Drawing Dead (14 page)

“Why would they care?” Princess asked, sincerely.

“It's just…vanity. But it's men who
make
them that way. You think it's easy walking around in high heels all day, like women have to do for business? I don't care if she's an executive or a waitress, flats are out. And the higher the heel, the harder it is on your whole body.”

“But you always—”

“Baby, I'm different. My spikes
are
spikes. Watch!” The Amazon grabbed one of the shoes she'd obviously taken off to put on the boots—lipstick-red four-inchers with black soles—and snapped the heel off in one smooth motion. Her hand flashed. A block of wood next to Rhino suddenly sported a new decoration—a deeply driven steel shaft.

“Wow!”

“I practice all the time, honey. I don't want to run out of ammo,” she told Princess, patting the two slim throwing-daggers she wore strapped to one muscular thigh. “And I hate guns; they're so noisy.”

“Uh-huh,” was all Cross said.

Tiger flashed her eyes in response. With the Amazon, every facial expression was an invitation or a threat: you took your guess…and proceeded at your own risk.

“You know what those cost?” Princess erupted, clearly not about to be shoved off-topic by practicalities like self-defense or intentional homicide.

Cross shrugged. Not “Who cares?” but “Who could guess?”

“Nothing! They wouldn't take a penny! Ask Tiger.”

“True enough,” she verified. “They said it took almost three months just to make them. ‘Your gift to her; our gift to you,' that guy with the thick glasses said.”

Cross nodded. It made sense now. Princess was a legendary figure in the gay community. Once he discovered that wearing makeup would make some nasty humans brave, it became his trademark. Some knew, and always greeted the huge child with a fake-friendly wave. Others…well, Ace probably put it best when he said, “Some fools gonna
stay
fools, 'cause they ain't gonna live long enough to be nothing else.”

But Tiger wouldn't be put off the scent. “These fit
perfectly,
baby. How could you…? I mean, we've been shopping plenty of times, but you heard what I just said about shoe sizes, right?”

“Oh, pul-leeze,” Princess said, in unconscious imitation of the staff at the leather-crafting shop where he'd gone to order the custom boots for the Amazon. “They asked me, how did I know? I told them I wasn't sure…and they told me to bring them one of Tiger's shoes. One she
wore,
I mean. I told them I couldn't make the surprise work if I had to ask her for one.”

His shaved head rotated slowly on his neck as he turned to Tiger. “So…remember when we went to that place where they always have shoes you like? I carried the packages out. When you were paying the parking guy, I copied down
everything
from one of the new pairs. What it said on the box and all. Just like they said.”

“You are one smart cookie,” Tiger said.

Princess blushed.

RHINO CAUGHT
the hand gesture from Cross.

“You're going out, right?” he said to Princess.

“Me and Tiger” was the answer. “But first I got to change clothes. There's this club Tiger said she'd—”

“I guess tonight's as good as any other,” the Amazon agreed. “I've got to change first myself. And we are
not
going in that insane truck of yours!”

“But Sweetie could get all cramped in the back of your car. I mean, he was in there for a long time when we picked up your boots. It's not—”

“Oh, Sweetie can come in with us.”

“Into a club?”

“Into
this
club.”

“Well…”

“What, honey? Everyone will love him, I promise.”

“Can he wear his party chain?”

“Why not?”

“Hear that, Sweetie? You're gonna
represent.
Isn't that great?”

Whether the black-masked Akita understood he would finally get to wear the heavy rope of 22-karat gold that once adorned the neck of a gangstah drug merchant who had grossly overestimated the loyalty of his personal posse was doubtful…but Princess certainly believed he did. After all, Sweetie had been present when that posse leader still
had
a head.

“I UNDERSTAND
why you waited for an organic opening to call us together,” Tracker said. “So now you have Princess away. And, as you said, this creature had never tried to attack Princess, even when he was alive. Tiger was not…known to him.”

“He's not back from the dead,” Cross said. “Whoever's trying to get us out in the open now, it's not him. But it all
connects
to him, somehow. All we know is that someone tried to get Ace to move on Hemp.”

“By spooking him,” Rhino said, very softly. “The same way that…thing spooked Buddha years ago, even though he didn't mean to. And with Ace, it worked. We just got lucky.”

“Lucky? We had Hemp tracked from the—”

“Yes, I know,” the mammoth whispered. “But Ace was going off the rails. He doesn't do research—he'd just start shooting until he ran out of targets. And in
that
neighborhood…”

“Okay. Let's say that's what would have happened. It
didn't
happen, though. And it doesn't explain why Ace got targeted.”

“There is a tribal name for the descendants of those who did not survive a battle,” Tracker said. When he added nothing to his words, Cross looked over at him:

“Which is—?”

“Enemy,” the Indian said, gravely. “This is why no war ever ends.”

“Tell that to the—”

“Who?” Tracker cut off the gang's leader mid-sentence. “It doesn't matter what words you use, the answer will be the same. The Japanese, did we end all their thoughts of vengeance with Hiroshima and Nagasaki? It is true, we do business with them on a colossal scale. But why do they celebrate every time a survivor of that war appears out of a cave in the islands? A hero, such a man.
He
never surrendered. A samurai to his core. Worthy of his nation's greatest respect.”

“Not a samurai,” Rhino argued. “For a soldier, his master would be the Emperor. And it was Hirohito himself who signed the surrender papers.”

“And never stood trial for war crimes,” Cross added.

“Ah, you confuse facts with truth,” Tracker said, almost sadly. “Did you miss the tone of my voice when I said ‘we' had won that war? Do you not understand that your tribe and mine were never one? We…all of us who once walked this country before you ‘discovered' it…we were not brought into a partnership; we barely survived attempted genocide.

“And ours was a culture more accustomed to war than
any
of yours. The Vikings were a warrior culture, but they fought wars of conquest. Genghis Khan, the Crusades—go back as far as you like, they are the same.

“But not us. We call ourselves ‘the People' now. Now, when it is too late. Before any man with white skin took a single step onto what is now America, we fought wars…wars among
ourselves.
Not for conquest—nomads care nothing for property. We fought as
tribes.

“Was that better? No, it was not. And look at the price we paid for that embedded insanity! Why should an Apache hate a Comanche? Why would a Hutu hate a Tutsi?”

Tracker paused, as if waiting for an answer. Or a challenge. When neither came, he continued: “In this country, people of color are all ranked below those
without
color. Black people will say this is because they were brought here as slaves. But who
captured
those slaves? No European ever entered the deep jungle and dragged out captives. The human cargo was already imprisoned, awaiting the arrival of the men with…with whatever the Africans on their western coast valued.

“This was acceptable. It was acceptable because, in Africa, color meant nothing, but tribe meant
everything.
Is that not the message of your brand, Cross?”

As if in response, the tiny blue symbol under Cross's right eye burned. “But only I can see it. And Tiger, too. It is not visible to you, is it, Rhino? Even in this darkness, you see nothing.”

“I don't,” the mammoth said. “Even when Cross told me where to look, I saw nothing.”

“Tiger and I, we are tribal. You are not. Nor is Buddha. Nor Ace.”

“A family is a smaller unit than a tribe. Than
any
tribe.”

“You call yourselves family,” Tracker said, holding up his hand to cut off any response. “And because you do, you are. I accept this. But there is more to know.”

“The Simbas,” Cross said. “Like when we were first hired—”

“I was
part
of that team,” Tracker reminded the other two men, “although my connection to you was not something those government people needed to know. Tiger felt the same. Neither of us have what the world would call a ‘family.' Both of us come from what the world would call a ‘tribe.'

“And that is a tribal brand on you, Cross. It was not your birthright—it came to you in that prison basement.”

“Then…”

“The brand is a message for me. And for Tiger. We both have lineage. Long lineage. An ancestral trail that could be followed back to its original seed. Neither of us have renounced our own…but neither of us have ever been put to the choice.”

“You would be with us?”

“Am I not?” Tracker answered Rhino. “Have I not been, ever since…?”

“Tiger, too?”

“Surely, you know this, Cross. Whatever your…feelings for her, or hers for you, can there be a doubt that she would step between Princess and
any
threat? Even one coming from her own people?”

“You're saying…?”

“I am saying the truth, Cross. You call Ace your brother, and brothers are what you have been to one another. Rhino was your choice. Princess was his. It goes on, does it not? Say I am not your brother.”