“Don’t worry, I covered for you. Taylor wants to call a showdown tomorrow morning with Bing Neebly and Tannyhill. He thinks he can wrap this up.” There was a pause over the cell phone. “We’ll need Randy at that meeting.”
She glanced over her shoulder. Randy had tipped the mattress against the wall and was putting the milk crates back where Jewel had found them.
“No problem. Is Taylor gonna arrest Bing?”
“I gather he thinks a civil invitation will suffice. You seem to have put the fear of Officer Jewel into him.”
“What about Steven? One word from Bing and he’ll skip town, with all his assets in the Caymans.”
“Uh, I don’t think he will. He’s been neutralized. So come back to my place as soon as you can. We need to organize that stuff Velvita sent us.”
Holy shit. “I have to get back to work,” she said apologetically to Randy.
He turned off Velvita’s air conditioner. His face was a dark mask.
Now what?
They left the apartment.
“Are you pissed with me?” Jewel felt sore and tender inside.
Shaking his head, he took Velvita’s key from her hand and locked the door. Then he pried open the mail slot and pushed the key through. She heard it fall, tinkling, to the floor inside.
With a small smile, he put his hand on her back and escorted her through the gangway, back to her car.
Guess we’re roomies again.
She felt a little breathless.
Chapter Forty-One
Jewel spent Wednesday morning in the Chief Attorney’s office at the Kraft Building, listening with appreciation while the Chief put the bite on Bing Neebly. Clay was wearing a designer suit for the occasion. A seedy-looking guy in an Inspectional Services jacket marked Zachariah sat beside Clay, looking scared. Ed tipped his chair back, arms folded, chewing gum. Randy sat at the far end of the table in custody of a large cardboard box.
Steven Tannyhill was also present in a designer suit. Above the collar, he didn’t look much like himself. Pale, wobbly-chinned, with one eye looking left and the other wandering, he looked like a total head case. Beside him, wearing a dark suit and a frown that screamed Big Nurse, if not Dominella Whiplash, sat Maida Sacker.
The Chief had been laying out the charges.
Bing sweated. He hadn’t met Jewel’s eye once. “You can’t prove anything. I have friends in high places.”
The Chief smiled and pulled a stack of file folders toward him. The top folder was the result of a long night between Jewel, Clay, Ed, the Chief, and Steven’s computer files. God knew what was in the folders under it. Old deli menus, maybe.
“Au contraire, Commissioner Neebly,” Taylor said. “Mr. Tannyhill has graciously opened his records to us, in exchange for immunity.”
The Chief flipped open the top folder and started reading off bank account numbers and dates and sums. “Your greed placed the entire city in danger when you violated the Hinky Policy, and you’ve embarrassed the city government. You don’t have friends.”
Bing wilted.
“—But this won’t go to trial,” the Chief said finally, and Bing brightened. “So long as you and Mr. Tannyhill are willing to pay back to the property owners the difference between what you paid for their homes and what the city paid you, I think we can keep the whole thing quiet.”
“To hell with that!” Bing burst out. “You don’t dare prosecute. It’s hinky from top to bottom. The government would send in the quarantine bulldozers, and bye-bye Circle Line.”
At that, the guy in the blue nylon windbreaker shot Bing a scared look, then glanced at Clay. Clay put a finger to his lips.
Clay had miraculously produced the Inspectional Services weasel, complete with confession and plea bargain, only that morning, and refused to tell Jewel how. The deal Clay said he had made was that they would prosecute Zachariah only if Bing or Steven stonewalled.
“I think Mr. Tannyhill would like to say something,” Jewel observed.
The former First Senior of Baysdorter Boncil pulled his eyes around until they both looked forward. “How can the sandwich have any meat?” he said huskily. “Without laundry marks, you’re screwed.” He squinted his eyes shut and shook his head violently.
The Chief looked at Jewel.
Jewel said, “I think he’s trying to question our assertions.” She faced Steven. “We know your pocket zones were portable.”
“There’s no such thing as a portable pocket zone,” Bing said.
Jewel raised her eyebrows at the Chief, and the Chief nodded. “Close the venetian blinds, Clay?” As he got up to do this, she beckoned to Randy.
Randy stood and slid the big cardboard box the length of the conference table until it was right in front of Bing and Steven. Then he unfolded the top flaps, reached inside, tapped dramatically, and stood back.
A Wilma poppet, eighteen inches high, jumped out like a dancer erupting out of a cake. She twirled, laughing silently, tossed her blonde curls, and stroked her body up and down with tiny pink hands, showing off every charm of her body. Then she reached out to koochie-koo Bing Neebly.
Bing’s eyes got big and round. He pulled his neck back until he was all chins.
She reached out to Steven next.
With a cry, Steven leaped backward, knocking over his chair, and stood, quivering, his eyes rolling randomly again.
Maida came up behind him and righted his chair. Then she pressed down on his shoulder until he sank back onto it.
Jewel said, “You see, Bing, there is a caterer’s truck in the loading dock at the Darth Vader building this very minute, unloading desserts for that fundraiser you’re hosting tonight.” She permitted herself a brief gloat at the panic in Bing’s eyes. “You may not know what happens when lots of people eat lots of Hoby’s pastry in an enclosed space. Maybe Steven can tell you.”
Steven turned his head to the side. The whites of his eyes were all that showed. A whine escaped his throat.
“And of course the caterers may leave behind a few boxes of printed matter — Randy, show them the printed matter?”
Randy reached past Wilma’s capering feet and pulled out a handful of Artistic Publishing porn magazines. He displayed these for a moment, then dropped them casually back into the box, heedless of proximity to the poppet.
Jewel showed her teeth. “It could take you all day to find the stacks they’ve left — here and there — all around your eighth floor luxury lakefront apartment.”
“Unfortunately,” the Chief said, “You’ll be here all day. It’s up to you — pay or be prosecuted. Twenty years in jail, no job, no pension. You have fifteen minutes before I call the Inspector General and the US Attorney for RICO. Play ball and you get fifteen more minutes to get the money in my hands.”
Ed whispered to Jewel, “Eighth floor? Holy shit, ain’t that where that woman was carrying on all summer?”
“Yup,” Jewel whispered.
Clay leaned over to whisper to Jewel, “And I hear she filed for divorce.”
“No kidding?” Ed said. “What cause? He’s too fat?”
“To horny. Something about forcing her to eat doughnuts.”
Over her chuckles, the Chief told Bing, “By the time you get back home, your condo doors will be sealed.” That was the Chief, putting bite into a plea bargain as only he knew how.
Bing protested weakly. “When you called this meeting and said bring your checkbook, I thought you wanted a bribe. This isn’t bribery. It’s blackmail!”
The Chief smiled.
“I don’t have the funds in my checking account!” Bing said desperately.
“You can wire-transfer the funds. There’s the phone,” the Chief said. “Or you can use this laptop and do it online. I’ve set up an account for your victims.” As Bing sweated, he nodded at the clock on the wall. “In five minutes I make the phone call.” He nodded to Randy. “We’re done with that now.”
Bing pulled out his checkbook, looking miserable.
/> Randy raised his brows at Clay and picked the box up in his arms. Clay went out with him.
Maida gave the Chief all Steven’s accounts and passwords. No one mentioned that Lena had sneaked them to Jewel a day earlier. Maida was legally entitled to provide them, since Steven had kept all the evidence on his computer at her firm.
No one brought up what the future held for Steven.
o0o
Today, Jewel seemed high on adrenaline, but Clay was pooped out, between cleaning out Zachariah’s accounts, and wrestling with Steven’s files all night, and having his heart broken, and giving up the woman he loved, and being flicked like a booger around Chicago in goddess form.
He escorted Randy to the freight elevator and helped him get the box of porn into the dumpster. Thanks for making it look hinky, he thought.
No problem, Wilma said in his head.
Randy didn’t say anything. In the creaky elevator, on the way back up to the Chief’s conference room, Clay finally brought himself to speak.
“I’ve been meaning to give you this.” He fished a long envelope out of his inside coat pocket. “Your identity.”
Randy took it, looking suspicious.
“It’s good. No booby-traps. Just like we talked about.”
“Thank you.”
“Winner takes all, huh?” With an effort, Clay held out his hand.
Randy shook. He said soberly, “You will need my help with Wilma.”
Clay froze. “Uh.”
“If we work together, you can be rid of her,” Randy said.
“Excuse me?”
Hey! Wilma yelled in Clay’s head. Come over here and say that!
Clay shushed her mentally. There is only one way I am ever gonna beat this guy. I’ve got to let him think he’s won, so he doesn’t rat me out and tell Jewel about you.
Randy said, “Come to me when you need help.”
The elevator dinged. Eyeing him warily, Clay edged out. “I think we’d better get back to the meeting.”
Back in the conference room, Bing and Maida were setting up the wire transfers. Steven leaned in his chair, dribbling. Zach tried to be invisible. The Chief Attorney smiled, benevolent as a Borgia pope.
Jewel smiled at Randy. Her expression hurt Clay in a way he promised himself he could get used to.
It was livable pain. Like shingles. Or migraines.
Or crabs, Wilma suggested.
Oh, be quiet, he thought.
Why so glum, chum? This will be fun! she said in his head. You liked smiting Steven.
That was cool, Clay admitted.
And the hinky sex with Jewel and Randy.
I did not! I just... didn’t hate it.
And you said yourself that sharing the body with me could be quite a racket.
A nice girl isn’t eager to aid and abet a con artist, Clay thought primly.
Ah, but I’m not a nice girl. On the widescreen in his head, Wilma appeared in a top hat, cane, heels, and a few scraps of black fishnet. She did a naughty dance step, winked and disappeared.
In spite of himself, Clay felt a little less heartbroken.
Bing and Steven, their involuntary disbursements completed, were sent into a deposition room while they all waited for the wire transfers to go through. Zach slipped away without remark.
The Chief sent for coffee. It came with a stack of hot, fragrant, cinnamony cow plops from Hoby’s. He eyed the pastry askance. “Are you sure,” he said to Jewel, “it’s safe to eat this now?”
“Pretty much,” she said with a guilty look and sugar on her chin.
Oh, great, Clay thought. That was something he’d spaced, between cleaning up the Circle Line scam and playing host to an oversexed teen goddess. A hundred million messages in bottles. Wilma? Is it safe to eat now?
Of course it’s safe, Wilma said. Don’t you remember? I recalled all my messengers.
Ed paused, his hairy paw hovering over the platter. “Well?”
“We determined,” Randy said suavely, “that there was a dangerous buildup of unexpended sexual energy in the building that houses both the bakery and the Artistic Publishing Company.”
“Randy’s our research expert on magic,” Jewel said. “Ed wants to hire him for the Hinky Division.” Clay saw her ankle kick Ed’s under the table. “He can also do safe hinky waste removal.”
“Uh, yeah,” Ed said, choosing a cow plop. “That’s right.”
“We need his skills,” Clay said, forcing the words out.
Taylor nodded. “Okay, I’m impressed. I’ll recommend it. And the dangerous buildup is under control?” he said to Randy.
Randy bowed in his chair. “The creation of a film division punched a hole in the dyke, as it were, causing a magical flood. We believe at this point that the excess energy has completely expended itself. In any case, the company has suspended use of the affected printing press until it can be proven safe.”
“What he means is,” Ed said, “the joint had a case of coitus holdin’-onto-us. But they started making dirty movies and then we got the Summer of Jizz. Everybody can use a dirty movie sometime.”
“I’m going to tell your wife you said that,” Jewel said.
“Feel free,” Ed said, daintily stuffing a whole cow plop into his mouth with his fingertips. “I been bringing home foo dovven of vese fings every night.” He squinted, swallowed, and aimed a crumb-covered finger at Jewel. “She’s gained ten pounds, but she ain’t feedin’ ’em to the dog, if you get my drift.”
Jewel clapped her hands over her ears. “Too much information, boss.”
“You started it. You start something,” he said with triumph, “you gotta be ready to finish it.”
Chapter Forty-Two
“So,” Jewel said, as she stood with Randy on the balcony of her apartment that evening, watching the sun set over the city, watching the gulls fly along the river below, on the way to their nightly slumber party on the lake. “Does this mean you’ve finally satisfied that stupid spell-curse-thingy?”
A shadow darkened Randy’s brow. “I scarcely know. Perhaps Lady Juliana had no intention of freeing me. Do you believe I love you?”
Her chest clutched up. The L-word. “Yes,” she admitted.
“Yet, now that you’ve freed me, she is to be the judge of my feelings for you! It’s unjust,” he said bitterly.
“There is that yuck factor,” Jewel admitted. “But it’s occurred to me that Lady Juliana isn’t, like, personally snoopervising you.”
He shot her a glance. “True. Such a curse would cut two ways. It binds the magician as much as it binds the victim.”
“That’s what I’m thinking. She’s probably out of your life for good.”
She looked down from the balcony on an unlighted ambulance crossing the bridge from Dearborn onto Wacker and turning the corner. He loves me. She could barely stand to think those words. Better to keep the conversation on the curse.
She said, “What’s the point of cursing somebody if you have to hang around to make sure it works? I think your mistress was a genius. Fiendish, but brilliant. She sets it up so that you have to curse yourself, because, I don’t know, because you have to. Because you want something she’s giving you so bad, you’ll torque yourself into a pretzel to make it work.”
He turned the thunder-brow toward her. “You agree with her? Have I failed to prove my feelings for you?”
“No, I mean yes, you’ve proved them.” Any second now he’ll ask how I feel about him. She was so nervous her ears were sweating. “But I’m saying it’s not up to me. I think she set up the curse so you would judge yourself. And if you thought you didn’t measure up, zappo.”
“Have we not argued this point to death?” he said, now looking steamed. “You accuse me of vanishing into a bed to inconvenience you.” In the last red rays of the sun, he looked harsh and desperate.
She took him by the shoulders. “No! No, I don’t. Don’t you see? This puts more power in your hands.”
He searched her eyes.
“How?”
“It gives you control over your fate. If you can face it, and take responsibility for it, you can have that control.” She took his face in her hands. “The danger is when you won’t face up to your part. Then you’re giving control back to her.”
He seemed to think about that. “No. No, I’m giving control to you.”
“What? I make you pull a zapper? Oh, for—!” She turned away, but he caught one hand and held it strongly, pulling her to face him.
“When I ‘pull a zapper’ it is because you’re angry with me. I fear to lose you. In that moment, all I can think is that you will always come to me under one circumstance.”
“If you’re stuck in a bed,” she said. He bowed. She added, with irony to fight the word rising in her throat, “And when I’m in bed with you, you’re in control. So if you think I’m dumping you, you make me get into bed with you, and that restores your—”
“My place in your regard,” he said steadily. “You want me when we are in bed.”
Her breath caught. I’ll always want you. She couldn’t say it.
“I want you to have a life, Randy. I’ve been a selfish bitch and I’ve used you sexually and I haven’t regarded your humanity or your dignity. I didn’t treat you like an equal.” She sucked air through her tight throat.
The “L” screamed over the bridge, far below.
He bent his head closer to hers. “Have I not said that you are my equal in demonspace?”
She gave him a steady look. “You don’t want an equal in bed, Randy. You want to be Lord of the Nooky. You force intimacy on me in demonspace, when you know I can’t say no.”
He paused, then bowed his head. “I want to be — very well, you compel me to confront it — I want to be your lover, not your incubus.” Her heart thumped hard. “I don’t know if I can be your equal. I was not bred to be anyone’s equal.” He said with half a smile. “It has been my one defense, for two hundred years, that I am Lord Nooky in bed. And now I am Lord Pontarsais out of it.”
“This is America, bub,” she blurted. “I’m not comfortable opening my heart and my life to a lord.”
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