The fax machine pauses an excruciating twenty seconds or so, its red lights blinking like a railroad crossing. Finally it begins churning out the second page, a five hundred percent blowup of the DVD box end label, the cryptic letters to all three words now filled in.

It is a movie title, a 1990 release that runs for seventy-eight minutes and answers a question posed by an earlier film. A movie title made up of three words on a dark background.

Three words that pass through the room like an electrical storm.

Paris Is Burning.

40

She had not known what to expect when Jean Luc opened the door to his apartment. She had been in so many houses and homes and apartments and penthouses over the past two years that she had become quite the expert at predicting things like motif, wallpaper, furniture. One of her marks was a sixtyish Italian American, a concert promoter who’d sported a two-carat diamond pinkie ring in a setting of gold when she’d met him at the lounge at Morton’s. It didn’t take a genius to know he’d have a paneled recreation room with a black vinyl nail-head bar.

Yet every one of those times she had been in complete control of the situation. If not the man. This time, it is different. This time, she’s the mark.

The real shock, the part that unnerved her as much as anything that had happened so far, is the fact that Jean Luc lives in the building next door to hers. The Cain Towers apartments. It explained how he knew so much about her, but it made her feel stupid. Dumber than the dumbest of her marks.

Earlier in the night she had texted Celeste four times and, for the first time since she had begun doing business with Celeste, she had not gotten a call back within a half hour.

Something is wrong.

Jean Luc had said for her to come over at ten-thirty and he would explain everything she was supposed to do. He had said that this would be the second last of their meetings, and that she would soon be done with him.

Jean Luc greets her at the door to his apartment, dressed in a black cashmere sweater, gray flannel slacks, loafers. His hair is swept straight back today, à la Michael Corleone.

She follows him to the kitchen, a kitchen full of modern, almond-toned appliances. But there is something beneath the fragrance of Glade aerosol and scented candles. Something that has gone off. Something dead.

She looks down the hallway where she figures the bedrooms and bathroom are located. Four doors, all closed, a single sconce at the end. To the left, a small living room, unfurnished. To the right, the tidy little kitchen. Not particularly lived in. Not septic either.

But where might he have the photographs and negatives?

Jean Luc takes her coat without a word and hangs it in the hall closet. He closes the door, leans against it, studies her. After an excruciating silence, a silence during which she could actually hear her pulse in her ears, he says, “I don’t want you to hate me.”

“I don’t hate you.”

“I’m glad.”

“I’d have to know you to hate you. I don’t know you at all.”

“We can change that.”

“No. We cannot.”

“Why?”

“We have a business deal, Mr. Christiane,” she says, realizing that it is the first time she has referred to him as anything, much less something as formal as Mr. Christiane. “It is ugly, it is something I never asked for. But it is now on my plate and I can’t get it off. Or can I? Can I just turn around and walk out of here right now?”

“No.”

“See? Now, let’s just tolerate each other for the next day or two and then go on our separate ways.”

“If you only knew my pain, for a single second, you would understand why I am doing what I am doing.”

“Believe it or not, I really don’t care why you’re doing it. What I care about is why I’m doing it.”

Jean Luc’s face is unreadable. Had she pushed him too far?

He crosses his arms, considers her for a few more long moments. Then, as if a key was turned somewhere within him, his face softens and he says: “Can I get you something? Coffee? A soft drink?”

“Nothing, thanks.”

“Sure?”

“Positive,” she says, relieved that she hadn’t overstepped any boundary. She has to keep reminding herself that this is a man who beat his father to death with a baseball bat, poured beef broth on the body, and let four big dogs eat what was left.

Jean Luc offers his hand, like an old lover on a beach.

For some reason, she takes it.

He says, “Let me show you a very special room.”

41

Paris presses the button at 3204-A Fulton Road for the fifth time. He steps back onto the sidewalk, glances up. There are no lights on in the apartment. He looks into La Botanica Macumba. It is dark also, save for a small spotlight over the cash register, which sits with its empty drawer open.

Paris tries the door to the stairwell that leads to 3204-A. Locked. He had circled the building twice when he arrived, but the back and sides of the two-story structure offered no lighted windows, no open doors, no fire escape. He takes out his phone, dials the Levertov number. There is no answer, nor is there an answering machine.

Five cars are parked along the curb within a block of the doorway. Paris jots down the license plate numbers. He calls them in, and at the same time requests an address.

Fifteen minutes later, Edward Moriceau is in custody.

Moriceau sits in Interview One at the Justice Center. It is nearly eleven and this is Paris’s third run at the story.

“And you never saw anyone argue with him, threaten him?” Paris asks.

“No. Never.”

“And you’ve never had any business dealings or personal dealings with Mr. Levertov?”

“No.”

Moriceau is lying. Time to ratchet things up a bit. Paris drops a photograph in front of the man, a medium close-up of Willis Walker’s tongue. The Ochosi symbol is very clear. Moriceau brings his hand to his mouth.

“Look familiar to you?”

“Yes,” Moriceau replies, his voice a little thin. “As I said . . .”

“Oh yeah . . . that’s right,” Paris says, knowing it is time to toss out the first bomb, the last vestige of cordiality. “You said something about a disemboweled rooster, didn’t you? This look like a rooster?”

With this, Paris places a full body shot of Willis Walker onto the table. The impasto of thick maroon blood is spread on the white tiles, giving the dead man’s body a bloated, moth-like shape. A rose-colored sprout of viscera extends from where Willis Walker’s genitalia once grew.

Moriceau dry heaves, turns away. Then vomits on his feet.

Paris grimaces, looks at the two-way mirror, and can almost hear the buck being passed down the food chain among the police officers on the other side. Low man gets to fetch the bucket and mop.

Paris circles to Moriceau’s side of the table, carefully skirting the foul debris on the floor. In a moment, Greg Ebersole enters, mop in hand. He hands Moriceau a five-inch stack of napkins, runs the mop over the vomit and makes a lithe and rapid exit from the room.

“Mr. Moriceau,” Paris begins, “somebody is doing terrible things to the people of this city. Right now, nobody here thinks that person is necessarily you. Do you understand?”

Weakly, Moriceau nods, dabs his chin.

“Good. The problem is, as time goes on, and there are more and more connections to Santeria, or the address on Fulton Road, the more likely it is that our attitudes will begin to change. Do you understand this also?”

Again, Moriceau nods.

“I want you to think about something for a moment. Somebody killed the old man who lived over your store. There is a good chance that that person is into Santeria or Macumba or Candomblé, or maybe he’s just a wanna-be asshole who gets his rocks off pretending to be some kind of witch. Either way, the link to your store, the link to the products you sell, is awfully compelling.”