“Maybe what you know can help save someone else,” I offered.
Violet sat silent for a moment before answering. “There’s no saving anyone, Jack. I’m surprised you haven’t learned that by now.”
I fished a business card out of my purse and handed it to her. “If you change your mind or think of anything, call me. Anytime.”
“And thanks for the CDs,” McGlade said, smiling and holding them up. “You can also call that number if you find any more Stones bootlegs.”
We let ourselves out. The rain had stopped, and it felt colder than before.
“Well, that was pretty much a waste of time,” I said, heading for the car.
“Are you kidding? I’m going to make a few hundred bucks selling these CDs on eBay.”
I scanned the parked cars, searching for the Monte Carlo.
My iPhone buzzed.
A text from Herb.
Just four words, but they hit me like a slap across the face.
THERE’S BEEN ANOTHER MURDER.
March 31, 5:45 P.M.
Movement in her peripheral vision, such as it was, pulled Lucy’s attention away from the Juke. Two thirteen-year-old boys—one tall and scrawny, one fat as a little doughboy—stood ten feet away, staring at her through the glass, their mouths hanging open, a look on their faces caught between ridicule and disgust.
They approached, and one of them knocked on the window.
Lucy looked over at Donaldson, who said, “Just tell them to get lost.”
She turned and stared at the boy through the glass. “Go away.”
“Holy shit, she’s only got one eye!”
“And this dude looks like Freddy Krueger!” the other boy yelled.
“Give me the gun,” Lucy said. “I’m killing them both.”
“We don’t have time.”
“How about just one of them?”
The taller of the two boys, a white kid wearing a black parka with a bandanna tied around his head, said through the glass, “What happened to you? Some kinda accident?”
Lucy lowered her window. “I was hanging out with my stupid friend, and we asked these very bad people too many questions.”
The tall boy’s friend punched him in the arm. “Damn, dawg, let’s skate.”
“Sure you don’t want to have a little fun?” Lucy asked. “I’ve played with boys like you before. I would do things to you that would blow your minds.”
“Yo, she’s psycho, Chris, come on, quit messin.”
“I’m coming around to your way of thinking,” Donaldson said. “Lots of cornfields around here. Maybe we could take a little siesta.” He turned to the boy. “Do you youngsters like beer?”
“You got beer?”
“We also have candy,” Lucy said. “We’re going to a party. All your friends will be there. Your parents said it was okay. I just talked to them.”
“Chris, this is whack, let’s bounce.”
“Oh shit,” Donaldson said. “Jack’s coming out, look.”
Lucy glanced through the windshield, spotted Jack and some man walking out of a townhouse on the far side of the complex.
The two teenage wiggers had made what was probably the only intelligent decision in their young, white trash lives, and had taken off.
“Too bad,” Donaldson lamented, watching them go. “My tube was getting hard.”
He started the car.
“What are you doing?” Lucy said.
“Following Jack.”
“No.”
“No?”
“Don’t you want to know who Jack was visiting?”
“Yeah, but we’ll lose Jack.”
“We know where she lives. We can always pick her up again. But who’s so important that Jack drove all the way out to Peoria to see them? This might be someone we need to talk to. Or someone to use as leverage.”
Donaldson grunted. “Yeah, all right.” He killed the engine and jammed the Beretta down the chest pocket of his overalls.
Jack Daniels’s Juke hauled ass out of the parking lot, tires squealing.
“She’s going somewhere in a hurry,” Lucy said.
Donaldson opened his door and struggled up out of the Monte Carlo.
It took Lucy three tries to muster enough inertia to hoist herself out of the seat.
Finally standing on her pushpin legs, she felt lightheaded. A wave of crippling pain swept through her. She braced herself against the car, took a deep breath.
“You all right?” Donaldson asked.
“Yeah. I’m gonna need a new patch soon.”
“How many we got?”
“Fifteen.” And it had been a hard-fought fifteen. Lots of pain-loaded nights in order to save them up.
“We’ll apply fresh ones when we get back to the car. Or maybe we’ll get lucky, and our little home invasion will result in some meds.”
They limped across the parking lot together like a pair of crippled demons, and by the time they reached the stoop to number 813, they were both panting so hard they had to stand there for two full minutes, recovering from the exertion.
“You ready?” Donaldson gasped, pulling the Beretta out of his overalls.
“I don’t have a weapon.”
“If I recall, your weapon was dragging people behind your car for miles, then spraying them with lemon juice.”
“Organic lemon juice,” Lucy corrected.
“You’re such a tree-hugging hippie. Do you want to go out and score some lemonade before we bust in? Or maybe some granola?”
Lucy shook her head. “Just don’t mess it up, fat ass.”
Donaldson made a sad, three-fingered fist, and pounded on the door.
After a while, slow, heavy footsteps approached from the other side.
As soon as the door cracked open, Donaldson shoved the Beretta into the homeowner’s face.
“Who are you?” he asked.
“Um…Violet.”
“Are you alone?”
A hesitation, then, “Yes.”
“We’d like to talk to you, Violet. You can open the door, or I can blow your brains out the back of your head. Your call.”
The door opened.
Lucy’s heart rate accelerated. It was an even bigger rush than morphine. God, she missed this shit.
They forced their way inside, Lucy deadbolting the door behind her.
The place stunk of stale cigarettes and beer and desperation. She turned to look at Violet, amused to find a morbidly obese woman in a housedress so big it could’ve been a circus tent. Except there wouldn’t be any customers who’d pay to sit under that big top.
Lucy remembered back to a guy who’d given her a ride. Before she’d met Donaldson. A long time ago. A lifetime ago.
The driver had been fat.
He’d also been a lot of fun.
Every extra pound of fat a person carried required an extra three and a half miles of veins and arteries to supply it with blood.
Which meant that fatties bled.
A lot.
And Lucy loved blood.
March 31, 8:30 P.M.
Luther stands glaring at the desk clerk.
“No, that won’t work. I need a room on the twelfth floor.”
“Sir, here at the Renaissance Blackstone, we strive to make—”
“Yeah, I don’t give a shit about that. I just want a room on the twelfth floor.”
The desk clerk sighs but maintains her pleasant exterior. She turns her attention back to the computer screen, fingers tapping furiously at the keys. “Sir, all we have is a suite, but—”
“I’ll take it.”
“—it’s four seventy-five a night.”
Luther reaches into his wallet and throws down the stolen plastic.