House of Skin

THE CONDEMNED MAN

“Lisa? This is Gulliver.”

She’d been expecting Fenn again. “Oh, how are you doing?” she asked. “I’ve been meaning to come and see you. Things have been so busy lately.”

“Yeah,” he said, as if he didn’t believe her.

She felt a momentary pang of guilt. If it hadn’t been for him, they wouldn’t have even known what Spider and Eddy had been doing, let alone that Eddy was in the city at all. Conversely, if it hadn’t been for him, none of the shit that had rained down on her would’ve happened at all. But it wasn’t his fault. Eddy had a knife on him, so he’d had to tell about her. He’d risked his neck to help and had been stabbed as a result. Both Fenn and she owed him for that. And how had they repaid their debt? By not so much as visiting the man while he recuperated.

There was just too much going on.

And that was increasing by the day, it seemed.

“Is Fenn there with you?”

“No… I don’t know where he is.” And she didn’t. It was nearly eight and, as yet, he hadn’t stopped by or even called. Thank God.

“Is there anything going on?” he asked. “With Eddy and that?”

Where should I start? she thought. “No, not much. Spider killed himself and we think Eddy snatched the body. But you know that. There’s been a few more murders…”

Tell him about the rape and how you liked it.

“Yeah, I read about that.”

“I don’t think Fenn and his men are any closer than they were before,” she admitted and wondered if he sensed the cynicism in her voice.

“He knows what he’s doing,” Gulliver said, almost as if he were making excuses for the man. “Eddy’s slick, though. He won’t be caught unless he wants to be. It’s a game to him.”

“Yes, isn’t it, though?” she said under her breath, ugly memories blackening her thoughts.

“What?”

“Nothing.” She was silent for a moment. She needed to talk to someone, so why not Gulliver? If there was anyone in the world that wouldn’t judge her, it was him. “Why don’t you come by? I could use someone to talk to. Maybe we could have a late supper in the lounge.”

“I can’t.”

“Oh?”

“I have something to do tonight,” he said.

She didn’t like the tone in his voice. It sounded ominous. “Well, if you change your mind.”

“Maybe you should talk to Fenn,” he said, his words heavy with suggestion. “I’ll see you.”

He hung up and Lisa set the phone down and brooded. What had that meant? Talk to Fenn? Was it all that apparent that she was keeping something from him? No, there was no way Gulliver could suspect anything. She’d told him she needed to talk to someone and he’d just put two and two together. That was it. But, then again, maybe it wasn’t. Gulliver was self-admittedly a bisexual, someone who could see both the good and bad in both sexes. Not the sort of man who would be deceived by female beauty. He wasn’t like heterosexual men who were so blinded by physical looks that they saw nothing else. He probably saw her for what she really was and she didn’t like that at all.

But all that was minor. The thing that really bothered her was his insistence that he couldn’t come over, that he had something better to do. She was certain she hadn’t imagined the dread lurking behind his words. Was he going to do something foolish? Seek revenge against the man who had attacked him? She hoped not. He had no idea what he was getting into. Regardless, if Fenn and his cops couldn’t bring Eddy in, how could Gulliver hope to locate him? But the answer to that was grim: because Gulliver knew the streets, he knew the underworld and where a man could hide. The police did not.

She went down to the lounge for a light supper and a drink. Her mind was racing, heading for a crash.