Page 41 of The Getaway God (Sandman Slim 6)

“People keep asking about buying copies of the discs,” Kasabian says.

“Selling isn’t part of the business plan. We’re strictly a rental operation.”

“That’s what I keep telling them. But those vampires can get scary insistent.”

“Tell them to come and talk to me,” I say. “Besides, what can a vampire do to you? I mean, do you even have blood anymore?”

He looks hurt.

“Watch the language. I’m just starting to feel good about this body and you go and bring that up.”

“Relax. We’ve both been dead. It’s no big deal.”

“Says the guy with the hot girlfriend and a body still made of meat. You think sweat stains are hard to get out of clothes? Try machine oil.”

“Anytime you want to go back on your magic skateboard, I’ve got it for you in a closet upstairs.”

“No, you don’t.”

“Candy uses it to do her paper rounds.”

Kasabian pulls a beer from behind the counter and twists the cap off. I’ve talked to him about drinking in front of customers, but he’s just one more person around here who doesn’t listen to me.

“You two are so domestic these days it’s sickening.”

“You should get out more, or at all,” I say. “You’ll meet someone nice and we’ll have little puppy hellhounds running around the place.”

“Speaking of shit that’s never going to happen, guess who just showed up in Hell?”

“Who?”

“Chaya, the long lost God brother. He doesn’t look too good. Like he booked a long weekend in an ass-­kicking machine. You should go down and check it out.”

“You just want me to do your swami work for you.”

“We need the money, genius.”

“I’m sick of talking about money.”

“That’s what ­people with no money say.”

I want to say something. About an incident that’s bothered me for almost a year. Even thinking about it makes me angry and ashamed. Angry she got killed and ashamed I couldn’t do anything about it.

; “I’ll make you a deal,” I say. “There’s a green-­haired girl in Hell somewhere. Find her for me.”

“A green-­haired girl? Sure. There can’t be more than a million of those.”

“She used to work at Donut Universe. I never told anyone, but I found her name in an online obit. Cindil Ashley. Find her and I’ll do your job.”

Kasabian waggles an eyebrow at me.

“An old love? You sly thing.”

“You do not even want to begin joking about this,” I say. “She was murdered by the Kissi right in front of me. If they weren’t dead, I’d kill them all over again for it.”

The Kissi were a race of mad, malformed angels that lived in the chaos at the edge of the universe. They’re gone now, but before they went, they killed a lot of innocent civilians. When I lost an arm in Hell, the Kissi marked me by replacing my normal arm with a Kissi one. Now I wear a glove on my left hand to hide it from ­people.