Page 32 of Slow Burn

“Hey, whatever. I’m just laying out the house rules.”

“Well, so am I.” Robby glared at her for another beat and said, “Are you ready?”

Well, at worst the suit would have a prissy little house with plastic carpet runners and cellophane on the lampshades. A museum house. The bathroom floor would be cleaner than most people’s plates. Who says you can’t go home again? Maybe Robby would have those stupid collectible salt and pepper shakers Mom loved so much.

“Sounds yummy,” Velvet lied, and followed her out to the living room. The guy with the hair—Jim, that was his name—Jim glared at her. Another thief who thought he was better than she was. Jesus, the world was just full of assholes. She paused long enough to bat her eyelids at him, even though it hurt like poking a needle up her nose. “Bye, sweetie. Sorry I can’t stick around. Maybe later.”

He looked like he wanted to slap the shit out of somebody, and couldn’t decide between the two of them. He flopped down on the couch, flicked the remote control on his big-screen TV. Basketball. Robby moved around the room picking up things and jamming them in her purse—a hairbrush, a makeup bag, a wallet. She yanked open the door and glared at Velvet.

“Come on,” she barked. Velvet readjusted the ice pack on her face, checked her balance on her high heels, and followed.

Once the door was shut behind them, she heard Robby take a deep painful breath in the dark.

“He ain’t worth it,” Velvet said helpfully.

“How the hell would you know?”

“Well, shit, none of them are,” she shrugged. Robby took her arm and led her across the warehouse, out to the dark deserted street. Nothing moving, not even a wino, just empty yellow pools of streetlights and cold, cold wind. Live music drifted on the air from someplace toward Dallas Alley—a free concert, probably. Velvet liked the Alley—a fun place to work, lots of drunk tourists looking for a little local adventure. She trolled there in between Ming’s jobs, sometimes. There was a barbecue place on the corner, closed up tight but breathing sharp tasty mesquite smoke out of its chimney. Her stomach growled.

“Where we going?” Velvet asked as Robby set out down the sidewalk, walking much too fast. Velvet’s ribs protested under the sudden impacts, and her face felt like one big blood clot. Thank god for the wind chill. She couldn’t have stood it if it had been hot. “Hell—hey—would you slow down? How far is it? Don’t you have acar?”

Robby, lit gold by the streetlamp they were passing under, shook dark hair out of her eyes and sighed. “No car. Six blocks west, two north.”

Velvet stopped dead in her tracks, reached down, and stripped off her shoes. She clutched them in one hand and shivered as her feet absorbed the shock of cold pavement.

“These,” she said to Robby’s questioning look, “arenotwalking shoes. Get it?”

Robby rolled her eyes, but she slowed down a little. Velvet concentrated on watching the pavement for bits of broken glass or sharp rocks; whispers of cheering and tatters of guitar riffs blew by. Velvet’s stomach growled again.

She wondered how Robby felt about Italian food.

“So what really happened?” she asked. Robby’s eyes flashed to her, then away, searching alleys and doorways for surprises. She kept her hands in her coat pockets; for the first time Velvet wondered if she was carrying. She had that paranoid look.

“When?”

“When you found the guy who burned up. What happened?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Oh, god, don’t lie. You’re a pissy liar. What’d you do, go inside?”

Silence. Robby hunched her shoulders and stared down the street. Velvet avoided a spray of broken glass on the sidewalk and did a jig to catch up.

“Yeah,” Robby said. “I went in.”

“And?”

Robby’s jaw had tightened. The soft brown eyes had a hard glittering look to them.

“He was still alive,” she said. “I heard his breath bubbling. He was bleeding from his mouth and nose, bubbling blood.”

“Jesus.” Velvet watched her face. “What’d you do?”

“Nothing,” Robby said. She kicked a sharp-edged piece of metal out of Velvet’s way; it shot off into the darkness and whined off a curb. “I took his money and I left. I left him to die.”

A car passed them, stirring papers like batwings in the gutter, and left behind an echo of laughter like wind chimes. Velvet wrapped her satin coat closer and looked down at her feet, white as marble in the cold.

“Burt could have been alive,” she said. The truth felt like a chunk of broken glass in her throat. “I didn’t check. I ran out on him.”

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