Edward Lee - Incubi

It was still early, not much of a crowd. Faye sat down at the end of the bar and sighed.

“Jack’s not on the case anymore,” Craig said.

“What?”

“They suspended him today.”

Faye felt incredulous, shocked. “Sus —why?”

Craig pointed to the TV. “Just watch. Here it comes again.”

It was the six o’clock news. “The Triangle case,” the newscaster kept saying. “Three ritual murders in a week.” The case had blown, and it had blown bad . The news made it look like it was the police department’s fault the murders had been committed, and now some man named Gentzel was passing the buck to Jack. “Captain Cordesman has been suspended from active duty,” the man said as they flashed a picture of Jack, “pending successful completion of the county alcohol program. Unfortunately he was assigned the case before his superiors knew he had a problem.”

“Pretty low-rent, huh?” Craig suggested.

“It’s awful. He was doing the best he could.”

“Those guys don’t care. They needed a fall guy for when the news found out, and Jack was right there.”

Faye could imagine how bad Jack felt. He’s probably getting plastered right now . But what could she do? She didn’t even know where he was. “Was he drinking when you saw him?”

“Nope. Said he was going to quit. His whole career’s on the line now. This time I think he’ll do it.”

Faye hoped so. And where did this leave her? Was she still on the case? Who was she to give her research to?

“Have a drink.”

“No, really, I—” She thought about it, “Sure,” she decided. “One of those big bottles I had last time.” After this, in addition to all the horrible stuff she’d read today, she figured she was entitled to a good drunk.

Next, a couple strolled in. Before Craig could take their order, they were sitting at a corner table, kissing. “You kids drinking tonight, or just here to eat face?” Craig inquired. The couple laughed, snuggling. Faye tried to remember the last time she’d been kissed. A year, she thought: A year.

“Tell me about this girl Jack used to see,” she asked when Craig returned from the floor. “Veronica.”

“Haven’t you ever heard of male confidentiality?”

“No. Just tell me about the girl.”

“Ask him.”

“He won’t talk about it.”

“It’s not my place to talk about his business.”

Faye laughed snidely. “Bartenders talk about everybody’s business, and don’t give me that male confidentiality crap.”

“Since you put it that way… He knew her for a while before they got involved. The relationship lasted about six months.”

“What broke them up?”

“Usually people break up because they find out they’re not compatible, or don’t have the same ideas about things. But that’s not how it was with them. I think it was confusion.”

“Confusion?”

“Sure, Veronica’s an artist, and artists are a little screwy sometimes. She’d never been in a real relationship before, and I guess she wasn’t sure how to deal with it. What she needed was time to adjust, but she thought it was something else, like maybe she wasn’t meant to be in a normal relationship at all. She was confused. She didn’t understand the situation, so she ended it. Then she went off on some kind of artists’ retreat. It’s a shame because I think things would’ve worked out for them.”

Faye sipped her Maibock. Confusion. Who isn’t confused?

“I knew her,” Craig went on, drawing six mugs of Oxford Class. “I was working the night they broke up. She had a lot of nutty ideas about ‘experience.’ She thought she wasn’t experiencing enough in life, and that’s why she felt out of place around other people. She thinks experience is what’ll cure her confusion, but if she’s not careful, she’s going to end up more confused.”

Faye felt equally confused. She hadn’t wanted experience; she’d wanted love but what she’d gotten instead was a facsimile. It wasn’t experience that had crushed her, it was finding out the hard way that a lot of awful things were easily disguised as truth.

The Maibock had her buzzing already. Damn it. Jack , she thought fuzzily. Where the hell are you?

Where the hell he was, exactly, and in no realm of legality whatsoever, was in the third-story apartment of one Virginia Thiel, also known as Ginny. The Dubbins nine-pin security lock had taken him ten minutes to tease open; he thought sure he’d be seen. But the hall had remained empty, by chance or by fate.

Wouldn’t that be great if she hadn’t gone, after all? he thought in the living room. He could picture the look on her face walking out of the kitchen — or better yet, the shower — only to discover a ragtag, unshaven Jack Cordesman standing stupidly with a set of lockpicks in his hand. It was a spacious, expensive pad, lots of good furniture, quality carpets and drapes, and one of those giant TVs where you could watch several shows at once. Must be nice , he humphed. Rich bitch . Veronica told him that Ginny made several hundred grand a year writing those things she wrote. Speculative feminism, the critics called her books. Tripe, Jack called them. He and Ginny had never really liked each other. Sometimes the three of them would go to the ’Croft, and Ginny and Jack would wind up arguing, which always amused Veronica. “You’re an unkempt, monarchical pig,” Ginny had once told him. “Monarchical? Does that word even exist?” he’d countered. “It’s probably like the stuff you write about. Pure horseshit.” “I’d kick you in the head if I wasn’t afraid of breaking my foot,” she’d come back. “Pound sand up your ass with a mallet, baby. How’s that?” “Immature, uncouth, and hostile, which is about all I’d ever expect from a cop.”

They were interesting arguments, at any rate. Jack found Ginny’s invitation in a basket of letters by the phone. It was close to identical to Veronica’s. Then be began his search. No purloined missives this time. Again, he didn’t really know what he was looking for. He snooped around the kitchen counter, any place where she might’ve written something down when she called to confirm. Ho! Contraband! he thought. In a drawer under some address books he found a little bag of marijuana . Shame on you, Ginny . He could not resist. He emptied the bag into the drain and refilled it with an equal portion of McCormick’s oregano from the spice rack. See how high you get on that, honey .

Next, the bedroom. This was irredeemable; he was enjoying it. Plowing through Ginny’s privacy gave him a perverse thrill. No, this was definitely not ethical, but what was the harm? It wasn’t like he was going to steal anything, or pull a whiz on the gorgeous beige carpet. Nevertheless, he imagined himself doing the most juvenile things: jumping up and down on the bed, moving the furniture around, writing “Kilroy was here” on the bathroom mirror. A few good squirts of whipped cream under the silk bedsheets would be nice. Or, hey, how about salt in the sugar bowl?

Time to grow up , he concluded. The underwear drawer revealed a surprising predilection toward panties of the crotchless variety. Holy-moly! he thought when he opened the next drawer. Ginny’s House of 1000 Delights. The drawer contained vibrators, electric ben-wa balls, numerous prods, probes, and ticklers and a few things that Jack, even in his wildest imagination, could not put a name to. They looked like alien appendages. One looked like the snout of a star-nosed mole. Another seemed to have tentacles. Jesus Christ, did women actually put these things into themselves? How could they keep a straight face? Last was a knurled black dildo over a foot long.