Stefan Petrucha - Dead Mann Walking

I made my way toward him, dodging couples, triples, and quadruples, trying not to step on anyone, ignoring invitations to join in. Other than Green, the only other people in the room “uninvolved” were two thugs leaning against one of the columns that lined the room and held up the faux heavens. They were dressed in black, wore sunglasses, had black hair, square jaws, the whole Reservoir Dogs look.

As I neared Green, one came forward and patted his jacket pocket to let me know he was there. I gave him a nod, then knelt by the edge of the pool near the main man.

“Mr. Green,” I said.

There was lots of noise in the room, grinding, heaving breathing, gasps, but when Colby Green turned toward me, a few drops of water fell from his hair and I could hear them hit the pool. The bat-black of his eyes sized me up like an hors d’oeuvre, something interesting enough to taste even if he was full. I think it gave me a small sense of how Misty felt out on the streets.

Before he could decide on his own what to do about me, I started talking, fast. “My name’s Hessius Mann. I know it’s unusual, but I’m a detective. I’ve got good reason to think—”

A piano song interrupted, playing over hidden speakers. The music was electronic, intentionally tinny, and vaguely familiar. Green put a finger to his lips and nodded toward the stage as the recorded lyrics began.

Got a feelin’ it’s all over now—all over now, we’re through.

Took me a second, but I placed the tune. It was the closing theme from All in the Family , an ancient sitcom. That’s the kind of crap I have no trouble remembering. If that weren’t strange enough, a female chak, pale as paper or maybe a blue-tinged moon, emerged from the side of the black velvet curtain and strutted to the center pole.

Nell Parker, I presumed.

And tomorrow I’ll be lonesome, remembering you.

Unless it was a ton of makeup, or the lighting, she was in great shape. The only thing that looked fake was the bowl-cut hair, bleached beyond platinum to match the alabaster outfit. The lighting gave her face some grayer patches, even a swipe or two of charcoal black, but the only real color on the stage was the green in her eyes. The color had to be fake, contacts, but they looked great, stuck out like emeralds on a sandy stretch of beach.

She spun and gyrated. The line between the folds in her dress and the curves of her body disappeared into the pattern of her movement. Women’s advocate? Sure, but she must’ve been a dancer, too. Strong hips, small breasts. Not boyish in any way, and there wasn’t anything missing. Not a bit of rot. One of the lucky ones. Oh, there were signs that she was a chak, but only two. Her eyes were a bit too sunken, and her expression was dull, detached, absent, echoing the ennui all the chakz here had.

A pole dance is about voyeurism. Look but don’t touch. You watch the dancer enjoy her own sexuality. Toss a chak into the mix and it’s something different. She swooped, flipped, and tumbled at an easy, erotic tempo. One moment her body rippled in a perfect imitation of hunger and longing; the next she spun away with a quick flash of disdain. I thought for a second she was looking at me. But, like a pro, she’d made eye contact with everyone.

I think I could guess what she meant to Green. It was echoes, all echoes, but so perfect she blurred the line with the real thing. That was his fascination, the line between the living and the dead. He wasn’t the only one. I barely noticed when the song ended. Barely heard it when a voice came over the loudspeaker.

“Ms. Parker will be back shortly to join in the fun.”

She flitted away, her eyes’ green sparkle lost in gray as she passed through the black velvet curtain. Before it floated closed, I noticed a circular staircase behind it.

Booth used to tell me that detective work should never, ever be personal. The cold formula’s the important part: two and two equals four. It doesn’t matter if it’s two apples or two oranges, two drug addicts or two helpless infants. Best not to pay attention to anything else. The moment you think you can have feelings and do the work is the moment you’re about to make your worst mistake.

Colby turned toward me. “Now, what was it you had to say?”

I didn’t answer. I was too busy watching the air she’d left behind.

22

Until I became a chak, I never realized death could be, on the one hand, so . . . active, on the other how much desire would be gone. I’m not talking erectile dysfunction. I mean the taste of food, the feel of fresh air, the peaceful tingle from the sound of an ocean surf. Now it was all through a glass darkly, to coin a phrase.

So what was with my reaction to this dancer, this Nell Parker? I had no idea. I was worried, really worried, that it meant my undead nervous system was completely fried, taking another step toward the big F. But I also couldn’t let go of the possibility that it was all her, the fact that she managed to remind me of being alive, the way it ached but didn’t hurt.

I assumed I was free to stare, that Green would think I was a typical chak, slow on the uptake, but when I finally turned to him, his eyes were narrowed. I pointed toward the stage.

“I’ve got good reason, real good reason, to believe someone’s out to hurt Nell Parker.”

His eyes stayed narrow. “You’re worried about her? Did you like watching her dance? She can take a lot without getting hurt.”

“I don’t mean that kind of hurt. I’m talking about something more permanent.”

The black in his eyes twinkled. “Nothing’s permanent.”

“They say a D-cap is.”

The amused twinkle vanished. He stood, leaving the chair bobbing behind him in the water. “Let’s talk privately.”

He closed his robes and climbed out of the pool. Dripping on his guests as he went, he strode back into the giant hallway, myself and the two gunsels following. From there, he took a left into a smaller hall, where, not so different from the dim lighting behind us, late-afternoon sun streamed in from a glass roof.

Wordless the whole while, he stopped at the only plain thing I’d seen in this massive place: a brown door. The office on the other side of it almost looked normal: dark paneling, bookshelves, and few paintings that actually didn’t involve fornication. There were plenty of comfortable chairs, but all four of us remained standing.

There was only one visible sign of his proclivities. On the desk, next to a laptop, sat a candy bowl full of Viagra. I tapped the rim. “Surprised you use the stuff, Mr. Green.”

“It’s for the guests. I’d offer you one, but they only make chakz tense. I have people working on that, though.” He pulled a bronze bowl from a shelf and held it toward me. It was filled with pills, too. They were the same oblong shape as the Viagra but bigger, and with more of a neon tinge.

I made a face.

“Can’t happen, right? Impossible? But I like a challenge. Chakz don’t have eye color, either, but Nell does, and they’re not contacts. She’s the first. That’s what makes things worth trying. Over and over and over, if need be.”

I waved off the bowl. “No offense, Mr. Green, but some people think doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result is the definition of insanity.”

He laughed. “Unless it’s something you like doing over and over.” He shook the bowl. “Think about what you and Nell could do over and over if they worked.” He took one of the pills, licked it, then held it out to me. “No?”

When I didn’t budge, with a shrug he tossed it back in the bowl. “They’re experimental anyway. Lots of side effects.”