THE CASE OF THE SCREAMING SHIP

Dom was missing. And I was trying not to panic.

We were working a divorce case. It wasn't much of a case, and I can't say I like that kind of work, but it paid the bills. However, the job called for a fair amount of surveillance, so we were alternating shifts - Dom had the night and I had the day. We weren't seeing as much of each other as I would have liked, but that was sometimes the nature of the job.

But that morning, when I went to relieve Dom from our hotel-room vantage point, she wasn't there.

I used the hotel phone to call the office.

Sooraya answered. She's our secretary.

"Yes, Miss Marie?" she asked. I've told her to just call me Marie maybe a dozen times, but Sooraya wouldn't do it. She's pretty old-fashioned.

"Have you heard from Dom?" I shot back, not bothering with pleasantries.

"No. Is something wrong?"

"She's not here. Did you see her yesterday?"

"Miss Domino was in here yesterday evening, just before she was supposed to start her turn on watch. She took a phone call and then she left."

"Do you remember anything about the phone call?" I asked.

"I answered the phone," Sooraya said tensely. "It was a man's voice - not young and he sounded nervous. He said he wanted to speak to Neena Thurman and I gave Miss Domino the phone."

That was possibly useful. Not a lot of people knew Domino's real name. She doesn't use it very often.

"What did Dom say?"

"Almost nothing. She listened for a while - perhaps a minute. Then she said she would look into it, hung up, and left the office. She didn't say anything to me, but I was busy with my typing."

I paused, thinking over what Sooraya had told me.

"I'm sorry. I should have paid more attention," Sooraya added. She was obviously worried.

"It's all right, Sooraya. I'll ask around. Maybe she got side-tracked and forgot to call in."

I didn't believe my own reassuring words. Dom may seem reckless if you don't know her very well, but she's actually very careful about the things she has control over. In all the time I've known her, she's never just vanished.

I made a series of phone calls, checking out various places where Dom might be.

The answer was the same everywhere I called. Nobody had seen Dom. Nobody knew where she was.

I called another PI and had her take over the divorce case for us. As far as I was concerned, the only thing I was going to be investigating was Dom's disappearance.

Then I picked up the phone one more time. I have a very, very powerful friend. His name is Logan and he's the biggest gang-lord in town. And once upon a time, he and I had been close. He had done favors for me - and Dom - in the past.

The phone was next to my ear and my finger was on the dial. Then I hesitated.

A while back, Domino had gone to Logan and asked for help. A lot of help. So much help that she'd been forced to make a deal with Logan. She promised to someday do a no-questions-asked job for him. She hadn't liked that, because there was no telling what Logan might ask her - us - to do.

So what if Logan wasn't the solution to Dom's disappearance?

What if he was the problem?

I dialed a different phone number. Logan wasn't my only useful connection.

There was a diner about a mile from the hotel that Logan used for his headquarters. The coffee tended to be a little weak, but the apple pie was really good. When I was a kid, my mom used to take me there. We both liked the place.

I sat down at my usual table. The waitress had been working there for a long time. She recognized me and gave me a smile. She knew my opinion of the coffee so, without bothering to ask, she got me a cup of tea.

A woman walked in the door. I didn't know her, but I did recognize her. She walked over to my table and sat down.

Then the woman sitting across from me changed into someone else. Now she had light blue skin and dark-red hair. She was Raven Darkholme, Logan's bodyguard and one of his way too many bed-partners.

"Hello, sweetie," she said. Then she leaned over and kissed me.

"Hi, mom," I said quietly.

Nobody knew about Raven and I. Not Logan. Not even Domino.

Maybe my real parents are still alive. Maybe they're dead. But they didn't really matter. After they abandoned me, Raven Darkholme took me in. I'm not saying she was the perfect mother - far from it - but when nobody else was there for me, she was. I won't ever forget that.

"What's wrong?" she asked.

"Domino is missing," I said.

She didn't say anything.

"Is Dom doing a job for Logan?" I asked.

She shook her head. "No."

"Are you sure?" I pressed.

"As sure as I can be. I'm within a few feet of Logan twenty-four hours a day. I know Logan and Domino have a deal, but he hasn't called in that marker yet."

The she hesitated before going on, her yellow eyes looking into mine. "I spent last night with Logan. Nothing out of the ordinary is going on right now - I know his moods by now."

Yes, my mom is sleeping with the man who was my first lover. In fact, Dom and Logan also used to be together.

One of Logan's street-names is "Wolverine". I understand that nickname goes all that way back to when he was in the Canadian army, back during the Great War. But I think that's the wrong animal. It's more like Logan is a lion. A lion-king, lording over the domain he built with his own strength and ruthlessness, and surrounded by an ever-shifting pride of deadly lionesses. We lady-lions come and go. We tell ourselves that we love Logan, then later on we tell ourselves that we're better off to be free of him. But that last part is a lie.

You're never really free of Logan.

I rubbed my eyes tiredly.

"What happened?" my mom asked.

"Dom went into the office yesterday evening and took a phone call. Then she told our secretary that she had to go check on something. We haven't heard from her since."

"Did you two have a fight?" she asked carefully. Raven didn't quite approve of Dom - she'd rather I date someone with money and a penis - but she's always said I was old enough to make my own mistakes. We usually avoided the subject of Dom.

"No."

"Are you working on anything?"

"A divorce case. A dentist is stepping out on his wife. All we're doing is surveillance. There's nothing about the case that's dangerous or even interesting."

My mom frowned and sat back in her chair. I could tell by the expression on her face that she was about to say something I didn't particularly want to hear.

"Honey... Dom has irritated a lot of dangerous people over the years," she said slowly.

I nodded. "I know."

She didn't say anything more, and I was grateful for that. Dom is an independent operator who's rubbed shoulders with most of the big-shots of this city. The list of people she's pissed off at one time or another is impressive. It was the kind of record that could easily result in a person simply vanishing one day, never to be seen again.

Not only might Dom be gone forever, but I might never even know what happened to her. Things like that happen in this city.

"I'll keep my ears open. And I'll ask a few questions," Raven promised.

"Thanks, mom," I said gratefully.

Then she frowned. "You know, come to think of it, there is someone you might want to talk to..."

She paused.

"Who?" I asked eagerly.

"Kitty," my mom said slowly. "Kitty Pryde. I heard her asking questions about the Santini family just the other day."

The Santini's were the mob family that used to run this town before Logan showed up. Logan's takeover had been hellishly brutal. Some of the stories from those days are pretty ugly. I joined Logan's gang a few years after the takeover and I noticed that some very tough people in Logan's gang didn't like to talk about the things they'd done in those days.

"What does that have to do with Dom?" I asked.

My mom pursed her lips. "Maybe nothing. But Dom helped Logan take down the Santini family."

Huh?

"You didn't know about that?" my mom asked me. She didn't really sound that surprised.

"No. How was Dom involved?"

"Well... not a lot of people talk about it, and it was before I joined up with Logan, but the way I heard the story, Dom infiltrated the Santini family and gave Logan a lot of useful information."

That didn't sound quite right. Yeah, I knew Dom has done work for Logan every now and then over the years, but Dom never said anything to me about the Santini family or being involved in Logan's takeover of the city.

Kitty worked nights and slept during the day, but I didn't care. I just banged on her door until she finally opened it.

Of course, the first thing she did was point a gun at my head.

"What the FUCK do you want?!" she snarled.

Kitty's a small and slender woman with curly brown hair and dark-brown eyes. At the moment, all she was wearing was a dirty and ragged men's t-shirt that hung down to mid-thigh. It was so tattered that one of her nipples was exposed.

Kitty was arguably the biggest nut in Logan's crew - a crazy and violent loose-cannon. Nobody liked her, and if you were smart you were scared of her. One of the biggest questions people kept asking about Logan was why he tolerated Kitty.

While I couldn't say with a straight face that Kitty and I were friends - Kitty doesn't have any friends - I'd always been able to talk to her. I was depending on that.

"I need help," I said.

Kitty hesitated. Then she took her finger off the trigger of the handgun.

"This better be good," Kitty said as she carelessly tossed her pistol onto the kitchen table. Then she reached into the cupboard and pulled out a bottle and a couple of glasses. As she stretched up to the cupboard, the t-shirt she was wearing rode up enough to reveal the lower quarter of her bare ass.

She poured us both a couple of fingers of rye and handed me one of the glasses.

"Dom's missing," I said.

Kitty didn't say anything. She just took a long, deliberate drink from her glass. She and Dom have a lot of bad history, and Kitty usually came off the worst in their exchanges. She wasn't used to that.

"What do you know about the Santini family?" I asked. There was no point in beating around the bush.

Kitty blinked and then collapsed into a rickety wooden chair. "For God's sake, Rogue, what the hell are you talking about? You roll me out of bed and tell me that your bitch girlfriend is missing. Then you ask me about ancient history? What the fuck is wrong with you?"

"There might be a connection between Dom's disappearance and the Santini family."

Actually, I had no reason in the world to believe that. I was just going with my mom's gut notion that it was odd that Dom had gone missing just a day or so after Kitty had said something about some "ancient history" that also happened to involve Dom.

Kitty shrugged, "Alphonso Santini is back in town."

"Who the heck is Alphonso Santini?" I asked tiredly.

"He was his family's chief enforcer. He scared people. He hurt people. He killed people. You might say he was a people-person."

Then Kitty giggled in that crazy way of hers. It didn't help that the way she was sitting - with her ankles crossed, her knees slightly open, and her t-shirt riding up on her hips - was giving me the kind of no-imagination-required peep-show that normally cost two-bits in some of this town's seamier bars. Sometimes I wondered just how much of Kitty's "I'm-crazy" routine is real and how much of it is an act, but at the moment she was coming across as a slutty lunatic.

"Why would he be back in town?" I asked. "Logan killed most of the Santini family. I'd steer well clear if I were him."

Kitty made a disgusted face. "Maybe he's stupid. Or suicidal. Or looking for something."

"Looking for what?"

Smiling into her drink, Kitty said, "Who knows? A girl. Revenge. Money. There's been talk for years that there was a Santini stash that we never found. A big one - something like a hundred gees."

A hundred thousand dollars was serious money. It was more than enough to set a man up for life. Or give him the operating capital he needed to build something big.

"How did you hear that Alphonso was back in town?" I asked.

"There's a guy named Sylvester who used to run numbers for the Santini's. The cops thinks he's one of their informers, but I basically own his ass. He was small fry, and Logan let guys like him go after we took over. But he knew Alphonso by sight. And he swore to me that Alphonso was back in town."

"Do you trust this Sylvester guy?" I asked.

Kitty giggled again. "The trick is to kick Sylvester in the balls until he begs for permission to lick your shoes clean. After that, you can pretty much trust whatever he says."

Kitty has these spells where she seems to be even crazier than normal. And, lucky me, she seemed to be sliding into one of them as we spoke.

"Is there a connection between Alphonso and Dom?" I asked, trying to keep my voice calm and level.

"Yep."

I waited, but Kitty didn't say anything. And there was a smirk on her face.

"C'mon, Kitty," I said evenly.

"Secrets," Kitty said, her eyes now brighter and wilder than normal, and her smile cocked to one side. "There are so many secrets in this town. Ask me to tell you a secret, Rogue."

I finished my drink and put my glass on the table with a sigh. "Okay, I'll play. Tell me a secret, Kitty."

"I love Logan. I love him, but he doesn't love me. Not they way he loves you. Or his two pet killers. Or that bitch you sleep with."

I shook my head, "That's not a secret, Kitty. I've always known that. So tell me a real secret."

Kitty gave me a long and dangerous look. "I've been with Logan for a long time. In the beginning, it was just me and him. We came to this city together. That was after he freed me."

"Freed you?" I said slowly.

Kitty nodded. "Yes. You see, once upon a time..."

She paused. "Do you mind if I tell the story like a fairy tale?"

I waved a hand at nothing in particular. "Go ahead."

"Thanks," Kitty said with a happy grin. "I like fairy tales."

Then Kitty took a deep breath and began.

"Once upon a time, there was a princess. Not a beautiful princess, but still a princess. And she lived in the magical city of Chicago with her mommy and daddy. And she was happy there."

Kitty paused and looked at me expectantly, waiting for something from me. I just nodded my head. That seemed to satisfy her.

"But the princess was different," she continued. "She could do things that other people couldn't do. Unfortunately, she was very young and very foolish and didn't know she should hide the fact that she was different. And that was why men came from the north to steal her away. They wanted her because she was different. The men of the north killed her mommy and daddy. Then they took the princess far north to their fortress of iron and snow."

Kitty paused and took another sip from her glass. "Am I going too fast?" she asked.

"No," I said quietly.

Kitty nodded and went on. "And in the fortress there were cruel guards and evil doctors - doctors with knives and needles and electricity. They made the princess take off all of her clothes, and they shaved her head, and then they did things to her with their knives and needles and electricity. The princess was very sad."

My stomach began to turn over.

"That went on for a long and terrible time. But then a not-very-handsome knight in not-very-shiny armor and with three very sharp swords in each hand came to the fortress of iron and snow. He killed the doctors and he rescued the princess. But by then it was too late. Way too late. Something was broken in the princess and it couldn't be fixed."

Kitty ground to a halt, staring out at nothing for a long moment.

"She was broken and she couldn't be fixed," Kitty whispered.

Kitty took a deep breath and finished her drink. Then she said in a completely normal voice, "So, you see, Rogue, I've been around longer than most people know. I've seen things and I know things. And I know why Domino would like to meet Alphonso."

"Why?" I asked.

"Alphonso Santini murdered Domino's husband."

It was no secret to me that Dom used to be married. Her husband's name had been Milo, and he was years dead and gone. However, I didn't know much more than that. Since that was a part of her past that Dom obviously didn't want to discuss, I let it go.

I was beginning to regret that decision.

"I'm going back to bed," Kitty said with a yawn. Whatever had overtaken her over a few minutes ago now seemed to be gone. Kitty was as close to normal as she was going to get.

I got to my feet.

"My bed's big enough for two," Kitty said absently, "and I always thought you were cute."

"Thanks," I said as politely as I could. It wasn't the first time Kitty had made that offer. "But I really need to find Dom."

Kitty mumbled a tired and indistinct reply as she stumbled back to her bedroom.

I used a pay-phone to call Sooraya. She was camped out at the office.

There was still no word from Dom.

"I questioned everyone in the neighborhood," Sooraya said. "Mac at the newspaper stand saw Miss Domino get into her car and drive away. Mac said she was heading towards the docks."

That was solid information. Mac was sweet on Dom, so he kept an eye on her.

It was late afternoon when I arrived at Emma Frost's apartment building. Emma is a powerful psychic. She's also a friend of Dom's. Personally, I didn't think much of Emma, but since this was about Dom, I was willing to bet that she would help.

The doorman recognized me and let me pass without any trouble. Dom and I had visited Emma more than once.

Jean Grey opened the door of Emma's apartment. She's Emma's live-in girlfriend. Jean is a tall, green-eyed, and red-haired girl that Dom calls "heart-attack beautiful". That's actually a pretty accurate description. At the moment, Jean was dressed in a short robe of expensive-looking gray silk, and nothing else. So far, it seemed to be my day for talking to women who were wearing minimal clothes. Normally that would be fun, but it was turning out to be a bad day.

Dom thought there was more to the story of Emma and Jean than a couple of girls in the top one percent of the beauty bracket enjoying each other's company. According to Dom, Emma thought there was something dangerous about Jean Grey. Something that Emma had to keep an eye on. Emma calls it the Phoenix and I had no clue what that was supposed to be about.

Well, if you had to keep tabs on someone, it might was well be one of the most beautiful women in town. The fact that Jean was sleeping with Emma made for a nice bonus. It's funny how things are always so easy for Emma. I suppose the millions of dollars, the ice-queen looks, and the psychic powers all helped.

On the other hand, my experience with Jean suggested that she was a decent person. She just had a problem with her taste in women, but I suppose I really couldn't hold that against her. We all have our weak spots.

"Emma isn't here," Jean said as she stepped out of the way and let me into the apartment. "She's out of town on Frost Enterprises business. She won't be back for at least a week."

The apartment was huge and was decorated in the art-deco style that was such a rage. I couldn't even hazard a guess what the furnishings cost. Or how much Emma paid in rent. I was sure that those kinds of numbers were meaningless unless you happened to study astronomy.

"Dammit," I fumed.

"What's wrong?" Jean asked.

"Dom's missing. I was hoping that Emma could track her down."

"That would be tricky in the city," Jean said thoughtfully. "There are a lot of people and that throws up psychic interference."

"I hate to admit it, but Emma's pretty good."

Jean smiled. "And so am I. Can you narrow down Dom's location?"

I thought about what Sooraya had told me. "How about the dockside part of town?"

Jean nodded her head and said, "That's something to work with. I can give it a try, but I'll need your help."

"Anything you need," I promised.

Jean hesitated before she went on. "I don't know Domino as well as you or Emma, but I need to have a strong psychic impression of her to work with. Do you understand what that means?"

"You'll have to get inside my head and find the part of me that's about Dom."

She nodded as she looked at me closely. "Are you okay with that?"

I shook my head. "Dom might be in trouble. This isn't the time to be worried about privacy."

Jean sighed. "I hope you feel the same way a few minutes from now."

Jean sat down in an easy chair. She had me sit on the floor, between her bare feet. Then she tangled her fingers in my hair, pressing her fingertips against my scalp.

There was a time when that would have been a really dangerous. I didn't always have the control over my power that I have now. Back in those days, if I touched someone else - accidentally or deliberately - it would knock them flat and fill my head with their thoughts.

I'm not a psychic like Jean or Emma, but one of the things I do when I touch someone is see some or all of their memories. And that also happens whenever I touch someone to absorb their powers. Back during the case with Doctor Banner and his wife, I had to copy Emma's powers. Which meant I knew more about Emma than she probably liked.

Suddenly, everything seemed to drift away, as Jean began to work her way into my mind.

We were in a memory I had taken from Emma. Emma and Jean were in the back of Emma's limousine. They had polished off some really expensive champagne at a local club and were both in the "silly-giggling" stage of being drunk. That was apparently also the "clothing-optional" stage of being drunk. Their chauffeur was getting quite of a show...

*Oh...* Jean said in a small, embarrassed voice.

*Sorry,* I whispered. Then I realized that neither one of us had really said anything out loud. We were psychically linked.

We shifted again, but we ended up in another of Emma's memories. Dom was naked and her hands were cuffed behind her back. She was kneeling on a concrete floor and secured to it by a length of chain around her neck. The scene - cruel and strikingly erotic - was starkly lit by a single bulb that hung from the ceiling. A coldly smiling Emma crouched down next to Dom, yanked her head back, and then kissed her hard. Meanwhile, Emma's white-gloved hand slid slowly down the length of Dom's nude body...

*Let's move on,* I suggested very hastily.

*Uhm... right!* Jean replied.

I was in Logan's small and sparsely furnished bedroom. It was night, but the window was open and the room was illuminated by the reflected light of the city, as cool night drove away the heat of the day. Logan and I were in bed, our bodies straining against each other. It was the same bed Dom used to share with Logan. Someday, Raven would be in that bed as well...

I flinched away from the thought of Logan and Raven together. Jean sensed that something was wrong and wordlessly began to pull us both away. But before we moved on, I could feel her strong attraction to Logan.

Logan and I were still making love. But then what we saw shifted from my memory to Jean's desire. Suddenly, it wasn't me in bed with Logan. It was Jean...

*Oh, blast it,* Jean said. I couldn't see the blush on her face, but I could feel it.

*Don't be embarrassed,* I replied. *Just about every woman wonders about him.*

*Is it worth the risk of getting close to him? He's had - has - so many women in his life...*

*There isn't a simple answer. I'm sorry, it's hard to explain.*

Without specifically replying, I knew Jean was considering my words.

Suddenly, the visions turned ugly.

A gas-filled room. Charles Xavier was already unconscious. Confused and terrified, Jean tried to hold her breath as she dragged Xavier to safety, but the gas got to her and she began to choke...

Jean shivered and hugged me closer, her legs suddenly clenching around my middle.

I put my hands on her bare knees and said reassuringly, *It's okay. You're safe now.*

Maria Hill had turned into... something. A thing of fire and bones and evil. And she was killing Dom - strangling the life out of her. Nothing was working, so I used my powers. I touched Hill and... and...

My entire body jerked as my mind flinched away from that memory. I wouldn't remember what I had seen in the transformed Maria Hill. I didn't dare remember.

*Easy,* Jean said softly as she steered us away. *Think about Dom. We're here for Dom.*

I tried to focus on some of my fondest memories of me and Dom together.

That first night together. We talked for hours - and then went back to my place and made love. Dom was so nervous and that was both funny and charming. She'd never been with a woman before...

A quiet moment in the office. Dom was writing a report for a client on a legal pad. I filled her coffee cup, shook my head at her look of intense and angry concentration - she hates to write - and kissed her on the top of her head. She blinked in surprise and then smiled up at me...

We were taking a bath together in the tiny tub of my old apartment. Dom closed her eyes and sighed in pleasure as I slowly slid a bar of soap over her body...

Dom had been too much for those Inner Circle mercenaries to handle. I called in the cavalry and we found her at the end of a trail of bodies. The look that filled her eyes when she saw it was me...

It was early in the morning and we were on a stakeout. Hours and hours of sitting in a car and doing nothing was excruciatingly boring, but Dom was always able to handle it . She was being so serious and focused and professional - which meant that the only reasonable response was to take off my clothes. It was the first time I'd done that to Dom and she was completely, comically, surprised...

It was our first Christmas together. We had just started the business and were having a tough time finding clients. Both of us were broke. Dom gave me a worn, but serviceable, switchblade. I tried not to laugh because Dom didn't see anything at all odd about what she had given me...

*I can feel her. She's alive,* Jean said suddenly.

I snapped back to reality, suddenly aware that I was still sitting at Jean's feet, with her legs around me and her hands in my hair. My hands had moved up from her knees and where slowly stroking her warm, smooth, thighs. I stopped. That sort of psychic connection was extremely personal. It could easily take you in directions that you wanted to go, but shouldn't go.

"Alive?" I gasped. I was disoriented and confused and aroused by my memories of Dom and my close proximity to Jean, and it took me a second to understand what Jean was saying.

"Dom's alive, but she's hurt," Jean said, trying to concentrate on what she'd seen. "She's in a building just off the river. There's a warehouse across the street that has a sign. It says 'South Seas Freight and Storage'."

I jumped to my feet and bolted for the door. Well... actually I stumbled to my feet and lurched for the door.

"Wait! I'll come with you!" Jean called. I stopped. Yeah, I had to find Dom, but having a world-class psychic for backup was worth the delay. Besides, I needed a few seconds to recover from my session with Jean.

Jean ran into another room, dropping her robe to the floor as she went. I caught a glimpse of her slim pale body and had to force myself to look away. Within seconds, she was back. She was wearing riding pants and carrying a pair of shoes in one hand, while awkwardly trying to button her blouse with the other hand. As we rode the elevator down to the lobby, I finished buttoning her shirt as she jammed her shoes onto her feet.

Once we were in my car, I drove like a madwoman and we got to the docks in record time. At the docks, I questioned some locals, handing out a few bucks to speed up the process. We found the warehouse Jean had seen in her vision pretty quickly.

"Over there," Jean said, pointing to a dilapidated building across from the warehouse. The building had a sign that proclaimed it to be the offices of "Santini Imports", but it definitely didn't look like the business was a going concern. Most of the windows were boarded up and there was "For Sale" sign nailed to the door.

Jean stared at the building.

"Damn it," she said after a few seconds. She was obviously worried.

"What's wrong?" I asked.

"She's in bad shape."

I could feel cold panic rising inside of me. I pulled my six-gun out of my purse and got out of the car. A passing drunk blinked owlishly at me - and my gun - and then immediately turned around and went back the way he had come.

The door to Santini Imports was locked. I aimed my gun at the lock and began to pull back the hammer, but Jean quickly grabbed my wrist.

The lock clicked and the door opened itself.

I didn't know that Jean was also a mind-mover. But that wasn't really an issue at the moment.

"Up there," Jean said thoughtfully as she scanned the top of the building. She pointed to the only window on the second floor that wasn't boarded up.

The interior of the building was empty. All of the furniture had been moved. The walls were decaying and a cloud of dust followed us as we moved from room to room. In the disturbed dust, we could see signs that someone else had been in the building recently.

Upstairs, in the room that Jean had pointed out, we found Dom and Alphonso Santini. Santini was dead. Dom was unconscious and barely breathing. Santini had been shot twice - once in his chest and again in the head. Either shot would have killed him, but the wound to his head had taken away a big part of Santini's skull. Dom had three slugs in her - one in her side and two more in her right arm. The only reason she hadn't bled out was because she'd managed to tear strips from her shirt and stuff them into her wounds. I think a normal person would have died anyway, but Dom is unnaturally tough.

All of a sudden, I was cold as ice. There was no time to panic. I had to make all of the right moves and I had to make them quickly.

I tossed my car keys to Jean. "Get the car and park it right up against the building entrance," I told her.

She nodded jerkily and left the room. Jean was holding it together, but she wasn't used to the kind of bloodshed she was seeing now.

I tucked Dom's .45 automatic and Santini's .38 into my purse. I carefully pocketed the two spent cartridges from Dom's gun. Gritting my teeth, I used a knife to extract the two .45 slugs - the one that was still in Santini and the other from the wall behind him. Then I quickly patted down Santini's corpse. There wasn't a lot to be found, but I emptied his pockets anyway.

Then I picked up Dom and carefully carried her downstairs. She didn't make a sound. That was when the tight control I'd been keeping on myself began to break down. By the time I got to the door, my eyes were blurry with tears.

Jean had the car's back-door open. I carefully put Dom in the backseat.

"You stay with her," Jean said. "I'll drive. Where's the nearest hospital?"

I shook my head. "Take us to Logan's place."

There was a damn good reason not to go to a hospital - a man was dead and I didn't really want to deal with the cops. And besides, Logan's outfit kept some pretty good doctors on retainer.

Sam Guthrie and Danni Moonstar were guarding the lobby when Jean and I carried Dom inside. Hank McCoy - Logan's second-in-command - happened to be there as well. Hank didn't ask any questions. He just had us put Dom on a cot in the hotel office and then quickly called in a doctor. Meanwhile, Sam and Danni brought a startling amount of hospital-quality medical equipment and supplies into the office.

The doctor arrived quickly. He was an elderly gentleman carrying a black bag and dressed in a manner that was forty years out of style. He immediately threw us all out of the office and went to work on Dom.

Hank escorted Jean and I into the hotel's mostly-unused bar and poured us a drink.

"What happened?" he finally asked.

"Dom got into a shoot-out with Alphonso Santini," I said.

The shot-glass that was half-way to Hank's mouth stopped in midair. Then he put it back on the table.

"What kind of shape is Santini in?" he asked carefully.

"The 'dead' kind of shape," I responded with a shrug. "His body is in the old Santini Imports building down by the docks."

"If this was anyone else, I'd say Dom was collecting on the contract we put out on Santini." Hank said slowly. "But since it was Dom, I presume she was finally settling things with him?"

I think I blinked in surprise. "You guys had a hit out on Santini?"

Hank nodded. "We heard he was back in town. It took Logan all of five seconds to decide that Santini wouldn't get to leave town alive. We put the word out just this evening that we wanted Santini out of the picture. Dom has five gees coming her way."

I shook my head. "I don't think Dom will take the money."

Hank smiled. "Maybe. See if you can talk some sense into her when she wakes up."

I gave Hank a long look. "You said something about it being personal between Dom and Santini."

He nodded. "They've got a history. Did Dom ever tell you about her husband and Santini?"

"I don't know the details."

Hank shifted deeper into his chair, staring thoughtfully out into the distance.

"Back before Logan took over, Dom spent quite a few years working for the government as an investigator. Some people say she worked for the Army. Others said it was the State Department. Whichever it was, she eventually got tired of it, quit, and moved here. Which is where she met Milo."

I nodded. I knew all of this.

"What Milo did for a living is kind of hard to describe," Hank continued. "He analyzed things. He looked at patterns in international trade, the stock market, military budgets, political party platforms, elections - that sort of thing - and then made predictions of what was going to happen in the future. And he was apparently pretty good at it. He made a lot of money working for stockbrokers, companies, banks, and the government. Hell, if he was still around, I'd try to put him on our payroll. And he eventually became important enough that he needed a bodyguard."

"Dom," I said.

Hank nodded. "She spent two months guarding him... and the next thing you know, they were married. I never met Milo, but everything I hear says he was a good guy. He and Dom were happy together, but it didn't last long."

"What happened?"

With a sigh, Hank finally picked up his shot of whiskey and downed it. "It was one of those damned things. There was a guy who owed the Santini family some money, but wasn't paying. The decision was made to make an example of him. A pair of buttonmen - including Alphonso Santini - got the nod to kill him, but they did a sloppy job of marking their target. They got Milo instead of the guy they were actually looking for."

"Oh, for God's sake," I said disgustedly.

"Yeah. That was a good example of how old man Santini and his people did things. Shoot first and ask questions later. And if you got the wrong guy... well, just keep on shooting until you did get the right guy. There was a reason the Santini family lasted for so long, but fell so hard. Everyone was terrified of them."

I gave Hank a long look. "And nobody is scared of Logan?"

Hank didn't take what I'd said personally. "Yeah, but when's the last time you heard of us killing the wrong guy? A guy who wasn't a player, but who just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time? For that matter, how often do we kill anyone? People fear us because of what we'll do if you cross us - not because we're borderline crazy and fulltime murderous. And that's actually good business on our part. In the end, the Santini family had a lot of enemies and no allies. Everyone wanted old man Santini and his people gone. You would be surprised at who helped us take him down."

Then Hank became more subdued. "And one of those people was Dom."

I nodded slowly. That certainly fit with what I knew about Dom. Hurt someone important to her and you're in big trouble.

"We were a small organization at the time, but Logan already had the idea of taking over the town. Betsy was giving us a lot of useful information, but she still wasn't used to her abilities. We needed to get somebody on the inside of the Santini family. That's the sort of job we would have Raven do nowadays, but she wasn't with us back then. Eventually, Dom contacted us and volunteered for the job - I still don't know how she figured out what he were up to. The number two man in the Santini family was Michael Santini. Dom got... uh..."

Then the big bad gangster suddenly got flustered at the thought of offending delicate little me. Hank can be such a doofus sometimes.

"Dom got close to Michael Santini and spread her legs for him," I said dryly. "Then - like most men - he turned his brain off and became a huge blabbermouth because he wanted to impress his new girl. Quit treating me like a kid, Hank."

Hank shot me a dirty look. "Anyway, Dom began feeding us information that was all but priceless. We had Betsy expand on what Dom was sending us. Within a few weeks, we knew old man Santini's organization better than he did."

"That was when we moved. We took over in a matter of days," Hank finished.

"But Alphonso got away," I added.

Hank nodded. "He was lucky. He just happened to be out of town when the takeover happened. Then he buried himself deep. We couldn't find him. And neither could Dom."

I stared at Hank for a long moment. "Tell me the rest, Hank."

He gave me a sharp look.

"I mean it, Hank. You aren't telling me everything. Tell me the rest."

Hank stared into his drink for a second. "You don't want to know the rest."

"Maybe I need to know," I shot back. "Dom's flat on her back with three bullet-holes in her and I don't think I have all of the picture. There's something more going on here."

Hank downed his drink and refilled our glasses. "Before Dom infiltrated the Santini gang, she got Logan to make her a promise. Logan promised that we would capture as many of the Santini wiseguys as possible. Then Dom would decide how they died."

Something tightened up inside of me. An inner voice told me to tell Hank to stop talking, but I shut it down.

Hank's eyes were distant now, as he looked into a past he didn't particularly want to remember. "The night after we took over, we locked the Santini guys into the hold of an old cargo ship and set out to sea."

A distracted smile flickered across Hank's face, and then vanished. "Try to imagine this, Marie. Imagine Logan asking Dom to show mercy to someone. It was the closest I've ever seen Logan come to begging. And it wasn't just about giving the Santini boys a break. What Dom wanted us to do was bad. It meant crossing a line that, once you've crossed it, you couldn't ever come back from. I think Logan was actually worried about Dom - worried about what she might turn into because of what we were about to do."

"What did you do?" I asked quietly.

"We set fires fore and aft on the ship. Then we got on the tug that was our escort and put some distance between us and the ship. But we didn't leave - Dom wouldn't let us. She wanted to watch. It took quite a while for the ship to burn. And all the while the Santini's screamed as they cooked alive."

I couldn't leave the hotel until I knew that Dom was okay. I offered to let Jean take my car and drive back to her apartment, but she turned me down. We ended up in the lobby, curled up in a pair of leather easy chairs, with a bottle on the table between us. I was getting drunk. Jean didn't say anything. She just watched me with worried eyes.

Logan walked into the hotel. Raven and Yuriko were escorting him. As always, mom and I didn't react to each other's presence. Our relationship is a secret that nobody else needs to know.

Logan looked at me. Then he looked at Jean. Then he frowned at the dangerously depleted bottle that was on the table between us.

Logan sat down in the chair opposite me and grabbed the bottle. He drank directly from it, draining a fair amount of what was left. Yuriko, in a kimono and full geisha makeup, stood behind Logan's chair. Raven was off to the side, watching the door.

"How's Dom?" Logan asked me.

"Hurt bad. She's lost a lot of blood," I said sullenly.

"I hear she got in a shootout with Alphonso Santini."

I nodded my head and reached for the bottle. Logan picked it up and put it on the floor next to him.

"Dammit, Logan," I tried to snarl at him. It sounded pretty weak, even to me.

"You've had enough," he said firmly. Jean, sitting beside Logan, nodded in agreement.

I leaned back in my chair. Tired, drunk, scared, and pissed off was a bad combination and it was turning me into a bitch. I was searching for something to say to Logan that would hurt him. Which was a stupid and unnecessary thing to do to a man who was helping me, but that was the mood I was in.

Before I could say anything, Jean touched me on my shoulder. And I fell asleep.

It was a moon-lit night, and off in the wave-tossed distance, a ship was burning. And as it burned, the ship screamed in mortal agony...

I woke up from the nightmare, gasping for breath. I was in the hotel office. Someone had undressed me and tucked me into a cot just like the one on which Dom was resting. Dom looked better, but her arm and torso were heavily bandaged. She was getting a transfusion.

Raven... mom... was sitting in a chair next to me, reading a newspaper. She heard me stir and looked at me.

"Good morning," she said.

"Hi," I said. "How's Dom?"

She shrugged and put down the paper. "Doc Whimbley kept saying that she should have died. Then he went on a long ramble about a pet theory of his - that mutants are just plain tougher than normal folks. In the end, he said she'd live."

I glanced at a clock on the wall. It was one in the morning. Then I sat up and swung my legs over the side of the cot. I was in my underwear. My clothes were neatly piled on a folding chair that was next to my cot. Standing up, I began to get dressed.

"Is Jean still around?" I asked. "Before I see her, I have to make up my mind if I'm going to thank her or kick her ass for knocking me out."

Raven smiled slightly. "Off hand, I'd say she did the right thing. Sam drove her back to her place."

"And what is our lord and master up to? Excuse me, what is your lord and master up to?"

"He's in bed."

"With who?"

"Tonight is Yuriko's night," Raven said with a shrug.

I rolled my eyes as I stood on one foot, and then the other, to put on my high-heels.

My mom sighed, "Marie, I don't expect you to understand. But at least try not to be rude. We have a system. It works. And you're not in a position to judge people who aren't playing by the normal rules of society."

"Okay. Okay. It's not like Logan and I weren't together once upon a time. What anyone else does with him is none of my business. It's just that..."

I suddenly wasn't sure what to say.

"It's just that he still isn't completely out of your system?" Raven suggested.

"I'm done with Logan," I told her. You know how you sometimes say things that are both true and not quite true? That was one of them.

My mom didn't say anything.

Kneeling next to Dom, I brushed the hair from her forehead and kissed her. She shifted slightly and a tiny smile appeared on her lips for just a second. I knew then that she was going to make it.

I was pretty sure that I still didn't have the full story. Yeah, Dom had finally settled her long-standing debt with the now-deceased-and-burning-in-hell Alphonso Santini, but there were still some nagging questions. Why had Santini come back to town? And why hadn't Dom called me in when she went gunning for Santini?

Something wasn't right. And ever since Dom made me into a private eye, I couldn't quite let things go that didn't make sense. Unfortunately, I didn't seem to have much in the way of leads.

Then I remembered the stuff I'd taken from Santini's pockets.

I sat down in the hotel lobby and pulled from my purse what I'd taken from the late Alphonso Santini.

At first, it was nothing much. A wallet with some cash and an out-of-state driver's license for 'Albert Santori', a pocket comb, some loose change, and a pack of cigarettes and some matches.

It was the book of matches that surprised me.

Remy's is a nightclub on the edge of town. The guy who ran it - a fellow named Remy LeBeau - has quite a flair for keeping his guests entertained. The music is great, the whiskey's unwatered, the gambling tables are honest, and the floorshows are fantastic. If you could afford it, Remy's was the place to be seen in this town. It was definitely not the place you would go if you were someone who wanted to keep his presence in town a secret.

Yet Santini had been carrying a book of matches from Remy's.

I wasn't dressed for a visit to Remy's, but Danni Moonstar - one of Logan's people - came through for me. She let me use her makeup kit and then loaned me a dress. It was a bit tight around the chest, but at least now I wouldn't walk into Remy's looking like a bedraggled alley-cat.

Once I was ready to go, I thanked Danni and walked downstairs.

Jean was waiting for me in the lobby. She was dressed to the nines in a long, black evening-gown. She looked absolutely amazing. And suddenly I felt like an alley-cat again.

"Maybe you should give up on college and go to Hollywood," I grumbled.

"Are you mad at me?" she asked with the easy self-confidence of a woman used to people making any kind of allowances for her actions.

"Yes," I replied.

"Sorry, but I thought it was necessary. Why don't you let me make it up to you? I'll buy the drinks at Remy's."

Sam was standing behind the lobby counter. I shot him a dirty look. He just shrugged and pointed upstairs.

"Logan was kind enough to give me a call and suggest you might need a date tonight," Jean continued.

"Logan should learn how to mind his own damned business," I said hotly.

Jean just laughed. "You're not really mad at me. And you're not really mad at Logan. And you could use my help in sorting things out at Remy's."

I sighed, "You psychics are all instruments of the devil."

Jean raised a perfect eyebrow at me. "I didn't have to use psychic powers to figure any of that out, Marie."

I shook my head, "Okay, you can come along. One good thing - with you dressed like that nobody will be paying attention to me."

She smiled impishly and took my arm in hers. "Really? You obviously don't realize what that dress is doing for your cleavage."

Remy's didn't really have a closing hour. Generally speaking, the party went on until the last few drunks were finally tossed into cabs and sent home. So despite the early morning hour, the place was still hopping when Jean and I arrived.

In the lobby, Jean and I checked our coats with a girl who was wearing nothing but a bunch of strategically placed feathers. Then a buxom hostess wearing a feminine-cut tuxedo gave us a dazzling smile and held the inner door open for us.

"Welcome to Remy's!" she said with a broad smile.

In a blast of noise, Jean and I walked inside.

The first few seconds in Remy's can be disorienting. What with the music, the conversation, the flickering lights, the dancing... well, there's a lot going on.

Jean suddenly grabbed my hand - hard - and froze. I put an arm around her and carefully steered her off to the side and away from the door.

*Sorry,* Jean "said" to me telepathically. *I've never been here before, and it's bigger than I thought it would be. All of the people in here hit me pretty hard. I'm okay now.*

"You're sure?"

Jean glanced past me and said, *Head's up. You have an admirer on the way.*

I put a smile on my face and turned to face Remy LeBeau.

"Ladies..." Remy said with a smile that was all Cajun charm and male horniness. Then he actually kissed our hands.

"Hi, Remy," I said. "How's it going?"

"Things are looking much better now that two such beautiful women have chosen to grace my place of business with their presence."

Yeah, he says stuff like that all the time. The amazing thing is that he actually pulls it off. It's the accent, I think.

Then Remy took us both by the arms and escorted us to a table that a harried-looking waiter was quickly clearing off. The table had a great view of the band and the dance-floor. We also had a good view of the side stages that were on the dance-floor's perimeter. On each of them a pretty girl was dancing. They were wearing very nice hats and elegant high heels - and nothing else.

"I... could never do something like that," Jean said to me as she tried not to stare at the hot-eyed brunette on the closest stage. The dancer wasn't making any bones of the fact that she was pretty interested in Jean.

Remy chuckled.

"You get used to it," I said absent-mindedly. Jean gave me a long and surprised look. Score one for the alley-cat.

Remy held our chairs for us as we sat down. It was then that I realized that I was still holding Jean's hand. I let go instantly. What the heck was I doing?

A bottle of fairly expensive champagne appeared on our table and the waiter expertly filled a pair of fluted glasses.

*Remy really wants you,* Jean telepathed to me.

*Remy really wants anyone with a vagina,* I responded. Jean managed to keep a straight face.

"You're over-doing it," I told Remy.

He laughed. "I have an image to protect, Marie. To not act like a love-stricken buffoon when two women like you enter? That's unthinkable. Just remember to act at least a little flattered."

"Sounds like a deal," Jean said cheerfully.

"Actually, I have a question for you," I said before Remy could say something charming and witty and then drift away.

"What do you need, cher?" Remy asked.

"Alphonso Santini was in here recently. Did you see him?"

Remy didn't react, he just answered the question. "Yes. He was here the night before last."

"What did he want?"

"We didn't talk, but..."

"But..." I prodded.

Remy's strange eyes met mine. "He was obviously looking for someone. Why else would he risk revealing himself?"

"Did he find who he was looking for?"

"I think so."

"Who was it?"

This time, Remy hesitated for a brief moment before answering. "Sylvester the Rat."

Something clicked into place in my head.

Jean sipped champagne as she used telepathy on the wait-staff. None of them knew Alphonso Santini by sight, but they definitely knew Sylvester - he was crappy tipper. But what Jean "saw" confirmed that a fellow who looked like Santini had spent some time talking to Sylvester two nights ago.

"What now?"

I gave Jean a hard and angry look. "Now I track down Sylvester and beat some answers out of him."

Jean winced. "If you want answers, I can get them a lot easier."

"Your way is less satisfying," I growled.

Once we got back to my car, I suddenly realized that Jean and I were holding hands again. And I had no idea who had started that. And I realized that the idea of touching Jean was... comfortable.

That wasn't right. I jerked my hand away from Jean's. My girlfriend had three bullet-holes in her body. She'd almost died. And I couldn't seem to keep my hands off a red-headed cutie.

I tried to conceal how flustered I was by fumbling my car-keys out of my purse.

"Marie, it's okay," Jean said calmly.

"No, it's not," I said, not daring to look her in the eyes as I opened the car door.

Jean reached past me and gently closed the car door. I took a deep breath and turned to face her.

Our faces were so close. It was all I could do not to lean over and kiss her.

I closed my eyes. Dear God, what was wrong with me?

"It's not you," Jean said. "You're not betraying Dom. It's that psychic exchange we had earlier. That sort of thing is pretty intimate under normal circumstances, but that one had us sharing some very personal memories and desires. It had an effect on you - and on me. We just have to acknowledge that this is happening, but that it isn't real. It will eventually wear off and we'll be fine."

I thought that over. Then I nodded slowly.

We rousted Sylvester out of bed. At first he objected, but I gained his cooperation by putting a gun between his eyes.

"What do you want?" he asked in a suddenly high-pitched voice.

I didn't bother to say anything. I just nodded to Jean.

With a faint look of disgust on her face, Jean pulled what we needed out of Sylvester.

"He's a go-between," Jean told me. "He's been carrying messages between Santini and someone in Logan's gang."

"Who?" I asked.

Jean gave me a worried look. "Kitty Pryde."

I'd already guessed that, but now I knew it.

Normally, Kitty has a route she works for Logan. She goes from place to place, picking up Logan's share of the receipts from his brothels, gambling dens, and bars. It's a simple enough task and suited to Kitty because nobody is crazy enough to cheat her. People still talked in horrified whispers about the first, last, and only guy who'd tried that. Kitty merged his head with a wall.

We found out pretty quick that Kitty wasn't working her route. So we immediately went to her apartment. I made Jean promise to stay in the car. She didn't like that, but she agreed.

The sun was rising as I walked back into Kitty's apartment building. I had my revolver in my hand.

Once I got to Kitty's door, I didn't knock. I just opened it.

Kitty was dressed to travel. She was standing next to the kitchen table, a purse and a pair of small suitcases were on the floor next to her feet.

There was a young fellow with Kitty. At first I thought he was a boy, but then I realized he was just a little on the short side. He had badly combed straw-yellow hair and there was something oddly distant and flat in his blue eyes. He was sort of handsome, but there was a vacant emptiness in his face that was disturbing.

"It's rude not to knock," Kitty said, giving me her trademark crazy smile.

Then Kitty reached for her jacket pocket. She pulled out a five dollar bill and dropped it on the table.

The guy standing next to Kitty blinked slowly and stepped back - as if he was a second or two behind us and had suddenly realized that something was wrong.

"The manager is going to need that to clean up the blood," Kitty explained to me.

Then a thin fighting dagger appeared in her hand and she lunged for me.

Kitty uses her power to phase in and out of reality when she's in a fight. She tries to be desolid when attacked, solid when attacking. It's a good trick, but it's not perfect. For one thing, a close-in fight isn't a neat and easy exchange of alternating attacks. And besides, I was familiar with Kitty's fighting style.

I didn't bother shooting as Kitty closed with me - she was intangible. Then she got so close to me that I couldn't aim my gun, turned solid, and thrust at me with her knife.

I deliberately stepped into Kitty's attack and parried with my right arm. I hissed in pain as I took a nasty cut on my forearm, but I ignored it and used my other hand to grab Kitty by the wrist, before she could slip into intangibility.

And just like that, I won the fight.

Kitty stumbled away from me, shaking her head to clear it as I duplicated her power. I ferociously shut down the transfer of Kitty's deeper memories. I suspected it wouldn't be a good idea to put too much of a crazy woman inside of my head.

Kitty realized she was in trouble and grabbed for the young guy. After she caught him by the hand, they dropped through the floor.

Saying something extremely unladylike, I turned desolid and followed her.

Kitty and the other guy were sprinting for the street, running through walls, closed doors, and the occasional startled neighbor. I followed, but I was more careful. There was really no point to hurrying.

Jean was waiting outside.

By the time I got there, Kitty was lying unconscious on the sidewalk. Her friend was kneeling next to her, cradling her head in his hands and whispering sounds to her that weren't words.

There was a bandage crusted with dried blood around my right forearm. The cut Kitty gave me throbbed and burned. I was going to need stitches, but at the moment I didn't have the time.

Betsy woke Kitty up. And the momentary look of panic that filled Kitty's eyes made me smile.

She was handcuffed to a rusty iron chair and she had one of those damned collars around her neck. Kitty wasn't going anywhere. As long as the collar was on, she couldn't use her powers.

The young guy who I'd found with Kitty was next to her, cuffed into another chair. He also had a collar around his neck, although I'd yet to see any sign that he had powers. He didn't say anything as he curiously looked around at his surroundings. By now, it was pretty obvious that he wasn't completely right in the head.

We were in a dockside warehouse that Logan owns. It's where Logan keeps people that he's really not happy with. The warehouse is isolated and has easy access to the harbor - or the sea, if you really wanted to make sure that a body didn't float to shore.

Sometimes, Kitty was the person who supervised the prisoners in the warehouse. If that happened, it meant that Logan was really, really, unhappy with the prisoner in question. Kitty likes hurting people. A while back, Emma spent a day and a night in Kitty's clutches. I have those memories in my head, but I keep them carefully locked down. I may not like Emma, but I don't hate her.

Betsy is Logan's psychic. She's good, but probably not as good as Jean or Emma. And right now she was obviously nervous and upset.

Logan tilted Betsy's chin up and looked her in the eyes. "It's okay," he said.

Betsy looked at Kitty - and then looked at Logan again.

"Go wait at the end of the dock. I'll call you if I need you," Logan said gently.

Betsy nodded. Then, without a word, she walked out of the warehouse.

By then Kitty had herself under control. I had to give her credit for guts. Aside from the blond guy, the only people in the warehouse with her were Logan, Raven, Yuriko, and me. Not Hank, or Scott, or Ororo, or Warren, or Bobby, or Kurt. In fact, none of the people in the organization who went way back and might feel some loyalty for Kitty. It was just Logan and three women who didn't particularly care if Kitty lived or died.

Kitty gave me a disgusted, hate-filled look. "You bitch. You couldn't just kill me. You had to do this."

"Yes," I said evenly. "Now explain everything to your knight in not-so-shiny armor."

Logan gave me a strange look, then he turned his attention back at Kitty.

"Jimmy, I didn't have a choice," Kitty said softly.

Yuriko and I stirred slightly when Kitty called Logan "Jimmy". We knew we'd just bumped into some kind of secret.

My mom didn't react at all. That was interesting.

"Kitty, tell me what you did," Logan ordered.

Kitty sighed, "Remember the story about that Santini stash we never found? The hundred gees?"

Logan nodded, "It was just a story."

"It's not just a story. Alphonso Santini gave me a call. He wanted the money and he wanted me to get it for him."

Logan didn't say anything. It was impossible for me to read what was going on in his eyes. They were flat and lifeless. Some men break down that way. You don't see anything external. It's all inside. I once saw a man right after he was told that his daughter had died in a car accident. Logan's eyes looked like that.

"Why would Santini trust you to do that?"

Kitty jerked her head to the guy in the next chair. "Don't you recognize him, Logan? Santini had him. He said he'd trade him for the money. And he'd kill him if I didn't play ball."

Logan frowned at the guy in the chair. Then he leaned closer and took a deep sniff. It's an animal-like thing that I've seen Logan do more than once. A familiar scent can trigger his memory when sight and sound have failed him.

"Doug Ramsey..." Logan said in startled recognition. "He's not a kid anymore. I thought he was still in Canada."

"Santini snatched Doug from that home we left him in," Kitty said. "God knows how Santini found out about him."

Logan's eyes shifted back to Kitty. "Spell it out."

Kitty took a deep breath and began. "Like I said: Santini used Doug to make me cooperate. He told me where the money was - it was in a long-term safety deposit box. It wasn't under Santini's name, so he couldn't get to it. But I could. And I did."

Logan nodded. Because of her ability to become intangible, Kitty is a superb thief.

"I met Santini and gave him the money. Then Santini changed the deal. He said I worked for him now. He said if I didn't cooperate, or if I called in anyone from the organization, he'd have Doug killed."

Logan nodded again.

"I needed time to track down Doug, so I told Santini that I'd work for him. He had a plan to siphon off some of the proceeds that I collected. It was a stupid plan. I told Santini that Bobby would notice a shortage and check it out. But Santini was full of himself - he thought he was a bigshot now - and he was sure I was just trying to scare him off from a huge score. He'd decided that the hundred thousand wasn't enough. He wanted to double it before he left town. I swear to God, these Santini bastards think with their fists. No wonder we took them down so easy."

"So you started shorting the receipts," Logan said coldly.

Kitty gave Logan a defiant look. "Starting two days ago. I skimmed ten thousand."

Which meant Kitty was dead. No gang-boss can tolerate having someone in his organization steal from him. And there was only one punishment for that sort of thing.

"Bobby noticed that something was wrong," Logan said. "Hank's checking it out."

"Yeah. I heard he was working on a problem of some kind. Santini's master plan didn't last a week. Idiot."

"How did you find Doug?"

Kitty smiled bitterly. "I did what I've always done for you, Logan. I slipped in and out. I asked questions. I walked into locked rooms. I beat people up until they told me what they knew. Eventually, I found out where Santini had put Doug. It turned out Santini had been running a bluff. He didn't have a crew. He didn't have people watching Doug who would kill him if Santini gave the word - or if Santini disappeared. And if I had the smarts God gave a snail I would have known that. Santini was all over town. People who knew him or knew of him had spotted him. Why would he do something so dangerous if he actually had a gang?"

"Where was Doug?"

"In a boarding house on the other side of the bay. There was a nice widow lady looking after him."

Then Kitty turned her head and glared at me. "Once Doug was safe, I could have fixed everything. I could have killed Santini, got the money back, and squared the receipts. No one would have known what happened. But then Domino fucked everything up. Your patch-eyed twat of a girlfriend found out that Santini was back in town. Then she tracked Santini down and killed him. I found them in that building where Santini was hiding out. I thought they were both dead. Too bad Santini wasn't a better shot."

Everything went hot and red. I slammed a fist into Kitty's face. Something crunched and blood flew. Then I hit her again. I was reaching back to hammer Kitty a third time when someone yanked me back.

Doug was trying to scream, but he was doing it all wrong. He just let out a series of strange gargling noises.

It was Raven who had me. She's stronger than me, a better fighter than me, and she had me in a full-nelson - there wasn't anything I could do to get free. I almost used my power on her, but I stopped myself just in time.

"Easy," she whispered in my ear. I closed my eyes, took a deep breath, and stopped struggling.

My second punch had knocked Kitty's chair over. She was laying on her side in a daze. Doug was looking at Kitty in horror and making a high-pitched moaning sound. He was trying to reach over to help her, but the cuffs kept him back.

Logan reached down and hauled Kitty and her chair back up. Then, after a moment's pause, he shoved Kitty's chair next to Doug's. Doug buried his face in her shoulder and started sobbing.

"It's okay, Doug," Kitty slurred after spitting out some blood. "It's okay. Nobody's going to hurt you."

"You got it together?" Logan asked me. The look on his face suggested that there was only one acceptable answer.

I nodded. Raven carefully let me go. Blood was darkening the bandage on my arm and was dripping down my hand. I'd opened the wound in my arm again.

Logan turned back to Kitty. "After Dom killed Santini, what did you do?"

"I snagged the hundred gees and walked away," Kitty said - still slurring her words. "I was going to take Doug, and Santini's hundred thousand, and set us up somewhere. I sent the ten thousand that I skimmed from you to the hotel by parcel post. Bobby is probably counting it right now."

Kitty hesitated for a moment, spit out some more blood, and said, "I wasn't just running because of the money I took from you. I've had enough of this. I wanted out."

"Kitty... you could have left whenever you wanted to," Logan sighed.

"And do what?" Kitty yelled angrily. "Wait tables? Work in a library? Become a nurse? Find a nice guy and get married? My head is broken, Logan! I don't fit in anywhere!"

Then tears suddenly appeared in her eyes, "Hell, Jimmy. I don't even fit in with you. So get this over with. Just promise me you'll do it yourself. I don't want one of your bimbos finishing me."

There was a long pause. The only sound was Doug crying.

Logan looked at Raven and Yuriko. Raven was still hovering over my shoulder, just in case. The tips of Yuriko's claws were slightly extended from her fingertips. It would just take a split second for her to rip open Kitty's throat.

"Raven, Yuriko, go wait with Betsy," Logan said. He suddenly sounded tired.

Neither woman said anything as they left the building.

Once they were gone, Logan looked at me.

"I'm calling in my marker. Domino Investigations owes me a job. No questions asked."

You know the phrase, "my blood ran cold"? Until then, I thought it was just some silly words used by pulp writers. Guess what - it's real.

"I'm not killing Kitty for you," I heard myself say.

"Yes, you are," Logan said implacably.

Kitty began to laugh.

Dom was awake when I got back to the hotel. I crouched down next to her cot and kissed her.

"Best thing that's happened to me all day," she whispered to me.

On the chair were a couple of magazines. The top magazine was about guns and hunting. The magazine underneath it was completely different - it was about hunting and guns.

"Danni was reading to me," Dom said with a faint ghost of a smile.

"The selection seems kind of limited," I said.

"Actually, the spring line of medium-caliber rifles is pretty exhilarating," Dom said thoughtfully.

"Be a good patient and do what the doctor tells you and I'll buy you a top-of-the-line Winchester."

"Deal," she said instantly. "Suckered you into that one."

"That you did," I smiled. "How clever of you."

"I'm the brains of this outfit, Marie. You're the looks. Dear God, you are definitely the looks."

"Funny. You weren't smart enough to call me in for backup when you went after Santini."

Dom's face fell.

"I guess we should talk about that," she said.

"Yes, we should."

Dom looked me in the eyes. "When I heard Santini was back in town, I went out to kill him. Not to talk. Not to take him in to the cops or even give him to Logan. I was going to murder him. I didn't want you to be a part of that."

"What happened?"

She shook her head. "He saw me first and drew on me. He hit me three times before my gun even cleared its holster. Then I got lucky and he had a misfire. I put one shot into his chest. He was beginning to fall when I put the second one through his head. A court would probably decide it was self-defense on my part. But the bottom line is that if I had seen him first, I would have killed him without a second thought."

"Okay," I said as I stroked her hair.

Dom looked at me. Her expression was uncertain.

"Santini was a bad guy," I said slowly and carefully. "The world is better off with him gone. As far as I'm concerned, he got what was coming to him and that's the end of it."

Dom was still looking at me. "That's not all."

"Yes?"

"A long time ago - before this business with Santini. I did something. I did something crazy and terrible that I've never told you about it."

"I know about the ship. Hank told me."

Dom didn't say anything. She just seemed to be closely examining my face.

"Milo must have been a hell of a man," I said with a sad smile.

"He was," Dom said, her eyes suddenly elsewhere. "He was smart, funny, gentle, and devoted. We were going to leave the city and find someplace quiet to live. We were talking about having kids..."

Then Dom focused on me and licked her lips nervously. "I understand if you think differently about me now."

I sighed. "I don't."

Dom's eyes narrowed. "Why not?"

"Because when you were missing, I realized that there was nothing I wouldn't do to get you back. And if you had been dead, there's nothing I wouldn't do to whoever killed you. I can't judge you, Dom. I'm just like you."

Dom close her eyes for a few seconds. When she opened them, she said, "We really should kiss, but I can't move."

I took care of that.

Kitty's funeral was sparsely attended. She didn't have a family. And she didn't have friends. It was just me, Logan, Raven, Yuriko, and Ororo.

Ororo - God bless her - actually wept for Kitty. That meant the sky also wept.

"Who was in my coffin?" Kitty asked curiously. She was holding hands with Doug as we walked down the pier. He looked excited and happy. Despite the still gloomy weather, Kitty was wearing a broad sun-hat with a dark veil. She also had on a long and graceful dress. Anyone used to Kitty's normal appearance would have never suspected that it was her.

"A Jane Doe," I told her. "She died of a drug overdose in a downtown hotel room. Nobody claimed her body and she couldn't be identified. She was an inch taller than you and maybe a little heavier, but the hair was right. There's a guy Dom knows who lives in the sewers and steam tunnels. He can change a person's appearance. By the time he was done with the body, she looked just like you."

"Never heard of that guy," Kitty said thoughtfully.

"This town has a lot of secrets," I said dryly.

"More than you or I will ever know," Kitty said with a careless shrug of her shoulders.

We got to the gangplank. The ship was headed to Australia. Kitty seemed to be pretty excited about seeing Sydney.

"What will you do?" I asked.

She tapped her suitcase, "Live in luxury on the Santini money. Take care of Doug. See the sights. Maybe find a handsome Aussie who's willing to stick his dick into crazy."

"What?" I asked. I was sure I'd misheard that last part.

Because of the veil, I couldn't clearly see Kitty's face, but I was sure that her scary smile was back. "There's a thing men say to each other: 'never stick your dick in crazy'. It's a warning to not take up with some broad who's over the edge. Maybe I can find a guy who doesn't care about by that rule. And if I can't..."

She reached up and gently touched my face. I fought down the urge to slap her hand away.

"...and if I can't," she continued gently, "I'll just have to diddle myself to sleep every night as I fantasize about skinning you and Dom alive."

"Have a nice trip," I said evenly.

"You mean you aren't hoping for an iceberg?"

I nodded at Doug. "I wouldn't want to see him get hurt."

Kitty laughed as she and Doug turned and began to walk up the stairs. An elderly couple gave her an odd look and edged away. Kitty has a strange and scary laugh.

As I walked away, the ship's steam horn sounded. For a brief moment, it sounded like the screams of men dying in horrible agony.

It was warm, but I shivered anyway.

Logan and I met in private. Raven and Yuriko gave me calm and dangerous looks as I walked past them and into Logan's office. I wondered how much they knew.

"It's done," I said.

Logan put down his newspaper and leaned back in his chair. I noticed that he was reading the 'Wall Street Journal'. He's an odd guy to figure out.

"Thanks," he said. "When she's feeling better, tell Dom we're square."

"Okay," I said.

I didn't leave.

"Is there something else?" Logan asked.

"What's the deal with you and Kitty and Doug? And why did Kitty keep calling you Jimmy?"

Logan laughed. Then he shook his head and said, "She's done it to you."

"What do you mean?" I asked irritably.

"Dom. She's finally turned you into a PI. Now you just can't rest until you know every damn detail. Secrets and mysteries drive you crazy."

"That's not true!"

"Sure, Marie, sure," he chuckled dismissively.

Then he gave me a calculating look. "You know something... you may be a PI, but I'm a businessman. I'll answer your questions, but I want something in return."

I crossed my arms over my chest and gave him a long, wary, look. "If it involves me on my knees under your desk, the answer is, 'go to hell'."

He shrugged. "As I recall, there was a time when you didn't mind. In fact, you were flat-out eager."

"Those days are gone. Thank God."

"Are you blushing?"

"No!" I half-yelled.

Then I took a deep breath to regain my composure, "So what do you want from me?"

Logan suddenly got serious, "A promise."

"What kind of promise?" I asked warily.

"If things ever fall through between you and Dom, you'll come back to the organization. You'll work for me for a year. Then, after that year, you can make a decision if you want to stay or go."

That surprised me.

"Things aren't going to fall apart between me and Dom," I told him very flatly.

Logan nodded mildly. "Then it won't hurt you to make that promise. And you'll get what you want for nothing. Sounds like a good deal, doesn't it?"

I stared at him. "Logan, you do a surprisingly good Satan imitation."

"I try my best."

"What is this all about? Why do want me to make that promise?"

He smiled. "Maybe it's part of a master plan where I'll somehow drive you and Dom apart and then trick you back into bed with me. Or maybe I've noticed that the very sharp girl who used to work for me has become an even sharper woman and I want a chance - even if it's a long-shot - of someday getting her back on my side."

I was still staring at him.

"Decision time," he said as he leaned back in his chair and put his hands behind his head. His dark eyes were amused.

I gave him my answer.

Jean and I met for lunch on the campus where she was going to school. It was amusing to see Jean as an ordinary college-girl after seeing her dressed in full-tilt, eye-popping, evening wear. However, she still managed to turn heads.

"It's not very fancy," Jean said apologetically as we sat down in the cafeteria.

"Are you kidding?" I replied immediately. "I love sloppy joes."

Which is true, by the way. Raven isn't a fancy cook. I grew up on a fairly basic menu.

"How's Dom?" Jean asked.

"A lot better. She heals faster than most folks. That's handy in our line of work."

"And Kitty?"

"Taken care of. I pity Australia. Thanks for the help, by the way."

Jean had run psychic support for me while I was setting things up with Kitty. Ever since we'd been in each other's heads, I knew I could trust her.

"And that... problem... we were having?"

"Well, I think you're cute, but then again I've always thought that. I just don't have the urge to grope you ever time we're next to each other. Does that count as progress?"

"I'd say so," Jean said with smile.

"On the other hand, I did have a dream last night where you, me, and Dom were having drinks together and Emma was our waitress. And when we left, we stiffed her for the tip. Since you're a mistress of the mind, maybe you can tell me what that means?"

Jean's smile turned into a laugh, "Off hand, I'd say it means you don't like Emma. I wish you could get over that."

"I wish I could understand what you see in her. Is it because you're both psychics?"

Jean nodded. "That's part of it. Having other people's thoughts in your head is often a disturbing and ugly thing. There aren't many people who understand that, and it helps to be with someone who does. I really only know two people who I can trust to know what it's like."

I thought that over. "Okay, Emma's obviously one of the two. Who's the other?"

Jean gave me an amused look and said, "You."

Oh.

When I got back home, Sooraya was there. And she didn't look happy.

"She is impossible," Sooraya told me irritably just before she left.

It was Dom's first day back in our apartment. And she was out of bed. In fact, she was in the kitchen, using a shotgun for a cane as she clumsily tried to make a sandwich. With one arm in a cast, it wasn't easy.

"For God's sake!" I yelled at her.

Dom gave me a guilty look. "Oops," she said.

"Back in bed! Now!"

"Little tyrant," Dom grumped as she limped back into the bedroom.

"So I take Kitty is on her way out of town?" Dom yelled at me from the bedroom as I finished making the sandwich.

"Yes," I yelled back. "And Logan says we're settled with him."

Then I brought the sandwich into the bedroom and put it on the nightstand where Dom could reach it. She was on her back, surrounded by magazines and newspapers.

Dom glowered at me. She's a lousy patient. Dom is just too active of a person to tolerate much inactivity.

"The doc said one week, Dom," I told her. "Just one more week. Then you can go re-injure yourself all you want."

Dom sighed. "A week? How about three days?"

"How about a week?" I suggested.

Dom the drama queen flopped her head back onto her pillow and glared up at the ceiling.

I shook my head and began pulling off Dom's pajama bottoms.

"What now?" she asked irritably. "Sooraya gave me a bath this morning! Which was ridiculous! I can do it myself!"

"No bath," I said as I tossed the bottoms into a corner.

Then I crawled onto the bed with Dom.

"That's a scary smile," she said as she looked at me through suddenly wary - and interested - eyes.

"A week in bed, Dom. A whole week. And I know you're going to be a complete pain in the ass the entire time. So, whatever can I do to make you shut up and cooperate?"

"I've got a few ideas," Dom said slowly.

"Let's talk them over. Just as soon as I've tried some ideas of my own."