Redemption Song (28 page)

He pushed his shoulders back, taking a deep breath and steadying himself. The guy was tough, I’d give him that.

“What next?” Lars asked.

“What’s next is the really dangerous part. You just have a cameo, though. You’ve done more than enough already. Agent Black, did you get the other stuff on my list?”

“All of it,” she said.

“Good. First, to set the scene.”

I moved to the corner of the room, far enough away that they couldn’t overhear the other end of my phone call. I’d told Harmony that I knew of a mole inside Vegas Metro who answered to Sullivan. I didn’t tell her it was one of her own partners. I’d keep that secret as long as I could. Not for Gary Kemper’s sake, but because he was still useful to me. Gary answered on the fifth ring.

“Faust,” he groaned, “it’s four in the fucking morning—”

“
Non
,” I said gravely, imitating Gilles’s accent the best I could. “Not Faust. Not anymore.”

Thirty-Six

T
he line went silent for a few seconds. When Gary came back, his voice was a whisper.

“No fuckin’ way.”

“I have, how do you say, ‘upgraded my accommodations’?”

“This is Gilles de Rais,” Gary said flatly.

“
Oui
.”

“And you’re possessing the body of Daniel fucking Faust.”

I chuckled, as if it were the most natural thing in the world.

“
Oui
.”

“Well hot damn, Christmas came early this year! What happened to Lars? Is he okay?”

“Regrettably,” I said, “Faust and some lady…how do you say, ‘cop’? Attempted to apprehend me. There’s been a terrible accident.”

“Wait. Wait. Harmony? Harmony and Lars? What happened, de Rais? What did you do?”

“As I said, a terrible accident. You should come pick me up. Be swift and silent.”

I told him where to find me and hung up before he could ask any more questions. Harmony sat on the far end of the steel table, giving me a dubious look.

“What?” I said.

“That is the worst French accent I’ve ever heard. I thought you were doing a Pepé Le Pew impression.”

Lars nodded. “I heard him talking, inside my head. Didn’t sound anything like that.”

“Well, the only person I really have to impress is Sullivan, and from what I heard he wasn’t keen on spending too much time having a deep conversation with the guy. Hopefully he’ll overlook it.”

“And if he doesn’t?” Harmony asked.

“Then he tears me into itty-bitty pieces and scatters my body parts all over the desert. And this officially becomes the worst plan I’ve ever had.”

I emptied the second shopping bag onto the table. Lars arched a dubious eyebrow when he saw what was inside.

“So,” I said lightly. “Ready to die?”

• • •

I stood at the end of the corridor, imperious, with my hands braced on my hips. Gary almost broke into a run when he rounded the corner and saw me. Sweat plastered his sleep-tangled hair to his scalp.

“Where are they?” he demanded. “What did you do?”

I waved my hand at the frosted-over interrogation room mirror. The spell faded like a gust of hot breath, giving Gary a prime view of the room beyond the glass. His breath seized in his throat.

Lars slumped on the floor in the far corner of the room, his throat slit from ear to ear and caked with freshly dried blood. Harmony’s corpse lay on the stainless-steel table like a body ready for autopsy. Deep red stains pockmarked her ivory blouse in the aftermath of a savage stabbing. Her killer had left the knife behind, protruding from one of her eye sockets.

“Jesus Christ!” Gary shouted, drawing curious looks from down the hall.

“Be quiet!” I snapped, staying between him and the door.

“You just murdered two federal—” He caught himself, lowering his voice. “You murdered two goddamn federal agents, you sick bastard! Do you have any idea how much heat you just brought down on all of us?”

“You are at a bit more risk than I,
monsieur
, so have a care and be a bit more discreet.”

“More discreet?” he snapped, looking at the murder scene then back to me. He slapped his palm against his forehead and tugged at his hair. “Those were friends of mine, do you get that? Do you understand that at all?”

“They were necessary sacrifices for the cause. You…do support the cause, do you not? Sullivan would hate to hear of your disloyalty, I’m sure.”

“Oh, you’re gonna play that card? What do you think Sullivan’s gonna say about this goddamn stunt, huh?”

I shrugged expansively, imitating Gilles’s body language.

“He forbade me to murder children,” I said, then gestured to the glass. “They are not children.”

Gary paced back and forth, running his fingers through his hair. “All right. All right. All right, you goddamn psycho, here’s how we’ll do this. I’m leaving. You wait here for five minutes, and I mean not a second sooner. Then you leave and walk three blocks east. I will pick you up there. Do not even
look
in my direction until then.”

He stomped off. I waited until he disappeared around the bend, then gave two knocks on the glass. Harmony groaned as she sat up, rubbing the back of her neck and tugging the fake knife hilt from the glob of cherry-colored latex over her eye. Lars pushed himself to his feet, scratching at the Karo syrup “blood” on his neck.

Vegas is a party town. It’s never hard to find supplies for Halloween.

I poked my head in the door. “You both get Oscars. Best corpse in a police station.”

“He bought it?” Harmony asked.

“Hook, line, and sinker. Now if you excuse me, I’m going to go try and con a demon.”

“Hey,” Harmony said before I could shut the door. “Faust.”

“Yeah?”

She nodded. “Don’t die.”

“I’ll make that a priority.”

I strolled out of the precinct house like the picture of innocence and headed east. Eventually I heard the slow rumble of a car coming up on my left and the whine of a window rolling down.

“Get in,” Gary said, gesturing towards the passenger side of his battered old Datsun. My shoes crunched on a clutter of crumpled McDonalds bags and empty plastic water bottles when I climbed in.

“I called Sullivan,” he said, not looking at me. “Told him whose body you jacked. I’m not sure if he’s pissed or ecstatic. He’s probably not sure either.”

“It is my pleasure to amuse,” I said.

I’d hoped Gary would drive me straight to the Redemption Choir’s new stronghold. If nothing else, and assuming I lived through this, I could call Caitlin’s people and let them burn the place to the ground. No such luck. Gary drove another four blocks and pulled into a Chevron gas station on a lonely corner. Dawn broke over the city, the soft desert sunrise clashing with the harsh gas station lights.

Sullivan stood in front of his black SUV, leaning on his walking stick. A cluster of cambion stood around him like a flock of vultures scouting out their next meal. These had to be the new guys from back east. There was something harder about them, meaner, more confident. A couple of them wore light windbreakers to cut the dawn chill, and even an amateur could spot the holster bulges under the nylon.

Gary parked a respectful distance away, and we got out together. This was it, the make-it-or-break-it moment. If Sullivan bought the con, I was home free. If not, I’d never leave this place alive. I focused on my breathing, pushed my shoulders back, and lifted my chin. If Gilles was anything, he was brazenly confident. I had to look the part. More than look it, I had to believe it.

Sullivan’s gaze burned into me as we approached. I could feel his psychic tendrils sliding over me, wrapping around my body like the tentacles of an octopus bathed in toxic waste. I spun a sheath of armor around my heart and thought of Naavarasi. Scent of jungle, textures of rough wood and vine.

“You feel…different,” Sullivan said. His face was a mask of stone.

“I
am
different,” I said proudly. “My last body was strong, but a simpleton. A dullard! This one has touched the winds of magic. Faust’s power has been added to my own, like two rivers feeding a mighty whitewater.”

He nodded slowly.

“And how did Faust find you?”

I shrugged. “Not all of his secrets are open to me…yet. I am peeling his mind away, layer by layer.”

He nodded again. Still with the poker face.

“You’ve done me a favor, it seems,” he said. “Loath as I am to acknowledge it. I won’t mince words, de Rais. You’re an abomination and if I had my way, I’d be pleased to send you screaming back to hell where you belong. Fortunately, you won’t be my problem much longer. You…do remember what I mean by that, correct?”

There it was. The test. What would Sullivan have told Gilles about his ultimate plans? Would he have gone into detail about Lauren? Or just told Gilles that some kind of trade was in the works? Sullivan expected a response, and if I gave too little detail—or worse, too much and incorrectly—it’d prove I wasn’t really Gilles.

Wait a second
, I thought, my mind racing.
Sullivan hates Gilles. He’s got no reason to share information. Besides, as soon as we let them escape the parking garage, Sullivan stashed him in that motel room and went to Denver
.

“When have we talked?” I demanded, puffing myself up. “You’ve done precious little since I took flesh but to insult me and abandon me. In the absence of words, your actions have made it painfully clear that I’m not an honored guest but a scorned hostage! I treated
Englishmen
more respectfully than this, in my day.”

Sullivan stared at me. Then he chuckled softly and nodded. I exhaled in relief.

“A fair assessment,” he said. “Very well. You’re going to be handed off to another owner tomorrow night, in exchange for something I need. After that, you won’t be a problem for anyone anymore. Until then, though, you will do exactly as you are told, exactly as you are told to do it.”

If I were really Gilles de Rais, he’d have a point. As long as Sullivan held his contract, the damned soul was bound to obey his every command. I tried to put the right amount of hostility in my voice as I bowed my head.

“I have no choice but to serve.”

“No,” he said, “you don’t. Now we’re going to find another place to stash you until the festivities. You will stay there. You will not contact anyone, you will not speak to anyone, you will not harm
anyone
. Is that understood?”

“As you command,” I said, practically spitting the words.

Sullivan turned away from me and shot a sharp look at Gary. The smaller man took a halting step backward.

“As for you, the deaths of Black and Jakobsen removed a potential long-term problem, but they don’t bode well for your usefulness to the cause. Can you be tied to the killings?”

He shrugged, shuffling from foot to foot. “The closed-circuit cameras in that part of the precinct house have been broken for two weeks. I didn’t sign in or anything.”

“You need an alibi, just to be safe. Go to Los Angeles, there’s a Choir safe house there. I’ll arrange receipts and documentation to prove you’ve been out of town for the last two days.”

Gary winced. “I’d…rather be here, if it’s all the same to you. I mean, I worked with those guys. I liked them. I wanna help with, you know, the arrangements—”

“It’s not all the same to me,” Sullivan said sternly. “We’re on the cusp of our triumph. I can’t risk any trouble or drawing extra attention toward my people. You have two choices: you can leave town, or you can just…leave.”

The way he said that last word, it was clear he wasn’t talking about a bus ticket to Idaho.

Gary nodded meekly, his eyes downcast. “Yes, sir.”

I felt a little bad about the fake-out, but I had to justify “Gilles” walking free, and the phony carnage bolstered my cover story. I couldn’t bring Gary in on the ruse. Sullivan would have seen right through his story if Gary didn’t honestly believe he’d seen a pair of corpses in the interrogation room. He wasn’t a good enough liar. Besides, he’d nearly shot me in the back less than twelve hours ago, so I wasn’t in the mood to be nice. I figured he’d have a happy surprise waiting when he got back from LA and found out his partners were still alive. By then, hopefully, Sullivan wouldn’t be.

Thirty-Seven

T
he Choirboys put Gary on a bus and me in the back of a Ford Explorer with windows tinted blacker than Sullivan’s heart. His new arrivals were a breed apart: quiet, hard-eyed zealots with moves like professional soldiers. I wondered if he had some kind of training camp back east, with obstacle courses and bomb-building classes. The Denver boys said little and smiled less.

“Where are you taking me?” I demanded, playing up my part.

The driver didn’t answer. The two cambion squeezing in on my left and right stared straight ahead, like robots waiting to be powered on.

“I am a nobleman,” I said, poking the back of the seat. “I insist that you—”

“Shut up,” the driver said. And that was the closest I got to a conversation.

They stashed me in a room at the Value Lodge on East Tropicana. I took bitter amusement in the fact that I’d been here not that long ago, in the room right next door: Jud Pankow, father of a wayward porn starlet, had holed up here while I was tracking his daughter’s killer. Turned out the kid was collateral damage in a much bigger plot, and that job led me straight to Lauren Carmichael. And Caitlin.

Things seemed a hell of a lot simpler back then.

“Stay here,” the driver told me as he half shoved me into the room. “Sit down. Watch TV. Shut up. We’ll be back tomorrow night.”

I gave them two minutes and peeked around the edge of the drawn curtains. Sure enough, they’d taken off. And why not? As far as Sullivan knew, the only people who’d been hunting for Gilles were Harmony and me—and Harmony was dead and I was possessed. Since “Giles” was bound by Sullivan’s command to stay in the room, and all his threats were neutralized, leaving guards behind would have been a waste of resources.

I opened the curtains, inviting a stream of light into the spartan motel room, basking in the morning’s warmth. I’d pulled off the short con, but the hard work was just getting started. I needed solid intel, plans, coordination…