Andrew Klavan - Damnation Street

So it was, in that rainy Nevada backwater, that I became admirable, beaten to jelly in the mud outside a whorehouse door, trying to buy Weiss another second, another minute, to do whatever it was he had to do.

Weiss went down the brothel stairs, into the lounge, into the shadows. He grabbed the little madam by the arm and dragged her out of her office. The blood from his hand stained the sleeve of her brown cardigan.

"Hey," she snarled at him.

"Shut up," said Weiss. "Where's Kristy?"

Her eyes flitted to the front door. She was waiting for the two enforcers to arrive from across the lane.

Weiss gripped her arm hard, dragged her closer.

"You're hurting me!"

"Come on," he said. He shook her. Her football tits stood solid, never wobbled, but her wig came askew, curls covering one eye.

"In the back," she told him.

"What room?"

"I don't know."

She knew. He glanced out the door. He saw the enforcers charging. He saw me step in front of them. He figured he didn't have much time. He shoved the madam away.

He plunged deeper into the shadowy lounge. From the corner of his eyes, he caught the flutter of fabric on every side of him as girls drew back against the walls. In the center of the room, in the island of light, the two bikers stood straight, holding their pool cues-ready, in a casual sort of way, to beat him to death if the need arose. But he went right by them. They let him pass.

He saw the door at the rear. He went for it. He tried the doorknob. It wouldn't turn. He looked over his shoulder. The enforcers were now pounding me into the mud. He didn't think it would take them long to finish up. He faced front, lifted his foot, and planted a kick just beneath the knob.

The door flew in. He was through.

Now he was in a hallway lit by red light. There were doors on either side of him. He grabbed the nearest knob. Threw the door open. Went to the next door. Threw that open too. He marched down the hall to the next door, then the next. He threw the doors open. In each room, he saw what he saw-quick, chaotic. Tumbling glimpses of raw human meat hinged together. A half second of flesh and confusion, the red light bathing everything. There were snarls and cries. A woman on her hands and knees. A man shackled to bedposts. Dark circles of wide open mouths. Damp patches of pubic hair. Straining limbs, straining faces. Scalding nakedness without tenderness or glamour. Nakedness like a blow.

Voices rose around him. Men shouted threats. Women spat rough, ugly curses. The smell of sweat and sex washed over him. The red light washed over him.

He kept going. Any second he expected the enforcers to barge in behind him, to grab him, beat him down, drag him out. But they didn't come so he kept on. Storming down the hall. Throwing open doors. A woman on her knees, her face impaled. A fat man squatting. A trio of sodomists tangled in a mess of flesh.

Then, up ahead of him, near the end of the corridor, one door opened on its own. A whore in spangled red panties stepped out to see what the commotion was. She was young, maybe thirty. A sharp face framed with long hair dyed blond. A small body, painfully thin but with large round breasts, implants, bare. She saw Weiss. Startled fear came into her eyes. That's what gave her away.

He pulled up short, his heart pounding, his lungs work- ing hard. He and the whore looked at each other. Shouts and cries and curses filled the air around them.

"You talk to me or you talk to him," Weiss told her, breathless. "You know who's following me, right? You talk to me or you talk to him."

The fear in the whore's eyes turned to terror.

Then the lounge door banged open and the two enforcers rushed in.

The whore glanced around Weiss's shoulder. He turned to follow the glance and saw the enforcers at the end of the hall. They were lined up shoulder to shoulder to block his way. They were pressing their big fists into their big palms. Their pale eyes were gleaming. They were getting ready to come for him.

But they were too late. Weiss had already said what he had to say. He turned back to the whore.

"It's all right," she told the two thugs. She lifted her chin. "Forget it. It's all right."

Weiss took another look at them. The light died in their eyes. He smiled. The enforcers punched their palms, turned around and went back through the door, and were gone.

The other doors began slamming shut all along the corridor. The cursing stopped. A murmuring quiet fell over the hallway. Finally, Weiss was alone in the red light with the bare-breasted whore. Kristy.

"Come on," she said.

She slipped back into her room. He followed her.

There was a little fat man hopping around the middle of the floor. He was pulling his jockey shorts over his leg, then up to cover his bare ass. When Weiss came in, he grabbed the rest of his clothes off a chair and held them against his chest. Weiss stood aside and the man carried his clothes out into the hall without saying a word.

Weiss shut the door on him. He faced the girl in the redspangled panties.

They were in a narrow box of a room. The bed, a queen size, almost filled it. There was a two-drawer bedside table with a lamp and a radio and a vase of flowers on it. There was a window, covered with blinds and with some kind of lacy stuff draped over the top of it. Betadine, baby wipes, condoms, and a pair of fur-covered handcuffs were piled discreetly in a little wicker basket in a corner on the floor. A cheap blanket-a trick towel-lay over the floral bedspread. It had a gray stain at the center of it.

Weiss went to the basket. Reached in, pulled out a baby wipe. He swabbed the blood off his hand. The cut wasn't deep. The bleeding was almost done.

He lifted his chin at the whore. He was still out of breath. "Listen…," he said.

Tense, the whore gestured to the bedside table. Weiss looked. He saw the lamp, the radio, the vase. But he knew how these places worked. There was an intercom in one of the drawers. The madam would sit in her office and listen in while her whores negotiated the price of their party. That way, the madam knew the girls weren't holding back her share.

"I guess everyone can listen, then," he said.

"I don't want any trouble," said the whore.

"Yeah, I got that message."

"I mean, you know…"

He nodded curtly. He knew. She didn't want the Shad-owman coming after her. She'd tell him whatever he wanted to hear as long as he would keep the killer away.

He looked down at her. He felt suddenly weary. He was weary at the sight of her, skinny as some child on a charity poster, but with that fake blond hair and those fake tits hanging out as if she didn't give a damn. He could see how scared she was. Julie had warned her he was coming and had warned her about the killer trailing in his wake. She was scared as hell, and Weiss was using that to get her to talk. That made him feel weary too.

The killer's right, he thought. We make a good team.

"Olivia called you," he said.

She nodded eagerly, her sharp ferret features going up and down fast. He wished she'd cover herself.

He tossed the bloody wipe back into the basket. "Just tell me where Julie is and I'll get out of here."

The hooker's shoulders came up around her ears. "Christ, I don't know that. She doesn't tell me that. She just calls."

"You mean she hasn't called since you talked to Olivia?"

"Right. Not since her sister. Right."

"So that's why you had them set the muscle on me."

"I didn't know what to do. Olivia told me you were coming, and I didn't know what I was supposed to do. I was scared if you came, then

… you know… he would come too…"

"So you didn't give Julie her sister's message."