"Understood. Which is the real reason I've come. I need an advance. I have an empty wall in my house that has to be filled with one of your paintings, but I won't be able to pay with cash today."
Benloise smiled, showing orderly little teeth. "I'm afraid I don't make those arrangements. You must pay for the art you leave with. And why ever is your face covered up?"
Lash ignored the question. "You're going to make an exception in my case."
"I don't make exceptions--"
Lash dematerialized across the space, taking form behind the guy and putting a knife to his throat. With a shout, the guard over by the door went for his heat, but there wasn't a lot to shoot at when your boss's jugular was on the verge of springing a leak.
Lash hissed in Benloise's ear, "I've had a really bad fucking week and I'm tired of playing by human rules. It is my full intention to continue our relationship, and you are going to make that possible not only because it benefits us both, but because I'm going to take it personally if you don't. Know this, you cannot hide from me and there is nowhere you can go that I can't find you. There is no door strong enough to keep me out, no man I can't overpower, no weapon you can use against me. My terms are this--one major piece to fill up my wall, and I will take it with me right now."
When he discovered who Benloise's overseas contacts were, he might just off the bastard--but that would be jumping the gun. The South American was the pipeline for product into Caldwell, and that was the only reason the son of a bitch had a good shot at having lunch later today.
As opposed to a date with an embalmer.
Benloise dragged in a breath. "Enzo, the new Joshua Tree pastels are due to arrive early this evening. When they do, you will pack up one of them and--"
"I want it now."
"You will have to wait. I cannot give you that which I don't possess. Kill me at this moment and you shall have none of it."
Fucker. Motherfucker.
Lash thought back to how much was left in the trunk of the Mercedes--and considered the fact that even now, the coke buzz was draining from him, leaving a whole lot of snooze in its wake. "When. Where."
"Same time and place as always."
"Fine. But I'll be taking a taste with me now." He dug the knife into that neck. "And don't tell me that you're totally dry. That's going to make me cranky . . . and twitchy. Twitchy is bad for you--FYI."
After a moment, the guy murmured, "Enzo, go get him a sample of the artist's new work, will you."
The meat across the way seemed to be having trouble processing everything, but then seeing someone disappear into thin air was no doubt a new one for him.
"Enzo. Go now."
Lash smiled underneath his mummy wraps. "Yeah, beat some feet there, Enzo. I'll take excellent care of your boss until you come back."
The bodyguard backed out and then there was the retreating sound of his boots clapping down the stairwell.
"And so you are the worthy successor to the Reverend," Benloise said with a strain.
Ah, Rehvenge's former nomenclature in the human world. "Yeah, I'm right up his alley."
"There was always something different about him."
"You think that shit was special?" Lash whispered. "Wait'll you get a load of me."
Back at the Brotherhood mansion, Qhuinn was sitting up in his bed, leaning against the headboard. He had the cable remote balanced on one thigh, yet another short-and-squat full of Herradura on the other side, and next to him, hanging tight?
Good ol' Captain Insomnia.
In front of him, the television glowed in the darkness, the morning news droning on. Turned out the police had found the homophobe Qhuinn had worked over in the alley next to the cigar bar and taken him to St. Francis Hospital. Guy was refusing to identify his attacker or comment on what had happened, but it wouldn't have mattered if he opened his piehole. There were hundreds of pierced, leather-wearing, tatted up sons of bitches in town and the CPD could kiss Qhuinn's ass.
But whatever, that motherfucker wasn't going to say shit to nobody--and Qhuinn was willing to bet his left nut he never gay-bashed again either.
Next came an update on what the humans were calling "the Farmhouse Massacre"--said report basically amounting to a whole lot of no new information, but plenty of hysteria-inducing hyperbole. Cults! Ritual sacrifices! Stay indoors after dark!
All of which was, of course, based on circumstantial evidence, because the blue-uni-and-badge brigade had nothing but aftermath to go on--no bodies. And although the identities of a rash of missing lowlifes were starting to percolate to the surface, the dead end was going to stick: Those few slayers who had escaped the Brotherhood's infiltration were now firmly entrenched in the Lessening Society, never to be seen or heard from again by their former friends and families.