Page 18 (1/2)

Chapter Fifty-Two

Ric would have been worried that I was off and running without waiting for his I didn’t want to explain at the moment Like mydoggie business, so no one witnessed htwine central I’d used Godfrey’s codes to disable the security cameras when I came home I didn’t want anybody in the main house to tumble to my intentions and try to talk me out of theain, I was, in fact, as good as a ghost of s My black ballet slippers and best vintage black satin opera gloves had rosin on the soles and fingertips to give the a reptile-arachnid world and I needed to slither with the best of them, even if only by artificialhip chain I wore for Ric -it was fragile andreflectivity of the silver farated somewhere obvious at a keyhad instantlychain and settled onRic At least I knew this chain wouldn’t snap although it as Strip blocks away from the Gehenna, where nobody bothered with security cameras, and retraced my escapee steps Into the laundry Du like an insect I passed the churning central mechanical systee area

The first shoouldn’t open forand everybody unloosened their corsets and breathed at a e over froe area, feeling an unhappy twinge of hoone I sensed that Madrigal had been thoroughly pleased at this outcome, also his pets They had liked the Stepford Wifethe status quo

Too bad Stepford Divorcee was here now and this was Splitsville

First, I had to confront the blue-toned front-surface mirror in which I’d split in two

The mirror surface was inert, as it had always been When I touched ers to their reflection, h Whole Uncorrupted by debased e-o, I was in Cicereau’s office, the sliainst my hip inside the leotard, concealed The drive was e-but a CD was more difficult to conceal in Spandex and I could hardly e file tophysical barriers is that you can’t scout ahead Even as ed crouched on the wet bar, I saw that the joint was juuard Sansouci, but my most non-favorite wanta-meet, Detective Hardboiled, Half-balled Haskell

At thereflection in a dozen silver surfaces Maybe if I kept the dazzle going, I’d be overlooked

"You’ve been useful before because you were hu "Now you are neither flesh nor foul, but a freakish half-breed You don’t even knohich super bit you, half-olf or debased va worse?

"I’h distended fangs He looked a raded and mixed with the worst of beastliness "I can do even more special work for you"

"Such as?"

"I knohere to find that al has been here having a fit when you arrived because she’d disappeared, and I ad, but I don’t want her, Haskell She’s et out of here"

Sansouci made it happen in one o

"Scuhs "Now half-breed scureed" Cicereau smiled "Still, scuie?"

"Your little Margie has left the building Gone" Sansouci sat in the swivel chair before the desk, then swiveled ht, Sparkle, sparkle, little reflective star Hideto do with it, despite his indignant act?" Cicereau asked

"No He had the perfect new trick worked up I saw it in rehearsal It rocked"

"Yeah, it did, didn’t it? What hooked you, like, as just an audienceswathed in silk and then naked in serpent coils and elevated into thin air and having a rhinestone apple sucked out of hes look enlightened, but what the hell else did they have to do?

"We’re still probably better off without Margie," Cicereau concluded "Dames will always turn on you and then you have no choice but to off theine Cicereau’s farewell speech to his own daughter sixty-soo, if he’d even bothered to be in on the kill

"I’h-roller baccarat tables" Cicereau rose from his desk and from behind his restored computer

"I’ll hold the fort, boss," the black-and-silver haired Sansouci said, standing

He would make a dale again with him in human form I hoped "the fort" meant more than this office

Apparently it did, for Sansouci eyed everything, then slipped out the door I heard the security system beep into action after he left

It hurt to stretch myself back into unmirrored form, but I hopped from the wet bar onto the floor and made for the computer on Cicereau’s desk

The flat-screen monitor showed the sa with rabbits, squirrels, and deer, all great prey for wolves

I ht to Photo Album, found the deeply buried family pic from 1949 and copied it onto my flash drive The drive whirred as happily as Jiminy Cricket for a second or two I was ready to chirp -sized portable drive intoperfectly until all the power in the roohts too Trouble was, I needed light to see a reflection to walk into While I froze, being a thinking being, and realized soe froe heavy web fell atop ered from outside A net seemed hokey for the Cicereau operation, so ould have motive or opportunity, and the nerve to use Cicereau’s office for his or her own purposes? It sure wasn’t Sylphia’s web, not these scratchy rope fibers I fought the cuhts and power came back on

The office door opened and in walked Detective Haskell in all his half-were glory

Chapter Fifty-Three

Talk about a list of people you’d most like not to meet in heaven, or hell; Haskell was now nuled in a huge, heavy-duty fishing net The led I becaed after my first break-in Still, I didn’t see Sansouci or Cicereau racing back to gloat Believe it or not, that tightened the sulfuric acid knot in rinned, showing yellowed teeth between a pair of rusty red fangs You could have nicknamed him Canadian Sunset Then he spoke

"Our friends here at the Gehenna underestimate you, and they sure underestimate me, Miss Delilah Street"

I jerked in distaste to hear , blackened lips

"You know frohtwine’s fence security that I havein thethe ceiling as I hadn’t before A dark pattern of rugged wood bea forest branches The net would have been invisible up there And Haskell probably had so on a lot of local security fir in what he had on me

"The minute I saw those new Gehenna billboards, babe, I kneas you"

He circled htly wrapped Thank God I’d quit Photo Albuure out what I’d been doing

"I suppose," Haskell went on, as the seldoging in the Sinkhole and thought you were done with Irving Haskell"

Irving! I’d forgotten it from the newspaper article And ouldn’t? Irma asked Not an A-list first naers prodded and poked , which irlie, does it pay ot you, or are they tired of you and I can take you home and keep you all to myself?"

I didn’t answer I didn’t breathe I knehich alternative I preferred So I screah it was useless I threw ed to kick his feet out froether

He actually see, but it orth the nausea if I could get the big boys back in here to play Against them I had a chance Sliainst the wall In an instant, Sansouci hauled us both upright and slaainst the nearest wall He hit a button on the desk, then sat against the edge, ar us both

I knehat he was thinking: Which of these tould I like to skin alive the lar outfit I could tell that he liked me best, and in my skin

Everybody hates a loser, and Haskell was a loser born, whether human or unhuman

On the other hand, I’d uy likes a woed and did a little Mae West CinSi off me and I’ll run aith you to the Clark County jail"

"Don’t listen to her!" Haskell screamed "She’s the Devil in a black Spandex catsuit"

Actually, that description didn’t hurt ot up, wrenched the netting off us both, kicked Haskell in the stoainst himself one-armed while he pulled the handcuffs from Haskell’s belt In a thrice I was cuffed behind ainst the wall solo while he rolled Haskell into a fishnet rug on the floor

"Mr Cicereau," Sansouci said, "will decide what to do with both of you" He glanced at me "Sorry that’s not up to me, Snow White The Clark County jail sounds like a nice peaceful getaway for us both about now"

As if cued, Cicereau bustled in, the busy, pudgy executive on a heartburn roll "So what’s this now?"

Sansouci stood to attention "Haskell caught her and I caught them both We throw ’em both over Hoover Da when he’d told ie charisma

"Hmmm" Cicereau strolled over to ht her, boss," Haskell panted froht" Cicereau prodded hilance that Was half-uessed he’d made a very similar decision decades before

"You did okay," he told Haskell grudgingly "You’re still on the payroll Nowand vanish We’ll call you"

Sansouci unrolled Haskell froesture Haskell spun so fast he otten rope burns as well as dizzy

Haskell rose and wobbled out

As soon as the door shut behind hie The o full I’ll decide about her then and there"

I breathed a sigh of relief to be rid of Haskell until I saw Sansouci’s ione before he pulled me away from the wall by one ar loves off behind lad I had theht do was another matter Quicksilver could follow the scent ht

Going through the office door en route to the e, I felt a sharp, quick pinch on the butt

Sansouci? He was looking way too gri

But so, "Somebody Loves Me"

The next line is even more apropos to this situation

"I wonder who?"

Chapter Fifty-Four

My chauffeurs to the Starlight Lodge were o They drove a van marked "Hazardous Material"

That worried me a little Okay, a lot What also worried hborhood familiar My body heat had warmed the hip chain and it was too delicate to sense

The boys were pretty tight-lipped It was full dark by the ti Mountains I didn’t see any signs for Los Lobos, but I did see billboards advertising the Paiute Golf Club and its fauys know a dance club called Los Lobos?"

"Not on this part of theis, he really sounded sorry Very sorry