Read Online Available Dark: A Crime Novel (Cass Neary) by Elizabeth Hand - Free Book Online Page A

days. The people there freaked me out. He had a bouncer at that club, really scary guy.” She shuddered.
    “All bouncers are scary. That’s what they pay them for.”
    “Not like this one.” She lowered her voice and leaned across the table. “He cut people up—dead people, people Anton had killed for business. There was a girl, a prostitute from Estonia; she disappeared. And another guy, too, a drug dealer. This guy took the bodies and cut them up and buried the pieces. Someone I know saw him, he was with his girlfriend one night; she was carrying a bag, and there was a head in it.”
    I laughed. “A head? How’d they know it was a head if it was in a bag?”
    Suri stared moodily at her beer. “I don’t like to talk about those people.”
    “Like Anton?”
    “Like I said—creepy.”
    “Old creepy or young creepy?”
    “Not that old. Ilkka’s age. He lived for a while in Berlin and sold black-market stuff, before the Wall came down. Then he came back to Oslo and started Forsvar—his club. All the dark metal bands play there. He has a back room where they hang out, a private room.”
    “Did you go into it?”
    “No. Ilkka did, but he told me I wouldn’t like it.” She rubbed her arms, shivering. “Those guys were into bad stuff.”
    “Drugs?”
    “Yes, drugs, though mostly they liked beer. But there were other things. Anton is kiero —‘warped.’ He collects photos of dead people.”
    “Well, there’re photographers like that; lots of people collect their work. They get a ton of money for shooting dead people.”
    “Yes, I know that kind of stuff. But that’s not what I mean. Anton buys pictures by murderers, also drawings and paintings. American murderers, some Germans, Indonesian, whatever he can find. Serial killers.”
    “You mean like John Wayne Gacy? Those clown paintings? What an idiot. They were terrible.”
    “Some people don’t think so. Musicians in some of those bands, they collect them. Anton sells them photos, and other things. Anton collects these things himself, and he knows people who would pay a lot of money for them. That’s how Ilkka met him—Ilkka used to be a crime photographer, did you know? Before the Internet these collectors would meet at a hotel room in Berlin or New York or Oslo. Now they do business online.”
    “Or in Anton’s club.”
    “That’s why I didn’t get too close. And you know, the head.”
    “You ever meet his customers?”
    “I tried not to. But Ilkka never did much business like that,” she added earnestly. “Sometimes he sells one of his old crime photos to Anton, as a favor. I have to make the arrangements. It’s not illegal; you’d think it would be, but it’s not. Murderabilia, it’s called. Some people only collect from serial killers in jail. Some people, they like autographs or…”
    She made a face, and went on. “Hair. Or fingernail clippings. All from murderers. I think it should be against the law.”
    That might explain how Anton found out about me. It also might explain the sudden spike in prices for Dead Girls. To a completist, maybe my passing association with a serial killer would be enough; the photo in Stern would lead them to my book and then, in Anton’s case, to me.
    I leaned across the table and covered Suri’s delicate hands with my own. She smiled, and I drew her hand to my mouth, kissed one knuckle then let my tongue trace the cleft between two fingers, tasting salt and ink. After a moment she withdrew her hand, still smiling. My eyes lingered on the ring on her third finger, a thick band of silver set with a moonstone.
    “My girlfriend,” she said. “For Christmas. We’re engaged.”
    “Too bad.” I sank back into my chair. “I don’t get it. You say you hate this, but you still work for Ilkka. Which means you have to deal with people like Anton.”
    Suri finished her beer. “Yes, I know. I’m a hypocrite. But selling crime photos, it’s not so different from fashion photography. Bodies are just