The Killing Floor Blues (19 page)

The chest-height slot in my cell door slid open. Piggish eyes peered in at me, the guard’s face silhouetted by the light outside.

“You gotta be kidding me,” Jablonski said.

“Light just went out,” I said, crouching in the dark.

He shook his head. “You think I’m
that
stupid? Oh, sure, lemme just walk into a dark cell and get jumped. You think you’re the first con to try and pull that trick?”

“Wow,” I said. “Guess you’re just too smart for me.”

“Forget you. You can sit in the dark and rot. You’re gonna die tonight anyway.”

The slot slammed shut, bathing me in perfect darkness. I stayed crouched, counting down slow from twenty, making sure he wasn’t coming back. Then I felt my way around the cell. I’d trained myself with my eyes closed, rehearsing how to retrieve my hidden contraband by touch alone.

Showtime.

*     *     *

Jablonski came back a few hours later with another guard in tow.

“Come up to the door,” he barked through the slot. “Lace your hands behind your head. Warden says I can’t kill you, but I’ve got fifty thousand volts for your ass if you try anything stupid.”

I obliged. In fact, I all but jumped out to join them the second the door swung open.

“Hey, guys!” I gushed, beaming. “Is it time to fight now? Can I? Can I, huh?”

They both looked at me like I’d grown a second head, but I kept up the patter while Jablonski’s partner shackled me.

“C’mon, buddy,” I said, “hurry up, will ya? I’ve been looking forward to this all week. I’ve got some brand-new moves and everything!”

“Solitary,” Jablonski said to his buddy, twirling his finger next to his ear and rolling his eyes. I hummed the tune to “Eye of the Tiger” and bounced as we walked.

We paused halfway down the stairs as Jablonski corralled another guard. I recognized this one: Vasquez, one of the guards we’d taken hostage on our first escape attempt. From the scowl on his face, he recognized me too.

“Hey,” Jablonski said, “get up to cell four-forty-six and fix the light. This asshole smashed it.”

Vasquez put his hands on his hips. “So? Let him sit in the dark.”

“It ain’t
for
him. It’s for the next prisoner who gets put in there, after this guy bites it tonight.” Jablonski shot me a glare. “I’ve lost enough money on you already.”

“That’s because you bet against me last time.” I gave him a cheerful smile. “Don’t make that mistake tonight. I might just surprise you.”

A jaunty jazz tune rose up from the floor below as the piano and bass duo started to swing. We walked down the corrugated metal steps while waiters flitted from table to table and lit votive candles in ornate glass sconces. A tiny sea of pinprick lights at the edge of the killing floor. They’d rolled out the wet bar, and the first guests were already arriving, dressed for a five-star evening, arm in arm and sharing soft laughter.

I lined up with the other ragged-looking prisoners. A pair of socialites strolled past, sizing us up, discussing their brochures for the night’s festivities. They talked about us like you might talk about a horse in a race or a pedigree show dog. Not like human beings.

My hatred and my hunger became one, simmering in my gut. I wasn’t a man anymore. I was a shark on two legs, and I smelled blood.

“Warden,” I said as Lancaster strolled past. He paused in the middle of glad-handing one of his guests and came my way.

“Faust. Nice to see you made it five days without another escape attempt.”

I stared at his throat.

“Does that mean I get the chainsaw tonight?”

His brow furrowed. “You seem…eager.”

“Well,” I said, “I’ve had
all week
to think about killing someone. I can’t wait. Put me in the first fight?”

He took a half step back. He knew something was wrong, I could see it in his eyes, but he didn’t have a clue what it was or where to start looking.

“Maybe,” he said and turned on his heel. More new arrivals to greet.

The seats filled in, and the champagne flowed. I stared into the crowd, marking faces, burning the ones I didn’t recognize from television or the news into my memory. All the while, a hot and nervous tingle grew in the pit of my stomach. It was the anticipation of violence, the feeling of staring down a cocked fist or a loaded gun. That queasy sensation that came from knowing blood was about to spill.

Lights from the guard tower strobed behind the smoky glass, signaling it was time to begin. The sound system crackled and hummed as Lancaster took up his microphone.

“Ladies, gentlemen, welcome! We have a great show for you tonight. A banquet of thrills and excitement you just can’t get anywhere else. Well…anywhere
legal
, anyway.”

He paused, wrapped in a smug smile, as the audience tittered. Then he gestured toward me. Jablonski grabbed my shoulder, tugging me out in front of the crowd. Behind us, waiters rolled the weapon racks into place, teasing the crowd with promises of the carnage to come.

“Our first fighter tonight,” Lancaster said, “is last week’s returning long shot, Daniel Faust. Can this one-time winner beat the odds and survive another night on the killing floor?”

Jablonski unlocked my shackles. I slowly flexed my freed wrists, staring him in the eye. As applause rippled through the room, Lancaster cupped his palm over his microphone and leaned in to murmur in my ear.

“You just remember, son: I’ve got two men up in that tower, ready and willing to put a high-velocity round right through you. Don’t try anything dumb. Give us a good show and you
might
live another week or two.”

He started to move away, thought about it, and leaned in once more.

“And if by some remote chance you actually win this match? Do me a favor: make the kill good and messy this time. That’s what these people paid to see.”

“That’s a promise,” I told him.

Jablonski walked over to fetch my opponent from the lineup, while the warden strolled back and forth in front of the crowd.

“If you thought last week was a one-sided matchup, you ain’t seen nothing yet. Let’s meet Faust’s opponent. He’s racked up a legendary five wins, and that’s nothing compared to his kill count before he came to—”

“I’ve got an announcement to make,” I called out.

Lancaster paused, almost stumbling as I threw him off his patter. He glared over his shoulder at me.

“Hey, it’s good news,” I told him, then turned to the crowd. “The warden’s right. It’s going to be a great show tonight. Let me ask you people, do you like violence?”

A scattering of catcalls. So many eager, smiling faces in the candlelight. I grinned and spread my arms, playing the showman.

“I knew it. And how about blood? Do you like
blood?
”

Applause now, and someone in the back hooted. Lancaster held the microphone, mute, as if he wasn’t sure if he should interrupt me or not.

“I can’t hear you, people! Make some noise if you want a good show. How about
death?
Do you wanna see lots and
lots
of death tonight?”

I took in the applause, the hollering, the hammering feet, basking in it.

Then my arm shot up, pointing one finger to the ceiling.

The guard-tower window exploded.

A man plummeted from the tower, slamming on the concrete floor behind me with a
splat
like someone stomping on a tomato. He’d been torn open from throat to groin, his chest a ragged ruin of splintered, wrenched-back ribs and mangled organs. His dead eyes were still open, jaw wrenched wide in terror.

Then came the rain. The second sniper, one piece at a time. Hands. Feet. Arms, wrenched off at the elbows. His severed head bounced like a basketball as it hit the concrete, rolling across the floor and coming to a stop next to Warden Lancaster’s Italian leather shoe.

A horrified silence fell across the room. The guards looked at one another, uncertain, hands on their guns but not sure if they should draw. Lancaster stared down at the severed head, frozen like a deer in the headlights.

“Well,” I said, “you’re about to get everything you asked for. What do you think, Warden? Is this good and messy enough for you? Wouldn’t want you to think I ‘pussied out’ again.”

His gaze snapped toward me. He took a halting step back, away from the carnage. “How? How did you—”

A third body dove from the shattered window. Not in a guard’s uniform, but a billowing white leather coat. She landed as graceful as a raptor, absorbing the impact with one knee and the outstretched fingers of a single hand, and slowly rose to her full willowy height. Her eyes blazed like molten copper, as radiant as her twist of scarlet hair.

“If anyone in this room believes themselves to be a righteous soul,” Caitlin said, “I suggest you kneel down and pray. If nobody answers…then you belong to
me
.”

Hours earlier, alone in the dark, I had set about my work.

I needed candles, and cigarettes wouldn’t do this time. So I crafted my own. The disposable yogurt cups made a fine substitute; instead of wax, I filled each one—five in all—with baby oil. Lengths of oil-dipped twine made crude but workable wicks, and I carefully replaced the plastic cups’ foil covers before punching a tiny hole and running the twine down the middle.

I didn’t have matches or a lighter, but I had a little steel wool from the kitchens and a nine-volt battery. I knelt down on the cold cell floor, rubbing the wool against the battery’s terminals like a Boy Scout trying to make fire with sticks. The steel wool glowed Halloween orange in the dark. With a spark, the first candlewick caught fire.

Soon there were five dancing lights, the candles laid out on the floor of my cell in the shape of a five-pointed star. Next came the salt, poured in a thin but unbroken circle. I painted glyphs in salt, twisted signs and seals I knew by heart.

“I invoke and conjure you by sigil and name,” I whispered. “I conjure by the ministers of the Tartarean seat, by fallen powers and principalities, by broken thrones and dominions. I speak with the authority of the kings in the outer dark. My words will be heard; my words will be heeded.”

The circle and seals glowed in my second sight, rippling with a cold blue fire. I extended a finger over the salt, gripping the razor blade in my other hand. One quick shallow slice, one jolt of burning pain, and my fingertip turned scarlet. Blood dripped down, slow and steady, splashing onto the concrete.

“The elements are overthrown,” I hissed, rocking forward and back on my knees as my blood fed the hungry magic. “The air is fire; the sea is dust. At the end of all things, I call to you. In the last of all places, I call to you. I conjure you by your name:
Caitlleanabruadi!
”

The air erupted in a silent shock wave that hit me like a fist, knocking me flat. It was a sonic boom with no sound, a blinding flash of hot black light that killed the flickering candles. I sat up, rubbing my eyes.

In the center of the bloody circle, a figure rose. Slowly melting up from the floor, it twisted and writhed in the shadows. I made out arms ending in clutching iron claws. The horns of a ram. A guttural voice boomed from the dark.

“
Who has disturbed my slumber?
”

I had just enough time to panic, to realize I’d botched the ritual somehow, before the figure launched itself at me.

I blinked, lying sprawled on my back. Caitlin perched on top of me, human, grinning. She rubbed the tip of her nose against mine.

“Gotcha,” she said.

Then she kissed me, long and slow, the pounding drumbeat of my heart melting from anxiety to raw heat.

“I’m looking for a damsel in distress,” she said. “Seen any around?”

I wriggled my fingers. “Right here.”

She took my hand, her warm fingers twining around mine, and pulled me up.

“I have to say,” she observed, “I’ve been summoned under strange circumstances…but I’ve never been
tactically
summoned.”

“I wish you could do that to me. Would have made breaking out of here so much easier.”

My hands slid around the slick waist of her white leather coat. One of hers closed on my shoulder, the other stroking the back of my neck as she pulled me close.

“True,” she murmured in my ear, “but this way is much more fun. So what are we up against? Bentley just gave me the abridged version. And Naavarasi’s been leaving voicemails for me, crowing about how you owe her a favor. That doesn’t please me.”

“The feeling’s mutual. Long story short, the warden and his staff are lining their pockets by running gladiator games for the amusement of the idle rich, and I’m on tonight’s fight ticket.”

“Hrm. Think I would have known about something like this happening in my father’s territory. None of my kind are involved?”

I shook my head. “Nope, and I haven’t picked up on a glimmer of magical power. No demons, no mages, just garden-variety criminals with big ambitions. And big guns, including a sniper’s nest or two. They won’t go down without a fight.”

“If they did, I’d be bored. But how did this happen in the first place? Bentley and Corman barely made sense. You were arrested the night I left, but everyone thought you were in prison for months?”

“That’s where it gets complicated,” I said. “The Chicago Outfit got me arrested in the first place; it’s a frame job, to get me out of the way while they make their bid for Vegas.”

“I heard.” She frowned. “Nicky’s a fugitive, and nobody’s seen the twins either…not that anybody is looking for them. We’ve all been searching for Jennifer, but nobody has any idea where she’s gone.”

“I know, I think she’s in big trouble. There’s a guy in here, a Calles banger named Raymundo—I think he knows where she is, but he wouldn’t tell me.”

“No worries,” she said. “He
will
tell me.”

I held her, keeping her close, savoring every second of her warmth and the scent of her musky perfume. Her eyes glowed faintly in the dark, swirling with motes of copper light.

“Anyway,” I said, “the Outfit’s not our biggest problem.”

I walked her through it, from the curse that left everyone with memories of a trial that never happened, to my hallucination in Buddy’s cell of a ravaged Las Vegas.

“So this Fleiss woman…” Caitlin’s voice trailed off as she thought it over.

“She orchestrated it for her boss: this ‘Enemy,’ the man with the Cheshire smile, whoever he is.
Whatever
he is. As far as I can tell, this scam wasn’t about me at all. They just needed a patsy who they could swap into the ‘Thief’s’ place, so someone else would die in here instead of him. I was on their radar because I’d just pulled that heist in Chicago for them. Once they heard I’d been arrested, well, you couldn’t ask for a better stooge. They needed somebody behind bars, and there I was.”

“They rewrote people’s memories on a massive scale, Daniel. Like some sort of…mental contagion. I don’t know anyone who can
do
that.” Her voice, already soft, dropped to a whisper. “I don’t even think my
father
can do that.”

“And it sounds like they’re just getting warmed up. At least I got Buddy out of here. If he can deliver his message to the right person, they’ve got a shot at stopping whatever the Enemy’s got planned.” I shook my head. “His twin sister told me I shouldn’t get in the way. Seems I’m not ‘the chosen one,’ so I don’t have a chance of standing up to this guy.”

Caitlin’s fingertips trailed along the nape of my neck. She studied me, eyes glittering.

“Oh? And what do
you
say?”

“Sweetheart, in the last two weeks I’ve been abducted, cut off from everyone I love, and left to rot in a prison cell. I’ve been beaten, tortured, starved, and I’ve got bruises in places I didn’t think you could
get
bruises, all so the Enemy could hand somebody a get-out-of-jail-free card.”

I leaned in. Our lips brushed. As I pulled away, her rising smile mirrored my own.

“
Fuck
being the chosen one,” I said. “I say we track this asshole down and wreck his world.”

“The Enemy,” Caitlin mused. “He chose his name well. If he intends to wreak destruction upon my prince’s territory—
my
territory—then he’s made himself an enemy of humanity and hell alike. We should teach him the consequences of hubris.”

“Good idea. Let’s rescue Jennifer, push the Outfit out of Vegas, and then we can go hunting.”

Caitlin glanced back toward the cell door.

“First, though,” she said, “we do have the slight matter of your escape to attend to. Which reminds me: Bentley sent along a present for you.”

She held up a deck of cards. Cherry-red Bicycle dragon backs, my usual brand, glistening with enchantment and the residue of exotic oils. I opened my palm. The cards leaped through the air in a stream, riffling into my hand, eager to play.

I slipped the deck up my sleeve.

“Perfect,” I said. “Bentley and Corman should be on their way with a getaway van. I don’t see any way of slipping out of here quietly, so assume we’ll be setting off a few alarms on our way out. That means we’ll have to deal with roadblocks on I-80. Don’t worry, I’ve got a plan for that. Think you can take care of our sniper problem?”

She cracked her knuckles and smiled.

“Just one thing,” I said, “Warden Lancaster.
Don’t
kill him. I assume he’ll run for it when the blood starts to spill, and that’s good. Let him think he got away.”

“
Don’t
kill him?” she echoed. “Why on earth not?”

In the dark, I stared grimly over Caitlin’s shoulder. Toward the door.

“Because I’ve got a plan for him, too. And he’s not getting off that easy.”