The room went quiet. The background music was between songs now. When it started up again, the beat had picked up a step, an old ditty from Supertramp. Jake Wolf slowly turned his head and looked back over his shoulder. Drew Van Dyne could see that the news was a surprise.

“That doesn’t change anything,” Jake said.

“I think maybe it does.”

“How?”

Drew Van Dyne reached into his shoulder holster. He removed the gun and aimed it at Jake Wolf. “Take a wild guess.”

CHAPTER 42

The storefront was a nail salon called Nail-R-Us in a not-yet-redeveloped section of Queens. The building had that decrepit thing going on, as if leaning against it would cause a wall to collapse. The rust on the fire escape was so thick that tetanus seemed a far greater threat than smoke inhalation. Every window was blocked by either a heavy shade or a plank of wood. The structure was four levels and ran almost the entire length of the block.

Myron said to Win, “The R on the sign is crossed out.”

“That’s intentional.”

“Why?”

Win looked at him, waited. Myron did it in his head. Nail-R-Us had become Nail Us.

“Oh,” Myron said. “Cute.”

“They have two armed guards stationed at windows,” Win said.

“They must do a mean manicure.”

Win frowned. “Moreover, the two guards didn’t take up position until your Ms. Rochester and her beau returned.”

“They’re worried about her father,” Myron said.

“That would be a logical deduction.”

“You know anything about the place?”

“The clientele is below my level of expertise.” Win nodded behind Myron. “But not hers.”

Myron turned. The setting sun was blocked now as though by an eclipse. Big Cyndi was ambling toward them. She was dressed entirely in white spandex. Very tight white spandex. No undergarments. Tragically, you could tell. On a seventeen-year-old runway model, the spandex jumpsuit would be a fashion risk. On a woman of forty who weighed more than three hundred pounds . . . well, it took guts, lots of them, all of which were on full display, thank you very much. Everything jiggled as she trundled toward them; various body parts seemed to have lives of their own, moving of their own accord, as if dozens of animals were trapped in a white balloon and trying to squirm their way out.

Big Cyndi kissed Win on the cheek. Then she turned and said, “Hello, Mr. Bolitar.” She hugged him, wrapping her arms around him, a feeling not unlike being wrapped in wet attic insulation.

“Hey, Big Cyndi,” Myron said when she put him down. “Thanks for getting down here so quick.”

“When you call, Mr. Bolitar, I run.”

Her face remained placid. Myron never knew if Big Cyndi was putting him on or not.

“Do you know this place?” he asked.

“Oh yes.”

She sighed. Elk within a forty-mile radius began to mate. Big Cyndi wore white lipstick like something out of an Elvis documentary. Her makeup had sparkles. Her fingernails were in a color she’d once told him was called Pinot Noir. Back in the day, Big Cyndi had been the bad-guy professional wrestler. She fit the bill. For those who have never watched professional wrestling, it is merely a morality play with good pitted against evil. For years, Big Cyndi had been the evil “warlordess” named Human Volcano. Then one night, after a particularly grueling match where Big Cyndi had “injured” the lovely and lithe Esperanza “Little Pocahontas” Diaz with a chair—“injured” her so badly that the fake ambulance came in and strapped on the neck brace and all that—an angry mob of fans waited outside the venue.

When Big Cyndi left for the night, the mob attacked.

They might have killed her. The crowd was drunk and fired up and not really into the reality-versus-fiction equation at work here. Big Cyndi tried to run, but there was no escape. She fought hard and well, but there were dozens wanting her blood. Someone hit her with a camera, a cane, a boot. They moved in. Big Cyndi went down. People started stomping her.

Seeing the mayhem, Esperanza tried to intervene. The crowd would have none of it. Even their favorite wrestler could not halt their blood-lust. And then Esperanza did something truly inspired.

She jumped on a car and “revealed” that Big Cyndi had only been pretending to be a bad guy to gather information. The crowd almost paused. Furthermore, Esperanza announced, Big Cyndi was really Little Pocahontas’s long lost sister, Big Chief Mama, a rather lame moniker but hey, she was making this stuff up on the fly. Little Pocahontas and her sister were now reuniting and would become tag-team partners.

The crowd cheered. Then they helped Big Cyndi to her feet.

Big Chief Mama and Little Pocahontas quickly became wrestling’s most popular team. The same scenario played out weekly: Esperanza would start every match winning on skill, their opponents would do something illegal like throw sand in her eye or use the dreaded foreign object, the two baddies would team up on poor, helpless Pocahontas while someone distracted Big Chief Mama, they’d beat the sensuous beauty until the strap on Pocahontas’s suede bikini ripped, and then Big Chief Mama would give out a war cry and ride in to the rescue.

Massively entertaining.

When she left the ring, Big Cyndi became a bouncer and sometimes stage performer for several lowlife sex clubs. She knew the seedier side of the streets. And that was what they were counting on now.

“So what is this place?” Myron asked.

Big Cyndi put on her totem-pole frown. “They do a lot of things, Mr. Bolitar. Some drugs, some Internet scamming, but mostly, these are sex clubs.”

“Clubs,” Myron repeated. “As in the plural?”

Big Cyndi nodded. “Six or seven different ones probably. Remember a few years ago when Forty-second Street was loaded with sleaze?”

“Yes.”

“Well, when they forced them all out, where do you think the sleaze went?”

Myron looked at the nail salon. “Here?”

“Here, there, everywhere. You don’t kill sleaze, Mr. Bolitar. It just moves to a new host.”

“And this is the new host?”

“One of them. Here, in this very building, they offer specialty clubs catering to an international variety of tastes.”

“When you say ‘specialty clubs’—?”

“Let’s see. If you care for flaxen-haired women, you go to On Golden Blonde. That’s on the second floor, far right. If you’re into African-American men, you head up to the third floor and visit a place called—you might like this, Mr. Bolitar—Malcolm Sex.”