Chapters (50)
- Praise
- Title Page
- Copyright Page
- Dedication
- Epigraph
- The Awful Truth
- The Life
- Make That Four
- Heaven, or: Last April at the Frick
- New Punch Line
- The J-Mart Employee of the Year Pleads His Case
- Reminder
- Auto-Nav
- Our Greatest Hit Hits Again, or: Who Is the Rat Burglar?
- I’m the Mang?
- Me vs. the Goldfish
- Size Matters
- Life of Crime
- I High-Beam the Dream
- What the Covet Girl Tells Me
- How Memory Harvesting Can Save Your Life
- The Sound of Our Future Together
- Bullet by Bullet
- The Effects of Drinking and Dosing
- A Bra Tells the Truth
- Gun Therapy
- WWPD: What Would Pinkerton Do?
- The Nakamura Job
- The Treachery of Images
- Herk to the Rescue
- The Truth About Herkimer
- The Polecat
- Do I or Don’t I?
- The World I Know Nothing About
- Kong’s Price
- Bathroom Talk
- Good Start
- Reunited
- Baconmouth
- Teamwork
- A Picture of Loveliness
- The Forty-fifth Murder
- The Unreachable
- Ambiguity
- Exit
- Sacrifice
- Otto Starks, Supernova
- Snitching
- Clean Getaway
- Acknowledgements
“Disgraced,” I say, understanding. “In jail. Paralyzed.”
“Yes.”
“And there was so much Nix because Herk knew I was vulnerable to it.”
“Sort of.”
“You’ve got to tell me. How do you know all this?”
“I work for Azar, too.”
“Then why did you save me? Won’t he kill you?”
“That’s the complicated part.”
I wither at him. “More complicated than you stealing Charlie from me?”
“I didn’t steal Charlie.”
“I saw the pictures.”
“You saw what Azar wanted you to see. To make you angry enough to kill.”
“The photos were doctored?”
“I don’t know what you saw, but I swear to you I am Charlie’s friend only.”
“Really?”
Hope ignites in my stomach but I clench against it. I don’t trust it.
“Otto Starks, she loves you. She needs you. I can take you to her.”
Is he chicaning? I almost don’t care. At this point, anything could be true.
Why not love?
Against my best efforts, my heart dives and loops like a stunt kite. Gushing like an idiot, I say, “O.K. Let’s go! I don’t want to waste any time!”
“Otto . . .”
“Come on. It’s going to take an hour to get to her apartment from here.”
“It’s not going to take an hour.”
“Ozone Park? Oh yes it will. Trust me.”
Jagjeet looks direly pained by my assertion.
“No it won’t,” he says gently. “We’re already there.”
“What? She lives in a dumpy little—”
“Otto, brace yourself for a shock.”
The Polecat
The Polecat
Jagjeet opens the door and the truth swarms over me. Clinging to the door frame for support, I stare into the wonderland of shock and hurt. Panning left in the apartment, the familiar: a stack of scholarly books whose titles I recognize, her utilitarian tote, identifiable shoes. Panning right, the alien: a coffee table littered with arcane-looking tools and electronics, a canister of face paint, black RealFeel gloves, scattered hypodermic needles and vials of toxins—the paraphernalia of talent. There is an olfactory component to the horror as well. On the air are the usual Charlie odors but also the sour, glandular tang of live animal—a ferrety smell that is not ferret.
Sure enough, the Polecat is a woman. My woman.