Killing Pretty (Sandman Slim 7)

“I don’t know.”

“Someone from the White Light Legion? Wormwood?”

“How do you know about Wormwood?”

With all the conviction of a good liar, Candy says, “We know all about Wormwood. They own your agency.”

Moore narrows his eyes, but his face relaxes a little.

“No, they don’t. The Burgess family owns it. You don’t know anything about Wormwood, do you?”

I prod him with the knife.

“Why don’t you enlighten us?”

Candy’s phone rings.

In the split second she and I look at the phone, Moore pulls the door handle and stumbles out onto Wilshire. He sprints across the street, dodging traffic like a goddamn ballet dancer. He almost makes it to the other side when a van pulls out of a parking space down the block, peels rubber, and mows him down. I get out of the car, ready to go after it.

Candy tackles me and pulls me out of the street just as a blue Honda Civic sideswipes the Crown Vic and takes off. I don’t have to run after it this time. I recognize the car from the other night when it shot up the front of Max Overdrive. That means the van that took out Moore was another White Light vehicle.

“Where’d he go?” says Candy.

I look up and down the street. There’s no evidence left of Moore’s collision but some skid marks and blood.

“They must have grabbed his body. Let’s get out of here.”

We jump in the car. It starts and drives just fine. All the damage the Civic did to it was cosmetic.

“Why are we running?” says Candy. “Somebody back there must have gotten our license plate. The cops will find us at home. Or find Julie.”

“Not necessarily,” I say. “After the other night, when the White Lights got our number, I switched plates.”

“With who?”

“A Porsche by Bamboo House. I took them while the owner was inside drinking mai tais.”

“So, besides kidnapping, we’ve been riding around in a car with stolen plates.”

“Yeah. Are going to rat me out?”

“Are you kidding? If I told Julie this shit, she wouldn’t fire us. She’d have us arrested.”

“Was she the one who called?”

Candy looks at her phone.

“Yes. I’ll call her back when we get home.”

“That’ll give us time to get our stories straight.”

“You’re going to change the plates back to the real ones. And throw the damned Porsche plates away.”

“What are we going to tell Julie about the car?”

Candy thinks a minute.

“We didn’t see it happen. We went for chicken and waffles, and when we came out, we found it this way.”