The Living End (Daniel Faust #3)(6)

Perkins’s office was a shabby little walk-up over a mechanic’s shop on Decatur Boulevard. Normally I wouldn’t have given him a second glance—he looked like the kind of guy who chased ambulances on his morning jog—but he came with the highest of recommendations.

“Nowhere fun,” said Caitlin, sitting in a cheap Ikea-knockoff chair to my left. She wore her scarlet hair in a twist at one shoulder and a black silk pantsuit made by a fashion designer whose name I couldn’t even pronounce. We’d made good time on the road back from Chloride, and she’d insisted on stopping to change. Couldn’t blame her for wanting an outfit that wasn’t drenched in blood.

“Right you are, ma’am,” Perkins said. “And may I say what a pleasure it is to be working with you again—”

“Save it,” she said.

“Right, well, let’s start with the good news then. The initial charges—possession of an unlicensed firearm, menacing, reckless driving and endangerment, blah blah blah—these all hinge on a single complainant. Mr. Faust and Ms.…Juniper? Jennifer Juniper? Seriously?”

On my right, Jennifer stared at Perkins over the rims of her blue-tinted Lennon glasses. Her sleeves were rolled up to show off her tattooed arm, an elaborate mosaic from elbow to wrist that featured Elvis Presley as the Gautama Buddha.

“My folks were hippies,” she said, her voice edged with a Kentucky twang.

Perkins shrugged and flipped through the police report. “I’d change it, but whatever floats your boat. I think we can get a lot of this tossed out or reduced out of hand. The gun’s questionable, and there are some strange circumstances surrounding the civilian witness…speaking of which, this ‘Meadow Brand’ person? As your attorney, I recommend killing her. Make it look like a drug overdose, maybe a gang shooting, something nice and unrelated, you know?”

I’m not sure what scared me more: that I barely blinked at his suggestion or that nobody else did either. It goes with the territory when your girlfriend works as muscle for a demon prince. Caitlin had called in a favor with her boss to get Jennifer and me a meeting with Perkins, and she promised us that he’d fight harder to clear our names than any other lawyer in town.

Any human lawyer, anyway.

“We’re kinda workin’ on that,” Jennifer told him.

“Good! I love proactive clients! This is a partnership, what we have here, and it means a lot that you’re holding up your side of things. Now, absolute worst-case scenario, you both do a couple of months in county and I get your records expunged after the fact.”

“Perkins,” Caitlin said. She rested a proprietary hand on my shoulder. Her slender fingers curled, nails rasping against the cloth of my oxford shirt.

“Yes, ma’am?” he said, turning his thousand-watt smile in her direction.

“Please understand that a worst-case scenario for them will result in a worst-case scenario for you.”

The smile vanished. He coughed politely, picked up a dented paper cup from his desk, and swallowed down a mouthful of cold coffee.

“I’m more concerned,” he said, “about this federal investigation. I looked into the task force that’s pursuing the Agnelli syndicate and hoo-boy, are they bringing in the heavy hitters. Now, theoretically, if Nicky Agnelli were to make a deal and turn state’s evidence, how much could he actually pin on you two?”

Jennifer and I looked at each other.

“It would be good,” I said thoughtfully, “if that didn’t happen.”

“Real good,” Jennifer said.

“Well then, our best bet is to stall the investigation, or toss them some raw meat to chew on for a while. The big blank slate on the team is the FBI representative, this…Special Agent Harmony Black? Any chance you can buy your way into her good graces?”

I would have laughed, if my stomach wasn’t tied in a knot.

“Zero,” I said. “Black makes Joe Friday look bent. She’d cut off her own hand before she’d take a dirty nickel.”

Perkins leaned back in his chair. “Huh. Bad news. Might want to kill her too and hope her replacement is more corrupt. But don’t do that yet! Dead feds are bad for business. Let’s just keep the option in mind for now, okay? Just back-pocket that sucker.”

“The real problem is Lauren Carmichael,” I said. “She pulled strings with Senator Roth to launch the investigation, as payback for Nicky screwing her over.”

“Far too late to stop that ball from rolling now,” Perkins said. “But you should probably think about killing her too.”

“Some days I don’t think about much else,” I told him.

I wasn’t normally a vengeful man, but two of my friends and a lot of innocent people were dead because of Lauren Carmichael and her crew. As of today, she could add five or six retirees and a waitress to her bill. Payment was overdue.

“Alton Roth, though,” Perkins said, thinking. “We might have a shot there. In the metaphorical sense this time. Please do not kill Senator Roth. I voted for him twice. In the same election, in fact.”

I was polite enough not to roll my eyes. Just barely.

“Look,” I said, “just take care of the charges. We’ll worry about the task force. Can you get us off the hook or not?”

“Yes, Perkins.” Caitlin stared coolly across the desk at him. “Can you…or not?”