“—commend the soul of our brother Burt into your loving hands—”

  “Are they always this long-winded?” Robby whispered. There was a stress fracture of Irish in her voice.

  “Nope. He’s just clearing his throat. Wait’ll he gets to the actual praying.” Velvet grinned, winced when it dragged at a bruise. “You never been in a church before?”

  “Not a Protestant church.”

  It was a Catholic thing. Velvet rolled her eyes and waited out the prayer, raised her head and twisted it right and left to ease the muscle cramp. She tried not to look at the centerpiece—shiny wood and gold handles—and wound up looking at the carpet again. Old nappy dark red carpet. Appropriate for churches and movie theaters. She scuffed a penny loafer over it and shifted from one cheek to the other on the thin red-velvet pew cushion.

  Burt had a lot of friends. The rows ahead of her were full of suits and church ladies, buzz cuts and big hair. In the second pew sat a fat woman wearing black. Three young kids—the oldest a pimply teen-aged boy, the youngest a restlessly squirmy girl—sat close beside her. The only other person on the family pew was a guy, small, neat-looking, weak-chinned. He kept wiping his eyes, although the widow hadn’t shed a tear.

  The organ crashed into a hurdy-gurdy version of “Just A Closer Walk With Thee,” and two guys who had the professionally sympathetic look of undertakers got up and collected the red, white, and blue flowers from the casket and hinged open the top.

  Velvet sat bolt upright, staring, though she couldn’t see anything but white satin. Jesus, they couldn’t have an open casket, they couldn’t. All of a sudden she couldn’t breathe, because she knew she’d smell him. The thought gagged her, but she couldn’t get up to head for the bathroom, she might accidentally see into the—

  The first two rows of people stood up. The fat woman waddled past the casket; as far as Velvet could tell, she didn’t even look down. The gawky-looking teenaged boy behind her didn’t, either; he stared right into his mother’s back. The next girl in line did look. She burst into tears, and the kid behind her let out a big hiccuping sob and the two of them ran off out of the sanctuary.

  Velvet swallowed hard. The man who’d sat on the end of the family pew stopped at the casket and stared for what seemed like a long time. He sniffled and blew his nose loudly. When he turned to walk away, his eyes met Velvet’s.

  He stopped. His mouth dropped open.

  She’d never seen him before in her life. She was sure of that. So what? Did she look that much like a hooker? Was everybody looking at her, pointing fingers, whispering?

  Nope. Just him. He stared at her.

  Velvet looked over at Robby and pointed to the guy, making a question out of her eyebrows. Robby looked and shrugged.

  The guy was gone when Velvet glanced back.

  The row in front of them stood up. Under cover of their backs, Velvet grabbed up her coat and ducked out, up the blood red aisle, heading for the door. She heard Robby scramble to follow.

  “Didn’t you want to pay your respects?” Robby demanded in the vestibule as they shrugged on their coats. Velvet shot her a dirty look. “Then why did you drag me down here?”

  Velvet’s hands paused in buttoning her coat. She frowned down at her penny loafers.

  “Hell if I know,” she said. “Seemed like a good idea at the time. I just didn’t want to—you know-look at him again.”

  The side door to the vestibule opened. Burt’s two daughters came out of the bathroom, still snuffling. They pushed past without an apology.

  “I’m sorry about your dad,” Velvet called after them. The younger looked back, surprised.

  “Did you know him?” she asked; she sounded sad and miserable and lonely. Velvet stared at her, frozen. Never should have said anything, she kicked herself. Stupid bitch.

  “She worked with him,” Robby supplied, and grabbed Velvet’s coat sleeve. “Come on, before you get yourself in bigger trouble.”

  The girl waved an awkward goodbye as the door wheezed shut behind them. Velvet shivered in the blast of cold wind.

  “You didn’t have to say that,” she snapped. Robby sighed, her breath a white flag.

  “I didn’t have to come here at all, you know.”

  “Well, why did you?” Velvet demanded. Robby gave her a long level stare.

  “Because you asked me to.”

  Robby’s borrowed car matched her perfectly. Gray. Conservative. Not too new, not too old. Velvet slammed the door irritably and stared out the window at the church, where people were starting to straggle out. One of them was the guy who’d stared at her. He seemed to be looking for someone.

  Robby hit the accelerator and Velvet closed her eyes, resting her head against the cold glass of the window.

  She still smelled burnt flesh. It had all been a waste of time, after all. Burt’s ghost wasn’t going to be put in the ground by anything so simple as a funeral.

  “I have to work,” Robby said. “I’m going by Jim’s. Where do you want me to drop you?”

  So that’s how it was going to be. Dropped off at a corner, just like a street whore. Dumped with the clothes on her back and—luckily—the three hundred stuffed in her shirt. Well, that was no big deal. She’d call Ming. That was it, she’d call Ming, get set up with a couple of gigs—

  The bruises. She’d have to explain the bruises.

  “How come that guy knew me at the funeral?” she asked. “I’m sure I never saw him before.”

  “Maybe a former customer?” Robby asked; she couldn’t quite keep the prissy tone out of her voice. “Somebody not very memorable?”

  “Look, I don’t remember everybody, but if he remembered me that good, I’d remember him. He looked like I was a ghost or something.” Ghosts. Burt. Amy. Her mother’s distant sobs on the telephone. Velvet pressed her aching forehead to cold glass. “Robby?”

  “Yeah?”

  “You ever killed anybody?”

  The car slewed gently right, then sharply left. She knew without looking that Robby had taken the opportunity for a good long look at her.

  “No,” Robby answered cautiously. “No, I never have. Why?”

  “I did.” Velvet opened her eyes. The car window was cloudy with her breath. “You know what? That guy looked guilty. Guilty as hell.”

  Amy had looked so small in the coffin, skin pallid, face bloated. They’d tried to talk Mom out of an open casket, but she’d been so sure it was all right, so sure Amy would look just like a sleeping angel. It had all been so hard, so hard to sit there with the family and know everybody was staring, whispering, pointing. She’s the one, you know. She was there when it happened. She should have done something. All her fault.

  Velvet gagged on the taste of Scotch and sperm in her mouth.

  “Are you all right?” Robby asked. Velvet opened her eyes and swallowed hard.

  “Sure,” she lied. “Hey, I got an idea. Know where Elegance Dry Cleaners is?”

  “Which one?”

  “Uh, the main one. The one in Highland Park.” That was a guess, but a good one. It was sure the priciest store in town, had the most blue-nosed customers. She’d probably find somebody to talk to there, somebody trustworthy. “Drop me there, okay?”

  Whatever Robby thought about it, she said nothing, simply played taxi driver, turning down Mockingbird and onto Preston, winding into old money neighborhoods where every house had room for four cars and a Suburban for the maid. She slowed and parked in front of a discreet narrow storefront; gold script glittered in the windows, spelling out ELEGANCE DRY CLEANERS—LEATHERS AND SILKS A SPECIALTY. The sign on the frosted glass door read OPEN in small unencouraging script.

  Velvet opened her door a couple of inches and looked over at Robby.

  “Thanks,” she said. Robby nodded. Her eyes looked preoccupied, like she’d already put all this behind her. Well, fuck you, Velvet thought. Even in her mind, it sounded sad instead of angry.

  She got out and watched Robby drive away.

  Velvet hugged her elbows and shivered as she turned to face the glass door. I could find a bus stop, she thought. Wouldn’t be that long a wait.

  No. She had to do this. Had to. She’d seen Burt’s kids, after all. She kind of owed him something.

  She pushed open the door. A silver bell tinkled somewhere in the back, past a marble counter and plush green carpet.

  A young highly toned woman with mercilessly stylish hair looked up, and the smile froze on her face.

  “Can I—” Blue eyes swept up and down doubtfully. help you?”

  “Uh, yeah. Was this—did Burt Marshall used to own this place?” Velvet shifted uncomfortably. Robby’s penny loafers seemed Payless Shoe Store tacky, the clothes one step above homeless shelter giveaways.

  “Marshall?” The woman gave her a brief contemptuous smile. Her outfit cost more than Velvet would have earned for a good round-the-world with a drunken stockbroker. “I’m sorry, miss, are you a customer?”

  “No.” Velvet shoved her hands in her coat pockets. Not likely to be, either. “No, I guess not. I was just looking for somebody who knew Burt Marshall. I got « something for his family.”

  “I’m afraid—”

  “What is it, Stacie?” a man asked. He swept in from the back, burdened with two handfuls of plastic-shrouded suits that he hung on gold hooks on the wall. “These are the special orders for Mr. Novacek. He’ll be in at four-thirty.”

  He turned—a small man, thin, weak-chinned. Wide dark eyes that locked with Velvet’s and got wider.

  It was the guy from the funeral.

  “Oh, Mr. Julian, this lady wants to talk to you about Mr. Marshall.” Stacie’s tone was as dry as the Sahara, but it got odd at the end. She’d noticed, too.

  Noticed Mr. Julian’s shock.

  “Uh, look, I don’t want trouble or anything,” Velvet blurted out. All of a sudden the idea of giving him two hundred bucks for Burt’s family seemed pathetic, and even dangerous. There was something weasel-bright in Julian’s eyes, a panic that looked rabid. “Never mind, okay? Just never mind. It was a mistake.”

  She backed up and stumbled on a Persian throw rug, caught herself with one sweaty palm on expensive wood paneling. Mr. Julian swung up the divider in the marble counter. God, she didn’t like this, it looked wrong, all wrong.

  When she reached for the door it swung open, blasting her with winter. An Arab guy stood in her way, big, staring over her shoulder at Mr. Julian. He had a face as sharp as a switchblade, and no expression at all. She’d seen enough enforcers to recognize the eyes of a killer when she saw them. The damn Persian carpet tripped her up again as she stepped back.

  The model—what’s her name, Stacie—behind the counter, said chirpily, “Sir, how may I help you?”

  Mr. Julian said, from somewhere behind Velvet’s left shoulder, “That’ll be all, Stacie. Why don’t you go in the back?”

  I’m going to die, Velvet thought. In a fucking dry cleaners. Oh my god, but I just made it up, I didn’t know, I didn’t—

  The Arab took a step inside. The door started to swing shut.

  They’re gonna lock the door. Turn the sign to CLOSED. I’m gonna—

  Before she could finish thinking of die, she opened her mouth and screamed at the top of her lungs, a glass-shattering siren that made the Arab jerk backward. Across the street, two pink-cheeked junior leaguers in fur turned to look with naked astonishment. Still screaming, Velvet dashed for the door.

  Either he’d grab her, or he wouldn’t.

  His hand came up and brushed her shoulder. She lunged past him for the cold thin air of the sidewalk.

  She remembered to stop screaming once the door had shut behind her, and turned to look at the two men standing on the other side of the glass. Mr. Julian looked scared shitless.

  The Arab was smiling a little. He tilted his head to one side and watched her.

  On the other side of the street, the junior leaguers huddled together like pack animals and muttered. They strode briskly off toward a corner drugstore where, presumably, a mobile phone could be had. God forbid they should call 911 from a pay phone. Ooky.

  “Sorry,” Velvet mumbled, and started walking. At the corner, a DART bus eased to a stop for the line of minority housekeepers and butlers and nannies. She lunged on before it could escape without her. As she fed coins into the box, she looked back.

  The street in front of the dry cleaners was empty. Nobody was coming after her.

  That was scarier.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Robby

  Robby waited in the freezing shadows, rocking back and forth to keep blood moving to her feet. There wasn’t any wind in the warehouse, but the temperature kept dropping and the humidity rising. Her bones felt as brittle and cold as ice.

  If he doesn’t come in five minutes, I’ll leave, she told herself, and slapped her arms with gloved fingers. The ache burrowed deeper. Three minutes. Three minutes more is enough.

  After only about thirty seconds, she stepped back up to the door and banged again, loudly, though he couldn’t have failed to hear her the first four times. The echo rolled thickly through the dark warehouse. Things shifted and rattled in its wake … rats, maybe. She knocked again, harder.

  Dumb. This is dumb, she told herself. He’s angry about Velvet. He’s gone off with someone else. He’s—

  Jim wouldn’t let any personal disagreements affect professional relationships. They worked well together. It was profitable for everybody. Then where was he?

  The street door opened with a rusty squeal, sending her heart thumping frantically. Robby stepped back into the shadows, glad she’d worn black to Velvet’s idiotic funeral, and watched the man come closer.

  “Jim?” she said softly. He spun awkwardly, almost losing the sacks he was holding. “Sorry. It’s me.”

  “Kid, don’t scare me like that.” His voice was rough silk, a little sharp with alarm, but already welcoming. She came closer, and he handed her one of the sacks—heavy, filled with cans and bottles. “Sorry I’m late. The market was crazy.”

  He unlocked the door and stood aside to let her in first, a bit of unconscious courtesy or chauvinism all out of proportion to who they were, what they did.

  “Hot cocoa?” He pulled a box out of the sack. She smiled and nodded. “You’re here early. What, being roomies with the hooker wasn’t quite the picnic you thought it might be?”

  “She’s just fine.” Robby’s ambivalence about Velvet melted instantly under the heat of Jim’s disapproval. “It was nice to have a guest. I enjoyed it.”

  “Oh, really.” He put blue cups of water in the microwave. “No accounting for taste. What’d you do with her, give her the keys and tell her not to steal anything over a thousand?”

  “Just because you and I are thieves doesn’t mean everyone is,” she countered. The skin around his eyes crinkled as he smiled.

  “She’d screw a priest for bus fare and you know it. Have a cookie.”

  Store-bought and not quite up to homemade standards, no matter what the advertising said. She licked crumbs from her lips.

  “Heard from Mark?” She took another cookie from the box. “We need some more home cooking around here.”

  “He’s taking his physics and literature finals this week. You know how he gets at the end of the semester. He swears he’ll never steal again as long as he gets A’s on the tests, then next thing you know he’s pulling twenties out of somebody’s backpack in lab class. The kid’s incorrigible.” Jim’s smile faded like an old photograph. “He could have been good, you know. Really good.”

  “He doesn’t have it,” Robby said. “The touch. The patience. You know that.”

  The microwave binged for attention. Jim turned away and mixed cocoa, then handed her a cup breathing thick milky steam. She stripped off her gloves and wrapped her cold fingers around it gratefully.

  “I know,” he said. “You’re the only one I know who does have it. The rest of them, they’re good and lucky, but they’ll get popped. Not you. Never you.”

  “You’re jinxing me.”

  “Maybe.” He leaned against a counter and watched her, smiling. He had on his professorial look today: a turtleneck sweater, a tweedy jacket with patches on the elbows, conservative slacks. All he needed was a thick book of literature, and the coeds would swarm. “Maybe the hooker’s all the jinx you need.”

  “I’m sorry—”

  “Don’t.” His smile disappeared. “Don’t apologize if you don’t mean it, and I don’t think you do. You like her, and that’s fine. So don’t apologize for liking her. I won’t apologize for thinking she’s a worm.”

  “It wasn’t about her, not really. You know that. I just couldn’t take the idea of waiting while he beat her.”

  A cocoa-warm silence filled the cool fluorescent kitchen. Jim reached over and traced the line of her cheek with one finger.

  “I know,” he said. His finger found the bump at her jaw where the break hadn’t healed cleanly. “Funny, even when you talk about him, you sound like you love him.”

  “He was my father,” she said, as if that explained something. She leaned her cheek against his hand, closing her eyes. “Which mall today?”

  “Oh, I don’t know. We’re going after the blue-collars at the hockey game tomorrow, want to go after the ladies who lunch? I like playing Robin Hood. Rob from the rich, give to us.”

  She felt her lips lift in a grin. His warm thumb traced them; she opened her mouth and nipped it lightly.

  “Not fair,” he said, and she opened her eyes to his smile. Warm, so warm.

  With a surge of wickedness she had never known she had, she licked his thumb and took it in her mouth, sliding down to the base. His eyes widened. She flicked his thumb lightly with her tongue, let it slide out again, and said, “Is that better?”

  “You’ve been hanging around the hooker way too much.” She liked the unsteadiness in his voice. “Robby—”

  She set her cup aside and came into his arms. His lips and tongue tasted of chocolate. He smelled of clean male skin with just a touch of sweat, and in the intimate body-to-body pressure she felt his erection nudge at her. His hands slid down under her coat and brushed over her sides, her breasts, her hips. Her breath sighed out into the hollow of his neck.