Skin Deep

by Jerome Preisler

  “Did you hang on to your pictures?”

  “Listen, I’m a pro, dig? No matter how I choose to pursue the American dream.”

  “So the answer’s yes.”

  Noble produced a long sigh. “They’re all catalogued and cross-indexed on disc,” he said. “My photo library’s in the stockroom. Next shelf over from some great dual-action toys.”

  “We might want to have a look, even burn some copies,” Nick said. “That okay?”

  “Oh, sure, be my guests.” Noble flashed his simulated grin. “Depending on your tastes, I can also recommend an excellent selection of videos.”

  Sara gave Nick a communicative glance. He nodded almost imperceptibly. “There’s something else we’d rather have from you,” she said, taking the lead.

  “And what would that be?”

  “Skin specimens,” she said.

  “Epithelials?”

  She gave him a questioning look.

  “The detectives wanted them, too,” he said.

  “And?”

  “Their attitude put me off. Much too cagey, no give and take.”

  Sara considered that. “Mr. Noble, you told me you followed dozens of trials, is that right?”

  “Dozens and dozens.”

  “So you know we can run lab comparisons with Dorset’s tissues,” she said. “The dyes that were used might tell us something, provide us with valuable leads.”

  Noble was staring at her. “I’ve been told there’d be minimal facial scarring if I hired the right doctor to remove the implants, really not much that can be seen. I’ve even got health insurance to cover the surgeries, yet I haven’t looked into it,” he said. “Can you guess the reason?”

  “Give us the samples, and I promise I’ll get back to you.”

  Noble regarded her for a full thirty seconds. “I like how you work,” he said finally.

  “I appreciate that.”

  “I’m serious.”

  “So am I.”

  Noble smiled, his eyes still on her face. “You can take whatever samples you want,” he said. “Why not? They’re only skin deep.”

  Watching him, Nick decided that this time, the smile was authentic. Although until further notice, he wasn’t at all certain he preferred it to the outright fakes.

  He had known of the place for a long time. It was down below a saddle in the canyon wall and across a wash where the Joshua trees stood in rooted assembly, a dozen or more of them, tall and grizzled, their shadows dark, dusty, and as tattered as the robes of ancient clerics. There beyond the trailheads frequented by hikers, in a deep notch cut into the canyon’s bare bedrock, he had once found an outcropping that rose from the ground in the shape of an altar.

  Like the slopes around it, the projection was composed of red sandstone. It came almost up to his knees, its top flattened and smoothed by erosion to a platform that was five feet long and easily two feet wide. There were no other formations of any appreciable size around it, no large boulders, nothing of a similar shape, only the windblown bed of powdery gray sand and loose, scattered stones and pebbles spreading from its base, the coarser deposits as red as the altar and the overarching cliffs.

  Early that afternoon, he’d driven out to an overlook spurring off the loop road, pulled his car in, and descended from the saddle on foot, taking a natural pass that wound to the bottom in slow bends and curves. Although he had known another, more direct route, this was far less strenuous. He’d realized his bloodstream was still flooded with endorphins and would not be fooled into thinking he was fully recovered from his suspension. In a sense, though, the peptides in his brain had helped him make the trip out there, dulling the pain of the cancer growing inside him.

  The sunlight was angling into the notch when he reached it, warming the air pocketed inside, brightening its high stone walls so that they seemed almost luminescent. He stood for a while and took in the brilliant crimsons, the pink, purple, and vermillion striations. Yes, he thought. Once consecrated, it would make an ideal chapel.

  At the altar, he crouched, shrugged off the shoulder pack he’d carried with him, removed his kit, and set it on the ground. Then he opened its lid and uncapped the inks he had prepared. He was confident the porous surfaces below the altar’s platform would let them take as if they were colored paints.

  On his knees now, he shut his eyes tightly and recalled the picture that had come to him the night before, appearing even as the sight and scent of sagebrush left him. It was as if a wave had overtaken his mind’s interior and then withdrawn to leave behind the second image… or possibly to expose one that had already existed there, hidden away in his subconscious.

  A child with the face of a lamb lying with his hands and legs bound together, a yellow circle of light around his head, his eyes closed almost as if in peaceful repose. A white resurrection banner emblazoned with a red crucifix waving from a sword or a knife above him, the edge of its blade low across the boy’s throat.

  The image was as vivid as a stencil illustration, and he closely examined it, his consciousness turned upon itself. The moment he felt ready, he reopened his eyes and took a fine-tipped artist’s paintbrush from his kit. Gripped by an exalted feeling that was something greater than mere inspiration, he would reproduce the image exactly as it had been revealed to him.

  Concentrating to his fullest, he dipped the brush into an ink bottle and applied his first stroke to the rock.

  “I can’t help you with what happened to Laurel,” Mick Aztec was saying to Langston. “I would if I had any information for you. Anything. Do you know what that means?”

  “I believe it speaks to how you felt about her,” Langston replied. He was sitting near the bottom of the stairs that descended to the workshop, his hands meshed on his lap. “But why don’t you tell me?”

  Aztec stood in front of him below the flight of steps. “Body artists, we’re a tight group,” he said, and crossed his fingers together for emphasis. “I don’t like talking to you.”

  “Because I’m with the police?”

  “And an outsider,” Aztec said. “It isn’t personal.”

  Langston nodded his understanding. “I appreciate your frankness—”

  “Laurel was special,” Aztec said abruptly. “It’s like I told you upstairs. We loved each other.”

  Langston was recalling that Aztec had actually told him the work he’d done on her was a loving act, which was not quite the same thing. “Were you in a relationship with her?”

  “It wasn’t sexual,” Aztec said. “Laurel heard about me about two, three years ago through word-of-mouth. Then she saw my online portfolio and flew here from San Francisco to get a scarification.”

  “Her first?”

  “She never went to anyone else afterward,” Aztec said. “I understood what she wanted.”

  “Aesthetically?”

  “And based on how her body would respond. As an artist, I do my best to envision how scar patterns will look on a client. Flesh is my medium, and I have a feel for its qualities.”

  “Your techniques… I imagine they would vary from person to person.”

  “Yes. Everyone heals differently. I can’t say why, but it was easy with Laurel.”

  “Knowing how she would heal, you mean.”

  Aztec looked at him. “We had an immediate harmony.”

  “So after you did your initial work on her…”

  “She came back here every few months. She was breaking ties with Frisco anyway—her family was giving her grief about the mod—but I think she moved to Vegas partly to cut down on her travel expenses.”

  Langston nodded, his eyes moving around the room. Small, unadorned, and immaculate, it had soft overhead lighting, with a tattoo chair like the one upstairs in front of the counter, a massage table, a couple of storage cabinets, and a trolley with several rows of pullout bins and trays. There was an adjustable standing lamp near the table, another near the chair, both switched off. He noticed an autoclave of the type used to sterilize me
dical instruments on a salon counter, the counter itself under a mirror covering the upper half of an entire wall.

  “You brought me down here for a reason,” he said finally. “I still have no idea what it is.”

  Aztec started to reply, seemed to think twice. “Cody’s had this place for five years,” he said after a moment. “We’re certified in blood-borne pathogen and infectious disease control, CPR, and first aid. Compliant with Clark County health regs for tattoo practitioners. But there are people who don’t like some of what we do here.”

  “We,” Langston said. “Or you?”

  “It’s all the same if they want to shut us down.” Aztec shrugged. “Cody’s strictly into permanent cosmetics and body piercing. He’s clear with the law.”

  “But you aren’t.”

  “It depends,” Aztec said. “My art is defined as extreme body modification. Somebody objects to it morally or whatever, they can interpret the regs so we’re slapped with all kinds of misdemeanors. Use them as excuses to call us public nuisances.”

  “The potential spread of hepatitis B and C and HIV isn’t an excuse,” Langston said. “I’d say the same for viral, fungal, or bacterial infections.”

  Aztec looked at him sharply. “I keep a clean room.”

  “And you’ll vouch for everyone else in your profession?” Langston caught another look. He sat forward, his fingers still meshed, his elbows resting on his knees. “I didn’t come here to run you out of town on health-code violations,” he said. “Anything you tell me stays off the record.”

  “That sounds fine right now,” Aztec said. “How do I know it stays that way?”

  “It’s possible I’m flattering myself,” Langston said, “but I think you only brought me down here because you sense it will.”

  They kept their eyes steady on each other for a long moment. Then Langston saw Aztec straighten up as if in decision. He finally turned, went over to one of the trolleys, reached into a bin, and came back holding a large assortment of stainless-steel instruments in his hand.

  “This is my basic tool set,” he said. “The ones I use for scarifications and implants.”

  Langston studied them. Most were surgical scalpels, scissors, and forceps. But there were some he didn’t entirely recognize—long-handled instruments with blunt, flatly circular tips of different sizes. “These tools,” he said, pointing to them. “They almost resemble root elevators, the kind that would be used in dental procedures.”

  Aztec looked surprised. “You know your stuff,” he said.

  “I’m a medical doctor,” Langston said. “A nonpracticing forensic pathologist.”

  Aztec’s eyes widened on him. “You’re serious.”

  “Yes.”

  “ ‘Nonpracticing,’ ” Aztec said. “Is that anything like a lapsed Catholic?”

  Langston gave a thin smile and saw Aztec do the same. “A little,” he said. “Tell me about the instruments.”

  “They’re dermal elevators.” Aztec slid one out from the rest to exhibit it in his free hand. “The dental tools you mentioned separate the gum from the root of a tooth. Mine do the same with layers of skin. Whenever you implant something, you make an incision and insert it between the layers. But if you go down as far as you need to all at once…”

  “There would be swelling and bruising,” Langston said. “A significant amount, I imagine.”

  Aztec nodded. “I take my time with the elevators to enlarge the space in graduated stages. It causes less trauma and speeds up the healing process. Anything that helps the tissues rejuvenate quicker gives me better results.”

  Langston took a moment to digest that. “You’re talking about the Tattoo Man as well as yourself.”

  “The pictures of the people he grabbed were all over the newspapers and the Net,” Aztec said. “He’s a genius… anybody could see it just from looking at them. But they tell me he’s got some years on him.”

  “By that you mean… ?”

  “He’s thirty-five, forty, at least.”

  Langston suddenly felt very ancient. “How can you be sure?”

  “Guys don’t share their techniques till they do some hanging out with you, loosen up, show off their work. Then they might swap some tricks of the trade… usually after you’ve had a few drinks together. I can tell he’s learned a lot from the old-school pros.”

  “Just from looking at those photos?”

  Aztec nodded. “His colors aren’t typical. Some of them have to be his own formulations.”

  “You’re certain of this as well?”

  “I know what I see. Cody can give you the detailed ins and outs,” he said. “Another thing… if the news stories are right, he held the people he kidnapped for about a week. But there’s no peeling where he did his tattoos. No swelling, no discoloration. Same goes for the skin around his implants. Not a mark. When you’re experienced with ink or mod, you plan around the normal healing cycle. He has a light touch. Knows his anatomy, too.”

  “And you?”

  “Hmm?”

  “Human anatomy,” Langston said. “I’m guessing you’ve also studied it.”

  “Of course,” Aztec said. “Since I was about twelve.” A shrug. “Just not in school, you know.”

  Langston, guilty over his sudden smile, could tell it simply puzzled Aztec. Then he remembered his question to Raven Lunar about symbolism and decided to do more fishing. “Is there anything else you see?” he said. “Some special meaning in what he did to his victims?”

  “I couldn’t say unless I knew him. Or them. And even then, your guess might be as good as mine.” Aztec looked thoughtful. “Hang on, I’ll show you something.”

  He went over to the trolley and put away his instruments. Then he returned, pushed up the sleeve of his sweater, and revealed a multitude of skulls covering most of his forearm. The distorted, socketed bone faces were rendered in black and gray washes.

  “Aztec isn’t my birth name,” he said, which for Langston was hardly a shock. “I lived in Mexico for a while and got interested in their culture. These are a few of their gods.” He pointed to one, another, a third. “This is Mictlantecuhtli, the king of the underworld. This here has sacrificial stone blades coming from the eyes and is based on a museum piece. And this, my favorite, has mystical carvings from the priesthood. But as far as their meaning… the history’s fun, but it’s really that the artwork was done by a friend.”

  Langston waited. Aztec turned his arm over, showing the face of a spike-haired blonde on the soft flesh below the elbow.

  “She’s Nina Tyford,” he said. “A singer-songwriter. Remember ‘Angel Heart’ from a couple years back?”

  Langston shook his head in the negative.

  “It was her big hit. Then she committed suicide. I wear the portrait because I was a fan. Nothing profound.”

  Langston nodded and found himself looking at the small tattoo on Aztec’s neck. The doughnut hooked to a pair of dangling chains.

  “And the one over there?” he said, touching his own neck. “Out of curiosity… I noticed it before.”

  Aztec shrugged. “I like doughnuts,” he said. “And I like hanging from hooks.”

  Langston opened his mouth, closed it, his question aborted. Aztec had rolled down his sleeve and was looking past him up the stairs, a signal that was easy enough to read. And he hadn’t forgotten that Greg was waiting for him.

  He rose from the step on which he’d perched and smoothed the front of his trousers. “You’ve been a great help,” he said, putting out his hand.

  Aztec nodded and took it. “You’ll still want to talk to Cody,” he said.

  To Cody, and maybe to Aztec again, Langston thought. But he’d learned when to push and when not to.

  Aztec motioned him upstairs with a polite wave, pausing to turn off the lights in his workshop before Langston heard him following closely behind.

  6

  SCHEDULED TO HAVE Saturday night free—his first partial weekend in a month—Nick had told Greg
Sanders in passing that he might head out to catch an R&B band at a local club that served the best authentic Tex-Mex food in Vegas. Greg had given him a dubious glance and said he hoped he had a great time. Later, Nick mentioned to one of the techs that he might just choose to stay home, take a crack at clearing away the mess that had accumulated over the last month or so of missed off nights, pick up the novel he’d been trying to finish forever, and hit the sack a little early. The tech hadn’t sounded convinced while saying she hoped he got some rest.

  A short while afterward, he’d shared a combined and amended version of those plans with Sara, saying he’d decided to stop at the supermarket on the way home, restock his fridge, fix himself a hearty dinner that included burritos and nachos with guacamole, then relax to a country-and-western CD or watch one of the blockbuster action flicks he had missed last summer—or had it been among the crop he’d failed to see the previous year?— on DVD. Her only response had been to roll her eyes.

  Refusing to let their skepticism bother him, he’d gone about getting the box of photo discs obtained from Mitchell Noble catalogued as evidence, asking David Hodges—whose lab was just down the hall from the evidence room and who was familiar with the necessary paperwork—to assist him because the clerk was nowhere in sight. Hodges hadn’t looked pleased and was even less thrilled when Nick asked if he could help him get a jump on things by taking care of it pronto, but he’d taken the box from his hands nonetheless.

  Now the midnight hour had come and gone, Sunday having crept up on Nick to find him still hanging around his office, his eyes grainy from staring at the computer screen. Hodges had managed to process and return the discs to him within a couple of hours, and he’d decided to give them a quick look before signing out. Although that had been around six P.M., Nick was still optimistic that he’d be able to knock off before too much longer, then maybe swing by the late-night taco joint on South Durango and grab some takeout. When it came to a CSI’s personal life, expectations were on a sliding scale, and they generally trended toward the downside.

  The thing was that he’d gotten on a roll and hated to quit. Noble, as it turned out, had not been exaggerating when he’d claimed to be a thorough archivist. The photos for each of the criminal cases he’d followed as a freelance shutterbug were kept in separate folders searchable by docket numbers, the court’s ruling dates, and the names of their respective plaintiffs, defendants, and presiding judges. The majority also cross-linked to scanned-in court documents obtained from the county clerk’s office. Browsing the contents of the index disc on his computer, Nick had found there were photographs relating to thirty-seven cases that had fallen into Judge Quentin Dorset’s lap, dating back to 1998, when Noble began his photography career.