Meanwhile, just to be on the safe side, she never smoked the stuff. She kept clean. Crack heads screwed up too often, had their heads too high in the clouds to manufacture the best stuff. She didn't even smoke those "fry daddys," hand rolled cigarettes laced with crack, preferred by most of her friends. Deep within herself, she knew if she ever started crack, she would never get that pink Cadillac.

  Pushing aside the glass bead curtain, Lisa brought the basket full of tubes into the living room. Oliver waited impatiently by the heavy old workbench in the center of the room. In one hand, he held a portable propane torch, fueled from the squat metal tank in the corner. Sitting on the table were two big bottles, each half filled with water; several small boxes of baking soda; and a half-dozen long metal spoons.

  A large clean sheet of brown wrapping paper covered the far end of the workbench. Lying on top of the paper rested the two miniature hammers they used to break the crack into small chunks. Lisa set down the basket of vials next to the hammers.

  "Hurry up, woman," said Oliver, glancing down at the cheap plastic watch he always wore. "It almost seven. You know those dumb Spics ain't gonna do no waitin'."

  Lisa nodded without saying anything. Oliver was right. The two swarthy Columbians they had dubbed the Hernandez Brothers for lack of any real names never deviated from their schedule. They made a pickup every night at ten after seven. If the crack wasn't ready, they left without it. A few missed deliveries, Lisa knew, and the Big Bosses closed their factory down for good. Say good-bye to that pink Cadillac.

  Hastily, she walked over to the only other piece of furniture in the room, an old sofa they had found in the apartment when they first moved in. From beneath the worn cushions, she yanked out the plastic bag full of cocaine delivered by another set of messengers an hour before.

  Meanwhile, with a snap of his fingers, Oliver lit a kitchen match and fired up his torch. A low chuckle crossed his lips as he stared into the pure blue flame. His eyes widened like a child fascinated by a new toy.

  Lisa repressed a shudder. This obsession with burning things was another one of Oliver's little quirks. The fire called to him like a drug. Arson had put him in Joliet for three to five, with time off for good behavior. Lisa secretly worried that next time the charge might be a lot worse. Every time he stared so happily at the blowtorch flame, she wanted to scream. His madness frightened her badly. As if reaffirming a pledge, she silently swore that as soon as they made enough bank to buy that Cadillac, she was gone, leaving Oliver and his torch to fend for themselves.

  Blissfully unaware of anything but the steady blue blaze of the flame, Oliver pulled on a pair of asbestos oven mitts to protect his hands from blistering. It was time to make crack.

  Into one of the glass bottles half filled with water, Lisa dumped the package of cocaine and most of a box of baking soda. With a laugh of sheer pleasure, Oliver hit the jug with the blowtorch flame. Inside the container, the mixture bubbled and steamed, boiling in seconds. The hot liquid crackled loudly, like the sound of breaking plasterboard.

  "That's why they call it crack," Oliver had told Lisa the first time she helped him. He knew everything there was to know about the drug. "Pure cocaine, with no distractions."

  Within minutes the cocaine powder boiled down to an oily base, with the baking soda soaking up all the impurities in the drug. Oliver popped off the torch and grabbed the other bottle of water. He poured an equal amount of cold water into the still seething mixture. Seconds later, the oily cocaine base hardened into little white balls, resembling small rocks.

  "Now we're cookin'," said Oliver, his tone more relaxed. "I'll spoon it out. You do the hammering."

  They worked well as a team. Oliver employed a steady hand, untroubled by the steam inside the bottle, to dish out the small crack pellets onto the brown paper. But his calloused fingers couldn't manage the delicate job of breaking down the crack into fingernail-size chunks to fill the glass vials. Lisa enjoyed that part of the job. Each container completed was another dollar in her bank, another step closer to her pink Cadillac.

  The shrill ringing of the downstairs alarm caught them both by surprise. They were on the fourth floor of the otherwise abandoned tenement building. According to their boss, this was a safe location. Voodoo cult signs filled the hallway and the outside walls of the building. Nobody ever messed with the Children of Danballah. But Oliver, obsessively cautious from his time in prison, had rigged up warning bells that sounded whenever someone stepped on each of the lower floor landings of their home. He liked to know when anyone, expected or not, entered the building, and where they were.

  "Hernandez Brothers done be early tonight," said Lisa, trying to fill the glass bottles faster. "Ain't due for twenty minutes yet."

  "The Hernandez Brothers ain't never early," said Oliver, a strange glitch in his voice.

  Hurriedly, he scooted over to the one window overlooking the street. "No car out there," he said as he peered into the thickening twilight. His voice trembled with excitement. "No car at all."

  He turned around and faced Lisa, his face flushed. "Must be some stickup boys looking for a quick score. Figure to hit us right before the pickup time when we got most the rock ready for shipment. Smart dudes, looking to catch us by surprise."

  He chuckled, that insane quiet giggle that frightened Lisa more than she dared admit. "They be smart. But not as smart as me." He reached for his blowtorch. "Not as smart, no way."

  Lisa backed away from the table, the crack momentarily forgotten. "What you planning to do, Oliver?" she asked, already knowing the answer.

  "Gonna make things hot for those stickup boys," he said, giggling wildly now. With a flourish, he lit the propane torch. He swung the pencil-thin, foot-long finger of flame around like a sword. "I knew in my dreams this would happen someday. I knew it. Fixed my torch a special way, just waiting for the time. Got me a nice long flame to do some cuttin'."

  A cold feeling of uneasiness swept over Lisa. The warning bell on the second floor landing rang shrilly, as she tried to stay calm. She realized now that Oliver was more than a little crazy.

  "No need for us to fight," she said, slowly backing up toward the kitchen as she spoke. "We ain't paid to fight."

  "They don't need pay me nothing," said Oliver, laughing and waving his torch. "I fight for free."

  "What if they carryin' burners," said Lisa, desperately trying to penetrate the madness that was engulfing her boyfriend. "Maybe one of them sporting an Uzi like Willis. Whatcha gonna do then?"

  "No Uzis for stickup boys," said Oliver, his voice wavering just a bit. Evidently, he never considered the possibility of heavily armed opponents. "Anyway, up close my torch is all I need."

  The alarm from the third floor landing made them both jump. "Coming up fast now," said Oliver, swinging around to face the front door of the apartment. "No time to turn chicken now."

  "But . . ." began Lisa.

  Knock, knock, knock. The door to their apartment rattled as a heavy fist pounded on the thin boards. "Anybody home?" asked a voice smooth as silk. "Anybody in there?"

  "Po-lite stickup boy is all," said Oliver softly, his confidence returning. "Ain't foolin' no one."

  "Nobody home but us dumb suckers," said Oliver. He wrenched open the apartment door with one hand, swinging round his blowtorch with the other.

  Lisa screamed. A giant in black filled the doorway. He wore a long slick raincoat, buttoned tight across his massive chest, stretching from knee to collar. A wide brimmed cowboy hat angled down across his face, completely shadowing his features. Black shiny gloves, stretching all the way up to the sleeves of his coat, encased his massive hands.

  "Good evening, Oliver," said the Dark Man, raising a huge butcher's cleaver in the air. The blue flame of the blowtorch reflected against the cold steel. "Good evening, Lisa."

  Oliver, shouting something incomprehensible about tasting fire, shoved the propane torch right into the giant's face. Lisa gagged as the smell of burning rubber and cloth filled the apartment. The Dark Man staggered back, stumbling into the hallway. Laughing wildly, Oliver started to follow.

  "Come back, you fool," Lisa shrieked, a sense of disaster gripping her tightly. "He ain't burnin'—he ain't burnin'."

  "What you sayin'," said Oliver in a puzzled voice, as he squinted over the edge of the flame into the hallway.

  "She's right, you know," said the Dark Man, stepping forward again. His raincoat was smoldering and charred at the collar. A thin ring of flame burned steadily across his hat, revealing a glimpse of the face beneath. Two bright red coals of eyes glared at them out of a featureless mask of black glass. "Fire can't harm me."

  With incredible speed, the Dark Man swung his knife at Oliver's head. Instinctively, the young man ducked and raised the hand holding the blowtorch to block the attack. Steel met steel, sending sparks flying. Oliver gasped in pain as the force of the blow knocked him to his knees. The blowtorch went flying across the room.

  Oliver scrambled after his weapon. Almost casually, the Dark Man reached down and grabbed Oliver by the ankle. With a powerful wrench, he spun the young man around, flat on his back.

  "No, no!" Oliver shrieked in panic. "Take the crack, take it, take it. Take my woman, anything. Just let me live!"

  "Sorry, Oliver," said the Dark Man with a shake of his huge head, "but no deals today."

  Without another word, the giant swung the butcher's cleaver at Oliver's neck. The heavy blade bit deep into muscle and bone, sending bits of gore flying up in the air. Oliver gurgled horribly.

  Ignoring the gruesome sounds, the Dark Man wrenched the blade out of the body, sending a fountain of blood to the ceiling. Almost instantly, he followed the first blow with another, so powerful that it almost severed Oliver's head from his torso. Then another, and still another. Methodically, the Dark Man worked at dismembering the black man, spraying blood and guts across the room.

  Lisa closed her eyes tight, as if hoping the whole scene would disappear. But she couldn't block out the grisly sound of each blow of the butcher's cleaver. And when she opened her eyes for an instant, the Dark Man looked over at her, as if sensing her gaze, and said, "You're next, Lisa," in the most pleasant of tones.

  Madness overwhelmed her. She turned and fled into the kitchen, mouthing incoherent sounds of absolute horror. Then the realization of her own peril broke through the fear. Lisa realized that if she didn't act immediately, she faced the same fate as Oliver. "Out the back door," she muttered wildly to herself. "Out the back door."

  Frantically she yanked off the steel bar that held the door shut and threw it to the floor. Her heart pumping furiously, Lisa wrenched on the doorknob with all her strength. The door refused to move. The three heavy-duty security locks held it rigid against the frame.

  In the other room, the grisly sounds of chopping ceased. In a panic, Lisa grabbed the three keys off the wood bar. In seconds, she forced the first key into the top lock. A quick wrench of the bolt opened it.

  The second key slid in equally smooth. Another turn and that lock slid open. Now only the third dead bolt, at the level of her knees, remained.

  "Leaving so soon?" asked the Dark Man pleasantly, ripping aside the beaded curtain with one huge hand.

  Features twisted in terror, Lisa sank down to the floor next to the door, her eyes fixed on the bloody butcher's cleaver held in the giant's other hand. The Dark Man's coat dripped blood and gore. His cowboy hat was gone, revealing a face that was not a face at all. A featureless mask of blackness, unbroken except for two burning red eyes, looked down at her. Without tongue or mouth, he spoke.

  "Now it's your turn."

  She screamed as the monster raised the blade over his head. Then the giant paused, as if suddenly aware of something taking place behind him. He started to turn when the thundering roar of gunfire filled the room.

  To Lisa, it seemed like a giant hand lifted the Dark Man up off the floor and flung him face-first into the outside wall. He smashed so hard into the plasterboard that the whole apartment shuddered with the impact. Without a sound, he collapsed into a massive heap, only a few feet beyond her.

  Cursing loudly in Spanish, the Hernandez Brothers stood just outside the door to the kitchen, pointing at the fallen giant and the ruins of the living room. Each man gripped a smoking heavy-duty automatic in one hand. Gesturing wildly, they turned and started searching the blood-soaked parlor. Lisa knew without asking that they were looking for the shipment of crack.

  Beside her, the Dark Man stirred and shifted in place. Busy in the other room, the two Columbians didn't notice the giant's movements. Relentlessly, the giant pulled himself up against the wall. Without making a sound, he rose to his feet, still gripping his butcher's cleaver. Noiselessly, he swung around to face his two new enemies. Lisa huddled into a small ball close to the door, praying that the monster wouldn't look down.

  "Madre dios!" shouted one of the Hernandez Brothers, suddenly catching a glimpse of the Dark Man. The two men, their faces white with fright, backed away from the crack table, fumbling with new clips for their pistols.

  "Two more fools," said the Dark Man, in the same relaxed tone as before. The back of his coat was ripped to shreds where he had been hit by bullets. Yet his body, the color and texture of shiny black glass, showed no signs of damage. Ignoring the two guns pointed at him, the giant stepped back into the front room, butcher's cleaver raised high in the air.

  Still crouched on the floor, Lisa fumbled with the last key, as behind her, the air filled with the sounds of gunfire and screams. "Gotta hurry, gotta hurry," she whispered to herself as she fitted the key into the third dead bolt lock. "Nobody stoppin' that dude. He be Death."

  A quick twist and the lock opened. Cautiously, afraid of attracting attention, Lisa reached up and turned the doorknob. With the merest whisper of protest, the porch door opened.

  Behind her a man shrieked in terrible pain. Then silence engulfed the room. Swiftly rising to her feet, Lisa slid out the back exit and onto the porch, closing the door behind her.

  She stood on a wood landing only a few feet square. Leading down from the platform was a rickety flight of wood steps to the next floor. The railing was gone, and several of the steps had caved in, leaving dangerous gaps in the path.

  In the alley far below her was an old garbage Dump-ster, filled with refuse. Nothing moved. The only other inhabitants of this forgotten part of the city were nocturnal beings who spent nights like this out on the street pumping and hustling. Lisa was alone.

  Pressing her body close to the building, Lisa started down. Her arms gripped the decaying walls with all the strength she could muster. Without any outer railing, one false move would send her tumbling to the street. With her eyes fixed on the broken wooden slats, Lisa took a tentative step forward. Then another, and another.

  Like an exploding cannon, the rear door slammed open. The Dark Man strode onto the outside landing, his butcher's cleaver dripping fresh blood. Almost instantly his huge red eyes caught sight of Lisa only a few yards away.

  Turning toward her, the giant took a step down.

  Crack! The decayed board snapped in two, causing the whole walkway to tremble and rocking the Dark Man back. Lisa pressed tight against the building and kept on edging forward.

  "Too shaky for me," said the Dark Man as if making casual conversation. Without another word, he reentered the apartment.

  Lisa sucked in a deep breath of relief and worked her way down another few steps. The third floor landing was only a few feet away. She knew that all of the other outer doors to the building were boarded shut. She and Oliver had checked them out long ago. The only way down was by the fire escape to the alley. Once there, she was safe.

  "Here, Lisa, catch," called the Dark Man. He moved so silently that she hadn't realized he had returned to the platform. With a gentle throw, he tossed something small and wet at her.

  The object, soft and damp like an old cloth, landed on her shoulder. Instinctively, she glanced sideways to see what it was. Horror engulfed her when she saw the Dark Man's gift. Lisa's shrieks echoed through the lonely alleyway. Again and again she screamed, unable to stop.

  Resting on her shoulder was a human hand. Broken and smashed to near putty, it resembled a piece of raw meat. One finger was missing, and another had been chopped off at the second knuckle. Bits of flesh and bone dangled like obscene strings where the hand had been chopped away from the wrist. Drops of warm blood soaked through her thin dress, onto her skin.

  Desperately, Lisa clawed at the crumbling shingles of the wall while she battled to hold her sanity. For an instant, madness reached for her. And then drew back, as it encountered a solid bedrock of resistance beneath the fear.

  Cautiously, she shook her upper body until her movement sent the grisly souvenir tumbling to the street below. Lisa knew that her survival depended on not giving up, no matter what. The dismembered hand only served as a reminder of her fate if she didn't keep moving. Not daring to look back at her tormentor, she inched her way forward.

  Lisa paused only a second on the third floor landing. No time even to catch her breath. The Dark Man had disappeared into the apartment. She felt sure he had not given up.

  The fire escape descending to the second floor was in much better condition. A remnant of railing still existed and while the steps still shook and groaned as she hurried down, they held firm. Her feet just touched the next landing when Lisa smelled smoke.

  She looked up to the fourth floor. The landing was ablaze, with jagged gouts of flame licking at the side of the building. The old wood structure burned like parchment. Tongues of red flame leapt down the steps as if chasing after her.

  The Dark Man stood undisturbed in the midst of the inferno, a figure of absolute blackness surrounded by fire. He leaned over the railing and stared down at her with unblinking red eyes. One huge hand gripped Oliver's propane torch, a jet of blue flame crowning the nozzle.

  The wood only a few feet above Lisa's head exploded into a shower of burning fragments. They dropped around her feet like a thousand hungry insects searching for food. In seconds, the wood slats beneath her feet caught fire. Burning fingers of flame grabbed at her. Eyes stinging from the acrid smoke, she stumbled about in pain, seeking escape. Hot ash nipped her exposed skin in a hundred places.