at the company—”

“And then they’ll call the police?”

“Right. Then they’ll call the police.”

She folded her arms. “Good. Dino needs to pay for what he did.”

She walked us to the door and I tried not to feel guilty. The cops weren’t coming. Monty’s death was never going to be anything, on the record, but a heart attack. And the only payment was going to be another envelope of cash from Greenbriar, once I got that Rolex back and laid Monty’s ghost to rest. I didn’t like giving people false hope. There was no money in it.

“Just one thing,” she said, opening the door for us. “I watched the fight from the window. How did you do that…that thing with the cards?”

“Oh, that?” I smiled and shrugged it off. “It’s a trick deck. Spring-loaded. I do some sleight of hand in my free time, keeps my hands limber.”

She nodded, buying it. Of course she did. In a world of CGI and special effects, where you saw the impossible every time you turned on the TV, nothing covered up for real magic like saying, “It was just a trick.” It was easy to believe. Safe.

“Sounds like the plot of a TV show,” she said. “Like you’re some kind of…magic detective.”

I winced. I smiled, I shook her hand, but I winced.

“You know,” I muttered to Caitlin as we walked back to the car, the door swinging shut behind us, “back when I was a full-time gangster, Nicky Agnelli called me his ‘hired wand.’”

She wrinkled her nose at the mention of Nicky’s name. “So?”

“So it’s cooler.”

Caitlin unlocked the Camaro, and I slipped into the passenger seat. She fired up the engine and looked at the dashboard clock with a slight smile.

“We should get back to the city just in time for dinner.” She paused, glancing sidelong at me as she stepped on the gas. “My fearless magic detective.”

*     *     *

“Oh,” I said as I peered around the glossy room, my voice carrying over the thumping bass beat of a live DJ set, “STK. Steak. I get it now.”

The steakhouse sat inside the W Hotel in West Beverly Hills, rich wooden tables offering a splash of earth-tone color in a sea of slate and ivory. Dozens of steer horns bristled along one creamy wall like a battalion of curving spear tips, looming above rounded banquette tables where a bevy of B-listers and their entourages held court. I recognized a couple of TV actors—by face if not by name—perfectly positioned to see and be seen.

Caitlin had reserved a banquette just for us, sitting side by side in the big, curving booth. I caught an uncomfortable number of glances shooting our way, people trying to figure out if we were famous or not. Or maybe just eyeing my date, who’d stopped at our hotel room to slip into a little black Chanel dress.

“We’re ready to order,” Caitlin told the waitress, barely looking at the menu. “For entrees, he will have the Wagyu steak, and I’ll go with the spiced duck breast.”

The waitress gave me a questioning look. I handed over my unopened menu.

Once she left, I turned to Caitlin. “Wagyu? Really?”

“Certified A-five grade. Wagyu is a fine breed. Not like what they call Kobe in the States.” She sniffed. “Legally you can call hamburger ‘Kobe beef.’ It’s a sin. And not the fun kind.”

“I just mean, it’s a little pricey.”

She arched one slender eyebrow. “And? You aren’t paying for it.”

We’d had our first meal together in a steakhouse, too, not long ago. Gordon Ramsay’s place, back in Vegas. Talking over a perfect meal, figuring each other out. We were still figuring each other out.

“I assumed we’d be splitting the bill,” I said.

“I asked you to dine, so it’s only appropriate that I pay for it. Besides,” she said, flashing a sly smile, “I fully intend to make you work it off later tonight.”

I lifted my drink—a dirty Grey Goose vodka martini garnished with a blue-cheese-stuffed olive—in wry salute. “Sounds like half come-on, half threat.”

“Good. Then you’re listening properly. So, what is our next move? I’m assuming involving the authorities is off the list.”

“It was never on the list in the first place. I figure that watch is the key to laying Monty to rest. All I have to do is get it back and slip it on his corpse’s wrist before they bury him.”

“What if he’s interred before you recover the watch?”

I shrugged. “Then I’m buying a shovel, and Greenbriar’s gonna have to pay me a lot more money. Bottom line, one way or another, reuniting the stiff with his precious Rolex should calm him down enough to shuffle off to his designated afterlife.”

“Excellent.” She wrinkled her nose. “I dislike the concept of remnant souls lingering past their time. It’s extremely…untidy.”

The waitress brought over a bread plate, and I slathered butter onto a warm, crusty slab, glad for something to do in the sudden silence. My mind was fifty feet under the streets of Las Vegas, remembering another restless wraith.

“Penny for your thoughts,” Caitlin said.

“Sometimes,” I said, catching electric light on my butter knife, “when we’re just…us. Talking, eating, just being us. It’s easy to forget that we aren’t, you know. The same.”

“That I’m not human, you mean.”

I glanced up, trying to read her expression. “I don’t mean any offense by that.”

“None taken. Besides, I should hope it’s easy. I’d be a terrible covert operative if I walked around wearing horns and bat wings, hmm?” Her fingertips trailed over the curve of my hand, teasing against the flat of the knife. “Seduction is what I was built for, Daniel. You know that neither begins nor ends at the bedroom door. Now what’s troubling you?”

“Stacy Pankow.”

“I thought we resolved that affair quite cleanly. A task well done.”

“You knew,” I said, “by looking at her ghost, that she was hellbound.”

Caitlin smiled and let out the faintest chuckle.

“That’s scarcely a trick. To my eyes, human souls are like little orbs of light. Some obscenely bright and garish, a disgusting shade of gold, and some beautifully smoky black. Most are somewhere in between, like clouds on a stormy day, with the sunlight struggling to shine through the dark. Or a glass of aged bourbon, complex and layered.” She reached up, curling her hand around the back of my neck. Her fingernails stroked my skin, teasing, sending an electric shiver down my spine. “Yours is right…here.”

“I know a guy on the east side,” I told her. “Used to be a tent-revival preacher until he spontaneously developed a gift for talking to the dead. Now he’s pretty much a full-time heroin junkie. Dope’s the only thing that makes the voices go quiet, he says. See, these dead people who call out to him, everywhere he goes—every single one of them is in hell.”

Her hand slid away from my neck, and she cradled her glass of pinot noir. “I’m hearing an unspoken question.”

“I’ve crossed paths with more than a few demons, but not one, before you, who I was actually on speaking terms with. So…I want to ask you something. Something that’s been eating at me for a while now.”

She lifted the glass to her lips. “Are you certain? Your hesitancy suggests you know, on some level, that you won’t like the answer.”

She was right, but I asked the question anyway.

“Is there a heaven?”

She paused mid-sip. A flash of irritation flickered over her face, a passing thundercloud. Then she replaced it with an indulgent smile.

“Daniel.” She set down her glass and put her hand over mine. “What difference does it make? If it exists, you’ll never see it. And would seeing it be a kindness, knowing you’ll never be allowed to set one foot upon its hallowed grounds? No. Of all the torments of the damned, nothing could possibly be crueler.”

“I’m not asking for myself.” I didn’t think I was, anyway. My own damnation was something I’d more or less taken as a given a long time ago. A man didn’t do the things I’d done with any hope of seeing the pearly gates, not if he was honest with himself.

“For who, then?”

“I’ve known some good people—better than me, anyway—who went down for the big sleep way ahead of their time. I’d like to know they’re in a better place.”

“And I’d like another glass of wine. One of us is going to get their wish.” She paused, catching my look. “I’m teasing. Daniel, the truth is, and it irks me to no end to admit this, I have no idea. None of us do. Some souls come to us; some go elsewhere. Wherever ‘elsewhere’ is, it’s a one-way trip, and quite barred to the likes of you and I.”

The waitress came around with our entrees. The cut of steak glistened on my plate, hot and red and bloody.

“Besides,” Caitlin said with a wink, “my homeland can be quite pleasant once you get used to it, if you know the right people. And you know the right people.”

I sliced into the steak, chuckling. The tender flesh parted like butter. “I’ll try to stay on your good side.”

“A capital notion. So, this precious watch. Where will you start looking for it?”

“I’m betting Dino took it off Monty’s body. Maybe as a trophy, or maybe he just wanted his own Rolex. Either way, it’s gonna be someplace close to him. I’m thinking I’ll break into his house tonight and take a look around. If I get lucky, this job will be all wrapped up by sunrise.”

“A burglary?” Her eyes lit up. “Excellent. We’ll go right after dinner.”

“Well, I mean, I was going to break in—”

“And leave me out of the fun? Did I not say I wanted to see what you do for a living?”

Some arguments just weren’t worth having. I lifted my martini glass in salute.

“Fine,” I said, “let’s go rob a house together.”

9.

I called Curtis’s assistant’s assistant, which resulted in a callback ten minutes later with Dino Costa’s Los Angeles address.

“He also owns a condominium in Orlando,” the admin said. “Will you be needing that address as well?”

“Hopefully not,” I told her. “I’ll let you know.”

The GPS led us through syrup-thick night traffic, a parade of gleaming lights on an endless strip of hot asphalt. Caitlin took an off-ramp and snaked along side streets, the Camaro purring past palm trees and sleepy bungalows. We ended up a few streets off Ventura Boulevard, cruising into the hills where the price tags kept up with the altitude.

“Slow it down,” I said, craning my neck to check out the real estate. “Okay. Here, stop at this driveway.”

She looked dubious but pulled up to the garage door of a sprawling ranch house. No lights shone behind the curtained windows.

“This isn’t the place.”

“No,” I said, “but it’s the perfect spot to stash our getaway ride. Check out the mailbox: it’s stuffed to overflowing. Good bet these people are on vacation, which means we can leave the car here for a couple of hours. Just one thing to make sure.”

She killed the engine and followed me up the walk. I rang the doorbell.

“What if someone answers?” she asked as we waited.

“Then we’re lost tourists who need directions.” I shoved my thumb against the buzzer, listening to fifteen straight seconds of muffled chiming on the other side of the door. No response, not even a light clicking on or a ruffled curtain. “Yep, nobody’s home. Anyway, we could park on the street, but a passing cop might remember seeing a strange car if anything goes wrong tonight. Driveway’s a little farther out of sight.”

She smiled. “I didn’t know you were so detail oriented.”

“If you want to stay out of prison, you have to be. And on that note, Breaking and Entering one-oh-one.” I took out my phone and turned the screen toward her. “Please silence your cell phone before the performance begins.”

I set my ringer to silent, and she followed my lead.

“I knew a guy,” I told her, “who was robbing a mansion back in Miami. Slipped past infrared sensors, guard dogs, and three layers of embedded security. And just as he was about to seal the deal and make off with an original Rembrandt, some asshole called him. The mark’s security guards all got an earful of his ringtone: the ‘Macarena’ playing at full volume.”

“How embarrassing,” Caitlin said.

“Imagine how I felt. I was the asshole who called him.”

We strolled along the sidewalk, just an average couple out for an evening walk. A breeze ruffled my shirt, chasing away the arid heat for one blissful moment. Crickets trilled in the dark.

“This part’s crucial,” I said. “Self-preservation is more important than any score. If an alarm goes off, we leave, no ifs, ands, or buts about it. If the cops are coming and we get split up, don’t try to meet back at the car. They’ll be on the lookout for anyone strange to the neighborhood, and on a street this swank I guarantee they’ve got a ten-minute response time, tops. Just get lost any way you can, put as much distance behind you as possible, and we’ll meet up come sunrise. Run through a few backyards and try to get to Ventura, where the crowds are.”

Caitlin cracked her knuckles. “I’m hardly worried about the police. I’d think we could make short work of them.”

“Uh-uh. No dead cops, under any circumstances. Avoid and evade, never engage.”

She gave me the side-eye. “Why not? You don’t have any compunction about killing, at least not that I’ve seen.”

“You want a practical reason? The police are the biggest street gang in any given city. You mess with one of them, you’re messing with all of them. Nothing brings the hammer down like a dead cop. We don’t need that kind of trouble.”

We came up on Dino’s address. His house was modern, on the edge of brutalist, a pale white cube that married another cube and gave birth to a bunch of little baby cubes. Faint lights shone behind long, skinny windows and ivory Venetian blinds.

“And what about him?” Caitlin asked with a nod to the house.

I’d been thinking about that. With one hand in the coke game and the other on the gun that killed his business partner, Dino Costa was anything but a civilian. I wouldn’t lose any sleep if he didn’t survive the night. Then again, I wasn’t getting paid to pull that trigger and I don’t work for free.

“If he dies, he dies,” I said, thinking it through, “but there’s always the chance of blowback. I don’t particularly want a murder investigation following us back to Vegas. Besides, if we just grab the watch and split, it’s a perfect getaway. What’s he gonna do, call the cops and complain that somebody stole the Rolex he took off his victim’s corpse?”

“So he’ll know he was stolen from, and he’ll know the only thing taken was the evidence of his crime. Meaning someone knows what he’s done, and all he can do is wait for the consequences to descend. And wait. And wait.” An amused smile played on her lips. “That’s the sort of fear that could torment a man to madness. I like it.”

“It’s not the payback he deserves, but it’s better than nothing. Besides, guys like this always come to a bad end sooner or later. He’ll get too greedy, piss off the wrong coke dealer, and eat a shotgun in some back alley, I guarantee it. Keep walking. I want to overshoot the house a little.”

We strolled past the long, black, and winding drive, a murky ribbon leading up to a three-car garage, and past the next house. Perfect dark ranches on either side, his neighbors out for the night or snug in their beds. I didn’t expect to be making any noise, but a little breathing room wouldn’t hurt.

We kept low, scurrying across the rolling lawn and circling Dino’s garage. If I had to break into a house I didn’t have time to scout properly, smart money was always on the garage: you wouldn’t believe how many people left the door between their garage and the house unlocked, figuring the garage door was enough to keep them safe.

I checked for a side window, a back door, any other way in beside the big rolling doors out front, but Dino’s garage was sealed up tight. No luck. We skirted around to the backyard. Windows looked in on a darkened kitchen big enough for a family of six, done up in pristine stainless steel. Garlic cloves and copper pans dangled from a rustic iron grate suspended above a granite-topped island. Craning my neck, I could see the oblong white plastic box of an alarm panel not far from the door. And the tiny green light saying it wasn’t armed.

“He’s locked up for the night,” I said, giving the back door’s knob an experimental tug, “but I’m betting he’s one of those guys who only turns on his alarm when he leaves the house. That makes our job a hell of a lot easier.”

Caitlin frowned, eyes fixed on the kitchen beyond the glass.

“Given that he works with narcotics peddlers,” she said, “he’s likely armed.”

“That’s fine.” I fished an oilcloth bindle from my hip pocket, untying it and spreading out an array of picks in snug little holsters. “Unless he actually goes to the range and puts in training time, it’s not a big worry. Too many people think a gun is a magic talisman that makes burglars disappear. Buying the steel isn’t enough; you’ve gotta actually know what you’re doing with it.”

Unless he’s got a shotgun in there, I didn’t bother adding. Shotguns were a dangerous equalizer, especially in a house with long, narrow hallways. Nothing I ever wanted to be standing downrange from. Still, I was feeling confident tonight.

And maybe I was showing off for Caitlin, just a little. I crouched down and worked the lock, gripping a pick and a tension wrench between my fingertips, concentrating on the feel of the tumblers.

“One thing’s a lot more dangerous than a gun,” I whispered, feeling a sliver-thin tumbler catch and roll over for me.

“A cluster of damned souls, bound together inside a suit of iron armor and driven mad with hunger, compelled to stalk and slay anyone who sets foot inside your lair?”

I blinked. The tumbler slipped.

“Or perhaps,” she said, tapping her chin thoughtfully, “a curse that melts the skin on your bones then causes it to reharden, trapping you forever inside the twisted, calcified husk of your own body?”

“Okay,” I said. “True. Both of those are true. But I’m talking about normal, average, non-insane houses.”

“Oh. In that case, I’m not certain.”

“Dogs.” I nodded over my shoulder at the empty, manicured lawn. “Last thing I ever want to see on a B-and-E job is any sign of a dog. Always check the yard and the kitchen for that. Take a peep through the window. You see any bowls, dog food, anything like that?”

While I worked on the lock, finding my groove again, she peered into the empty kitchen. “Nothing.”

“Good. Dogs were humanity’s first security system. They’re damn good at it, too. And—here we go.”

The last tumbler flipped and the lock gave a faint, satisfying click. I pocketed my picks and slowly pushed the knob, bracing for loud squeaks or the shrill of an unseen alarm. Nothing. The only sound came from deeper in the house, carried on a bed of audience laughter. Dino was watching television.

Caitlin followed me inside, stepping lightly across the smooth granite floor. If we were lucky, Dino had passed out in front of the TV, sound asleep. If not, it was going to take some real skill to slip in and out without catching his attention.

Realistically, nothing was at stake. I could grab a kitchen knife, storm in, and turn Dino into a human pincushion, then sack his place at my leisure. I couldn’t see any reason not to kill him, beyond the fact that I wasn’t getting paid to do it. The way I figured, he deserved anything he got.

Then I saw the reason, crouched next to me, eyes glittering in the dark, wearing an eager smile as she looked my way. Caitlin wanted to see what I did for a living. I could either show her Daniel the thug or Daniel the smooth operator. I wanted her to see the best side of me. To see that I had genuine skills, that I wasn’t some purse snatcher or penny-ante hood.

We were basically out on a date. A weird, fucked-up date by most people’s standards, but still. What did I really want tonight? Easy. I wanted my girlfriend to have a good time.

And that meant I had to do things the hard way.

10.

As we edged up a long, narrow hallway, taking it slow, my eyes adjusted to the dark. No pictures on the ivory walls, no memorabilia. Dino wasn’t a sentimental guy. Up on the left, light spilled from an open archway, along with a peal of audience laughter as Conan O’Brien delivered his monologue.

I was about to peep around the threshold to see if I could spot Dino, when a cell phone trilled. The television volume dipped and a voice—hard, irritated—spoke from just a few feet away.

“Yeah,” said the man. Dino, I presumed, unless he had company over. Then a pause. “I don’t want to hear about it, Max. I don’t wanna hear about any goddamn magic flying cards or some chick who lifted your guy like he weighed ten pounds. If I didn’t already know you were on meth, I’d be worried right now. Cut the deadwood and go hire some more guys. No more of these pool-hall wanna-be gangsters, either. Get me some soldiers, all right? People with security training, military experience—spec ops if you can round a couple up. Tanesha is going to sign with us. That’s not up for discussion. And once that’s done, we’ve got another tour to prep for.”

Beside me, Caitlin frowned. The kind of frown, in my experience, that sailed just ahead of violence like thunder before the storm.

“Well, Monty’s not here anymore. We’re doing this my way now. Take out her security, get her alone, and convince her to sign the damn contract.” Dino paused, listening. “Jesus, Max, do I really have to spell it out for you? Just don’t mark up her face. Her looks are half the package. We’ll talk tomorrow, I got another call coming in.”

Dino listened for a moment, then replied in halting, broken Spanish. Caitlin edged toward the open doorway. I knew what she had in mind. Threatening an artist Caitlin liked was a great way to end up dead.

There went my chance to show off my amazing thieving skills. Once Caitlin went to work on him, the first responders would have to scoop the remains of Dino Costa into ten separate body bags. Still, it wasn’t that momentary pettiness that moved to me to touch her shoulder, shaking my head. It was the feeling that I was overlooking something. That there were angles in play I wasn’t accounting for, and we’d be missing out if she killed Dino here and now.

I crept forward, daring to peek around the edge of the threshold. Dino—untucked salmon shirt draped over his beer gut, sporting a graying ponytail—paced back and forth in front of the muted television set. Phone in one hand, a nearly empty glass of scotch in the other. And the glimmer of white gold on his wrist. The son of a bitch hadn’t just taken the watch off Monty’s dead body; he was wearing it like a trophy.

“Can we—can we do this in English, please?” He tossed back the last swig of scotch and set the glass down on the end table beside a long black leather sofa. “Thank you. Look, we’ve gotta make this happen. Winter Court is going on national tour next week. I’ve got everything in place. We do it just like last time. Simple, easy, everybody makes a mint.”

As he paced, he loosened the Rolex, dropping it next to the empty glass.

“Yes, ten keys, on credit.” He paused, frowning. “You know I’m good for it. Come on, have I ever not come through with—no. No, señor, I’m not—yes. Thank you. Gracias. I’ll call with the details as soon as we’re ready to move.”

Dino hung up and set down the phone, cursing under his breath as he traded it for the empty glass. He stomped off, presumably in search of more booze, and I craned my neck to follow as he vanished through another arch and into the dining room.

Now was my chance. I motioned for Caitlin to hold back, then scurried across the living room floor, head ducked, to drop down behind the sofa. The watch, abandoned on the end table, was just a quick grab away.

Instead, I took his phone. Moving on instinct now, letting my gut call the shots. I pulled up his incoming-call log. The “Max” he’d been talking to—I’d bet fifty bucks it was our friend with the tire iron from the fight on Tanesha’s porch—was listed as “Dunsborough Security Solutions.” The second call came from a Red Bee Supermarket, weirdly enough. I took out my own phone and copied down the numbers as fast as I could, fighting to keep my hands steady and listening for footsteps.

He was coming back. I put his phone right back where I’d found it and looked at the watch.

And left it there as I scrambled back into the shadows, out of sight.

In the darkened hall, Caitlin gave me a quizzical look and wriggled her empty hands. I shook my head and nodded for her to follow me, back to the kitchen, to the open door and our waiting getaway. We slipped out of the house in silence. Dino never knew we were there.

A plan percolated in the back of my head, a map with lines drawn between the players in this little drama. Dino. Monty. Tanesha.

And in the intersection of those lines, an opportunity waiting to happen.

*     *     *

Caitlin and I sat snug in a scarlet booth at Fred 62, an all-night retro diner in Los Feliz where black-and-white movie stars adorned the wall and hipsters clustered at the long central bar for black coffee and breakfast at midnight. Caitlin ordered milkshakes—chocolate peanut butter for me, strawberry banana for her—and they came tall and thick as cement in fifties-style fluted glasses.

“Best in the city,” Caitlin said, tearing the paper from a fat plastic straw. “So, now that we’re away from the scene of the crime, mind explaining why we apparently forgot to commit the aforementioned crime?”

“Would I be remiss in guessing that you’ve got plans of your own for Dino Costa?”

She wrinkled her nose. “After what I heard? I like Tanesha’s music, Daniel. I’d like there to be more of it for me to enjoy in the future, and art produced under duress is rarely worthy of being called art. You said yourself you’d have no problem seeing Dino dead. So why did you stop me? And why didn’t you at least steal the watch so you can finish the job you’re being paid for?”

I took a long sip of the shake. It tasted like a frozen peanut-butter cup melting on my tongue.

“Greenbriar’s paying me a measly two grand to play his errand boy and put my neck on the line while he sits back home in Vegas. And the more I think about it, the more it sticks in my craw.”

“Which part?” Caitlin asked, the tip of her straw brushing her bottom lip. “The two thousand dollars, or playing the errand boy?”

“Both. Sure, I could do my magic-detective routine, lay Monty to rest and collect my pay, and put this whole mess in the rearview. And you could rip Dino’s throat out to keep Tanesha safe—which makes you pretty much the most hardcore music fan alive, by the way. But we’re both thinking too small.”

“Enlighten me,” she said.

“We know Dino’s hooked up with some shady customers, and based on that second phone call, we know he’s got a new coke deal on the horizon. Probably the same scam he pulled on Curtis Rake: sending his “roadies” along with the drugs stashed in the tour cases. Selling blow at every stop, making bank, and the artists are none the wiser.”

“Unless they’re found out, in which case Dino can blame it on the musicians,” Caitlin murmured, frowning. “Walking away with clean hands.”

“Bottom line, there’s about to be a lot of money and product swirling around Dino’s orbit.” I lifted my glass. “So how about we wring him dry and burn him down?”

Caitlin showed her teeth. Her glass clinked against mine.

“All the way down,” she replied.

We hit the streets bright and early the next morning, tracking down the grocery store on Dino’s phone with a reverse directory search. We followed the trail to East Los Angeles, down a warren of twisty streets lined with bodegas, bars, and broken windows reinforced with chicken wire. The Red Bee was a smallish store, windows plastered with the daily deals scrawled on big sheets of construction paper, shaded by an angled cherry-red plastic roof. The dusty sign on the door said Open, but the locals were staying away in droves.

“Not a popular place to shop,” Caitlin mused.

“I’m thinking groceries aren’t their main line of income. See that alley? Pull around. I want a look at the back of the store.”

Loading-bay doors. A delivery truck in faded paint, rusting away in the morning sun. And a few employees hanging out, smoking and kicking loose rocks around. Most grocery stores made you wear an apron and a name tag. These guys wore a uniform of bandannas, matching gym shoes, and prison ink on their shirtless chests, and they turned to give us hard-eyed stares as we rumbled on by.

“Keep going,” I said to Caitlin. “And turn left at the corner. Hopefully they’ll just assume we’re a couple of lost tourists.”

“What did you see?” she asked.

“Trouble,” I said and dug out my phone while Caitlin drove.

When it came to recreational substances of the forbidden variety, Jennifer Juniper was my faithful guide in the wilderness. Yes, that was her real name. Her parents were hippies. She picked up on the fourth ring.

“Hey, sugar,” she drawled, sounding just a little bit off. The old wake-and-bake, I thought.

“Hey, Jen, question for you. Out in LA, what set wears blue Chucks and blue and black bandannas?”

“Narrow it down for me. See any ink?”

“Yeah, but we didn’t get close enough to read it. I did see one guy with a big tat on his chest, a hand with the pinky and index finger sticking up. Like throwing up the horns at a metal concert.”

“Ooh. Sounds like MS-Thirteen, or a set claiming to be down with ’em. Steer clear, Danny—those guys are bad news.”

“Define ‘bad news.’”

“They’ll kill your whole family for looking at ’em sideways. Bad enough news for ya?”

I winced. “Yeah. They make any waves in the coke game?”

“Sure. They’re arm in arm with the Sinaloa Cartel.”

There it was. Dino’s supplier. His contact at the “supermarket” must have been his link to the cartel and their cocaine pipeline. I thought back to Dino’s phone call and a detail that stuck in my memory.

“I’m gonna ask a really dumb question. Is there any chance, ever, for any reason, these guys would operate on credit? Give out product on a promise to pay ’em back later?”

“To a junkie? Hell no. To a street-level dealer? Sure. Happens all the time.”

Not the response I was expecting. “You’re kidding me.”

“Nope,” Jennifer said. “Not to just anybody, of course, but if you’ve got the right vouchers, they’ll kick you some powder on credit. It’s coke, Danny. Selling coke in the United States is like selling ice water in the desert. You can’t not make money at it. Of course, you gotta pay ’em back on time, unless you’re looking to die in a bad way.”

Listening to my gut was feeling like a better idea all the time.

“Jennifer,” I asked, “would you like some cocaine?”

“I’m not in college anymore, Danny. Nah, the hardest stuff I do these days is weed, maybe some E, the occasional handful of shrooms. You shouldn’t touch that stuff either. I know you. With your personality, you’d like coke way too much.”

I sighed. “Not for personal consumption. To sell. See, I know this guy who’s about to come into possession of ten kilos of coke, and it looks like some cowboys from Vegas might be getting ready to rob him blind.”

“Now you’ve got my attention,” she said. “What’s the plan, sugar?”

“A little bit of hustle, a little bit of muscle.”

“That’s my favorite combo. I’ll be on the next flight out.”

11.

Caitlin had booked us a room at the Orchid Suites in Hollywood, a stone’s throw from Grauman’s Chinese Theater and the Walk of Fame. The room was simple, clean, eggshell white, with a balcony window overlooking the rectangular swimming pool. I could have stepped back in time thirty years, and everything would have looked exactly the same.

A knock at the door announced Jennifer’s arrival, sunlight glinting off her blueberry-tinted Lennon glasses, one tattoo-sleeved arm dragging a battered roll-on suitcase. She threw her free arm around me, a quick tight hug, then waved to Caitlin as I shut and latched the door behind her.

“Cait,” Jennifer said, “lookin’ good.”

“And you,” Caitlin replied. “Daniel tells me this is your field of expertise.”

“When I was little, my mama taught me about two things: blood magic and bootleg hooch. I’ve diversified my portfolio considerably in the years since.”

“If we jack this shipment,” I said, “you’re sure you can line up a buyer?”

She left her suitcase by the door and flopped down on the bed, stretching her sneakered feet straight up in the air.

“Damn, that feels good. Think I had about three inches of legroom on that flight. Now just to be clear, Danny, I’m not about to pick a fight with those MS-Thirteen boys, or the Sinaloa. This guy you’re looking to take down—what’s his deal? How connected is he?”

“Record producer. Not a very reputable one. The drug game’s a sideline for him.”

“Hell of a sideline. You’re sure he said ten keys?”

I nodded. “He lines up national tours for his acts, then sends his crew along to deal at every stop. Not sure how often he pulls this routine, maybe once a year?”

“Why?” Caitlin asked her. “How much is ten kilograms worth?”

Still flat on her back, feet pointed at the ceiling, Jennifer poked the air with her fingers as if working an invisible calculator.

“Let’s see. Current price in Colombia is eighteen hundred a key, but bring that over to the States and—well, it varies by state. Some are drier than others, but to use our homestead as a reference? Street value in Vegas is twenty to twenty-five grand. Each.”

“Wait,” I said. “So this shipment could be worth a quarter of a million dollars?”

“Pop your eyes back into your head, sugar. That’s best-possible-world pricing, and we ain’t gonna get that. For starters, I’m gonna have to hire a mule to ferry this stuff back home—”

“Couldn’t we do that?” Caitlin asked.

“You wanna drive about three hundred miles in a rented car with enough coke to put all three of us behind bars until we qualify for Medicare? I’ll answer that for ya. No. You do not. We’ll use this guy I know; he’s a ghost on wheels. Never been sniffed at, let alone caught, and he’s rock-solid trustworthy. So he’ll take a small chunk of the profit.”

I paced the room, running numbers in my head, as Caitlin edged closer to the bed and eyed Jennifer. “And then?”

“Understand I’m not selling this on the street level. It’d take forever, and the dealers on my payroll don’t run in the kinda circles where Peruvian marching powder is the flavor of the day. Your average pothead’s got no interest in blow. So I’ll hook up with some midlevel specialty dealers and offer them the product—or pieces of it, if they can’t afford the whole kit and caboodle—at a wholesale discount. We get a lot less money, but we get it next week as opposed to the cash trickling in over the next decade or so, and we’re not caught with the goods if the DEA comes sniffing around.”

“Define ‘a lot less,’” I said.

Jennifer tapped at her invisible calculator.

“Figure five percent for the mule, but he’ll probably go for a flat fee if I ask nice. Might have to break the cargo up between three distributors I know. One’s stingy as hell, but I can sweet-talk the other two into a fifty-fifty split. Then there’s five percent for Nicky Agnelli, since you know that son of a bitch is gonna hear about our score ten seconds after we get back in town. I hate payin’ the Nicky Tax, but he’ll keep Metro off our backs while we get the deal done.”

I couldn’t argue that. Nicky was the de facto boss of Las Vegas, and he had his fingers in every seedy slice of pie. By blackmail, bribery, or both, he had heavy pull in Metro, too. Keeping him happy was the difference between vice detectives looking the other way, and a full-on SWAT team ramming down your front door.

Caitlin slid onto the bed, lying on her side and propping herself up on one arm as she looked into Jennifer’s eyes. “And the grand total is?”

More air tapping. “Hold on. Carry the three, divide by…okay, there’s a lot of wiggle room, and the more people we gotta hire for this job the less take-home pay we get, but I’m thinkin’ it’ll come to somewhere between seventy and eighty grand in profit. Call it a three-way split, so around twenty-three to twenty-six thousand dollars for each of us.”

“Each,” I echoed.

“Each.” Jennifer tilted her head, glancing at Caitlin. “On the high end, specifically, twenty-six thousand, six hundred and sixty-six dollars. And sixty-six cents, repeating. Figured you might appreciate that.”

Caitlin grinned. “You have a head for numbers.”

“And a bod for all kinds of things,” Jennifer replied, wriggling one eyebrow.

“I don’t know if I believe you,” Caitlin said. “I might need a demonstration.”

I wasn’t sure what jarred me more: the idea of twenty-five thousand dollars in my pocket, or watching my girlfriend flirt with my ex-girlfriend. This was shaping up to be one of my stranger days.

“Not to change the subject,” I said, “but to change the subject: the mark, Dino Costa, he’s taking this whole shipment on credit. When it goes missing, what are the odds his MS-Thirteen buddies or the Sinaloa come gunning for us?”

“Long as we cover our tracks, zilch,” Jennifer said. “Dino’s the buyer, so it’s his responsibility to pay for the product, no matter what happens. These people ain’t big on excuses. He can’t pay up, he is done. They’ll make an example out of him.”

Caitlin looked my way. “Do you think he can cover the loss? Judging from his home, he’s not in want of wealth.”

“I think he might be. Curtis Rake—”

“Big Rig?” Jennifer asked. “You met Big Rig and you didn’t invite me?”

“Didn’t know you were a fan.”

“‘Booty Thumpin’’? That is my jam.”

Jennifer bicycled her legs while snapping her fingers to the beat in her head. I took a deep breath.

“Anyway, Curtis told me Dino’s overextended. He’s investing all his cash—legal and otherwise—into some streaming-music start-up. He sounded pretty hot to get this coke run lined up. If he’s got all his eggs in one basket, losing the shipment could be enough to sink him for good.”

Caitlin gave me a sly smile. “So the best case for him is bankruptcy. He has to sell everything he owns to pay the cartel back.”

“And worst case for him—best for us—is if he can’t even manage that. The Sinaloa kill Dino for us, and nobody comes looking for ten kilos of stolen coke.”

“Got a feelin’ you’ve got something more complicated in mind than a straight-up hijack,” Jennifer told me.

“Dino’s got to be feeling confident right now. Like you said on the phone, selling coke is like selling water in the desert. Hard to go bust on a sure thing. So what if we gave him a reason to overextend his cash reserves just a little bit further? Make him spend more than he ever would if he wasn’t confident that he was about to make some serious drug money.”

“What do you have in mind?” Caitlin asked.

“Offer up another ‘sure thing.’ We know he’s desperate to sign big names to this streaming venture, and we know he wants Tanesha bad. What if we convinced her to say yes—in exchange for a nice fat signing bonus? She wouldn’t have to follow through with it. Dino’ll be dead before the ink dries on the contracts.”

Caitlin shook her head. “While you are quite skilled at your chosen vocation, pet, reading people is my specialty. Did you notice how she cringed at the mere mention of his name? And that was before she knew Dino murdered Monty Spears. No, there’s no force capable of compelling Tanesha to cooperate like that—none that I care to inflict upon her, anyway.”

“Idea ain’t a bad one, though,” Jennifer mused. “Could work if we had another musician on the crew, somebody good—I mean real good—who Dino might go for.”

I shrugged. “I’ve got safecrackers, wheelmen, and grifters on my speed dial. I can call a guy who makes corpses, and another guy who makes corpses disappear. No musicians. That’s a little outside my usual circle.”

“Is it?” Caitlin said archly, rolling off the bed and landing in a crouch. She rose gracefully to her full height.

“Well, yeah, generally it’s not the kind of—”

The sound that trilled from her throat was like a pitch-perfect instrument given human form, an operatic diva running through her warm-up scales with the skill of a master. Then she sang a cappella, the words flowing around me like velvet smoke. It took me a minute to place the lyrics, an old Duran Duran tune. I stood stunned until she finished the first chorus. Then her song faded as she took a bow.

“You can sing?” I asked. “I mean, holy shit, you can sing.”

“Got that right,” Jennifer said, looking like she’d just been blindsided by a truck.

“How soon we forget,” Caitlin told me. “I sang for you in your dreams.”

“Sure, but that was, you know, a dream. I can fly in my dreams. Doesn’t mean jumping off the hotel balcony is a good idea.”

“I haven’t had cause to perform in quite some time. Hmm. Come to think of it, last time I set foot on a stage was…well, never mind when it was. Suffice to say this isn’t my first visit to Hollywood, but Los Angeles wasn’t quite as large back then. Or as smoggy. The parties were delightful, though.”

I snapped my fingers, feeling the plan come together. “All right, this is good. So we dangle you in front of Dino, get him all hot to sign you, and hold out until he forks over a nice stack of cash. Enough cash that when his coke goes missing, there’ll be no way for him to recover. We split town with the money and the drugs, the cartel kills Dino, and dinner at Joel Robuchon’s is on me.”

“Good deal,” Jennifer said. “Only one problem. Cait’s gonna have to cut a demo tape. We got the singer, but we don’t got the songs.”

“I have a thought on that,” Caitlin replied. “As I said, Tanesha won’t help directly. That doesn’t necessarily mean she won’t lend us a hand behind the scenes.”

12.

Nobody talked directly to anybody in this town. I had no way of getting hold of Tanesha, short of camping outside her retreat in Mt. Baldy and waiting for her to show up. So I put in a call to Curtis Rake’s assistant’s assistant, who patched me through to his receptionist, who took my number and told me somebody would call me back.

While I played phone tag, Caitlin did some business of her own. She took her phone into the bathroom, shut the door, and turned on the tap water to cover the muffled sounds of conversation. I wandered too close to the door and caught a murmured twist of flensetongue. The faintest echo of the demonic language, toxic to human ears, made my stomach clench. The wave of nausea didn’t pass until I moved to the far side of the room.

Jennifer perched at the edge of the bed, TV remote at her side, watching a People’s Court rerun. She glanced my way.

“So, you and her.” She nodded to the bathroom door. “You’re really doin’ this, huh?”

It felt weird slowing down long enough to think about it. The weeks since I’d met Caitlin had been a turbulent whirlwind. Dealing with serial killers, corporate sorcery, soul-shattered ghosts, and smoke-faced men with doomsday plans had kept us all neck-deep in trouble. And something told me we were just getting started.

“Yeah,” I said. “Really doing this. What do you think?”

“Dunno. She seems good for you. Which I wouldn’t expect, y’know, given she’s a raging hell beast. You look happier than you’ve been in a long time.”

“I feel…” I paused. How did I feel? It took me a second to find the word that fit. “Healthy. How long this’ll last, where it’ll all end up, I couldn’t tell you. If we were good at long-term planning, we probably wouldn’t be criminals.”

“It’s true,” Jennifer said. “Ten keys of coke are gonna make a nice bundle for the retirement fund, though.”

“Sure. We just have to con Dino Costa, rip him off, and set him up to be killed by a Colombian drug cartel.” I shrugged. “Huh. Something just occurred to me. We are not good people.”

“Nope.” Jennifer leaned back on the bed. “I’ll start caring as soon as you do.”

“I’ll let you know.”

I glanced at my phone for the twentieth time, as if I could will it to ring.

“So. That bullwhip of hers.” Jennifer gave me an impish smile. “She ever bring that into the bedroom?”

“Jen, c’mon.” I shot a look at the bathroom door. “She’s right there.”

She held up her open hands. “I’m just tryin’ to get a notion of the dynamics of your relationship, that’s all! It’s a perfectly innocent question. Besides, I remember back when we were datin’. That Halloween party at the Tiger’s Garden? You really liked my cowgirl outfit…”

I pressed my palm to my forehead. “Jen.”

“I still got the spurs. Want me to lend ’em to her, or does she have her own?”

My phone chimed against my hip. I held it up with a sigh.

“Saved by the bell,” I told her.

Curtis’s admin’s assistant admin’s receptionist had passed my details along to Tanesha’s receptionist’s admin’s assistant, or something like that. Bottom line, we had an address and an invitation to drop by for a quick chat. “She can give you five minutes,” I was told, in a tone that made it clear we’d be lucky to get three.

Good enough. As we got ready to head out, Caitlin emerged from the bathroom, looking vaguely pleased.

“Local business?” I asked her.

“Checking up on a few people. And doing a bit of research that might come in handy later. Shall we?”

The address led us to a sky-blue office just off La Brea Avenue, with no sign out front and a keypad lock on the polished glass door. A woman in scrubs came to meet us and had us wait out on the front stoop while she verified our invitation was legit. She finally came back and ushered the three of us inside, the arid sunshine replaced by cool AC and string music piped over concealed speakers.

“What is this place?” I asked, earning a look of disdain from our greeter. Apparently I’d just outed myself as a filthy peasant.

“The Shulman Clinic is a full health and body resource for patrons requiring discretion and privacy. We offer private workout rooms with the best personal trainers in the city, saunas, a full day spa—”

“So it’s a gym for rich people,” I said.

That look again. I was definitely a filthy peasant.

Behind the door for Salon Three, we found Tanesha in a small, brightly lit weight room with tangerine walls. Her gray sweats soaked through as she struggled to keep up with a rock-bodied trainer straight out of an ’80s aerobics video.

“Oh, hey,” she gasped, then looked to her trainer. “Molly, I gotta take five, okay? It’s business.”

Judging from the trainer’s glare, I was not only a filthy peasant but possibly a creature made of sentient dough. Still, she left the room and Tanesha dropped her weights. She staggered over to a glass-and-chrome credenza and uncapped a bottle of vitamin-infused water.

“Thanks for that,” she said, downing half the bottle before coming up for air. “Swear that woman’s gonna kill me. I’ll look good when I die, though. Who’s your friend?”

I gestured to Jennifer. “Another member of my team. Helping out on the Dino Costa investigation.”

“What’s to investigate? You got all the info you needed, right? Now you’ve just gotta turn it all over to the cops and bust him for it.”

I hated when a lie came back to haunt me.

“Right,” I said, “that. There’s…been a complication.”

Her brow furrowed. “Complication? What kind of complication?”

“We did provide everything we had to the authorities. And, unfortunately, Dino was a step ahead of us. His lawyers have already moved to respond in Nevada, doing everything they can to shield him from prosecution. Apparently he’s got a solid alibi for the night of the murder. It’s bogus, we know he killed Monty, but what we’ve got just won’t hold up in court.”

“Damn.” Tanesha sank down on the edge of a weight bench, cradling her half-empty bottle. “So he gets away with it?”

“There’s more,” Caitlin said. “We have reason to believe he’s targeting you for further harassment. Getting ready to step up the pressure. You’re in serious danger.”

“Tell me something I don’t know. Long as that creep’s walking free, he’s never gonna leave me alone. Is that it?”

I shook my head. “No. Not if you don’t want it to be. Tanesha, you have…friends at CMC Entertainment. I’ve been given the authorization to take special steps here. Steps that would remove Dino Costa as a threat. Permanently.”

She looked up at me, a new wariness in her eyes.

“You mean permanently, like…” She touched her throat, her fingertip making the faintest slicing motion, as if afraid to commit to the gesture.

“Permanently as in he’ll never bother you again, and that’s all you have to know. You wouldn’t be involved in anything illegal or unethical, and your name wouldn’t be connected to what happens in any way.”

“If I’m gonna be so uninvolved, why even tell me this?”

“Because we need your help. We’re setting up a sting operation to expose the inner workings of Blue Rhapsody and prove Dino’s crooked.”

That perked her up, her eyes widening a little. I knew she wouldn’t go for a murder plot—she wouldn’t want anyone’s blood on her hands, not even a tiny drop—but a sting operation was something else entirely. Something benign and righteous.

It was still going to end with Dino’s head on the chopping block, but she didn’t need to know that.

“Like on TV,” Tanesha said. “An exposé.”

“Exactly like that. We’re going to present him with a singer he’ll have to sign, so we can document the whole process on a concealed camera. The pressure, the intimidation tactics, everything.”

“Not me,” she said fast. “I can’t. I can’t do it. I can’t be in the same room with that man.”

I held up my hands, easing her down. “Not what we had in mind. When you were telling us about your new album, you said nobody’s heard it yet, right?”

“Nobody but me and my studio engineer. Why?”

“We have the singer,” I said. “What we don’t have is the music. If you could let us use two songs off that album to cut a demo, it’ll be the kind of bait Dino couldn’t possibly pass up.”

She tilted her head at me, dubious.

“You want me to let you cover two tracks off an album that hasn’t come out yet. My best work. Exposing me to who knows how much trouble, legal and financial, if those recordings leak. And trust you with them—total strangers who just came in off the street.”

“When you put it like that,” I said, “it almost sounds unreasonable.”

She tossed back a swig of water. Her head sank.

“No. Forget it. I don’t want to get involved in any of this shady stuff. I’ll take my chances alone.”

“Dino will pursue you,” Caitlin said. “And the next group of men he sends won’t be there to frighten you. They’ll be there to hurt you. Badly.”

“Then I guess I’ll quit.” Tanesha sighed. “I made a nice nest egg. I can retire young. Go out on a high note, right? Fame just makes people crazy. All I ever wanted to do was make music. Entertain people. That’s all.”

I started to respond, digging for something, anything, to win her back to our side. Then Caitlin silenced me with a light touch to my sleeve and glided over to the weight bench. She sat down beside Tanesha.

“That’s your choice to make,” Caitlin said, “but what would Wanda say?”

Tanesha blinked. “My grandmother? How did you—”

Caitlin brushed her fingers along Tanesha’s arm. “You talked about her in an interview last year. Her years in Motown, her struggle to make it. She worked every day of her life to achieve that dream.”

Tanesha gave a slight nod. “Never did, though. Lived and died as a backup singer for the ones who did make it big.”

“But she never stopped believing in you, did she? She supported you every step of the way. She was there for you when the chips were down, when you were sure you’d never get your big break. Even when she was too sick to come to your shows, she’d call you after each and every one, just to find out how it went.”

Tanesha smiled, just a little. “Yeah. She sure did.”

“She wanted you to fly.” Caitlin’s fingers curled gently over Tanesha’s shoulder. “Are you really going to let a worm like Dino Costa steal that from you? From you both? Are you really going to let a small, greedy man stand between you and your dreams, when you’ve already fought so hard and given so much to make them come true?”

Tanesha didn’t answer right away. She looked from the bottle in her hand to Caitlin’s unblinking eyes.

“You know what?” she said. “No. I’m not. To hell with him. So this demo tape—if it hooks Dino in, you can use it to bring him down? You’re sure?”

“Positive,” I said.

She turned my way. “And you’ve got a singer lined up?”

“I’ll be doing the honors,” Caitlin said.

“If you’ve got the pipes,” Tanesha told her, “I’ve got the songs. I’ll book some studio time and round up my band, and we’re gonna put together a demo so hot no producer alive would turn it down.”

I gave Caitlin a small thumbs-up behind Tanesha’s back. We almost had our bait. After that came the hard part: casting our line and convincing Dino to bite down on the hook.

13.

Back in the rented Camaro, riding shotgun while Jennifer perched in the rear seat, I let out a sigh of relief.

“Wow,” I said, “when you’re a fan, you are a fan. I thought we were gonna lose her, but that detail about her grandmother? Perfect. You remembered all that from one interview?”

“Not in the slightest.” Caitlin flashed a smile, cranked up the air conditioning, and threw the car into drive. “When I was making my calls back at the hotel, I ordered a bit of quick research. I thought we might need an emotional pry bar to get into Tanesha’s head, and I was right.”

“So your people went and read through a bunch of interviews?”

“No, silly. They found her. Tanesha’s grandmother is in hell.” Caitlin touched her finger to her lips. “Shh. No telling.”

“Ooh,” Jennifer said. “That just got dark.”

“Dark,” Caitlin said, “was her repeated insistence on knowing when her son-in-law was going to be joining her down there. Anyway, she was very cross at the idea of her granddaughter being threatened. Happy to throw a bit of help our way.”

The sky blossomed ocher and candle yellow as the sun shimmered its way down, blurry behind a rippling gauze veil of smog. We were all in agreement that when it came to getting this job done, sooner was better. On the phone to his supplier, Dino had said Winter Court was the band who’d be unwittingly ferrying his drugs cross-country. I hadn’t heard of them, but a quick Google search enlightened me. Some neo-goth thing with classical influences, a quartet of artists in black mascara who dressed like vampires without the fangs and played the electric violin. Not my style of music—give me B.B. King or Bo Diddley any day of the week—but the tour dates on their official website commanded my full attention.

Their kickoff show was on Friday night; then the tour buses rolled out. We had three days to seal the deal and rob Dino blind.

Fortunately, Tanesha and her backup band were night owls. She’d booked the studio time and sent out the rallying call, leaving us with nothing to do for a couple of hours but wait. We found a diner down the street from the studio, juicy burgers and fries and fountain drinks, and ate while we hammered out the details.

“Don’t think a guy like Dino’s big on cold calls,” Jennifer said, clutching a quarter-pound burger in both hands. Ketchup leaked out the other side, dripping from a curled lettuce leaf and spattering the paper place mat. “How are we gonna get his attention?”

“A little social engineering,” I said. “I think we need Pixie for this job.”

“The mysterious Pixie. Am I ever gonna meet that girl in person?”

“Who’s Pixie?” Caitlin asked.

“Mercenary hacker,” I said. “Probably the best on the West Coast. She’s a little idealistic, but if I tell her I need help fighting the bondage of capitalism and the elite bourgeoisie, she’ll generally go along with the plan. Right now I’ve got her working on tracking down Lauren Carmichael. Lauren’ll poke her head out of hiding sooner or later.”

“I look forward to chopping it off,” Caitlin murmured.

We finished our meal, bellies full and energy refreshed, and met up with Tanesha at the studio. Her studio engineer, a lanky young man named Trey—just Trey—sat at a mixing console that looked like the control panel on a 747. Her backup band waited behind a wall of glass, perching on stools and tuning their instruments.

“Okay,” Tanesha told Caitlin, “I picked out my two favorite tracks. One’s a breakup song, all heartache and regrets, and the other’s a serious piece of dance-your-ass-off high-tempo pop. Think you can keep up with me?”

Caitlin chuckled, one hand on her hip. “I’ll do my best.”

“We’ll run each song once with me singing lead, so you can get a feel for it.” Tanesha handed Caitlin a couple of photocopied pages. Lyrics, it looked like. “Then if you think you’ve got it down, it’ll be your turn and I’ll sing backup. Let’s see what you can do.”

Jennifer and I hung out in the mixing room, watching the action from behind the glass. Caitlin’s eyes met mine, and she beamed like a kid opening presents on Christmas morning.

Generally speaking, I wasn’t a huge fan of Tanesha’s tunes. Then the music swelled up, and she parted her lips and made me a believer. There was something raw about a live performance, something intimate you just didn’t get on the radio after all the rough edges and hard feelings had been sanded smooth. She snared me, cupping me in the palm of her hand. Then she passed my soul and the microphone over to Caitlin, one more slow ride through the valley of heartache, and Caitlin’s voice nearly brought me to my knees.

After the last, lingering note trembled into silence, Tanesha blinked at her. “Damn, girl. Why aren’t you doing this for a living?”

“Afraid I have a higher calling,” Caitlin replied with a subtle smile. “You approve, I take it?”

“I think if you ever want a new job, you should let me know. Okay, next one. We’re gonna go hard, loud, and fast. You ready?”

“Hard, loud, and fast,” Caitlin said as she slipped her headphones back on, “is exactly how I like it.”

I’ll admit it, I danced. Badly, but Jennifer has two left feet just like me, and we weren’t looking to impress anybody. Sometimes, when the music’s right, you just have to move a little.

“It’s good,” was Trey’s reserved opinion. “Lemme mix this down and play with it a little. Gonna be one hell of a demo.”

“Nobody’s going to hear this but Dino, right?” Tanesha asked as she and Caitlin stepped out of the recording booth. “I can’t have these songs getting loose in the wild before my album drops.”

“Trust us.” Caitlin’s fingertips brushed her shoulder. “Your work is in good hands.”

Jennifer glanced my way. “So. We’ve got the singer, and we’ve got the songs. What now?”

“Now,” I said, “we get Dino’s attention. I need to step outside for a minute and make a call.”

I’d been putting together a plan in my head, and it needed two more pairs of hands. One potential recruit would have to wait until morning. The other was never hard to reach.

“Faust,” Pixie said with the tone one might use to discuss a venereal disease. I wasn’t one of her favorite people. Still, my cash was good and I never tried to cheat her, so she usually took my calls.

“Hey, Pix. Is this a bad time?”

“It is if you’re calling about the Carmichael-Sterling job. Lauren’s hiding deep, no news to share. I’m working on it.”

“No, this is a side deal. Got a question for you: is there any way to hijack a person’s web browser so it goes wherever you want it to? Like, if they try to read a news site, could you redirect it to a fake?”

“Sure,” she said, “BeEF it.”

“Beef?”

She sighed, spelling it out for me. “Browser Exploitation Framework. So easy a script kiddie could do it. Once your target’s browser is hooked, you can see everything he types, every URL he visits, read his passwords in plain text, whatever you want. Total ownage. Heck, if he’s got a webcam hooked up, you can watch him through it. And yeah, you can send him anywhere you want, completely invisible on the user’s side.”

“Wow, that’s…kinda terrifying.”

“You asked.”

“True. So if I wanted you to, um, beef somebody…”

“That part is easy,” she said, “but there’s a catch. First you’ve gotta inject the malware into your target’s system.”

“And that’s done how?”

“It scares me that you don’t know this. Get him to open an infected file, execute a compromised Java app…let me put it this way, does the guy have any computer smarts? Is he dumb enough to click on a random file from a stranger, or open links from a spam email?”

“For the record, I don’t do either of those things. And I’m not sure. Maybe?”

“‘Maybe’ isn’t helpful,” she said. “Look, all you have to do is get him to open an infected file. You’re the con man. Figuring that part out is your job. Once he’s infected, I can do the rest.”

Fair enough. My next call, which involved two transfers and ten minutes on hold, was to Curtis Rake.

“My man,” he said. Faint bass thumped in the background. Clinking glasses and muffled laughter. “I talked to Tanesha. Sounds like you got something cooking over there. You really gonna go toe to toe with Dino?”

“That’s the idea.”

“Just so we’re clear? That line you used on Tanesha—that some freakin’ casino cares so much about justice for Monty that you’re doing an exposé? I don’t buy it any more than I bought your probate-lawyer act.”

“Aw,” I said, “not even a little bit?”

“Don’t try to play a player, son. Hell, she doesn’t totally believe you either, I don’t think, but she wants the same thing half of LA wants: Dino gone. That I believe you want too. And she told me how you handled those thugs on her front porch. That was righteous. So whatever your hustle really is, I’m down, so long as Tanesha doesn’t get hurt.”

“I gave her my word. Her hands stay clean.”

“I’m gonna hold you to that. Dino ain’t the only man in this town who can round up some muscle.”

“I hear you,” I said. “Speaking of, what kind of pull does Dino have in this town, anyway? With him and Monty poaching artists left and right, I gotta imagine the other labels don’t have anything nice to say about him.”

Curtis laughed. “That’s an understatement. Barely a bridge he ain’t burned. And at least Monty was a nice guy. Dino’s an all-around asshole, and everybody knows it but him. Let’s just say he doesn’t get too many party invitations these days.”

So when an up-and-coming songstress started making a splash around town, nobody would be contradicting the story. Perfect.

“So how’s he get the local buzz? Who tells him what hot new artists are worth keeping an eye on?”

“Internet, magazines,” he said. “Locally, he’s got a guy. Sleazebag ex-paparazzi turned ‘talent scout’ named Hanover. He basically gets paid to hit the clubs, drink on Dino’s dime, and keep an ear out for the next big thing. He ain’t found it yet.”

“Any idea where I can find him?”

“Beats me. Try the bars along Melrose, maybe. He goes for the hipster scene.”

A quick search turned up Hanover’s website, a creaky relic littered with “under construction” graphics and broken links. Still, it had the one thing I needed: a photograph. Back in the studio, Caitlin and Tanesha were deep in hushed conversation, and Jennifer was comparing tattoos with the drummer. I gently pried them both away, and we regrouped in the car. Time to go hunting.

Hanover was our way in, our perfect angle of attack. Whether he wanted to be or not.

14.

It was sometime after one in the morning, pushing up on closing time, when we found our prey. He sat alone at a beer-sticky table in a Disneyland parody of a dive bar, the kind of place that worked overtime to promise a dark and seedy atmosphere to a wealthy college crowd. The distressed wood was too perfectly worn, the faux-biker bouncers too friendly, the pool table in the corner kept up to tournament-regulation standards. The bar served Pabst Blue Ribbon by the can and tiny plates of artisanal delicacies that were, the menu insisted, exclusively crafted from farm-to-table ingredients.

“Oh, I forgot,” Jennifer said, “I hate Los Angeles.”

Standing on my opposite side, Caitlin stared in dismay.

“Half the men in this room are wearing fedoras.” She looked my way. “Think anyone would miss them if a massacre just happened to break out? Hypothetically speaking.”

“Probably not,” I said, “but let’s keep our eyes on the prize.”

The prize—though I hesitated to call him that—was also wearing a fedora. Hanover had a scruffy little neckbeard, the smug smirk of a trust-fund kid, and about twenty pounds too many for the vintage suit he’d squeezed himself into. Up on a stage under cool blue lights, a five-piece band in rockabilly couture fumbled their way through a Buddy Holly cover.

“Everything old is new again,” I said, slipping into the chair at his left. Caitlin and Jennifer took the other two seats.

Hanover blinked, surprised. “Hey, private table.”

“We won’t take too much of your time,” I said. “I understand you’re a talent scout for Blue Rhapsody. We’ve got a band your boss will be interested in.”

He rolled his eyes at me. “I’m a scout. That means I look for you. If I haven’t seen you, it’s because you suck. If you’re a nobody looking for a come-up, submit a demo directly to the label and they might get back to you in a few months. If you’re a somebody, you should have the juice to get a personal meeting with my boss. In no case do you need to be talking to me.”

“You shouldn’t be surprised,” Caitlin purred. “A man in your position wields a great deal of power. It’s only natural that people would want to curry your favor.”

He straightened his hat. “Well, uh. Yeah. That’s…that’s true. But still, this isn’t how it works.”

“When there’s something I want,” I told him, “I don’t care too much for rules and regulations getting in the way. There’s an old saying, and I believe it’s absolutely true: ‘Energy and persistence conquer all things.’”

I reached into my jacket, fingers slipping into Greenbriar’s envelope and peeling off a crisp hundred-dollar bill. I set it down on the table between us.

“Know who said that?” I asked. “Benjamin Franklin.”

I saw the sudden look of recognition in Hanover’s eyes, just like I’d seen it on countless other faces. He knew what this was all about now. His confusion and irritation turned to eager greed.

“The man said some wise things,” he replied.

I put two fingertips on the bill and slid it toward him.

“He did. You should keep this, as a reminder.”

He awkwardly swept the bill into his hand, crumpling it as he shoved it down in his hip pocket.

“You understand,” he said, “that I’m a talent scout. I don’t sign artists. I don’t make deals. My job is to find promising leads and bring them to my boss’s attention, and that’s the end of it. Whoever you’re repping, unless they’re genuinely marketable, I can’t do a thing to help.”

“All we need is a foot in the door,” Jennifer said. “Just deliver our demo to the man at the top. That’s all we’re askin’.”

He rubbed his scruffy beard and eyed me like a pawnshop clerk appraising a stolen TV set. Something told me this wasn’t the first time he’d been approached like this. Now he had to choose: take the bribe, walk away, or try to squeeze me for more money.

“You know,” he said, “Benjamin Franklin said a lot of memorable things.”

There it was. Option number three. I wasn’t exactly surprised.

“I might remember a couple of relevant quotes,” I told him and peeled off another two bills. He put his hand on the money, but he didn’t take it.

“Maybe,” he said, “even three or four more?”

Caitlin leaned across the table, eyes narrowing.

“I believe the man had some pertinent commentary about the folly of greed,” she said, “and the dangers to one’s health that it might pose.”

“Right.” Hanover pocketed the extra two hundred, fast. “This is good. This is plenty. I don’t need much to be happy.”

“Good thinkin’,” Jennifer told him.

I took out my phone. “Give me your email address. I’ll send you the recording. Tell Dino that you recorded it at a local club, tonight, and he should listen to it pronto.”

*     *     *

It wasn’t Caitlin’s demo I sent him. We had to save that bullet for after Dino’s defenses were down. Instead, just before starting our barhopping expedition, I’d followed up with a second call to Pixie.

“This malware he’s gotta run,” I said. “Can you slip that into any kind of file? Like an audio recording?”

“Technically no. When you open an audio file, you’re not ‘running’ the audio; you’re running the software that plays it back. That said…” She paused. I could hear her thinking. “I could disguise an executable as an MP3, or better yet, write up a wrapper that’ll inject the code as a background process and—you’re not following one word of this, are you?”

“I know what MP3s are,” I said, trying to be helpful.

“Okay, lemme rephrase that. Yes. The answer to your question, for all intents and purposes as far as you’re concerned, is yes. You should express awe at my skills now.”

“I’ll make a big donation to St. Jude’s as soon as I’m back in Vegas.”

“Damn right you will. So what’s the source file?”

I told her what I was shopping for, and she hunted around until she found a winner: a four-song set by a decent but obscure bar band back in Detroit, filmed and tossed up on YouTube by a friend of the lead singer. She stripped the video out along with any identifying signatures and added her special sauce to the recording before emailing it to a throwaway account.

“That’s it?” I asked her.

“That’s it. One double-click and his box is mine. The malware’s designed to phone home as soon as it takes effect. I’ll let you know when I see it go active.”

“You’re a lifesaver, Pix. Can’t thank you enough.”

“Sure you can,” she said. “Pay me.”

*     *     *

Hanover eyed his phone. It pinged as my email hit his in-box, and I saw a list of unread and unopened messages bump down another notch. He didn’t bother opening mine, either.

“Easiest three hundred bucks you’ll ever make,” I told him. “Just shoot it to your boss, tell him you recorded it, and you’re done.”

“Yeah, yeah,” he said, pocketing his phone and downing the last of his drink. “He’ll get it.”

“Tonight.”

Hanover pushed his chair back, cheeks flush from the gin.

“Sure,” he said. “Don’t worry about it.”

The tone in his voice told exactly me how worried I should be. I shared a quick glance with Jennifer and Caitlin, and they were thinking the same thing.

I never faulted a man for taking a bribe. Life was a hustle, and you had to make ends meet wherever you could. That meant following through, though, and doing what you’d said you would. Taking the money and running? Unacceptable, especially when it was my money. I was suddenly having grave doubts about Hanover’s honesty.

We let him leave the bar. Then we silently rose as one and followed him out onto the crowded sidewalk.

He didn’t use the premium garage just up the street. Either he didn’t have the cash for the good spots, or he just didn’t want to spend it. Instead we followed him for about three blocks, down side streets where the crowds and the streetlamps went thin, to a shoebox-sized parking lot with no security and a busted light. Five bucks a spot, but you got what you paid for.

He was jiggling his key in the lock of a rusted nineties-model Volvo when he spotted our reflections in the window glass, coming up on him fast.

“Hey, guys, I told you.” He turned, giving us a plastic smile. “I’ll get it over to him, don’t even—”

Caitlin grabbed his left wrist, spun him around, and slammed him down against the hood of his car. His cheek to the flaking metal, his last word turning to a yelp of pain as she wrenched his arm behind his back.

“At this angle,” Caitlin said calmly, “it would take approximately seventeen and a half pounds of force to dislocate your shoulder. Tearing ligaments, wrenching your arm from its socket, possibly inflicting permanent damage. What you are feeling, at this moment, is exactly seventeen pounds of applied force.”

“Jesus,” Hanover groaned, “that hurts.”

“It’s meant to.”

I leaned over and snapped my fingers in front of his face. “Hey, buddy. Sorry for the demonstration, but my colleagues were concerned that you might think we’re stupid.”

“Stupid people aren’t too good at physics,” Jennifer said. She plucked Hanover’s wallet from his pocket, stepping back to rifle through it. “So you’d better hope my friend here knows exactly how much stress she’s puttin’ on your arm, or things might start going pop any second now. You don’t think she’s stupid, do ya?”

“N-no!” he gasped. “I don’t! I don’t think that at all.”

“I think we’d all feel better if you sent that email to your boss,” I said. “Right here. Right now.”

Caitlin let him up. He rubbed his shoulder, wincing, then took out his phone and held it in a trembling hand. I stood at his side and watched him draft the email to Dino, telling the story just right: “Saw this band tonight, I think they’re a sure thing, we should move fast. Take a listen and let me know what you think.”

I patted him on the back as he hit send. “There. Was that so hard?”

He blinked at me, wide-eyed. “What is wrong with you people?”

“We like to get what we pay for.” Jennifer tossed him his wallet. She held up his driver’s license, the glossy rectangle shimmering in the dark. “Fair’s fair, you can keep the three hundred. But we’re holdin’ onto this. We know where you live now.”

“And if you say one word about this to Dino…” I said. The rest of the threat hung in the air between us.

“You—you aren’t really music promoters, are you?”

I opened his car door for him and gestured to the front seat.

“Not your problem. Go home and enjoy your money. Stay cool for another few days, and we’ll mail your license to you.”

“Consider a vacation,” Caitlin told him.

15.

We got back to our room at the Orchid Suites with dawn chasing our heels, just in time to catch a few hours of blissful sleep. It had been a long, busy day, and tomorrow—today, I reminded myself with a glance at the digital clock on the nightstand—was going to be even busier.

“They were all out of rooms, last I checked.” Jennifer stifled a yawn as she stretched. “Wanna kick me the keys to the Camaro? I’ll crash out in the backseat.”

“Nonsense,” Caitlin said, “we have a king-size bed. That’s plenty of room for the three of us.”

I’ll admit it: for one fleeting second, my thoughts went someplace they had no business going. A second, though, that was all it was. My short-lived romance with Jennifer had been a disaster; we’d agreed, in the end, that we made better friends than lovers. At least our friendship had come out stronger for it, and we could joke about it now.

She caught my eye and smirked. “I saw that look,” she muttered under her breath.

I was asleep before my head hit the pillow. It felt like an eyeblink later when I woke up, light streaming around the curtains and the sounds of morning traffic drifting up from the street outside. Beside me, Jennifer grumbled and rolled over. Caitlin glanced over from the table by the window, lifting a mug of coffee in salute. Bright and alert, dressed, and ready to go.

“I keep forgetting,” I groaned as I pushed myself up from the mattress, “you don’t really need to sleep.”

“Fifteen minutes, now and then, to freshen up,” she said. “I do enjoy the sensation, though.”

The blankets clung to me with invisible hands, trying to pull me back into dreamland. I fought valiantly, shambled into the bathroom, and turned the shower on full blast. Steaming hot as I lathered up, and then, just before I was ready to get out, I twisted the handle and turned the water arctic cold. The sudden freezing rush flooded the lethargy out of my body, an electric jolt of pain that shocked my brain into high gear. I stood under the icy torrent as long as I could stand it, killed the water, then rubbed down my shivering, pale skin with a fluffy hotel towel.

When you need to wake up fast, nothing beats the cold-shower cure. That and caffeine. Fortunately the room came with a coffee maker, and Caitlin had already put on a fresh pot. She handed me a mug as I stepped out of the bathroom.

“You are the perfect girlfriend,” I said.

She gave me a lopsided smile. “I know what you need.”

Jennifer stumbled past me, still half-asleep. I held the mug in one hand, taking a sip—strong, black, just right—and my phone in the other.

“While we wait for Dino to open that file,” I said, “I’m thinking we need to hit him on multiple fronts. Fortunately, I’ve got a guy for that.”

My guy answered the phone in a bored monotone. “Thank you for calling the Love Connection, where you can make your love connection.”

“Hey, Paolo. It’s Faust. What would it take to get you out in LA, with your gear, for one day’s work?”

“I don’t know, man. I’d have to close the shop. That’s a whole day of lost income.”

“Which is what, twenty bucks? This is the twenty-first century. People get their porn online these days, like civilized human beings, and you know it. If it wasn’t for your backroom business, that store would’ve been shuttered ages ago.”

“Yeah,” he said with a sigh, “you got me there. What would you need me to do?”

“What you’re best at. Need some custom paper done. A little Photoshop, a little stealth editing. Nothing you can’t handle.”

“And you need me when?”

“As soon as possible,” I told him.

“Have to load up the van, drive my gear out, ’bout five hours on the road each way,” he murmured, tallying the expenses in his head. “How about eight hundred, plus you cover my meals and gas?”

“You got yourself a deal,” I told him.

I was finishing up my next call, bringing Bentley and Corman up to speed and seeing if they were available for a little work, when Jennifer emerged from the bathroom with a towel wrapped around her head like a turban.

“How many people you wanna bring on board, sugar? Every extra pair of hands is less cash in the kitty for us.”

“Only as many as we need,” I said as I hung up. “Besides, the bookstore had a lousy month, and I know they’re having bill trouble. Bentley and Corman won’t take my money if they think it’s charity, but they will let me pay ’em for a job well done. Their end comes out of my cut, don’t worry about it.”

“Our cut,” Jennifer said, rubbing her hair with the towel. “They’re my friends too.”

“So what now?” Caitlin asked.

“The Dino scam is percolating,” I said. “Nothing we can do on that end until Pixie’s malware goes off and Paolo shows up with his counterfeiting gear. That gives us a few hours to work on the coke deal. I’m gonna find out what kind of muscle Dino’s bringing to the party. On the phone, he told his boy Max to start recruiting hardcore soldiers. I’d like to know what we’re up against.”

Caitlin nodded and sipped her coffee. “While you’re doing that, I’ll take a peek at the venue where Winter Court will be playing their inaugural show. That should help us refine a plan of attack.”

Tracking down Max, Dino’s tire-iron-swinging henchman, was harder than I expected. The record on Dino’s call log had given me a name: Dunsborough Security Solutions. Problem was, Google had never heard of it. No business listing, no reviews, nada. On a hunch, I hit up the California Bureau of Security and Investigative Services. The state bureau kept a database of interesting licenses, from alarm and locksmith companies to repo men and firearm instructors. No hacker needed: it was all public info, if you knew where to look.

I entered “Max Dunsborough” and struck tarnished gold: he’d been licensed as a private investigator. Past tense, since the state had stripped his license from him about two years ago for reasons undisclosed. His firearm permit? Same, right around the same time. Somebody had been a naughty boy. Something told me the lack of a legal license wouldn’t stop him from carrying a piece, though.

Caitlin took the car, intent on scoping out the concert hall, so Jennifer and I headed out to the sidewalk and flagged down a taxi to take us to the Civic Center district. We ended up on West Temple Street, greeted by burbling fountains, palm trees, and a long alabaster brick of a building frozen in the 1960s.

“The Kenneth Hahn Hall of Administration,” Jennifer said, reading a plaque on our way to the front door. “You take me to the most excitin’ places.”

Slow electric fans pushed sluggish air around the lobby, while a bronze bust of Abraham Lincoln kept a tired eye on us. We followed the building directory to the records office, then waited in a shuffle-step line until one of the clerks had time to help us.

“We’re with Cowrie and Jet Family Law,” I said, offering my business card and a smile. He took the card out of polite obligation. We both knew he’d toss it in the trash can the second my back was turned, but that was fine. “We’re conducting a probate investigation. Could you pull a business registration from about two years ago, for a ‘Dunsborough Security Solutions’? Owner’s name was Max Dunsborough. I can provide his private investigator’s license number if you need it, and his firearm permit number.”

Twenty minutes later, we stepped out into the LA sunshine with a grainy photocopy of Max’s old business license.

“It’s amazing how much information is on the public record,” I told Jennifer. “You just have to know which bits you can find where, and which bits can unlock other bits.”

“Nice job, Columbo. So what’d that do for us, anyway?”

I brandished the photocopy, raising my free hand to hail a cab.

“Max isn’t the kind of guy who’ll let the lack of a PI license or a firearm permit keep him from doing business. His phone number, according to Dino’s call log, is still showing his old company name. I bet he’s still working out of the same address, too. If not, maybe we can talk to the landlord and get an idea where he moved to.”

The address was deep in the South Figueroa Corridor, and when we read it to the cabbie, he looked us over in the rearview mirror.

“You sure?”

“Drop us off two blocks away,” I told him, catching his tone. “Whichever direction you feel safer in.”

Jennifer leaned back in the shabby cloth bench seat and folded her arms. “Yep,” she murmured, “the most excitin’ places.”

“Hey,” I told her, “you could have gone with Caitlin.”

By the time the taxi dropped us off, leaving us at the edge of a weed-choked vacant lot, she was probably wishing she had. Hell, so was I. The air stank of diesel fumes, burning my sinuses, and the sun beat down on an urban wasteland so far off the beaten path it might not have been on any maps.

Jennifer took a pouch from the pocket of her artfully ripped jeans, carefully sliding out her favorite piece of jewelry: a polished razor blade dangling on a delicate silver chain. She clasped it around her neck and slipped the blade under her shirt.

When you worked with blood magic, it helped to be able to spill a lot of it, fast. More than one would-be challenger had learned the hard way that what didn’t kill Jennifer really did make her stronger.

“Now I’m ready,” she said.

Tract houses, yellow grass, the sounds of a cheap stereo playing from a parked Impala with the doors thrown open and the trunk lid up. Box fans stuffed in windows that didn’t fit, anything to keep the heat down in a neighborhood where nobody had central air. And eyes everywhere. I didn’t need a sixth sense to feel them. Eyes behind ragged window screens, eyes in a slow-moving rust-bucket sedan rumbling past us at five miles an hour. We were foreigners here, outsiders, and nobody knew what kind of trouble we might be bringing with us.

I kept my head up and my walk easy, hands open at my sides. Jennifer did the same. Keeping our body language a careful balance between “we’re not looking for a fight,” and “you don’t want to start one, either.”

Nobody did. We passed on through, a pair of silent pilgrims.

The street ended in the shadow of the Pasadena Freeway. A two-story roach motel crumbled away next to the overpass, flanked by a vacant lot and an old Shell station with the pumps gone and graffiti-plastered boards over the cashier’s booth. Max’s address had bars on the windows and a little gravel lot out front. The cars caught my eye: six of them, and two matched the black Lincolns we’d seen at Tanesha’s place. The others were a mix of pickup trucks and muscle cars, more expensive than anything we’d seen in this stretch of LA.

“That’s a bingo,” I said. “Looks like Dunsborough Security Solutions is unofficially still in business. And recruiting.”

Jennifer adjusted her necklace. “Let’s go say hi.”

16.

We took the long way around, skirting the boarded-up cashier’s booth of the gas station next door and scoping out Max’s lair from the side. Nobody outside, no visible sentries—but then again, it wasn’t like he was expecting any uninvited guests. A couple of side windows, but they were fitted with fifties-era scalloped glass, and it’d been about that long since anybody had cleaned them. All we could make out inside were lights and the occasional blur of movement.

“Six cars out front,” Jennifer said softly. “Could be a lot of guys in there. Lot more than six, anyhow.”

I crouched beside her, shadowed by the booth’s cobwebbed overhang, nothing but a patch of weeds and broken concrete for cover.

“Yeah, and Dino specifically told him to hire pros this time. Max was a punk, but if he’s any good at finding talent, this could be a problem.”

“Doubt he’s got talent like us,” she said. “How do you wanna play it? We could go in right now and clean house. Might save us some trouble later.”

I shook my head. “I want intel, not bodies. Too many unknowns to start kicking down doors. Besides, we don’t want to spook Dino, and killing his muscle’s gonna spook him hard. Let’s get a closer look.”

The only nice thing about scalloped glass was that it was equally useless from either direction. We jogged up alongside the building, shoes rustling through the weeds, crunching on shards of broken glass from a shattered bottle of beer. I crept close to the corner and peeked around back. No lookouts. Just a sturdy back door and an open window filled by a rattling box fan.

I crouch-walked to the window, keeping my head ducked and ears straining to hear over the fan’s shuddering whine. A snatch of familiar sound—Max’s voice—slipped out between the spinning plastic blades.

“You wouldn’t be responsible for the distribution,” he was telling someone, “just maintaining its security. The tour runs from here to Orlando. Keep everything under control, and you walk away with a first-class plane ticket and the second half of your fee, in cash. Sound good?”

I couldn’t make out the response. The voice was too far from the window, too soft, but laden with a thick accent. I dared a peek. Through the blur of the fan, two figures sat opposite each other at a shabby office-surplus desk. One lanky, the other broad-shouldered and built like a bull on two legs.

“No,” Max replied, “they’re to be kept in the dark at all times. In a worst-case scenario, the musicians are disposable. Obviously, my employer would like the entire tour to go without incident.”

“Obviously,” came the response. Somewhere between amused and bored. “How many men under me?”

I tried to place the accent. Russian? Beside me, Jennifer’s brow furrowed.

“Ten,” Max said. “Half to provide security over the tour cases, half to handle distribution at each tour stop.”

“And they will do this…roadie business as well?”

“Right. That’s their cover. They’re fully trained. You won’t have to deal with any of it. Officially, you’d be in charge of tour security.”

“Good,” the Russian said. “I do not do grunt work.”

“Shit,” Jennifer hissed into my ear. “I think I know that guy.”

From the tone of her voice, I didn’t think she was expecting a happy reunion with an old friend, either. The Russian mumbled again, too low to hear over the fan, and I took another quick peek to see Max rising from his chair. I ducked back down as they shook hands.

“I’ll have the first half of your payment ready in the morning,” Max said.

“See that you do,” his guest replied, and heavy footsteps made the floorboards groan.

Jennifer tugged my sleeve. “C’mon,” she whispered, “gotta get a better look at him.”

We ran back to the neighboring lot, to the scant shelter of the derelict gas station, and crouched in the booth’s shadow to get an eye on the cars out front. The man who sauntered out the front door, ambling toward a snow-white F-350 pickup truck, was bigger than he’d looked through the blur of the window fan. Seven feet tall and chiseled from granite, wearing black jeans and a white tank top that showed off his pile-driver arms. His skin was a history drawn in prison ink, from the spiderweb tattoo on his elbow, to the constellation of stars on his shoulders, to the stylized, dripping dagger inked across one side of his neck. Razor nicks and old fish-belly white scars decorated his crudely shorn scalp.

“Dammit,” Jennifer whispered, “I hate bein’ right sometimes.”

His pickup rocked as he hopped in, slamming the door shut and firing up the engine.

“Fill me in,” I said.

“Calls himself Koschei,” she said. “Freelance muscle for hire, and he likes things messy. Couple years back, two dealers in Sacramento were feuding over turf. One hired Koschei. They found his rival’s body in about a dozen pieces.”

“Koschei cut him up?”

“Pulled him apart,” Jennifer said, “with his bare hands. Just started grabbing limbs and twisting ’til they tore right off. That’s his style. Up close, personal, and brutal as all hell.”

I shrugged. “So Max is hiring some scary guys. Doesn’t make ’em bulletproof.”

“That ain’t it. Koschei’s one of our kind, Danny. Word is, after studying Krav Maga and Muay Thai, he wanted something nastier. Found himself a teacher from the Forsaken Hand.”

That changed things. A lot. I tried to ignore the chill in my blood slicing through the LA heat. I’d just run up against a Hand sorcerer, an accountant named Sheldon who hadn’t looked like a threat until he beat me down from the other end of an open room with punches that split the air.

A good friend died that day, his body broken and bloody on the carpet right beside me. The memory was still raw, like poking an open sore.

“Caitlin and I must have made an impression on Max when we took down his last pack of thugs,” I said. “All right. It’s a new wrinkle, but we’ll deal with it. Forewarned is forearmed.”

I took out my phone. Jennifer glanced down as I pulled up my contacts list.

“Who ya callin’?”

“Caitlin,” I said. “I don’t think we’re going to get taxi service out here.”

Caitlin had just finished her own recon trip. She picked us up in the Camaro and filled us in on the drive back to the Orchid Suites.

“The first concert is at the Hamilton Pavilion,” she said. “It’s a smaller venue, perhaps four hundred seats, and quite cozy. Winter Court isn’t exactly a household name. Their first album’s barely made a splash, and I can’t imagine they’d be getting a national tour if it wasn’t being financed with drug money.”

In the backseat, Jennifer frowned. “Heck of a step down from Big Rig.”

“A smart step down,” I said. “Using a major name like Curtis Rake meant more eyes, more heat, and more people in the mix every step of the way. No surprise he got caught. Now Dino’s doing what he should have done in the first place: moving his coke with a low-profile band. Cait, did you get a chance to peek backstage?”

“Of course I did. Not much room to maneuver, though. Narrow hallways, cinderblock walls, and concrete floors, a few modest dressing rooms. There’s a setup area just behind the main stage, connected to the outside by a pair of loading-bay doors. Tour buses and trucks assemble behind the auditorium; there’s a parking lot back there, tucked out of sight. Encircled by buildings on three sides and a partial chain-link fence on the fourth.”

“You,” I said, “are a natural at this.”

Her fingertips slid over the steering wheel, a pleased smile on her lips.

“That’s our spot then,” Jennifer said. “Coke goes in the roadie cases, roadie cases go on the tour bus. We jack ’em either right before the show or right after. Nobody’ll see a thing.”

“It’s what they’ll hear I’m worried about,” I told her. “If this turns into a shootout, we’ll have the LAPD on our heels. We’ve got to take Dino’s crew down fast, smooth and quiet. That won’t be easy. Jen, tell Caitlin about Koschei.”

Jennifer filled her in. Caitlin looked more intrigued than worried.

“A human who can put up a decent fight?” she asked. “Oh, I’ve got dibs on that one.”

We got to the hotel right around the same time Paolo arrived, trundling up in a dirty white Econoline panel van that spat black smoke from the soot-encrusted tailpipe. He jumped out and I walked over to shake his hand, trying to ignore the acrid smell of burning oil.

“My gear’s in back,” he said, jabbing a thumb over his shoulder. “Gimme a hand? I brought the props and the lighting you asked for, too.”

“Sure thing. Paolo, you know Jennifer, right?”

“Sure, sure,” he said, ratcheting open the van’s side door. “Hey, pretty lady. And who’s—”

He turned and froze, seeing Caitlin at her side.

“And you met Caitlin.”

“Yeah,” he said, his smile as frozen as the rest of him. “Yeah, I remember. Uh, Dan? Sidebar?”

I wasn’t sure how he’d react to the unexpected reunion. The first and only time he’d met Caitlin, she’d been dolled up in a French maid’s outfit and serving drinks at a porn director’s McMansion. Later Paolo had seen the same news story as everybody else. The one about the house burning to the ground, and Cait’s old boss found torn into a few hundred bite-sized pieces.

I gestured for Caitlin and Jennifer to hang back and clambered into the van with Paolo. We found a spot to huddle amid the clutter of electronic gear, crates, and cardboard boxes, everything bound under heavy cotton tarps.

“She’s that chica from Kaufman’s place, right? What’s she doing here?”

I shrugged. “She’s the muscle on this job.”

He squinted at me. Then over his shoulder, back at her.

“She…don’t look like muscle.”

“You can’t always trust your eyes,” I told him. “C’mon, how long have you lived in Vegas? You should know that by now.”

We lugged his gear up to the room, and he set up his base camp on the table by the window. Paolo’s portable kit didn’t look anything different from what a respectable graphic designer might use: a sleek white MacBook, a pro-quality printer that took one page at a time, a digital camera, and an artist’s Wacom digital tablet with a screen the size of a TV. Then there were the boxes, five cardboard crates filled with samples of paper in a hundred different colors, textures, and weights, along with vials of glue and binding paste.

“So what am I working with?” he asked me. I handed him the raw materials for his masterpiece: that week’s issues of Variety and Billboard Magazine, hot off the newsstand. While Paolo finished setting up, I got a call from Pixie.

“Fish on a line,” she said.

“You got him?”

“I’m watching his activity from my laptop. He’s surfing some truly skeevy porn at the moment. He’s got a webcam hooked to his system, but you’re not paying me enough to turn it on right now.”

“Can you access his browser history?” I asked.

“Why? Are you looking for skeevy porn?”

“Industry sites, Pix. Need to know where he goes for professional news, and what search engine he uses. The pages he hits every day.”

“Sure, grab a pen, I’ll read ’em off to you.”

Alienating half the city had trapped Dino Costa in an information bubble. A bubble we were about to turn into a steel trap.

17.

Paolo worked late into the night, whipping up his Photoshop magic with one hand on his digital pad and the other on the keyboard, pausing for a quick photo shoot with Caitlin. Jennifer kept the job on target while I sat on the phone with Pixie, ferreting through Dino’s web browser and crafting the second leg of the con. At some point Caitlin ordered pizza and Cokes from some gourmet parlor down the street, filling the increasingly cramped room with the scent of hand-rolled dough, Italian herbs, and fresh, juicy sausage.

“That’s it,” Paolo finally said, pushing back his chair. The final touch, a pair of forged address labels with artfully copied postal marks, slid hot off the printer. He carefully affixed them to the doctored magazines.

“We good?” I asked him.

“Better than good. I could fool myself with these. I gotta get going. It’s a long drive back to Vegas, and I got some teenagers coming in for fake IDs first thing in the morning.”

“They can’t go on a drinking binge without your help.” I hefted one of his boxes of paper and lugged it to the door. “Truly a noble cause.”

“I’m a philanthropist at heart,” Paolo said.

I helped him bring his gear back to the van, slipped him a wad of cash, and saw him off. Back up in the room, Caitlin and Jennifer were marveling over his work.

“Paolo’s the best in the business,” I said, dead-bolting the door behind me. “Nobody tell him that, though, or he’ll start charging more.”

“He’s got the chops, all right,” Jennifer said. “How’s your hacker doing?”

“She’ll have everything ready by morning, which is when Bentley and Corman arrive at LAX. Just in time to get this show underway.”

*     *     *

Blue Rhapsody had an office in Hollywood, a turquoise pillbox of a studio bolted onto a steep hillside. Up a flight of gleaming metal steps, past the front door with its glass labeled in midnight blue, a stubby little hallway led to a clean, bright waiting room decorated with posters of the label’s top talent.

We’d staked out the building for hours, with Bentley and Corman stationed at one end of the street in their rented Ford and Caitlin on the other, while Jennifer and I walked up and down the street pretending to be tourists. We weren’t waiting for Dino; he was already there, his black Lexus—vanity plate reading MUSKMAN—parked in a place of pride out front.

“‘Musk man’?” Jennifer asked as we strolled by, arching an eyebrow at the car.

“I…think he was going for ‘music man.’”

“Well that’s a swing and a miss.”

My phone buzzed. I checked it and gave Jennifer a look at the text.

“Ten minutes,” I said. “Let’s do it.”

For this con, timing was everything. Specifically, the timing of the postman. The message was from Caitlin. She had spotted the delivery truck puttering north, heading our way. Jennifer lingered outside, one eye on the parking lot to watch for trouble—like Dino’s buddy Max dropping by, for instance—while I headed into the studio alone.

A framed poster in the entry hall made me do a double take: Tanesha, in concert. I wondered if it was Monty’s poster or Dino’s. Either way, that was some massive wishful thinking on display. I straightened my shoulders, checked my smile in the glossy reflection, and strode into the waiting room like I’d just won a salesman of the year award.

Dino’s receptionist—young and blonde, which I suspected were Dino’s main hiring criteria—sat behind a curved desk, filing her nails and not bothering to look busy. She flashed a thousand-watt smile my way.

“Welcome to Blue Rhapsody,” she said. “Can I help you?”

“I hope so.” I gave her one of the new business cards Paolo had printed up for me last night. Cowrie & Jet Family Law was now Cowrie & Jet Talent Management. “Peter Greyson, here to see Mr. Costa, if he’s available.”

Peter Greyson was my favorite and most dependable alter ego. Unlike the real me, he had a solid credit history, a genuine passport, and a long line of reputable references. Like I said, Paolo was the best in the business.

She eyed the card, still smiling but more out of strained courtesy than friendliness. I felt her getting ready to slam the door in my face, just like she probably had to do ten times a day.

That was fine. It was all part of the plan.

“And…did you have an appointment?”

“No,” I said, “sorry. I was just looking for a few minutes of his time. I’m representing some hot local talent that I think would be a perfect match for Blue Rhapsody, and I was hoping he might be free.”

She shut me down gently. “I’m so sorry, sir, but Mr. Costa’s busy schedule just doesn’t allow for meetings with walk-ins.”

Footsteps behind me. I didn’t have to turn; I recognized Corman’s lumbering gait. At least I’d gotten a look at him when we picked him and Bentley up at the airport—the sight of Corman dressed up in a three-piece suit was about as rare as a blood moon.

“Is there any way you could pencil me in?” I asked, putting a desperate edge in my voice. I didn’t need her to say yes; I just needed her to stay focused on me.

“I’m sorry, sir,” she said, then shifted her attention to Corman. Hoping I’d disappear gracefully. “Hi, can I help you?”

The faint sound of more footsteps. Another new arrival, coming in the front door and up the stubby hallway.

“No rush,” Corman said. “Go ahead, you two finish up. I left my sample case in my car. Be right back.”

I wasn’t sure what pleased her less: being stuck talking to me again, or the prospect of another unwanted salesman hanging out in her reception area. At this point, as she looked my way, her pleasant expression stayed on by sheer force of will.

“I know,” I told her, “I’m making your day difficult. There’s no way in hell I’m getting in to see Mr. Costa, and right now you’re wondering if I’m too dumb to take the hint.”

She blinked, disarmed. “No, I didn’t say that—”

I flashed a smile. “You didn’t have to. Hey, I get it. You’re the guardian at the gate. It sucks. And you’re being paid to keep guys like me out, just like I’m getting paid to keep knocking. And yes, I do know when to give up. So don’t worry, I’m not gonna push it.”

I had her undivided attention now, as a little warmth came back into her eyes. Exactly what I needed, so she’d be focused on me and my voice instead of what was happening fifteen feet behind me.

I didn’t get the details until later, but it had gone down just the way we’d rehearsed it. Corman timed his exit so that he’d be just out of sight, in the hall between the lobby and the front door, as the postal carrier walked in with a bundle of mail.

“Perfect,” Corman said, holding out his hands. “I was hoping you’d get here before my next meeting.”

Faced with a big guy in an expensive suit who was obviously expecting to be given the mail without question, the postal carrier had two choices. Option one: challenge Corman’s identity, insist on handing the mail to the receptionist instead of the man who might very well be her boss, and risk an unpleasant and shouty confrontation. Option two: assume everything was in order, give him the mail, and leave. One choice could make his day hard, one would make it easy, and he had about two seconds to decide.

He gave Corman the mail and left, just like ninety-nine out of a hundred people would. Humans are hardwired to respond to shows of authority, and we are, as a species, allergic to confrontation. A person’s natural reluctance to say no, or ask potentially uncomfortable questions, is a predator’s greatest weapon.

“I appreciate it,” the receptionist told me. Her eyes on me and not the hallway. “You wouldn’t believe how pushy some guys get.”

“Oh, I’d believe it. So, uh, while we’re being all not pushy…” I leaned a little closer to the counter, pitching my voice lower while holding her gaze. “Any chance you have plans for lunch today?”

She chuckled and held up her left hand, showing me the tiny twist of gold and the glittering diamond on her ring finger. “Sorry,” she said, “engaged.”

“I should have known,” I said with a smile. “Nice ring! Hey, you didn’t pick rings out together, did you? My brother’s going to pop the question next week, and he has no idea where to start shopping.”

While the conversation turned to wedding rings and the perfect diamond, Bentley made his entrance in the hall, just out of sight. His postal uniform was about a decade out of date, but nobody but another postal employee would even notice. Uniforms made people invisible. At that point Corman had already stripped the real magazines out of the bundle. He passed the rest of the letters and bills to Bentley, who slipped our doctored magazines into the stack and entered the lobby with a big, friendly smile.

“A fine day, young lady,” he said, sidling up to the counter beside me. “Got the mail for you. I do hope you get the chance to go outside for lunch. It’s beyond lovely out there.”

“I wish,” she said, giggling as she took the bundle. “Where’s Maurice? On vacation?”

“Just a little under the weather, they told me. I’m only filling in. He should be back again tomorrow.”

I watched Bentley leave, then turned back to the receptionist.

“I should head out too. I’m not done getting shot down: three more doors to knock on before I can hang it up for the day. Good luck with the wedding!”

“Hey, thanks,” she said and sent me off with a friendly wave.

The five of us reconvened at the hotel, and I got Pixie on speakerphone. I didn’t have eyes inside the building, but it wasn’t hard to figure out the general turn of events. First, the receptionist would sort through the mail, bringing most of it into Dino’s office along with his lunch order. Then, over a pastrami on rye, he’d sit down to peruse the latest industry trades.

Which would lead him, hopefully sooner than later, to the two-page spread in our specially doctored version of Billboard Magazine. Featuring a moody shot of Caitlin, looking glamorous and wistful as she cradled an acoustic guitar, and the headline: “Who is Lulu Brooks? Meet the overnight sensation who has LA buzzing.”

As we’d worked on the story last night, Paolo artfully slicing an article from the real magazine and replacing it with our own, I glanced at Caitlin. “Where’d you get that name, anyway?”

Just for a moment, her eyes went distant, and she wore a faint, wistful smile. “An old, dear friend of mine,” she said. “Just doing her a tiny honor.”

Billboard would weave a tale of the unexpected spotlight. Of this ingenue who played coffee houses and dive bars, only to discover the biggest names in the music industry demanding copies of her demo and vying for her attention. A superstar waiting to be born, they all agreed.

A shorter, drier article in Variety would back up the story, with a few crucial name-drops. Names of major players in the industry who, a call to Curtis Rake confirmed, wouldn’t piss on Dino if he were on fire. Even if he wanted to call and double-check the story, none of them would be picking up the phone. His next step, if he wanted to know more about the mysterious Lulu Brooks, was obvious.

“And we’ve got movement,” Pixie chirped over the line. “He just got online and searched for her by name. And…redirecting now.”

Thanks to Pixie’s hack, Dino’s internet connection would go exactly where we told it to. We’d already verified, from his web history, that Bing was the only browser Dino used. It wasn’t hard to prepare a dummy page of search results ahead of time. The top two hits were links to articles on his favorite music sites. Which, once again, would take him to customized counterfeits Pixie had whipped up the night before. Just variations on the Billboard story, with hints that some top producers were aching to collaborate on a track with Lulu Brooks. Oh, and a mention of her rep, good old Peter Greyson with Cowrie & Jet.

“And now he’s searching for Cowrie and Jet,” Pixie said. He’d find a hastily pasted-up website, deliberately shoddy. The kind of firm where you’d look at the talent on display—Caitlin’s headshot prominent on the first page—and think, “They can do a lot better.”

“Thanks, Pix. Gonna hang up now.”

I set the phone down on the table. Jennifer, Caitlin, Bentley, and Corman all leaned in, staring at the blank screen like it was a magic eight ball about to render a prophecy.

“And five,” I said, “four, three, two—”

The screen lit up. Incoming call from Blue Rhapsody.

18.

I let the phone ring. And keep ringing. Jennifer looked my way. “Ain’t you gonna answer it?”

“Nah,” I said. I let it go to voicemail. We waited exactly four minutes, counting down the slow turns of the clock, before I called him back. Just long enough to make Dino antsy. Antsy enough to snatch up the phone after one ring.

“Hi there,” I told Dino. “Sorry I missed your call, been a crazy day over here.”

He bubbled like a fountain, the fake friendliness failing to conceal the nervous tension in his voice. We’d carefully crafted every article, every blurb and bogus quote, as a secret sales pitch aimed straight at Dino’s hunger. Here was a singer with a career about to explode, at a time when Dino needed a hitmaker in his stable. She was new to the business, young, naive, with a dodgy talent agent who was probably already fleecing her. A woman like Lulu was catnip to a scumbag like Dino Costa. Or a piggy bank, ready to be broken open.

“No worries, no worries,” he said. “My name’s Dino Costa, with Blue Rhapsody. Don’t know if you’ve heard of us—”

“Oh gosh,” I said, “of course I have. Who hasn’t, in this town?”

“Great, well, I understand you’re representing an artist named…” He paused, pretending to search his memory. “Lola, something—no, Lulu. Lulu Brooks?”

Nice touch. He might have been drooling at the idea of signing her, but he was doing his best to play it casual. Too bad he was a lousy actor.

“Lulu? Sure, she’s really going places. Are you interested in hearing her demo?”

“Yeah,” he said. “I mean, I’ve got a backlog of demos here—we’re kinda buried in talent right now, and we’ve only got room for a couple more people on the label this year—but I wouldn’t mind giving it a listen when I get some free time.”

“Well, we’re grateful for the opportunity and for your time. Give me your email and I’ll send it over to you right away. And, you know, if you think Lulu would be a good fit for Blue Rhapsody, just give me a call and we can set up a meeting.”

I hung up and shot over the songs. “What now?” Jennifer asked.

“Now we go get a late lunch. I guarantee he’s listening to the demo right this minute, but he won’t call back right away. He can’t afford to look too desperate. If he did, we could bend him over at the contract negotiation.”

“If it was a real negotiation,” Caitlin said. “It’s a shame my music career has to end here. And Pixie can remove the demo from his computer?”

“She’ll be watching like a hawk,” I told her. “Once we’re done with Dino, every copy of that demo goes poof. We’ll keep our promise to Tanesha. No leaks.”

Corman put his arm around Bentley’s shoulder. “Well, kiddo, we’ve got a flight to catch. Glad we were able to help out.”

“It was quite enjoyable,” Bentley added. “Do drop by the store when you return home and let us know how everything turned out.”

I slipped a few folded bills from my breast pocket, folded and palmed them, and held out my hand to Bentley.

“Will do,” I said. “Here, for the work.”

“Oh, Daniel,” Bentley said, “we couldn’t possibly—”

“Please. For the work.”

Our eyes met, and he gave me the faintest smile along with a sigh.

“For the work,” he said. I passed the folded bills from my palm to his. A tiny flick of his wrist, and his hand was empty again.

After they left, Caitlin tilted her head at the door, a quizzical look on her face.

“What?” I asked her.

She glanced my way. “He knew it wasn’t for the work.”

“Sure he did.”

“He wouldn’t take the money if it was charity. So you blatantly lied to him, in a way that you both knew you were lying, and then he accepted it.”

I nodded. “Sounds about right.”

I looked at her. Catching something in her eyes as she processed it. I could almost see her making mental connections, mapping out relationships. Absorbing.

“I’m starting to figure you out,” I told her.

She blinked, finding herself in the spotlight. “Meaning?”

“When it comes to desire, passion, things people want, you know everything there is to know about human beings.”

“Thank you,” she said, “I do my best.”

I gestured to the door. “It’s families you don’t get.”

Her gaze flicked to the butterscotch carpet. “My people’s families are…different from yours, Daniel. Suffice to say they are neither a source of strength nor of warmth. What you’ve built for yourself here, these people, all bound to you and you to them in different ways—it’s strange to me, yes.”

She looked up at me, her apprehension fading, a tiny smile rising to her lips.

“But I am starting to like it.”

Jennifer sauntered over and threw an arm around Caitlin’s shoulder. “Don’t worry, sis, you’re doin’ just fine.”

We didn’t even make it to the restaurant. Whatever Dino’s strengths were, impulse control wasn’t one of them. Passive-aggression, judging from his tone when he called me up, was.

“Listened to the demo,” he said, his forced-casual voice fraying at the edges. “It was okay. A little, you know, better than the average lounge singer. I could see her doing all right, if she had a competent producer backing her up and solid management.”

I grinned into the phone. “Gosh, Mr. Costa, thanks so much for giving it a listen! I don’t suppose there’s any chance you’d like to talk about this further?”

He paused. I heard a faint rustle of air, like he was counting to five under his breath. Making me wait for it.

“Yeah, y’know, normally I’m so booked it’d be at least a couple of weeks before we could sit down together, but as it happens I just had a cancellation this afternoon. Would two o’clock work?”

“Absolutely,” I said, “I’ll call Lulu right away. Thanks again!”

I hung up the phone and cradled it to my chest.

“He’s on the hook?” Jennifer asked.

“Yep,” I said, then looked at Caitlin. “Let’s go reel him in.”

*     *     *

I wore a nice jacket and a striped purple tie to the meeting. Caitlin wore a polka-dot dress and tall black boots, guitar case slung over one shoulder, rocking the quirky pop-singer look.

And Dino wore Monty’s white gold Rolex.

The stolen watch glinted on his wrist, singing a murder ballad to the world. Dino reminded me of a big-game hunter, draping himself in the skin of the tiger he’d gunned down. Taking smug pride in the kill.

His office was all cedar and chrome, the chairs tan fabric stretched over art-deco frames, pleasing to the eye but a pain to sit in. Appearances above all. A flat-screen monitor and a keyboard sat on one edge of his desk, a cigar box on the other, imported Cuban Cohiba cigars on display under glass with a thermometer and moisture sensor to keep them pristine. Not the faintest whiff of stale smoke in the air, and no way to open the polished window that looked out over the boulevard. Either he had an amazing air filter, or the cigars were just for show.

“Thanks again for meeting with us,” I said, pulling back a chair for Caitlin.

“Think nothing of it,” he said. Magnanimous in his lair. “I like what I heard on that demo. And if you don’t mind me cutting to the chase, I think Ms. Brooks would make a fine addition to the Blue Rhapsody family.”

“Please,” Caitlin said with a demure smile, playing at being nervous, “call me Lulu. And thank you. These last few weeks have just been…so overwhelming.”

“Lulu. I understand completely. And that’s exactly why you should sign with us. Blue Rhapsody won’t just oversee your debut, press a few albums, and leave you to sink or swim, like most labels. We’re here for the long haul: to nurture your career, and give you the management you deserve.”

“Wow.” She chuckled awkwardly, ducking her head a little. “That…that sounds really great.”

“We have a cutting-edge studio, access to top-quality session musicians, the best producers in the business—”

“Like T Bone?” I asked.

Dino paused. “Er. W-what?”

I took out my phone and flipped the screen around, giving him a quick flash of an email. It was just my flight reservation, but I didn’t give him a second to read before resting the phone back on my knee.

“T Bone Burnett,” I said, as casual as discussing the weather. “He’s wrapping up a new project with Elton John, and he’s eager to work with Lulu on a track or two.”

“T Bone worked with Bob Dylan,” Caitlin added, innocently starstruck.

“Well,” Dino said, “we don’t do business with him specifically, but—”

“Then again,” I mused aloud, “that offer from Aftermath Entertainment this morning was pretty tempting.”

“Aftermath?” Dino sank an inch in his chair.

“Dr. Dre wants to produce a collaboration between me and Eminem,” Caitlin said. “Did you know he’s not actually a doctor? I didn’t know that. Made for quite the embarrassing conversation.”

“Well, you know,” Dino said, his eyes darting around like he was hunting for a life preserver to grab, “it’s—it’s not all about specific names. I mean, it’s the package, the total album that really counts in this business. And, um, distribution! Have you heard about our new project, Sonic Wave?”

Caitlin tapped a fingernail against her chin. “I think so. Isn’t that the thing where you can listen to music on the computer?”

Dino beamed at her. “Exactly. Instant, on-demand music streaming, twenty-four hours a day. And the best part: every single time somebody plays one of your songs, you get paid!”

I folded my arms, playing the skeptic, just like we’d rehearsed on the drive over.

“I don’t know. It is a revolutionary idea, but Republic Records is promising us a pretty big signing bonus.” I glanced down, pretending to think, using the excuse to tap out a quick text to Pixie. Watch Dino’s browser. We’re going in for the kill.

“How…big are we talking, exactly?” Dino asked.

I glanced sidelong at Caitlin. “Lulu, could you give me and Mr. Costa a minute alone?”

She looked between us. “I don’t know, shouldn’t I be here?”

I gave her my smarmiest smile and said, “Sweetie, baby, it’s fine. Just some legal contract stuff you don’t need to be bothered with. I’ll be right out, okay?”

She reluctantly rose from the curvy deco chair and saw herself out. As soon as the office door clicked shut, my smile went away.

“Dino,” I said, “c’mon. Real talk, now. You know what we’re both doing here.”

He gave me a guarded look, pulling in his shoulders a little.

“Not sure if I do. Why don’t you tell me what you think we’re doing here?”

“You and me,” I said, “are trying to get paid. First, let’s get on the same page. You’ve heard the buzz. You’ve heard the demo with your very own ears. You know that girl is the next big thing, and you want a piece of the action. Get on the elevator at the ground floor and you can ride it all the way to the penthouse suite.”

“Maybe,” he said, his shoulders relaxing. Still on his guard, but he liked what he was hearing.

“Lemme tell you something. What just happened there”—I gestured to the door—“that’s how easy it is. She does what I tell her. She signs everything I put in front of her, doesn’t even read it. Pretty sure I could have power of attorney over her arthritic grandmother by now, if I wanted it. I don’t rep Lulu Brooks; I own Lulu Brooks.”

Dino steepled his fingers on the desk. The Rolex caught the light, gleaming white-hot.

“And you’re looking to sell her,” he said.

“Damn right. Why do you think I’m fielding offers all over town, but she hasn’t signed yet? It’s not about what she gets; it’s about what I get. Because she doesn’t sign on that dotted line until I tell her to. She’s a babe in the wilderness, and the only wolf she trusts is me.”

Dino nodded slowly, on my level now.

“I think we can do some business,” he said.

19.

“I guess the question is,” Dino said, his gaze drifting to the closed door and back again, “what’s it going to take to get you on board?”

I spread my hands. “I’m a man of simple needs. At the moment, though, I’m having a little cash-flow problem. I need a signing bonus. Not for her. For me. Something unofficial and off the books. She doesn’t need to know, either.”

“‘Unofficial’ isn’t easy. I’m running a legitimate label here—my accountant goes over the books with a fine-toothed comb.”

“C’mon, Dino, don’t tell me you don’t have any rainy-day money set aside. No little stash accounts, someplace safe from the prying eyes of the IRS?”

He mirrored my smile, chuckling a little as he leaned toward his computer and tapped a few keys. My phone, resting on my knee, blinked once. A message from Pixie: He’s logging into his banking site now.

“Maybe so, but I’m not made of money. If you’d be willing to wait a little, spread it out as a series of milestone payments—”

“No can do,” I said. I inched a little closer on my chair. “Look, I’ll be honest with you. When I said ‘cash-flow problem,’ I meant I owe some guys a lot of cash. And my problem is, if I don’t pay them back pronto, they’re gonna put on their tap shoes and do a song-and-dance number on my spinal cord. So time is a factor. I’m going with the first label that can do right by me and make this situation go away. I’ve struck out twice already today. Hoping you won’t be unlucky number three.”

He couldn’t hide the satisfied look on his face. I had what he wanted, sure, but now he was the one holding all the cards.

“I think I can help you out.” He glanced at the monitor and tapped another couple of keys. “Of course, I’m going to expect favorable terms on the contract. To reflect my generous aid in your time of need.”

“Sure, sure,” I said. “Look, long term? I just want there to be a long term. You help me out today, and I’ll get Lulu to sign whatever you put in front of her, no questions asked.”

“How much cash are we talking about here?”

I shot a look at my silent phone as he moused through his banking site, the monitor turned so I couldn’t read it from my side of the desk. C’mon, Pix, I thought.

The phone lit up with a new message. He’s got $12,250.26 in his checking account.

“Fifteen grand?” I asked, looking hopeful.

Dino winced. “Little rich for my blood. Could you take…five thousand?”

“That won’t save my kneecaps. I can’t do this deal for any less than twelve. It’s that simple: twelve grand and you get Lulu. Anything else, I’m out the door. We’ve got a three thirty appointment with Sony, and I’ll take my chances—”

“Hold on, hold on,” he said, staring at the screen like he was kissing his newborn child goodbye. “Okay. Twelve grand, but that’s it. You’re cut off. No matter how well Lulu does, you don’t get one thin dime off this label. Going forward, we deal directly with her.”

I reached into my pocket and took out a folded slip of paper, opening it to reveal a bank account and routing number. I tensed my forearm as I slid it across the desk, making my hand tremble.

“You can have her,” I said. “It’s worth it, just to get these guys off my back for good.”

He could barely keep the smirk off his face. He’d just bought a gold mine at a copper-mine price by taking advantage of the dumb, desperate guy on the other side of the bargaining table.

I gave him a dumb and desperate smile of sheer gratitude as he initiated the bank transfer.

“I’ve still got a two-hour window to reverse this payment.” He slid the paper back to me. “So how about you bring the little lady back in here, and we do some official business?”

After that, it was just a matter of running down the clock. We brought Caitlin back into the room and took turns showering her with false promises while she blushed like a schoolgirl. If lies burned oxygen, the three of us would have smothered to death. Dino laid out some “standard” contracts that nobody in her right mind would touch with anything but a flamethrower. Caitlin signed each and every one, laying down Lulu’s name in swirling script, giving away everything but the rights to her first-born child.

“Obviously we’re eager to get started as soon as possible,” Dino told her. “Can you come in tomorrow morning for a planning meeting and a roundtable with our producers?”

“Oh,” Caitlin said, “I really want to, but it’s my little brother’s birthday party, and I promised him I’d be there. The day after, perhaps?”

The day after tomorrow was fine. Well, fine for Dino. Caitlin and I had other plans.

*     *     *

“Out of curiosity,” Caitlin said, taking my arm as we strolled out into the LA sunshine, “how much did you get out of him?”

“Twelve grand,” I said. “Well, I didn’t. I don’t have a bank account in my name, and I didn’t want to use the Peter Greyson account just in case anybody came sniffing around later.”

“So where did you send it?”

“St. Jude’s. It’s a homeless shelter and soup kitchen back in Vegas.”

She stopped in her tracks. The yank on my arm, like a leash jerking tight, almost pulled me off my feet.

“You just stole over ten thousand dollars,” she said, “for charity?”

“Me? Oh, hell no. See, St. Jude’s is also where Pixie spends all her time volunteering, when she’s not doing the hacker thing. Beyond her help on this job, I’ve had her working around the clock for a week now, trying to track down Lauren Carmichael and crack into her company’s computer system for us. So I figured I’d pay up in the form of a generous gift to her pet cause. More than I owe, but I don’t mind having her on retainer.”

Caitlin gave me a dubious look.

“It was the safest play,” I told her. “Now, if anyone pokes around Dino’s accounts, all they’ll see is a nice little tax-deductible contribution to a legal charity. Totally explainable, nothing suspicious. And nothing ties us directly to St. Jude’s.”

“Still, seems like we just went to a great deal of trouble to give money away.”

I shook my head. “The money wasn’t as valuable as the information. See, once Pix confirmed he only had twelve grand in his account, I pushed for fifteen. If he had any other sources of income, any cash in his figurative mattress, he could have paid up. Instead he lowballed me, and getting twelve out of him felt like squeezing blood from a rock.”

“Meaning that’s all he has,” Caitlin said, leaning in with a pleased murmur as we walked back to the car.

“Exactly. Curtis was right. Dino’s poured all his liquid cash into the new start-up. Once his coke goes missing, he’ll have to sell everything he owns to pay the Sinaloa back. He doesn’t know it yet, but he’s got one of two futures ahead of him: ruined or dead.”

Caitlin’s fingertip stroked the car remote. The Camaro let out a squawk.

“I vote for dead,” she purred.

“I’m leaning that way myself,” I told her. “After all, I still have to get that watch off his wrist before they bury Monty. Technically, I’m still here on a job.”

We met back up with Jennifer at the hotel. She’d sketched out a crude map of the Hamilton Pavilion based on Caitlin’s description and pulled a timetable from the band’s website.

“First concert’s tomorrow night,” she told us. “Opening act is at seven, Winter Court takes the stage at seven thirty, and the concert ends around ten. Next show is in Phoenix. There’s a meet-and-greet for the fans at three p.m. on Saturday, so I can’t imagine they’re gonna dawdle around here for too long once the show’s over. Figure they’ll pack up the tour buses and head straight out.”

“That doesn’t give us a very large window of opportunity.” Caitlin tapped her chin, gazing at the sketch.

“If we make our move just as they’re arriving or leaving,” I said, “all the roadie cases—and the coke—will be in one place. Problem is, so will Dino’s guys.”

“Easier to take ’em if they’re spread out a little,” Jennifer said.

“Exactly.” I tapped the sketch. “It’s gonna be three against ten, not to mention their new recruit with the magic karate. And we absolutely can’t let this get loud. No matter who starts shooting, gunfire means cops, and cops mean this heist is over.”

“Once the concert begins,” Caitlin said, “all the cases will be inside the hall, yes? Backstage?”

I nodded. “Should be. They need the actual gear in there to run the show. If these guys know what they’re doing—and let’s assume they do—they’ll have some roadies hanging around to watch the cases and the rest covering the exits, watching for trouble.”

“So we divide and conquer,” she said.

I still didn’t like it. Not our odds in a fight—between my cards, Jennifer’s blood magic, and Caitlin’s…being Caitlin, we could do a world of damage. That wouldn’t stop them from turning the place into a shooting gallery, though, and with four hundred civilians packed into the concert hall, I wasn’t comfortable with that kind of risk.

“I’ve got an idea,” I said. “Let’s take a trip to the Hamilton. Something I want to try.”

Not a trip to the hall itself, anyway, but the neighborhood around it. We found a nice big commercial corridor lined with coffeehouses and clothing boutiques and started hunting for an easy target. The first place we tried had too many people. The second, a security camera keeping silent watch. The third stop did the charm: a high-end shop aimed at professional women with a sense of style, and price tags to match.

Jennifer drew attention from the clerks the second she walked through the door, her T-shirt and tattoos sticking out like a sore thumb amid the imported silk and six-hundred-dollar pantsuits. Both salespeople descended with oh-so-helpful attitudes, keeping an eye on her. She brushed them off politely, then hovered near a rack of easily pocketable scarves and accessories, casting nervous glances over her shoulder now and then.

While Jennifer made herself look like a shoplifter, Caitlin and I browsed as a couple on the opposite side of the store, nice and invisible. I felt a pang of memory and shoved it away hard. It must have shown on my face. Caitlin glanced away from a Christian Dior jacket, giving me a curious look.

“What?”

I shrugged. “This was the first trick I ever learned as a kid. Back before…before I got sent away, I’d take my little brother to the 7-Eleven. He’d pretend to pocket something and draw the cashier’s attention, while I was on the other side of the store filling my backpack.”

“Mischievous little scamps, weren’t you?”

“We were hungry.” I put my shoulder to the wall, taking one last look at the room and making sure the clerks were turned away. “Anyway, let’s do this. Set the timer.”

The second she was ready I reached to one side, grabbed the fire alarm handle, and yanked it down.

20.

A shrill, grinding klaxon split the air, and Caitlin and I scurried to the far end of the aisle as the clerks jumped. Jennifer blinked with feigned surprise, looking up at the emergency light flickering on the tiled ceiling.

“Did they say they were testing the alarm today?” one of the clerks asked the other, shouting over the ear-splitting whine.

She shook her head and clasped her hands over her ears. “No! I’ll go check the back room.”

The first clerk herded us like cats, arms waving. “Ladies, sir, I’m sorry, we have to ask everyone to leave. I’m not—I’m not sure what this is, but we have to close up. I’m so sorry.”

She didn’t have to ask us twice. My eardrums were throbbing by the time we stepped out into the fading sunlight. I rubbed the side of my head, wincing, and led the way down the block. We found a nice little cafe a few doors away, grabbed a streetside table in the shade of a blue canvas umbrella, and ordered a round of lattes.

Soon we heard the distant roar of sirens, and the slow-moving traffic grudgingly parted for a fire truck. It rumbled to a stop outside the boutique, and a firefighter in a crisp uniform shirt jumped out to talk to the bewildered clerks on the sidewalk.

Caitlin thumbed the screen of her phone, pausing the stopwatch app. “Response time for a false alarm: twelve minutes and forty-eight seconds.”

A waiter came around with a tray, setting steaming paper cups in front of us. As soon as he stepped away, I raised my coffee in salute.

“Ladies, I suggest we treat ourselves to a light dinner and a good night’s sleep. Tomorrow, we get paid. And also ruin Dino’s life and lay the unhappy ghost of Monty Spears to rest. That too.”

“But mostly,” Jennifer said, “we get paid.”

*     *     *

Of course, nothing was that easy. The morning of the concert, I rose with the sun. Shambled to the bathroom, shocked my brain awake with ice water and black coffee, and got dressed in the thin blade of light that sliced around the corner of the curtained window. That old familiar nervous excitement curled its tingling fingers around my spine, like I was a boxer about to fight for the championship belt in front of a screaming arena. Tonight I’d put my skills to the test and either walk away rich or go down hard.

We had one last hurdle to deal with: transportation. Jennifer’s smuggler buddy was ready to help us out, but he wouldn’t go within five miles of the actual heist. We’d have to move the roadie cases out ourselves and meet up with him someplace private for the handoff.

“They’ll probably be hauling ’em in a bus or a truck or something,” Jennifer said. “We could just take their wheels.”

I shook my head. “Last thing I want is to get stuck in traffic driving a stolen bus. Gotta be another way to move those crates.”

“Must we?” Caitlin asked. “Move the crates, that is. The narcotics are concealed underneath the stage equipment, most of which will already be out and in use during the concert. It shouldn’t be too much trouble to open the crates, take what we need, and leave the rest.”

Jennifer nodded. “I like that. Heck, a key of coke is about the size of a brick. We could toss all ten in the Camaro’s trunk. Not the smartest way to travel, and we’re screwed if we get caught with it, but that’ll get us to the meet just fine.”

I took another look at Jennifer’s sketch of the concert hall. My fingertip traced the access road between the main parking lot and the loading dock around back.

“We’ll have to be fast,” I said. “Once we deal with Dino’s men, maybe we do it relay style. One of us brings the car around, one of us strips the roadie crates, and the third runs back and forth with the coke.”

“Obviously, I’ll be doin’ the running,” Jennifer said.

I gave her the side-eye. “Why ‘obviously’?”

“Because I ran a 5K in the Hoover Dam Marathon last year. The most athletic thing you do is—” Jennifer paused, glancing at Caitlin. “I’m not even gonna finish that thought.”

Caitlin smiled like a cat with a saucer of cream.

We got to the venue at five, two hours before the opening act was set to hit the stage. The sun had started its slow crawl downward, the sky shimmering like hammered brass. The brass faded and the shadows grew long as we hustled down back alleys, checking every approach to the loading bay behind the concert hall. East of the hall we found a fire escape bolted to the back of a two-story building. The old metal groaned as we zigzagged to the top, climbing up onto the flat, sunbaked rooftop.

The edge gave us a perfect view of the action. We lay flat at the lip of the roof, looking down at the small lot behind the concert hall. A fat double-decker Jumbocruiser bus sat out back, parked and silent near the loading-bay doors. The band and their gear were already inside. I figured they’d been there for hours, getting set up and doing their sound check long before the show. The bus might have been empty, but it wasn’t unguarded: a pair of bruisers hung out by the backstage door, wearing cheap jackets over their black T-shirts and their shoulder holsters.

“The rest have all gotta be inside,” Jennifer said.

I pointed to an overhang above the backstage door. “Cait, can you use that?”

“I can indeed,” she said.

Jennifer squeezed my shoulder. “It’s all on you, Danny. Get on in there and do your thing. We’ll be ready and waitin’.”

I’d scored a last-minute ticket at scalper prices. A terrible seat, but I wasn’t planning on sitting in it. I made my way around to the front of the concert hall, where a throng of people had lined up like a centipede outside the venue doors. It was a younger crowd, a sea of black clothes, thick black mascara, and black lipstick—on the women and the men—and I felt more out of place than a nun in a brothel. I slipped into line and joined the shuffling march to the doors, catching the occasional odd look from packs of teenagers half my age. Not hostile, though. For all the skull necklaces and death couture on display, the crowd had an upbeat, friendly vibe to it.

Then I realized, spotting a few other pained-looking thirty-somethings like me in the crowd, why I didn’t stick out as much as I’d feared.

Oh my god, I thought. They think I’m somebody’s dad, playing chaperone.

Demons and gangsters I could handle. That was scary.

Once I finally made it inside, I floated along with the stream of people down a sloping walk upholstered in faded gold. The Hamilton was a vintage theater, with rows of stiff close-packed seats and a grand proscenium arch above the curtained stage. My target was the closed door to the right of the orchestra pit, where an elderly man in a rent-a-cop uniform sat on a stool with a clipboard in hand. Not one of Dino’s guys, I gathered. Probably on the venue’s staff.

I edged forward as he held his ground against a pack of teenage girls, calmly explaining all the reasons they were not getting through that door. Keeping it casual, I craned my neck and got a two-second glimpse of the list on his clipboard, then eased back a few steps. Once the fans backed down, trudging to their seats, I made my move.

“Hey there,” I said, greeting him with a nod and a smile. “Crazy night, huh?”

His whiskers crinkled as he grinned. “Tell me about it.”

“I’m Elon Harper, with LA Weekly. Mind if I head on back?”

“You got a press pass?” he asked, his sharp eyes darting to my chest.

I shook my head, letting out an exasperated sigh. “My pass was supposed to be waiting for me up front. They said, no, ask in back. I’m like, I can’t go backstage without a pass, so how’s that supposed to work? Anyway, I should be on the list. Could you check for me?”

He glanced at his clipboard, trailing his finger down the page until he found Elon’s name, but he didn’t budge from the stool.

“Yeah,” he said, “your name’s here, but I’m really not supposed to let anybody through without a pass.”

“C’mon.” I jerked my thumb back over my shoulder. “Do I look like I belong in this crowd? I’m not exactly in the fan demographic. Trust me, there’s a hundred things I’d rather be doing tonight, but if I don’t get a few words from the band, my editor’s gonna kick my ass tomorrow morning, and he won’t take ‘they lost your pass’ as an excuse. Help a working guy out?”

He took a long look in my eyes, found something he could trust there, and gestured to the door.

“Ah, go on back,” he told me. “Good luck with your article.”

Backstage was a cinderblock maze, a flurry of stage coordinators and lighting and sound people racing around like the floor was on fire. A man with a fat clipboard and a headset barreled past me, looking frantic. It was easy to tell the difference between the venue staff and Dino’s boys: Dino’s were the ones not doing any work, hanging out with crossed arms and sullen glares. No familiar faces from the fight on Tanesha’s porch, though, so they had no reason to recognize me. Still, I had to keep a low profile. Max was back here somewhere, and he’d definitely remember our last encounter.

I ducked into a staff washroom. Light from a flickering wall sconce cast shadows across the cheap fixtures and the cold concrete floor. The scent of industrial-strength antiseptic stung my nostrils, like the janitors had splashed buckets of the stuff around the room and let it dry. I stepped into one of the stalls and latched the door.

In position, I texted to Jennifer. Then there was nothing to do but wait. I sat like a spider in a web, listening to toilets flush and the faucets flow, the door clattering as staffers came and went. I slipped on a pair of latex gloves. I wasn’t too worried about leaving fingerprints in the concert hall—they’d be mingling with hundreds of other people’s prints, a forensic mess nobody but the cops on television would want to tangle with—but better safe than sorry.

I wanted a drink. I always wanted a drink before a job, just one, something to cut the tension and keep me loose. I’d have to ride it out. My muscles clenched with nervous energy as the interminable wait became a countdown. I heard the swell of the audience from behind the concrete, getting pumped up for the band, their restless voices like the whisper of distant wind or water racing through rattling pipes. It grew into a muffled roar as the first note played out, a bow slashing across the strings of an electric violin to split the air. From this far backstage, I couldn’t even make out a melody; it was more the impression of music, played on the shore while I was a hundred feet underwater. The twisting, tangled chorus spinning on and on as the minutes crawled by.

My phone said 9:28. Time to make my move.

I stepped out of the stall, sidled up to the row of sinks, and checked myself in the mirror. Eyes sharp, cards warm in my hip pocket, ready to roll. Behind me, another toilet flushed and the stall next to mine rattled open.

Max stepped over to the sink next to me and turned on the tap, giving himself a bleary-eyed look in the mirror. Then he glanced to his left, at my reflection, and froze.

“Hi there,” I said.

21.

Max’s hand dropped to his jacket, going for his gun. I grabbed a handful of his hair, slamming my fist into his gut to shove him off-balance, and smashed his skull against the sink. The sink broke and so did his face, leaving a raspberry smear on the fractured ivory porcelain as he fell to the concrete. Blood gushed from the split in his forehead while I put my hands under his arms and dragged him back into the stall, propping him up on the toilet. With a bleeder like that, he wouldn’t last long without medical attention. And he wasn’t getting any. I shut the stall door as best I could—it hung open an inch or two, no way to latch it from outside—grabbed a paper towel, wet it down, and smeared away the blood on the broken sink. Anybody with two good eyes would know something bad had gone down here, but in a few minutes it wouldn’t matter.

I strode out of the bathroom and up a long cinderblock hall, eyes on the steel double doors at the far end. The loading bay. A fire alarm box hung on the wall to my right, a tiny square of bright cherry plastic in the middle of drab gray. I reached out, grabbed the lever, and yanked it down without missing a step.

This close to the end of the concert, most of the venue staff would be up by the band, close to side stage. Everybody but Dino’s guys, who were only there to safeguard their secret cargo. I paused by the double doors as a whirring klaxon went off, followed by a voice booming over the house PA system.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” the voice said, “please evacuate the theater in an orderly manner, proceeding toward the closest lit exit sign. Ushers are on hand to direct you.”

I opened one of the double doors, just a crack. The roadie cases stood scattered across the loading bay like a pirate’s treasure, just waiting to be plundered. Not unguarded, though: a handful of Dino’s guys—skinheads with military tattoos, jackets off in the heat and shoulder holsters on open display—milled around in confusion.

“Get that loading door open,” one snapped. “And where the hell is Max?”

“Is there a fire?” another asked him, punching the button to ratchet up one of the truck-sized doors.

“Do you smell smoke? I sure as fuck don’t. I don’t like this. Let’s get the cases back on the bus, just to be safe.”

Two of Dino’s men ran out into the dark lot behind the concert hall, racing for the bus. They didn’t make it. Caitlin swooped down from the overhang above the door like a bird of prey, claws out, latching onto the backs of their necks and driving them to the pavement. Bones cracked and they stopped kicking. The nearest thug, the one who’d opened the door, stuck his head out to see. Then the air rippled and he staggered back, arms pinwheeling, a foot-long needle of Jennifer’s crystallized blood buried in his eye socket.

My cards riffled into my palm as I closed the jaws of the trap, hitting from behind. My fingertips rasped across the deck, once, twice, sending two aces soaring across the loading bay to slice wet grins into a pair of throats. Caitlin charged from a crouch, tackling another thug from behind, cupping her palm over his mouth as her teeth—the teeth of a great white shark now, and too many for any human mouth to hold—sank into the side of his neck and tore away flesh and glistening sinew.

One of Dino’s men spun, holster clear, framing me in his gunsight. Then Jennifer ran in through the open bay door, whispering a chant as she ripped her razor-blade necklace across the palm of her left hand and flung a fistful of blood droplets at him. Droplets that flew like a cloud of stinging hornets, the pistol tumbling from his grip as he slapped at the tiny attackers. He opened his mouth to scream and the droplets swarmed in, flooding his throat, nothing escaping but a strangled wheeze as he keeled over on the floor. Thrashing wildly as he suffocated.

“One’s gettin’ away,” Jennifer gasped, pointing. One of Dino’s boys ran like all of hell was on his heels, sprinting mad-eyed for a door marked Main Stage Access. I flung a card, the pasteboard slicing into his shoulder and drawing a grunt of pain, but it didn’t stop him from slamming against the door and barreling through.

Not good. With a quarter-million in coke up for grabs, the last thing we wanted were any survivors who could tie us to the heist and come after us later. All of Dino’s crew had to go. “I’m on it,” I said and ran after him.

I burst through the door and out onto an empty stage, pinned by spotlights hotter than the desert sun. In the vast dark beyond the footlights all I could make out were vacant seats and empty aisles, the whining fire-alarm still screeching over the PA system. The band had abandoned their electric cellos and high-backed chairs, arrayed in a semicircle before a backdrop of billowing purple velvet, and tall amplifiers stood like silent monoliths.

I saw the runner, a frantic shape scrambling for the nearest exit, but more pressing business had my attention: Koschei, the massive Russian stalking toward me like a lion moving in on a wounded gazelle. Jennifer shot past me, leaping from the stage and into the aisle. I didn’t see what she did to the runner, but a sudden, short and anguished yelp told me she’d taken care of the problem.

“Heard you know a little magic,” I told Koschei. I twirled one finger and one of my cards leapt from the deck, spinning in the air between us. “Guess what: I do too.”

I sent it lancing toward him, a perfect kill shot aimed straight at his throat. He didn’t even try to get out of the way. The card hit his skin—and bounced, crumpled and harmless, as if his flesh was forged from titanium steel.

His lips twisted in a crude smile as he closed the gap between us and shoved out his open palms. A billowing fist of black smoke streaked toward me, slamming into my chest with a peal of thunder. I flew off my feet, suddenly weightless, reeling from the jolt as I hit the stage on my shoulder and rolled hard.

“I am Koschei, the deathless,” he said. “No mortal hands can harm me.”

I clutched my deck of cards and clambered to my feet, tossing a pair of jacks straight up in the air as he spun into a steel-booted kick. Another arc of black smoke lashed out, blasting against the jacks with the sound of a hammer crashing down on an iron anvil. Even behind my shield I staggered back a step, concussive force hitting me like a punch to the gut as the cards scattered to the stage, dead and scorched black.

Koschei pulled one beefy fist back, drawing breath for a knockout punch, when a blur shot through the backstage door. Caitlin hit him like a truck, tackling him from the side and pulling him down to the boards in a frenzied tumble of bodies. He rolled, leaping to his feet, the grace of a ballet dancer in a juggernaut’s body. He charged at Caitlin and she met his force head-on, grabbing him by the shoulders, swinging him around and using his momentum to hurl him across the stage.

He flew, arms flailing, and crashed into a standing amplifier. The mesh screen buckled under his weight and the box fell onto its back, a ready-made black coffin. A coffin hooked up to the concert hall’s electrical mains. I caught my breath, watching as the Russian thrashed and seized, frozen by the raw current burning through his body. The air filled with the stench of smoking flesh, and wisps of sickly gray smoke rose from the ruins of the amplifier, even after Koschei’s corpse finally fell still.

“That should do it.” Caitlin dusted off her hands.

Jennifer clambered back up onto the stage, jerking a thumb over her shoulder. “Y’all, we are not good on time. I’m hearin’ fire-truck sirens. We gotta go.”

“All right,” I said. “Cait, if you can grab the Camaro and bring it around—”

I paused as a groan rose at my back. We slowly turned to watch as Koschei—his skin seared by electrical burns, his undershirt and jeans scorched and torn—pulled himself to his feet.

“You have got to be kidding me,” I muttered.

“I am Koschei, the deathless,” he said. “No mortal hands can harm me.”

Caitlin grinned, savoring the challenge. She stepped up, open hands ready at her sides, and they circled one another. Daring each other to make the first move.

Koschei lunged at her, throwing a brutal roundhouse. She ducked under him, dropping low and hammering his gut with three blindingly fast pile-driver punches. Then she swept his legs, spinning like a dancer, and grabbed his skull with outstretched fingers as he fell to his knees.

I gritted my teeth at the sound of a snapping spine as Caitlin wrenched his head a hundred and eighty degrees backward. He stared at us with wide, surprised eyes for just a heartbeat, before his lifeless body tumbled to the stage.

“My hands aren’t mortal,” Caitlin told him.

We ran for the loading bay. I hauled open the closest roadie case, ripped out the inner lining, and gazed down at the prize, two fat bricks of white powder wrapped in thick cellophane. I could hear the sirens now, fire trucks—and possibly cops with them—closing in fast.

“No time to bring the car around,” I said. The band’s dusty Jumboliner sat out in the back lot. “We’re stealing the bus.”

“I thought you said that was a bad idea,” Jennifer said.

I waded through the corpses of Dino’s men, crouching to pat down the one who’d acted like he was in charge. Dipping into his pocket and coming up with a ring of keys.

“It’s a terrible idea,” I told her. “And unless you get a better one in the next thirty seconds, we’re doing it anyway.”

We stripped the crates bare and raced to the bus. I fired up the engine while Caitlin and Jennifer stashed the score—ten bricks in all, the whole mother lode—in the bus’s bathroom. No time for elaborate camouflage. If we got stopped by the cops now, driving a stolen bus and leaving a trail of dead bodies in our wake, getting caught with a quarter-million in coke would just be another shovelful of dirt on our graves.

The bus groaned as I threw it into gear, the engine sputtering and spitting diesel fumes. I clung to the oversized steering wheel, leaning into it as the bus rumbled across the blacktop, fighting me every inch of the way. Getting it down the alley felt like wrestling a whale. We skirted the parking lot, looking out across a sea of strobing police lights, fans milling like a horde of displaced vampires while a row of fire trucks formed a wall out front.

We hit the boulevard, made a sharp left turn—the wheel kicking against me as I struggled to pull the Jumboliner into its lane—and put the concert hall in the rearview mirror. I hopped onto the first highway on-ramp we spotted, heading anywhere. Right now, “away” was the only direction that mattered.

22.

We drove down a sparse night highway with the lights of Los Angeles burning in the distance. No cops on our tail, but we were a long way from safe.

“They’ve found the bodies by now,” I said, “and it’s only a matter of time until somebody notices the tour bus is gone. One plus one equals an APB on this thing. We’ve gotta hide it.”

Jennifer sat behind me, leaning against the headrest as she squinted at the bus window. “There,” she said, pointing at a passing billboard. U-Pik-It Cherry Farm, two miles ahead.

“Cherries are out of season,” Jennifer said. “If we’re lucky, the farm’s buttoned up tight ’til next year. All we gotta do is get this rig outta sight, call my guy to come pick up the product, and we’re good as done.”

A quarter mile past the off-ramp, far from the urban sprawl, a grove of cherry trees stood silent in the dark. A short access road ended in a locked gate with a sign reading, “See you next year!” The bus idled while I jumped out, running to the gate and digging out my picks. I made short work of the padlock, chains slithering to the dirt as I swung the gate wide and waved the bus through. Jennifer hopped behind the wheel.

At the far end of the grove, a farmhouse squatted beside an old barn, gray clapboard slowly rotting away in the off-season. The house had sheets of tarp over all the windows, no lights, no caretaker to stumble upon us. I jogged to the barn, putting my back into it as I grabbed hold of the slats and hauled the mammoth door open one jolting foot at a time.

Jennifer inched the bus inside. The engine ground to a dead stop and the headlights went cold, leaving us with the shadows and the endless trill of crickets.

I took a quick look around. Nothing much to see: empty stalls, some old farming tools, and a clumsy stack of deadwood, branches and tree stumps piled high next to an industrial-sized wood chipper. No alarms, no cameras, nothing that could give us away. All the same, the sooner we were out of here—away from the stolen bus and anything that could connect us to the concert hall—the sooner I could breathe easy. An electric lantern with a yellow plastic shell dangled by a wire from the rafters, and I clicked it on to give us a little light.

Caitlin and Jennifer climbed down from the bus, Jennifer already on her phone, dialing up her smuggler friend as she walked past us. I turned, taking Caitlin’s hand, and gave it a gentle kiss.

“So,” I said, “having a fun vacation?”

She pulled me close, the fingernails of her other hand grazing my shoulder.

“So this is what you do for a living,” she said.

“Yep,” I told her. “Boring and uneventful. Just another day at the office.”

“It’s me,” Jennifer said, cradling her phone as she lingered by the barn door. “We need that pickup, like, now. Hon, we can talk about your fee on the way, okay? You know I’ll treat you right. This ain’t a good time for negotiatin’.”

Caitlin chuckled, folding me in her embrace. “To answer your question, yes, it’s been a lovely trip. Though I think we’ve had enough excitement for one night. It’ll be nice to get back home.”

“No argument there,” I said. “You can go on ahead if you want. I just need to get the watch from Dino, put it on Monty’s wrist, and tell Greenbriar his ghost problem is settled.”

“You’re certain that will work?”

“Sure. He gets his precious watch back, and the guy who stole it—and murdered him—is either ruined or dead. All accounts paid in full. Monty’s spirit won’t have any reason to stick around after that.”

“My clever pet,” Caitlin murmured.

“It’s a cherry farm,” Jennifer was saying. “Just head right up the access road and look for the barn. Put a little hustle in it, all right—”

A hand lunged from the darkness, grabbed her by the hair, and slammed her head against the wall of the barn. Jennifer dropped to the dirt, her phone bouncing from her outstretched fingers. The plastic case crunched into shards of pink confetti under a steel-toed boot.

“I am Koschei, the deathless,” said the hulking figure silhouetted in the open doorway, “and no mortal hands can harm me.”

Jennifer groaned, stunned and cupping her hands to her head. Koschei stepped over her without a second glance, his burning glare fixed on Caitlin. A thin bruise at his throat was the only lingering trace of their last fight. His neck made soft crackling sounds as he raised his chin.

“Unacceptable behavior from a human,” Caitlin growled, brushing past me as they stalked toward each other.

He swung from five feet away, an arc of black smoke sizzling from his fist. Caitlin swiveled back on her hips, hair flying as the smoke sailed above her head and blasted into the barn wall, smashing a chunk of weathered gray board into splinters. She ran in, leaping, one foot flicking out in a snap kick that drew a grunt of pain from Koschei’s pursed lips. She pressed the advantage, taking a swing—and Koschei caught her wrist, spun her around, and gave her arm a sharp, brutal twist.

The sound of Caitlin’s bones snapping hit me like a kick to the teeth. I heard the hiss of strained breath, saw her contorted face as she staggered back, her right arm dangling broken and useless. Koschei threw another punch, black smoke ripping through the air with the speed of a jet turbine, hitting Caitlin in the chest and flinging her off her feet. She landed hard on her arm, more bones crackling.

She scrambled back on her good hand as he closed in on her, eager for the kill. My cards felt useless in my cold, sweaty grip. They couldn’t cut his skin, and I didn’t have time for a spell, didn’t have time to do anything but watch Caitlin die. Jennifer slowly pushed herself to her knees, still dazed from the hit to her head, too slow to help.

Then, looking past Koschei, I saw my chance.

“Hey!” I shouted. “Over here!”

He turned my way. I flicked my fingertips over my cradled deck, feeling a surge of razor-edged magic as I fired a card straight for his eye. He yelped as it hit, finding something softer than skin to cut, and he grabbed at his wounded face. I couldn’t kill him, but I could hurt him, and that was what I wanted to do more than anything. I slowly advanced, firing off another card, then another, aiming for his eyes, his lips, one slicing across his upraised fingers. A black pit of rage simmered in my stomach and I called it all up, fueling my weapons with my hatred.

One card went wide, arcing off to his left. Its corner struck the big black start button on the wood chipper.

The engine chugged to life, the industrial chipper’s teeth whirring as they spun. Koschei figured out what I was up to just as Jennifer ran in, brandishing a pitchfork she’d snatched up from the tool rack. The tines punched into his chest and she kept on coming, steering him back one strained step at a time as he struggled against her. I darted for the woodpile, grabbed a broken branch, and drove one splintered end against his stomach. Together we forced him right up to the chipper’s yawning mouth. His hands flailed out, grabbing the edges of the machine, the back of his head inches from the grinding teeth.

Caitlin jumped between me and Jennifer, put her good palm against Koschei’s neck, and shoved.

“I am Koschei, the deathless,” he wheezed, his glistening scalp dripping with sweat as his face twisted in animal panic. “No…no mortal hands—”

“Sure they can,” I told him, giving the branch one last push as Jennifer threw her back into the pitchfork, thrusting it like a spear. “Watch.”

He shrieked as the metal teeth bit into the back of his skull, chewing flesh and powdering bone. His hands spasmed, losing their grip, and Caitlin grabbed one of his legs. Yanking him off-balance, lifting him up and over, and feeding him to the machine.

The wood chipper screamed, steel rattling in time to the frantic thrashing of Koschei’s legs as the other end blasted wet crimson and chunks of bone across the back wall of the barn. Torn fabric and torn skin, bits of glistening flesh and entrails, the hulking killer reduced to a wet pile of carnage one squirming inch at a time. We fed the last of him into the machine, one boot kicking free and tumbling to the dirt as his foot went into the steel teeth, and then it was over.

Jennifer leaned on her pitchfork, letting it prop her up like a walking stick as she took a deep breath. “Come back from that, asshole,” she muttered.

Caitlin bit her bottom lip hard enough to turn it fish-belly white, cradling her shattered arm. I was at her side in an instant, feeling helpless, glad she was alive but hating to see her hurting. She shook her head at me.

“It’s all right,” she said. “Pain is only pain. I can mend this.”

She sat with her back against the bus’s wheel, gently massaging her arm, deep in concentration, while Jennifer and I stood sentry at the barn door.

“How’s your head?” I asked her.

She touched her scalp and winced. “Gonna have a beauty of a goose egg. Can’t complain too much, all things considered.”

Two hours later, distant headlights strobed along the access road. We braced ourselves for trouble, watching for police lights; then Jennifer let out a sigh as the car loomed into sight.

“It’s my guy, sugar. Everything’s good now.”

Her guy was an Asian kid, no older than nineteen, driving a dusty mud-brown Dodge Caravan. A stick-figure family played soccer on the minivan’s back window. He was all smiles and quiet professionalism until we led him into the barn. He stopped in his tracks and stared wide-eyed at the bloody mess.

“Whoa,” he said, “what happened here?”

Jennifer put her hand on his shoulder, smiling like an angel.

“Darlin’,” she said, “as soon as I’m payin’ you to ask questions, I’ll be sure to let you know.”

The Caravan was a smuggler’s special, outfitted with removable sidewalls, concealed panels, and hollowed-out seats with lead-lined cases inside. He stashed the ten kilos of coke in ten different hiding spots and turned them all invisible.

Then he gave us a ride back to Los Angeles. Leaving the farm, the stolen bus, and the remains of a deathless man far behind.

23.

We picked up the Camaro from a side street near the concert hall, keeping a watchful eye out for the cops. The hall itself was buried behind a spiderweb of yellow police tape, and construction cones blocked the empty parking lot, but our car had spent the night as just another piece of random street clutter. Under the radar, just like us.

I drove us to LAX. Jennifer and Caitlin had an early flight. Caitlin’s arm had almost entirely mended, just sore and splotchy with big purple bruises now, and I gave her a careful hug as I saw her off at the security checkpoint.

“I’m right behind you,” I told them. “Just have to take care of loose ends. Dinner tonight?”

“Robuchon’s,” Jennifer said. “You’re buying. You promised.”

“I’ll give you a call as soon as I land.”

I was strolling through the parking garage, on my way back to the car, when my phone buzzed. A call from Dino.

“Cowrie and Jet Talent Management,” I said cheerfully, “Peter Greyson speaking.”

“Peter, hey, Peter,” he stammered. “Uhh, it’s Dino Costa.”

“Hey there,” I said, “we’re looking forward to our meeting this afternoon. We’re still on, right?”

“N-no, listen, I gotta reschedule. We’ll talk about that later. Listen, that, uh, advance money I paid you. Is there any chance I could get that back?”

Now my smile was real, fed by the panic in his voice. That twelve grand was a measly drop in the bucket compared to how much he owed the cartel for his missing coke; when the bill to pay up came due, it wouldn’t save one inch of his skin.

No, I realized, it’s not to pay them back. He knows he’s a walking dead man. He’s getting ready to run.

“Give it back?” I said, pretending to be confused. “You know I need that money—”

“I’ll double it. Triple it! I just…I have a line on an investment. A sure thing. But I’ve got to act today. If you can bring me that cash, I’ll triple your money by next week. Guaranteed.”

“All right,” I said. “I guess that sounds promising. I’m gonna need details, though. Should I come by your office?”

“No!” he yelped. “No, uh, my office…it’s not good. Where’s yours? I’ll come see you.”

“I’m out on the road,” I told him. “Hold on, I’ll call you right back.”

I looked up an interstate map, fast, and dialed him up again. He picked up in a flash.

“Yeah?”

“I’m on I-5, northbound, about an hour and a half from the city,” I told him. “My GPS says there’s a rest stop up ahead. Lebec Service Road. Meet me there as soon as you can, okay?”

As soon as he hung up, gushing his gratitude, I checked the numbers I’d pulled from his phone the night we broke into his house. I dialed the Red Bee Supermarket. It rang about twenty times before someone finally deigned to pick up.

“Listen up,” I said, “Dino Costa bought ten kilos of cocaine from you, on credit. And now he’s running. You’re never going to get a dime out of him.”

Silence, for so long I thought he might have hung up. Then a voice growled, “Who the fuck is this? You a cop?”

“If I was a cop, you and your buddies would all be in cuffs right now. You watch the news? Hear anything about a slaughter backstage at a concert last night?”

“Yeah,” the voice said grudgingly. “Maybe. What about it?”

“Check who manages the band. You know how Dino moves product. His guys got hit last night. The coke is gone.”

“How do you know?”

“Because I was one of his guys,” I said. “This crew of meth-head cowboys came in and lit the place up. Between them and the cops, I barely got out alive. I called Dino, and he told me it was my problem, and he was gonna run for Canada without me. I’m laying low right now, can’t do a damn thing to him, but you can. That’s why I’m telling you this. Look into it yourself, everything I said will check out. He’s meeting a guy out at the Lebec Service Road rest stop on I-5, somebody who can smuggle him across the border and get him a new identity. Dino’s about to disappear, and he’s gonna make you guys look like punks.”

Another long silence. Then a faint click as the line went dead.

I drove north, making good time, weaving through traffic in the warm California sunshine. Dino was already at the rest stop by the time I got there, standing outside his black Lexus with the MUSKMAN vanity plates and looking anxious. I kept my head down, circling the tan brick building and grabbing a parking space on the far end of the lot. Five minutes later, he called me.

“I’m here,” he said, “where are you? I thought you’d be here already.”

“Close,” I told him. “I had to find a bank and get the cash out, figured you didn’t want a personal check. Just hold tight. I’ll be there any minute now.”

He filled the time making calls, pacing back and forth in front of his car. From the twitch in his body language, they weren’t going well. The rest stop was dead, the occasional tourist coming through for a quick bathroom break or a five-minute leg stretch, but otherwise we had the place to ourselves.

I watched the road.

Dino was on another call, engrossed in an argument, when a white van came trundling up the access road. Harsh sunlight glinted off the dirty windshield, shrouding the driver in shadow. The van turned into the parking lot, slowing to a crawl as it rolled up on Dino and his car.

Dino turned just as the side door rattled open and a kid with a blue and black bandanna tied over his face leaned out, raising a MAC-10. The machine pistol spat fire, the first three-round burst tearing into Dino’s chest, the second throwing him to the pavement in a bloody heap. The kid swung back in, the door slammed shut, and the van took off, squealing back onto the access road and gunning the engine. Message delivered.

I got out of the Camaro and took a casual walk over. Dino looked up at me, flat on his back, his pale blue dress shirt soaked in a river of blood. His jaw trembled, trying to form words, and he raised one shaking hand as if begging for help.

I stripped the Rolex from his wrist and slipped it onto mine, admiring the way the white gold glinted in the sunlight.

“W-why,” he managed to stammer.

I shrugged.

“I could tell you there’s a situation in Vegas—a situation you caused—and I’m being paid to discreetly resolve it. I could tell you that my girlfriend is a big Tanesha fan, and you pretty much signed your own death warrant when you went after her. I could tell you that you’re a loose end, and you needed to get snipped.”

I crouched down beside him, looking him in the eye.

“I could tell you all those things, Dino, and they’d all be varying degrees of the truth. But at the end of the day, it comes down to this: you were greedy, you were stupid, and you got in my way. Those were the only three reasons I needed.”

I patted him on the shoulder.

“This is what I do.”

His last breath wheezed from his ruptured lungs, and his trembling hand fell still. I strolled back to the car.

*     *     *

I fought my way through sluggish city streets, one hand on the wheel and one eye on the dashboard clock. By some miracle I made it: right on time for Monty’s funeral.

The parking lot was not full. Neither was the church. Sunlight streamed through stained-glass windows, casting warm and dusty light across empty pews of lacquered oak. Mourners gathered in clumps here and there, talking softly. I spotted Tanesha across the room, somber in a black lace veil. I didn’t let her spot me. Tonight or tomorrow she’d hear about Dino’s murder. Maybe she’d connect it to the massacre at the concert hall, maybe she wouldn’t. Maybe she’d connect it to me, maybe she wouldn’t. Not my problem. I was about to disappear from her life forever.

First, though, I had to make one last thing right. I waited until the coast was clear and sidled up to the open casket. Monty lay on a bed of soft white satin, eyes closed and hands folded at his heart.

“Here you go,” I murmured, slipping the Rolex onto his cold, heavy wrist. “You got your watch back, Dino’s dead, all scores are settled. No reason to hang around. Just…let go. Wherever you’re headed, there’s a chance it’s better than here.”

I didn’t have anything else to say to a dead man. I turned and walked away. Job done.

I caught the next flight home, a one-hour glide with a California sunset at my back. As soon as the plane landed, wheels bumping down hard on the tarmac and the momentum pressing me back against the stiff seat, I felt the last residual tension of the job fade away. This was my home turf. My sweet city of lights. A cab ferried me over to the Monaco, where Greenbriar was waiting.

“Your penthouse is open for business,” I told him.

“You’re sure?” He bounced on the balls of his feet. “I mean, you’re absolutely sure?”

“Everything keeping Monty from moving on has been taken care of. He’s got no reason to stick around.”

He pumped my hand. “Aw, Dan, you’ve got a friend for life. I can’t tell you how much we appreciate this—”

“Show your appreciation,” I said, “by paying me.”

I got paid twice that night. Once in a slim little envelope from Greenbriar and once—after a five-star French dinner at Robuchon, as promised—in a cheap aluminum briefcase from Jennifer.

“Done deal,” she told me. “Couple of distributors I know went fifty-fifty on the product. Took all ten keys off our hands, and paid cash. Nice used bills, nonsequential. Your cut comes to right around twenty-three grand.”

“We got away with it,” I said.

“You almost sound surprised, sugar. Yeah, we got away with it all right. I already gave Caitlin her cut. Whatcha gonna do with yours?”

“For now,” I said, “just savor the feeling of not being dead broke.”

Back at my apartment, safe behind a double-locked door and three layers of magical wards, I opened the case. The rows of bills sat snug in rubber-banded stacks, whispering as I riffled through them. I pulled aside my bedspread and tugged up the fitted sheet, then unzipped my mattress. The bills went inside, stack by stack, into a hollowed-out compartment at the foot of the bed.

I’d worked hard to make my home invisible, with a mix of fake names, cash payments, and carefully laid spellwork. It wasn’t much to look at, but it was mine—and for me, it was a sanctuary. Keeping my cash in the mattress didn’t worry me one bit.

Unless somebody managed to penetrate all my defenses, track me down, and pitch a Molotov cocktail through the window—none of which would ever happen—my apartment was the safest place in the world.

I was sound asleep when my phone rang, sometime around two in the morning. I fumbled for it and muttered, “’Lo?”

“God dammit, Faust,” Greenbriar snapped, “what the hell are you doing?”

“Sleeping. What are you doing?”

“Paying a couple of wealthy European tourists to shut up about the ghost that just attacked them, that’s what.”

I shot up in bed, wide-awake now.

“What?”

“You heard me,” Greenbriar said. “It’s still here.”

24.

I didn’t get it. Ghosts were a mixed bag of weirdness, but the case was closed. I’d taken out Monty’s killer; I’d given him his watch back. What the hell else could he want? Real restless spirits were rare for a reason: unless they’d been cursed or bound somehow, it took an unbelievable amount of sheer willpower—like clinging to a skyscraper ledge by your fingernails—to stay in the land of the living. Something was so important to Monty that even after being avenged, he just couldn’t let go.

I thought back to the night I’d spent in the penthouse suite. How I’d lived his final moments, feeling the bullet that killed him. The flood of panic and fear—

Then I saw it. The missing piece.

“You still there?” Greenbriar said.

“Yeah.” I took a deep breath. “I know what I have to do. I’m going back to Los Angeles. Tonight. I’m gonna need a favor.”

“Will it solve my damn problem? Fine, what do you need?”

“Find me a backhoe operator who works nights and can keep his mouth shut,” I told him. “I have to dig up Monty’s grave.”

*     *     *

I drove along the winding forest road, watching the sun glitter as it rose over the trees. My back sore, my shoes dirty with caked earth from exhuming Monty’s casket. And in my mind, for the hundredth time, I lived through the memory of Monty’s death.

At the end of the private drive, I pulled up outside Tanesha’s retreat. The front door opened a crack. I couldn’t quite read the look on her face. Somewhere between fear and relief.

“Dino’s dead,” she told me.

“That’s right.”

“Did you do it?”

I shook my head. “No. Can I come in?”

She unhooked the chain and opened the door.

“Thought I saw you at Monty’s funeral,” she said.

I didn’t answer. We walked into her living room. To the hearth, where her pictures stood. Her and Monty, in the recording studio, the white gold Rolex on his wrist.

“We had reason to believe Dino might have…robbed Monty’s body, after he killed him,” I said. “I had a friend in the coroner’s office check through Dino’s belongings.”

I pulled the Rolex from my pocket, holding it up between us. The inscription, Forever Gold, gleaming in the light.

“I think that Monty would have wanted you to have this.”

Monty had died in an agony of fear. Not for himself, though. I remembered his last words, pouring from my lips: “Don’t hurt her. Promise me you won’t hurt her.” He’d died the same way he’d lived: obsessed and in love. He’d carried that torch all the way to the grave.

And the torch still burned.

Tanesha stared at the watch. She took a deep breath.

Then she reached out, letting out the breath in a tired sigh, and curled her fingers around the watchband.

“Thank you,” she said. “It’s good…it’s good to have something to remember him by. We had some good times, me and him. I’ll always be grateful for that. I couldn’t be…what he wanted me to be. But I’ll always be grateful.”

I turned to go.

As she walked me to the door, I glanced into a hallway mirror. I saw my reflection—tired, worn down—and hers.

And one other person standing in the mirror. Down the hall, in the shadow of a darkened room, the dim, shrouded shape of Monty Spears. Staring back at her.

And there he would stay, I knew, as long as his spirit could hold on. A silent sentinel, standing an invisible watch over her. Struggling, with the last fleeting remnants of his soul, to prove his love to a woman who would never love him back. Singing his one-note love song until he finally let go and tumbled into the void.

There’s no con more convincing than the one you play on yourself.

I set my GPS for the airport and drove. I’d had enough of ghosts and delusions and Los Angeles hustlers. Enough of gold records and gold watches. It was all a mirage anyway, yellow rocks glittering in the California sun.

The job was done. That was real. The cash, that was real too. And that was all that mattered.

Time to go home.

1

Afterword

So, a little history: when I was picked up by 47North to write the Harmony Black series, my publishing schedule suddenly posed a problem. Between the first two Harmony books being released back-to-back, and the final Revanche Cycle novel in the pipeline too, I wouldn’t be able to release the next Faust novel until the end of 2016. A whole year between Faust books? I hated the idea of keeping readers waiting that long. So, I canceled an overdue vacation and carved out extra time wherever I could with the intent of weaving a little stand-alone side story, an as-yet-untold tale from Daniel’s past to tide everybody over until the next full length adventure.

Working at novella length was an interesting experience, taught me a few things, and provided some more ideas for other side-stories set in Daniel’s universe; if folks enjoyed this one, I’ll likely do more of these. Not now, though. Now, I’m taking the weekend off. I might even sleep in. Maybe.

Thanks as always to Kira Rubenthaler, my editor; James T. Egan, my cover designer; Adam Verner, narrator of the fantastic audio book adaptations; and Maggie Faid on administrative support. And of course, thank you for reading!

Want to get the advance scoop on new books and projects? Head over to http://www.craigschaeferbooks.com/mailing-list/ and hop onto my mailing list. Once-a-month newsletters, zero spam. Want to reach out? You can find me on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/CraigSchaeferBooks, on Twitter as @craig_schaefer, or just drop me an email at craig@craigschaeferbooks.com. I always love hearing from my readers.