I gave my makeup one last check in my compact mirror. Tonight, it involved glitter, false eyelashes with feathers on the ends, and lots of glittery powder in my fake cleavage. My blue wig topped it all off, perfectly and literally. I slicked my mouth with bright pink lip gloss for the finishing touch, and tapped the back of the cabbie’s seat once we hit the edge of the French Quarter. I gave him the fare plus twenty bucks.
“You never saw me, right?”
From the way he looked at my chest, he’d seen way more of me than I’d wanted.
My platform boots gave me a definite swagger, and my taffeta tutu accentuated the swing of my hips. I focused on the ground and concentrated on lengthening the shape of my eyelids, along with puffing up my lips and making my cheekbones more prominent. I searched for my reflection and found it in a plate-glass window. I could see my own face underneath, but only because I was looking.
It had rained most of the day and a fine mist hung in the air, but the endless party still went strong. I melted into the crowd, noting details for my escape route, since I’d be on foot.
I couldn’t always tell the bums from the tourists, and even though Mardi Gras was only one week a year, some glassy-eyed coed was always ready to lift her shirt for a string of cheap plastic beads. Stories were ripe for the picking in the Quarter, and most were written all over their authors’ faces. The same creepy-ass clown stood outside Oz, juggling shot glasses tonight. I skirted my way past him without making eye contact.
I hated clowns.
I hooked a right down a side street. More warning than beacon, Skeevy’s neon sign shone red off the wet payment. I straightened my shoulders and headed for the front door. Heavy metal bars covered the bulletproof windows. An electronic ding sounded my entry as I pushed open the door. Easy to get in, harder to leave, especially if you held something in your hands.
Good thing Poe would be taking a shortcut.
The register was the old-fashioned kind with ticker tape and a little bell that rang when the drawer opened. Cash only at Skeevy’s. Checks bounced and credit cards left records, and no one on either side of the counter wanted that.
Danny Launoux was my target.
Thanks to my rock star surveillance skills, I knew he liked comics, vodka, and girls. That last part was crucial to my role in this little drama.
He wore 1970s, tinted glasses that didn’t hide his eyes but did make him look like a pimp. The heels of his boots hung on the rungs of the stool where he sat hunched over, reading a Batman comic. A set of keys dangled from a chain on his belt. His hair was out of control, frizzy, curly, and more tall than wide. I forced fifty product suggestions to stay on the tip of my tongue and crossed the dirty, tan carpet. Danny didn’t look up until I reached him. I waited for a reaction. I didn’t get one.
“I’m looking for a ring,” I said. It had been one of my mother’s. I’d sold it earlier in the week as a blonde with thin lips, all Broke College Student Who Needed Tuition. I’d even managed tears. He hadn’t been impressed then, either.
“Prices are on the tags. No bargaining. What you see is what you pay.”
I browsed. Poe was already supposed to be in the back, but I couldn’t be sure until I got confirmation. I checked my phone as I slinked toward the jewelry cases. No texts.
I made a big show of bending over, and then arched my back and stretched. I’d at least expected curiosity from Danny, but he’d gone back to reading. I dropped my arms to my sides with a sigh and tried the direct approach.
“Is that the latest Batman issue from the New 52 series?” My Internet research had told me all I needed to know about the 2011 relaunch of DC Comics. It had also lured me into placing an order of my own.
He blinked, lowered the comic, looked at me, looked at the cover, and then at me again. “That’s what it says.”
“I feel sorry for Batman. I couldn’t imagine what it would be like to have to hide your identity. Never to be truly close to a woman. I like to get close. Don’t you?”
“I don’t care how hot you are. I’m not going to lower my prices because you’re coming on to me,” Danny said in a monotone. Definitely not distracted. More like bored.
Damn. I’d hoped my fierce comics knowledge would work in my favor in case my flirting didn’t. “I’m not coming—”
“I know how women are,” he said in a Cajun drawl. “And I could smell you angling for a deal when you walked in the door.”
He could smell me? Jackass. I hated to use my sexuality for evil, and here he was, trivializing my effort.
“I happen to like Batman, and I told you, I want a ring. Show me the blue one.”