Bitch. I sat in the chair. Watched her curl herself around my legs, the T-shirt riding up to her waist, strip of blood-red silk between her thighs. She bent forward, the red silk a thong between her buttocks. Her hand on my zipper. Raspy, hard sound. "Mine," she said, thrusting her hand inside. Nobody home. She made a noise in her throat, took my softness between her lips, licking, making sounds to herself, speaking in tongues. A stirring in the softness but…nothing. Teeth nipped at the head of my cock, lips sliding over the shaft, sucking. Dead. As dead as Belle. I thought if it ever happened to me, I'd die a bit. It felt like winning.

She gave it up after a couple of minutes. Eyes focused hard now, watching my face. "Why?"

"I don't know- it's just gone."

"Is this the first time?"

I don't know what made me tell the truth. "No."

"Did something happen to you?"

"Yeah."

"You got hurt?"

"Yeah."

"Is it going to get better?"

"I don't know. I don't…"

"Care?"

"I don't even know that."

She pulled the zipper up, roughly. "It won't last. I know. I don't care what any doctor says. Don't be…"

"Don't be what? Depressed? Depressed is finding out you're a diabetic. I found out I can't get insulin, you understand?"

"You're not scared." It wasn't a question.

"No."

"You were the last time."

"I know."

"You think that's what did it…if you were scared again?"

"I. Just. Don't. Know. Okay?"

"Okay." Her eyes looked wet- it must have been the light in that white room.

I got up to go. "Give me the address."

"I don't have it."

"You…

"I think I know where he is. But I have to be sure, okay? You can't go twice. Once it happens, they'll know it came from me."

"It could come from anybody. Their own outfit is lousy with rats."

"What about our deal?"

"I sat in the chair."

"I know. I know there's things you can't fake. Especially you. That's not what I mean. Julio."

"Spell it out."

"You have to do them both."

"When will you have the address?"

"Tomorrow, next day. Soon. Couple of days at most. I swear."

"Okay."

She walked downstairs with me, kicking off the spike heels, padding along on the carpet. She stood a step above me. Bent down and kissed me on the lips. Sweet. No biting into me. No witch-fire. She turned to go back upstairs, watching me over her shoulder. I flashed on Candy and years ago. Something stirred. It died when I remembered Candy had never kissed me goodbye when we were kids.

DRIVING HOME, my black &white eyes were still working, but the images were reversed. Inside out. Inverted. For me, playing it safe wasn't playing- it was my life. I couldn't find the controls- nothing was where it had been. Terror said it was my partner, but I didn't have my old pal Fear to keep the nerve-endings sharp. Strega the witch was back in my life. Liars gave me their word, sociopaths gave me their trust. Dead people in my zone- some didn't know it yet. Some had my address. Users wanted my blood and vultures waited for my flesh. And I couldn't work up the adrenaline to get off the killing floor. Get off the track before the train came. It wasn't just my cock that wouldn't work. I didn't know if I was lost or gone. In the ground, with Belle.

Freaks use pornography on kids to desensitize them. Break down their natural resistance. Make them think this is the way things are. Drop the thresholds until they can step over them.

Maybe lies and loss work like that too. They don't take your soul, but they made it not worth fighting over.

Like when you're hijacking. You know you're going back to prison, you just don't know when.

It didn't seem so hard to find a way out. Just hard to give a fuck.

IN PRISON, I used to make lists. In my head. Draw a bright line down the middle of my mind. Pro and con. The two things I wanted to be.

Some fights you can't get in shape for. I was only in prison with Wesley one time. We kept missing each other on the exchanges. I heard he even went in the Army for a while- when Vietnam was hot and heavy and the judges would give you a pass if you enlisted. There was another guy in the joint with us at the same time. Dayton was his name. A gorilla. Iron-freak. He muscled off the weaker ones, did bodywork for the gangsters. Good time. He didn't seem to give a fuck, but he survived. A life charmed by strength and stupidity. I don't remember how he got into the dispute with Wesley, but I was on the yard with the Prof when it kicked off.

Wesley was standing against the wall. By himself, like always. Dayton rolled up on him. I didn't hear what they said to each other. Dayton grabbed Wesley by the front of his shirt, pulled him close, slapped him hard across the face. Wesley slumped, hands away from his body. Dayton left him there, walking away with his boys.

One of the young Italian guys standing with us laughed. "My man is about to be mondo dee-ceased," nodding his head at Wesley. He said it the same way they say dee-fense at pro football games. The Prof flashed his hustler's smile.

"It won't play the way you say. For one to five, I say my man comes out alive."

Within minutes, we'd booked twenty cartons of cigarettes against a hundred that Dayton wouldn't outlive Wesley.

It was a sucker bet. Dayton was a Dianabol freak. Snarfing the steroids the way other guys in the joint did Talwin, or Valium, or anything else the docs handed out to help you escape for a few hours. They made him massive- bigger than a human should be. When the hacks found him slumped over the pile of weights in the gym, there wasn't a mark on him. But his skin had a nice bluish tone to it. The guys who bet with us thought we got lucky behind an OD. The ones that stayed in prison long enough put it all together. By then, going up against Wesley was an out-bet.

MORALES braced me as I was coming out of Lily's joint. It had to happen- a pit bull would drop a bite sooner than Morales would walk away on the losing end. It would have been okay, but Max was with me. About four steps behind, in my shadow. Morales is about my height but he goes about two-twenty- none of it fat. He was a born head-cracker, not a gunman. That saved his life.

He snatched a handful of my jacket, shoved me face-first to the wall, running his rap, telling me if I was carrying I was going back to the joint…when he went dead-quiet. I looked back over my shoulder. Max had one hand on the cop's arm, the other at the back of his neck, bending him backward at an impossible angle. I spun off the wall, making a "drop it" sign to Max. Morales slumped to the sidewalk. I jammed my thumb back in a hitchhiking gesture, twirling my hand, telling Max to disappear.

I knelt next to Morales. He was trying to catch his breath and draw his gun off his right hip with his left hand at the same time- the right arm hung limp and useless at his side.

"You want me to get it for you?" I asked him.

"Cocksucker!" Almost sobbing with the effort.

"Take it easy. You're okay."

"You're not."

"I already know that. Am I under arrest?"

People passed us on the sidewalk. Nobody stopped. I tried to help him to his feet. His eyes were somewhere between rage and pain. Rage won. He fired the elbow of his good arm at my chest. I stepped back and he chopped air. I left him there. Went back to the wall. Stood facing it. Waiting.

Heard him get to his feet, muscles tightening over my kidneys. Felt the barrel of his pistol jam me just where I expected it. Didn't hurt any less.