Killing Pretty (16 page)

I hold Candy in the dark for a ­couple of minutes. She's vibrating with animal rage, her body in the transition state between regular Candy and her Jade form. I've never seen a full-­on Jade with a gun, and I'm not sure I want to. Soon she calms down and folds up the pistol. I let go of her and we walk around to the front of the store. There are more than a dozen bullet holes in the walls, but not a single shot through the glass.

“Here's why,” Candy says.

Some clever boots has painted
ED
on the window, so the angel's tag now reads
KILLED
. Next to that is a squiggle that looks like a left-­handed monkey painted it with his right hand. But if I squint at it hard enough, I can make out the emblem of the White Light Legion. Turns out these guys might be murderous Nazi shitheads, but they'll need some community-­college art classes before they take over the world.

The paint is still wet, so Candy leans on my arm and smears out the letters and emblem with the sole of her boot.

When we get inside, Vincent, always the good guest, is soaking up the spilled whiskey with paper towels. The Colt is lying by the edge of the counter. I pick it up and put it back in my waistband.

Vincent stops wiping the floor and looks up.

“Was all that because of me?”

I look at him on the floor on his hands and knees, wet towels in one hand and a confused look on his face. I've never seen an angel so out of his element.

“I don't know. We ran into them the other night. It could be you, or it could be on us.”

“How did they find you?” says Kasabian. “I mean, am I going to have to crawl around the store like a goddamn schnauzer waiting for round two?”

“That's a good question,” says Candy. “How did they find us?”

“I turned on the car lights the other night. Maybe one of them saw the license plate.”

“That would lead them to Julie, not us.”

“Yeah, but they wouldn't be looking for her. They'd stake out her place and look for the two idiots that went after them.”

“Still, if they know where to find Julie, that's bad.”

“Call her,” I say. “And tell her to get out of there.”

“What are you going to be doing?”

“Nothing. I just want you to call. She'll be nicer to you when you tell her about her maybe getting shot.”

“She knows you attract trouble.”

“
We
do, sweetheart. We. It was a doubles act the other night, so you get to give her the good news.”

“Lucky me.”

Vincent pops a ­couple of his pain pills and dry-­swallows them. I can't say I blame him.

C
ANDY IS STILL
doing more computer research in the morning, so I go over to the office alone. Julie is pouring coffee when I get upstairs. She brings both mugs over to her desk. I sit down across from her and take the cup she pushes my way.

“Thanks.”

“Of course,” she says. “I thanked Chihiro for the call about the shooters. I slept with my Glock under my pillow last night.”

“You might make a habit of it for a while.”

“Trust me, I will.”

She takes a ­couple of sugar packets out of a desk drawer, shakes them, and dumps the contents into the mug.

“You sticking to coffee during working hours?” she says.

“Pretty much. The Augur offered me a drink on his boat. It seemed unwise to turn him down.”

She nods. Sips. Sets down the cup.

“That makes sense. This morning, Chihiro told me more about what happened last night.”

I pick up a paper clip from her desk. It's an odd shape. Round, the metal spiraling down to a point. I start unwinding it.

“I wish I could have gotten my hands on those White Light pricks.”

Julie says, “Has anyone ever talked to you about PTSD?”

“No. What's that?”

“Don't play coy. You know exactly what it is. In this case, it's you running after a carful of ­people with guns.”

I stop fiddling with the clip.

“At the time, I didn't know I was unarmed.”

“The point still stands. Your reactions aren't always those of a normal person.”

What the hell did Candy tell her? I go back to tormenting the paper clip.

“Exactly which normal part of my life are you talking about? The normal part where I spent eleven years in Hell? Or the normal part where my father told me I wasn't even a human being, right before he was murdered by an angel. Maybe it's the part where I live with a dead man's head and I have to beg for my cigarettes from the Devil. Or maybe it's how I can't even look at my girlfriend without seeing a stranger's face. Which of these normal things in my life are you referring to?”

Julie takes her coffee cup in her hands and leans on the desk.

“All I'm saying is that your fight-­or-­flight response is dialed up a little high and it's something you might want to look into.”

“You mean I need a shrink. No thanks.”

She takes a sip of her coffee.

“Aren't you going to drink yours? It'll get cold.”

I set down the paper clip and pick up the mug, but I don't drink.

“Consider this,” Julie says. “If you'd finished your psych evaluation forms when you worked for the Golden Vigil, they would have paid you what they owed and you'd be a wealthy man right now. But you didn't do it. I wonder why?”

“I don't know. Maybe I was busy saving the fucking world.”

“You're always saving something or killing something or chasing cars. You scare ­people, Stark. You scare your friends. You scare me sometimes. You scare Chihiro.”

I thought the two of them were talking about the case this morning. Is this what's going on behind my back?

I set down the mug.

“Thanks for your concern, and don't take this the wrong way, but there are two things in this world I don't respond well to: threats and interventions.”

“This is a conversation over coffee, not an intervention. And don't go looking for threats where there aren't any. That's exactly the kind of thing I'm talking about.”

The only thing worse than being threatened is being told you're not being threatened. No way I'm drinking my coffee. There could be Prozac in there or an evil Vigil feel-­good powder. I don't want some psych poison telling me how to think.

When I stay quiet, Julie says, “You're going to burn out and you won't be good for anyone, including yourself.”

“I handled the arena. I can handle this.”

“What about Chihiro? Do you think she's all right with you just handling things?”

“Did she say something to you or is this just coming out of your own skull?”

“Human beings are capable of doing more than just existing. They can be happy.”

I pick up the mangled paper clip from her desk and toss it in the trash can.

“But I'm not human, am I? I'm not a Hellion or an angel or a person. I'm not anything except maybe, as angels like to remind me, an Abomination. Try explaining that to a shrink.”

Julie picks up her mug, starts to take a sip, but sets it aside.

“All right. Let's forget this for now. I didn't mean to upset you. But you need to know that there are ­people worried about you and that they have your best interests at heart.”

“Noted. Now can we get back to work?”

“Of course.”

“You know all about these White Light clowns. Where are they and how are we going after them?”

Julie shakes her head.

“We're not going to, and when we do, I'll be the one doing the legwork. I don't want you running in cutting off any heads.”

“It gets ­people's attention.”

“Chihiro is doing some background work on the Legion for me. Right now that's more important than you skulking around, looking for revenge.”

“Just to be clear, as my boss, you're officially telling me not to go after them.”

“Yes.”

“Then what exactly am I supposed to do?”

Julie picks up a pen from a pad sitting next to her laptop. She taps it on the paper.

“I agree with you about looking into Tamerlan Radescu, but we have a problem. You're too well known to do it discreetly.”

“I'd say let Candy—­Chihiro—­do it, but ­people will have seen us together. If they know me, they'll know her.”

Julie looks away, thinking.

“I suppose I could call some old colleagues from the Vigil and see if they want any after-­hours work.”

“I have a better idea. Brigitte Bardo can do it. She's an actress, so she can look and sound like anything you want. Plus, she's a trained zombie hunter, so she can handle herself if there's any problems.”

Julie sits back in her chair.

“I don't know her that well. I'd have to interview her before I can agree to anything.”

“I'll call and get her over here today.”

“All right. Do that.”

“You know, one thing I could do is talk to some Cold Cases. They keep tabs on the dying and the recent dead. Maybe one of them has heard about some necromancer badassery.”

“That could be a good idea, but don't you have a history with the Cold Cases. Didn't one try to have you killed?”

I wave it off.

“Who hasn't tried to have me killed? We'll have a chat over tea and cakes. It will be fine.”

“Keep it civil. No fighting. No guns. At the first sign of trouble, you excuse yourself and report back to me.”

“Got it. I wonder if I should talk to some ghosts.”

Julie frowns.

“You can do that?”

“I don't see why not. I saw a witch do it at Max Overdrive. It didn't look all that hard.”

“Once again, I don't know if you're joking. But if that's something you can do, hearing from the dead might be helpful.”

“I know a ­couple that will probably talk to me. All it'll cost is some coffee and donuts. Maybe a sandwich.”

“Don't forget to get receipts.”

“Right. Receipts. Sure.”

“I'm serious—­if you want to get paid back I need paperwork.”

“No problem. I'm on it.”

Julie picks up her mug and takes a swig of coffee.

“Are we going to be all right working together?” she says. “You were pretty upset earlier and I need to know that it's not going to affect things.”

I touch the cigarettes in my pocket, wanting to get outside and have a smoke.

“We're fine. I'm sorry I flew off the handle. I know you were trying to help, and I'll take what you said under advisement.”

“Good.”

“I can head over to Bamboo House later and see if there are any Cold Cases around. And I'll call Brigitte.”

“Good. Chihiro and I have a meeting later. She's doing a great job.”

“She's a smart girl. Smarter than me.”

“I'll have to tell her you said so.”

“She already knows.”

I take off, stopping in the stairwell to light a Malediction.

Outside, I draw the smoke in and let it out slowly, pacing up and down the block, checking the parked cars. I don't see any Honda Civics, blue or otherwise. Anyway, most of the what's happening is on the sidewalk or in the street. Not many ­people hanging out in parked cars or loitering on the block. No one obviously casing Julie's office. I check the door to her building, making sure it locked behind me.

I think about Candy, but I call Brigitte and tell her to make time between auditions to come by the office. She sounds happy. I think I made her day.

At least someone in L.A. is happy.

“
A
LITTLE BIRD
told me you've been talking to Julie about me.”

Candy glances up, then back to the laptop. She reaches out and half closes it.

“Just about the other night.”

I dumped the Crown Vic a few blocks away on Hollywood Boulevard so I could walk off some anger.

“But you did it in secret. I thought we weren't supposed to have secrets.”

She shifts around on the sofa.

“Everyone has secrets.”

“You think there's something you can't tell me? You think I'm that shockable?”

She looks up at me, two sets of eyes—­Candy's and Chihiro's—­nervous and wounded.

“Don't make this into a bigger thing than it is. I only talked to her because she can say things to you I can't.”

“Like PTSD. Because you probably have it too after Doc Kinski and all the shit that went down at Christmas. Are there other things you haven't told me about?” I don't want to sound angry, but I am even if I'm not sure it's fair.

She shakes her head, the expression on her face changing.

“Nothing I want to talk about now.”

“But sometime.”

She puts her hands together and nods.

“Probably sometime.”

“I guess that's the best we can hope for in this life.”

“Don't be mad.”

“I'm not. Just defensively curious.”

“You still trust me?”

“Who else am I going to trust? Kasabian? He'd sell me for a dozen glazed if he thought he'd get his body back.”

“No, he wouldn't.”

“You don't know him like I do.”

“And you don't know him like
I
do.”

Downstairs, Kasabian and Vincent are watching
A Hard Day's Night
. Vincent was singing along when I came in through the store. The sound comes up through the floor. I want to choke him.

“This stuff you can't tell me . . . is it Jade stuff?”

“Some is. Some isn't.”

“So there's that much. Does this have anything to do with Rinko? She came by the other day, didn't she?”

“Yes.”

“Are you still in love with her?”

Candy leans back on the couch, crosses her arms.

“I was never in love with her. But if you're asking me the bigger question, yes, sometimes I miss dating women.”