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rough,” she said. “Here’s why you don’t kiss the guys. It’s too romantic. It’s too personal. When you fuck for money, you’re just doing a job.”
    Scagnelli nodded thoughtfully. That was something he could understand. He was about to ask how come it was okay to kiss during the lesbian scenes, but she’d reminded him why he was here.
    “Like I said on the phone, they couldn’t let you live, after what happened,” he said.
    She nodded, her eyes moist, and she slid back down to her neckline, and Scagnelli didn’t even miss the view. “I’m tired,” she said. “I wish they’d killed us last time. That whole Monkey House thing messed with me. And that other guy, Kleingarten? Were you friends with him?”
    Scagnelli had heard the rumors. Kleingarten was a free agent, too, but a low-level thug who was totally out of his league at the government level. The death certificate had him down for a heart attack, but he’d been tied up with Burchfield last year. Scagnelli wanted to make sure he himself didn’t become Burchfield’s latest heart-attack victim.
    “What’s this about the Monkey House?” Scagnelli would bet a porterhouse steak she knew the half of the story that wasn’t in the dossier.
    “I don’t remember,” she said. “But ever since then, I’ve been a wreck. The lithium made me get fat, and then they switched me to valpro, and—”
    “They don’t understand,” Scagnelli said, adjusting his hardhat. “They always think drugs are the answer, but it’s something inside, isn’t it?”
    The song ended and the next began, this one featuring a male singer and a cowbell, jarringly upbeat.
    “Do you have any Halcyon?” she asked.
    “Of course,” he said, noting it was the same word Alexis Morgan had used. He was edging into the other half of the truth, and maybe he could keep her talking with more than just his smile. A hooker had once told him he looked like the actor Steve Buscemi, only with better teeth. He probably could have been a movie star if he wanted. Hell, he’d been acting for years. “That’s what you were expecting, right?”
    “I think they should legalize it. Imagine a world where everyone forgets.”
    “Yeah, some world that would be, huh? This Monkey House. What happened there?”
    She shook her head, glittering drops of water rolling from her cheeks. “All I remember is Kleingarten trying to kill us. But Lex and Roland and Mark saved us.”
    “Do you remember a guy named Burchfield?” He didn’t want to spend too much time here, but he hid his impatience so she didn’t spook.
    Her pretty lips pursed in distaste. “I think we did it, him and me. You know how it is, when you suddenly come around and you got somebody’s slime all over you, and you don’t know how it got there?”
    Scagnelli was tired of her now. She was no longer attractive and sexy and mysterious, no longer special in any way. She was just another job, just like she’d been the job for a lot of guys and gals during her career. “Yeah, I know how it is. I don’t blame you a bit.”
    “The last time, they gave us pills every four hours.” A tuft of bubbles dangled from the tip of her nose. “I want so much to forget.” She glanced at the razor blades. “Forget everything .”
    “The prescription’s changed since then,” he said, fishing the vial from one of the pouches on his belt. “What have you taken tonight?”
    “Nothing much,” she said, and her words were slurring now. “Six Valium and a couple of oxies. Couple glasses of wine.”
    “We’ll fix you right up,” Scagnelli said.
    “Will I forget everything again?”
    “You betcha.” He twisted the lid from the vial and knelt beside the tub.
    “Good, because I was starting to remember more stuff. That senator, the one who wants to run for president—”
    “Burchfield.” She’d already forgotten. These Monkey House people were a mess.
    Her glazed eyes were staring at the window, where a moth was thumping against the