Klein. Harold Klein. Met him in LA. A bar on La Cienaga. Tiny's Place. We tipped a few, and he saw my piece and we started jabbing and he figures I'm up for some action. Says he needs a driver and he'll pay me a thousand. That sounded good, only he didn't level. Told me he was. .h.i.tting a Wells Fargo. I park in front of the bank, only he goes in next door to this TV station and blows the face off this anchor gal, Theresa Chung. Remember her?

Okay. We get the f.u.c.k out of there and he has me drive up in this canyon and stop. Only instead of pulling out the bucks he owes me, he pulls a Colt automatic. Dead men don't yap, right? Only he didn't figure on Sammy Hoffman, and guess who winds up in the ditch?

Next thing I know, I wake up in the middle of the night with a muzzle up my mouth. Friends of Harold, right? Wrong. Co workers. They figure, if I'm good enough to put the dark on Harry, I'm good enough for them. Smart fellas.

Too bad I wasn't that smart. I'd of kissed them off.

But I went along, and pretty soon I'm a hotshot a.s.sa.s.sin for The Group. They don't want people snooping into their business, you know? Blowing the whistle on them? s.n.a.t.c.hing off some of their converts for deprogramming? That sort of s.h.i.t. They set up the hits real good and paid me through the nose and took good care of me. I was living like a f.u.c.kin' tyc.o.o.n.

Who'd I hit? Senator Cramer, for one. Guy was calling for an official investigation. Seems his son got mixed up in the SDF. That's The Group, you know. The Spiritual Development Foundation. Anyway, that's what got me into this p.i.s.s soup, that b.a.s.t.a.r.d from People catching a shot of me in the crowd.

Before Cramer was that n.i.g.g.e.r mayor in Detroit. Jackson? The LA city council explosion, that was me. The New York police commissioner, Barnes. This ain't necessarily in order, you understand. I can give you guys all the details later, when you get me out of this rat trap and take me someplace safe. Give you something to shoot for. If I tell you everything now, you might just let those b.a.s.t.a.r.ds have me, right? I'm no fool. I'll just whet your appet.i.tes a bit, okay?

Remember d.i.c.kinson? Heart attack in his office while he was d.i.c.kin' his secretary? That was me. Tricked up his rubbers. Chavez, the investigative reporter? He put his nose into the SDF. The o.d. that put him away, it wasn't selfinflicted: it was Sammyinflicted.

That's just scratching the surface. There's plenty more. s.h.i.t, I worked six years for The Group.

Anyhow, it was that People shot that put me away. They figure I can't show my face around, so I'm the perfect sucker for their experiment. They're gonna make me invisible, they say. Sure. Invisible. And s.h.i.t smells like Chanel, right?

Only they do.

Lacey knocked on the door.

"Come on in," Dukane said.

Lacey opened it, and stepped into the bathroom. The air was pungent with the smell of turpentine. Scott and Dukane, kneeling over Hoffman, were scouring him with washcloths. The small ca.s.sette recorder from Scott's attache case rested on the toilet seat.

Scott smiled up at her. His face was sweaty, damp hair clinging to his forehead. "How's it going?" he asked.

"One of the men changed positions. He went over to the body. He's still near it."

"They had to correct their field of fire," Dukane said. Tipping the turpentine can, he dampened his washcloth and started working on Hoffman's shoulder. Most of the back was clear, now. The arms, still painted, remained cuffed behind him. One leg was gone, as if it had been amputated below the rump. Scott was busy cleaning the other.

"How about joining the party?" Hoffman asked. "I been entertaining these guys with my exploits. Great stuff, I hate you to miss it."

She ignored him. "There's plenty of food," she said. "Shall I make some breakfast?"

"I'm starving," Scott said.

"Bacon and eggs all right?"

"Can't eat that s.h.i.t," said Hoffman. "Get me some beef, and don't cook it."

"What about you, Matt?"

"Bacon and eggs sound fine. I could use some coffee, too."

"Gonna get me that meat?"

"It's frozen," she said.

"So unfreeze it."

She left the bathroom, never mentioning why she had come in. She couldn't ask them to move out, and she certainly had no intention of using the toilet in front of them. In a kitchen cupboard, she found a plastic pitcher. She lowered her pants and squatted over it. When she finished, she flung its contents out the front door. Then she washed her hands, and set about preparing breakfast.

Guess she didn't want to hear, huh? I get the feeling she don't like me.

Anyway, The Group's got this lab. It's out in Iowa, looks just like a farm. Even grow stuff there. The lab's underground, all kinds of security. Make up all their s.h.i.t there: potions, amulets, stuff like that. Witchin' s.h.i.t.

Okay, they take me to the lab. I figure I'm in for it. I mean, how they gonna make a guy invisible, you know? I figure I'm in for shots, at least. G.o.d only knows. You don't make a guy invisible with food coloring.

But they don't put me in a cell or a dissection room or nothing, they put me up in a nice room aboveground. I've even got my own little enclosed garden right outside my door. This isn't so bad after all, I figure.

And it gets even better. These two gals come in, and they're both fantastic knock outs. One of them, the gal in charge of the project, she's...you'd have to see her. Give you wet dreams. But man, I know right off I'd be in deep s.h.i.t if I crossed her. It's her eyes. She has this look like she wouldn't mind eating your heart. Well, that wasn't what I wanted eaten so I figured I'd keep off her.

The other, her a.s.sistant, wasn't any slouch but she didn't have that wicked look so I was hoping to get a piece of her.

Okay, they're in charge. They're witches, and the gorgeous one turns out to be the leader of the whole ball of wax. Laveda herself. I'd worked six years for her, never seen her. Keeps herself a low profile.

They come in one morning before dawn, it's a Wednesday, with a sack. Laveda tells me to open it. I do, and inside is this guy's head. Nothing else, just his head. A fresh one.

"What am I supposed to do?" I say. "Eat it?" They don't even crack smiles. Instead, Laveda hands me these black beans and tells me what to do.

I'm not a squeamish guy, you know? I was okay, sticking the beans in his mouth and ears and nose. Then it came to the eyes. You oughta try it sometime. I've gouged a few eyes in my time, but I never stuck around to inspect the damage. Anyway, okay, I popped this guy's eyes and stuck the beans in and shut the lids. Made my skin crawl.

Then they give me a shovel and we go out in my little garden and I have to dig a hole. It only has to be a foot deep. When I'm done, we all get naked. I figure, this is getting better and better. Maybe next is an orgy, who knows? I'd heard plenty about Laveda and her orgies.

Okay, the three of us are standing there bare-a.s.s in the dark, with Coral hanging onto the head. Laveda's wearing this gold chain belt with a dagger at one side and a gold flask on the other. She takes out the dagger. Coral gets on her knees and holds out the head.

What Laveda does then, she starts carving a design on the guy's forehead. Looks like a figure-eight with x's in the middle.

Okay. After she's done with the cutting, she takes the flask off her belt and opens it and holds it up at the sky. "The river flows," she says. "Its water is the water of life. All powerful is he who drinks at its sh.o.r.e." She takes two drinks out of the flask, and some of it runs off her chin and I see it ain't Scotch, it's blood. Then she takes a mouthful of the stuff and gets the guy's head from Coral and spits it right into his mouth.

Coral does the same thing. Two gulps for her, one for the G.o.dd.a.m.n head. Then it's my turn. I've done a lot of s.h.i.t, but I'm no f.u.c.kin' vampire. You oughta try a swig of blood, sometime. Put you off your appet.i.te for a week. But that wasn't the worst, the worst was putting my mouth up to this guy's mouth. I didn't want to shut my eyes, you know, and have the gals think I couldn't take it. So I stare the poor dead b.a.s.t.a.r.d right in the face and hold his mouth open and try to spit in the blood without touching his lips. But I touched them, all right. And his mouth couldn't hold all this blood, you know, so it came slopping back like he was puking.

s.h.i.t. Enough of that. So much for my G.o.dd.a.m.n orgy. We plant the head face-up, and that's it. The gals slip into their clothes again. Adios, see you tomorrow.

I brushed my teeth so hard my gums bled and I figured it was more of his blood, and the harder I brushed the more blood came out. I figured the only way to get all the blood out was to upchuck. Didn't do that. It might break the spell, or whatever, and we'd have to go through the whole thing again. So I finally quit brushing, and gargled a lot with Irish, and spent the rest of the day killing the bottle.

The next morning, Coral comes in alone. She's got a bottle under one arm, and I'm hoping it isn't blood. It's Remy Martin. Not for me, though. It's for our pal in the garden. She has me water the f.u.c.kin' head with it. A whole fifth of cognac. I suggest we save some for ourselves-I mean, is he gonna miss a couple of shots? But she doesn't go for it. Doesn't go for me, either, when I try out a few moves on her.

Okay, we keep this up for a week. Every morning, she wakes me up and we go out with a fresh bottle to dump on the ground.

I keep putting moves on her, and she's getting more b.i.t.c.hy all the time. But I figure I'll get her, sooner or later. One way or the other.

The eighth day, Laveda's with her. She tells me to keep my hands off Coral, and I figure it out. They're a couple of d.y.k.es, right? Says she'll cut off my c.o.c.k...Yeah, well, she hasn't yet. The c.u.n.t.

Anyway, after she lays this on me we go out to the garden and get naked, and Laveda starts this chanting s.h.i.t, holding up a fifth of Remy. I was cold sober. I never do drugs. Maybe she had me hypnotized or something, who knows? But anyway, pretty soon I hear this other voice-a man's voice. Coming out of nowhere. It says, "What are you doing?"

Laveda hands me the bottle. "Say, 'I'm watering my head.'"

So I say it.

"Let me water the head," the voice says.

"Tell him 'no.'"

So I tell him no.

Then the dirt over the head starts to move, like a finger's drawing in it. It draws the same design, that figure-eight with the x's, like Laveda cut in the guy's forehead.

"Now he may water your head," Laveda tells me.

"Go ahead," I say.

Something s.n.a.t.c.hes the bottle out of my hand and it falls to the ground and the cognac spills out. That's it. We get dressed, and the gals take off.

I spent a while out there looking for a speaker. Figured there might be one hidden around somewhere. But if there was, I didn't find it.

The next morning, Laveda and Coral come back. First we strip down, then I have to dig up the head. What a f.u.c.kin' sight it was. They made me take out the beans, dig'em right out of his ears and nostrils and mouth and...and out of his eyeholes. The beans'd sprouted a little, by then. Laveda held up this mirror and told me to put one of the beans in my mouth. "Don't swallow it," she told me. She didn't have to tell me that.

I put one in my mouth, like she said, and held it in my cheek like a wad of chewing tobacco. Only it didn't taste like tobacco. It tasted like a rotten f.u.c.kin' corpse.

Anyway, I look at the mirror and bango, I'm gone.

Lacey knocked on the bathroom door and entered. "Breakfast is..."

On the floor where Hoffman had been, she saw six bandages: three hovering several inches above the tile, the others pressed against it. And she saw his silver p.e.n.i.s and s.c.r.o.t.u.m. He lay on his back, one handcuff around a leg of the sink.

"Just in time," Hoffman said.

Dukane poured turpentine onto a washcloth. The cloth left his hand, moved through the air, and began to stroke the p.e.n.i.s.

"He's free ?"

"Just one hand," Scott told her.

"All I need," said Hoffman, rubbing himself to an erection. "Squeamish guys. Don't want to touch my d.i.c.k. How about you?" He flung the cloth at Lacey. It slapped her upraised arm, and she knocked it away. "Rather lick me? Wouldn't get the paint off, but it'd get me off."

"Shut up!" Scott yelled.

"Touchy touchy. This guy's got a hard-on for you, hon. Don't we all?"

Dukane pounded down, his fist hammering the emptiness near the bandages.

Hoffman grunted.

Lacey hurried from the bathroom. "Breakfast is on the table," she called back.

She rushed into the kitchen, breathing deeply, fighting her revulsion. Afraid she might vomit, she bent over the kitchen sink.

"That guy's an animal," Scott said, stepping up behind her.

"Stop maligning animals."

He laughed softly, and kissed her bare shoulder.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN.

Okay, where was I? Oh yeah, just popped a bean in my mouth. Just like that, I'm gone. I look down and can't see nothing-no legs, no d.i.c.k, no nothing. I feel myself. I'm all there, just like normal, only I can't see myself. I give Coral's t.i.ts a squeeze and watch'em bunch up, and Laveda stabs me in the back with a f.u.c.kin' dagger.

Hurts like s.h.i.t. I go down, wondering why they went to all the trouble making me invisible if they're gonna kill me.

Laveda says, "I warned you not to touch her." Then she tells me I'll be okay, I can't be killed'less I'm hit in a vital place like my heart or a big artery or I'm burned, or something; I've drunk at the river and I'm all powerful and I'll heal up in no time flat. She tells me to get up, and I do. I can feel myself bleeding for a while, but pretty soon it stops.

She tells me to take the bean out of my mouth. I do, and presto I'm there again.

Long as I've got one of the beans in my mouth, she says, I'll be invisible. When I spit it out, you can see me again. But if I swallow one, it's so long Sammy for weeks, maybe months. It'll digest, see, and some of it'll get in my system. Long as any's in my system, I stay invisible.

Then Laveda lets me know what it's all about. She's got big plans for me. Tomorrow, I'm supposed to head off for D.C. and do a job on the president, the V P, the speaker of the house. Presto, instant chaos. That's just the thing for Laveda and her bunch. They'll be free to do what ever they want. And it'll be a cinch for me, right? I can go anywhere, do anything. I can't be stopped. I pretend it's a great idea.

Well that night, I get a few ideas of my own. Laveda's right, I can go anywhere and do what ever I please; I could think of plenty of stuff I'd rather do than spend the rest of my life knocking off people for The Group.

So I strip and pop a bean in my mouth, and do a little exploring. I explore my way right into Laveda's room, which turns out to be just down the hall. Coral's there, too. Just like I figured.

They're sitting around gabbing. Turns out, I'm the first guy they've done this number on. Laveda'd tried it herself, a year ago, and Coral's saying how she'd like a crack at being invisible.

Laveda sort of puts her off. I think I know why, too. Reason she hasn't gone around making lots of her people invisible. It gives them too much power. She wants all the power for herself, wants to stay in control. She just made me invisible to get a job done for her. And I figure I'm probably expendable, she'll wipe me out once I get it done.

Well, they finally leave off their jabber and get down to rolling on the bed. You should've seen those two go at each other. Grunting and groaning, licking, eating each other out. I almost popped my load, just watching. Must've gone on for an hour. I wanted to jump right on'em and stick it in the nearest hole, but I held off. Didn't want to mess with Laveda. The gal's bad news.

They finally get done. I see Coral making for the john, so I get in quick ahead of her. She starts taking a shower. Okay, I know Laveda's out in the other room and if she gets me, I've had it. But I'm invisible, right? How's she gonna hurt me if she can't find me?

So I climb into the shower with Coral. She suspects something when the door slides open, but before she has a chance to yell I bash her head on the tile and knock her out. More than out, dead. So then I lay her down in the tub and have my fun. You ever let it go after holding back for an hour? Nothing like it. Thought I'd bust, I came so hard.

Okay, I get out of the tub and dry off-don't want to be tracking water, you know. Then I get scared'cause I see myself in the f.u.c.kin' mirror! It isn't me, really. The place is all steamy and there I am, like a hole in it. Bad news! I wanted to get outa there. So I hurried and finished drying, and snuck open the door a crack, just enough to see out. Laveda was on the bed. Looked like she was asleep.