Private Berlin (Private 5)

I pay my entrance fee, and go down to the locker room where I strip and put on a robe and rubber slippers. I take the canvas bag with my latest mask acquisition and head upstairs, hearing the sound of women laughing.

Is there anything like it? The sound of women laughing? I feel alive here among these laughing women. I can be anyone I want to be. They can be anyone I want them to be.

And that’s a relief after such a long and difficult day.

But as I wander, evaluating the women against my criteria, my mind keeps flashing to the expression on my friend the thief’s face when I hit him with the stun gun.

Even with the music blaring from the brothel bar I can honestly hear the crunch and squish of the screwdriver entering his brain.

And behind it all, like a shimmering backdrop, the memory of that unbelievable fireball that rose above the slaughterhouse, scorching and pulverizing that part of my past into dust.

As I walk through the brothel’s spa, admiring the women soaking in the whirlpools, these pleasant memories bow to pressing concerns. I have much to do to finish burying my past for good, and it will take every bit of my skill to get it done swiftly and without a trace of my participation.

But I’ll wait until tomorrow to address those crucial tasks.

For now, I’m seeking to

cleanse myself, a sensual reduction to the primal, a release from all that I appear to be to the ignorant outside world.

I spot my prey on an elevated platform in the middle of one of the pools.

She’s exotic. Black hair. Dark, flashing eyes. A copper stain to her skin.

She’s naked except for a gold chain about her waist, and she’s writhing in a slow-motion belly dance to the appreciation of several men lounging in the water below her.

I stand there, watching until our eyes meet. I smile and crook a finger at her. She smiles and keeps dancing.

We keep this up and a nice little tension builds between us before she finally leaves, crosses the pool, and comes up to me. Her brown eyes are dazzling. Her hips to die for.

She says her name is Bettina and asks if I want company. I smile warmly. She comes into my arms as if she belongs beneath me. Which she does.

I tell her I’ve got a little surprise for her in my bag.

“What kind of surprise?” Bettina asks.

“The kind that surprises, silly girl,” I tease.

Moments later in a mirrored room, I have her get on her knees and elbows, her legs open so I can see every little bit of her mystery.

I unlock the case and draw out the mask: a black jaguar with golden eyes and ruby mouth, baring golden teeth.

Bettina’s looking back over her shoulder, uneasy at the mask.

I can already feel myself rising.

I put the mask on and prepare to enter her.

Bettina’s clearly unnerved now, and I don’t think I could be more excited if I’d planned to throttle the life out of her or stick a screwdriver in her brain.

“What’s with the mask?” she asks in a tremulous voice.

“It’s an ancient Mayan relic, Bettina,” I say as I crouch over her and drive myself into her as a panther might, thrilled at her grunt of disbelief and fear. “It depicts their Jaguar God, the ruler of the night and the lord of the fucking underworld.”

CHAPTER 37

AT EIGHT THIRTY that evening Mattie stood unsteadily outside the door to her apartment. She smelled fresh cookies baking. She could hear a radio announcer giving the news, and caught something about the slaughterhouse explosion.

She leaned her head against the door. She was more than a little drunk.