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reevaluate my priorities. The steady income was nice. Unspeakably nice. I had taken care of substantial unfinished business in my personal and professional life thanks to Julian’s monthly checks. I’d cleared my debts. I’d installed the steel door to my basement. I’d even managed to fully update the rental properties that had gone neglected for far too long. My tenants seemed happy, especially Abraham Carter, my superintendent. When old Abe stopped showing up at my stoop with his hat in his hand about some damned busted air unit or a leaking gutter, I knew I had finally achieved the level of passably acceptable landlord.
    But the constant demand for my attention was draining. I had a soul to find, damn it. And when I managed to carve out some time to look for it, I received an earful of shit from Julian about it. I really wanted to like Julian, and the money was making that harder and harder every week.
    Just as I was about to give up and pour myself some wine, my phone rang. Private number.
    “Hello?”
    A deep, resonant man’s voice stated, “You received my photos.”
    Aha. “I did.”
    “Good.”
    “I take it you’re my friend in the blue Chrysler?” I knew a power play when I felt it. I tried to knock this fellow off his stride before he got too much momentum.
    “What? No.”
    Oh well. It was worth a shot. “What do you want from me? These photos don’t mean anything.”
    “To you, maybe. To the Deputy Mayor? The Mayor? I think you know what these photos could do if they go to press.”
    “I do.”
    The man sighed. “Which is why I sent them to you instead.”
    “Come again?”
    “I want to meet. In public.”
    I wasn’t sure if I was quite ready for a Deep Throat scenario with a man I didn’t know, but ignoring this was clearly a more dangerous option. “Where and when?”
    “Inner harbor, by the aquarium. In a half-hour?”
    I quipped, “Well, I’ll have to cancel my tea with the Daughters of the Revolution.”
    “I’m trying to help you, Dorian.”
    I took a seat at my kitchen table. “Do I know you?”
    “Just meet me.”
    “How will I recognize you?”
    “I’ll recognize you.”
    He hung up.
    The Inner Harbor was close enough to walk, and it was a nice enough day. Finding parking would have been a bigger time sink than hoofing it the twenty-some-odd blocks into downtown, so I just grabbed my sunglasses and got to walking.
    I made the Inner Harbor in twenty-five minutes, and found a planter next to the stanchions marking the ticket line for the aquarium. A middle-aged, black man in blue shirt-sleeves approached me, his eyes moving everywhere as he walked. He seemed vaguely familiar, the fact of which granted me a modicum of relief.
    “Dorian. We meet again.”
    He held out his hand, and I shook it briskly.
    “Yeah. See, thing is―”
    “You don’t remember me. That’s okay. It’s been a long time.”
    I had this trouble with clients now and then. They’d remember me, but I would lose their name in the sea of faces I’d done business with over the years. Considering the circumstances, I put a bit more effort in remembering this one.
    “I want to say… Cedric?”
    “Cecil.”
    He pronounced it SESS-ul, without a hint of pretentiousness. And it started to click. He had been a client of mine, one of my early clients back when I had just returned to the States from England. I remembered his was a basic vindictive ex-wife taking him to the cleaners scenario. She had more karma coming to her than the person who invented telemarketing. The job was cake.
    “Right. Cecil Rawls?”
    He nodded and urged me away from the planter with his elbow. “Let’s keep moving.”
    “How are things? I mean, aside from taking surreptitious photos of my clients.”
    “I didn’t take the photos, Dorian. They were given to me to publish.”
    “Small relief, I suppose.” I stiffened my spine. “Wait, did you say publish?”
    “I work for The Sun. I’m the Editorial Assistant for the