Before the Dawn

Chapter twelve No sale

In a dark T-shirt, blue jeans, and running shoes, Max sat perched on the edge of the chair across the desk from Vogelsang. The office of the goateed, overweight detective had its own unique bouquet — a distilling of egg rolls, detergent, cigarette smoke, and something that was either cleaning fluid or really rank barbecue sauce.

The funds Max was contributing to this small business were obviously not going into cleaning the place, nor for that matter was there any sign Vogelsang had upgraded his wardrobe: the private eye still dressed as though he picked his clothes at random in a very dark room... unless actual thought had gone into the choice of a slept-in sky-blue shirt and a pair of alarmingly bright green pants, which together turned his waistline into a bizarre, convex horizon where the sky and grass met.

“What have you found?” Max asked, not wanting to spend any more time here than she had to; she wasn’t sure the peculiar aroma of this room would come off her clothes, particularly not if she used this laundromat. And she still had plenty to do yet today. The sky was threatening rain and she knew it wouldn’t hold off much longer.

“I’ve got nothing on the woman or the Tahoe,” the detective said, riffling through some papers on his desk, avoiding his client’s direct gaze.

“Nothing.”

He looked up and twitched a nervous smile; shrugged. “It was ten years ago. I told ya — this is gonna take some time.”

“What about our badass kid?”

Vogelsang shook his head, said, “Nothing on him, either — and a contact at the PD ran the computer looking for that barcode tattoo, too. Got squat.”

Max sat way forward, her eyes tight, intense. “This kid is tied to Eyes Only — and Eyes Only is somebody the cops are interested in... so there oughta be something ...”

“Saying he’s tied to Eyes Only is like sayin’ he hangs with Zorro.”

“Who?”

“Pre-Pulse reference. Sorry. Damn, you are young... Anyway, if he is working with or for Eyes Only, we’ll have a damn hard time turning anything. Eyes Only is more than just a voice and eyes on some cable hack... it’s more like a network. People who help Eyes Only, they’re all loyal, and they don’t talk to anybody about anything, if you’re not one of them.”

Max felt her hopes slipping away, like water through her fingers. She’d come into this knowing Seattle was a big city, but Vogelsang knew the town inside out; and while her brother was a trained professional soldier, so was she. Why, between the two of them, couldn’t they find him?

“So you don’t know anything more than when we started? What am I paying you for, again? Remind me.”

With a shrug, Vogelsang sipped from a lidded cup — there was no way to tell what was inside, which was probably the idea. But something about his eyes — the way they seemed to flicker with thought, first tight, then loose, then tight...

“Mr. Vogelsang!”

He almost jumped, and the cup would have spilled, but for the lid.

“You paged me,” she reminded him sternly. “Why? To tell me you have jack shit?”

The private eye righted the cup, then smiled in a nervous, fleeting, wholly inappropriate manner. “I guess I did find out one thing.”

The hope welled within her, though she tried to keep such emotions in check. “What do you ‘guess’ you found out?”

“... I’m not the only one looking for this guy.”

Her eyes widened as she settled back into the chair, stunned as a clubbed baby seal. Who else could be looking for her brother? Two names popped into her mind: Lydecker; and Sterling... and then another: Kafelnikov. “How do you know?”

“It’s all over the street.”

Max sat forward again. “Explain.”

“Pawnshop owner, name of Jacobs, he’s... not what you would call a real upright citizen. More what you’d call... well...”

“A scumbag,” she said curtly. “Hard to imagine you associating with that type. What did he tell you?”

The detective didn’t argue with the characterization. “Anyway, Jacobs told me I wasn’t the first guy that had come ’round lately askin’ about a kid with these particular talents.”

“Who else is looking?”

“This is where it gets... scary. It’s somebody with a lot of grease, maybe even federal. Two bent cops... forgive the redundancy... were accompanying this character around.”

“What character?”

“I didn’t get a name — just a blond guy, not big or anything... but there was somethin’ about him, Jacobs said, scared him shitless. Jacobs, y’understand, is a guy who’s dealin’ with the dregs every hour of every day... nothin’ I know of ever scared Jacobs before, that’s why he’s able to thrive, livin’ like he does, sort of on the fringes.”

Vogelsang was on a nervous roll and might never shut up, and Max was listening, but her mind was working out whether the blond man was Lydecker, Sterling, or even Kafelnikov. The latter two would be bad enough, but if Manticore was on Seth’s heels, Max really needed to get to her brother, first.

“Anyway, Jacobs said he asked around, and the two cops and the blond guy were rousting every crook on the street, from the connected ones to the crum bums... slappin’ ’em around, when necessary, even guys that paid for protection.” His concern seemed genuine; even a little of it may have been for her. “Listen, Max, we’re playin’ with fire — if this is federal, I—”

“Okay,” Max said, patting the air. “Back to earth — settle.”

The detective nodded and tried to regulate his breathing. He asked, “You got any idea who this blond guy might be?”

“No... maybe you should hire a detective to find out.”

That seemed to hurt him a little. “Very funny.”

“Did your friend Jacobs know anything about the kid with the barcode?”

Vogelsang shook his head. “No — but his ears are perked. I got feelers all around town on this thing.”

“Good,” she said, letting out a long breath. “Keep on it.”

He nodded, then gave her a sheepish look. “Money’s goin’ fast though, kiddo.”

She glared at him.

He held his hands up, as if surrendering. “What can I do? I got overhead... getting street info means greasing palms, and if you don’t mind terribly, I gotta make a living myself.”

She moved out to the edge of the chair again and gave him a cold, hard, unblinking stare. “If you want money, Mr. Vogelsang... you’re gonna have to help me get it.”

Now he pushed the air with his palms, like a bad mime fighting imaginary wind. “Whoa, whoa, whoa... I’m an officer of the court, y’know... comes with the license. I don’t do crime.”

She gave him an arched-brow look.

He shrugged, smirked humorlessly. “Nothing you can do time for, anyway. Guy in my line does work the gray area sometimes.”

“Do tell... All I need is a name.”

He squinted, as if Max had gone out of focus momentarily. “Whose name?”

“Let’s just say... speaking hypothetically, since I wouldn’t want to offend an officer of the court... if you had a valuable piece of art, who would you go to, if you wanted to sell?”

He considered that. “I suppose this sale would have to be of a confidential nature.”

She nodded.

“An off-the-books transaction.”

“Don’t ever let anyone tell you you’re not quick.”

The detective squinted again. “Large scale?”

“Oh yeah. Could keep you in egg rolls for a long time.”

Sparked by this incentive, Vogelsang thought for several long, hard seconds. “Forget the guy I mentioned earlier... Jacobs? Large scale is beyond him. But there is one guy, and he’s not far from here. His name is Sherwood.”

“Where can I find him?”

“Been down on his luck, but he’s good. Right now he does business in this old building off Broad Street.”

This time it was Max who squinted. “Will I need an intro with Mr. Sherwood?”

“Yeah, you will.”

“And who’s going to do that for me?” Max asked as she rose.

Vogelsang smiled at her and rubbed his fingers back and forth against his thumb. “I maybe could be persuaded.”

She leaned on the desk with both hands. “You want to keep getting paid?”

The detective switched gears. “I could call him for you, sure — sort of a favor to a good client. Referral kinda thing. Happy to do it.”

“Make the call.”

He did.

She listened attentively as he made arrangements with Sherwood, calling him “Woody.” Vogelsang’s manner was friendly enough to convince Max she wasn’t the first client the detective had referred to the fence. Vogelsang assured the man these were “quality goods,” that the seller was reliable, and so on.

Vogelsang covered the receiver and turned to Max. “How’s an hour from now?”

“Swell,” she said.

He relayed the information and nodded to her as he listened. Then he said, “I’ll tell her,” hung up, and gave his client detailed directions, ending with, “Third door on the right.”

Max thanked him.

“So,” Vogelsang said cheerfully, hands flat on his desk, “the next time I see you, you should have some cash.”

“Sure,” she said, exiting, throwing a blatantly insincere smile over her shoulder at him. “And the next time I see you, you should have some information.”

Back at her apartment, Max changed into a black hooded sweatshirt, leather jacket and pants, to better protect her against the bad weather on its way. She collected the Grant Wood and the Heart of the Ocean (still in their zippered pouch); and then she rode the Ninja hard into the night, heading to the address Vogelsang had provided.

The rain was closing in now, as if the city was a suspect the weather was after, Max knew that the storm could erupt at any moment and, despite the zippered bag, she feared subjecting the painting to a downpour, so she pushed the bike, enjoying the engine’s harsh song as she revved it up.

The first drops hit her just as she drove through the doorless entry of the building, a dilapidated three-story brick structure with most of the windows punched out and the walls starting to crumble. Only the roof seemed to be sound.

Max parked the bike, climbed off, and looked around. She stood in a wide hallway that had once had offices on either side — but now, doors were either absent or hung open, with their glass knocked out; and the Sheetrock interior walls had holes kicked in them. She could hear rats scuttling. Not surprisingly, the apparently abandoned building was dark, and if it hadn’t been for her special genetics, she would have needed a flashlight to get around.

Had Vogelsang sold her out? she wondered. Was she walking into a trap? Were Lydecker and/or Sterling and/or Kafelnikov among the rats scurrying in the darkness?

Carrying the zippered bag like a pizza she was delivering, she crept down the hall to the third door on the right — the only closed door in the corridor. To her relief, Max saw light filtering out from underneath.

Of course, this still could be a trap...

But caution just wasn’t on her agenda, tonight. She turned the knob and walked right in.

Unlike what she’d seen of the rest of the building, this room was still in perfect shape — except for a head-sized hole on the right wall, providing an impromptu window into the next office. But the other walls were fine, the door had a lock, and an overhead fluorescent illuminated the room.

In the middle crouched a bunged-up metal desk with a TV on a crate next to it; two metal folding chairs were on the client’s side of the desk. On a card table against the back wall sat a hot plate, with an open door nearby leading to a tiny bathroom. A sleeping bag, rolled up, was snugged in a corner; and the tiniest of refrigerators purred. These were spartan quarters, to say the least, but the place was spotlessly clean.

Behind the desk, his hands folded on the desktop, seated in an ancient swivel chair, was a gray-haired man of perhaps seventy with wire-frame glasses aiding lively dark eyes of indeterminate color, a neatly trimmed but thick salt-and-pepper mustache, and a long but well-tended beard every bit as gray as his hair. He wore a dark suit with a white shirt buttoned all the way up, with no tie — the suit was out of style but not threadbare. Despite the surroundings, he struck Max as both dignified and businesslike.

“Mr. Sherwood?” Max asked.

He rose, gestured to one of the metal folding chairs opposite him. “I would be pleased if you called me Woody... And you’re Max?”

“I’m Max,” she said, and couldn’t help but smile. “Interesting place of business. Do you, uh, live here as well?”

As she sat, so did he. “At the moment I do, yes... Sometimes being an art speculator causes us to reevaluate our lifestyle and make certain subtractions.”

“Like a bed, for example?”

He sighed, but his response seemed chipper. “I won’t deny that I’ve had a few setbacks of late... but I’m just one deal away from Easy Street.”

“Is that in a nice part of Seattle?”

“It’s an expression, dear. Pre-Pulse.”

Max thought: I need to hang with a younger crowd.

Sherwood was saying, “You know, dear, you’re very young and quite pretty. You look healthy.”

She cocked her head, narrowed her eyes. “Thanks... I guess. What does that have to do with any transaction we might have?”

He patted the air with one hand. “I meant nothing by it — just an observation. But the people who bring me merchandise are, by definition, thieves. The young ones are drug addicts and don’t have your... robust glow. The older ones have a... hardness about them, that I hope you will never achieve.”

She didn’t know what to say to that; no matter: Sherwood was plowing on.

“Now I’m not saying a woman... a young woman... can’t be a thief, and a good one. I’ve known a number, over the years... The female thieves I’ve known have either been... unpleasantly hard, or, frankly, gay... or both.”

Not knowing whether to be amused or irritated, Max said, “And you’re wondering if I’m gay?”

Teeth flashed in the beard again. “My dear, at my age I’m afraid it’s damn near irrelevant.”

Max returned the smile. He was an engaging old boy. “Would you like to see what I have for you?”

“Oh yes,” he said, with just a hint of innuendo. “I think we’ve had sufficient conversation to satisfy the social contract, don’t you?”

She answered that with a glazed smile.

With her back to Sherwood, she slowly unzipped the bag, slipped the necklace surreptitiously into her pocket, then slid out the painting. When she turned back to him, his mouth dropped like a trapdoor.

After a long moment of staring at the painting, he asked, “Is that... that the real thing?”

“It should be.” She smiled. “But I won’t be offended if you want to test it.”

“Please,” he said.

She placed the painting on the wide desk and, from one of the drawers, Sherwood withdrew a device that he explained was an UVIN. Then, standing at the desk, the painting like a patient on a surgical table awaiting the doctor’s skills, he said, “Get the lights, would you please, child?”

Max did as the old boy requested, and the fence fired up the UVIN and ran its rays over the painting. He looked from the painting to her, his expression almost... alarmed; and then back down at the painting, going over it again with the ultraviolet light. A crack of thunder made her jump; heavy rain hammered at the windows and echoed down the corridor.

“My dear,” he said finally, “this is indeed a genuine Grant Wood.”

Trying to conceal her excitement, Max asked, “How much?”

“Normally...” He shrugged. “... six figures, easily. But you may have guessed I don’t have that kind of money around here. Actually, I don’t have any kind of money around here... but I know several buyers who do.”

A pulse of excitement jumped in her stomach. “So — what’s our next move?”

Somewhere under that beard, Sherwood had worked up a half smirk. “I suppose you trusting me, for a few days, is out of the question.”

“I like you, Woody,” she said. “But not that much.”

“I can hardly blame you. Well, then, here’s the situation. If we want to sell this beautiful painting for anywhere near its value, people are going to want to test it. To see it tested... For that to happen, I need to have it here.”

Max didn’t like where this was going. “What’s to keep you from screwing me?”

“Besides my age, and the price of Viagra?” He shrugged. “All I have is my word. Didn’t Mr. Vogelsang vouch for me?”

“Oh, sure... but who’d vouch for that sleazebag?”

“True, true... but I assure you, I’m honest.”

“Woody, you deal in stolen property.”

“That’s true, but I do it honestly.”

She laughed in spite of herself. “Okay, Woody, you call me, and I’ll bring the painting, and whoever wants to see it tested, can see it tested.”

“That would be a workable plan,” he said, “but for two things.”

“Go on.”

“First, my function is to buffer you from the buyers and the buyers from you — I provide insulation of sorts, should — for example — you or my client turn out to be participating in what used to be called, quaintly, a sting... is that pre-Pulse term familiar to you?”

“That one is,” she admitted.

“Second, rain’s coming down like a veritable son of a bitch, and you should not risk taking that painting out into it, even with that zippered pouch of yours.”

Max shrugged with a knowingness beyond her years. “Maybe so, but I’m still not leaving the painting here. You have a nice line of bull, Woody, but I just met you... and you may be an honest crook, but you’re still a crook.”

He made a clicking sound in his cheek. “That is a fact... and this is a commission I could dearly use right now.”

“Fine. Well?”

The fence let out a big sigh. “All right, little lady. Let me make a phone call. There is a client I know who would be perfect for this acquisition.”

“Excellent. Tell me about him... or is it a her?”

For the first time, a frown creased the fence’s brow. “I can’t give you a name or any background — you’re compromising my professional ethics enough as it is.”

She said nothing; she was frowning, too.

Sherwood removed a cell phone from his suit-coat pocket. “Do I make the call? I’ll do my best to get the buyer to come down right, now.”

“... Make the call.”

“But you can’t be here.”

Now she was getting pissed. “Woody, I can’t not be here.”

Sherwood was ahead of her. “No, dear... What I mean to say is, you go into the office next door, you can use that hole in the wall to watch and listen.” He pointed to the head-sized hole she’d noted coming in; the aperture was a foot or so behind Sherwood and would give Max the perfect place from which to monitor the transaction.

“I’d still feel better knowing who the buyer is.”

“That is not negotiable, dear. I would protect you, likewise.”

She rose, picked up the metal folding chair on her side of the desk, and there was a loud crack as she snapped the back off it with her two small leather-gloved hands.

Sherwood’s eyes flared. “I do like an assertive female... Mr. Glickman is his name, and that’s all I know. He’s actually another layer of insulation, the agent for a consortium of buyers. What I do know... and this should please you... is that Mr. Glickman pays top dollar, in untraceable cash... tens, twenties, twenty-fives... and he never haggles much about the price. For quality such as this, he’d expect to pay a quality price... Shall I make the call?”

A tiny smile formed on her full lips as she said, “Go ahead and drop the dime.”

Sherwood’s smile was a delighted one. “You do know some pre-Pulse slang, don’t you, you little vixen?”

Twenty minutes later, the rain still beating its staccato rhythm on windows, echoing down the hall like gunfire, Max and her Ninja were safely snugged in the office next door when she heard a car door slam outside. She crept to the hole in the wall and assumed a position that would conceal her and reveal the mysterious Glickman.

For his part, Sherwood didn’t seem the least bit nervous, and Max realized she was no doubt not the first person to witness a transaction from this hiding place. She did wonder if the porthole had been formed by a dissatisfied client shoving the fence’s head through the wall...

Tucked into the shadows, Max could see through the broken-glass door frames of her private office as two men walked down the hall, passed her without looking in, and strode into Sherwood’s office. The two men stayed near the door, and Max couldn’t make out anything more than their shapes.

“What happened to the chair?” one of them asked, his voice sounding nasal and somehow muffled.

“Vandals,” Sherwood said distastefully, as he rose, and then his tone warmed up. “Mr. Glickman, I apologize for bringing you out in such vile weather...” The painting was on the desk, like a colorful blotter. “... but, as I told you on the phone, this is a major Grant Wood.”

The fence, smiling proudly, held up the Masonite board.

“It certainly is,” a rather refined voice replied.

“I, uh... haven’t met your associate. This is a breach of etiquette.”

“Breach of etiquette?” another, rougher voice responded. “I can think of something worse.”

An icy shiver spiked through Max: she had heard that voice before ... in the foyer at Jared Sterling’s mansion. One of his security team! Maurer, the black, clean-cut guard...

“Something worse?” Sherwood said, clearly off-balance.

The pair stepped forward into the fluorescent’s path and Max’s view. In a black rain-dripping raincoat, Maurer stood on the right, his nose heavily bandaged, while on the left, the other “insulation,” Mr. Glickman, stood in a London Fog, and Max recognized him, as well — his hair in the same iron-gray crew cut, the scars still on his cheeks, each about the size of a dime.

Sterling’s security chief.

“I mean,” Glickman said, “trying to sell back a painting stolen from my boss.”

Sherwood’s whole body seemed to go slack. “I... I... I had no idea...”

“It was heavily covered in the media. You work in the art field. Certainly you knew this painting was Mr. Sterling’s.”

“But... gentlemen... I was not aware that Mr. Sterling was your client. I was under the impression you represented a consortium of overseas buyers... Forgive me.”

“No,” Glickman said.

The security guard was reaching inside the London Fog, and Max did not think he was going for a handkerchief. She took three quick steps back, then threw herself at the Sheetrock wall. She burst explosively into Sherwood’s office just as Maurer fired the first shot. Max couldn’t get to him in time, but in reflexive if pointless self-defense, Sherwood lifted the painting in front of his face.

The nine-millimeter slug tore through the painting leaving a hole bigger than a golf ball, then ripped through Sherwood’s head, blowing away a piece of the old man’s scalp.

“The painting!” Glickman called, in warning.

But Maurer’s second shot shredded even more of the masterpiece before cleaving its way through Sherwood’s chest and sending him backward, upending the chair, pitching the painting, which cracked against a wall, while the fence lay on his back, asprawl.

Max leapt, kicked, her boot connecting solidly with the bandage across Maurer’s face. He screamed, dropped his pistol, and fell backward to the floor, a hand covering where the blood erupted from his nose, red streaming through his cupping fingers. Glickman had dodged when Max came through the wall, and from the sidelines fired at her, but was off-balance, and missed, the bullet burrowing into Sheetrock. She rushed him before he could get his equilibrium, ducking a wild shot, and kicked sideways, her boot slamming into the man’s groin, knocking him into the Sheetrock behind him, air whooshing out of him; he slid down the wall, and his mouth was open in a silent scream.

But Sterling’s security chief was no pushover, and hardly a stranger to pain; plenty of fight left in him, Glickman squeezed off another shot, this one whizzing past Max’s shoulder, again thunking into Sheetrock.

On the floor near the dead fence (who was on his back staring sightlessly at the ceiling) Maurer — his hands smeared and slippery with his own blood — was scrambling for his pistol; he got hold of it, and raised it at Max, stupidly heedless of how close she and his superior were. Just as the black guard fired, Max dived out of the way and Maurer’s bullet missed her and sent up a puff of pink as it punched Glickman in the chest.

The iron-haired security chief’s eyes went wide with shock, and he slumped back against the wall. He looked down at his wound, then up at Maurer. His last words were a kind of cough: “You dumb fuck.”

“Oh, shit,” Maurer said, and brought his pistol around, searching for his target, who seemed to have disappeared.

Then Max was suddenly at his side, and grabbed his arm and bent the elbow the wrong direction; Maurer screamed and his fingers popped open and he dropped the blood-smeared pistol. She kept going, applying torque to his shoulder as she cranked his arm around behind him.

The guard was in so much pain, he couldn’t even scream.

“One question,” Max said, her voice cold, hard. “Wrong answer, I break your arm.” She applied a little more pressure to make her point; Maurer arched his back and groaned pitifully.

“Ask! Ask!”

“Where can I find Sterling... right now?”

He tried to twist his head around to see her, but she cranked up on the arm and his head dropped, as he yelped with pain.

“Let’s have that answer,” she said, and started moving the hand upward.

“Okay, okay! He’s at the Needle.”

Frowning, Max relaxed her grip somewhat, and with the lessening of pain, all the air went out of Maurer, who sagged; she felt if she let go of him, he’d drop like an armload of firewood.

“Space Needle?”

“What the... fuck other Needle... deal going down.”

“More,” she said, not bothering to punctuate her question with a ratchet of pain; the guy was cooperating now.

“The boss and that Russian, they’re selling some shit to some Koreans, there. Up top.”

“Right now?”

“Less than an hour from now... yeah.”

Max said, “Thanks,” and let go of him.

He stood there unsteadily for a second, his back to her, and he said, “I won’t... won’t cause you any trouble.”

“I know,” she said, chopped him across the back of the neck.

She left behind a damaged painting, a dead fence, a dead security chief, and an unconscious Sterling subordinate, who would have explaining to do about the precious painting he’d ruined and the superior he’d shot and killed.

At least Max still had the necklace in her pocket, the precious object that had sparked so much damage and death, the weight of it suddenly very heavy. She needed this to end the cycle, or she and her brother would never be safe.

Gazing down at Sherwood, she shook her head. The old boy hadn’t needed to die, but she felt no guilt or responsibility. He had chosen this path, even if he’d never made it to Easy Street. Still, she had liked the eccentric fence, during their short but significant relationship; and now Sherwood was just one more thing taken from her by Sterling and Kafelnikov, one more comrade slaughtered, like the Chinese Clan...

In the office next door, she put on her amber glasses, walked her Ninja out into the hall and down to the entranceway. Then she climbed aboard, fired it up, and gunned it through the doorway into the waiting storm.

Wind-driven rain slashed at her face as she raced up Broad Street toward the Space Needle, but she didn’t mind — it seemed cleansing; she wished the rain would wash away all the dirt and grime and corruption from this foul city, this fractured country...

Parking in a burned-out building two blocks away, and looking up to get her bearings, she was surprised at how huge the structure looked. Naturally, she’d seen the Needle before — you couldn’t live in the Emerald City and not notice the Needle — but she’d never paid much attention to it.

Over six hundred feet tall, the Needle rose like a giant metal flower. The night was so dark and the rain so dense that only during a lightning flash could she make out the crest of the building. A beacon of futuristic hope when it was built back in the ’60s, the Space Needle now towered in ghostly tribute to the blight brought on by the Pulse, the skeleton of a vision dreamed in a more hopeful, naive time.

In the years since the Pulse, the downturn in the economy had brought fewer and fewer visitors to the famed tourist spot, until the restaurant had gone under, the observation deck had been closed — too many people were jumping — and the banquet facility had been forced to shutter. The structure now served primarily as a practice pad for every graffiti artist in the city, the Needle seemingly painted a hundred different shades at once; red, black, yellow, white, spray paint in every possible color had been applied somewhere on the giant building. The first-floor gift shop — its windows had long since been broken out — seemed like it would make the natural point of entry for Max.

The neighborhood around the landmark had suffered the same fate and reminded Max of vid footage she’d seen at Manticore, labeled SARAJEVO and BEIRUT. The only unbroken windows in the whole neighborhood seemed to be in the two vehicles parked in a lot at the base of the Needle, beneath a tin overhang on which rain drummed insistently. She edged closer, positioning herself behind a Dumpster at the periphery of the parking lot. From here she had a better view of the two cars.

One, a black luxury number, a Lexus, had California plates — this would be the Russian’s ride; the other, an old Hummer, appeared to be a rental and reminded Max too much of her days at Manticore. Near each vehicle stood a guard; the one near the Hummer — shorter than the other guy — smoked a cigarette and strolled back and forth on the driver’s side.

The other guard, near the Lexus, closer to her, leaned against the door, staring in her direction. At first, she thought he’d seen her, then she realized that he was looking at nothing, and his head just happened to be pointed in her direction. Still, as soon as she moved, he would likely see her... and any chance for surprise would be gone.

Behind the Dumpster, she found a rock about the size of a sugar cube and threw it down the street. The rock hit on the concrete, barely loud enough to be heard in the rain; but, to their credit, both men looked in that direction. Max using the diversion to swing around and conceal herself in front of the Lexus.

“Hell was that?” the other man asked, his accent giving him away as Japanese.

“No idea,” the guard near the Lexus said, bored. He wore a dark brown zip-up jacket and black jeans.

Closer now, Max made him as Jackson, the crew-cut wrestler from her first visit to the Sterling estate.

“Should we investigate?” the Japanese guy asked.

“Do what you want. Soak your ass. My orders are, stay put.”

The Japanese guard went back around the Hummer and lit another cigarette.

Jackson was leaning against the driver’s door of the Lexus, staring into space; real ball of fire. Max decided to take the Japanese out first. She rolled under the Hummer, and — when his pacing brought him close enough to her — she grabbed the man’s ankles and flipped them up in the air. Gasping, he took the ride.

She was out from under by the time he smacked his head on the cement; sprawled there, the guard groggily lifted his head to look up at her with a glazed look, perhaps wondering if he was dreaming, such a lovely face looking down...

The owner of the lovely face punched him in the side of the head and he lay back, out cold.

“You say somethin’?” Jackson asked.

When he got no answer, Jackson straightened, eyes tightening, finally interested enough to turn and look. But all he saw was Max’s boots as she flew over the top of the car with martial-arts grace and dropkicked him in the face. Jackson toppled over, spitting bloody teeth like seeds, then tried to rise, clenching what was left of his smile... and Max decked him with a short left.

Rain drummed on the tin overhead.

Back when the Needle had been a family-fun destination, three elevators had been in service here, and though Max didn’t plan on taking one, she did want to know whether or not the things were up and running. If Sterling used the Needle as a regular drop point for his dirty deals, it didn’t even seem like a stretch to her that the art collector might arrange having power supplied to the building that only his people knew how to activate.

Max stepped through a broken-out window in the gift shop and surveyed the store; the only sound she was making came from the moisture dripping off her leather. Access to the power had to be on this floor somewhere. Dust blanketed the floor and the counter, too; she could make out where the cash register had been before it had been ripped out.

She paused, listened intently, heard nothing... and crept forward.

To the left, a doorway led to a hallway off of which were the three elevators. That hall curved back, and out of sight, so Max decided to start here. Behind the counter, another opening led to a back room. Again listening carefully, and still hearing nothing, she edged into the room — pitch-black... even Max had trouble seeing. After slowly scanning for any other doors, the X5 backed out into the relative light of the empty store, illuminated completely, now and then, by lightning.

Max got to one side of the store door and peered down the elevator hallway, saw nothing. Moving forward, she could make out the elevators on her right. She also could see the lighted-up floor indicator, above the elevator doors — they were working.

The nearest car was up on the observation deck, the other two were here at ground level. The left side of the hall had once been the glass wall of the pavilion, but now was mostly just metal framing and random shards. Six feet beyond the last elevator door, another doorway beckoned, this one with a small shaft of light shining out of it.

She slipped across the open space, peeked in... and saw one of Sterling’s men inside the small room.

A naked lightbulb, hanging like electric fruit, provided the only light. Several large circuit boxes lined one wall and Sterling’s stooge sat on a folding chair against the other wall, reading a sports magazine with a bikinied woman on the cover. This guy she hadn’t encountered before, a redhead with a wide chest and a sharply angular face; he wore a zippered brown jacket and darker brown slacks.

Stepping in quickly, she said, “Can I see that when you’re through with it?”

He looked up in blank confusion and she hit him with a right, a left, and another right. The magazine slipped from his hand and he and the chair tumbled; she caught them, setting both man and chair down gently, avoiding the clatter. She considered using the coil of rope on her belt to tie the guy up; but decided it might be put to a better use later on, and secured his hands behind him with his belt.

Taking the elevator up would tip them that she was coming.

She would just have to climb the stairs to the tower, where an evil prince and assorted vile advisers of his would surely await.