A Leap in the Dark (The Assassins of Youth MC Book 2)(4)

Dingo turned to us excitedly. “Guys, this is Deloy Pingree. Or do you have a different name?”

Some of the shine went out of Deloy’s eyes. “I’m still Deloy Pingree because I’m not ashamed of my family. They didn’t do this to me. Allred Chiles did.”

“But he’s gone now,” intoned Dingo with round eyes.

There. The cheer was back, and Deloy jumped up and down wringing Dingo’s hands. “Yes, yes! So I heard! What a wonderful day in the neighborhood it was when I heard that!”

Did my ears deceive me? Deloy Pingree equated the murder of a cult sect leader with a walk through Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood? Besides, since I knew Gideon Fortunati had something to do with that event, I wasn’t eager to talk about it.

“Deloy, I’m the nurse your boss called in for the exams. Would you like to start first?”

Deloy held a hand to his chest as though being informed he’d won a beauty pageant. He seemed so innocent, even more na?ve and unsophisticated than Dingo. “Me? Your first? Why, certainly. I aim to please. Is that all right, Levon?”

Levon waved a dismissive hand. “Sure, sure. Go, go. You don’t have an appointment until seven tonight.”

It surprised me when Deloy rolled his eyes. “Oh, that Mr. Rice fellow. He’s the sort that every escort dreads.”

“Why’s that?” I dared to ask as we headed back toward the house.

Deloy wrinkled his nose. “Always wanting to, you know, ride the Hershey Highway. He always wants to make pound cake. Raw dogging it, too, without a rubber.”

Although the reality was horrifying, I had to giggle at Deloy’s terminology. He was old enough to do those things, but not old enough to speak of them without using metaphors. My heart went out to him. “Well, that’s why I’m here. If you’re doing things without rubbers, you need me.”

“Oh, I don’t let him ride bareback. No siree, Bob. That’s one of the house rules. Here, I think Levon set up a table in here.”

“In here” turned out to be the book-lined office I’d seen earlier. Someone had rolled out a massage table and covered it with a sheet and given me a clip-on draftsman’s lamp I could move around on an arm. It was okay. Most of the tests were blood or a swab from inside the penis, but I wanted to check for sores.

“Can you undress completely? I’m sorry I don’t have any gowns.” Out of my medical bag I took my tray, gloves, swabs, syringes.

“That’s okay,” Deloy said good-naturedly, stripping off his sports jersey. “I’m used to being naked. It’s the nature of the beast around here.”

I asked, “Do you like…working for Mr. Rockwell?”

To my surprise, he shrugged. I expected the enthusiastic kid to rave about Levon. “It’s all right. It’s a living, as they say. Before I was led by Lucifer to turn traitor to the priesthood, I actually dreamed of becoming a dentist. Don’t laugh!”

“I’m not laughing.”

“I know that no one inside Cornucopia could become a dentist because they choose your path for you. And most likely I would’ve gone into construction in one of Chiles’ concerns. If I was lucky I’d become a foreman. Or maybe help run the book binding business. But nothing like be a dentist.”

“Does Mr. Rockwell know your wishes?” I looked around at some titles of books on the walls. I frowned. Dostoevsky, Chaucer, Henry Miller, and even Anais Nin were a few of the literary titles I perused. What the…? Levon Rockwell was a man of letters? I also saw volumes by Nietzsche, Bertrand Russell, and Jean-Paul Sartre. This man got around, intellectually. I tried not to be impressed because I loathed him so much. I started by taking bloods from the naked boy.

“I suppose he does. But how could I ever get the time off to attend dental school, what with having to work so many hours here?”

“And why not? I worked part-time while attending nursing school. Pretty much everyone does, unless you were born into money. Mr. Rockwell would be an ass and a bastard if he didn’t let you fulfill your goals. You just might have to work a few extra hours a week. I’ll tell you what. Go talk to my sister, Mahalia. She’s interested in saving some Lost Boys and bringing them down into her fold. I’ll bet you she can find some honest, upstanding part-time work for you while you go to dental school. I believe there’s one in St. George, which is just a hop skip and a jump from Avalanche.”

“Really?” Deloy perked up. Then just as quickly, he slumped. “I wouldn’t want to let Levon down. He literally pulled me up by my bootstraps when I was getting high off cough syrup I stole from CVS. Miss Warrior, I was lying in a gutter, just a bag of bones and piss. I wondered why I didn’t die at birth, why I caused problems for everyone, like they all told me. I was a worse mass murderer than Hitler. What in the world was I thinking when I tried to challenge God?”

“What got you kicked out of Cornucopia?”

Deloy fell silent. I’d done all the bloods and now it was time to get the penis swab. It sat in its little nest of hair, small and curled like a snail. I saw no sores. “You’re a medical person. I can tell you. I was found…making out.”

I snorted. “Oh, God forbid. You know, you’re better off without those people, Deloy.”

“I know that. I was kissing another boy.”