Because You Love to Hate Me(72)

“Are you her?”

You turn around and answer with your mask.

The client is supposed to be eighteen, but he looks to be in his early twenties instead; heartbreak can age a person. He’s six feet, a little taller than you, but you knew to expect this. You stalked him online to see if there was actually a chance he had enough money to pay for your most illegal drug. Turns out his father launched a successful new app for college students looking to date. The irony of this meeting doesn’t surprise you.

He avoids your face, backing away, the gym bag in his hand trailing along the ground.

It’s not news to you that you look like you’re attending the creepiest masquerade ever. What would be news to the world is how the rotted flesh pulled across your face once belonged to your father’s hand. The bones of his fingers, entwined by rope, keep the mask tight across dozens of tiny scars he inflicted upon you. But that story isn’t anyone’s business but your own. Not even Karl knows about this.

“You’re her,” he says.

The certainty in his voice is rewarding considering how many posers are out there pretending they’re you. You’re as unmistakable as your product is unrivaled.

“I’m Mike,” he says.

You know.

You know his name and you know why he’s here.

You reach into your jacket pocket, and your fingers brush against the small pistol while grabbing the drugs. “It’s eight thousand for Trance.” You’ve never killed before, but if he tries haggling on this evening when you’re desperate to get back home for some normalcy with Karl, this boy will have a third eye before he even realizes you’ve grabbed your only-for-absolute-emergencies gun.

He tries handing over his gym bag, but you hold up your hand and he halts. You point to the backpack leaning against a grimy crane that’s missing a wheel. “Put the money in there,” you say. The aluminum inside the backpack will interfere with any signals in the event Mike was recruited by Local to bug you. The price on your head for being the most wanted girl in the city is huge.

You should start increasing your rates for how risky this is becoming.

Mike kneels between the bags, shuffling cash from one to the next. If there’s even one dollar missing, you’ll put him through a pain he won’t be able to forget even with a strong dose of Daze.

“I need my girlfriend back,” Mike says, looking up at you as if this is a surprise. Even if you hadn’t stalked him online to see his recent relationship status switch from IN A RELATIONSHIP to SINGLE, you’d know what was up. Love is the reason Trance is such a top-seller. “She found out I was cheating on her. It was a mistake, seriously. I’ll never do it again. We just need a fresh start.”

You hate hearing the stories. You didn’t care about the woman who needed Daze to forget the sins against her sister and start anew. You didn’t care about the man who needed Token to remember his dead stepfather more vividly. You didn’t care about the man who needed Trance to trick his boss into giving him a promotion he didn’t deserve. You don’t care about this kid needing Daze to get his girlfriend back. But you listen because a god is only a god when they know how to serve their worshippers.

“Daze will work, right?”

“Your doubts are not my problem. My reputation has gotten you this far.”

This is why the cops and bounty hunters want you so badly. The authorities don’t care as much about people forgetting their own drama or taking a stroll down memory lane. They care when Daze, Trance, and Token are used against others. The authorities are too caught up in locking you away to see the good of what you do. How some takers are better off. Some were nobodies off the streets. Others needed escapes from abusive situations, new identities. But they don’t see that. They chase you down because they think what you’re doing is unethical. Except you don’t force this on anyone.

Not anyone who doesn’t deserve it, at least.

Mike finishes depositing all the cash into your bag and looks up at you.

You toss him the drugs, which he catches with shaky hands. He stares at the small velvet pouch containing the four Daze seeds. “How should I—”

“Your move, not mine,” you say.

You only supply the seeds. It’s up to them to plant it.

You’re betting on him bowing out of this completely. You doubt his desperation. You also care so little you’re already thinking about putting his father’s eight thousand dollars toward a yacht for you and Karl.

Mike stares at the pouch with a loser’s smile. “Who said you can’t buy happiness, eh?”

You roll your eyes.

He takes a couple of steps toward you, and the gun is out of your pocket so fast the smile is still on his face. But he doesn’t beg for his life. “You’re an angel,” he says. Even as he looks upon your face, masked with flesh so rotten it’s gone charcoal black, he calls you an angel. This is a first. You’ve been called a god for your power and you’ve been called the devil for your fierceness, but you’ve never been called an angel for your services.

Mike looks as if he wants to bow before you and kiss your feet, but instead he turns away from you and the gun you’re pointing at him.

An angel. Interesting.

“Put the gun down!” This new voice rips you out of your reverie. A bald, muscular brute in a tacky denim vest and wielding a shotgun steps out from behind the crooked crane.