City of Night

Chapter 72

Sitting at the kitchen table in Michael Maddison’s apartment, Cindi Lovewell used a pair of tweezers to pluck the last of the wood splinters out of Benny’s left eye.

He said, “How’s it look?”

“Icky. But it’ll heal. Can you see?”

“Everything blurry in that eye. But I can see well with the right. We don’t look so cute anymore.”

“We will again. You want something to drink?”

“What’s he got?”

She went to the refrigerator, checked. “Like nine kinds of soft drinks and beer.”

“How much beer?”

“Two six-packs.”

“I’ll take one of them,” Benny said.

She brought both six-packs to the table. They twisted the caps off two bottles and chugged Corona.

Her wrist had already pretty much healed, though some weakness remained in it.

Maddison’s place was hardly bigger than a studio apartment. The kitchen was open to the eating area and the living room.

They could see the front door. They would hear the key in the lock.

Maddison would be dead two steps across the threshold. Maybe the bitch would be with him, and then the job would be done.

O’Connor being barren, Cindi felt sorry for her, but she still wanted her dead in the worst way.

Opening a second bottle of beer, Benny said, “So who was that tattooed guy?”

“I’ve been thinking.”

“He wasn’t Old Race. He has to be one of us.”

“He was stronger than us,” she reminded Benny. “Much stronger. He kicked our ass.”

“A new model.”

“He sure didn’t look like a new model,” she said. “What I’m thinking is voodoo.”

Benny groaned. “Don’t think voodoo.”

Sometimes Benny didn’t seem imaginative enough for a Gamma. She said, “The tattoo on his face was sort of like a veve.”

“None of this makes sense.”

“A veve is a design that represents the figure and power of an astral force.”

“You’re getting so weird on me again.”

“Somebody put some super-bad mojo on us and conjured up a god of Congo or Petro, and sent it after us.”

“Congo is in Africa.”

“Voodoo has three rites or divisions,” Cindi said patiently. “Rada calls upon the powers of the benevolent gods.”

“Listen to yourself.”

“Congo and Petro appeal to the powers of two different groups of evil gods.”

“You called voodoo science. Gods aren’t science.”

“They are if they work according to laws as reliable as those of physics,” she insisted. “Somebody conjured up a Congo or a Petro and sent it after us, and you saw what happened.”