“I have my own company. Some days I wear suits and some I’m out on the sites making sure the floor tiles are going in the right way up.” He smiles like we’re supposed to laugh. It’s a joke he’s used on a lot of clients. Now it’s just a nervous tic.
“Depending on business, I’m either out in the field most of the time or back in the office having meetings.”
“Whaene>Èt kind of real estate do you develop?”
“Whatever a client asks for. Shopping malls. Business parks. Apartment buildings. Whatever a client wants.”
“Is business good?” asks Vidocq.
K.W. shrugs.
“With development, it’s always feast or famine. No one wants anything new. All they want is new electrics or pipes in old structures. Then someone wants a new hundred-apartment complex up in two weeks. And there are ten other companies behind that one who want the same thing.”
“Was Hunter going to work for you when he finished school?”
“I don’t know. We talked about it.”
“Did he spend much time at the building sites?”
K.W. sips his coffee. Puts his hand on his wife’s hand. Squeezes. She squeezes back.>“Mason went to Hell all right, but he got his revenge. That’s why I’m sure what Mason wants is to be in charge. This time around he’s not going to be dragged into the jungle while his family is chopped into dog food. He’s going to be the dragger, not the draggee.”
What do you know? Mason isn’t Dr. Doom after all. He’s Bruce Wayne, pining away for his long-gone Partridge Family lifestyle. I have no way of knowing if everything in Kasabian’s tall tale is true, but he got at least one thing right. From the moment we met, I don’t think it ever occurred to Mason and me to do anything but go at each other. It’s not that we hated each other. It’s more like how some people can’t help but bring out the not necessarily righteous parts of your personality. Like how you meet someone and instantly know they’re a full-time professional victim, and no matter how hard you try, something takes over and you can’t help needling them. From day one Mason and I were playing King of the Hill. It all makes a sad kind of sense now. Sending me Downtown wasn’t just Mason’s play for power. It was his way of finally winning the stupid game we’d been playing since we met. Kasabian nailed it. Mason and I aren’t anything special. Just a couple of angry toddlers out to crack the world over a playground punch-out.
“You okay?”
I look around. Kasabian looks concerned. Somewhere along the way I’d gotten to my feet. I guess I’ve been standing here for a while.
“I’m fine. Thanks for laying it all out for me. At least now I know why Lucifer thought Mason was the only other candidate to take his place.”
“Maybe you ought to sit down and finish your drink.”
“Good idea.”
I’m feeling a little dazed. A little high. Mason and I are connected at the hip and the brain stem. Isn’t that goddamn hilarious?
“Just be cool. You wanted to hear the story. Don’t go getting mad at me.”
“Don’t sweat it. I’m glad I know.”
I pick up my coat. Finger the bullet hole. It’s not bad enough to throw the coat away. Besides, I heard that blood is the new black.
My cigarette has gone out. I drop it in a half-finished drink by the bed and light another.
“I get it now. Why Mason wants Heaven and Hell.”
“What do you mean?”
“He’s going to do it again. He doesn’t want to be God. He wants to burn us like he burned that mountain.”
“Why would he do that?”
I look at Kasabian. He’s as mad as any human or Hellion I’ve ever met. Why can’t he see it? It’s because he’s a lousy magician. Third rate when he gets a good tailwind. He never learned to dream big.
“Because the universe abandoned him. Mason was scared. He’d seen his family butchered. He needed help. He begged and groveled and prayed, but nobody came. Not his parents. Not the Sub Rosa. Not the army. Not God or Lucifer or one lousy angel. The little boy got tossed out like the trash and now he’s going to burn the universe because when he was lost and pathetic and needed help the universe turned its back and took a planet-size dump on his head.”
“How do you know this sick shit?”
“Because it’s exactly what I was going to do. When I got back from Hell, I traded Mr. Muninn for something I have hidden in the Room of Thirteen Doors. Something that can fry every atom in Creation. Turn this whole peep show to dust. I thought that killing the Circle and sending Mason to Hell was going to fix me and the world would be full of sunshine and pretty girls and bluebirds that shit cold beer. But it didn’t. Alice was still dead. God and bead. GodLucifer still gave me the silent treatment. And Wells, Aelita, the Golden Vigil, and everyone who worked for them still walked the streets.”