Chapter 1

CHAPTER 1

I woke up early for a stupid reason. I'd rolled over in my sleep and put my hand out to let it rest on Max Reddy, and of course he wasn't there. He'd been gone two weeks, and I was still reaching for him in my sleep.

Okay, that had to stop.

I sat up and saw Maggs, Max's long-haired black German Shepherd, alert at the foot of the bed where she'd been keeping my feet warm. "It's okay, baby," I said, but Maggs had already been sitting up, looking out the window now, so I must have made some noise in my sleep to alert her.

I got up and texted Max's satellite phone number in the light from the streetlamps out front, shining through snow-frosted windows.

YO, FOOTLOOSE GUY

TEXT ME THAT YOU'RE ALIVE

I knew he probably wouldn't read the text for hours, but I needed to feel like I was making some kind of contact with him. I closed my eyes for a moment, remembering how good it had felt to have my arms around him. His arms around me. The scent of him and the taste of him and . . .

I felt myself breathe deeper at just the thought of him, but memories weren't getting my work done, so enough of that.

Maggs and I went downstairs to our secondhand shop because I knew I wasn't going back to sleep and because Maggs was ever hopeful of a dog cookie or possibly bacon. The shop counter had the mask I was making for a friend of mine, and it was as good a distraction from my lack of Max as any, given it was six in the morning and there was nobody to talk to.

About the mask: The guy who'd left me the shop in his will, my old boss Ozzie Oswald, had also left me (among many, many, many other things) a box of masks with labels on them. One was an elegant white rabbit that had been tagged "Coral" with a post it. Ozzie knew I collaged and made assemblages, so I assumed he'd wanted me to collage a portrait-mask of our next-door neighbor, Coral Schmidt, the owner of the Ecstasy bakery and coffee shop, who also happened to be the woman he loved.

So, I wanted the mask-portrait to be special, a last legacy from Ozzie. I'd used a lot of black lace, some doll house bread, coral-colored flowers, a black eye mask to show that Coral was a woman of mystery.

I was putting the last of the glue on her black lace and thinking about what else I could add when I heard her scream "NO!" next door.

I ran like hell out of my shop's front door, skidding on the ice on the pavement outside, and into her shop, Maggs right with me, to see Coral struggling with a woman who had a knife raised in both hands, but Coral was losing the battle, the point of the blade inching closer to her as she screamed her head off.

I picked up a chair and swung it hard against the back of the knife-woman's head.

She staggered and let go of Coral and turned the knife toward me, but Maggs leapt for her knife arm and Coral caught her by the neck from behind and twisted sharply, and I heard a snap, and the woman hit the floor. I raised the chair again, in case she tried to get up, but she was very still, flat on her back, her eyes wide open staring at the ceiling, her neck at a bad angle.

I froze, and Maggs backed up and barked, both of us impressed by the speed of Coral's work. Although, really, if you attack an international assassin, even if she's in her seventies and retired, you do not turn your back on her. Big mistake.

Coral was bleeding like a stuck pig from a slash mark on her cheek and a deep one in her forearm. I slammed the chair down in front of her and said, "Sit," and ran for the first aid kit I knew she kept behind the counter.

She sat, looking dazed and dizzy and angry, blood flowing down her cheek and from her arm. She must have done that neck twist on pure adrenalin.

I grabbed the kit. "I'll call an ambulance?—"

"No," Coral said. "Who the hell are you?"

At first, I thought she was disoriented, but I should have known better. Coral does not disorient. Maggs gave a very low growl and I looked behind me to see a tall redheaded Black woman wearing jeans and a puffy jacket, standing in the doorway, surveying the scene with surprising calm.

Outsider.

But Maggs was staring at her, hackles not raised and not growling any more. Maggs was a very good judge of character. Plus, the woman wasn't holding a knife or a gun or a flamethrower (yes, really, after the last six weeks, nothing would surprise me).

"I heard you screaming from the pharmacy." The redhead pointed at Coral's arm. "That should be stitched if you're not going to call for help." She didn't seem upset by the blood or the dead woman on the floor, speaking in a flat, business-like manner. "I'm a doctor. I can get my bag and take care of that."

"No," Coral said, and I said, "Yes. Jesus, Coral, you're going to bleed to death." That may have been an over-reaction, but with her cheek bleeding too, there was so much blood.

I checked out the woman in the doorway, slender and fit, so it was possible she was an accomplice, but she wasn't trying to kill anybody at the moment.

She glanced at the body on the floor. No reaction. Well, it was beyond any doctor's help.

"Get your bag, please," I said to her, and frowned at Coral. "You. Keep that arm up." I thought that was what you were supposed to do for knife wounds, keep the wound in the air so the blood wouldn't flow. Or something.

Coral didn't fight back, pale as the white icing on her cinnamon rolls, while I got some napkins from the stack by her register and tried to staunch the bleeding on her cheek and arm so the new Outsider could see to put her back together when she returned.

God, there was so much blood.

"Coral," I said. "You need to be serious about this."

She looked up at me. "I am serious. Get Max back. Now."

Her voice was faint, as if she was saving all her energy not to bleed to death, but she sounded sure as all hell.

I took out my phone and texted Max.