City of the Lost by Stephen Blackmoore Page A

you’re not a regular?”
    She shakes her head. “Oh, hell no. Though I must say I’ve been enjoying the show.”
    She seems to see my scotch for the first time. “If I’d known you were a serious drinker, I wouldn’t be trying to ply you with this crap. What are you drinking?”
    “Nothing.” I slide the glass over to her. What’s the point if you can’t get drunk?
    She reaches over, takes a sniff, a delicate taste.
    “Oban. Pretty expensive nothing.”
    “You know your scotches. Consider it the obligatory drink I buy you.”
    “Obligatory? You make it sound like you’re lancing a boil.”
    “If you don’t want it.” I start to pull the drink back, but her hand closes over mine. Her touch sends a ripple through me.
    She keeps it there for a moment longer than is entirely comfortable, and her voice softens. “It’s just what I’m in the mood for. Thank you.” She looks at my hand. “You’re awfully cold.”
    I’m not sure what to say to that, so I start to pull my hand away. “Sorry.” I’m probably running right around room temperature. I’ll have to figure out a way to hide that. Gloves?
    She holds onto me. “No, it’s nice. Soothing.” She turns my hand palm up, stares at it with an odd intensity.
    “Oh, now this is interesting,” she says.
    “My palm?”
    “It’s a window to the soul, you know. Same thing, really.”
    “Lot of pressure to put on a hand.”
    She turns it over, a jeweler examining a particularly rough diamond. Touches my fingertips, scarred knuckles. Carefully traces the crevices.
    “You’re a fighter. You’ve had some trouble with the law. See this line, here?” She runs a finger across a deep seam that runs the breadth of my hand. “Says you’ve got a long time ahead of you. But this one,” she touches another near my thumb. “You die early.”
    “What else does my hand tell you?”
    “That you have a thing for hot blondes who hit on you in fetish bars.”
    “You’re good at this.”
    “It’s a talent.”
    I suddenly realize how close she is, her scent strong, sweet. It cuts through the meaty sweat stink of the crowd. She smells like warm summers and lemonade, sunlight through the trees. And something a little darker below the surface.
    I glance at my hand for signs of rot. But there’s nothing. And this is a different feeling than the hooker. There was hunger there, blind need. But this is like melting in a hot tub. Relaxing.
    But that’s not something I have the luxury for anymore.
    I pull my hand away. “You know,” I say, “not to spoil the moment or anything, but I could be your dad.”
    “Not a chance,” she says. “My dad was a bald cobbler who regularly beat his wife. You’ve got all your hair.”
    “That’s not what I—” She shushes me with a finger to my lips. That touch again. She fills my vision until there’s nothing but her and me. Even the music fades away.
    The bartender sticks her head between us to tell us it’s last call, and the spell breaks.
    Samantha shivers, like she’s just woken up. “And things were just getting interesting,” she says. I look around, surprised to see how much the crowd has already thinned out.
    “Lost some time there.”
    “Lost implies a waste,” she says. “You know, I have a beautiful view from my apartment in Santa Monica. Care to see it?”
    “Oh, now that depends,” I say.
    “On?”
    “Whether you’re a friend of Giavetti’s or not.”
    The question hangs in the air between us, thick and heavy. A little pout on those luscious lips. Her eyes never leave mine.
    “I was laying it on kind of thick, wasn’t I?”
    “Just a touch.” I knew that it was all a show, but I’m still disappointed to find it confirmed. “So, I suppose you know Giavetti?”
    “More or less. I hear you made him go away.”
    “Yeah? From who?”
    “Oh, little birds here and there. You’ve stirred up quite a ruckus in the trees, you know.”
    “Don’t suppose you want to elaborate?” I want to know