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46

THE BLACK-PAINTED FRONT of the bar looked tired in the morning sunlight. You could see where the paint was cracked and beginning to peel. The front of the bar looked almost as neglected as the rest of the street. Maybe Nicky Baco hadn’t tried to run the other businesses off. Maybe it had been an accident. Standing there in the soft heat of morning, I felt something I hadn’t felt at night. It was as if the street had been used up in a mystical sense. I’d felt very strongly when I’d been here last time that Baco had drained the street of vitality, caused this to happen, but if that were true, then it hadn’t been enough energy to sustain him. Or maybe all that negativity was finally coming home to roost. Most systems of magic or mysticism have rules of conduct, things you do and things you do not. You break the rules at your peril. The wiccans call it the three-fold law: what you do to others comes back to you threefold. Buddhists call it karma. Christians call it answering for your sins. I call it what goes around comes around. It really does, you know.

I had the Firestar tucked into the front of my pants, minus the innerpants holster, because the gun could ride higher and not dig in as much. Edward had loaned me a paddle holster for the Browning, and I had ended up with it in front, so that I looked like one of those wild west gunslingers with two guns crossed over my hips. Though actually the black polo shirt came down low enough to hide both guns. Untucked, most shirts are too long on me. It looked sloppy, but it did hide the guns if you weren’t looking too close. The polo shirt was a little too close to the body not to show telltale lumps, though Edward had been thoughtful enough to bring my black suit jacket, which helped camouflage the lumps. Last time I’d been here with guns I’d had the police backing me, but now we were taking guns into a bar, very illegal in New Mexico. Strangely, it wasn’t a big worry, but I did hope the cops didn’t choose today for a raid.

I still had the wrist sheaths plus knives on my wrists. Ramirez had collected all my knives from the inferno and given them to Edward, who had scrubbed, cleaned, oiled, and sharpened them to an inch of their lives. I’d had to leave the big blade in the car because I couldn’t figure out how to carry it concealed, and carrying what amounted to a small sword barehanded seemed a little too aggressive.

Edward had even given me an incendiary grenade for my jacket pocket. It helped balance out the derringer in my right-hand pocket so that the jacket didn’t swing too funny as I walked. The derringer had been his idea, too, though I had brought it with me from St. Louis. I wasn’t sure I really needed it today, but I’d learned never to argue with Edward when he gave me a weapon. If he thought I might need it, I almost certainly would. Scary thought on the grenade, isn’t it?

At some unknown signal, Olaf moved up and tried the bar door. It was locked. He knocked twice hard enough to rattle the door. He also stood right in front of the door. After staring down a sawed-off shotgun the last time I came to the bar, I might not have stood facing front at that black door. Either Olaf hadn’t heard about the shotgun, or he didn’t care. Maybe he was trying to be muy macho for my benefit or maybe for his own benefit. If he’d been more secure in himself, then he wouldn’t have been so easy to piss off.

Even standing off to one side, the sound of the locks being drawn back was loud. Good, solid locks just from the sound of it. The door pushed open, slowly, showing a thick slice of darkness like a cave pressing against the sunlight. The door continued to push slowly open as if on its own power. Only at the very last did a large beefy arm come into view, spoiling the illusion.

Harpo stood in the doorway peering out at us, eyes hidden behind the same small black sunglasses he’d been wearing the first time I saw him. He had changed clothes, though. He was wearing a jean vest open over a very hairy chest and stomach. He looked more like