Then I considered my relationships with Teague. And Vicki.
Apparently I needed to put in more work with the people who were important to me.
Five hundred thousand people. Damn.
When I arrived at Zelda’s, I dumped the bike in a loading zone and headed for the elevator. Surprisingly, Neil was still in the apartment. He sat naked on the sofa, his head slumped down and his shoulders sagging. He was making a high, keening sound, somewhere between a sob and a yelp. When I walked over he looked up at me, his face glistening with tears.
“My pee-pee shrunk.”
I was all out of stock in the sympathy exchange, so I ignored the incredible shrinking dick and turned my attention to Zelda’s bookshelf. I picked four titles that looked particularly old and expensive. Then I went to the bedroom to take the Monet. Funny how we place value on physical things. This was a nice enough landscape, done in pastels, but worth a fortune? I pulled it off the wall, pried off the back, and ripped the canvas out of the matte. I folded it up, then put it and the books into one of Zelda’s handbags. Also, on a whim, I grabbed her raccoon-fur coat.
Neil was curled up on the floor, cupping himself. I stepped over him, then grabbed a bottle of pills from the bathroom medicine cabinet.
“Will those make my willy grow back?”
“Take five of these, and it will grow back tomorrow.”
I shook five into his hand. Technically, I wasn’t lying to him. His manhood would bounce back to normal size tomorrow, all on its own. The pills would have nothing to do with it, because they were industrial-strength laxatives.
I made it back to my house fifteen minutes before McGlade was scheduled to arrive. While waiting for him to show up, I double-checked the location of my little raccoon buddy. He was still on that dick Chomsky’s roof. But he’d apparently become a trifle more active. I didn’t know much about raccoon behavior, but this one appeared to be running laps.
Time crawled by. Still no McGlade. I tried calling Vicki, and Sata, and was unsuccessful with both.
Ten minutes after the agreed-upon time, McGlade motored up on his Harley Davidson biofuel bike. Unlike the scooters prevalent throughout the city, this hog was three times the size and twenty times less fuel-efficient. But it was deafening to make up for it.
McGlade pulled up and said something, which I couldn’t hear over the roar of the throttle. I gave him the universal I can’t hear you hand signal, cupping my hand to my ear while saying, “I can’t hear you.”
“What?” McGlade yelled. “I can’t hear you!”
Jackass.
He eventually cut the engine. “You got the stuff?”
I nodded. “Do you?”
“Yeah. Lemme see the books.”
I handed them over. McGlade scowled. “Fiction? Who reads fiction these days?”
“I just grabbed a few.”
“Who the heck is James Patterson? How am I supposed to sell that? Don’t you have any Joe Kimball?”
“I think I have a few.” I had no idea if Zelda did or not.
“There are a whole bunch. Here’s the Monet.”
McGlade unfolded it, taking a long look. “Not his best work. You sure it’s real?”
“AFAIK.”
“I don’t know if it’s a fair trade, man. You know trapping endangered species is a major crime. I could do jail time, just for being caught with the cage. And selling real firearms…”
“Hundreds of books,” I said, “and a few more paintings.”
“Where?”
“I’ll tell you after we catch the raccoon.”
He raised an eyebrow. “What’s this we, Mr. Most Wanted?”
“I need your help. The animal is at my neighbor’s house, and he won’t let me in.”
“Can’t say that I blame him.” McGlade peered over my shoulder. “What’s that?”
I followed his gaze to the things strapped to the back of my bike. “A raccoon coat.”
“Real?”
“Yes.”
He rubbed his jaw. “Never saw a real fur coat before. Tell you what, you throw in the coat, and we’ve got a deal.”
FORTY-THREE
I hid around the corner, holding the cage while McGlade rang Chomsky’s videobell.
“Who is it?”
“Animal control,” McGlade said. “We heard you have a raccoon on your premises.”
Chomsky made a face. “It’s about time. The damn thing ate half my coca plant. It’s running around like a spaz.”
Just what I needed. A raccoon racing on cocaine.
“I’ll take care of it for you, sir,” McGlade said. “I’m a professional. I have years of varmint killing experience.”
“Can I see some ID?”
My heart sank. But McGlade was on top of it.
“How’s this for ID?” he asked, holding up the raccoon coat.
Chomsky opened his front door, and McGlade went inside, me behind him.
“You!” Chomsky said, pointing a finger at me. He was walking bowlegged and had an ice pack clutched to his groin. “I’m calling the cops on you right now!” He pointed at McGlade. “And you, too! Aiding and abetting! You’re going to jail for the rest of-”
McGlade shot him with the Taser. When Chomsky fell over, McGlade injected him in the thigh with something.
“Your neighbor is a dick,” McGlade said, putting the coat over his shoulders.
“Tell me about it. Come on.”
I led him up the stairs, pausing to pat Barack O’Llama on the head. Once on the roof, I looked around for the raccoon while McGlade baited the steel-cage trap with cat food. It worked on a simple lever principle. The animal walked in to get the food; the door closed behind it.
“You see him?” he asked.
“No.” I checked the GPS. He was hiding in the northwest corner. “He’s over there. Okay, set the trap down here. If he runs past, grab him.”
McGlade appeared dubious. “He’s a wild animal. Is he safe to grab?”
“Yesterday I fed my chip to him. He’s gentle as a lamb.”
McGlade set down the cage, and the raccoon jumped out of the bushes and onto McGlade’s chest. It hissed, teeth snapping, while McGlade fell onto his butt, screaming like a girl.
“GET IT OFF! GET IT OFF!”
“He thinks you’re a raccoon,” I said, pointing to the coat. “You’re invading his territory.”
“TELL HIM I’M NOT A RACCOON! TELL HIM I’M NOT A RACCOON!”
I picked up the cage and fit it over the raccoon, manually shutting the door. Its little hands grabbed my fingers and he tried to bite me through the steel mesh. I quickly dropped it and backed away.
“Gentle as a lamb?” McGlade said, breathing heavy. “Maybe a lamb with fucking rabies!”
“Did it bite you?”
His face twisted up. “I think he got my leg. It feels wet.”
“You pissed yourself.”
“Fuck. Look at that crazy little bastard.”
The raccoon was shaking the cage, hissing and spitting. McGlade took out his Magnum and aimed it.
“McGlade! No!”
“It’s evil, Talon. It needs to die.”
“He was fine yesterday. It’s probably the coke.”
“Bullshit. It’s Frankencoon. If we don’t kill him, he’ll eat the city.”
The animal did seem a bit more hostile since I last saw him.
“Hit him with the sedative,” I said.
“I gave it to your dick neighbor.”
“Shit.”
“Why don’t you let me cap it? You have to cut the chip out anyway.”
I shook my head. “I’m not slicing through innards and intestines trying to find the chip. He’s going to give it to me in a different way.”
“How? You’ll ask him nicely?”
“Laxatives.”
McGlade shook his head. “You’re a real piece of work, Talon.”
I picked up the fallen can of cat food, then pushed five laxative pills into the mush. Now it was just a matter of opening the cage.
“Okay, McGlade, I’ll open the door; you put the food inside.”
“Fuck you. Keep the Monet.”
To say the animal seemed extremely agitated would be putting it mildly. It looked angry enough to eat a mountain lion.