The Getaway God (Sandman Slim 6)

He rolls over and grins at me and Julie. His face is covered in scars and sutures.

“Look at you. The Lone Ranger and Tonto. Saviors of the little ­people.”

I kick him in the ribs.

“Don’t talk to me like you know me.”

He rolls up into a ball, hurting and laughing.

“Don’t be a killjoy, Jimmy. Come over here and give me a hug.”

It’s like someone opened me up and emptied me out. I’m cold and hot at the same time. I want to throw up. I look down at Saint Nick. His face is different, but I recognize the voice.

It’s Mason Faim.

ONCE UPON A time I was a regular jackass living a regular jackass life. I was part of a Magic Circle. There were six other ­people in the circle. All of them are dead now because I killed most of them, including and especially Mason Faim. Why? Good question. Because he was the prick who sent me to Hell and the others were the assholes who stood by and watched.

But that wasn’t enough. Mason had my girlfriend Alice killed. That was just one little thing too much. I escaped Hell and came back gunning for everyone in the circle, Mason most of all.

Like any Sir Galahad asshole, I went for the worst revenge I could think of—­I sent him to Hell alive to live among the slickest, sickest Hellion torturers in the universe. Only fairy tales are full of lies and Mason is the best liar I know. He just wouldn’t take his punishment like a well-­behaved villain. Mason cut deals, cut throats, and used his considerable hoodoo to try and become the new Lucifer. Did I mention that he stole Alice’s soul from Heaven and dragged it to Hell? So I had to go after him all over again. It was during that little barn dance that I lost my left arm.

I killed him once and for all in a rigged game of Russian roulette. Watched him blow his brains out, and felt just fine about it. After that, I made sure Mason’s soul was exiled in Tartarus, the Hell below Hell, where he was going to spend the rest of eternity alone in darkness.

And I lived happily ever after.

The end.

Okay, the happily-­ever-­after thing didn’t exactly work out, but the one thing I knew I could count on was never seeing Mason Faim alive again. And now here he is. The universe has a fucked-­up sense of humor.

Of course, the lump of meat squirming on the floor isn’t entirely Mason. His real body is long gone in Hell—­I made sure of that—­so all that existed of him was his soul in Tartarus. It took some massive hoodoo to bust him out and plant the worm in one of the chop-­shop bodies. I should have looked closer at Saint Nick’s eyes when we snatched him. Even if the body is all wrong, I can see Mason clear as day, staring at me from his mismatched brown and green peepers.

Still, there’s only one good thing about this moment.

I pull the Colt and point it at his hand.

I get to kill him all over again.

“Stand down, Stark,” shouts Wells.

He pushes my arm out of the way and gets between Mason and me.

“Your presence here is no longer required. Get out of here until we sort this out. You can give me your report in the morning.”

I stand there, just breathing. Mason lies on the floor looking around at the assembled Vigil morons who don’t have a clue about what’s happening but know that it’s really, really bad. Worst of all, no matter what happens after this, Mason knows he’s won the war we’ve been waging for eleven years. Just making it back to Earth and into a skin suit puts him one up on every civilian, Sub Rosa, and angel that’s ever lived. Which doesn’t mean I’m giving up. I sent him Downtown once before and I can do it again. And this time I won’t get fancy with Tartarus or anything else. I’ll kill his body and destroy his soul, wiping him out of existence.

“Stark,” says Julie. “Did you hear Marshal Wells?”

I look at him. He’s still in reach. I could toss him across the room and kill Mason before anyone could stop me and he knows it, but he stays put. Slowly, it sinks in that maybe there’s more to all this than Mason and me. There’s a dozen bodies in a meat locker and around ninety more in an asylum. And how many more that we don’t know about yet? And it’s all tied up with the Angra. Kill Mason so we can’t get any answers and it might be the biggest favor I can do for the end of the world.

I put the Colt away.

Wells nods to his crew.

“Get this thing out of here. Max lockdown. No one talks to him but me.”

They haul Mason to his feet and hustle him away to the cells at the far end of the clubhouse. He hums “Onward, Chris­tian Soldiers” until I can’t hear him anymore.

“Marshal Sola, see Stark out of here, please. When you’re done I’ll take your report in my office.”