Penny Dreadful by Will Christopher Baer Read Free Book Online

wet and you twist it in your hands like a piece of rope. You sleep topless on the balcony with those strange shadows falling across your belly. You have more money than you know what to do with and still you steal fruit from the market. You spend hours shooting green bottles in the desert with your back to the sun.
    You ruined me for sex, by the way. I just can’t be bothered anymore. I can’t be fucked.
    I remember something you said about serial killers and how the interesting ones are always very good kissers. I stared at you, stupidly I’m sure. I asked how many serial killers had you kissed and you laughed like the ghost of Lady Macbeth. You kissed me.
    Moon was drunk, crashing around his apartment. He breathed wetly. His eyes rolled around, loose from their moorings. He was looking for something to punish, it seemed. He clumsily put his foot through a coffee table, panting. His foot became stuck and he fell heavily to the floor. I scrambled to move lamps and stereo equipment from harm’s way. I remember, vaguely, that Moon was not really supposed to drink. There had been incidents in the past, nasty incidents involving borrowed motorcycles and flooded toilets and gouged eyeballs. There had been a rather notorious sword fight maybe ten years ago. But I was never my brother’s keeper. The opposite, if anything. I could remember more than one night when Moon had prevented me from doing something stupid or fatal.
    Moon now lay sideways on the floor, his foot wedged among the splintered remains of his table. He coughed for several minutes, then demanded angrily to know where Mary had gone.
    I was patient. I promised him that I knew no one named Mary and Moon growled, then dropped the subject. I crouched next to him, patting his damp belly as if he were a wounded bear. Moon sighed sleepily and I quickly disarmed him. Moon carried only one weapon, and was known to disapprove of ankle holsters. But this Colt that he had carried at his hip for eleven years and had rarely fired was a regular monster. I hefted it, thinking I could easily kill a car with the fucker. I unloaded it, then slid the big gun under the couch. I currently had no gun, myself. I carried only the knife, and if it came to a knife fight I reckoned I was quicker on my feet than the poor coffee table, which had fared pretty well against Moon.
    What happened, said Moon. What happened in Texas goddamn you.
    Nothing much, I said. I watched a kid die.
    And the woman, said Moon. The fuck happened to that crazy bitch.
    I sat cross-legged on the floor. The carpet was dusty, hairy. It was pretty sticky in places. I stared at Moon’s heaving chest and belly, at the stains on his white shirt and the limp, smeared tie. The white, hairy stomach flesh that gathered at his waistband. The green canvas military belt with unpolished buckle. The filthy white pants, the white socks. The black shoes with flattened rubber heels. Moon needed a woman in the worst way.
    I leaned over and began to extricate Moon’s foot from the shards of wood.
    Jude, you mean. She’s living in Mexico City, last I heard. Married to a nice banker and two months pregnant. She’s happy as a clam.
    Liar, said Moon. Fuck happened.
    Ask me tomorrow.
    You shit me.
    Sleep, I said. Go to sleep.
    Not tired. Let’s go up on the roof.
    I don’t think so.
    Fresh air. I can’t breathe.
    You can’t even walk.
    Okay. Lemme tell you a story. Moon abruptly began to frisk himself, grabbing at his pockets and crotch. Where the fuck is my gun? My gun, my gun.
    I eyed the couch warily, hoping that Moon was too fat and soggy to wiggle over there. It’s in the freezer, I said. With your life savings.
    Okay. Shut up. Lemme tell you a story.
    Yeah. Tell me.
    Moon was a lump on the floor. His voice was thick, droning. I lit a cigarette and listened, my own eyes closed.
    Thirteen, said Moon. Total of thirteen cops gone missing. But it’s gradual. They fade. Not dead exactly. No bodies to speak of. They go undercover