I’VE KILLED THE whole pack of Shermans by the time I hear the front door open and close. There are a few tentative footsteps into the store.
“Hello?” says Rose.
It’s after nine o’clock and I swear I can feel my body starting to curdle. It puts me in a bad mood. I have the light on in his office, so that he’ll know exactly where I am.
“All that cigarette smoke. I can smell you back there,” he says. “I’m calling the police.”
“I wouldn’t do that if I were you, Atticus.”
He doesn’t say anything. I know he’s dialing. I go to the door of his office and bark some hoodoo. The phone is up next to his face when it bursts into a mass of shattered plastic and electric sparks. Rose staggers back. Half turns away from me. When he turns back, he has a little pistol in his hand. I step out of the way while barking more hoodoo. He flies back a few feet and the gun goes spinning into some dark corner of the store. When I approach him, Rose doesn’t move, but lies there trying to catch his breath. I pull him to his feet and shove him toward his office.
I have hold of the back of his jacket and say, “I want to see your workshop.”
“What workshop?” he says. “I send all of my merchandise out for repairs.”
“Not that workshop. I mean your Tick-Tock Man lair.”
He grabs on to a heavy armoire so I have to stop to keep from running him over.
“How do you know about that?”
“I know all about you, Atticus. I chased you underground once. Make me chase you again and the only underground you’ll see is me shoveling dirt on you in your grave.”
He whirls around and looks at me. Stares at me hard.
“I don’t know you. What kind of shakedown is this? Do you know who I work for?”
“Sorry. That was rude of me,” I say as I let the glamour fade.
“Stark?” he gasps. “You’re dead.”
“People keep saying that, but here I am. And yes, I know who your bosses are. That’s why I’m here. I want to know where to find them.”
He gets a funny look on his face. Half snarl and half smile.
“You’re out of your mind.”
I slap him and shove him against the armoire. Go through his pockets to make sure he doesn’t have any more surprises. There’s nothing interesting. Keys. Wallet. A pocket watch. Some cash. I throw it all on the floor.
“Show me your workshop.”
“No.”
“Do it or I’m going to start breaking your fingers so they never heal right. Then try staying in the Tick-Tock business.”
“Go ahead,” he says. “It will hurt, yes. I might even break down and cry. But Wormwood works with some of the most important Sub Rosa in town. They’ll perform a healing spell and I’ll be working again tomorrow.”
“Not if I break them with Hellion hoodoo. Trust me, Atticus. Those posh Bel-Air magicians have never seen the kind of Baleful magic I know.”
He nervously rubs his hands together.
“I … I can’t.”
“I’m on kind of a tight schedule here, Atticus. So let’s start with something easy: take me to your workshop now.”
He croaks, “I can’t.”
“Okay. Let’s do it my way.”