Its New Year's Eve for God's sake
, he reminded himself.
Glancing at his wristwatch, he realized it was almost 10 pm. Still another two hours left until the ball would be falling in Times Square.
He could have chosen a hotel closer to the festivities; instead, he booked himself into his usual room in the small family run place on Royal Street, just a block or so away from the Old Ursuline Convent.
If he was quick he could change into some fresh clothes and head for one of the bars that littered
Bourbon Street
. Jim didn't want to see in the coming year stuck in a room on his own.
He would take a wander down
Bourbon Street
and see the sights; have a few drinks and maybe he would even treat himself to a cigar.
That’s what he loved about this city, you could amble through the streets drinking a glass of wine and smoking a big fat stogy if you wanted, and no one would look at you sideways. If he tried doing that in LA, he would have half-a-dozen unemployed actors -
between jobs
, they would be quick to correct - yelling in his face how much harm he was doing to himself, how he was depleting the ozone,
blah-blah-blah
. He'd heard the same arguments for the last half-a-century.
Even good sense can start to stink if your nose gets rubbed in it for long enough
, he thought.
Jim laughed at himself, a quiet half-mocking snort. A cigarette, the promise of booze
and
a cigar, damn he was living dangerously these days.
What the hell! Why should he care? He was sixty years old, after all. A couple of smokes and a few drinks weren’t going to shorten his life by more than a couple of minutes. He deserved a break. He had thrown himself into the latest book with more gusto than usual. It had consumed him for the past four months and it had also taken a toll on him, both physical and mental. A few hours away from it would do him good, give him a chance to clear his mind and reset his imagination.
Jim Baston had never once encountered writer’s-block during his career as a writer. Twelve books, all of them in the top ten of all the right bestseller lists. The books had flowed from him. He had written them
on the fly
, straight from his imagination to the computer. The completed novel invariably needed little in the way of editing; such was the clarity with which he was able to visualize the story and its characters in his mind.
But this one was different.
It was a work of non-fiction, his autobiography of sorts. Facing his past was hard and painful. So many mistakes locked away, hidden in the darkness of his previous life. And, as he released each memory out of its mental holding-cell, carefully removing the psychic padlock that had kept them safely locked away, he was forced to confront them in all their horrible glory.
As he watched the thunderheads moving closer to the city, he realized how weary he was. It was a weariness that started deep in the marrow of his bones, radiating out through every sinew, along every vein and nerve ending; resonating in every atom of his body.
Exhausted
, he thought. Tired of getting up in the morning alone, of drowning himself in his work, of the only calls he ever received being from his editor. He was tired, he realized, of life. He was exhausted by the weight of his past. One night of rest would be a good thing. He could rejoin the human race for a little while.
Flicking the dog-end of the cigarette onto the concrete of the balcony, he extinguished it with his foot, turned and walked back into the room. A shiver ran through him, it was cool out there.
Jim grabbed his overcoat from the hanger behind the door, threw it on, picked up his wallet and keys from the side table, and headed out the door that would take him to the streets of New Orleans.
* * *
Two
Byron Portia slipped his silver-gray Peterbilt Hydro-Con into gear, rumbled out from the truck stop off I-15 and headed towards the interstate onramp.
In his late fifties, Byron was a man who just seemed to slip past the view of most people. If he had walked into a restaurant and blown away a couple of the patrons, the survivors would have been hard-pressed to remember any distinguishing feature. 'Nondescript' was the word most people would use to describe him, if they had to.
Of course, they would be completely wrong.
His unremarkable appearance was a carefully cultivated part of his persona. He did not
want
people to remember him. The mop of graying hair, usually hidden beneath a Met's baseball cap, changed color at his whim with the use of an off-the-shelf hair dye. He didn't favor wigs - too much chance they could fall off in a struggle. The paunch jutting out over his belted Levi's was sufficient to suggest a lazy, relaxed, lifestyle, of nights in front of the TV and a diet of Coors and fast food. His naturally frost-blue eyes were occasionally altered with the use of disposable tinted contact lenses, and he was always quick to cultivate a beard or mustache, interchanging as he saw fit. Underneath the baggy, blue flannelled shirt, he was a tightly muscled man. He worked out regularly using the dumbbells he kept in the back of his big-rig, putting in three hours a day most days.
Strong as an ox
, as his dear departed mom had often said.
He was meticulous about one other thing: maintaining his
mask
.
It did not matter how careful he was with all of his physical disguises, if you didn't take into account your
mask
then you were screwed. He had learned that little lesson early on in his career. No matter how well he manipulated his appearance as non-threatening, however shy he acted, how big-brotherly or fatherly he appeared, if he could not control his unconscious thoughts he would betray himself.
That bitch in Las Vegas had proved that to him.
The big-rig thundered up the onramp. The interstate filter light showed green, so he slipped the gear stick up a notch and gently eased his foot down on the accelerator, pushing the speedometer up towards sixty. He did this on instinct, his subconscious running through the routine of controlling the rig. His conscious mind ... elsewhere.
Byron could have activated the rig's artificial intelligence system and had it drive the vehicle but he was a man who liked to remain in control of every situation. In all the years that he owned the truck, not once had he switched the AI on.
Instead, he allowed his mind to drift, running through memories almost a quarter century old.
Vegas Baby!
What happens here, stays here.
That’s what the old ads had extolled. That whore of a city, built by the mob and run for years by a mayor who had represented more killers and triggermen than he could probably remember. It was in this place that his calling had almost ended before it started.
He had picked her up not far off the Strip. There were plenty of nondescript saloons and cantinas scattered throughout Vegas that would cater to the lonely trucker back then. Besides, it was always safer to pick them up in a bar rather than straight off the street; much less chance of them being an undercover vice cop that way.
Sitting at the bar nursing a rapidly warming Bud - he didn't enjoy beer, so he only occasionally took a sip from the longneck - she had sauntered up to him, taking the vacant barstool next to his.
She was all tits and make-up. She wore a short sequined dress that shimmered and glittered when she moved, cut just low enough to show off her implants. It rustled like a windblown tree when she sat down. Peroxide-blond hair framed a face pretty enough for her age ... and her profession.
"Hi," she had said her voice husky from too many cigarettes, "been in town long?"
He had just shaken his head and smiled at her.
She pulled a cigarette from her clutch bag and he lit it for her with an envelope of matches from the bar. She made sure she leaned low into him so he could see the full package.
Why do they always smoke
, he had thought to himself.
"My name’s Jenna," she said between puffs and extended her hand. He took it and shook it gently, returning her smile. Her skin was warm and clammy to the touch. It sent a thrill of revulsion through him.
"Anthony," said Byron, "Tony to my friends." He was careful always to use an assumed name.
"Well, Tony," - another Goddamn smile- "do you need a date?"
Then his mistake. For a second he saw what he was going to do her, its exquisiteness playing through his mind like a movie. The shock of her realization when he showed her the knife -
'the tools of the trade'
as he preferred to call them - the skittering look of confused terror on her face as she felt the steel slip between her ribs and pierce her heart, the muted gush of blood that would be accompanied by his own gush of liquid as he ended her dreadful, sinful, life.
It was all he had been able to do not to explode right there, so vivid were the images and so intense the need to fulfill God's will. The anticipation brought cold perspiration to his brow as he unconsciously wiped his greasy, sweaty, palms on his trousers.
His mask had slipped and the whore must have sensed the change in him, because her coy expression quickly disintegrated into a look of puzzlement, then a half-realization of just what she was sitting next to, of how close she was to death. It was subconscious but it was there.
"I ... I need to go freshen up," she stuttered her coquettish demeanor transformed now to that of a cornered alley cat. He could almost see the hair standing up on the back of her neck.
Confusion backlit her eyes as she pushed away from the bar and started to head towards the
ladies
-room. He grasped her by her forearm, gently but firm enough that she would have to struggle to break his hold. That’s when the full realization had hit her, and she pulled her arm out of his grasp.
"Why don't I come with you," he said suggestively.
"Stay away from me, you weirdo," she had spat back flecks of spittle landing against his face. "Stay away." Her face contorted by fear, not by rage, by
fear
.
She backed away, and then disappeared into the gloom of the bar. Byron stood up, trying to look as much like a disgruntled boyfriend as he could.
"Women," he said with an exaggerated sigh to the bartender, as if this single word could sum up the full complexity and confusion that was the fairer sex. He slapped down a five-dollar tip on the bar and made his way slowly out of the dive.
He was lucky that night, watched over by the
one
who had set him the task, who had taught him this, his most valuable lesson. But for weeks after leaving Las Vegas, he expected to be pulled over every time he saw a highway patrol officer or a Deputy, and
he
had been afraid. That was a first for him.
He did not understand what had happened that night, and spent hours going over the scenes in his head, looking at himself through her eyes, analyzing the situation. It had come to him eventually, a simple realization; on some lower level, she had detected his intentions. During that moment of indiscretion as he had teased himself with the pleasure to come, he emanated some kind of psychic energy that she had picked up on: his aura is how he thought of it.
Since then he was careful always to wear his psychic-mask when hunting. Slipping it on when he stepped out of his cab, not letting any part of the real Byron Portia ooze out of the cracks. Byron thought of it as locking himself away in a little room inside his head. Like one of those rooms on the old cop shows with one-way glass where he could look out and see them, but all that the person in the room would see was a reflection of themselves staring back at them.
It had worked. No more whores causing commotions in bars. Simple and efficient.
And so, here he was years later, heading south on I-15 towards Los Angeles. Still undiscovered. Protected. With much work behind him but far more still to come.
It was New Years Eve and there would be an awful lot of people out celebrating. That was just fine by him. He could lose himself easily in a crowd, walking among those he had been given the task of watching over. Watching for those that he hunted. And tonight he felt the pull, the need, the powerful imperative that flowed through his blood when the calling was upon him.
His truck hurtled along the highway, surrounded on either side by desert and the sun a liquid ball shimmering on the far horizon. He was just a couple of hours outside of LA, if everything remained copasetic he would find somewhere near Burbank airport and park up for the night, with enough time to clean himself up and go see-what-he-could-see.
Tonight he would hunt.
* * *