Redemption Song (Daniel Faust #2)(23)

I rolled my eyes. “Evening, ladies. Murder anybody interesting lately?”

Juliette sniffed. “If they were interesting, we wouldn’t murder them, now would we? That’s just silly.”

“I’m here to see Nicky.”

“Aww,” Justine pouted. “Come have a drink with us first. We don’t bite.”

“Yes we dooooo,” Juliette sang in my ear.

“Nicky,” I said. “Now.”

Eventually I convinced them to take me in back, past the bar and down a stubby little hallway with a cigarette-burned carpet. Nicky’s office was a hole-in-the-wall, a clutter of remaindered furniture under harsh fluorescents. You’d never guess that half the dirty deals in Vegas were hatched in that room.

Nicky sat behind his desk, nursing a glass of scotch and flipping through an accounting ledger. He looked up and grinned when the twins walked me through the door, his wolfish eyes sharp behind the titanium rims of his Porsche Design glasses.

“Danny Faust. To what do I owe the pleasure?”

“Business,” I said, sliding into a chair in front of the desk.

“If this is about the feds, you’re a few hours late to the party. Jennifer already chewed my ear off about it. Don’t worry, I got this. You got nothin’ to worry about.”

“Don’t handle me, Nicky. I’m not here to get a pat on the back and a comforting word.”

Behind me, Justine crossed her arms. “We could give you so much more than that, if you weren’t such a party pooper.”

Nicky sighed. “Ladies, please.”

He finally got them out the door, leaving the two of us alone.

“Swear to Christ, Dan,” he said, rubbing his temples as if warding off a migraine. “If you’d just date the twins for one night, just take ’em out somewhere nice, somewhere far away from here, I’d owe you big-time.”

“Trouble in paradise?”

“Hey, I love ’em, but they never stop. It’s like being on a coke bender you never crash from. I just want eight hours of sleep is all.”

“Yeah, well, I’m kinda seeing somebody right now.”

Nicky let out a little chuckle and raised his glass.

“That Caitlin,” he said. “She’s something, huh? Thing is, I hear you two got some problems of your own. The prince ain’t too happy with you right now.”

“What, does everybody know?” I cocked my head. “You guys have your own mailing list or something?”

He laughed and shook his head. “Information is my business. I get paid to know everything about everybody. Thing is, pal, are you sure he’s wrong? You and Cait are all gaga over each other right now, but what happens when something really pushes your limits? Whackin’ a priest isn’t exactly heavy lifting in that crowd. Hell, I was gonna offer to do it for you myself, just as a favor for a friend, but I knew you’d turn me down.”

“My rules are my rules,” I said. “I draw the line where I have to, so I can still look at myself in the mirror every morning. I don’t pull the trigger on anybody who doesn’t have it coming. It’s that simple.”

He sipped his scotch.

“Do you know,” he said, “why they call Caitlin the Wingtaker?”

I shook my head.

“Funny story. See, there’s this place where all worlds connect, the Big Empty. Just an endless desert plain where nothing grows and the skies are always on the edge of a storm that never comes.”

“Limbo,” I said.

“Call it what you want. It’s the Big Empty. Now, nobody’d seen an angel in at least a thousand years. Not here, not there, not anywhere. The way I heard it, one day, out on those empty plains…they spot one. A real, genuine angel. Supposedly, it was confused, lost, like a robot with its wiring all messed up. Still, y’know, an authentic handmade warrior of God. Nothing to f*ck with.”

I didn’t like where the story was going, but I had to hear it out. “What happened?”

“Well, everybody lost their shit is what happened. Running around like chickens with their heads cut off, screaming about the sky falling, scared out of their damn minds. So Caitlin—remember, this is just what I was told, this was all way before my time—she says, ‘I’ll handle this,’ picks up a spear, and goes hunting the thing! Not only does she fight it, all by herself, she ruined it.”

“Caitlin,” I said flatly, “killed an angel.”

Nicky snorted. He rolled the scotch in his glass, letting it catch the light. Then he waved his other hand.

“I didn’t say she killed it, Danny. I said she ruined it. It’s still alive.”





Twelve

A chill prickled the back of my neck, and I knew it wasn’t the air-conditioning.

“The things she did to that poor bastard,” Nicky said. “I don’t even wanna think about it. When she was finally done, she sliced its wings off as a souvenir. Word is? It begged her to do it. Then she put it on a leash and gave it to Prince Sitri as a pet. And that, buddy, is the story of how Caitlin became the apple of Sitri’s eye. Think about that the next time you two are cuddling and making kissy-face, if there is a next time.”

I wanted to tell myself it was just a story, some typical Nicky Agnelli line of bullshit, but I try not to lie to myself too often. Yeah, I thought, picturing Caitlin’s face in my mind, I believe it.