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Hollywood Dead
Richard Kadrey


Life and death takes on an entirely new meaning for half-angel, half-human hero James Stark, aka, Sandman Slim, in this insanely inventive, high-intensity tenth supernatural noir thriller in the New York Times bestselling series.James Stark is back from Hell, trailing more trouble in his wake. To return to LA, he had to make a deal with the evil power brokers, Wormwood – an arrangement that came with a catch. While he may be home, Stark isn’t quite himself…because he’s only partially alive.There’s a time limit on his reanimated body, and unless Stark can find the people targeting Wormwood, he will die again – and this time there will be no coming back. Even though he’s armed with the Room of Thirteen Doors, Stark knows he can’t find Wormwood’s enemies alone. To succeed he’s got to enlist the help of new friends – plus a few unexpected old faces.Stark has been in dangerous situations before – you don’t get named Sandman Slim for nothing. But with a mysterious enemy on the loose, a debt to pay, and a clock ticking down, this may truly be the beginning of his end…























Copyright (#ud9bab7d0-e025-5327-a862-e57093c196aa)


HarperVoyager

Published by HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd

1 London Bridge Street

London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk (http://www.harpercollins.co.uk)

First published in Great Britain by HarperCollinsPublishers 2018

Copyright © Richard Kadrey 2018

Cover layout design © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2018

Designed by Crush Creative (www.crushed.co.uk (http://www.crushed.co.uk))

Richard Kadrey asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

Source ISBN: 9780008219093

Ebook Edition © July 2018 ISBN: 9780008219109

Version: 2018-07-12




Dedication (#ud9bab7d0-e025-5327-a862-e57093c196aa)


Sandman Slim wouldn’t exist without the music that inspires me and keeps me writing. This book is for Lustmord, Klaus Schulze, Bohren and Der Club of Gore, (early) Tangerine Dream, and Nine Inch Nails.




Epigraph (#ud9bab7d0-e025-5327-a862-e57093c196aa)


Life being what it is, one dreams of revenge – and has to content oneself with dreaming.

—Paul Gauguin

So much time and so little to do. Wait a minute. Strike that. Reverse it. Thank you.

—Roald Dahl, Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory


Contents

Cover (#uc73d56fb-5e6e-5e03-8f6f-d077b97bfa3c)

Title Page (#u3df4b6e3-795f-59fa-956c-d6808c29aafc)

Copyright

Dedication

Epigraph

Hollywood Dead (#ud2618545-5dca-5434-8b57-3b1b010f5ed0)

Acknowledgements

About the Author (#litres_trial_promo)

By Richard Kadrey

About the Publisher


THERE’S DEAD AND there’s Hollywood dead, and those are two very different things.

Dead is just dead. In the ground. Pennies on your eyes. A cold slab of meat with no slaw and definitely no dessert.

But Hollywood dead? That can be a lot of things. Yeah, you’re still a slab of meat, but now you come with curly fries and hot apple pie.

Hollywood dead is movie dead. When the director yells “cut” you get up and have a donut, and someone makes sure your hair is perfect. When you’re Hollywood dead you can die a hundred times and still come back for the sequel.

Hollywood dead is the dead everybody thinks they want because nothing is final, everything is negotiable, and you’ll even get a producer credit if you keep your mouth shut and do what you’re told. That last is the hard part. When you’re Hollywood dead it’s hard to sit still and take orders. Hollywood dead is party dead and you never want to hear last call. Hollywood dead is the best kind of dead and the worst.

Hollywood dead means you can go to the movies and have a smoke, but if you’re out in the sun too long you start to rot and stink. Hollywood dead makes you very careful about cuts and scratches because you don’t exactly heal anymore.

Hollywood dead gets you thinking about making everyone else regular dead. The good news is that if you’re lucky and you play your cards right, you might just get the chance to do it.

DON’T LET ANYONE tell you that shooting a gun in a bowling alley isn’t loud. It’s very loud. Incredibly damn loud. The noise bounces off the smooth paneled walls and rattles every nerve in your skull. Of course, everything down here under the mansion is soundproof, so my target practice doesn’t bother anyone else. But I should have brought some earplugs. The tissues I jammed in my ears are pretty undignified and I don’t have a lot of dignity left to spare. I mean, I was dead and now I’m alive, but I’m still sort of dead. Not pork-chop-dropped-in-a-parking-lot dead, but dead enough that Tinder is out of the question. That’s why I’m shooting the shit out of Eva Sandoval’s bowling alley.

There’s something very satisfying about seeing bowling pins explode when they’re hit with a .45 slug. But I’m annoyed with myself. I left an open frame on the right lane, only killing nine out of the ten. And yet that’s still better than the seven-six-ten split I left on the other lane. I need to practice. My body hasn’t moved in a year and I have to get it back in shape. Whatever Wormwood has planned for me, I’m definitely going to get punched and I’d like to be able to hit back harder than a marshmallow Peep.

Sandoval and her entourage come in while I’m reloading. She frowns and her lackeys cluster in back of her like confused ducklings. I’m not exactly sure why. I mean, I’m working for them. Maybe seeing a corpse loading a Colt .45 wasn’t in their day planner.

I say, “Take it up with HR.”

“Take up what?” says Sandoval.

“Whatever is bothering your Mouseketeers. They look like they just saw Lemmy’s ghost.”

When I’m done reloading, I hit a button and an arm slides out of the back of the bowling lane on the left, sweeps away the debris, and loads another ten pins in place. I raise the Colt and cock it, sighting on the one pin. But Sandoval walks over, puts her hand on the pistol, and lowers it.

“Exactly what are you doing?” she says.

“Target practice. I need to get my eye back.”

She looks around the alley.

“My grandfather built this. My father updated it, and I use it with guests.”

“Sounds great.” I raise the Colt and fire. The one pin explodes. Everybody except Sandoval cringes.

I say, “I’m a guest.”

“You’re an employee.”

“Independent contractor, if you want to get technical.”

I raise the Colt and she pushes it down again.

“If you needed weapons practice you should have told me. I would have arranged something less deranged.”

“I thought deranged was why you wanted me. Otherwise you could have hired any number of local knuckle draggers.” I smile at the people behind her.

“What I want is for you to have a basic modicum of self-control and sense of responsibility. If you can’t do that, we should part ways and void your contract right now.”

Ouch. She got me where it hurts.

“Anything else?”

“Yes,” she says, leaning in close to my ear. “I don’t like being fucked with.”

I give her a smile and slip the Colt into my waistband at my back.

“See, now we’re speaking the same language. Okay. You can have your alley back. If you give me your granddad’s name, I’ll write him an apology note. I’ve got connections in Hell, you know. They’ll get it right to him.”

She probes a shattered bit of bowling pin with the toe of her designer pump, clearly biting down what I’m sure is a clever retort.

“If you’re through playing the idiot, let’s go upstairs and talk business.”

“Sure. But remember. I might be an idiot, but you’re the idiot who hired me. You have to expect a certain amount of breakage.”

Sandoval looks me up and down and says, “And put a glove on that grotesque hand. It makes me sick.”

I flex my prosthetic left hand. I can’t argue with her on the ugly part. The hand was a present from a monster. Really, my whole left arm looks like something that belongs on a mechanical insect. It’s still good at giving the finger, but I restrain myself now.

While I slip on my glove, she leaves with her entouragein tow. I give them a few seconds before leaving the bowling alley. I might be an idiot, but I know they need time to cool down. Just like I know I have to keep pushing them. If they get pissed or flustered enough, they might drop some useful piece of information. But I can’t go too far too fast. Sandoval could have their necromancer pull the plug on me and I’d be right back in Hell with no body and a pack of new enemies. I’ve got to play this right. Dance around the edges of being a complete asshole.

The problem is, I’m not the best dancer.

On my way out, I flick off the bowling alley lights. Too bad they found me. I kind of like it down here. Especially the soundproofing. It would be a good place to play the monster and slap the shit out of one of them until they told me what’s really going on.

I MEET UP with them in Sandoval’s office, where I woke up yesterday. It’s a nice room. Nice furniture covered in pretty silks and leather. A nice pool table. A nice TV the size of Kansas. It’s all so fucking nice it’s like a museum. I halfway expect a stuffed grizzly bear and maybe some wax Neanderthals in the corner. No such luck. It’s the same six assholes I’ve been staring at since I got back.

Sandoval is the boss, that much is clear. Black hair, a deep tan, and a dress cut low enough that you could autopsy her and never touch the edges. She’s pretty, she knows it, and she isn’t above using it. It’s tedious just looking at her.

“I take it that you’re feeling better today,” says Sandoval.

I glance at the other idiots in the room.

“Better is a relative thing. I feel better than dead, so, yeah, I guess I’m feeling swell.”

“It looks like your motor functions are coming back, too. That’s good. You’re going to need them,” says Barron Sinclair. He’s the only other one who talks much. He’s heavyset. Long gray hair and perfect little beard. He’s one of those guys born with an old face. He could be fifty or seventy. He’s also sick. I can smell the drugs in his system. Metallic and bitter as lemons. Sinclair tries to look calm, but he’s scared. Whatever he has, it must be bad if he can’t find any magicians who can cure it. He’s worried about what’s waiting for him in Hell, especially since I wiped out Wormwood down there. Good. That’s more incentive for him to want me alive.

“Eva keeps telling me that, but she won’t say what I’ll need them for.”

“That’s what this meeting is about. I think you’re coherent enough to discuss your mission,” she says.

I look at her.

“My mission? That sounds so noble. Am I going to rescue your kitten from a tree?”

“Not quite,” she says, shooting me a feral smile. “You’re going to kill someone.”

“Probably a lot of people,” says Sinclair.

“That’s what I figured. Who’s the lucky guy or gal?”

She points to one of the other cockroaches that follow her around. A young, cocky guy with a face built for punching.

“Roger here can give you the details. Roger?” says Sandoval.

I hold up a hand as Roger opens his mean little mouth. He closes it again.

“Is Roger going to be giving me orders? Are any of these other idiots?”

Sandoval crosses her arms.

“I suppose not.”

“Can any of them help me stay in my body?”

“No.”

“Then fuck ’em.”

Roger and the other roaches’ heartbeats spike. I smell sweat. Roger starts to open his mouth again. I raise the Colt and point it at his stupid face.

“Hush, Roger. Grown-ups are talking.”

He clamps his mouth shut. I put the Colt in my waistband at my back. Okay. Enough of that stuff for now. Everyone is nice and rattled. Let’s see if someone says something interesting.

Sandoval stares at me, wondering if she made a huge mistake. When she doesn’t say anything, Sinclair steps forward.

“It’s not exactly a hit,” he says. “Though I suspect there will be a considerable number of casualties. What we need you to do is stop an event.”

He coughs wetly and wipes his mouth with a monogrammed hankie. When he’s done I say, “What kind of event?”

“Stupendous,” says Sandoval. “Cataclysmic.”

“Can you narrow that down a little?”

“No. All you need to know is that something awful will happen on Sunday unless you stop it.”

“And if I do I get put back in my body for good, completely alive?”

She raises her eyebrows a fraction of an inch, even as she says, “That’s the deal.”

The silk slippers they gave me are absurdly comfortable. I wiggle my toes in them, telling myself that this pack of jackals is going to keep its end of the bargain.

“I’d still like to know what kind of event.”

“I told you. No.”

“You see, it would help to know what I’m walking into. Am I knocking over a quinceañera or stopping a nuke launch? You get my meaning? It’s about preparations, appropriate tools, and my general attitude.”

“Maybe we should tell him,” says Sinclair.

“No,” says Sandoval. “It’s a trick.”

I look at Sinclair, then back at Sandoval.

“I know it has to do with the Wormwood bunch that broke away and opened their own lemonade stand without you.”

“No,” says Sandoval. “You do what we say and you get your body back. That’s all you need to know.”

I don’t say anything long enough for the room to get uncomfortable. Sandoval gives me the stink eye and I give it right back.

“I think we should tell him,” says Sinclair.

Eva shakes her head.

“No.”

I wait, wiggling my toes. Not saying a word.

Finally, Sinclair blurts, “It’s a ritual. A magic ritual.”

Sandoval whirls around and slaps him hard enough to leave a mark on his cheek.

I say, “What kind of ritual?”

Sandoval stares at Sinclair, breathing hard. Sinclair touches his face where she hit him. Despite things, he says, “When you joked about a nuclear launch you were closer than you realize.”

“The other Wormwood has a bomb?”

“They might as well have,” says Sandoval. She turns from Sinclair and looks at me. “The splinter faction are in possession of a ritual that will utterly destroy Los Angeles.”

Sinclair says, “It will trigger similar destruction all over the world. Berlin. Tokyo. Sydney. Anywhere we, the true Wormwood, are concentrated.”

“They hope to wipe us out in one massive action,” Sandoval says.

I listen to their hearts. Check the microtremors on their faces. They’re telling the truth.

Well … fuck.

I say, “With all due respect to Berlin, Tokyo, and wherever the fuck else, I don’t care. Let’s talk about L.A.”

“They’re out to destroy our entire infrastructure,” says Sinclair.

Sandoval says, “Then they can pick off the stragglers one by one.”

I look over at the roaches.

“Any of you have a cigarette?”

“There’s no smoking in the house,” says Sandoval.

“I wouldn’t think it matters, seeing as how you’re all going to die.”

“What do you mean?” says Sinclair. “You won’t take the job?”

“Not if you keep lying to me.”

He frowns.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean you’re Wormwood. Why do you need a dead man to do your dirty work? You’re global and yet you can’t find one single asshole who can handle this job for you?”

“I think you might overestimate us at the moment,” says Sandoval quietly.

“The other faction took many of our best and brightest,” says Sinclair. “Or killed them.”

“Besides, you have a unique set of skills,” Sandoval says.

It’s making more sense now.

“That’s why you gave me back the Room of Thirteen Doors. You don’t just need someone who can stop the ritual. You need someone who can get to it.”

“Exactly.”

“That means you don’t know where it will happen.”

“Correct.”

“But you’re absolutely sure it will happen Sunday.”

“On the new moon, yes,” says Sinclair.

I look at them both. They’re still telling the truth.

“What day is it now?”

“Wednesday evening.”

“Wednesday? Why didn’t you bring me back sooner?”

“You don’t just snatch a soul from the afterlife willy-nilly,” says Jonathan Howard, their necromancer. “It needs to happen at the right time.”

He’s taller than me. British, with wire-rim glasses. He carries the weird smell of death that all necromancers have. Rotting flesh. Nasty hoodoo potions. They try to cover it up with cologne, but that just makes it worse.

I walk over to him.

“What about fixing my body? Does that need to happen at some super-special time too?”

He leans back from me a little.

“No. That can happen anytime.”

“You sure?”

“Completely.”

I pat him on the arm.

“You better be, Johnny, ’cause I’m not going back to Hell alone.”

I turn back to Sandoval.

“Let’s hit the fucking road. Where do we go? Who do I kill first?”

“I have no idea,” she says. “We thought we’d leave that up to you. You seem to have a knack for these things.”

I look at Sinclair.

“Is she serious? You don’t have a where or a who?”

“I’m afraid not.”

“Okay. How do you contact the faction? A phone number. A name.”

“They’ve hidden themselves well. We don’t have anything.”

“Fuck.”

I look over at the roaches. They’re no help. Not a flicker of intelligence anywhere in the bunch.

“Here I was expecting Lex Luthor and what I get is a bunch of runaways picking pockets at the bus station.”

Sandoval looks at her watch.

“The clock is ticking, Stark. Your body is already starting to break down.”

“A cigarette would really help me think.”

“Tick-tock,” she says.

I take a breath and lean back on the pool table.

“Then we have to make them come to us,” I say. “Make them think you have something they want so they’ll come after it. Maybe a counter-spell that can blow up their ritual. Now, here’s the hard part. Someone’s got to take that fake spell and stroll out of here with it. Let themselves get kidnapped, then bring one of them back here for questioning. Any volunteers?”

I glance around the room knowing the answer but hoping Roger might be enough of a suck-up that he’ll raise his hand.

No such luck.

“I think you win the coin toss, Stark,” says Sandoval.

“I had a feeling I would. I wish you’d told me all this earlier in the day. I can’t really get started until tomorrow, Thursday. That’s cutting things close.”

“I told you. We couldn’t bring you back any sooner,” says Howard.

“You’re lucky you brought me back at all. I was one hot second from being double dead.”

Howard frowns.

“Dying in Heaven?”

“Being murdered, technically.”

“You do find trouble everywhere,” says Sandoval.

“I was just looking for the buffet line.”

“Is there anything we can do to get started now?” says Sinclair. There’s the slightest edge to his voice. He doesn’t like all this chitchat. Yeah, he’s scared, but he knows something he’s not telling me. Probably what’s really going on. I believe that these creeps don’t want to get blown to rags, but I wonder what they do want. I’ll put beating information from Sinclair on my to-do list for tomorrow. For now, I just talk to him.

“Do you have a rat in your organization? Don’t answer. It was a rhetorical question. For things to be this out of control, of course you do.”

“They’re worse than you think,” says Sinclair.

“What do you mean?”

“Assassinations,” says Sandoval. “Slow, but steady.”

Sinclair chimes in.

“Mostly the heads of other offices. Pieter Holden in Vienna was first.”

Sandoval holds up one finger, then two.

“Megan Bradbury in Chicago and Franz Landschoff in Cairo are the most recent.”

I look over at the roaches, then back to them.

“You’re sure it’s the faction doing it?”

“There’s no question,” Sandoval says.

“Not just a rat then. A great big rat.” I go to Sandoval and stage-whisper, “Eva, do you think it’s one of these assholes?”

She looks over at her mute bugs.

“Don’t worry,” she says. “I trust all of these people with my life.”

“Good. ’Cause if it’s one of them, we’re completely fucked.”

“What’s your idea?” says Sinclair.

“Put the word out to all of your people. A courier is taking something life-or-death important across town tomorrow afternoon. Make it to one of your other offices.”

“You think the faction will try to intercept the courier?”

“They better or you can relax and eat finger sandwiches until they blow your asses up.”

“And you with us,” says Sandoval. “I take it that you’re going to play the courier?”

“Since none of you stepped up, I guess so.”

She looks at the roaches.

“All right. You know what to do. Spread the word about the courier to all of your subordinates.”

“Make sure they know I’m the only thing between their ass and the next coal cart to Hell,” I add.

“Go,” says Sandoval. “Start making calls.”

I hold up a hand.

“Not yet.”

Everyone looks at me.

“If someone doesn’t give me a cigarette, the deal is off.”

Roger reaches into his jacket and tosses me a pack of Shermans.

“Got a lighter?” I say.

“I thought you were Mr. Magic. Light it your-fucking-self,” he says.

“Thanks, Rog. You’re a pip.”

They all file out.

“We’ll be working tonight, Stark. What will you do to occupy yourself?” says Sandoval. “And keep in mind that you’re barred from the bowling alley.”

“Then I’m going out.”

“Where?”

“Out. I want to smoke. I want to see things. I want to have a drink with people I don’t hate.”

She doesn’t believe me.

“Calm down, Eva. Where am I going to go? I’m in hock to you. I’ll be back in a couple of hours. Just make sure your cherubs do their jobs.”

She checks her watch and says, “Two hours.”

“I’m going to need some money.”

“Why?”

“Unless things have changed in the past year, liquor isn’t free.”

She stares at me.

“I don’t carry cash.”

“Of course you don’t, your highness.”

I look at Sinclair.

“How about you? You too good to touch filthy lucre?”

He pulls a wad from his pocket enclosed in a gold money clip. Peels off a twenty.

“Don’t fuck with me.”

He peels off another.

“Keep going. I tip big.”

I stop him at a hundred dollars. He holds the bills out like I might bite his hand off. It’s tempting.

I walk to a shadow and put the bills in my pocket.

“Don’t wait up.”

“I don’t want you coming back drunk,” says Sandoval.

“Don’t worry. I’ll look pretty for class pictures tomorrow.”

One more step and the shadow swallows me.

I know those two are going to fuck me over, but I don’t know how, and until I do I’m going to have to dance their dance, take my lumps, and smile the whole time. Howardis the one I need to keep an eye on. The necromancer is the Blue Fairy to my Pinocchio and I want to be a real boy again. If things go sideways, the others can fry. Howard though? I won’t let anyone touch a hair on his stinking head.

I step out of the shadow onto Hollywood Boulevard a few blocks west of Las Palmas and Maximum Overdrive, the video store where I live. Or used to. Who knows now? Up ahead, Donut Universe shines like the Virgin Mary doing barrel rolls over Lourdes, so I head over.

BEFORE I GO inside there’s the matter of Roger’s cigarette. There’s no one on the street I can bum a light from, which leaves me with one option. I put the smoke in my mouth and cup my hands around it. Whisper some Hellion hoodoo. A small flame flickers up from my palm, just big enough for me to spark the cigarette. It’s a relief, and I don’t mean just getting to smoke. I haven’t done any hoodoo since coming back and I didn’t want Sandoval and Sinclair to see me in case I blew it. Now I want to try something bigger, but what I’m best at is breaking things, so I’ll wait until there’s something I want to see in pieces.

The Sherman is a decent smoke in its own way, but it doesn’t have the bite of a Malediction, the most popular cigarette in Hell. I had a whole box stashed upstairs at Max Overdrive. Wonder if they’re still there. More important, I wonder if I should even go near the place again. What if I run into Candy? The last time she saw me, I was dying with a knife in my back. I’ve been gone a year. What’s her life like now? A year is long enough to move past whatever grief she might have felt back then. The good news is that I saw her outside Max Overdrive the night I came back from Hell, so I know she and the store are still around.

The truth is, I want to run inside and see her right now. But what if things don’t work out with Wormwood? It’s almost Thursday and I could be gone again by Sunday. Is it fair to stumble back into her life when I could just as easily stumble out again? The answer is simple. Seeing her now wouldn’t even be close to fair. So, for the moment I’ll keep to myself and see how this insane fucking situation plays out. It’s a lonely feeling, but I’m almost used to that.

What’s really getting to me is that as much as I missed her in Hell, it’s a hundred times worse being back. My perfect, beautiful monster. During my last look at her she was in her Jade form, tearing Audsley Ishii apart. That’s how you know someone really likes you. Anyone can give you chocolate and flowers, but when they’ll disembowel someone for you? That’s true love.

I crush the Sherman under my heel and go inside Donut Universe.

The smell that hits me is almost overwhelming. Familiar and alien at the same time. Hellion food tastes like what a butcher shop throws in the trash and then a hobo sleeps on it for a couple of days. But what’s on the shelves in this shop …

If I have to die again, let it be in Donut Universe. Bury me in old-fashioneds and éclairs. Burn me in the parking lot and let me drift up to Valhalla on a wave of holy sugar and grease fumes.

When it’s my turn, I step up to the counter, where a pretty young woman asks me what I want. Like the rest of the Donut Universe staff, she wears little antennae with silver balls on the end. The balls bop gently as she speaks. My friend Cindil wore antennae like that when she worked here. Back before she was murdered. I can’t ever come in here without thinking of her. But I brought her back from Hell and now she has a pretty decent new life. She even plays drums in Candy’s terrible band. Or she did a year ago. Where is she now?

Goddammit. Memory is such a bastard when you don’t know if any of it’s true anymore. Candy. Cindil. Max Overdrive. L.A. That’s hard to lose and maybe harder to get back when you don’t know if you can keep it.

“Sir?” says the antennae girl. “Do you want a donut?”

Fuck me. How long have I been standing here? I can’t even interact with actual humans without looking like a lunatic. Take two.

“I’ll have an apple fritter and a cup of coffee.”

She rings them up and tells me the price. I hand her one of the twenties and when she tries to give me change I say, “Keep it. I’m just happy to be back here.”

She smiles and says, “Welcome back,” like she means it, and it kind of breaks my heart. She’s nice. I forgot what that’s like. I try to smile back at her, but I’m not sure I’m getting it right. I mean, my face does something. Whether it’s a smile or not is up to her.

The good news is that when she brings me my order she doesn’t pepper-spray me. That’s a beginning. I feel like a kid on his first date, proud he didn’t spill whiskey on his girlfriend’s dress or puke on her when he drank too much.

“Come back soon,” she says as I pick up my stuff.

“If I’m still alive next week, I’ll buy out the whole damn store.”

She laughs and says, “It’s a date then.”

I nod and get out before I blow the moment.

More than I already have, I mean.

At the corner, I take a long sip of coffee. It’s funny. I remember what they served at Donut Universe as being pretty good, but I can barely taste this stuff at all. I unwrap the apple fritter and take a bite. It’s the same thing. I feel the dough in my mouth, but I can’t taste anything. Another sip of coffee and another bite of fritter. I chew until I can’t stand it anymore and spit the fritter into the gutter. It’s not the food. It’s me. I can’t taste it. Another side effect of being only half-alive. At least the cigarette had a little kick. And I could taste bourbon the other night. This half-alive situation is getting on my nerves. I’ll do whatever it takes to get right again.

If cigarettes and liquor are all I can handle until I’m fully alive again, there’s only one place I can go. I head for Ivar Avenue and Bamboo House of Dolls. And it better be there. I swear if it’s gone, Wormwood won’t have to worry about the faction.

I’ll nuke L.A. myself.

FORTUNATELY FOR EVERYONE, I don’t have to drop even a single bomb. As soon as I spot the neon, my whole body relaxes. I need a drink more than ever to wash the last mealy remnants of the fritter out of my mouth. But I don’t want anyone here to know I’m back, including Carlos, the bartender. I step into an alley and throw on a glamour so no one will recognize me. There are still eighty dollars of Sinclair’s money in my pocket. That should be enough to get decently horizontal.

But I don’t go inside right away. Instead, I stay on the street letting the moment soak in. A day or so ago, I was standing at the pearly gates. Just a few hours before that, on the road for a year with a dog pack of psycho marauders tearing up the Tenebrae, killing and burning everything in our path. Standing here now, just a day later, all that feels like a bad dream. Mouthfuls of dust, road rash, and the kind of burning fear that’s indistinguishable from anger. But here and now it’s just cigarette smoke, couples whispering to each other, and the sound of bird chirps and horns as Martin Denny spins on the jukebox. It’s a little overwhelming, but in a good way. I take one last gulp of L.A. night smog and go inside.

At first glance, not much has changed inside. It’s still the best punk tiki bar in existence. Old Cramps and Germs posters hang on the walls. Plastic hula girls and coconuts carved like monkeys are lined up behind the bar. And Carlos is there, solo as usual, doling out beer and whiskey to the rabble. What’s changed is the crowd. It’s still a mix of fanged and feathered Lurkers and civilians, but they’re quieter than I remember. Bamboo House of Dolls used to be shoulder to shoulder any night of the week. Tonight you could fire a cannon in here and not hit anything but the wall. Over in the back corner is a minuscule stage where Carlos has installed the death knell of any good bar—a karaoke machine. It’s good to be back inside, but the state of the place is depressing. Most of the stools by the bar are empty, so I take one at the far end away from the door. Yeah, it’s quiet now, but I’ve had enough things creep up on me in here that I know I won’t be able to relax with my back exposed like that.

Maybe that’s what’s wrong with the place. Have any flesh-eating High Plains Drifter hoedowns, skinhead assassination attempts, or hoodoo firefights happened here since I’ve been gone? Maybe not. And maybe people miss the danger. Maybe Bamboo House of Dolls isn’t the same if you’re not risking your life every time you walk inside. Carlos should have hired an evil clown to hide in the rafters and chase people around with a cleaver every now and then. It sure would have woken up these sad sacks.

Carlos comes down the bar and gives me a hello nod.

“What’ll you have?”

I open my mouth and—like an idiot—almost say “Aqua Regia,” my favorite Hellion brew. Instead, I clear my throat, tell myself to focus for a goddamn minute, and manage to croak, “Jack Daniel’s. A double. Neat.”

“You got it,” he says, and heads back to the bottles and hula girls.

It’s ridiculous how happy it makes me just hearing his voice. The moment I do, the bar becomes more real, the smells and sounds more solid. Who cares if I couldn’t taste a fucking donut? This is my home away from home. Literally these days. I don’t even know if I have a home here anymore. For all I know, money got so thin at Max Overdrive that they tossed some throw pillows upstairs and now rent it out on Airbnb. I wonder if they would mention that I used to keep Kasabian’s head in the closet or point out all the blood that’s soaked into the floor. I would if I was them. It gives the place character. Who wouldn’t pay a little extra to sleep in a real-life Hollywood murder flat?

When Carlos brings me my drink I put down a twenty.

“Keep it.”

He picks it up and tosses it back on the cash register.

“Thanks.”

I look around the place once more.

“It’s quiet in here. Quieter than I remember.”

“Yeah? You been in before?”

“About a year ago. It was a lot more crowded. Loud and lively.”

He looks around the place too.

“That it was. Things change though. Crowds change.”

I sip the Jack. Swirl it around in my mouth and swallow. It burns just right and washes away the last of the fritter.

“Do you ever miss the noise?”

He thinks for a minute.

“Sometimes. Not always. Sometimes it was nice. Other times, it was something else entirely.”

“I remember it used to be a little dangerous around here.”

He lays out coasters and says, “Only if you consider dying dangerous.”

“When you think of the old days, what do you miss most?”

“The people. The old regulars. Some still come in, but others … they’re gone for good.”

I take another sip of Jack.

“This is L.A. Nothing is ever gone for good.”

He smiles.

“Maybe that’s what we need. A reboot. Bride of Bamboo House of Dolls.”

“Son of Bamboo House of Dolls.”

He gives me a look.

“You a Frankenstein fan? I had a buddy who used to like old movies.”

“What happened? You’re not friends anymore?”

Carlos brings over the Jack and a glass. Pours himself a drink.

“He’s gone with the wind.”

“Left town?”

“Dead.”

“I’m sorry.”

He looks up as the jukebox begins to play Martin Denny’s “Quiet Village.”

“Me too,” he says. “I mean he could be a real asshole sometimes, but you know?”

“I have friends like that. Pains in the ass, but they keep things interesting.”

“Exactly. But he’s gone, so what are you going to do?”

“Get yourself a necromancer?”

He rolls his eyes dramatically. “I get enough of those gloomy bastards on trivia night.”

I almost spit out a mouthful of whiskey.

“You have a karaoke machine and you do bar trivia?”

He nods slowly.

“Pathetic, isn’t it? But you do whatever it takes to keep the doors open.” He gives me a hard look. “What, you never compromised anything to stay alive?”

I wipe my mouth with the back of my hand.

“I’ve compromised plenty. More than I like to think about. But damn, trivia and karaoke?”

Carlos downs his drink in one swallow.

“I know. I sold my soul. But when I win the lottery— boom!—they’re all gone.”

“You wouldn’t quit the business?”

He chuckles and pours us both another round.

“I’m a bartender. Some people are cops or priests or movie stars. Me? I pour drinks and keep the jukebox cool.”

As the music fades away, someone behind us blows into a microphone.

“Testing. One. Two. Can you hear me?”

The crowd murmurs.

A young guy wearing a pale blue pullover and a tech-startup haircut is hunched over the mic at the karaoke machine. He points to a young woman across the room.

“This is for you, Cherie.”

I can’t help but smile when I see her. This is a taste of the old Bamboo House of Dolls. A clueless tourist slumming in a weirdo bar and he picks up a pretty young thing. Only his paramour is a Jade and if he does or says the wrong thing, she’s going to bite him and drink his guts like a milkshake. I’m almost tempted to tell him, only then he starts singing that Barry Manilow song “Mandy,” but substituting “Cherie” in the chorus. That’s when I decide to let Darwin sort out his fate.

I finish my drink and get up.

“I think that’s my cue to get moving.”

Carlos puts out his hand and we shake.

“Don’t be a stranger. You’re allowed to come back more than once a year.”

“Believe me, Carlos. I will if I can.”

He gives me a funny look.

“How did you know my name?”

Shit.

“I must have read it on Yelp or somewhere.”

He nods, not entirely buying it.

“Okay. Well, come back on a Tuesday and play trivia with those necro bores. I’ll throw in a lot of old movie questions.”

I give him a nod and leave.

Carlos, you have no fucking idea how much I want to make that happen.

I WANDER ALONG the boulevard. It’s a nothing night. Cars honk at jaywalkers. Knots of wandering tourists are disappointed at how boring Hollywood and Vine really is. The Egyptian Theatre is dark as a repair crew works on the electric lines out front. There’s more action down by the wax museum and Ripley’s Believe It or Not!, but the lights are too bright and it’s too close to the Chinese Theatre. An off-duty creep in a Spider-Man costume chats up a bored Wonder Woman who’s about two puffs of a Virginia Slim away from beating him to death with her shield. Really, I’m not ready to go back to Sandoval’s Castle Grayskull and I’m trying to distract myself from lurking outside Max Overdrive in hopes of catching a glimpse of Candy. I’ve already done that once since I got back and she almost caught me. There’s no percentage in taking a chance like that again, so of course, I do it anyway.

Lucky me, there’s nothing happening there either. Candy is upstairs or out, so I’m basically staring at a dark storefront like a tweaker trying to work up the nerve to rob the place. But unfocused staring sometimes pays off. Through the front window, I get a glimpse of Kasabian moving around inside. He’s talking to someone and smiling, and for a second I get fifth-grade giddy that I might score a look at that cute girl who sits next to me in history class. Instead, it’s Alessa— Candy’s girlfriend. Candy met her a few weeks before I died and they became lovers soon after that. I mean, I told her it was okay with me, and it was. Candy had always dated girls and the fact she was with me didn’t make her desire to be with other women magically disappear. Now, though, things are different, and for the first time I feel jealous of the two of them. They had a year together that I’ll never get back. They’re a year closer and I’m on the street like a goddamn lost dog wondering if I’ll ever find my way back home.

Thinking about it, though, maybe this is a good thing and I should shut up and not get so maudlin. Candy watched me get murdered and Alessa was there to help her through it. And Alessa has obviously forgiven Candy for lying to her about who she really was. Alessa didn’t know Candy was a Jade when they started dating. She also only knew Candy as Chihiro, the identity she had to adopt to stay out of a federal lockup. When someone gets hit with secrets like that all at once and they stick around, that makes them good people and someone who really cares about you. So, yeah, Alessa is a lot more all right with me now than she was before I died.

But none of that stops me from wanting to charge inside and see Candy right now. Instead, I step into a shadow before I do something truly stupid.

I come out in my room in Sandoval’s mansion. I want another drink, but that means going into her office, which means I might see her or Sinclair, and in my current mood I’m not sure either one of them would leave with their head on their shoulders. Instead, I throw my clothes in a heap in the corner and get into bed. I’m suddenly a lot more tired than I was a couple of hours ago.

My dreams are about bombs exploding and L.A. being wiped off the map. It’s all in slow motion, so I get a good look at the city flying apart, burning bodies tossed into the air with flaming palm trees, the fire moving up the hills, scorching everything along the way. The Hollywood sign flies apart. The Griffith Observatory explodes when the concussion wave hits it. I try to distract myself with all of this cinematic carnage, but it doesn’t work. Swirling around the center of things is everyone I know and care about: Candy, Kasabian, Vidocq, Allegra, Brigitte, Carlos, even Alessa. They’re whipped around in a sun-bright vortex, pulled down into a boiling mass of nothingness. A swirling singularity so incandescent it turns to ash not just their bodies, but every particle of their being, so that there’s nothing left of them for Hell or Heaven, meaning they just fade from existence like they were never there. And all I can do is watch and let it happen because I don’t know how to stop it.

Fuck Wormwood. Fuck the faction. If I can’t stop the ritual, no one lives. No escape jets or yachts heading out to sea for this crowd. They get swallowed in the burning madness with the rest of us. I’ll laugh and laugh as they cry and cry all the way down into nonexistence when it finally hits them that all their money and power isn’t going to hold their atoms together in the coming shitstorm. The feeling isn’t satisfaction. It’s more like revenge. And sometimes that’s as close to satisfaction as you’re ever going to get.

WHEN I WAKE up in the morning, there’s a black suit waiting for me in the closet. It’s a Hugo Boss. Of course he’d be the go-to guy for Wormwood. In World War II, he made uniforms for the SS. There’s also a dark purple shirt and a pair of Italian shoes by the bed.

When I try everything on, they’re a perfect fit. That’s unsettling. I’m going to assume that Sandoval or someone figured out my size by eyeballing me. It’s either that or someone sneaked in here while I was asleep and measured me like they were getting me ready for a coffin.

Normally I don’t like playing dress-up, but Sandoval, Sinclair, and their roaches look startled enough when they see me in James Bond drag that it’s worth it.

“You look very convincing,” says Sinclair.

“Except for the face,” says Sandoval. “Really, Stark, you’re much too ugly to be a Wormwood associate.”

I whisper some hoodoo and put on the glamour I used last night. Again, Sinclair and the roaches are startled. To Sandoval’s credit, she just looks me over like she’s selecting which lobster in the tank to eat for dinner.

She says, “Much better. Almost human.”

I adjust my tie in a mirror on the wall.

“Thanks. You’re looking pretty Maleficent yourself. Curse any kids today?”

“No, but Sinclair and I punched a lovely hole in the Japanese stock market.”

“It seemed a good time to bring down some Yakuza-controlled companies that have aligned themselves with the faction,” he says.

Sandoval grins broadly.

“There’ll be blood flowing in Tokyo tonight.”

“Sounds like fun,” I say. “Me, I prefer a good thriller. Ever seen The Usual Suspects?”

“Stop it. We don’t have time for your nonsense. And neither do you.”

I close in on her and Sinclair.

“I only bring it up because the whole story hinges on a huge lie. You see my point?”

Sinclair scratches his ear. A nervous tic.

“We did what we talked about. All of us.”

“So, everyone knows that a courier is going out?”

Sandoval says, “Calm down. We said as much as we could without being too obvious. If there’s a traitor in our organization, he or she knows that you’ll be moving an important package.”

There’s a briefcase lying on the pool table.

“What’s in it?”

“Random financial records,” says Sinclair. “Nothing the faction can use against us.”

I look at them both.

“You better not have fucked this up because my only other alternative is to start killing your staff and hope someone squeals.”

“Why don’t you just do that now?” says Sandoval. “That sounds more efficient than this courier scenario.”

“Sure. I could start with you and Barron. How do I know that this whole thing isn’t a setup? Maybe you two are the rats and you just want to see if anyone can get through to your faction pals.”

“Don’t be absurd. We’re the injured party.”

“Then don’t tell me who to kill and when. It unsettles my tranquil disposition.”

“We’ve done our part. Now you do yours,” says Sinclair.

Sandoval glances at her watch.

“The car will be here soon.”

I pick up the briefcase.

“Nice. What is this? Rattlesnake?”

“Alligator,” Sinclair.

“I knew it was something cold-blooded.”

Sandoval’s cell phone rings. She exchanges a few words and hangs up.

“The car is here. The driver knows where to take you. It’s one of our law offices in Westwood.”

“Do you know the driver?”

Sandoval gives me a look.

“Philip? He’s worked for me for years. I trust him.”

“I mean, if I get snatched, he might not be in shape to be your driver anymore.”

She looks at Sinclair. “I hadn’t thought of that.”

She looks back at me.

“That’s why we wanted you. Your sick little mind.”

“You have any spare drivers lying around? Ones you don’t like as much?”

“No. Do you, Barron?”

He shakes his head. “I’ve known my driver for years.”

“Just one big happy family,” I say.

I weigh the briefcase in my hand. It’s very light. That means there aren’t any bombs in case they change their minds about me.

“I’ll do my best to keep him alive. But if it comes down to him or me, well, you know.”

Sandoval glances at her roaches.

“Just do your job and leave the rest to us.”

Before I start for the door I say, “Where’s Howard?”

“In the library. Why?”

“I’ll try to keep the driver safe. You do the same with Howard.”

“Why do you think he might not be safe?” says Sinclair.

“No reason. It’s just that I’ll be very cranky if anything happens to him.”

Sandoval looks back at me.

“The car is waiting.”

Sinclair says, “Good luck.”

“Thanks.”

As I reach the front door Sandoval calls after me.

“Don’t get any grand ideas about betraying us or running off. The spell Howard used to bring you back is very specific and not something just any necromancer can duplicate.”

I open the door but pause. “That reminds me. Does Howard like movie trivia?”

“I don’t know. Who cares? What does that have to do with anything?”

“Just curious. If he brings me back right, I know the place to take him for a drink.”

IT’S A HOT day, even for L.A. The sky is clear, but the cat-piss smell of Sandoval’s eucalyptus trees makes the air feel heavy. The driver is holding the limo door open for me at the head of the circular driveway. I get in and it’s twenty degrees cooler. Is the driver from the Arctic or does he know about my not-quite-alive situation and think he needs to keep me on ice so I won’t stink? Or maybe he knows what’s going to happen next and he’s trying not to sweat. There’s nothing I can do to help that, so he better buckle up tight.

As he pulls away from Sandoval’s house and takes us out through the gates of the estate I say, “You’re Philip, right?”

He glances in the rearview mirror.

“Yes, sir.”

“Well, Philip, do you know who you work for?”

“Ms. Sandoval? Of course.”

“You know what she does for a living?”

“I know that’s she’s in international finance.”

I wish I could see his eyes. It would help me know if he’s lying. His heartbeat’s up a little, but he’s not panicked. Just curious about getting the third degree from a stranger in the backseat.

There’s a small but well-stocked bar on the left wall of the limo. I find the bourbon and pour myself a few fingers. Look at Philip again in the rearview.

“You ever heard of Wormwood?”

He shakes his head. “No, sir. Should I?”

I try to think of a delicate way to ask the next question but don’t come up with anything.

“Is this car bulletproof?”

“Yes. Why do you ask?”

“No reason. But if I tell you to hit the gas or bail out or get on the floor, don’t ask questions.”

Now his heart is racing. Even though it’s Ice Station Zebra in here I can smell him start to sweat.

“Are we in danger?” he says.

“It depends on what you mean by ‘we.’”

“Am I in danger?”

“That’s the first smart thing anyone’s said to me today. And, yes, you really are. So do what I tell you.”

“Yes, sir. Thank you for the warning.”

“Just remember to duck if I say so.”

“Yes, sir.”

He’s quiet after that.

WE’RE ON THE part of Sunset Boulevard that winds like a drunk anaconda through Beverly Hills and Bel-Air. Most of the drive is a dull blur of walled compounds where good, upstanding American families debate whether their artisanally raised mutts deserve domestic or imported champagne with their prime rib kibble. But it’s the side streets that are where the action is. These Sunset flatlanders are mere paupers with millions of dollars, while the side streets lead to gated Xanadus where the toilets are gold and the trash doesn’t end up in landfills but gets a gentle yacht journey out to the open sea, where it receives a Viking funeral, complete with human sacrifice. I can’t help but wonder how many associates of Wormwood and the breakaway faction we’re passing on our way west. Odds are that some of them live right next door to each other, filling Easter eggs with thermite and hiding razor blades in apples as Halloween surprises for the unenlightened in the neighborhood. I’m trying to work up some sympathy for the big-money families that have no Wormwood connections, but it’s hard to do. Whether it’s Beverly Hills, Bel-Air, or Pandemonium—Hell’s capital city—odds are anyone living in this kind of luxury has a body or two buried in the greenhouse. No, this patch of land is a No Sympathy Zone. They don’t give it, so they shouldn’t expect it. Whether it’s death by Wormwood, a bad stock market, or Daddy’s drinking, they’re on their own. Islands of privilege in a sea of shit and bad karma. When the tide rises, they better know how to swim, because no one is tossing these gold-plated Capones a life preserver.

Which makes me wonder what kind of deal Sandoval and Sinclair will offer me to not murder them after I’m completely back in my body. Whatever it is, it won’t be enough and they probably know it, which means they’re going to fuck me over at their first opportunity. I need to focus and be ready for when it happens. I let an idiot send me to Hell once. It will be embarrassing if I do it again.

It’s about halfway between the Playboy Mansion and the Bel-Air Country Club that I spot the van behind us. Black with dark, tinted windows, no plates or brand insignia on the front. I tell the driver to turn left on Hilgard Avenue, then swing onto a side street.

“Oh god,” he says. “Is it happening?”

“What did I say about questions?”

“Not to ask them.”

“Right. Now, do you have a cigarette lighter?”

“Yes, sir.”

“How about a handkerchief?”

“Yes.”

“Give them to me.”

As he hands them back, I take one last slug of bourbon and stuff the handkerchief into the neck of the bottle.

The moment we turn off Sunset, the van speeds up. With luck, being on a side street will get us away from traffic and minimize collateral damage, but I’m not counting on that last part.

The van floors it and slams us from behind. The limo starts to spin out, but Philip gets control and stops us before the car flips. We’ve done a one-eighty, though, which gives us a perfect view of the van as five men in sharp suits and balaclavas pile out, shouting and waving shiny new SIG 552 rifles—very serious weaponry that makes me wonder if taking prisoners is a priority.

“What do I do?” shouts Philip.

I roll down a side window.

“Get on the fucking floor.”

I light the handkerchief in the bottle and throw it at the welcome committee. A small but satisfying fireball explodes in the street, scattering the gunmen and sending a couple of them into frantic pirouettes, beating out the flames on their suits. I don’t want to see Philip get shot over my fun, so I step outside and take a couple of badly aimed swings at the closest shooters. All of my instincts make me want to crack their skulls, but I let my punches miss by a mile. I keep reminding myself that I want to get taken hostage, so when the five of them swarm me, I go down without a fight. Two of them haul me up while another grabs my briefcase. I can’t see what the others are doing, but when I hear a single gunshot I know exactly what it means: Philip didn’t make it.

Fuck. Shooting an unarmed driver cowering on the floor, that’s just mean, even for Wormwood.

One more thing to remember for the Fuck Wormwood ledger.

They shove me into the van, bind my hands, blindfold me, and peel out. We drive for a long time.

No one talks, but I hear a lot of grunts and moans. Probably from the shooters I torched. It’s small satisfaction, but I’ll take anything right now.

Except for Philip, things are going pretty much the way I’d hoped. The faction snatched both me and the case. They could have just shot me, but they didn’t, so that means they want information, which I’m more than happy to give them. I just wish this blindfold wasn’t so tight and I could see something. If they’re wearing their balaclavas in the van it means they still don’t want me to see their faces, which means they’re not necessarily planning on killing me. At least not right away. I’m going to have to improvise from here. And I can’t use hoodoo because they’ll know I’m a ringer and that will blow my chances of getting any useful information from them.

So I wait.

The drive takes a long time. We’re not moving for a lot of it and when we are, it’s at about five miles an hour. That means we’re probably on a freeway. The closest one is the 405, but are we going north or south? And are we staying on that one route the whole way?

I slow my breathing and try to relax. Theoretically that’s a good thing, but relaxing while blind lets my mind wander and the first thing that comes into my head is, I wonder what Candy is doing right now.

Nope. None of that shit. That will make me crazy, distract me enough that I’ll miss clues, and maybe get me shot. No, anything is better than thinking about Candy right now. I move my bound hands around so I can touch my wrist and feel my pulse. Count to sixty and start again, trying to time the drive. It’s well over an hour. In most towns that would mean we’re halfway to Argentina, but in L.A. it means we could be circling the block looking for parking. Still, it keeps my mind off Candy.

Finally, the van makes a sharp right turn. The tires crunch over something for a few seconds. Probably gravel by the sound. Then we’re back on solid pavement. When we stop, there’s the sound of a motor opening a large door. As it closes, the sound echoes. We’re probably in a warehouse. Now all I have to do is narrow it down from among the other ten thousand warehouses in L.A., while not getting shot. I hate multitasking.

Someone grabs my lapel and pulls me out of the van. I stumble getting out and a couple of them grab me before I can fall. Good. They’re concerned about keeping me in one piece for now. I can work with that. Someone pulls my blindfold off and I feel even better. Everyone still has their balaclavas on. Good. They want me to live. Now I just need to give them a reason.

One of the shooters drags me to a metal folding chair in the middle of the room. He’s limping and I look down long enough to see a burned pant leg.

“I hope there’s no hard feelings,” I tell him. “I was aiming for the van.”

He shoves me into the chair and cuffs me on the ear before joining the others behind me. I turn and look at him.

“Ow. Fuck you.”

A feminine voice from my other side says, “Don’t look at him. Look at me.”

I turn back around. She’s tall. Long torso, legs, and arms. In her spare time she could be a fashion model or a basketball player. Smart. Tall is good for these situations. It lets the interrogator loom menacingly. She’s wearing the same suit and balaclava as the guys who snatched me. That’s okay.

What isn’t okay is the cattle prod she’s holding.

She takes her time coming over. Points at me with the business end of the prod.

“Who are you?” she says.

“I work for Eva Sandoval.”

She moves the cattle prod back and forth like shaking her head no.

“That’s not what I asked. Who are you?”

Oh, right. A name. That’s the kind of thing I should have thought about instead of mooning over Candy.

“Miles,” I say. “Miles Archer.”

She pulls the cattle prod back and slaps it against her hand.

“Mr. Archer, answer my questions and you’ll get to go home. Don’t and …”

She shoves the prod into my stomach and gives me a good quick jolt.

“Understand?”

I look up at her.

“I’m not sure. Can you repeat the question?”

She jams the prod back into my gut and leaves it there longer this time. I’m a little out of breath when she takes it away.

“I think I got it that time,” I tell her.

“Good. What’s in the briefcase?”

I look down and see it sitting by her feet.

I shrug.

“It’s financial papers. That’s all I know. They don’t tell me much.”

“What do you do for Eva?”

“Lots. I move things around. I talk to people. I take care of problems.”

She leans in a little closer. I could probably snap her neck from here.

“A fixer,” she says. “That’s my job, too. You ever kill anybody for Eva?”

“No. That’s where I draw the line.”

When she shocks me this time, it’s on the inside of my thigh, close enough to my balls to make them consider finding work elsewhere.

“Okay. Yes. A couple of times.”

“Who were they?”

“Just some punks. One was selling company information out the back door. The other was a dog who needed to be put down.”

“A liability.”

I take a breath. “A big-mouth drunk and meth head. He was heading for trouble and taking the company down with him.”

“What company is that?”

“Southern California International Trade Association.”

Another shock, this time back in the gut.

“What company?”

“Wormwood Investments.”

“Good,” she says. “You might wonder why I’m asking you these particular questions.”

“Actually, I was wondering when the sushi class started. I forgot my knife, but there’s tuna in the briefcase.”

Another shock.

I say, “Yeah. I was curious about the questions.”

She gets closer, staring down at me like a buzzard sizing me up for lunch.

“I’m just trying to establish a basis for trust. If you’re going to live, we have to trust each other.”

“I’m all for that.”

“Here’s my problem though, Miles. It seems to me that you’re very chatty for a man in your profession. If you are who you say you are, I’d expect a bit more discretion. And balls.”

She points the cattle prod between my legs and I flinch just like she wants me to.

I say, “You mean I should encourage you to torture me? When I can tell you already know the answers to most of those questions? No thanks. I’m not getting my teeth kicked in for that.”

“I should ask you harder questions?”

“You should untie me and I’ll spring for drinks at Chateau Marmont. Short of that, yeah. Ask me something fucking real.”

“What’s the address you are going to?”

“I don’t know. The driver did.” I turn around and shout at the guys behind me. “He could have told you, but one of these assholes shot him.”

She shocks me in the ribs and I turn back around. I’m starting not to like her.

“Focus on me, Miles.”

“I don’t know the address. It was in Westwood.”

“Was it a bank? A person? A café?”

“A law office.”

“All right. That’s something. And you say it’s just financial papers?” she says.

“That’s what they told me.”

She holds the cattle prod about an inch from my face.

“Do you know who we are?”

“I have a pretty good idea.”

“Who?”

“You’re the faction. The other Wormwood.”

She moves the cattle prod like she’s going for my eye and this time when I flinch, it’s 100 percent real. Seeing that, she smiles.

“You’re wrong. We’re the only Wormwood. The Wormwood you work for is sick. A bloated tick full of diseased blood.”

“And who are you, the Salvation Army? You bring down companies like the other Wormwood. You fuck people over when they’re alive and you make money on their damnation when they die. I don’t see much difference between you two.”

She opens her hands wide.

“Because you’re part of the old system. All you see is the method. You don’t consider the reasons. The outcome.”

“Okay. Convince me. What makes you so special?”

She taps the prod against the palm of one hand like a teacher tapping a ruler.

“If the old, diseased Wormwood gets its way, you’ll barely notice a ripple in the world. They want power, money, and influence in the afterlife. We, on the other hand, will overturn existence. When we’re through, this world and the next will be clean and pure. All the old, corrupt systems washed away.”

I lean back.

“Is that supposed to impress me? You sound like every supervillain in every comic book ever written.”

She swings down the prod and gets me in the ribs. Holds it there for a while. This time when she stops I can hear the shooters behind me laughing.

“Forgive me,” she says. “It’s a real problem in this line of work. Broad goals always sound a bit like hollow threats. It isn’t until you get to the specifics that you find the true vision.”

“But you’re not going to share that with me.”

“Do you want to die right here, right now?”

“Goody. I get a choice?”

“Yes, but the window is closing. Do you want to die?”

“Not particularly.”

She rests the cattle prod on my shoulder while she goes on.

“If I let you live, will you deliver a message to Eva for me?”

“That depends on what it is.”

“It’s a warning. The last she or any of her people will receive. Will you deliver it for me?”

“Like I said, it depends. If I think it’s going to get me killed, no.”

“Fair enough,” she says. “Here’s the message: Dies Irae.”

I look up at her.

“Day of Judgment?”

She smiles broadly and steps back.

“Look at you, Miles. An old altar boy, I bet.”

I shake my head.

“Mom worshiped vodka and dad worshiped not being around either one of us, so not really.”

She nods.

“Then I’ll tell you: ‘Dies Irae’ is also ‘Day of Wrath.’ And that’s the message I want you to give to Eva. Judgment day is coming soon. Wrath will fall like fire from Heaven,” she says. “Eva and her people can join us or quit altogether. Just walk away. By this time next week, the Wormwood you know will be gone. There will be only us.”

“And judgment and wrath.”

“Exactly.”

“I think I can remember that.”

She gives me a quick zap in the gut.

“I’m positive I can remember.”

“Good for you, Miles. You get to live for now. But just to make sure you don’t forget, the boys are going to help you remember.”

She kicks me in the chest, knocking me to the floor. The shooters rush over and put the boot in hard. I curl up in a ball, taking their kicks when what I really want to do is peel off their skin and drag them down the Hollywood Freeway behind the van they brought me in.

The things we do just to be alive again.

After a few minutes, the interrogator says, “That’s enough.” A couple of the laughing boys pick me up and toss me back into the van. She sticks her head in after me.

“What’s the message, Miles?”

I get up and sit back down on the wheel well.

“Two parts rye, half a part sweet vermouth, a dash of bitters. Add a cherry if it’s your birthday.”

She nods.

“Good boy. Now get him out of here.”

The six creeps get back in the van. Two sit up front. One sits on either side of me on the floor. The other two are across from me, leaning on the door. The one on the right pulls the blindfold back over my eyes. Each of them has a distinctive bulge under the arm—aside from the rifles, they have pistols in shoulder holsters.

We pull out of the warehouse, crunch across the gravel, and head who the fuck knows where. Goddammit. I need to get back in the warehouse before the interrogator gets too far away.

A moment later I hear lighters flick and matches scrape. This is followed by the smell of cigarettes and weed. I hold my hands out and say, “Think I could have one of those? I promise I’ll keep quiet. And about the fire thing earlier, that was uncool and I’m very sorry.”

There’s silence for a minute, then someone up front says, “If it will shut him up, give him one.”

Someone takes a step toward me. From the sound of it, it’s one of the two across from me. I hold out my hands and he puts a cigarette between my fingers. I hear a lighter flick on and lean into it. My hands are still bound together with plastic cuffs, so this is really going to hurt.

The moment I feel the cigarette spark, I grab his arm and pull him toward me. His head smashes into the side of the van hard enough that I hear his skull crack. I push him back against the far wall, then pull him down on top of me. I’m strong enough that I snap my hands out of the plastic cuffs. My prosthetic left arm doesn’t feel a thing, but it hurts like hell as the cuffs cut into my right wrist.

Still under him, I get the pistol from his holster and fire blindly in every direction until the thing is empty. Then I drop it and yank off my blindfold. The other shooters in the back are all down on the floor. The guy in the passenger seat turns to take a shot, so I kick the guy whose skull I cracked into his face. His gun goes off into the roof.

I spin around to find the other door shooter with his pistol a few inches from my face. I move my head just as he fires. My ear goes deaf, but I get my hands around him so when he tries to fire at me, he ends up spraying the back of the van. The moment he stops shooting, I roll, pull his arm across me, and break it. His pistol falls and slides away. Out of the corner of my eye, I can see the goon who was sitting on my right try to get a shot at me. I can’t reach the fallen gun, but the shooter I wrapped around myself has a knife in his belt. I pull it and use him as a battering ram, stunning him and pinning the other shooter against the wall. He tries sneaking an arm around his pal to get a shot at me. I grab the hand. Lean in and jam the knife into his throat, twisting the blade. When I pull it out, arterial spray jets onto the wall and he twitches like a dying bug. My human shield has been working on my back and sides with his one good fist and elbow. I slit his throat and push him at the other shooter on my left. But he’s flat on his back with a bullet in his head. Someone got lucky. Hope it was me.

I grab the pistol that slid into the back of the van. Dive on the floor as the passenger up front fires at me. One of his shots grazes my side and I empty the pistol into the back of his seat. When he falls, he bounces off the dashboard and lands on the driver. The van swerves and slam into something. In the back it’s a water park of blood. The crash sends me Jet Skiing up front. I crash into the passenger seat as the van comes to a stop.

The airbag explodes in the driver’s face, knocking his head back. I hurt like I just climbed out of a cement mixer, and the shot that grazed my side burns like hell. But I don’t have time to whine right now.

I slap the driver until he wakes up. When he sees me, he lurches back against the door. I let him get a good look at the bloody mess in the back before putting the knife to his throat.

“Take me to the warehouse.”

The van is resting against a stop sign on a service road. He doesn’t say a word but hits the ignition. The engine grinds. I press the knife harder.

“You better hope it starts or I’m going to carve off your face and make you eat it.”

He tries it a couple more times before the engine catches and holds. In a few seconds, we’ve turned around and are running back the way we came.

While he drives I take the pistol from his shoulder holster and put it in my waistband. The rifles are tangled up in the meat market in the rear of the van and it takes a few seconds to pull one free. I check it to make sure it’s loaded, then jam it into the back of the driver’s head.

“How much farther?”

He points with his free hand.

“Around that corner up ahead.”

“Don’t go all the way to the warehouse. Stop where I tell you.”

When we’re about thirty yards from the warehouse driveway I tell him to pull over.

I move around the seat and put the rifle in his face.

“Did you shoot the limo driver?”

He shakes his head. Hooks a thumb at the mess in back.

“It was Bill.”

“Bill a friend of yours?”

He shakes his head again. “No. He was a real asshole.”

“When we run into each other in Hell, tell me how it feels to die for an asshole.”

I pull the trigger once and toss him in the back with the others.

As I step out of the van, blood flows out the door in a mini-waterfall—think an elevator–in–The Shining level of blood. I look at myself in the van’s side mirror. In my bloody suit, I look like the maître d’ at a Texas Chainsaw cookout. My shoes squish with each step as I limp to the warehouse. For a second I think about going back to the van and digging around for someone’s cigarettes, but they’re probably as soaked through as my suit.

At the end of the driveway I hunker down, trying to stay out of sight of any security cameras. Every part of me hurts. If I could be anywhere else right now, my first choice would be in bed with Candy. My second choice would be in the closest ER that has hot tubs in the rooms. They have those, right? Hot-tub hospitals? I should Google that. I might just have a million-dollar idea. Maybe Sandoval will back me if I don’t kill her. Scratch that. I’d rather shoot her and Sinclair. I’m just not gentry material and killing them sounds like more fun than a mansion.

I’m still mourning my hot-tub millions when the warehouse door slides open and a Mercedes coupe drives out. I can’t see who’s behind the wheel, but the car has to slow when it reaches the gravel at the end of the driveway. That’s when I step in front of it and open up with the rifle.

I blast a few rounds through the windshield—but only on the passenger side. I have a feeling whoever was interrogating me isn’t the chauffeur type. Closing on the Mercedes, I spray more rounds into the side windows, keeping the driver off balance until I can get there.

I’m at the driver’s door when the rifle goes dry. I ditch it and smash the window with the butt of the pistol. There’s a woman inside with her hand in her coat.

I put my gun to her head.

“Take out your hand slowly and put them both on the steering wheel.”

She does what I say. She has short blond hair and even sitting down, I can tell she’s built long, just like my interrogator. Plus my briefcase is sitting on the seat next to her.

I say, “Pop the trunk and get out of the car. Slow and easy.”

I hear the trunk unlock and pull the door open for her. She gets out and looks me over.

“I don’t suppose any of my men are still alive?” she says.

“We can go look. They’re just down the road. Pieces of them, anyway.”

“I’ll pass.”

When I frisk her I find a very nice Glock 17 in her jacket and a punch dagger in her pocket. I keep the pistol and knife and toss her phone into the weeds. She smiles at me.

“You had a perfect opportunity to cop a feel and you didn’t do it. What a gentleman.”

“If I put a couple of rounds through your knees would it change your opinion?”

“See?” she says. “You asked before doing it. You weren’t an altar boy, but I bet you were a Boy Scout.”

“Troop Six-Six-Six in Hell. You should have seen our jamborees.”

She nods toward the trunk.

“I’m supposed to get in there?”

“That’s the idea.”

“I guess a bribe isn’t in the cards.”

“Unless you have a pair of men’s shoes not full of blood, there’s nothing you have that interests me.”

She starts for the rear of the car. As she steps into the trunk she says, “You ruined your nice suit.”

“I’m hard on clothes.”

“You’re a fall. A little red looks good on you.”

I look up and down the road.

“Where the hell are we?”

“City of Industry.”

“That’s a long drive back.”

“If you say so.”

“What’s your name?”

“Marcella.”

“Is that your real name?”

“No, but it’s the name I always wanted.”

“Good. People should die with their true names.”

I close the trunk and get behind the wheel. Marcella’s balaclava is on the passenger seat next to the briefcase. I use it to wipe some of the blood off my face. Sure, I could take her back to Sandoval’s through a shadow, but I really want to drive this Mercedes. And I really want her to bounce around the trunk while I do it. I start the car and jam it into gear. We take the corner on two wheels and Marcella makes a satisfying thump in the back.

IT’S NINETY MINUTES back to Sandoval’s mansion. The car gets some funny looks when traffic slows, but mostly it’s smiles and waves. I’m in Hollywood camouflage, hiding in plain sight. Most people think I’m a stunt driver heading home from a movie set in my prop car. The rest think the bullet holes are decorations. Gangster chic. When anyone checks me out, I give them a cool-guy nod and a thumbs-up. I’ll end up on a lot of people’s Instagram accounts tonight.

The Mercedes is on its last legs when I get to Sandoval’s, barely creaking up the hill. I punch the intercom beside the gate and tell them who I am. Even wave at the camera so they can see my face.

A voice crackles from the speaker: “Where’s the limousine?”

“In a police impound by now. Don’t ask about Philip. He’s not coming back.”

There’s a moment of silence, then the gates swing open. The last fifty yards up to the circular drive are dicey. The car finally commits seppuku halfway around the circle. Steam geysers from the radiator. Darker things leak from below. I’m not much better. Sandoval, Sinclair, and the roaches huddle at the front door, and when I walk over I leave a trail of red footprints. Eva takes a step back when she gets a good look at me.

“Oh my god,” she says. “Is that blood?”

“On me? Yes.”

“On my driveway.”

“Yeah. Plus a little oil and gasoline probably.”

She points at the Mercedes.

“You can’t leave that there.”

I wipe my bloody hands on my suit. It doesn’t help much.

“I’m not your valet. You want it moved, get one of your roaches to do it.”

I go back to the car, pop the trunk, and pull Marcella out. She’s sweaty but in decent shape, all things considered. However, she’s dizzy enough that I have to hold her arm like we’re on a prom date as I walk her over to the welcoming committee.

“Who the hell is that?” says Sandoval.

“This is Marcella. Say hello, Marcella.”

She spits on the ground.

Sinclair says, “Is she with the faction?”

“No. She’s my fiancée. I thought I’d bring her home to meet the family.”

When she gets her balance back, she pulls away from me.

“Give them my message,” she says. “You said you would if I let you live.”

“You’re right. I did say that.”

I look at Sandoval and Sinclair.

“Dies Irae.”

Marcella laughs. “Boy Scout.”

“Hush.”

“Dies Irae? What is that?” says Sandoval.

“I’m told it’s ‘Day of Wrath.’”

Marcella takes a step toward them. I grab her arm again.

She says, “Your judgment is coming and it will be harsh if you don’t repent and come to us willingly.”

“You’re insane. We’ll kill you all,” says Sinclair.

“To live, you will walk away from your operations. All of them.”

“This is ridiculous,” says Sandoval. She looks at me. “Why did you bring her here?”

“She asked me questions at the end of a cattle prod. Now I’m going to return the favor.”

“No, he’s not,” Marcella says. “He talks tough, but he’s adorable.”

Sandoval touches Sinclair on the arm.

“That’s wonderful. She has no idea who he really is. Take off that silly face, Stark, and show her.”

Marcella stares at me as I let the glamour fade.

“Hi. My name is James Stark.”

“Better known as Sandman Slim,” says Sinclair.

Sandoval says, “Bitch.”

Marcella looks from me to them.

Then she laughs, shaking her head.

“You’re as adorable as him. But Sandman Slim is dead. Everyone knows it.”

“Was,” says Sinclair. “We brought him back.”

Sandoval says, “That’s what we can do. So you can keep your threats and Day of Wrath nonsense to yourself.”

Marcella shakes her head again, not laughing this time, but still not believing.

“You’ve told so many lies you don’t know when you’re doing it anymore.”

“Make her believe, Stark.”

“That’s the idea.”

I take the blindfold from around my neck and put it over her eyes.

“Don’t mind the blood,” I tell her. “None of it is mine.”

“Where are you taking her?” says Sinclair.

“Where we can have a heart-to-heart in private.”

Sandoval points to my shoes.

“You can’t go through the house like that.”

“Watch me.”

I take Marcella’s arm and lead her inside, grinding my bloody heels into the carpet all the way downstairs to the bowling alley.

WHEN WE’RE INSIDE I turn on the lights and take her blindfold off. Marcella looks around.

“You’ve got to be kidding me. This is your torture chamber?”

“Like it? It belonged to Eva’s granddad. She lets me use it on the weekends.”

“It’s not the weekend yet.”

“This is a special occasion.”

I grab a folding chair from the back of the room, pull Marcella to the end of a bowling lane, and push her into it.

“Won’t it be hard for me to take my turn from down here?”

“I doubt you’ll live long enough for it to be an issue.”

“Come on, Boy Scout. We both know you’re not going to—”

I pull her gun from my pocket and fire at her head, close enough that she has to duck.

She says, “You missed.”

She looks cool, but I can hear her heart going like a jackhammer.

“You sure? Maybe you’re right—I haven’t done much shooting in the last year. I’m still getting the hang of it.”

“Because you’ve been dead, Mr. Sandman Slim?”

“You still don’t believe? You saw me change my face upstairs.”

She leans back in the chair and crosses her legs.

“Just because you’re Sub Rosa doesn’t make you Sandman Slim. You and the fools upstairs, you don’t scare me. This is Hollywood. Any good makeup artist could give you those scars.”

“Hey, I earned these scars.”

Marcella sighs. “When does the torture start? Or is this it?”

I fire a few more rounds, this time at her head and her feet. She has to curl up into a fetal position on the chair to not get hit.

I say, “Tell me about the faction.”

“No. Tell me about Hell, Sandman Slim.”

One of her chair legs explodes when I shoot it. She goes down on her side. It knocks the wind out of her.

I grab another folding chair and slide it down the lane to her. She opens it and sits down.

She says, “I think the woman upstairs is going to be mad if you keep shooting her furniture.”

“After what I did to your men, you really don’t think I’ll hurt you?”

“I think you’re a killer. I think you’re vicious and an animal when cornered. But, no, you’re not going to hurt me. It’s not something you do or you would be doing it already instead of playing William Tell.”

“I’m not Sandman Slim. I’m not a torturer. Damn. I don’t impress you at all.”

“Not much.”

I put the gun in my waistband and walk quickly down the lane. She tries not to react, but her shoulders stiffen when I get close.

“If I proved to you that I was Sandman Slim, would you talk?”

“But you’re not, so what does it matter?”

“But if I did?”

“Not even then, Boy Scout.”

“Let’s test that.”

I yank her to her feet and pull her into a shadow at the end of the alley.

When we’re in, I push her ahead of me into the streets of Pandemonium.

The smell hits her first. It’s what gets most new arrivals. Sulfur. Burning blood and shit. The sour fear sweat of a billion losers. I don’t like being here. I sure didn’t plan on it and now that I’ve done it, I wonder if it’s a huge mistake. But there’s one thing I have going for me. I’m used to this misery. Marcella isn’t, and so far, she’s not handling it well. She’s a few feet ahead of me, on her knees, puking into a ditch full of burned vehicles and charred Hellion bones. I sit down on the collapsed wall of a deserted building.

When she’s done, she takes off her jacket, uses it to wipe her mouth, and throws it into the ditch. She tries to stand, but her legs are too shaky.

“How are you doing this?” she says.

“Doing what?”

“The special effects. They’re good. Did you get Disney to build it?” She staggers to her feet and sweeps her arm at the ruins. “Mr. Stark’s Wild Ride, right next to the Matterhorn and the spinning Sleeping Beauty’s castle.”

I’m actually impressed at her bullheadedness.

“You don’t believe this is Hell.”

“Not for a second,” she says.

“How do you imagine Hell?”

“Two more minutes with you.”

“What would it take to convince you this really is the bad place?”

She kicks a stone away with the toe of her shoe. “You can’t. This is nothing God would make or permit.”

I walk over to her.

“Maybe you’re right. Maybe it’s all fake.”

I push her into the ditch with her puke and the Hellion dead.

“I’m going back to the bowling alley. You stay. Walk around. Explore. Enjoy yourself. I’m going to have lunch.”

I go out through a shadow and leave Marcella behind. I’ll give her five minutes. Now that I think about it, when I go back I should look around for some Maledictions. If I don’t get a real cigarette soon, I’m going to start gnawing on the roaches’ skulls.

Marcella is interesting. Altar-boy jokes. Dies Irae. God wouldn’t make or permit Hell. She talks a lot churchier than I’d expect from a Wormwood creep. But I guess it makes sense that Wormwood has some pull in the religion industry. It’s a good way to control the masses. A little fear and they’re all yours. I wish I could see inside her head so I could figure out what her Hell really looks like. Maybe it would scare her, because my Hell sure as shit doesn’t.

Should I go to Candy tonight? No. We already talked about this. Shut up.

I check the time. Four minutes. That’s long enough.

I walk back through the shadow and check the ditch. She’s not there. I look in the abandoned building. She’s not there either.

Fuck.

I yell, “Marcella.” Nothing comes back. I climb a pile of cinder blocks to get a better look around and spot a couple of bug-ugly Hellion Legionnaires at the end of the block. They’re running somewhere fast. I jump off the blocks and take off after them. Sure enough, when I get around the corner, there’s Marcella swinging a pipe at the two soldiers. A third one lies at her feet with something sharp sticking out of his chest. I’m still sore enough from the van that I don’t feel like throwing fists with Legionnaires, so I pull my gun and shoot them both in the head. Marcella jumps at the shots. Stares as they both blip out of existence.

I head over to her and when she sees me, she sags against a toppled streetlight. Her face is smeared with dirt and a little blood. Her shirt and sleeve are torn. The Hellion at her feet isn’t quite dead yet. It’s leaking black blood fast, but it’s tough. It keeps crawling after her.

“What the fuck are these things?” she screams.

“Hellions. Fallen angels.”

She looks around, starts to say something, raises and drops her hands in a gesture of futility.

“Why did you do this to me?”

“Do you believe now?”

“Why did those others disappear when you shot them?”

“It’s what angels do when they die.”

She looks at the Hellion crawling for her, then at me.

“Make this one disappear.”

“Did you stab him?”

“Yes.”

“Then you do it.”

She purses her lips and hovers over him as his hands reach out for her. The Hellion wheezes and growls low. When it drops its hands for a moment, Marcella smashes its head in with the pipe. The Hellion sags on the sidewalk and disappears. When it’s gone, she leans back on the streetlight.

When I’m close enough, I take the pipe from her hand and throw it away. I don’t want her getting any ideas.

“Do you believe yet?”

She looks up at me. Nods.

“I didn’t until I stabbed him. I felt the metal in my hand. It was real and sharp, and when I shoved it into his chest, I knew it wasn’t a trick.”

“No. It wasn’t.”

She looks around.

“How long did you spend here?”

“Eleven years, the first time.”

“And you were alive the whole time?”

“Yeah. You’re one of the only other living humans to ever see the place. Congratulations.”

She flexes her fist. Her knuckles are red where she must have punched the Hellion before stabbing it. Marcella is tough. I wish she was on our side.

“Get me out of here.”

I take her hand and pull her into a shadow. We come out again in the bowling alley. She collapses on one of the lanes. I let her sit there for a while.

“You’re a torturer after all,” she says. “You sure had me fooled.”

“I wouldn’t have had to leave you there if you weren’t so full of shit.”

She looks at me from the floor.

“You can take me back there any time you want, can’t you?”

“Yes. I can.”

She shakes her head, picks up a piece of one of the pins I shot earlier, toys with it. Tosses it away.

“I’m sorry, but I can’t tell you anything.”

Now I’m getting annoyed.

“Why not?”

She gestures back at the shadow we came through.

“Because now I know what will happen to me.”

“You mean damnation? If you tell me you’re afraid you’ll be damned?”

“I know I will.”

“You faction types must have some good preachers.”

She smiles, but it’s exhausted and unconvincing.

“The best.”

“Then you’re going to want to help me, Marcella.”

“Why?”

“I hate to break it to you, but you’re already going to Hell for the things you’ve done. And when you get there, I’m the one who can get you out.”

That makes her laugh.

“My my. The salvation of my eternal soul rests with Sandman Slim.”

“The world is funny that way.”

“And if I still won’t tell you?”

“I’ll put you right back in the ditch.”

She looks at me.

“I think you would.”

“Test me.”

“Okay,” she whispers. “Ask your questions.”

I hold out a hand to her.

“Get off the floor. Let’s pretend we’re people for a minute.”

I help her up and we sit on the padded seats by the scoring table.

“You ready?” I say.

“You’ll really come for me if I help you?”

“I haven’t lied to you so far. Well, except for my name. But you’re lying to me about your name, so we’re even there.”

She rubs her hands together nervously.

“Ask your questions.”

“Let’s start with what’s going to happen. The way I heard it, you’re going to nuke L.A.”

That makes her chuckle.

“It’s a cleansing and consecration of the land. But, yes, the Los Angeles you know will be wiped away.”

“And you’ll do it with a ritual.”

She nods wearily.

“Yes.”

“Does it happen Saturday or Sunday?”

With her thumb, she draws a cross in the dust on the table. Wipes it away with her fist.

“You might want to fire whoever is getting you your information.”

“It’s not this weekend? Then when?”

“Tomorrow.”

“Friday?”

Finally, some good news. Wormwood wants me to clean up their mess by Sunday, but I’ll have it done tomorrow. Then Howard does his spook show and I’m home free. I could be talking to Candy by sometime Saturday.

“Where does it happen?”

“The Chapel of St. Alexis.”

“I never heard of it.”

“Most people haven’t. It was condemned about twenty years ago and hasn’t been used since. After it closed there was a split in the congregation, so they were never able to raise enough money to repair it.”

“Then the faction stepped in and promised to foot the bill.”

She draws a smiley face in the dust, then wipes it out too.

“Yes. The ritual will take place in the crypt under the church.”

“When?”

“Vespers.”

“Sunset.”

She cocks her head.

“Are you sure you weren’t an altar boy?”

This is it. I know the what. I know the where and I know the when. I even know the why, but who gives a damn about that?

“Is anyone there now, setting up, maybe?”

“No one will arrive until just before the ritual begins.”

“How are they getting away? Car? Truck?”

“They’re not.”

I look at her.

“What does that mean?”

She draws aimless lines in the dust.

“They’re not leaving,” she says eventually. “The officiants are all volunteers.”

“Martyrs.”

She looks down the alley.

“Yes. And unlike me, they’ll go straight to Heaven.”

“That’s what the preachers told you, but it’s not going to happen. Even if they pulled it off.”

She stops doodling.

“What do you mean?”

“Whoever’s been running your crew is a liar or woefully uninformed. No one gets into Heaven anymore.”

She narrows her eyes.

“That doesn’t make sense.”

“It does to the angels determined to keep human souls out.”

“That’s not possible.”

“And you think we should fire whoever’s giving us information? Where have you guys been? There’s a new war in Heaven, Marcella. God tried to open Heaven to all souls, saved or damned. A handful of winged pricks disagreed and Heaven has been sealed shut ever since.”

She crosses her arms.

“I don’t believe you.”

“I don’t care, but think about this: Why would I lie to you now? What would it get me? You’ve already told me everything I want to know.”

She shakes her head. Keeps shaking it.

“That can’t be right. It’s not true.”

“Believe what you want. I have things to do, like changing out of this suit.” Shifting my weight, I can feel the blood squelch in my shoes.

She looks at me.

“What happens to me now? Are you going to kill me?”

“No. I might have more questions for you later.”

I leave her and go to the door.

“I’ll have them bring a mattress and some food down for you. There’s a bathroom through that door over there.”

She looks around.

“It’s a funny place for a slumber party.”

“Be good and we’ll play Twister later.”

When I start out she says, “You know that if you don’t kill me, the others will.”

I stop.

“No one is going to bother you.”

“You’re so sure I’ll make it through the night?”

“You’ll be fine. But don’t try to leave. I’m putting some wards on the door. The idiots upstairs will be able to bring you food and things, but if you try to go …”

“Then I’ll die.”

I carve some runes in the door frame with her punch dagger.

“No. But you’ll get knocked out by a jolt like a cattle prod up your ass.”

“No fair. I didn’t get anywhere near your ass.”

“I never play fair. That’s how I got out of Hell.”

“Good night, Sandman Slim.”

“Good night, Marcella.”

I finish carving the wards and go upstairs. I tell the roaches what to bring her. None of them will get near me in my bloody butcher suit, so I’m reasonably sure they’re listening to my orders.

When I’m in my room, I lock the door and strip off every piece of clothing. Some of the blood has dried. Bits of it flake off and land in the carpet. Somehow, I don’t think anyone is going to be using this room for a while after I leave.

I toss the clothes on the floor and get in the shower. I stay in there a long time, letting the steam burn the stink of Hell and that van off me.

WHEN I GET out of the shower, I check my side and right wrist. There’s still a deep red slash where the bullet grazed me. My wrist aches and blood still trickles from the edges of the cuts where the plastic cuffs bit into me. My arms and back are covered in bruises. This isn’t right. I should be more healed by now. This half-alive skin suit is second-rate stuff. Until Howard puts me back together again, I’m going to have to be more careful in fights. Though with any luck, tomorrow night is the last time I’ll have to worry about that.

It’s only a little after five, but I’m suddenly very tired. I decide to lie down for an hour and then go check on Marcella.

When I wake up, it’s after dark. I’ve slept three hours. There are streaks of blood on the sheets where my wrist rested. Now when I check it, it’s healed. It’s the same with my side. The red has gone out of the bullet wound and the skin has almost closed. This is good to know. My body takes longer to pull itself together and it uses more energy, so I’ll get tired faster. I need to remember that in case things get hot at the chapel tomorrow.

I get dressed and go down to the bowling alley. I can hear Marcella in the bathroom when I stick my head in. There’s a rollaway bed near the wall and a tray of uneaten food on the seats by the ball return. No problems here. I leave and go back upstairs before she sees me.

When I go into Sandoval’s office it’s just her, Sinclair, and Howard inside. They’re deep in discussion when I come in but quiet right down when they see me.

“Am I interrupting anything?”

Sandoval goes to the bar and pours herself a drink.

“Did you have a nice nap? I hope no one disturbed your beauty sleep.”

“Yeah. Sorry about that. I didn’t think I was going to sleep that long. It’s this body. It runs down fast.”

She looks at Howard.

“Is he telling the truth, Jonathan? Is there something wrong with his body?”

“There’s nothing wrong,” says Howard. “He’s simply in a liminal state between life and death. Consequently, his system runs a bit slower than normal. But aside from occasional bouts of fatigue, there should be no other impairments.”

“You’re sure? Our lives and holdings are riding on this man,” says Sinclair.

Howard looks at me like I’m a bug under a microscope.

“I understand that you were tortured and overpowered several people today. How did you feel while doing it? Any mental or physical problems?”

I hold up my wrist so that the others can get a good look. It’s healed but scarred and bruised, covered in patches of livid reds and purples. Sandoval and Sinclair frown at the sight.

“No problems at all. It wasn’t until I got back that I turned to jelly.”

He waves a hand at me.

“You see? No problems. He was able to perform his job, return, and is now awake, refreshed, and completely coherent.” He looks at Sandoval. “I know you’re not used to dealing with creatures such as this but trust me, Eva. He is functioning perfectly normally.”

Speaking of normal, I pour myself a drink at Eva’s bar.

“Thanks, Howard. And if you ever call me ‘creature’ again, I’m going to cut off your tongue with bolt cutters.”

Sandoval pats me on the arm.

“Careful, Stark. You want Howard to be your friend on your trip back to the world of the living.”

“Just tell Dr. Frankenstein to watch his language.”

“Of course. I’m sure he understands what a sensitive snowflake you are,” she says.

“What were you and Sinclair gossiping about when I came in?”

She looks over at him.

Sinclair says, “There were two more assassinations. Jared Glanton and Tetsuya Shin.”

“Here in L.A.?”

“No,” says Sandoval. “Jared was in our New York office, Tetsuya in Buenos Aires.”

“And they were the heads of their branches?”

“Yes.”

“Good. At least the pattern is confirmed. Which one of you runs L.A.?”

“That would be me,” says Sandoval.

“Then you’re not going to get a bullet in the head.”

“What makes you say that?” say Sinclair.

“Because they’re going to blow us up, Barron,” Sandoval says.

“Ah. Right.”

She looks at me. “That’s enough of you questioning us. What did you learn from that horrid woman in the basement?”

I glance at Howard, but he’s staring at a painting on the wall and won’t look at me.

“I’ve got good news. The ritual is tomorrow. And I know where and when.”

Eva goes over to Sinclair. They whisper to each other for a minute.

“Are you sure?” he says. “We were told it was the weekend.”

“She might be lying,” Sandoval says.

“She wasn’t. I made sure she knew it wasn’t in her best interest.”

Sandoval holds up a hand.

“Don’t tell me what you did. I don’t want to know.”

“Don’t worry. There were no bolt cutters involved.”

“Not another word.”

Sinclair says, “Where will the ritual take place?”

“At the Chapel of St. Alexis. Exactly at sunset.”

He looks at Sandoval.

“That’s right downtown. We could have a hundred armed associates there by then.”

“That’s a great idea,” I say. “Scare them off so they disappear and reschedule the ritual without us knowing when or where.”

“How do you want to handle it, then?” says Sandoval.

“I’ll take care of it myself. I don’t think there will be many faction people there because the ones who show up are committing suicide.”

“How will you do it?” says Sinclair.

“I’ll know when I see the setup, but I imagine I’ll basically just kill them all and take their stuff. Is that okay with everyone?”

Sandoval says, “It’s fine with me.”

“Me too,” says Sinclair.

Howard just grunts.

“Will you need anything from us?” says Sandoval.

“Body armor would be nice. Until I’m a hundred percent back, I’d like to keep bullets at a pleasant distance. I also need a couple of boxes of nine-millimeter ammo, plus three extended round clips. And bullets for the rifle I took from Marcella’s boys. A hundred rounds of 5.56 × 45 millimeter.”

“I don’t understand,” says Sandoval. “Can’t you simply use magic to kill them all?”

I shake my head.

“I won’t know that until I get there. There could be wards, charms, enchantments. A million little tricks that could slow down my hoodoo. I want to keep my body in one piece and that means being prepared for anything. Besides, sometimes a gun is just quicker.”

Sinclair has been scribbling notes on a piece of paper. When he’s done he looks over at me.

“Aside from the armor and the guns, is there anything else you need?”

I finish my drink.

“Yes. Before I have another one of these, I want a goddamn cigarette.”

Sandoval goes to her desk and pulls out a box of Nat Sherman Classics. Tosses it to me along with a gold lighter.

I sniff the box.

“Thanks, Santa.”

She nods at me.

“Eat something before you have more liquor. We want you in decent shape for tomorrow.”

I nod and head back to my room with my presents.

“I’ll get something when I’m out.”

“Where are you going?” says Sandoval.

“I’m taking a walk. Personal stuff.”

“What I mean is, will it be dangerous?”

“My ego might get bruised, if that’s what you’re asking.”

Howard says, “Remember to take care of your body. The healthier it is, the easier your transition will be. Damage it too much and I might not be able to bring you back fully.”

“You just be ready tomorrow night, Dr. Frankenstein. This monster wants to be able to eat donuts again.”

“What the hell does that mean?” says Sinclair.

“Don’t worry about it. Just be ready.”

I STILL HAVE some of Sinclair’s cash burning a hole in my pocket. Bamboo House of Dolls has good drinks and good food, so that’s destination two. Before that, though, I need to make one other stop.

It’s closing time at Max Overdrive and Kasabian is hustling the last customers out the door. It’s Friday night so I know what happens next. I light a Sherman and wait for it. Sure enough, in a few minutes, the door opens again and more people file out. Allegra is in the lead, followed by Brigitte Bardo. Candy and Alessa are last. They’re laughing, holding hands as they head out for a night of drinking, and my heart stutters for a minute. It’s one thing to wish them happiness in the abstract, but it’s another to see Candy laughing and in love without me. It hurts, but I’m a big boy, so I stay in the dark across the street and finish my cigarette.

Kasabian is still in the store putting money and discs away before heading out to join them. I wait until Candy and the others are out of sight before stepping into a shadow.

And step out again in the back of Max Overdrive. I watch Kasabian for a minute. He looks good. The mechanical body Manimal Mike made for him moves smoothly and naturally. He even has a few upgrades. His hands look human, not like the metal claws I remember. He’s wearing a bulky track suit zipped up to his neck to hide his stainless steel torso and legs. The suit hangs loose on him like someone deflated him. Still, he looks happy and healthy enough. Time to ruin all that.

I walk into the light.

“Evening, Kas. Long time no see.”

I should have waited a little longer. He was going through the day’s mail and the moment I speak it all goes up in the air and floats down like New Year’s confetti. He stumbles back and slams into the wall, stays there like a butterfly pinned to a board.

I hold up my hands and say, “Before you reach for the gun under the counter, I’m just here to see how you’re doing.”

He points at me and doesn’t say anything. Finally, he sputters, “Fuck you.”

I approach him slowly because I really don’t want to get shot tonight.

“Everything’s fine, man. Calm down.”

He relaxes a little and put his hands to his head.

“Fuck you, man. Why won’t you stay dead?”

“Nice to see you too, Kas.”

He leans heavily on the front counter and stares at me.

“Shit. It really is you.”

“It really is.”

“And you’re not here to kill me?”

“When I crawled out of Hell last time I wasn’t exactly thrilled to be back. This time I am.”

He stares a little more.

“How did you do it?”

“Get back?”

I make it to the counter and offer him a cigarette. He takes it with trembling fingers. I light it for him and look the store over.

“I didn’t do it,” I tell him. “Truth is, I didn’t know if I’d ever make it back. It was some other people who brought me back.”

He frowns.

“I don’t mean to sound harsh, but why? It’s been a year, man. Things …”

“Things have changed. You’ve all moved on. I get it and I’m not going to barge back in and expect you to throw me a party. But that doesn’t mean I don’t care about you assholes. I need to know how things are.”

He puffs his cigarette.

“You mean how Candy is.”

“That’s a good place to start.”

“How she is is there’s a big box of your shit in the closet where you used to lock me up. No one goes in there. No one looks at it. You’ve been cleared out and put away. Get it?”

I light my own cigarette.

“I take it that means Alessa has moved into our place upstairs.”

“Their place,” he says. “Not yours. Theirs. I told you. Things have changed.”

There it is. Things have changed. I’m not surprised, but it’s still a kick in the teeth.

“Are they happy?”

“Like a basket of kittens. And it gets a little aggravating sometimes for those of us, you know.”

“Alone?”

“Yeah.”

“What ever happened to Fairuza?”

Fairuza is a Lurker, a Ludere. Blue skinned and very sweet. She and Kasabian were an item last time I saw them.

He taps some ash on the counter.

“She’s long gone. Remember that night Allegra killed the French chick who poisoned Vidocq?”

“I ditched the body, so yeah.”

He shakes his head.

“She never got over it. Had a nervous breakdown and everything. Doesn’t want to have anything to do with any of us.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t sweat it. It’s the story of my life.”

“Speaking of Vidocq, I didn’t see him when the others left. How is he?”

He looks at me.

“You’ve been spying on us? There’s a word for that: stalker.”

“That’s why I came in tonight. I don’t want to be that person.”

“Thanks for making me your shrink.”

“So, where is Vidocq?”

He shrugs.

“Don’t know. I haven’t seen him for a while. Allegra dumped him after the thing with the French chick.”

“He was kind of an idiot, chasing after a girl he hadn’t seen in two hundred years.”

“I’m not sure you’re in a position to judge, window peeper.”

“How’s Brigitte? Working?”

He reaches back and pulls a Blu-ray box set off the wall.

“She’s doing fine. She’s the star of a big cable series. Plays an international spy and hit woman. But she’s a good guy, you know? Anyway, she spends a lot of time kicking the shit out of everybody in six-inch heels.”

I turn over the box set. Queen Bullet, it says in shiny red letters. The back is mostly stills of her snapping necks and shooting bad guys, dressed in miniskirts and evening gowns. She looks like she’s having a ball. Good for her.

I slide the set back to him.

“And how’s the store? Still in business, I see.”

Kasabian sighs.

“It’s doing good. Alessa had the idea to sponsor movie nights every month and Candy lets bands play here sometimes. We put the floor shelves on wheels so we can push them out of the way.”

“That really is good thinking. Are you still getting those special movies?”

“All the time.”

A witch friend used to use her hoodoo to find us movies in other realities that were never made in this one. Then she’d snag us a copy and we’d rent them for a fortune.

Kasabian hands me another disc.

On the front is a drawing of a burning giraffe holding a butterfly net and wearing a cowboy hat. I hold it under the light to make sure I’m seeing it right.

“What the fuck is this?”

“Giraffes on Horseback Saddles,” he says. “Screenplay by Salvador Dalí and starring the Marx Brothers.”

“This is what’s keeping the lights on?”

He takes the disc back and hands me another.

“Right, I forgot you have no sense of humor. This is more the stuff that’s keeping us going.”

There’s a horned red guy smoking a cigar on the front. The cover says, Hellboy 3, directed by Guillermo del Toro.

I hand it back to him.

“That makes more sense. I’m glad you didn’t all lose your minds while I was gone.”

He turns around and gives me a look.

“Don’t worry about us,” he says. “We’re doing fine and making more money than ever.”

“Don’t stab me in the heart so quick. I’m not ready to die again.”

“Okay. But sometimes you have a high fucking opinion of yourself. I mean, if you came back to save us, we don’t need it.”

“Understood.”

I look around the store, feeling like it was a bad idea coming here. The place looks great. Clean. New posters on the wall. And unless Kasabian was lying, they’re making money, which we never did when I was here. It makes me wonder if I was the thing holding the store back. Candy and Kasabian, too. Maybe it’s more than them getting over me. Maybe it’s that I was the problem in the first place. If that’s true, I’m not really sure what I came back for. It’s sure not to fuck up everybody’s lives again. I’m going to have to think about it. See if there’s some small place I can still fit in.

Kasabian is wiping his cigarette ash into a trash can when he says, “So, who brought you back?”

“You don’t want to know.”

“Yes, I do. First time you came back from Hell you were alive. This time, I don’t know. I saw you die. We all did.”

I look at him.

“Wormwood. It was Wormwood who brought me back.”

He frowns.

“Those crazy Illuminati bastards? Why would they do that?”

“I’m working for them. But only for one more day.”

“What the fuck are you doing for people like that?”

“Trying to save your life, for one thing. They might be complete assholes but there’s a worse bunch of assholes that want to blow L.A. off the planet in less than twenty-four hours.”

“Oh,” he says. “Is that why you’re here? To tell us to get out of town?”

“No, because I know when and where it’s going to happen and I’m going to stop it.”

He looks at me.

“Are you sure? I mean, I can get to LAX in an hour. Burbank airport even faster. And don’t worry. I’ll leave a note for Candy and Alessa.”

I tap a finger on the counter.

“Stop it. I told you. I’ve got it handled. After I take out the bombers, I’m free. I don’t owe Wormwood anything. I fact, I plan on killing a whole lot of them soon.”

He puts his hands over his ears.

“I don’t want to hear this shit. Don’t you understand? None of us have had to hear about one of your Superman murder sprees for a year. And I think I can speak for Candy and Alessa too when I say we don’t want to. Things are quiet. We do our jobs and we have fun. We have okay lives. Please don’t fuck that up.”

I look at him, trying to gauge his level of bullshit. Kasabian has never forgiven me for cutting off his head, and I can understand that. Part of me wants to believe that he’s saying all of this because I’m in a weak position and it’s his chance to finally get some revenge. But it’s not that. He doesn’t have a heart for me to listen to, but I can read his eyes and the frightened microtremors around his lips. He’s telling the truth. Barging in here like this, I might as well have driven a tank through the front door. At least I waited for Candy to leave so she didn’t have to see this disaster.

“You’re right,” I say. “I just had to know how things are. I’m going to go now. Do not tell Candy I was here.”

He looks at me like he doesn’t trust me. “Is that a threat?”

“No. It’s me asking you politely to keep Candy out of this.”

“Okay,” he says grudgingly. “I just didn’t like your tone there at the end.”

“Sorry. I’m going to take off.”

I’m starting to step into a shadow when Kasabian says, “Hey, I’m not telling you to fuck off forever. Just don’t pop out of the dark like the Grim Reaper and scare the piss out of me.”

“Got it.”

“For what it’s worth, I know Candy misses you. We had a drink on your birthday. Just the two of us. She got kind of misty-eyed and everything.”

“Misty-eyed? I suppose that’s better than nothing.”

“Beggars can’t be choosers, right?”

“That’s what they say.”

As I’m about to leave, a poster on the wall catches my eye. It’s for a drive-in theater called the Devil’s Door.

“Is that Flicker’s place?”

“Yeah,” says Kasabian. “She reopened about three months ago. Fixed the place up nice. You ought to go see it.”

“I just might.”

“See you, Stark.”

“Later, Kas.”

I step through a shadow but don’t go out anywhere. I stay in the Room of Thirteen Doors and just breathe the cool air.

That didn’t go the way I’d hoped. To tell you the truth, I’m not sure what I was looking for, but it wasn’t “You being dead is the best thing that ever happened to everyone.” I’m going to have to think about this more before I do anything. Maybe check in and see if Vidocq wants some company. Two assholes without a country. I wonder if he’s still living in my old apartment. Maybe he wants a roommate. It doesn’t sound like anyone is going to be inviting me back to Max Overdrive anytime soon. But I’ll worry about that later. Got to keep my head clear and get through the next twenty-four hours. After that, whatever happens, I’ll be home and alive. Hell, if it comes down to it, I can get a sleeping bag and bed down here in the Room, which, now that I say it, sounds incredibly depressing. I wonder if I can squeeze some money out of Sandoval for finishing the job early. Then maybe I could get my old room at the Beat Hotel. A bathroom, a bed, and clean towels that don’t stink of Wormwood corruption would be fine with me. And I’d be back in Hollywood full-time. It’s not exactly an ambitious plan, but the world is coming at me hard and fast. One step at a time is all I can handle right now.

At the moment, however, I have to figure out the rest of my night. I’m not ready to go back to Sandoval’s place and I’m sure as hell not going to Bamboo House. Kasabian is right. There’s a fine line between looking in on your ex and stalking, and I’m right on top of it. What’s depressing is that even Donut Universe is useless to me right now. But I have one more alternative, and it’s not a bad one at all.

I STEP INTO a shadow and come out due west of Max Overdrive.

Sure enough, it’s right where I remember. Because the entrance faces north, Flicker calls the place the Devil’s Door. The drive-in is surrounded by a high black wall covered in flames and horned dancing girls. There are eyes over the entrance and teeth around the edges so that when you enter, it’s like you’re diving right down the Devil’s gullet.

I go through another shadow and come out by the concession stand. It’s all overpriced drinks and expensive popcorn that you’re happy to pay for because all the money goes back to keeping the last old-school drive-in in L.A. open for business.

On the screen, Alan Ormsby is chewing up the scenery as he mock-marries a corpse from the local cemetery. The movie is Children Shouldn’t Play with Dead Things and Alan’s blushing bride will be snacking on his guts before the honeymoon is over. It’s a beautiful print of one of the first color zombie movies ever made. I wonder where she found it.

It’s wall-to-wall cars below the screen—a full house. There are even a few rented hearses in between the sports cars and SUVs. About half the crowd milling around the food stand is in makeup and filthy zombie rags. That’s why it takes me a few minutes to recognize her. She’s in zombie drag too, talking to an undead ballerina and a cowboy spinning a lariat made of vertebrae.

I don’t know Flicker’s real name and I don’t know anyone who does. I know she’s Chinese. I know she comes from heavy Sub Rosa money. And I know that she doesn’t talk to her family anymore because they don’t approve of the kind of hoodoo she practices. But she’s one of the best at what she does and this drive-in is proof of that.




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