Andrew Vachss - Strega

"And if I don't? I mean, if I look and come up empty?"

"How long will you look?"

" If I look, I'll look four, five weeks. After that, there's no point. You could run some ads, shake some trees…but if it's around, still local, that's all the time there is."

"How do I know you'll really look?" she asked.

"You don't," I said, "and that's the fucking truth."

"Five thousand a week?"

"Plus expenses.

"For a hundred grand, you can pay your own expenses.

"If I find the picture," I said, "the hundred grand covers it all, okay? But if I don't, you pay five grand a week for a max of five weeks, plus expenses.

The redhead stroked her own face, soothing herself, thinking. Finally she said, "Ten grand up front and you start tonight."

"Twenty-five up front and I start tonight," I shot back.

"Fifteen," she offered.

"Take a walk, lady," I said. "I shouldn't have started this in the first place."

"You walk with me," the redhead said. "Back to my house. I'll give you the twenty-five."

"And a picture of the kid?"

"Yes. And all the other stuff I put together."

"And then you're out of it? I do my work and I let you know the result?"

"Yes."

"And then you forget you ever saw me?"

"Oh, I'll do that," she said, "but you'll never forget you saw me.

Even in the car I was still cold. "You have the money at your house? Your husband?"

"Don't worry about it. He won't be home tonight. Is it a deal?"

"No promises," I told her. "I'll take my best shot. I come up emptythat's all, right?"

"Yes," she said again. "Follow me."

She got out of the Plymouth and into her car. I let the engine idle while she started up. She pulled out and I followed her taillights into the night.

THE REDHEAD drove badly, taking the BMW too high in the lower gears, backing it off through the mufflers when she came to a corner, torturing the tires. The Plymouth was built for strength, not speed-I drove at my own pace, watching to see if she attracted attention with her driving.

The BMW ducked into the entrance for Forest Park. I lost sight of her around a curve, but I could hear tires howling ahead. I just motored along-there was no place for her to go.

She turned out of the park and into a section of mini-estates-not much land around the houses, but they were all big bastards, set far back from the street, mostly colonials. The redhead took a series of tight, twisting turns and stopped at a flagstone-front house with a wrought-iron fence. She got out and walked to the entrance, never looking back. Something from her purse unlocked the gate. She waved me around her car and I pulled into the drive. I heard the gate close again behind me and then the BMW's lights blinded me as she shot past me, following the curve of the driveway around to the back of the house-it opened as we approached-it must have had some kind of electronic eye. The light came on inside the garage. Only one stall was occupied-a Mercedes sedan.

I watched her slam the BMW into the middle space. I brought my car to a stop, and reversed so the Plymouth 's rear bumper was against the opening of the garage. She motioned for me to pull all the way inside. I shook my head, turned off the engine. She shrugged the way you do at an idiot who doesn't understand the program and pointed for me to follow her inside.

The redhead pushed a button against the garage wall and the big door descended from the ceiling and closed behind us. She opened a side door and started to climb some stairs, flicking her wrist at me in a gesture to follow her.

The stairs made a gentle curve to the next floor. Soft light came from someplace but I couldn't see any bulbs. The redhead's hips switched almost from wall to wall on the narrow staircase. I thought about the magnum I'd left in the Plymouth.

She took me into a long, narrow room on the next floor. One whole wall was glass, facing the backyard. Floodlights bathed the grounds-there was a rock garden around a patio in the back; the rest faded into the shadows.

"Wait here," she said, and moved into another room.

She hadn't turned on a light in the big room but I could see well enough. It looked as if her interior decorator had a degree in hospital administration. The whole room was white-a low leather couch in front of a slab of white marble, a recliner in the same white leather. There was a floor lamp extending over the recliner-a sharp black stalk with a fluted wing at the top. A black glass ashtray was on the marble slab. Against the far wall was a single black shelf running the full length, the lacquer gleaming in the reflected light. I saw four floor-standing black stereo speakers but no components-probably in another part of the house. The floor was black quarry tile and there were two parallel strips of track lighting on the ceiling-holding a series of tiny black-coned spots. The room was a reptile's eye-flat and hard and cold.

I sat down in the recliner and lit a cigarette. My mouth burned with the first drag. I pulled the butt away-there was blood on the filter. I wiped my mouth on my handkerchief and sat there waiting. I heard the tap of her heels on the tile, turned my head without moving. I tasted the blood on my lip again. She was wearing a black silk camisole over a pair of matching tap pants. The whole outfit was held up with a pair of spaghetti-straps-they made a hard line against her slim shoulders. The redhead had a pair of black pumps on her feet-no stockings that I could see. She was all black and white, like the room.

"You want a drink?" she asked.

"No."

"Nothing? We have everything here."

"I don't drink," I told her.

"A joint? Some coke?" she asked me, an airline stewardess on a flight to hell.

"Nothing," I told her again.

She crossed in front of me, like a model on a runway for the first time, nervous but vain. She sat down on the couch, crossed her long legs, folded her hands over one knee. "We have a deal?" she asked.

"Where's the money?" I said in reply.

"Yeah," she said absently, almost to herself, "where's the money?"

She flowed off the couch and walked out of the room again, leaving me to my thoughts. I wondered where her kid was.

The redhead was back in a minute, a slim black attaché case in one hand. She looked like she was going to work. In a whorehouse. She dropped to her knees next to the recliner in a graceful move, crossing her ankles behind her on the floor, and put the attaché case on my lap. "Count it," she said.

It was all in fifties and hundreds-crisp bills but not new. The serial numbers weren't in sequence. The count was right on the nose. "Okay," I told her.

She got to her feet. "Wait here. I'll get you the pictures," she said, turning to go. "Play with your money.

As soon as she was out of the room I got up and took off my coat. I transferred the money from the attaché case to a few different pockets, closed the case, and tossed it on the couch. Lit another cigarette.

She was back quickly, her hands full of paper. She came over to the same place she'd been before, kneeled down again, and started putting the papers in my lap, one piece at a time, as if she was dealing cards.

"This is Scotty like he looks today. I took this last week. This is Scotty like he was a few months ago-when it happened. This is the drawing he did-see the swastika? This is me and Scotty together-so you can tell how big he is, okay?"

"Okay," I told her.

She handed me one more piece of paper, covered with typed numbers. "These are the phone numbers where you can reach meand when you can call. Just ask for me-you don't have to say anything else."

"Any of these answering machines?"

"No. They're all people, don't worry.

I took a last drag of my smoke, leaning past her to snub it out in the ashtray, ready to leave. The redhead put her face next to mine again, whispering in a babyish voice, more breath than tone, "You think I'm a tease, don't you?"