Kill City Blues (Sandman Slim 5)

Carlos puts the bottle back and says, “You know, someone was asking about you yesterday.”

“Did you get a name?”

He shakes his head.

“He didn’t say. But he was dressed to the nines and the tens.”

“Did he look like someone who might produce bad TV or good porn?”

“Neither. He was right out of GQ.”

“Then he wasn’t Declan Garrett.”

“Who’s that?”

“I was eating a donut and he tried to shoot me.”

“Some people are like that. Anyway, the guy who is looking for you said he’d be back. He has a business deal for you.”

“When he gets here tell him to fuck off. I’m beginning to I think I’ve spent this whole month doing things backward.”

“Backward how?”

Carlos pours more Aqua Regia into my cup. The more I drink, the clearer it gets. I look around to make sure Traven doesn’t see me.

“I’ve been looking for a thing, but what I should have been looking for is who wants it. Think of the ultimate weapon. Think of a death ray that fits in your pocket like a phone. Who would want that? In the old days, it would be the Vigil. They had a massive hard-on for hoodoo tech. Who’s left in L.A. like that? Not the cops. If they had the 8 Ball, they’d have blown themselves up by now. Who does that leave? Gangsters. But not civilian ones. They’re dumber than cops, so they’d all be dead. It’s got to be a Sub Rosa or Lurker crew. They’re the only ones who might handle the 8 Ball without setting off World War Three.”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about, but feel free to yammer.”

He sets out coasters and drinks for other customers.

I say, “How would you feel if I became extremely unreasonable?”

Carlos leans on the bar and speaks quietly.

“Like the old days? You’re not going to kill anybody?”

“Absolutely not.”

He stands up and takes empty glasses off the bar.

“Things have been quiet lately. Business is off. Maybe we need a little . . . what’s the French thing?”

“Grand Guignol?”

“That’s it. Some of that.”

I nod. Push the empty cup at him. The place is crowded for a weeknight. Civilian groupies huddle at the jukebox with a vampire holding hands with a blue-skinned Ludere. Some Razzers pick at a plate of deep fried tumors. Horned Lyphs, a tour group from Seattle, take snapshots in front of the old punk posters. A table of psychics quietly shares a bottle of tequila shaped like a Día de los Muertos skull.

“Who don’t you like? I mean if they all dropped down dead, who would you not miss?”

“That’s easy,” Carlos says. He sets a gimlet in front of a Mal de Mer in a tight wife beater. He’s shaved down the coral on his scalp so it looks like a mullet swept back to the shoulders and covered in skin like a cobra’s—diamond-scaled and shiny as marble. Carlos picks up an empty glass and uses it to point across the room.

“Them,” he says. “Those fucking Cold Cases.”

I turn and spot a table with four of them.

Cold Cases are soul merchants. There’s a lot of call for fresh souls in L.A. It’s an easy town to get yours smudged up. Or maybe you get dumb and desperate and sell it to Lucifer. Don’t worry. Just call your friendly neighborhood Cold Case. They have plenty of replacement souls. Most they even paid for, though there are rumors that they sometimes lift a particularly spotless soul without the owner’s permission. Everyone hates Cold Cases, but enough people need them that when one of them gets in trouble, evidence gets misplaced. Paperwork disappears. Not a one of them has ever spent a night in jail.