The Living End (Daniel Faust #3)(23)

“We spent the night taking each other’s measure,” Caitlin said. “Seduction is a slow dance, not a sprint. She’s definitely eager to be courted, but she doesn’t want to seem too eager or give me any opportunity to upset her position with Prince Malphas. She goes back to Denver this morning. We’ll see what comes of it.”

While Caitlin and Melanie prepared for a day of pampering, I had a less glamorous job on my plate. Pixie’s missing-persons problem had kept me tossing and turning all night while I tried to find an angle. The problem, I realized, was that I was doing all the hard work. Why hunt the predators, when I could let them hunt me instead?

Passing for homeless and hungry didn’t take too much work. The people who lined up for food at St. Jude’s didn’t look a whole hell of a lot different from me or my friends. A little more tired. A little more scuffed up and beaten down. It was mostly in the eyes.

I headed back to Bentley and Corman’s place and raided their closet. Corman was a bigger guy than me, and he hung onto clothes until even the moths lost interest. I scored an LA Dodgers T-shirt with a faded pasta sauce stain and a baggy pair of jeans that frayed at the cuffs. In the mirror, I looked like a guy wearing the only hand-me-downs he could find. I hadn’t shaved yet that morning, and my stubble looked more sloppy than stylish. The bags under my eyes? Those were authentic. I really needed to stop couch-surfing.

I grabbed a fifth of Jack Daniels from the liquor cabinet and trundled back into the bathroom. Not every person on the streets has a battle with the bottle, but it’s a popular stereotype. When you’re crafting a disguise, playing on stereotypes goes a long way. I winced as I took a heavy swig from the bottle and gargled, swishing it over my teeth and tongue like it was mouthwash, then spit it into the sink. I gazed longingly at my unused toothbrush on my way out.

I could take my pick of gutters to crawl into, but I needed visibility. That meant the Boulevard. I parked a block off the Strip and blended in with the tourist foot traffic, noticing I was already getting more personal space than usual. Any herd can tell when they’ve got a sick animal in their midst.

Crystals at CityCenter was a monument to ridiculous excess. A shopping mall for the elite and elite wannabes, where Gucci and Armani boutiques rubbed shoulders with Cartier, Prada, and Kiki de Montpernasse. Normally I couldn’t afford to breathe the air in there, but I’d been dragged along on a couple of shopping trips. Kiki de Montpernasse was where Caitlin bought her lingerie.

Panhandlers weren’t a strange sight anywhere on the strip, but they knew to go where the money was. Outside Crystals, on a pedestrian bridge riding over the nightmare tangle of traffic below, a couple of regulars were already camped out with hand-lettered signs on corrugated cardboard and empty coffee cups for collecting change.

I’d done my own sign with a black Sharpie. “Homeless hungry need work. God Bless.” I walked down to the far end of the footbridge, swallowed my pride, and sat down on the dirty concrete with my back to the steel railing and my sign propped up on my lap. In a heartbeat I went from a human being to a statistic, another faceless number in “The Homeless Problem.”

It was amazing how fast I vanished. I’d braced myself for stares of disdain, insults, every bit of humiliation I could imagine, but it was the exact opposite. I just wasn’t there. As the sun rose over Las Vegas, making the sweat bead on my scalp, I became a part of the background. The tourists didn’t look at me. They stepped around my sign without seeing me at all. Trying to make eye contact turned into a game—when I managed it, their gazes jerked away so fast it was like they’d touched a hot stove.

I don’t know why I was so surprised. That was exactly how I acted every time I passed the panhandlers on the bridges. I just never realized what it felt like until now.

Not everyone turned away. Every now and then someone would toss a few spare coins into my cup, even a couple of rumpled and sweaty dollar bills. I’d duck my head and mumble a “God bless ya, ma’am” as they quickly moved on, their good deed done for the day.

By noon the heat was as murderous as the growling in my stomach. I’d skipped breakfast, and now I was paying for it. I almost had to laugh. For me, this was playing a part. I could get up right then and there, walk into any restaurant on the Strip, and sit down to a decent meal. Amazing, the things you take for granted.

All right, I thought, enough. Either these guys only prey on the homeless at night, they only work the back streets, or maybe they’re just staying home today. Bottom line, the fish aren’t biting. Time to pack up.

That was when I saw the Missionary.





Eleven



The Missionary. That was what I dubbed the guy when I noticed him chatting up the panhandlers on the far end of the bridge. He had that look: crisp white shirt, gray slacks and polished wing tips, department store eyeglasses, and a save-the-world smile. A tan canvas satchel like a mail carrier’s bag dangled over one shoulder, but I couldn’t read the logo on it. I stopped watching and stared down at the concrete instead, putting all my energy into looking weak and alone.

He came over and stopped in front of me, rummaging in his satchel. I pegged him somewhere in his mid forties, with a military-neat haircut and a lantern jaw.

“You look hungry, buddy,” he said. “Say, what do you like better? Turkey or roast beef?”

I gave a noncommittal shrug. “Beef, I guess.”