“You don’t,” I said. “You have to roll the dice. Except that one thing you do know is that if you don’t talk, you will die, and you’ll die badly. Soundproofed walls, a hungry dog, and a motherfucker who doesn’t give one little, tiny roach turd about you. That’s one of two outcomes. Take a moment and think about which option sounds more fun to you.”

I stopped talking and let him work on it.

The clock in my head was telling me to speed it up. The guard I darted at the safe house was probably awake, pissed off, and making calls. Which meant Bug knew, and Church knew. Maybe someone was already on their way. I wondered … would Church send Toys after me again? Or would it be Top and Bunny this time? Either way, someone would come.

I could feel the Darkness in my head wanting to reassert itself and do very awful things. Even if Casanova gave me what I wanted. It was so damned hard to keep the lights on in my soul.

“Tick tock,” I prompted.

His eyes were jumpy, as if he were a cornered rat, and the sweat was running down his cheeks. I made a small and unobtrusive finger gesture, and Ghost immediately came over and sat close enough so that his hot breath blew against Casanova’s face. Dog drool spattered the man’s orange prison onesie.

“Okay,” he blurted. “Okay, okay, okay.”

“Okay … what?” I asked quietly.

“Okay, I’ll tell you what you want to know, goddamn your eyes.”

“What is it you think I want to know?” I asked.

“Look,” he said, “I don’t actually know where Kuga is. I’ve heard rumors. Somewhere in Canada, somewhere in Texas, who knows? I don’t know. No one does, but I can tell you where you can find Rafael Santoro.”

My heart was throwing haymaker punches against the walls of my chest. I pushed Ghost out of the way and leaned close so that it was my own furnace breath, my own hot spit he felt on his face.

“Where. Is. He?”

It came out as three words, three beats. He flinched as if each one were a physical blow. Casanova looked absolutely terrified. Of me. Of the dark things he saw in my eyes.

He said, “If you want to find Santoro, you need to go to talk to Die Katze.”

The Cat. A code name for a guy our friends at Barrier had been tracking. No one knew his real name, but he’d been a key lieutenant in the old Ohan international black market operation, though before that had worked in the sex-trafficking business. A real evil son of a bitch. Heartless and mercenary in the extreme. After Ohan got his throat cut, the Cat had become a free agent. I hadn’t heard that he was tied in with Kuga, though it made sense.