Not this night, eh, Kalzar? Justin thought. The Dragon is not watching.
With his eyes narrowed, Kalzar tossed the mirror on the floor. It shattered into sharp, glistening shards.
Justin stayed where he was.
“It appears,” Kalzar said, “that the Dragon does not yet realize it is necessary that you die.” He turned and walked to the dais and up to the huge mirror. “I will do everything in my power to change that.” He stepped into the mirror. It rippled with his passage and was still.
ten
Sandra threw her blouse on the floor and shoved her closet door wide, then stood motionless a moment, wondering what to wear.
Tentatively, she fingered one of her flashier miniskirts, but finally pushed it back into the throng of hanging clothes. She wasn’t in that sort of mood. After the kind of day she’d had, she wasn’t interested in putting on a pair of spike heels and hamstringing herself for fashion’s sake.
She tossed a black lace blouse on her bed and closed the closet. From her chest of drawers she took out a black satin chemise and a comfortable pair of jeans. And definitely, she decided, returning to the closet, a pair of patent leather flats…
Five minutes later, she scrutinized her reflection and nodded with satisfaction. Ten years ago, she wouldn’t have dreamed of going out on the town alone dressed like this. Besides the fact that Chuck would have beat her silly for even thinking about it, there was the other factor. She was a cop. She knew too well what kind of predators were out there, just waiting for a woman to step into their midst dressed in something provocative. In their twisted little minds, a good-looking woman dressed in anything but a head-to-toe gunny sack was “asking for it.” “It” being anything up to and including full-blown rape.
Slipping money, a lipstick, her driver’s license, her shield and ID, her keys, and her off-duty weapon—a Smith & Wesson .38 snubbie revolver—into a small beaded handbag, she smiled. With the load of unfocused hostility she was struggling with, it just might be a real pleasure to run into some idiot who wanted to cross the line with her.
She narrowed her eyes at her reflection. A pretty woman holding a purse with a pistol inside. She thought about the redhead who had knocked her on her ass today. That embarrassment still burned. And the feeling of being stalked, the weird paranoia that had almost made her come unglued earlier. Maybe it was just cop jitters. But it felt real enough…
She grabbed her purse and left her room. Benny’s door at the end of the hall was closed. She paused. Benny had let something slip earlier, and she’d almost missed it. She walked to his door and knocked.
“Yeah?”
She opened it a crack and popped her head inside. A gray-blue glow from his monitor lit the walls. He twisted around in his chair and raised his eyebrows.
“I’m a dork,” she said, frowning. “A selfish dork.”
Benny smiled and swiveled his chair around. He beckoned for her to come in. “Yeah? How big a dork?”
“Big.”
“How selfish a dork?”
“Very selfish.”
“What color?”
She laughed and sat on his bed, leaned back on her hands. “C’mon, Benny. You said something when I came in and I blew past it.”
Benny wrinkled his brow, “What’s that?”
“You suggested we trade troubles. I was too thick to pick up on it. Your troubles. What’s going on?”
Benny shook his head, but his mood darkened. He broke eye contact and looked back at the computer screen, then down at his chair. “Nothing. Same shit, different day. It’s not important.”
“It’s important to me.”
Benny was silent for a moment. It was tough to get him to talk about his own troubles. His attitude toward adversity was to act as if it didn’t exist. He didn’t like to dwell on the bad things. That worked well for him with most problems, but sometimes he let things fester inside. She knew she had to proceed with care. Too much sympathy and Benny would clam up. He hated it when people pitied him.
“Remember me mentioning a girl named Kylie?” Benny said slowly.
Sandra thought about it. Benny talked with so many people on the Internet. She could never keep their names straight. “Vaguely,” she replied.
“Well, we’ve been flirting over the Net for months now.”
“Okay.”
Benny ran his hands through his hair. “A couple of months back, when I got that big advance for the game, I invited her out to dinner to celebrate. It was a gesture, nothing more. She lives in Maryland, so I figured there wasn’t a chance in hell of it happening. No harm done. She could come with me in her imagination. Well, a week ago she writes and tells me her company is sending her to Chicago for some sales training seminar. She says she wants to collect on the dinner.”
“How is this a bad thing?” Sandra asked.
“I told her to meet me at Ambria, over in Lincoln Park.”
Sandra whistled. “Solid choice. But rich. So, what, you’re Mr. Moneybags now?”
“She seemed worth it. She told me to wear a red carnation so she would recognize me. I suggested wearing my ON THE ENTERPRISE, YOU’D CALL ME SIR button instead. I got an LOL for that.”
“LOL?”
“Internetese for Laugh Out Loud.”
“So what happened?”
“What happened?” Benny snorted. “Nothing. That’s what happened. I show up in my best suit and red carnation, wait there for two hours, and nothing.” He looked at her pointedly.
“And?” Sandra said.
“And what? That’s it.”
“That’s what? That’s all you did? You didn’t call her to find out why she was late?”
“Late? Don’t you get it?”
“Yeah, she got lost or something came up. Give her the benefit of the doubt, Benny.”
“No. She was there, Sandra. I’m sure she was at the restaurant at some point. You see, I didn’t tell her about me. About this.” He waved a hand at his wheelchair. “I didn’t want to deal with the whole pity thing.”
“I’m missing something here. You think she was there and she didn’t even say hello?” Sandra asked.
“Obviously she walked in, saw me like this, and kept right on walking. Oh, sure.” Benny threw his hands up in the air. “Old Benny’s a good Net pal. He can make you laugh till you’re blue in the face, gives you a shoulder to cry on. But he’s just not good boyfriend material, is he? Doesn’t quite have the face. Just doesn’t have the right functioning equipment.” Benny glared at Sandra, as though it were her fault.
Sandra kept her reaction from showing. She wanted to move over and throw her arms around Benny, hug him tight and tell him how much she loved him, and how that little bitch didn’t deserve him. But she didn’t dare get emotional. She didn’t dare show pity. With Benny, it was the quickest way to get your butt tossed out of the room.
Benny fumed, oblivious to the long silence that filled the space between them. He seemed to be asking her with his eyes what he should’ve done different. He seemed to be waiting for her to admit that it was true, that he wasn’t worth dating, that it was hopeless.
Sandra swallowed, and spoke. “So…” The only other sounds in the room were the soft hiss of Benny’s breathing, the humming computer, and the muffled city noise beyond the window. “Are you done now?”
“Done what?” Benny’s voice was sharp, slightly confused.
“Done feeling sorry for yourself.” It was a risky thing to throw at him. She knew it, but she couldn’t think of anything else. They were a pair of tough nuts, the two of them. They hadn’t made it to this point in their lives by being weak.
Benny’s face reddened. Sandra drew a breath. She leaned forward, ready to hug him and tell him it would be all right. But something kept her from that. She waited.
At first he didn’t look at her. “No,” he said, “I’m not done.”
“Well, how long is it going to take?” Sandra was surprised at the steadiness in her voice.
Benny let out a long breath. He cracked a reluctant smile. “One night of playing Cheerleader Carnage on the computer should just about do it.” He looked up at her, and his eyes sparkled.
Sandra smiled. “I love you, Benny.”
“You always say that after you punch me in the stomach.”
“I have to get your attention first.”
He nodded, looked at her clothes. “You going dancing now?”
“Yeah.”
“In that outfit? You trolling for creeps or something?”
“Something like that.” She laughed.
“Be gentle with them.”
“I’m always gentle with those who are gentle with me,” she said. He noticed the fire in her eyes.
Chuckling, he turned back to his monitor, “You’re in one of those moods, huh?”
“Something like that.”
“Get gone,” he said, turning back to his computer.
Purse, umbrella, and raincoat in hand, she left their apartment, locking the door behind her. She thought about taking her car, but decided that if she was going to drink, it might get in the way. Nobody knew better than a cop how stupid it was to drink and drive. She’d hail a cab at the curb or take the elevated train, one of the great advantages to living in the city. She felt a little better now. Benny would be okay. Tough bastard. Sometimes she felt like the entire world wasn’t big enough to knock him down. And she’d be okay, too.
The rain had ceased. Bloated gray clouds still slid slowly and easily through the dark void of the night sky. But she could see the moon through breaks in the cloud cover and a few stars bright enough to outshine the city’s light pollution. She’d prepared for the weather and now she didn’t need the gear. She wondered if the clearing skies were an omen. Just as she thought that, the heavens opened again.
Shaking her head at such superstitious nonsense—omens, for God’s sake!—she closed the gate behind her and walked into the rain. She hailed the first cab she saw.
As it slowed and turned toward the curb, a footstep scuffed the pavement behind her. She turned quickly, nervously. Nobody in sight. She heard somebody chirp their car alarm and climb into a car. Sandra gave a sigh of relief—nothing to worry about—and got into hers.
“LaSalle Street and Monroe, please,” she told him. She wanted to be right in the heart of the city, to feel Chicago’s millions of people all around her as she danced.
She paid the driver, overtipped him, and got his card in case she needed to call a cab to get home. I need a drink, she thought. Something, anyway. The combination of her dream last night, the murders, and the redhead in the trench coat who seemed to be following her had her jumpier than she’d been in years.
Sandra headed for the Top Hat, a blues club a friend of hers had turned her on to. She’d been there before, and had liked it well enough. The scene was a little rough around the edges and the people were interesting. Most of them, at least. The entertainment tonight was a band from New York reputed to be pretty good. Edward—the friend who’d taken her here the first time—said he’d seen them before and they weren’t to be missed. Sandra couldn’t remember the group’s name—Dirty Dimes, Spare Change, something like that. She walked up to the door. There was a poster of the band in the doorway. Dusty Nickels. Close enough.
She recognized the bouncer. He’d been working the door on her previous visits.
“Nice to see you, lady,” the tall, gaunt young man said as he took her money for the cover charge. He was dressed well—Calvin Klein urban waif from head to toe. Nodding, she slipped past him.
Though she didn’t smoke herself, Sandra loved the swirling backlit haze that marked a real blues club. It made her feel caught in the solitary embrace of a surreal world where the whining of the lead guitar was the speech of the realm and nothing was too bright or too frenetic. Exactly what the doctor ordered.
She sat down at a small round table close to the stage and ordered a screwdriver. The waitress returned quickly with the drink. Sandra grabbed the glass like a lifeline. The sting of the alcohol was pleasant on the back of her throat, and the sweetness of the orange juice provided a pleasant contrast to the sour taste of the unsuccessful day she’d spent hunting for a killer.
The band had finished their first set sometime earlier. She smiled and slouched back in her chair. The clock on the wall said ten till nine.
A roadie came out onto the stage and crouched before one of the amplifiers, fiddled with a knob. The audience was growing, people filtering in for the second show. The bar became crowded and the noise level grew. She watched the customers move and squirm past her. Good old Stevie Ray Vaughn was on the sound system, lulling the patrons with comfortable familiarity before they started their venture into a new sound.
A tall man in a light sport coat wedged himself in the chair across the table from her. He flashed her a Dentine smile and ordered a rum and Coke. She gave him no more attention than anyone else in the throng and waited for the band to begin.
She didn’t have to wait long.
As soon as the man fiddling with the amp left the stage, the PA system went silent and the band walked on.
The lead singer, a black man with thick dreadlocks, took the microphone. He was of average height, with a multicolored vest hanging open over his lean, well-muscled chest. His baggy pants looked as though they had been made from the fabric of a black parachute. He looked like someone who belonged in a reggae band, not a blues band.
“Check. Check.” His lips touched the mike. His resonant voice boomed throughout the room and thrummed in the bones of Sandra’s rib cage.
He gave the audience a smile, the private smile of someone who’s about to share a secret. Sandra found herself immediately attracted to him.
“You folks ready for some blues…?”
A spatter of applause.
The singer nodded, grinned, and raised one hand. The band kicked in with a rush of sound that was pure pleasure wrapped up in a C-seventh chord.
The club went wild.
It was going to be a good night, Sandra thought. She sipped her screwdriver as the Dusty Nickels thrummed into an old Muddy Waters song. She closed her eyes and let the music fill her. The lead singer’s deep voice seemed to caress her with each word.
She knew it was time to get out there and dance.
Leaving her table, she was the first one to move underneath the lights illuminating the tiny dance floor. That was often the case. She didn’t care one way or another what the rest of the crowd thought of her. She did this for herself, for her sense of self.
She was vaguely aware of others following her lead, more people joining her, moving to the music. One song led into another as she danced. Most of the time, she kept her eyes closed, opening them just often enough to keep from running into other dancers or into one of the tables surrounding the tiny, packed space. The music spoke to her even as the dancing healed the psychic abrasions of the day. She felt the freedom of movement and the gratifying coolness of her own sweat beading on her brow.
She bumped into someone, but refused to let the small collision break the spell. She apologized without looking up, and moved on.
But when she was bumped again, she opened her eyes and realized the man was intentionally trying to dance with her. He had dark skin, black eyes, and black hair, and was slightly shorter than she was. If she had to guess, she’d place him as coming from middle-eastern stock.
“Hello,” the man said in a thick Arabic accent. His hot gaze undressed her. “My name is Omar. What is your—”
She frowned at him, stopped dancing, turned and walked off the floor, leaving him standing alone, his mouth open, looking foolish and hurt.
Sandra could tell he was angry, and she waited for the confrontation, feeling the muscles along her shoulders go tense. She’d decided not to look for anything, but if something came—well, that wouldn’t be so bad, either. He wasn’t a little redheaded street punk, but he would do.
The man locked his angry st
are on her, but when she returned it steadily, he finally shrugged and turned away. He started dancing again, trying to act as if nothing had happened.
Her icy brush-off had been instinctive, and she immediately regretted it. Something about him had bothered her, but it wasn’t anything she could put her finger on. Still, she’d been unnecessarily rude. She could have bowed out gracefully. No point in looking for trouble…
Because looking for trouble was stupid. Coming to a crowded bar and dancing alone always attracted attention, whether a woman wanted it or not. That wasn’t fair, but it was the way the world worked. She sighed as she pushed her way in between two people at the bar and ordered another screwdriver.
She should probably apologize to the man. His fragile male ego had undoubtedly been wounded, and it wasn’t as if he’d done anything wrong. Just bad timing. But apologizing to a man who hit on you was tantamount to saying you wanted him to try again. No, better to just let it drop. She gazed out into the crowd, but avoided looking at the dance floor.
She sipped her drink. Benny was right. Sometimes, she was crazy. Breathing slowly, she felt the alcohol begin to pull at her. One drink at home and two here so far. The lazy burn was suffusing her with a pleasant glow. She relaxed.
And she slipped into the game, the one she always played in a roomful of strangers. She’d begun to play it when she started training as a police officer, at first with conscious effort, then almost automatically. They taught classes at the academy on how to study people so that you could ID them easily afterwards, days, weeks, or even months later. She had learned how to put together spot psychological profiles on people simply by looking at them, watching them interact with others.
The process didn’t always work, of course. Some people had elaborate social facades, facades that didn’t reflect who they really were. But the game worked most of the time. Using such techniques, she could separate the dangerous from the harmless with some degree of certainty a few moments after entering a room. There were standard indicators of those who might use deadly force if given cause, who were just looking for an excuse to do so.
Dark Heart Page 14
