Page 17 (1/2)

"Money is good"

"Money I have"

Muninn brings over a set of blueprints he’d hidden behind a collection of canopic jars He spreads the blueprints on the only relatively uncluttered table in the roo animal teeth, Mayan vases, and a box of lenses and pris is called Avila It’s a gentleentleentleman’s club In the old sense A place to drink, to eat, and to gamble with friends It’s also the most exclusive and expensive bordello in the state Perhaps the country Avila’s clients are film producers, software billionaires, local politicians, and foreign heads of state Only the highest of the high can get inside Except for you two, of course You’ll be the rats in the walls"

The building on the blueprints is round and the interior is laid out in concentric circles

"While Eugene is an accoht take days or even weeks for hiure out how to penetrate the defenses However, I understand that you can easily get hiain"

Avila is laid out with the offices in the outside circle Food and a bar one circle in Ga one more level in, and the bordello one after that The center of the blueprints is blank

"At this ti up to their New Year’s Eve party in a couple of days You’ll want to go in there as soon as possible Now, there will be enough chaos to make your work easier, but on New Year’s there will be too ’s blank center

"What’s in there?"

"No one knows Perhaps you’ll find out"

"Does it pay extra?"

"Let’s see what you bringto keepive up the hunt for Mason so I can play cat burglar for an Oompa-Loompa But that’s exactly what I have to do if I want to keep Max Overdrive open and have a place to live I don’t have a choice I don’t think Vidocq would be happy havingmass murder at his kitchen table

"I’m in," I say

"Good boy," says Vidocq "I’et it No ara starts to say soht, even if he’s rude about it What we’re doing is crierous This isn’t the tis"

"Fine," she says "Have a boys’ night out I hope you and your dicks will be very happy together"

I look over at Muninn and he has two tuxedos on hangers

"Gentleentleman’s club"

WE STEP FROM the roo I’ve alondered about How can you see two guys dressed like ushers at Liberace’s funeral walk out of a wall and not react? My guess is that no one sees us or remembers us The room or the key or some combination must temporarily blind or switch off the memories of anyone nearby Otherwise how could I have sent so many of Hell’s A-team killers down to Tartarus, the special Hell for the double dead Avila is a palace designed by Martians A rip-off of a rip-off of a rip-off of a Victorian ner saw in a Sherlock Holmes movie when he or she was six Still, the scale of the place is impressive They et the dark wood for the bar The Rolexes in this one room could pay off the national debt

The place is full of sloppy, well-dressed drunks laughing and screaes Happy hour at the United Nations of Money Half-naked and just plain naked hostesses serve drinks and tapas and hold out silver trays piled high hite powder, syringes, and glass pipes, whatever the partiers want Perfect Who needs ula’s bachelor party going on down the hall?

Vidocq’s thief instincts are cranked up to eleven and he finds the office in the tiirls He’s no fun at all when he’s in business mode He pushes me into the office ahead of him and closes the door

After all the rumpus-room fun, the office is kind of a letdown It could be the office of a bank president or a Beverly Hills real-estate tycoon There are lots of awards on bookshelves Lots of celebrities slazed it looks like you could go ice skating on the on the safe is an oak desk the size of a Porsche and probablyover there?" I ask

Vidocq is rattling little bottles together as he pulls potions froht," he says "The safe is ordinary, but it’s protected by a nuood at breaking things"

"Be quiet I have to understand exactly what’s at work here and eliminate the spells one by one and in the proper order"

I’m already bored and annoyed by Avila It’s not that I have anything against bad behavior I’, heavy- I hate about LA in particular and hu high above it all on this hillside, they’re the kind of people whose faces end up on money or a new library so that kids will have a new place to hang out while realizing that no one ever taught them how to read Their wealth doesn’t insulate them from the world It creates it Their bank stateht and let a thousand investment banks bloom They shit cancer, and when they belch in a bowl valley like LA, the air turns so thick and poisonous that you can cut it up like bread and serve it for lunch at McDonald’s A Suicide Sandwich Happy Meal

There must be a hundred of them just ten steps away I wonder how ot here

Vidocq isover his vials and potions across the rooh the pile of envelopes in front ofletters, suck-up notes from politicians, and more bullshit awards, the rest is just bills and ads What do you know? Even the gods get junk mail

I toss the pile back on the desk and pick up a photo in a silver frauy as the current uy as al to one side and the governor is handing her yet another award All three bea their teeth A pack of happy wolves

So fun must have just happened at the party because the crowd suddenly got loud and then died down again I bet I could take out everyone in that roo