That, Shaw had to admit, was frighteningly likely. North was very much the type to deliver on a threat like that. And Shaw wasn’t vain, not at all, he’d been reading all about how to see people’s spirits and how important that was, but he also was pretty sure he didn’t want to be bald.

“What if we compromise? I’ll find some red envelopes, and we can—”

North was starting to growl.

That was when the bell on the front door jingled, and before Shaw could say anything, North shot to his feet. “I’ll get it.”

While North spoke in low voices to whoever had come to the office of Borealis Investigations—a client, Shaw hoped, although it was more likely somebody wanting to sell tacky bracelets on display in the front office, or maybe a kid trying a paper route, or the gas guy who couldn’t find the meter—Shaw pulled open another desk drawer and started digging.

“Shaw?”

He looked up too fast, and his head cracked against the underside of the desk. “Ouch.” His face heated as he extricated himself.

North stood in the doorway, shaking his head. Next to him were two young women. Girls, really. Barely out of high school, if Shaw had to guess, although he’d never really been an expert on girls. One was tiny, with light brown skin, dark hair, and a vermillion bindi on her forehead. The other had peroxide-blond hair shorter than North’s, and her combat boots put her almost as tall as him. The two girls were holding hands.

“We have clients,” North said.

“Awesome,” Shaw said, but as he stood up, his foot caught on a stack of pages under the desk, and Shaw slipped and fell backward, landing on the floor. He took a moment to clear his head and then looked at the mountain of paperwork that had tripped him up.

“Oh! North! I found the invoices!”

North just sighed.

2

THE STORY WAS SIMPLE, although unusual: a bunch of bros was invading a local lesbian bar—the Radio Girls.

“Tune in Tokyo?” Shaw said as they drove east on Gravois. “That kind of radio?”

In a strip mall parking lot, where neon signs flashed for payday loans and liquor stores, a flock of plastic bags fluttered in the fall breeze, cycloning up against a cart corral and then fluttering back to the ground. Shaw cranked down the Grand Caravan’s window—the smell inside the old minivan was worse today, reminding him of mold under a bath mat—and the wind came off the Anheuser Busch brewery heavy with hops.

“What?” North was studying the street signs.

“Never mind.”