Constantine by John Shirley, Kevin Brodbin Read Free Book Online

blood in the sink. “Screw the Indians,” he said. “Today is not a good day to die.”

FOUR
    Outskirts of Mexicali, Mexico

    T he old Ford pickup rattled through the cool early evening, along a potholed road between the warrens of dun colored, tile-roofed houses crowded together at the edge of town. The truck soon left the houses behind, came to a thinly populated region of warehouses, shanties, gas stations, strip joints, cantinas.
    In the back of the pickup, among cardboard boxes and gunnysacks, Francisco savored the evening air. He savored even the truck’s exhaust, the pluming dust. A new life. The north.
    There! The crossroads.
    The shape scarred into Francisco’s wrist seemed suddenly to burn and quiver.
    That way, Francisco. Not this way. The border guards will stop you. Head east and then north.
    But then again, why not use his new power in Mexicali? He could take over every gang, with this kind of power. He could gather money, and purchase a false identity, a passport-
    But the emblem on his wrist burned hot. And again he heard the buzzing, the gnawing… the ten million mouths chewing, feasting… then the whisper…
    No, Francisco. No delay. America - as quickly as possible. Los Angeles… glory awaits you there. Glory and power. ..
    But after all, why bother with Mexicali, or even Calexico? Why not a fresh start in the north?
    The truck barreled and jounced past the crossroads.
    “Pendajo!” Francisco shouted in Spanish, pounding on the roof of the truck. “The crossroad! Stop here - or go east!”
    The driver’s reply was hard to hear from within the cab. “First we go to… my cousin… you must pay more…”
    “I will pay nothing!” Francisco snarled, realizing he’d fallen in with a man who was going to hold him hostage. It happened often to people; his new clothes had given the impression he had money tucked away somewhere.
    The ratchety chewing, the droning, feasting buzz roared ever louder as Francisco drew the iron spike from his coat and smashed through the back window of the truck. The glass parted for his hand like paper. He grabbed the bearded, shouting driver by the throat from behind and with a single sharp pull smashed his head against the metal frame of the back window.
    Francisco held on as the truck swerved out of control, spun around once, and stalled. He climbed down, went to the driver’s door, pulled the dead man out and dumped him on the ground, then climbed in and started the truck. And he drove back to the crossroads, and to the east. He needed to find a way through the desert - to the north.

    Los Angeles, Ravenscar Hospital

    Angela felt the dread rising in her like hot bile as she walked through the hydrotherapy center, past the little spas, toward the shallow pool. Beside the pool a group of cops milled, uniforms mostly. They stood around two male nurses kneeling by a body.
    Detective Xavier was there, his shoulder and arm bandaged, watching her arrival. She moved past him, not wanting to talk.
    “Angie…” Xavier said. “You don’t need to see this…”
    Angela ignored him, thinking, in a distant sort of way, that really it was Xavier who shouldn’t be there. He should be convalescing, but it was like him to push the envelope.
    She walked over to the body. It seemed to take a strangely long time to get there. The coroner was hunkered by the covered shape. He was an older Chinese guy in a white coat, the pens clipped in his pocket leaking ink stains: a doctor, name of Zhen. He glanced up at her, hesitated, then lifted the tarp.
    “No, no, no. No…,” Angela heard herself say.
    “No, Isabel…”
    She knelt by the body and her tears fell on her sister’s pale, bruised face. Her twin sister, Isabel, in a bloodied nightgown. The dream had been with her all morning and she’d known, even before hearing about a suicide at Ravenscar, that the dream had been real - had been about Isabel, not Angela. But then again, Isabel owned a piece of Angela’s soul. That’s