The Blonde

4:45 a.m.

The Hot Spot

Kowalski thanked the cabbie, slid him a ten, grabbed his gym bag from the seat—oh, the hilarity that would have ensued if he’d forgotten Ed’s head in the back of the cab. He could imagine the headlines in the local tabloid, OOPS, FORGET SOMETHING? Or maybe HOW TO GET A HEAD IN THE TAXI BUSINESS. They lived for crap like this. Ed deserved better than a bad pun in a runny egg-and-coffee tabloid.

The brown plastic intercom at the side door asked him for a password. Sylvester, his Goth snitch, had given him one that should work: “eyeball skeleton.” (Hey, he’d used worse.) Kowalski tried it. The door buzzed, then clicked open. Sylvester was a big pain in the ass, but he did come through most times. Kowalski had to kick him a bonus. Let the guy buy himself a pair of vampire-teeth implants.

Now the tricky part: scouring a secret sex club for one white guy who probably didn’t want to be found.

But after ten seconds in the place, Kowalski saw only close-cropped haircut after haircut, and weekend muscles, and that bored Catholic schoolboy look; he knew he was home free.

This was a cop sex club.

“Hey, buddy,” he said, wrapping his arm around the nearest thickneck he could find. He flashed his Homeland Security badge, saw the guy’s eyes light up. Oh yeah. He could see the embossed foil with the holographic eagles.

Hot shit, right?

“I’m looking for a guy who probably stopped in here a short while ago.”

“Oh, I know the guy,” the cop said, trying to stifle a huge smile. “You want his wallet?”