Crooked Little Vein

deadened all the sound. Even our footsteps rang wrong.

Two levels down, we found the door we were looking for, an X roughly scratched into its steel. There was an odd light beyond. I went through first, shifting my grip down to the base of the flashlight so I could use it as a blackjack if necessary.

The door was an access point to a wide, wet, stinking tunnel. My attention was drawn to the floor. The light came from a couple of dozen shake-and-break green glowsticks tossed on the ground.

And I was looking at those instead of everything else.

Trix yelped.

I turned. There was a gun muzzle pushed into her eye.

A tall, thin man with bad skin and eyes like a doll’s was behind her, one arm around her throat, the other pressing a gun into her eye.

“The thing about cheap bullets,” he said, “is that they’ll shatter on the inside of her skull. I can shoot her through the brain and the bullet will not emerge out of the other side. My name’s Tim Cardinal. I understand you wanted to see me.”

Dead eyes. They didn’t reflect any light. Black and motionless. His smile was polite and without life.

“This was business,” I said.

His polite smile widened by a precise amount, as if he’d learned how to feign emotions in the mirror. “This is how I do business. I have no desire to kill her. But then, I have no desire to use toilets or eat food. They are simply things I have to do in order to live. So is this. You wanted to see me?”

“Trix, just relax,” I said. “We’re doing business here. He’s not going to have any reason to harm you.”

“You think he needs a reason?” she said.

Tim Cardinal laughed. It made me jump: it sounded like a gunshot in a small room. “Oh, I like you. Now. I won’t ask again. You wanted to see me?”

I put the flashlight beam square on his face. I wanted him to focus on me, not Trix.

“Alexis Perez received a book as payment from a client,” I said, in as loud and steady a voice as I could manage with Trix looking down a gun barrel. “I believe you took the book for yourself. It’s a rare antique. My client has hired and empowered me to purchase it from you for a significant fee. Under-the-table purchase, bank transfer, no records.”

“How do you do a bank transfer with no records?” Cardinal sneered.

“My client is very important. It’s not an issue. I’m here to give you a lot of money for a book that’s no good to you. There’s no need for any of this.”

“If the book is so very important to your very important client, how do I know it’s no good to me?”

“Are you intending to go into politics any time soon?”

He laughed again, a genuine snort of amusement. The tunnel still made it a flat and horrible noise. “No.”

“Then it’s no good to you.”

He considered. “This would be the old leatherbound thing that she got from the Texan?”

“Right.”

“And she told you I had it?”

“She’s dead. She died a few hours ago. Death by misadventure. Home-brew plastic surgery.”

“Oh,” he said. For a moment there, he almost looked concerned. And then, “So how do you know I have it? Who told you?”

“I’m a detective. I worked it out. Let go of her now.”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“Because you want me to. You’re not armed, are you?”

“No.” Damnit.

He threw the smile away, but there was light in his eyes for the first time. He was amused. He had all the power in the situation, and he knew it, and that was the only thing in the world that could make him register a pulse.

“I don’t have the book,” he said.

“Then we’ll be on our way. No hard feelings, no comeback. You won’t see us again.”

“But you have money, don’t you?”

“Not with me. Who has the book?”

“Ah. I have two things you want, then. What price do you set on that name and her life?”

“Screw the name. Let her go.”

Cardinal grinned. “I am finding this very interesting. I think I’m going to kill you both. Her first. Let you watch. Would that be nice?”

“I have access to four hundred thousand dollars,” I said.