Chapter 15

Inside, the parlor’s empty—even Vito’s gone, and the place looks forlorn and depressed. “Hello?” you call out, taking off your shades. Leaning over the counter, you try to see into the stockroom beyond the console, but the door’s half shut. “Anybody home? Vito?”

“He’s with the tech.” You turn as a heavyset girl comes up the stairs—she wears jeans that look painted onto her large legs and a long T-shirt that falls from big breasts to cover her stomach. There’s a familiarity about her, something you can’t quite place, and her voice is loud and brittle. She laughs like glass shattering. “You must be James.”

That’s what Vito calls you, and as she comes closer you can see she looks like him in the face—the same brown eyes, the same heart-shaped lips. “Where’s Vito?” you ask as you watch her, fascinated by the way she turns her broad hips with an odd grace to fit around the counter.