She was waiting there and watching television when Eddie returned that afternoon.  He had already successfully dodged a barrage of questions from the San Jose PD, and his mood was guarded.  He was happy to see that Nikki had come back, but he didn’t know how the job had gone, other than Ethan’s being assaulted.  Nikki looked up at him and her eyes followed him into the bedroom.  “So,” he called, tossing his now-useless BMW satchel on the dresser and loosening his tie, “are we successes or are we going to try again?”

Nikki turned off the TV and came into the bedroom.  She tossed the optical drive onto the bed.  “I’m hungry,” she said, sitting next to it.

Eddie allowed himself a sigh of relief and gave Nikki a congratulating smile.  “I owe you dinner, then.  Prodigy went ballistic, as I’m sure you could imagine.  Did you hit their kid?”

She looked at the floor.  “He grabbed me.  I’m not happy about it,” she added.

“Well, you busted his nose and cheekbone, Killer,” Eddie said in a congratulatory voice as he put the drive on the table next to his laptop.  His tone irritated Nikki, and she was on the verge of snapping that she could have done a lot worse to the kid.  To his mother, too.

Eddie said, “You’re clear anyway.  Mom thought you were a man.”

For some reason, that made her feel worse.  “What?” she gasped.

“You heard me.  She even described you with a mustache.  The kid couldn’t give a statement yet, but when he does it’ll confuse things even more, regardless of what he thinks you were.”

How was that possible?  Just because she was thin?  Because she’d hurt this woman’s son?  Nikki’s brow wrinkled, deeply upset.  It wasn’t fair.  She doubted that Taiisha had ever been mistaken for a man.  Not that Taiisha would have cared one way or the other.  But it hurt.  Nikki wished she knew why.

When Nikki didn’t say anything, Eddie took that as his cue to continue.  “Don’t sweat it.  It’s embarrassing, but it’s a good end to a spoiled caper.  I’m glad you remembered not to come back,” he said.  “Good thinking on your feet.  Now, for our next trick, I have a prospective job from an old friend in Michigan.  Unless of course something comes up between here and there.”

“I hate Michigan,” she said, without a lot of conviction.  She didn’t want Eddie to think she wouldn’t go with him, not that it mattered.  She wondered if she should kill him tonight after he fell asleep, or in the morning  He’d struggle a lot, and she was too worn out to do it now.  A bath and dinner sounded like better plans.  She didn’t want to think about it at all; injuring the kid had left her feeling unsettled and ashamed.  She couldn’t blame Taiisha for forcing her to do that, and the guilt was beginning to gnaw.  She could have blamed the boy himself, but what was he supposed to do upon catching a burglar?  She didn’t want to think about it any more.  “I hate it,” she said again, bringing herself back to the present.  “That’s why I left.”

Eddie sat on the bed and pulled his shoes off.  He hated dress shoes.  Nikki moved away from him, putting space between them–a move born purely out of habit, he could tell.  “Absence makes the heart grow fonder,” Eddie said.  He put his hands to his heart and made a sappy face.

“Not after a five-hour plane ride.”

“Well, I’m glad you brought that up, because we’re not flying.  We’re driving.”

Nikki frowned, confused.  She asked him why with her eyes.

He was getting used to her nonverbal questions.  “I bought a car.  Couldn’t pass up the deal.”  Murray had put Eddie onto a silver Lincoln Town Car at a local dealer three days ago.  It was a demo car with two thousand miles on it.  Eddie had always wanted to own a Lincoln, so he had bought it.  Judging by Nikki’s demeanor, Eddie guessed that she felt badly about hurting Prodigy’s kid–”hurting” being something of an understatement.  When the paramedics brought him out, he looked like he’d been brained with a small appliance.  Nikki seemed to be pissed at herself for doing all that though, and maybe about the job not going right, either.  It reminded him of…himself, actually.

Nikki muttered, “Takes half my life to get here and then I leave after a fucking week.”

“Pardon?”

“Nothing.  Nothing.” She started folding her afghan.  “Are we leaving in the morning?”

“Bright and early.  Hope you’re as good at quick travel as you are at picking pockets.”

“Eat shit and die.”  Yeah, she could kill him.  In the morning.  Right now she had to eat.

As if he had read her mind, Eddie put two twenties on the bed.  “Go get yourself some dinner,” he said, standing up again.

Nikki looked at the money.  “You’re not eating?”

“Naah.  I want to download that stuff,” he motioned to the optical drive, “and have a look at it.  Call me nosy.”

She couldn’t go.  If she went out without Eddie, Taiisha might think she was running away…

“What’s wrong?” Eddie asked.  “You shivered.”

“No, I didn’t.”

“Yes you did, I saw you.  And your breath trembled, too.”  He met her midnight blue eyes.  “You afraid to go out for some reason?”

She didn’t deny it again.  Eddie was looking at her with that almost concerned look in his eyes.  It made her think of the way he’d cleaned her up after Taiisha’s attack, and a completely incongruous desire to ask him to bathe her rose up suddenly.  Just to have caring fingers on her skin, not touching to hurt but to comfort.  Just maybe.  She couldn’t ask, of course, that was stupid.

“Was it something else?” Eddie asked again, his grin widening.  “Just a hot flash?  Let me guess, it was that film guy Jason, right?  He’s got that grunge thing you girls go for.”

Nikki sprang abruptly off the bed, snatched the money, and stalked into the other room.  He heard her on the phone a moment later, ordering room service, and smiled to himself.  He couldn’t help himself; it was just fun to tease her.

He looked in on her a while later, to see what she was up to.  Nikki was sitting on the floor with a logjam of colored pencils by her side, hunched over her sketchbook.  Her hand moved in short, violent strokes.  She didn’t look up.  Eddie heard the lead snap with a faint, brittle click, and Nikki dropped the pencil, picked up another one of the same color from the pile, and continued without pause.  He was tempted to say something, but decided to let her be.

Eddie disappeared the next morning, leaving instructions for Nikki to call an answering service and take messages off of it.  There weren’t many; a call from someone named Dell, who wanted to see if Eddie could arrange a hotel conference and a bogus delivery van to intercept a package, a call from his friend in Michigan, whose name was Ian, a familiar, how’s-it-going call from someone named Cathy–Nikki guessed it was a relative or close friend, not a girlfriend–and finally a call from a toady-sounding man named Tony who said that he’d had a lot of requests for Eddie’s services lately and suggested a quick phone call.  Nikki wrote them all down.

Eddie returned half an hour later, without the optical drive, and checked them out of the hotel.  Before lunch, they picked up his new Lincoln and left for Michigan.

Nikki sat in the back seat while Eddie drove.  The car smelled like leather and a mellow sort of plastic.  She was on edge for the entire first day of the trip.  Eddie talked continuously.  He spent most of the time punctuating halfway interesting conversation with things that annoyed her with their familiarity, like he’d known her all her life.  She didn’t like that, and made it clear by not speaking to him all the way through Nevada.  Not that it did much good.  If he wasn’t talking, he was singing along to classic rock with an earnestness that wouldn’t have been out of place in an overly sentimental family movie.

Nikki was looking out the window at Utah with thoughts of completing Taiisha’s mission rolling about in her head, while Eddie sang along with the Eagles.  Then the radio went off, and he was talking to her again.  “You got any paper in your bag, Poppet?”

She looked reluctantly away from the Great Salt Desert.  “Don’t call me Poppet.”

He laughed.  “Whatever.  You got any paper?”

“What for?”

“To write on.  I want you to write something down for me.”

“Oh, I’m your goddamn secretary now?”

“No, if you were my secretary you’d be up here sucking my dick.  You got any paper or what?” He laughed again.  Nikki didn’t.  She still wasn’t sure if he believed she actually thought he was funny in spite of the fact that she didn’t laugh, or if he didn’t give a damn.

She took out one of her spiral pads and flipped past pages of pencil and pen sketches.  Most of the recent pages had faces of people she’d seen or random images vomited up by her mind, things with teeth and claws and flashing lights.  Not surprisingly, her mind had been a turbulent place recently.  Last night she’d drawn Eddie pierced by a hundred swords…literally.  The last page contained a more careful portrait of a grassy hill, curving gradually away into a cliff that fell away into mist.  It was the edge of the world.  Nikki dreamt about this place sometimes, although she’d never seen it.  She drew it on and off, and she got the sense of a place she’d like to go, where she might learn something about herself just by sitting quietly and absorbing the aura of the place.  In this particular drawing there was a little person hunched at the edge of the cliff, and that was her, from a great distance.  There was also a figure behind her, and it was scratched out.  Nikki didn’t know who it was supposed to be, and couldn’t recall why she had scratched it out, though she remembered doing it.  Maybe it was Taiisha.  Maybe it was herself, too–one dead, one alive.  Maybe, it was someone else who could die and come back like she and Taiisha could.  Were there others?  There had to be.  How could she find them?

“Hey, did you fall asleep?”

Nikki flipped the page and uncapped her pen.  “Okay, what?”

“Just a sec.” Eddie took the phone out of the console and dialed a number.  The first three tones were the same; he was calling directory assistance.  He asked for the phone number at an address she didn’t recognize.  He read the number aloud and she wrote it down.

“Whose number is it?”

“It’s a film production company in Chicago.”

“What, the one you hired?”

He shook his head.  “A completely different one.  I was reading some of the files that we copied from Prodigy, and I acquired a curiosity.  Want to hear about it?”  She did, but not enough to say so.  Eddie took her silence as a yes.  “Most of the stuff on the drive was pretty dry–business related crap, you know.  ‘Micro-’ this and ‘Exp-’ that.  That’s the stuff we were there for, I’m sure.  But there was a folder called ‘PirateKing,’ full of some pretty cool stuff.  Our friend Prodigy has a password-access only website devoted to the secrets of Ile du Soleil.  Ever heard of the place?”

“A little bit.  They’re islands somewhere south of Hawaii, aren’t they?”

“South and west.  And they’re big islands–all three of them together are a bit bigger than Texas and Oklahoma.  Haven’t got any natural resources.  It looks a lot like this,” he said, indicating Utah around them.  The whole place is basically one big salt flat, with some mountains around the edges.”

“And people live there?”

“Oh, yeah they do.  There wasn’t anything there till the Cold War, when businesses started investing in offices there just so they’d have something left when the world nuked itself into oblivion.  Now Ile du Soleil’s got a real population, cities, the whole nine yards.  And crime, too.  It’s a pickpocket’s paradise during tourist season, with plenty of studs in thongs.  You’d love it.”

Nikki sighed.  At least he wasn’t singing.  “So what was the website about?”

“I just skimmed it.  There’s a lot of history-book stuff about Ile du Soleil.  Do you want to hear it, or did you already learn it watching Jeopardy?”  Eddie looked at Nikki in the mirror; she didn’t smile.  Okay, so she didn’t watch Jeopardy, apparently.  But she was listening to him.  He could tell, because her dark blue eyes were eating up her face, absorbing everything he was saying.  Despite her resistance, she was probably enjoying the books he gave her to read, too.  He considered telling her that if she were a little bit stupider, he’d find her attractive, but decided not to tease her just now.  “The islands were discovered in the late sixteen hundreds, by Captain Joseph Emmerling.  There wasn’t anything there, but he sailed right back to Europe and spread stories that there was.  Cities, treasure, natives, the whole nine.  He convinced a few ships to follow him there, to trade, and none of them ever came back.  But Emmerling came home, kept traveling, and spread even more stories.  ‘Course by then, no one believed him.  He got tried as a pirate or something, and strung up.  But wouldn’t you know, fifty years later his great-grandson David Emmerling resurrects these stories.  Says he’s seen his great-grandfather’s treasure.  Not with his own eyes of course.” Eddie lit a cigarette, chuckled.  “David Emmerling was a complete kook.  Claimed that his great-grandpa had spoken to him from the spirit world, and given him the keys to some great vault full of the treasure he’d stolen from those six trade ships.  Nutball or not, little David managed to convince a ship to take him there in the mid-1700s.”

“What did they find?” Nikki asked.  She vaguely remembered some of this from school, but it hadn’t been as interesting as Eddie was making it sound.

“Not a damn thing, of course.  A storm left ‘em marooned there.  End of story.  Until, another fifty years later, Bergstrom Roylton turns up.  He’s some random nephew of David Emmerling’s, and he gets England to grant him the deed to Ile du Soleil, and goes around getting all the other European countries to recognize it.  They didn’t care, it was a useless hunk of salt in the middle of nowhere.  Still, pretty impressive work getting them to let him have this land in the midst of everyone’s empire-building.  I’ll bet the guy was a smooth talker.  Anyhow, once he got that, Bergstrom returned to Ile du Soleil.  Didn’t find a single living soul, of course, just some wreckage that proved his uncle’s crew had indeed starved to death there forty-nine years ago, or so.  And that’s about it until World War II.  Seeing as how they owed the British Empire one, the Roylton family allowed the Allies to land planes there, build facilities, help out the Pacific Theater.  That wound up being the start of their industrial base–everyone left their shit behind once the war finished up, and the Royltons used it.  Then along came the Cold War, like I said, and more and more people wanted to build there, and the Royltons dealt with everyone just like they were a government.  Eventually the UN recognized Ile du Soleil as a nation.  The Roylton family ruled Ile du Soleil until the Seventies.  Good old King Khorbin.  You remember the big uprising…oh, wait, you were barely born then, never mind.  Shit, that makes me feel old.”

“Good.”

Eddie glanced at her in the mirror, grinning.  “Doesn’t matter.  What matters is the shipwreck they found in ’69.  The wreckage of David Emmerling’s ship.  They found ‘interesting artifacts.’”

“What were they?”

“The website doesn’t say for sure.  Prodigy might not have known.  The rumors circulated faster than the stuff did, and then there was that coup in ’72 that sent everything crazy in Ile du Soleil and the shipwreck disappeared during that.”

Nikki’s curiosity was piqued.  Just a little bit.  “So nobody knows what was found.  That’s impossible.  It wasn’t that long ago.  Somebody has to know.”

“I’m going to try to find out.  Supposedly that film company in Chi-town is putting together a documentary for A&E on precisely that subject; Ile du Soleil’s mysteries.  It was supposed to air last summer, but Prodigy’s website says it didn’t.  A bunch of the crew, including the commentator, got killed while wrapping up production in California–bus crash–and they pulled the show.  I’m going to see if I can get a look at the unfinished tape.”

“I guess it’s nice to have a hobby.”

“What?”

Nikki shook her head and looked out the window again.  She was wondering if she could help him with that.  She’d forgotten about killing him for the moment; suddenly she wanted to impress him somehow.  The feeling was fading fast.  But if she helped him, maybe he’d help her find more people who could die and come back.  Before she killed him that was.  Because he wouldn’t be back.  “Nothing.”

He turned halfway around in the seat to look at her.  “No, what did you say? You said something about hobbies.  Pardon me if I can’t hear you.  Maybe you should try talking instead of muttering in that little voice of yours.  If I even think of other voices, it drowns you out.”  Nikki looked back at him, turning her eyes without turning her head, and he made a face of mock fear.  “Ooh, midnight blue eyes, you’re so intimidating, Poppet.  What did you say?”

It was too much, coming on the heels of her friendly thoughts about helping him.  She considered telling him that he had no idea who his enemies were.  Nikki considered telling him a dozen things that might wipe that smug look off his face.  She even considered climbing over the seat, making him stop the car, and breaking his legs just so she could kick him to death out on the salt and take the car and get this all over with.

In the end she just looked at him for a long moment, then looked back out the window without saying anything at all.  Nikki didn’t like the rage inside herself when it started to get out of control.  It didn’t feel like it was hers any more.  She turned and looked out the back window, half-expecting to see Taiisha’s car on the horizon.  There weren’t any cars at all, though.  Maybe, just maybe, she didn’t know where they’d gone.  She doubted it, but it was a hope.

Outside, nothing had changed.  The salt ran white and flat on either side of the freeway.  She hadn’t seen a building in almost an hour.  It was desolate and beautiful.

A hot, charged silence filled the car for a few minutes.  When Eddie broke it, he surprised her for the second time since she had met him.  “So where’d you get your necklace?” he asked.

Nikki touched the charm, a turquoise glass oval living in the bell of a silver teardrop.  She hadn’t been wearing it around Taiisha, who would have merely tried to strangle her with it, but with Eddie she was beginning to feel comfortable wearing jewelry again.  When she thought about it, it made her happy.  “Why?”

“Just curious.  It’s nice.”  Like when he’d sat her down after Taiisha had attacked her, his voice conveyed real interest and concern.  Maybe it was sincere and maybe it wasn’t, but her instinct was to believe him.  His interest melted her ice a little bit.

“It was my mother’s,” she said.  “It’s the only thing of hers I kept.”

“She died?”

“Yes.”

“What happened?”

Nikki looked at Eddie in the mirror.  He was looking at the road.  She found it easier to talk to him when he wasn’t looking at her.  “She was murdered,” she said, looking out the window again.  “My whole family was.”

“Well.  That’s what I would call a speed bump on the road of life.”

That brought the anger back, and Nikki kicked the back of his seat.  Hard.  “Fuck you!  Fucking shit-eating asshole, fuck you!”  She leaned across the seat so she could get more extension on her leg and kicked the seat twice more, tearing the leather with her heel and knocking Eddie against the steering wheel.  The car swerved into the next lane as Eddie was thrown forward.

“Sorry,” Eddie coughed, straightening the car.  “No, really, I am, that was a crappy, tacky thing to say.  I apologize.  I just wanted to know about the necklace anyway.  Where did she get it?  Your mother?”

She held the teardrop out on its slender chain so she could see it, and decided to accept the apology.  Her hand was still shaking.  “It came from a garage sale.  When I was young we would go to garage sales.  I picked this out for her, when I was in second grade.  I think it cost a quarter.  It’s just glass.”

“Real silver?” Eddie looked at her in the mirror, saw her looking back, eyes narrowed.  “I ain’t going to steal it, Nikki, I’m just curious.”

“Yes, it’s real silver.  Why are you asking about it?”

“To learn more about you.”

“You could just ask me directly.”

“And I doubt you’d ‘fucking’ answer,” he said.  “Would you, if I asked you what your hobbies were? What your favorite TV show was? Where you were born? Your favorite food?”

He was right, of course.  Nikki shrugged and looked out the window.  Her sketchpad was still on her lap, and she put it on the seat next to her.

“Besides, you learn more from the little things.  Why people wear what they wear, keep what they keep.  Knowing what makes you tick is more interesting than knowing you grew up in Dog’s Balls, Idaho.”

She felt suddenly exposed, naked.  “I guess.”

“Didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable,” he said.  “I just want to be your friend.” That got him another look in the mirror.  “I’m not bullshitting you.  You spend all your time around someone, which we certainly will be–” the hairs on her neck rose, fearing needlessly that he was talking about an intent to rape her, “–and you want to be able to talk to them, that’s all.  Ask me something, if it makes you feel better.”

Nikki tried to think of a question similar to his.  There was nothing she wanted to know about him, and for a moment she was ashamed of herself for that.  “Okay.  Why did you buy this car?”

“To get cross-country without flying,” he said.  “Or do you mean, why a Lincoln?”

“Why this Lincoln? Why did you pick silver with a blue interior?”

“This is the biggest car they make, and I wanted a big, comfortable car, something not as showy as a Benz or a Bimmer.  And silver is a nice color.”

“Silver’s a noncolor.  The car might as well not be painted,” she said.

“Fine, then, we’re more anonymous.”

“Why didn’t we fly?” Nikki asked.

Eddie’s eyes met hers in the mirror.  “So we could get to know each other on a nice long family trip, of course.”

“Liar.”

He smiled.  “It’s what I do.”

“No, tell me why.”

He didn’t back down this time.  “I already did.  Is it my turn to ask you another question yet?”

Taiisha found herself at once pleased and annoyed with Nikki, because she hadn’t finished Edward, as she was supposed to.  In fact they’d left San Francisco together in a big silver car and driven off across the country like newlyweds.  It wasn’t all bad, though; in staying with him, Nikki had the opportunity to learn more from him.  Edward had a useful way of dealing with the world; it was good for Nikki to learn that.  It was a good enough rationalization for now.

She had no doubt that Nikki would eventually do as she’d been told.  The punishment she’d gotten in San Francisco had been harsh.  Taiisha chose to allow the girl the luxury of dawdling, for now.  Taiisha went off in her own direction to run some errands.  She went to the same car dealer that Eddie had, and bought a car for herself, trading her seventeen-year old Thunderbird for a new black Lincoln coupe.  The cool blue dash lighting and leather interior amused her, and she liked it.  Time allowed her the luxury of some networking, as it were, so she stopped in Reno, put on a friendly face, and asked questions at the casinos until she found Antonio Seago at Circus Circus.

Taiisha didn’t like Antonio, but he was a useful connection.  Antonio prided himself on being able to solicit her services for a variety of employers, when in fact he was little more than a go-between.  He was by no means the only go-between she used, just as she wasn’t the only hunter-killer he found jobs for.  Their relationship was mutually indifferent.

Antonio spent the majority of his time prowling the casinos (in Taiisha’s opinion, for lack of more productive pastimes).  She found him at Circus Circus, lunching in one of the restaurants with an idiot girl on one shoulder.  He looked as though he’d been awake for a day or two, which was about as fresh as his pockmarked, prematurely weathered face ever looked.  The graying waves of his shoulder-length hair were yellow with grease at the ends, and his suit was a few hours off.  The girl with him looked freshly primped.  That was the last bit of attention Taiisha paid to her.

“Taiisha,” Antonio said when he saw her approaching.  He stood and pulled out a chair for her.  She feigned mild pleasure at the action, as she did at much of his fawning over her.  “You know, I got nothing for you, babe,” he said as she sat.  “Nothing domestic, anyway.  Wanna go to Libya?”

“I’m not here for a new game,” she said.  She spoke without any of the fake accents or inflections she frequently used.  Taiisha liked her voice, and the way she spoke.  It was as striking yet nondescript as her face.  If she were to address a group of people, they’d disagree for hours as to where her accent was from, or if she even had one.

“No?”  Antonio didn’t like Taiisha any more than she cared for him.  He pretended he liked her as much as anybody, because she scared the shit out of him.  She was good at what she did–which was to track and kill people, anywhere in the world, for any reason that suited her–but she was scary even for a professional killer.  The other hunters Antonio worked with, he could have a conversation with them, nothing about business, but just talking.  Maybe it meant they were sociopaths or something, but he didn’t care.  Taiisha was something else entirely.  He couldn’t say shit to her.  She didn’t discourage conversation directly, but he got the sense that she was constantly waiting for him to say some specific thing, and he didn’t know what would happen when he said it.  Maybe she’d kill him.  She looked like she wanted to, a lot.  Every so often, when he talked, she’d tilt her head just so, or purse her lips, and he’d think that he had just said whatever it was she was waiting for.  It creeped him the hell out.  He was already losing his appetite, with her sitting here.  Antonio tried glancing at Tammy, but even a coked-up showgirl wasn’t enough of a distraction from the woman in gray sitting across from them, waiting for him to say something.  “What is it then? You look all business.”

“Other business, that.” Taiisha said, thinking of Nikki.

She smiled a secretive smile, indicative of some inside joke that she wasn’t going to tell him.  Antonio let it go, not having much other choice.  “You want some dinner?”

She sneered slightly at the offer of roasted chicken.  “No.” She enjoyed Antonio’s free-floating discomfort.  She knew he was afraid of her.  It kept him from playing any games.

Antonio took a few furtive bites of food that he didn’t really taste and glanced at his date again.  “So, um, how did that troubleshooter you wanted work out?  Eddie Sharp.  You asked for him, remember?”

“Worked out,” she said.  “All finished now.” She had used Antonio to locate Edward for her, prior to sending Nikki that way.

“Huh.  I just had him on the phone like an hour ago.  He’s a good guy, isn’t he?”  No answer, just those sunglasses and that goddamn stoneface.  Antonio was so nervous he started talking again with a mouth full of mashed potatoes.  “So, do you know anything about what I hear he got into?  The Ile du Soleil treasure?  That what you were up to?”

“Not nice to pry,” Taiisha said.  “Although that wasn’t my game.”

Antonio nodded, relieved that she was finally speaking in something close to full sentences, at least.  “I didn’t think it was, you know, your style.  I just remembered you asking about him, right before this came up.” He ran a hand through his hair; gray curls shifted, found order, then fell back into disarray.  Taiisha met his gaze, waiting for him to continue and offering nothing.  “Well, it’s got the Ravens all wound up.  You know, the Ile du Soleil secret police–”

“Know who they are.”

“Yeah, they been lookin’ for whoever stole the recovered part of that treasure back in the Seventies, you know.  Been looking for the treasure longer than that.  If the damn thing exists.  I say, if it’s out there somebody woulda found it by now–”

“Tangent,” Taiisha said impatiently.  “The Ravens?”

“Huh.  Yeah.  You know how they are.  They know all the guys who are into the treasure, all the mystery and archaeology and mythology nuts.  They’ve researched all of ‘em till they’re just about pets.  I guess Eddie stole some computer files from a guy who was one of those mythology guys.  But now they think Eddie has that stuff, and they don’t know him.  There’s been some ears out to find out why he stole all that information.  I don’t even think it’s what he was after, do you?”

Taiisha frowned at the pointless prying.  She briefly considered killing Antonio’s idiot girlfriend if he asked another question.  She could do it without anyone but Antonio noticing.  But talk of the global web of secret-trackers and hired muscle known as Ile du Soleil’s Ravens having interest gave her pause.  Taiisha had worked for the Ravens herself.  She didn’t want Nikki tagged by them for any reason.  Purging a record from the Ravens’ massive database was difficult, expensive work, and Nikki needed to remain a shadow.  Taiisha had gone to a lot of trouble already; she’d made a late-night trip to the hospital where the boy Nikki had attacked was convalescing, and found the mother there visiting as well.  It had taken minutes; son dead, mother vanished.  Perhaps they’d find her eventually.  Two birds, one stone, and no one left who had an inkling of Nikki’s abilities.

Taiisha also didn’t want Nikki’s kill stolen.  Whatever their interest, Taiisha doubted the Ravens had any interest in keeping Edward alive.  Troubleshooters–even good ones–were easy enough to find.

“Maybe I don’t want Edward squeezed,” she lied.  A pretense of interest would grease the wheels of the occasionally recalcitrant information machine that Antonio was.  “I rather liked him.  What’s their intent toward him?”

Antonio shrugged, glad for any tiny opening up from Taiisha that he could work with.  He was a people person when it came down to it.  He got to know people, learned what made them tick.  Only if they never goddamn said anything, it was kind of hard to do.  “I might know a guy you could talk to,” he said.  He didn’t.

“Find me one.  Don’t care about treasure nonsense.  I just want to know Edward’s fate.”

“Huh.  I’ll see if I can find anything out.”

“Do,” she said with a rare smile, and left him.

As soon as Taiisha was out of earshot, Antonio squeezed Tammy’s arm, speaking as much to himself as to her.  “That is one scary chick, eh babe?”

Tammy, whose name was actually Margie, nodded mutely, having only half-heard what Antonio had said.

Once finished with Antonio, Taiisha resumed following Nikki.  She trailed Nikki and Eddie to Denver.  She followed as she always had, using signs the girl left that Taiisha herself couldn’t even explain.  She’d been following Nikki for years, just by listening to some quiet inside voice that told her where the girl had gone, what exit she’d taken, what aisle of what store she’d been in, and she was always at the end of the trail.  Taiisha followed Nikki’s trail precisely, drifting through the stores and restrooms and out again.  She was almost a full day behind them.  She wasn’t in any particular hurry, and it amused her to go where Nikki had gone.

Once in Denver, Taiisha found the hotel Nikki and Edward were staying in.  They were in their room, likely for the night, so Taiisha sought a quick dinner.  She returned to find Nikki across the street in a laundromat.  Taiisha smiled to herself.  The girl was fastidious to a fault.  She looked content sorting her small pile of clothes.  When she finished loading the machine, she curled up in an uncomfortable-looking chair near the window.

Near the window!

In the dark!

Taiisha’s soft smile became a scowl.  The foolish girl’s guard was completely relaxed.  She needed to be waked up.

Eddie had shooed Nikki out of their hotel room so he could return a call to Antonio Seago.  Eddie said, “Antonio’s one of the guys who finds me jobs.  He lives in Reno,” he added, as if that made some kind of difference.  “I’ll be on the phone for a while; go and do whatever voodoo you do.”

Nikki didn’t complain; she was glad to be away from him.  When Eddie decided he was going to work on something, he worked on it nonstop.  They’d been cooped up all of yesterday and most of today while he slaved away on some electronic project–she had no idea what the mess of wires and circuit boards and plugs was going to do when he delivered it to whoever asked for it, and he wouldn’t tell her.  There was nothing she could do to help, so she was stuck reading.  Eddie paused only to eat and to make other phone calls or check his e-mail.  He had tried to teach her some electronics, but wasn’t patient enough to make her understand today.  By lunchtime today they’d been doing nothing but snapping at each other, yet the work continued until well past dark.  The smell of solder seemed to be permanently adhered to the inside of her nose.  Being sent away was a privilege.

Nikki took her time sorting her clothes.  To be honest, sorting them was only remotely necessary; she was down to three days’ worth, and that was counting everything she was wearing already.  The clothes she’d worn at Prodigy’s house were gone, tossed into a goodwill box by Eddie, “just in case.”

Everything was dirty, but it would have all fit in a single washer even if she stuffed her afghan in.  She used two anyway, so she could start one load while mending the other.  One of her skirts had a big rip in it, and the waistband was coming off again.  There was a bra with a torn strap to be repaired, also.  Nikki wanted to take better care of her clothes, but Taiisha made it difficult.

She dug in her bag for her sewing kit.  Mending was comfortable mindless work.  Nikki was happy to occupy herself with stupid prosaic thoughts, like deciding between Burger King or Subway for a midnight snack  (Eddie had treated her to yet another room-service dinner, but that had been about two hours ago.).  It was nice to think about little things like that.

A more pressing problem was the cold.  The warmest thing Nikki had was her sweatshirt.  She hadn’t expected to be dragged back east, ever.  Actually, she hadn’t even thought about wintertime when she had run away.  She checked the clock on the wall, even though she knew it was too late to go and buy or steal a coat.  It was almost eleven, in fact.  It was also the first week of November.  It was freezing.  Nikki sighed, finished reattaching the elastic to her skirt (had it really been new once? it seemed so long ago), looked at it, decided it was good, and dropped it into the wash.

There was a small pile of makeup in her bag; an accumulation of lipsticks, eyeshadows, eyeliners, and mascaras that had slipped into her sleeves in drugstores from Sacramento to here.  Another pleasant luxury of being away from Taiisha was the chance to wear makeup, to dress up, to not look like a Dickens orphan for a while.  She spent a little while trying on lipsticks, most of them in shades of maroon or purple.  There was a silver-blue one, too, but that was just silly.  There was no one else in the laundromat; she didn’t even have to feel self-conscious.  The ones she didn’t like she put on the table, for whoever came along and was brave enough to keep found makeup.

Playing with the lipsticks led to the application of a full face; base, eyeliner and eye shadow, mascara, everything.  It was relaxing, as if she were getting ready for a night on the town–when was the last time she’d done that?  Half an hour later, Nikki looked at herself in the tiny mirror in her hand, then at her reflection in the window, too.  Pale face, blacked-out eyes, and in the end she’d decided to use black lipstick, too.  She needed to do something with her hair, though.  It needed a trim.  For now, she ratted it with her fingers until it stood on its own.  Dyeing it would be fun, too (maybe purple) but Eddie would complain.

The hell with Eddie.  The idea of how he’d react to her with purple hair made her smile, and that was good enough for now.  She found a little tin in her bag that had once held Altoids but was now stocked with jewelry.  Earrings–yet another thing she couldn’t wear around Taiisha.  Nikki put five in her left ear and four in the right, all of them smallish silver hoops.  There was a ring in the tin, too, silver with an oblong green stone, and she slipped it onto her right thumb.  Her mother’s necklace was taken out from its hiding place inside her shirt, so it was visible too.  Nikki looked at her reflection again.  She felt a hundred times happier, thus decorated.  It was easier to face the world looking like this; she’d forgotten how comfortable the virtual armor was.

The washer stopped.  Nikki put her things away and stretched, pressing the small of her back.  It always ached after she’d been sitting for a while, and always would, since she’d broken it in what seemed like another life, long before Eddie or Taiisha.  She opened one of the large-capacity dryers, ridiculously huge for her meager pile of clothes, and put two quarters into the slot.

Nikki dug her clothes out of the washer, tossed them into the dryer, then bent to get a sock she had dropped.  By the time she straightened, Taiisha had crossed the laundromat and reached her.  She seized Nikki by the back of the neck and waistband, yanked and lifted her so that the smaller woman grabbed the dryer’s edge to keep from falling, and then upended her through the door.  Nikki’s heels slammed into the top of the dryer as she went in, and she yelled once before Taiisha slammed it closed.

Nikki thrashed about, rocking the dryer’s barrel, unable to turn over or figure out where the way out had gone, and then she heard the coinbox ratchet as her quarters tumbled into the dryer’s cash box.  She heard Taiisha tap the door once before the dryer started to spin.

Hot, hot, intolerably hot air blew in through the dryer’s honeycomb-holed barrel, from all around, and then there weren’t any directions anymore and Nikki was tumbling over and over, tangled in clothes, banging her head and shoulders and elbows and knees and rolling over her back and hitting her head again, air too hot to breathe filling her lungs.  Sweat had broken out all over her, warm dampness mingling with that of the clothes spinning crazily around her.  Nikki shouted again, hearing her voice echo, almost lost under the sound of the dryer’s motor.  She tried to brace herself on the sides of the rolling dryer barrel but found it too hot to touch, and suddenly rolled up against something vertical.  Nikki opened her eyes; it was the back of the dryer.  She rolled sideways, tumbling with the dryer’s spin, in an effort to orient herself.  She was dizzy and rolling over and over and the heat made it worse.  She was up against the back of the dryer, though.  Nikki kicked out with both legs, hoping the dryer wasn’t more than five feet deep.

It wasn’t.  The door crashed open, bouncing off of the wall and cracking its porthole.  Cycle broken, the barrel slowed to a stop.  Nikki thrust herself out feet-first and hit the floor, unsteady but waiting for Taiisha.  She hadn’t seen the woman, but who else would have thrown her in a dryer?

The laundromat was empty; not even a counter attendant.  “I’m going to do it!” she yelled at the room full of indifferent machines.  “I’m going to fucking do it!  I just need more time!”

If Taiisha was still there, she didn’t respond.  Nikki dropped back into the chair she’d been sitting in.  Her hands were shaking, and she clenched them to make it stop.  So much for forgetting about her problems for a few hours.

Eddie was deep inside a cellphone.  He had the little Nokia’s back panel removed, and was carefully tracing a circuit.  The Allman Brothers played softly in the background, and Eddie was singing along in a low voice.  Playing with electronics was about as close as he got to entertainment, these days.  He’d had an idea not too long ago about giving Nikki a cellphone, and an unrelated one about one whose location he could track with the satellite navigation system he’d already installed in the Lincoln, and combining the two sounded like even more fun.  He was looking for a place to put a tracking patch in without having to cut up the phone’s case.  It looked like it was going to work, too.  He wondered if Nikki would accept the phone.  He figured she would; she was stubborn, but she was sensible, too.  If he had thought to give her a phone earlier, the Prodigy situation might not have been such a snafu.

Sending Nikki away for the rest of the evening had been a good idea; she didn’t seem to like being far away from him, even though she didn’t like him much and they’d done little but argue today.  Maybe she expected him to try to ditch her or something.  Still, they needed to split up, just for a few hours.  Plus, once he’d sent her away, he had been able to get a local call girl he knew to drop by for about an hour.  That accounted for his good mood as much as the electronics work did.

He heard the door open, and said, “Hello, Poppet,” without looking up.  Nikki didn’t reply.  “What did you do?”

“Washed clothes,” she said dryly.  “Thought about killing you.”

That was about as much of a joke as she ever made, and Eddie was learning that if he laughed at them, she wouldn’t tell any more.  He turned to look at her, and she was standing between the beds, fixing him with a funny, creepy look.  No, hell, it wasn’t a look at all.  “What the hell did you do to your face?”  She was wearing black and white vampire makeup and about eight earrings.  “Are you wearing black lipstick?  Jeezus.”

“This is what I look like,” Nikki said.

Aha!  So she was getting more comfortable around him, whether she admitted it or not.  “Remind me to buy you a coffin to sleep in,” he replied.

“Drop dead,” Nikki said.

“Is ‘what you look like’ going to make it hard for you to dress like the rest of us humans once in a while?”

She narrowed her eyes a little, turning them to black dashes in her face, and waited for a long moment before answering.  “No, I won’t mind.”

“Good.  Long as you’re flexible, you can look any way you want in your downtime.”

His lack of reaction was both disappointing and a relief.  Nikki pulled her afghan out of her bag and spread it on the bed.

“You’ll be happy to know that I finished today’s project while you were gone.  We’re working tomorrow afternoon,” Eddie said.  He was no longer watching her, but had his attention back inside the cellphone.

“What are we doing?”

“Security game.  Local company wants to test their new security and see if someone unauthorized can get into their building during office hours.”

“Sounds easy,” Nikki said.

“It is.  And fun, too.  Sort of like Capture the Flag; we get in, grab some paperwork–and my payment–and get back out again, and I’ll mail our contact a report of how we got it.  But if we get arrested, they won’t bail us out.  That’s part of the challenge.”  He was looking forward to the challenge, and it showed.

She sighed.  Something about the things that made Eddie excited bothered her.  Maybe it was just his big shit-eating grin.  “It better pay well.”

“This kind of crap always does,” he replied.  “They’re always surprised that I get in and out.  It’s easy shit.  I might do it for laughs, even if I wasn’t picking up a check.”  Nikki looked a little nervous, so Eddie reassured her some more.  “I’ve never been arrested, and I do this about twenty times a year.”

She nodded, looking at the floor now.

“If the shit hits the fan, I promise to come and bail you out.”  He knew it would be easy; he’d already checked to see if she had a record, which she didn’t.

Nikki looked skeptical.  “Really.”

His answer was to turn up that irritating, knowitall smile a few more degrees.  He laid out the setup for her; a security guard slash secretary at the front door, back door monitored from that desk by a camera and opened remotely by a buzzer that was right on the desk.  Eddie already had a plan in mind, and the next morning they went and did it. 

Just that easily.  Nikki (dressed down for the day) went in the front, told the guard that her car had broken down and that she needed to use the phone, then had a loud, embarrassing argument with a nonexistent boyfriend (actually Eddie’s voicemail).  As she screamed, the guard took a courteous walk away from the desk and gave Nikki time to bang an outraged fist near and then on the back door buzzer when she saw Eddie in the camera.

The rest was up to Eddie.  It was child’s play; he moved through the building like he had every right to be there, no one asked him any questions, and by lunchtime they were back in the Town Car and headed for a bank, because the little company had paid him in cash.

“I can’t believe they didn’t write me a check.  What business raises fifteen thousand dollars in cash these days?”

“Now you know why they wanted the security tested,” Nikki replied.  She was riding in the passenger seat with her eyes closed.  She was glad that it had gone well, and felt peculiarly satisfied about this whole troubleshooting thing.  It would be disappointing when she killed him.

“Wake up,” Eddie said as they pulled into the parking lot.  “Go and deposit this for me.”  He held the thick envelope out to her.  “I wrote the account number on the envelope.”

“What, you can’t walk your fat ass in there and deposit your own money?”

“Of course I can’t, Poppet,” he said, reaching into his pocket for his cellphone.  “I’m going to sit here and listen to the voicemail you left me.”

Nikki sat bolt upright.  “Oh, God.  Don’t, please.”  Eddie laughed.  “I’m serious, don’t listen to it.  Just erase it, Eddie, please.”

“Why?  Something incriminating in there?”

“No, it’s just bad.  I pretended I was mad, like you said, and I swore a lot and called the phone names.  It’s so embarrassing.  Don’t listen to it.”  She put her hand on his, to stay it from the phone, then dropped it, blushing because of the familiar way she’d touched him.

He nodded toward the door, still smiling.  “Go on, take care of that for me, and then we can get some lunch.”

“Eddie, don’t.  Don’t call the voicemail.”

“Okay, I won’t.”

“You’re a liar.”

“It’s what I do.”

“Don’t call it.  I’m serious.”

He reclined his seat slightly.  “You have the choice of being here while I listen to it, or of being safely in the bank where you don’t have to listen to me laugh.”

She called him a nasty name he barely understood (fuckwhistle?), jumped out of the car, and slammed the door as hard as she could.  That in itself made Eddie laugh.  It was too easy to make her mad.  And too much fun to stop doing it.

He listened to the voicemail three times.  It was about five minutes long, and his favorite part was where Nikki called her fictional boyfriend a ‘jizz-spewing waste of boyflesh.’  Man, could that girl swear.

The police cars pulling into the parking lot took him completely by surprise.  Eddie came clumsily upright in the seat and reached for the keys, racing through a mental list of possible reasons they’d send a car–no, three cars–after him.  Make that four.  Five.  Okay, he’d never done anything worth five cars.  Eddie’s hand came away from the steering column.  Something else was going on.

The cops blocked the exits, their focus clearly on the bank’s doors.  At the same moment, a helicopter clatter-rumbled into view above.  Oh, shit!  The bank!

There was a tap on the window, and uniformed officer leaned in.  “Excuse me, sir.  We’ve got a situation in the bank, and we need to get you moved back, for your safety.”

“No problem, officer,” Eddie said, getting out.  He took the keys with him.  He could catch a cab back to the hotel.

Of all the things Eddie had said or done to annoy her, nothing had made Nikki want to kill him more than this.  And it wasn’t even his fault.  That was ironic enough that she might laugh about it later.  Maybe.  Right now, all she wanted was to get out of this bank, strangle him, throw him on a fire, and watch his eyes pop.

She was lying flat on the floor, in the middle of a serpentine line of prone people.  An hour ago, three heavily armed men had stormed into the bank, taken control with a few warning shots, and then forced everyone to lay on the floor.  The bank staff joined them shortly, so that they were in a loose group in the middle of the lobby, just out of sight from the front doors.  No one looked at anyone else.  The blinds had been pulled as well, blocking any view in or out.  A few hostages sobbed softly.

Their three captors were identically dressed, in black fatigues, bulky flak jackets and shiny black open-face helmets.  Dark plastic visors covered their faces past the cheekbones, and they wore gloves as well.  Their individuality was limited to their chins:  one white, one black, and one blond-bearded.  Each of them carried two pistols and a submachine gun.  The bearded one seemed to be the ringleader; at least, he was the one who had spoken with the police negotiator.  He spoke calmly, but there was malice in his voice.  “No, I’m not going to wait for you to call your supervisor,” he told the voice at the other end of the line.  “I suspect he’s out there already anyway, isn’t he?  It’s not an outlandish request.  Transportation to a plane, which will then take us to Mexico.  An hour is plenty of time for that, I think.  And if it isn’t, we’ll see how quickly you move when I begin shooting.  I’ll shoot every last hostage in here.  Ta-ta.”  With that, he hung up and turned to his companions.  “Looks like we’ve got an hour to kill.  No pun intended.  How do we pass the time, fellows?”  He slung his Uzi over one shoulder and clasped his hands behind his back, strolling among the huddled hostages.

Nikki watched him as best she could as he drew close, following him with her eyes.  She couldn’t turn her head.  From somewhere beyond her field of vision, there was a thump and a groan as one of the hostages was kicked, apparently for sport.  She guessed that they were going to rob everyone.  And she was still carrying fifteen thousand dollars in cash.  Shit.  Nikki closed her eyes and listened to the feet moving to and fro on the floor.

She was wrong, though.  After some discussion, the robbers decided to force all of the women to strip.  Well, two of them wanted to.  “Haven’t you always wanted to do that?” the clean-shaven one said.

“It don’t serve any purpose, man.”

“Screw purpose.  I like breasts.”

Nikki kept her eyes closed as they selected their first “contestant.”  She didn’t care to have a visual of a woman’s meek protests.  It didn’t take long anyway.  The woman whimpered, the ringleader cocked his pistol menacingly, and their subsequent ugly laughter suggested that she was disrobing.

She felt a surge of mingled hatred and disgust, as much for the hostages as for the men with the guns.  Not a single one of them was willing to fight back, to try to stop this, to not be humiliated.  They’d lie passive on the floor if these men chose to walk around and shoot them one at a time.  Like sheep.

Nikki knew the attitude was more Taiisha’s than her own, but it had leached into her so deeply that she wasn’t sure where her own feelings began just right now.  Every last one of these hostages lying here with her was pathetic, groveling on the floor because scary-looking men were waving guns about.  Nobody wanted to be a hero, of course, but waiting around to be saved was little more than an excuse not to act.  The robbers were probably too chickenshit to actually shoot anyone–just as meek and herd-like in their own way as their captives.  Truly dangerous…Nikki had seen truly dangerous people.  Lived with them.  Fought them.  These guys were garbage, elevated only by superior weapons.  Someone had to call their bluff.

When they picked a second woman and made her start taking her clothes off–despite her two children lying prone at her feet–Nikki stood up.  “Stop this,” she said.  Her voice was stronger and clearer than she expected it to be, and her eyes were on the bearded one.  “Stop this right now.”

He looked down at her with a grin.  “No one told you to get up,” he said.  “I think you’d better wait your turn.”

If Nikki had expected any of the other hostages to stand with her, she had cast her lot with the wrong group.  She hadn’t really expected any of them to get behind her anyway.  “Screw you,” she said.  “Don’t make anyone else do this.”

“Screw me?” the ringleader laughed.  He pulled one of his pistols and pointed it at Nikki’s face.  She could see herself reflected in his dark goggles.  “I think not.  Screw you.”

He pulled the trigger.  Nikki’s hands came up in an abortive defensive motion, and her head snapped back as the back of her skull was blasted out.  Already dead, she dropped to her knees as if to pray, her head lolling like a ragdoll’s, and then she crumpled forward onto her face.

Eddie was in the hotel room watching television and reading the New York Times when Nikki returned, some time after dark.  She was disheveled, and her shirt was crusty with dried blood.  She was walking stiffly; she looked really tired, and really pissed off.  That was fine.  He was willing to take any abuse she wanted to dish out.  Once he had heard about the hostage situation, he had gotten worried.  The thought of Nikki in there gave him a flutter of concern deep down.  He knew she could take care of herself–she had nearly booted his head off, after all–but the thought of little Poppet in danger was just somehow not right.  “Five hours of hostage drama,” he said lightly, masking the fact that he was really glad to see her.  “Hell of an afternoon, eh?  You hurt?”

She shook her head and sat on her bed.  She was clutching her bag; the straps had broken completely at one end, and she had to hold it with both hands to keep it from spilling open.

“How’d you get so messy?”  The live coverage of the bank robbery was still on, despite the fact that it had ended in a violent shootout half an hour ago.  All of the robbers were dead, apparently.  The SWAT boys had had a grand old time taking them out.  The report had said no hostages were hurt, but seeing Nikki was still the only thing that made him feel better.  He turned the TV off.

“One of them got shot near me.”

“Said on the news they had bulletproof vests.”

“In the face,” Nikki said.  She eased herself down, flat onto her back–usually she flopped–and stared at the ceiling, arms stretched out over her head.

Eddie folded the Times.  “Did you make the deposit?”

“No.”  You bastard, she thought.  You bastard, you bastard, you fat disgusting bastard. She wished she could somehow beam the thought into his brain that she didn’t feel like talking.  “It was kind of disorganized.  I ran out with everybody else.”

“News said police snipers took the hardcases out.  Do these sorts of things happen everywhere you go?”

“Seems like it,” Nikki sighed.

“I knew you’d say that, Poppet.”

“I’ll bet you did.  Don’t call me Poppet.”

“So what, did you fall or something?”

She pushed herself up on her elbows, slowly.  Her back gave a fresh spasm, as if to tell her what Eddie was talking about, but she asked anyway.  “What?”

“You’re in pain,” he said. 

“My back hurts.  I was lying on my face on the floor for five hours.  Not exactly therapeutic.”

“You got a bad back?”

“Ever since I broke it.”

“How the hell did you manage that?”

“I was in a truck.  It crashed.  I went out the window.”

Eddie laughed.  “Shit like this does happen around you a lot, doesn’t it?  If you tell me the story, I’ll rub your back for you.”

Nikki turned her head to the side, looking at him.  “Why would I want your fucking hands on me?”

“Aw, don’t be like that.  I don’t offer backrubs to just anyone.  And I’ve been trained by the best.”

She looked back up at the ceiling.  The anonymous white spackle-patterned hotel room ceiling didn’t cheer her up at all.  “I’m sure you have.”

“You say no, but you really mean yes,” he joked.  He turned in the chair as if to come to the bed, and started rolling up his sleeves.

“I’ll chop your hands off,” she replied, her voice soft and deadly serious.  “First the left and then the right.  And I’ll make you eat them.  I really, really will.  I can’t take any more today, Eddie.”

He didn’t move toward her, thinking about the mini-sword she had, and the tone in her voice that he couldn’t ignore any more.  She was past the point where he could tease her.  It was also a little bit creepy that she didn’t seem the least bit bothered wearing a shirt covered with someone else’s blood, despite her tendency to be a cleanliness-freak.  “Suit yourself.  You want I should find a chiropractor for you?”

“No, I’ll be okay.  I’ll take a bath.”  Nikki sat up painfully and retired to the bathroom.  Eddie heard her run her bath, and all was silent for about an hour.

She came out, damp and smelling of soap, and inspected the strap of her bag.  The leather had frayed from being mended so many times; she’d have to cut the end off and punch new holes for stitches.  She sighed again.  The strap couldn’t get much shorter than it was.  She pulled out the sewing kit and looked at the woefully thin thread she had.

“Fishing line.” Eddie said.

“What?”

“Fishing line will work better.  To fix that,” he said, pointing.  “Want some?”

Nikki’s demeanor softened slightly.  “Okay.”

“I’ll trade you for the story about the truck you got tossed out of.”

She slapped the bedspread with her open hand.  “Can’t you ever just sit in silence?  Jesus Christ.”

“Is it a deal?”

Nikki considered waiting until Eddie had gone to bed, and then just finding the fishing line on her own, if he really had any.  She didn’t like telling him things about herself.  The only reason she did was because he was going to die anyway.  She dumped her things out of the damaged bag and started sorting them.  “Okay,” she said finally.  “What do you want to know?”

“Well, I know the what:  you were in a car crash.  Now I want to know the who, when, where, why, and how.  Just like the newspaper guys would.”

“The newspaper guys already know,” Nikki said.

“It made the news?  That’s even more interesting.  So go on.  Who?”

“Me and seven other kids.  All of them died except me.”

Something like sympathy crossed Eddie’s face, faintly.  Very faintly.  He didn’t make a joke.  “When?”

He was talking like Taiisha, and she didn’t like that.  “Three years ago, I guess.  It was in Michigan,” she added before he could ask where.

“That why you left?”

“No.”  She thought about it.  “No, it wasn’t,” she repeated.

Eddie had opened his toolbox, taking out the phone he’d modified for her and a spool of fishing line.  “That leaves why and how.  How is easier.”

Nikki laughed–one of her amused sighs, actually–and said, “The driver was drunk out of his skull.  We all were.  We ran off a snowy road in the middle of the night and crashed and rolled the truck.  No one even found us until six the next morning.”

“And you got away with a broken back.”

“It wasn’t completely broken, I guess.  I remember hearing it crack when I hit the ground, but that’s probably my imagination.  I was paralyzed from the waist down for two weeks and had PT for two months.”

“You bounced back from it pretty well.  Did it scare you?”

Nikki shrugged, fingering the frayed end of her bag strap.  “I don’t know.  I was in shock.  Everybody I knew at that school was in that truck. I didn’t think about maybe being in a wheelchair.  I didn’t care.”  She looked at Eddie, surprised to see that he was still paying attention.

He handed her the fishing line.  “Now for the hard one.  Why?”

“Why what?”

“Why were you there?  Why did you get in the truck with a drunk driver at the wheel?”  He stopped himself, but he wanted to yell, My God, girl, what were you thinking?  He felt parental, which combined with his earlier concerns, was distinctly weird.  “Sorry.  I’m not trying to bust your chops.  I’m sure you’ve done that for yourself already.  Forget that question.”

Nikki answered anyway.  “I wanted a group to belong to, Eddie.  That’s all.  It was high school.  Who wants to be alone, then?  I mean, all the time.  I was the weird kid, I was the new kid, and so when someone finally acted like they wanted me around and wanted to know about me, I just went…” she trailed off, embarrassed.  She was in the same situation now, wasn’t she?

Eddie decided that it was a good time to pretend he hadn’t been paying attention.  She didn’t trust him yet, and it was too soon for him to know too much about her.  “Anyway, whenever you’re done,” he said with a bored air, “this is for you.”  He tossed the phone onto the bed next to her.

Relieved as she was that Eddie hadn’t made the connection, she was somewhat annoyed that he wasn’t listening to her, either.  “What’s this for?” she asked, looking at the phone like she might a boiled cow’s tongue.

“So we can stay in contact easier.  I’ll give you my cell number, too.”

“How sweet,” she said sarcastically.  “I could have used this–”

“I know, I know,” he said, holding up his hands.  “I made a mistake, it happens once per century.  Won’t happen again.”

“So can we leave Denver yet?”  Not that she was particularly eager to get to Michigan, but she didn’t want to have to drive past that bank any more.  Besides, Taiisha was in town.  She had no illusions that moving on would get rid of the woman, but the need to be moving gnawed at her nonetheless.

“In the morning,” Eddie said.  “And we have another stop to make along the way, too.”

“Why, another job?”

“For starters.”

Nikki sighed again.  What next?

“Your enthusiasm is infectious,” he said.  Nikki muttered something, lay down and rolled over on her side, facing away from him.  “You want dinner?” he asked.  She ignored him, pretending to sleep.  She did that sometimes.  He knew she wasn’t really sleeping, because if he spoke while she was really out she came awake with a little jump.  Nikki was the lightest sleeper he’d ever known.  He wondered if she ever got any rest.

But, if she was going to feign unconsciousness, then she either wanted to be left alone, or she intended to spy on him.  Eddie didn’t have anything to hide; let her eavesdrop, if she wanted to.  He picked up the phone and called his answering service.  There were three messages, but only one worth returning, from Ian Warnock.  It wasn’t too late to call him in Michigan, so Eddie did.

When Ian’s wife answered, Eddie said, with a chuckle, “Hey, bitch, put Ian on the phone.”

Sara laughed at the old shared joke.  “I’ll get him, Mister President.”

Ian was on the phone in a moment.  “What’s up?”

“Not much, just getting close to your corner of the country.  Wanted to touch base with you, as they say.  How’s it going?”  Eddie knew Ian would rather bitch about his own problems than listen to anyone else’s.  He wasn’t even in the habit of telling Ian about his personal life, and Ian rarely asked apart from a perfunctory question or two about Eddie’s sister.  This was not a problem; Eddie and Ian had been friends long enough that he was used to it.

“It’s a nightmare, that’s how it is,” Ian said with a sigh.  “We had the auction just the day before yesterday.”

“What auction?”

“The collection.  The cars, mostly.”

“And?”

“Went well,” Ian said a little proudly.  “I think it took just four of those cars to offset the cost of the whole deal.  Amazing stuff.”

“How many total?”

“Two hundred eighty-nine.”

Eddie whistled.  “And you saved one for me, right?”

Ian was instantly frantic, talking so fast Eddie couldn’t get a word in edgewise.  “I thought you said you were going to buy a new car?   God, Eddie, those cars were so much trouble to deal with, I just wanted them all out of here.  If you could have told me which one, I might have been able to–”

“Back up the truck, Ian, I’m just kidding.  I did get the new car, by the way.  I take it you enjoyed yourself, then.”

“Oh.  Well.  It was completely chaotic.  It’s still completely chaotic.  Warren’s records are the most cryptic things I’ve ever seen.  I’ve been checking the estate inventory against the auction sales list, and there are cars missing.  How the hell do you lose a whole car?  Not to mention all of the furniture, and the leftovers from the sports cars they were building.  Half the inventory is missing.  It’s supposed to be warehoused in Detroit, and the place is empty.  So all of this automotive tooling equipment is just…somewhere.  It’s a nightmare, and I’ve got to get through it all before I can even think about selling that house in Arcadia.  And I haven’t even gotten to the cherry on top.”

“Which is?”

Ian hesitated, and Eddie instantly knew it was something under the table.  The guy was always uncomfortable discussing shady stuff over the phone, as if somehow every line was tapped.  “Maybe it should wait until you get here.”

“Maybe I’ll be more help if you tell me now.”

A sigh, then another long hesitation.  “I’m in over my head, Eddie.  I just…the auction, the cars and things I’m fine with.  But the warehouse…Frederick suggested that I lease it out rather than selling, to keep some cash flow, and that was a good idea, but there’s something going on there.  I don’t know what.  Something’s moving through that warehouse.  I don’t know if its guns, or drugs, or what.  But I’m tied too closely to it–my name is on everything, Eddie.  If they go down, I go down.  I don’t know how to put a stop to it before this blows up in my face.  And her friends are breathing down my neck now, too.”

“There, now, don’t you feel better, now that you’ve confessed?” Eddie said.  “Don’t get your panties in a bunch, I can take care of it.  You still need me to babysit, too, right?”

“That’s the–yes, yes I do.”

“Then I’ll take care of both problems at once.”

“You can do that?”

“Are you kidding?  It’s what I was born to do–fix other people’s problems.”  Eddie glanced up at Nikki, who hadn’t moved or made any sign that she was listening.  “So how is the patient?”

It took a moment for Ian to figure out what he was talking about.  “Oh.  Lexi’s doing fine.”

“She still in La-la-land?”

“That she is.  So when are you getting here?  Right now Charlie Zheng’s up there with Lexi, but I don’t like leaving her with him.  She hates his guts.  And, as brilliant as the guy is, he’s got all the warmth and charm of Jack Kervorkian.  She’s not much more than an experiment in damaged psychology to him.”

“Sounds like that bothers you.”

“It does, a little.  I feel like I’m putting her in a zoo when I leave her with him.  I just want her to be happy.  I’m thinking I’ll find a place for her closer to Sara and I, maybe out in Grass Lake.  I can set her up there with a live-in, and she should be okay.”

“Of course she will.  We’re on our way.  If you had told me about the auction, I could’ve handled that for you, too, you know.  Are there any other loose ends you need me for?”

“No, just replace Charlie, and keep her occupied.  And if you can help me with this warehouse thing, that would be great.  That way I can figure out what to do next.”

“Take your time,” Eddie said, grinning.  So what are you doing with the rest of the money?”

“What money?” Ian replied, a little cagily.

“You know what money I’m talking about.”

“Well, that’s still TBD,” Ian said.  “I need to discuss your fee.”

“How much extra you’ll pay me to kick back to yourself, you mean?”

He could practically hear Ian’s tight smile.  Eddie liked needling him.  “Maybe we should talk about it when you get here.”

“I can do that.  Just tell me one thing:  how many digits are we talking about?”

“We’ve been friends how long, Eddie?”

“Shit, I don’t know.  Ten years?  Fifteen?”

“Can you stay at least six months?”

“If the pay’s good enough,” he joked.

“Then it’s at least six figures.”

Eddie couldn’t help but grin.  “I like the way you think, sir.  I really, really like the way you think.”

Eddie ordered room service the next morning; Nikki was awake and watching the sunrise when he got up.  She took a piece of toast and covered it generously with grape jelly for herself, then another.  And another.  She ate as though she were starving.  He watched her for a while without saying anything; she tore through four slices of toast, a cup of coffee, a glass of juice then two of water, all of the sausage, and two plate-sized pancakes and paid him no attention at all.  Finally he spoke.  “Here’s the plan.  I’ve got to go to Chicago,” he said to her.  “I’m going to fly out in two hours.  I need you to do a quick thing here for me this evening, and then drive the car out to meet me in Chi-town the day after tomorrow.”

Nikki’s mouth fell open.  “What?”  She all but jumped to her feet.  “You’re leaving?”  What the fuck would Taiisha do?  She glanced at her bag, on the floor next to her bed.  Her knife was in there.  She’d have to kill Eddie right here and now, unless she wanted Taiisha to “school” her again.  Why was he doing this?

“Don’t panic, Poppet,” he said, misreading her agitation.  “I promise not to abandon you.  We just have a couple of different things going on right now, and it’ll work best for us to split up.”

Maybe it was because he said we instead of I, but Nikki decided not to lunge for her bag.  It took her a moment to find her voice.  “What’s in Chicago?” she asked.  She sat on her bed and hugged her knees.

“That production company, the one who did the Ile du Soleil documentary that never aired.  They’re going to let me screen one of the production tapes.  Shouldn’t take but an afternoon, but I’ve got to fly out there today.  I’ll be at the Whitehall Hotel, that should make it up to you.  It’s a nice place.  Very much your style,” he added with a touch of sarcasm. 

She sighed.  “So what am I supposed to do?”

“Play usher tonight, is what I’m told,” he said.  He wrote an address on a hotel pad.  “Super-simple.  If you get bored, steal some pagers for me.  I can use them.”

Nikki frowned.  She didn’t move from her position on the bed with her knees to her chest.  “These people can’t find an usher on short notice?”

“Not one willing to carry listening devices in and out,” was the reply.  “I told you, half of my business comes from people who’re too paranoid to trust the average moron.  And I can’t tell if you understand what I’m saying because your face never changes.”

“I hear you,” she said.

“Figured you did.  Just checking.”

“When do I need to leave?”

“Around seven forty-five.”  He wrote the time on her note as well.  He didn’t ask if she had ever been an usher before.  She didn’t ask what it entailed, either.  Eddie liked that.  She had apparently decided that she’d handle the situation, like she’d handled it in San Francisco (well, hopefully not exactly like that, as no faces needed to be smashed in).  That independence was one of his favorite things about her.  He wrote the Whitehall’s Hotel’s name on the note, leaving it up to her to find the place and find him there.  He didn’t doubt she would, or could.

Taiisha squatted in shadow, watching her prey.  The day was sunny but chilly, threatening snow if some clouds showed up, but she showed no signs of being particularly cold.

The man she had followed was inside a restaurant getting a submarine sandwich.  She could see him through the windows, excusing himself as he squeezed past another patron, carrying a bag in one hand and a drink in the other.  He was dressed in a garish running suit, shiny electric blue with yellow and black stripes that didn’t suit his neatly trimmed beard and darkly handsome face; he looked like an Ivy League lawyer trying to pass as a rap artist.  At least the ill-advised fashion made him easy to watch, even easier than his limp did.  He’d hurt his left leg at some point.

When casino-hopping Antonio the information sponge had gotten in touch with her, he’d been bursting to tell her that he’d found someone who’d know what the Ravens wanted; this was that man.  For his trouble, Taiisha had given Antonio a smile and a promise to remain in his Rolodex.  Only the smile was an inconvenience.  Antonio was an idiot and she thought that it was good to be shut of him for a few months.

And here she was, still close to Nikki, but now watching this man instead, this man called Martin Stonecipher, this Raven.  Taiisha watched him through the Subway restaurant’s window.  As he headed for the exit she started walking toward the door.  She had pulled her hair back in an uncharacteristic ponytail and put on makeup that accented her lips, and she concentrated on this new face as she adjusted her pace.  Martin was eight steps from the door, then seven six five four and Taiisha was right where she wanted to be three two one–he opened the door and she pulled it out of his hand, putting on a mildly annoyed face and speaking with an Italian accent.  She’d lived in Italy for a long time, to perfect it.  “What do you do here?” she snapped.

“Oh, sorry, I beg your pardon,” Martin said to the woman he’d almost hit with the door.  Didn’t see you there.”

“Who are you?” she snapped.  He saw instantly that she was far too angry for a near miss with a glass door.

Martin braced himself for an undeserved outburst.  “Excuse me?”

“I know you follow those people.  So do I.  So who are you?”

“Lady, I have no idea what you’re talking–”

Taiisha pointed to the hotel Eddie and Nikki were staying in.  “In that hotel.  You watch them, and you follow.  You listen to them.”

Martin’s face changed from mild irritation to cautious appraisal.  His mood shifted even farther than that; if he had competition, he liked to know about it beforehand, the people paying the bills and pulling the strings knew that, dammit.  “You’d better come with me, lady,” he said.  He led the Italian woman to his car and opened the door for her, and she slipped inside without so much as a thank you.

He expected her to wait for him to talk first, but she didn’t even give him a chance to breathe.  “What are you follow them for?” she asked, her accent growing thicker with the agitation in her voice.  “Are you police officer?  Has that man done something wrong?  He has, hasn’t he?  He’s a bad, bad man, isn’t he?”

The car was positioned nicely; he could see Sharp’s car and the main lobby entrance.  They’d picked a Holiday Inn with only one main exit, and that was helpful, too.  Martin glanced at the woman next to him occasionally, but kept his eyes on the doors and car the rest of the time.  He didn’t stare, just relaxed, letting his mind take in the whole scene, alert only for the faces of Eddie Sharp and his unknown assistant.  “I’m not a cop,” was Martin’s answer to her shotgun queries.  “But you’d better tell me who you are, and who it is you’re following.”

Taiisha studied Martin’s face, his eyes somewhere outside the car.  Her false face had convinced him, even if he pretended it hadn’t.  “I don’t know his name,” she lied.  “He’s a fat man.  He drive that silver car there.”

“Well, it looks like we have a common acquaintance,” Martin said with a chuckle.

“I don’t acquaintance him,” she replied, mangling her English on purpose.  “He has my daughter.  She’s taken from me fifteen years, and I’ve found her with him.  With this bad man.”

Martin smiled without looking at her.  “Bad man, indeed,” he said, relaxing.  “What’s the girl’s name?”

“Kerry,” she said.

“And yours?”

“Grace.  You may call me Gray.  Why are you follow this man?”

“I’m here to see if he’s done a bad thing, or not,” Martin replied, looking at her this time.  “We just want to find out.  How did you find me?”

“I see you here.  Their car leaves, you follow.  It comes back, you come back.  I saw you yesterday and this morning.”

Martin nodded.  Had he been so obvious that a civilian could spot him?  Damn knee surgery had taken more out of him than he’d thought.  He wished Sharp would run, give him more of a challenge.  This crap was like watching paint dry.  Martin wanted to track the man like a bloodhound, not sit outside a hotel day after day.

Taiisha moved a little bit closer to him, sliding slightly toward him on the seat, close enough that she could all but smell his libido awakening.  “I want my daughter away from this man,” she said, meeting Martin’s hazel eyes.  “But I don’t know what to do.  Will you help me?”  She leaned closer.  Kissing distance.

Martin smiled.  This job might not be so boring after all.