Touching Evil

Chapter One

It is simply a matter of patience, being a collector. He has to wait
and watch for just the right thing to wander by—it can't be
exactly like any of the others, but it needs to be in the same vein,
have the same tones. The same flavors. He knows—he knew when he
saw his most current acquisition, he knew that was the next piece, the
next bit of perfection.

The new ones were always the most perfect, the most pristine.

The surge of electricity when he sees them—through a window,
in a store, in a library, in a grainy photo in the newspaper—it
can make him weak in the knees, make his mouth water and his heart
pound.

He turns the light on over the worktable, the single bulb swinging
idly as he hand-primed the grinder, starting it moving. The little
sparks as metal met belt reminded him of fireflies and picnics on the
Fourth of July, sitting on the sand on Wrightsville beach and watching
the lights in the sky, the answering lights in the glass jar he carried
with him.

Firefarts, his father had called them, lighting another cigarette, eyes staring out over the ocean. Friggin’ firefarts.

Nothing permanent. Just seconds of beauty. Like his
collection—pure distant beauty, just for a moment, captured
forever before they were ruined, spark gone.

His fireflies.

His to collect. To keep.

Dark. It was dark; how could it be dark already? Unreasonably dark, dark enough that it seemed to cling to his skin like oil.

Greg walked forward, bare feet splashing, landing on smooth, slick
flooring. He took one reluctant step at a time, hands held in front of
him, fingertips stretched back as if recoiling from what they were
going to encounter. Nothing he would find here would be good. Nothing
could be, covered with this slime of darkness.

He could hear things, muffled cries and mutters, soft words.

If he was a stronger man, he would turn, would turn around and run toward the door and the light and the...

Oh.

He fought the urge to cry out as his hands brushed a curtain, slick
and warm like a shower curtain in a public bathroom, fingers curling
into it even as his instinct was to pull away, let go. He wasn't a
stronger man. He hadn't been able to fight this then; he couldn't now.
He took a breath, breathed in the heaviness, the black, the ink of the
air.

Then he wrenched open the curtain, eyes wide, and stepped into someone's nightmare.

Hours later, when the dawn was breaking, Greg Pearsall found himself
crumpled on the floor of his bookstore, drenched in sweat even in the
chill of a late October night, a book clenched in his hands like it was
a life preserver. His cry startled him, surprised out of him by the
pain of unclenching his hands. He wouldn't be able to move them
tomorrow, the knuckles already red and swollen. It was no easy
task—God knew he wasn't twenty anymore—but he unfolded
himself, and found his glasses, before fumbling for the phone on the
counter and dialing a number he knew better than his own. He waited
until the machine picked up, listening to the laconic voice telling him
to leave a message or hang the fuck up, then he left his message.

"It's me. It's happened again. You know where I am."

Or where he would be in an hour, after he stumbled upstairs to his
loft, showered, and changed into something less ... atrocious.

Greg left the book on the floor, among the wrapping and the rest of
the mail that had fallen, and pulled out his elevator key, listening to
the creak and rumble of the old girl. Alice would get whatever was
still on the floor when she opened The Candle's End in a few hours,
sorting the pamphlets into psychics wanting clients, the latest
improvement in herbal supplements that increased
libido—trash—and publishers’ catalogs—his
in-box—and the new tarot samples—display counter. He
couldn't care less.

He wanted the man off his skin, out of his blood. He wanted heat and steam and...

Oh. Oh, thank God he had a sliding glass door on his shower.

Thank God.

He turned the stereo on, Arabic music filling the air and his head,
pounding through the empty space, keeping him company as he let the
water pour over him. Relax him. Ease him. Home. Safe. Home.

Safe.

Be at peace.

When he got out of the shower, though, he almost jumped out of his
skin, tension slamming back into him in a rush. The only reason he
didn't was because the brick shit house sitting on his toilet was one
he knew. Artie. Detective Arthur McAdams.

Jesus fuck, the man was quiet.

"You made good time." He grabbed one of his towels and started
drying off, sluicing the water off his own skinny-assed limbs. He knew
he'd eventually regret giving Artie a key, but...

Hell, some things were necessary.

Artie was necessary.

The baseball cap came off, Artie running his rough fingers through
that straw blond hair, too early to be in work mode, still blinking
slow. "I came ASAP. No traffic. Wanted to make sure you were ... Well.
Last time I found you on the floor, man."

Artie's shirt was inside out and the short-cropped hair looked
vaguely like the cat had been wallowing in it. Artie needed a hat in
the worst way.

"I just got up off the floor. I need to start opening the mail on
the sofa." He should have known when the package came in with the
Candle's End mail, no return address, no nothing. After that fucking
reporter wrote that article on him a year ago, there was no telling
what came in. Christ, he was tired of old rings, old letters—"can
you find this person," "what can you tell me about that?" Like he was a
side-show freak, something from daytime TV.

"You all right?" He could feel those cool gray cop's eyes all over him, sizing him up.

"It wasn't pleasant. I left ... the book and the packaging are
downstairs. I won't touch it again. There's blood on the cover." He
slipped into his sweats and sighed, drying off his hair. "He sent it to
me, directly."

"So he knows who you are. What you do." Artie stood up and almost
... almost reached for him. He could feel the warmth of that big hand
hovering just below his elbow. "Let's go out and sit. Get you orange
juice. Get my notebook."

Shit, he must be looking shocky. Artie wasn't giving him any hassle.
He was feeling shocky, even after the shower, even now in his own
little sanctuary. His hidey-hole. His neat, pristine, nicely decorated,
feng shui-approved prison.

He nodded to Artie, letting the detective lead the way. Ten years.
Ten years since the accident—one misstep, one head meeting
concrete stairs, and three days in a coma and nothing ever went back to
normal. Not a thing.

Damn it.

"There's coffee. I started it before this all started . French roast. Good stuff."

"Heavy cream and sugar, then." Artie led the way out, waving him toward the couch. "I'll get it."

He nodded, sitting on his sofa, fingers sliding over the white
corduroy and finding a blissful silence inside. This one had only ever
been his, the cloth and wood telling him nothing at all. "I saw your
partner on the television yesterday. Congratulations on your arrest."

"Thanks." Cups clinked together, the refrigerator door thumping open
and closed as Artie moved around his kitchen like a man who belonged
there. "It was good to wrap that one up."

"Leah looked tired. Tell her I have some of that tea she wanted. It
came in with the last shipment of astralagus and that hideous diet tea
that smells like old bed sheets." Honestly. Diet tea. Retail could be
most foul. Of course, he could always close the Candle when something
... untoward happened. It had been much harder to explain during his
basic anatomy seminar lectures.

Panicky freshmen.

"I will." Artie came back and handed him the cup, Artie's fingers
very carefully not touching his. "She likes that stuff. Not the diet.
The other."

Greg nodded his thanks, drank deep, the coffee warming him inside,
burning all the way down from his lips to his toes. God, he could sleep
for a month.

Waiting until Greg'd drank halfway down, Artie sat back and got his
notebook out, a steno deal, simple and plain. Kinda like Artie. The pen
was nice though. He'd used it once. It had been a gift from Artie's
sister, Agatha. Agatha used to think Artie was a pain, but she loved
him dearly now, adored him. Thought he was the best brother ever...

Oh, fuck. Stop it. Stop. It.

He rubbed his forehead, thinking, trying to focus on the last thing
on earth he wanted to focus on. Old book. Heavy. The blood stain looked
like a flowering tree branch, just drooping ... "The package was plain.
The book was old. Hardback. From a library. There was blood on the
cover."

They always started like this. Simple things. Normal things. Things anyone could see.

"Back up. Did you save the packaging?" Scribbling, Artie glanced up
at him and back at the page, cagey. Judging his mood. He was getting
used to the man knowing him almost better than he did, even if it
chafed like hell.

"Yes. It's downstairs with the book. On the floor by my desk."

"Okay. I'll have a look. You know the drill." He did. They'd take it in for evidence, etc., etc. "What kind of book was it?"

"A medical text. Surgery. I didn't get to open it. The spine was
broken, torn up." It had smelled bad when he'd torn the paper
off—rotten, spoiled. The words had been gold once, but they were
still raised. Embossed.

"Fuck. Something you'd be interested in. This guy is scary." The pen
scratched loudly for a minute, the only other sound the tiny noise of
his fingers on the couch, rubbing. His home. His place.

Greg nodded, head feeling a little like a bobble-head doll, the
memories starting to slide along his synapses. "She's young and
somewhere very dark, underground maybe. Warm, even now. The only light
is red. She was still alive when he sent the book. It's her blood on
it, not his. It's his book. He loves his books. He sent it because she
ruined it. There was water. His knife is short, curved, like a claw."

He put the coffee cup down. He hated this part. Remembering this was
like a dream, something that couldn't be real. Shouldn't be real.

"She. Okay, so he's got a girl. Young how? Baby? Kid? Teenager?"

Greg frowned, drawing his feet into Indian style, ankles dragging
along the sofa fabric. Her. It was a her. A girl. Painted and primped
and crying. "I ... Not a baby. She's got makeup on, though."

"Yeah? Is she old enough to have boobs?" So delicate. Lord.

"It was dark. Maybe? She's not naked. He wasn't going to rape her.
He wanted to cut her. Fix ... fix her?" His fingers moved faster,
pushing the memories away. Not in him. Not in his head.

Those eyes peered at him over the top of the notebook, Artie's blond
brows drawing together. The chair creaked as Artie got up and came to
squat in front of him, hand resting next to his right knee.

"'S'okay, man. We don't have to think about that right now. Just what I ask, remember? One little bit at a time."

"Right." He took a deep breath, looking right at Artie. Home. Safe.
Sanctuary. The man knew how to help him, how this worked; he just had
to trust in it. Trust Artie. This was old hat. "One detail at a time."

"Let's go around the girl right now and break it down. You said red
light was the only light. What kind? Emergency tunnel lights? Stoplight
lights? Construction lights?"

"They moved, swinging or blinking or something. Dull dark red. They went slow."

"'Kay. What about the water? Deep or shallow? What did it smell like?" Yeah. Yeah, he could do it this way.

He leaned back, eyes on the mural painted on the ceiling—blue
and grays and white, all swirled and peaceful and ... He could see
hints and whispers, remember the way he'd stared and gagged. Remember
the water on his bare feet. Between his toes. "It was enough to get
your feet wet. Enough to splash. The place smelled dead, foul, like
rotted flesh."