He turned around to see what was behind him and he was not at all surprised to see a second man in a gray suit, probably the other man he'd seen in the apartment. This man was much shorter and had a little bit of a tan but looked just as unpleasant. Both men moved slowly and steadily toward him and Jack realized he did not have a hell of a lot of options.
'Fuck me,' he thought and he wasn't aware he'd said the words aloud until the first man, the taller one, said, 'That's right, pal. Fuck you.'
The little one got there first and before Jack could turn around, he was rabbit-punched in the small of the back. He moaned and started to twist to the side but the tall man grabbed him and threw a compact right to Jack's stomach. All the air went out of him and before he could either speak or move, they were on either side of him, they'd grabbed both his arms and shoved him through the first doorway Jack had seen when he stepped out of the elevator.
The room was dark and Jack was hunched over, trying to get his breath back. It wasn't until the smaller man flicked on the light that Jack could see where they were.
They were in a morgue.
Several dead bodies were laid out on stainless-steel tables. One was half dressed – a man wearing a shirt and suit jacket but no pants. Another had clearly not been touched yet; it was an old woman and she was clothed in a simple cotton nightgown that was bunched up around her waist. There were probably twenty drawers built into the wall that had the look of big, heavy filing cabinets. Jack did not particularly relish finding out what was being filed in them.
He looked up to speak to the taller man but he was not in much of a listening mood. The man slashed down with his fist and hit Jack a hard blow over his left eye. Jack again started to go down, but the smaller man held him up and wouldn't let him go. Jack felt a trickle of blood on his forehead, sliding down onto his cheek.
'Listen, pal,' the taller man was saying. 'Let's get this straight. It'll be a lot easier for all of us if you pay serious attention to what I'm saying, okay?'
Jack nodded but that didn't seem to satisfy them. The smaller man rabbit-punched Jack again. The stabbing pain in his kidney was almost unbearable; the heat ran up and down his body and he had a flashback to the hospital bed in Virginia, when the pain had taken over and he hadn't wanted to live. He started to sweat and began to keel over again but this time it was the taller man's turn to hold him up and prevent him from falling.
'I asked you a question,' the taller man said, 'but I didn't hear an answer.'
'Okay,' Jack breathed and he thought he would explode from the pain that came with just speaking. But then he thought: No. I won't give in to it. I can't give in. And he remembered Kid saying, when the pain was bad in one of their early sessions: It's not injury. It's just surprise. So that's what Jack concentrated on. He wasn't hurt. He was just surprised as hell. It was pain, but it was pain that wouldn't last. 'Paying serious attention,' he said as the tall man waited. 'Paying attention.'
'Okay, good. So here's the deal. You stop fuckin' around with anything that has to do with your friend from the apartment. You stop fuckin' around with anything that has to do with the person you're bothering here. I don't think we even have to say her name, do we?'
Jack shook his head but when he saw the man's fist draw back, he gasped, 'No. Don't have to say her name.'
'So it's pretty simple. The bottom line is you go home and you stop fuckin' around.'
As punctuation, he threw a quick right to Jack's stomach. It could have been worse – Jack thought the guy's heart was no longer in it – but it still did some damage. Jack doubled over and he felt a tiny dribble of vomit escape from his mouth and stream down his chin.
'Do we understand each other?' the tall guy asked.
'Yes,' Jack said and when he spoke, he felt the little guy behind him let go of his arms. Slowly, very slowly and gingerly, Jack straightened up. He was standing on his own now, bent over slightly, one hand on his stomach, one hand using the nearest stainless-steel slab, the one holding the old woman, to prop himself up. And again Jack thought: It's not injury. It's just surprise.
It's just surprise…
'Can I ask one question?' Jack managed to say.
'Okay. One question,' the taller guy agreed. 'You seem like a nice guy, so why the hell not?'
'Isn't embalming fluid extremely flammable?' Jack gasped.
'What?' the tall guy said. 'What the fuck does that have to do with anything?'
Jack struggled to get his breath back. 'I'll show you,' he breathed out. And whirling to his left – they couldn't stop him, they didn't have a chance – he grabbed a glass bottle of embalming fluid that was sitting on the steel table. In the same motion, never slowing down, Jack finished his turn and smashed the bottle across the neck of the smaller man. Jack felt glass cut into his palm but he didn't even feel the sting. He saw blood spurt from the man's neck, but that didn't hold his attention either. The fluid flowed from the shattered container, drenching the man's jacket and shirt, and Jack, still moving, never stopping, had his left hand in his pants pocket. The little man staggered back one step and Jack used the extra room to raise his right elbow and jab it as hard as he could into the man's chin, which sent him back another foot. Then both of Jack's hands came together and as he finished his turn, he had a lit match in his hand.
'You motherfucker,' the tall one said and took a step toward Jack. His eyes were incredulous but cold and Jack had no doubt that the man was absolutely capable of killing him without ever changing that expression.
'Don't move,' Jack told him. He held the match out an inch closer to the little one. 'Take one more step and I'll have no problem turning your friend into the biggest goddamn toasted marshmallow you ever saw.'
The big man hesitated and Jack saw the liquid soaking into the smaller man's shirt now. He was drenched in the stuff.
'Ronnie, don't fuckin' move!' the little guy screamed. 'I'm fuckin' covered in this shit!'
The match was almost out and Jack quickly lit another one before they could do a thing.
'Now,' Jack said. 'I want you to pay serious attention to what I'm saying, okay?' He moved the flame a fraction of an inch closer to the little man. 'I didn't hear an answer to my question.'
'You motherfucker,' the tall guy said.
'Okay, close enough. You,' he said to the big guy, 'you're going to get Eva Migliarini and bring her to this room. If she's not here in five minutes, call the fuckin' fire department 'cause you're gonna need 'em to put out your friend's head.'
The tall guy didn't say anything. He just narrowed his eyes, then nodded, turned, and left the room.
Jack turned to give his full attention to the smaller man, whose eyes were popping in terror.
'I think you cut my fuckin' artery,' the smaller thug said. 'Look at the fuckin' blood.'
'Turn around,' Jack told him.
'What?'
'Turn around.'
The shorter man turned so his back was to Jack. Jack threw as hard a punch as he could into the man's kidney. The thug grunted and immediately dropped to his knees. Before he could make any kind of a movement, Jack had another lit match in his hand.
They stayed just like that for several more minutes. Jack heard the footsteps in the hallway before he saw anyone. Then the door to the morgue opened and a dark-haired woman wearing a short black dress and high heels strode in. She wore no jewelry except for a magnificent diamond wedding ring and an antique pink-gold woman's pocket watch, which she wore around her neck on a black silk string. Jack was startled by how attractive she was. When she walked into the room he could see the muscles in her legs ripple, just slightly, from the middle of her thighs all the way down to her calves. Her arms were tightly muscled, thin and elegant, her skin was deeply tanned but smooth and absolutely unlined. Her breasts were small but perfectly formed under the tight dress. Her eyes were almost coal black and they shimmered; there was a deep and compelling mystery to her eyes, as if they were their own separate universe. She looked to be in her late thirties but Jack knew from his reading she was almost a decade older than that. As he looked at her, he could hear Kid's words echoing in his head: They're almost perfect physical specimens. It's not only their looks. They're hungry. They want things. I don't know how else to describe it… their want is just overpowering.
He finally understood. She was overpowering. Five-foot-six, five-seven, tops. Her chest moving up and down just a little too rapidly, the only sign that she was anything but in absolute control. Her lips thin and a deep,
