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e always took Joey with him to answer the ads because Joey was likable, the kind of kid anybody could relate to, with his open face and wide eager eyes and the white-blond hair of whoever his father might have been. Or mother. Or both. Royce knew something about breeding, and to get hair like that there must have been blonds on both sides, but then there were a lot of blonds in Russia, weren't there? He'd never been there, but from what his sister Shana had told him about the orphanage they must have been as common as brunettes were here, or Asians and Mexicans anyway, with their shining black hair that always looked freshly greased, and what would you call them, blackettcs? His own hair was a sort of dirty blond, nowhere near as extreme as Joey's, but in the same ballpark, so that people often mistook Joey for his son, which was just fine with him. Better than fine: perfect.

The first place they went to, in Canoga Park, was giving away rabbits, and there was a kid there of Joey's age—10 or so—who managed to look both guilty and relieved at the same time. A for sai.k sign stood out front, the place probably on the verge of foreclosure (his realtor's brain made a quick calculation: double lot, maybe 3,500 square feet, two-car garage, air, the usual faux-granite countertops and built-ins, probably sold for close to five before the bust, now worth maybe three and a half, three and a quarter), and here was the kid's father sauntering out the kitchen door with his beer gut swaying in the grip of his wifebeater, Lakers cap reversed on his head, goatee, mirror shades, a real primo loser. "Hey," the man said. He (continued on page 108)

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(continued from page 58) was wearing huaraches, his toes as black­ened as a corpse's.

Royce nodded. "What's happening?"

So there were rabbits. The kid's hobby. First there'd been two, now there were 30. They kept them in one of those prefab sheds you get at Home Depot, and when the kid pulled back the door the stink hit you in the face like a sucker punch. Joey was say­ing, "Oh, wow, wow, look at them all!" but all Royce was thinking was Get me out of here, because this was the kind of rank, urine-soaked stench you found in some of the street fighters' kennels, if they even both­ered with kennels. "Can we take two?" Joey said, and everybody—the father, the kid and Joey—looked to him.

He gave an elaborate shrug, and how many times had they been through this cha­rade before? "Sure," he said, "why not?" A glance for the father. "They're free, right? To a good home?"

The father—he wasn't much older than Royce, maybe 34, 35—just nodded, but on the way out Royce bent to the kid and pressed a five into his palm, feeling magnan­imous. The next stop yielded a black Lab, skinny, with a bad eye, but still it would have to have its jaws duct-taped to keep it from slashing one of the dogs, and that was fine except that they had to sit there for half an hour with a cadaverous old couple who made them drink lukewarm iced tea and nibble stale anise cookies while they went on about Slipper and how she was a good dog, except that she peed on the rug—you had to watch out for that—and how sad they were to have to part with her, but she was just too much for them to handle anymore. They struck out at the next two places, both houses shuttered and locked, but all in all it wasn't a bad haul, considering these were just bait animals any­way and there was no need to get greedy.

Back at home, the minute they pulled up under the oaks in front, Joey was out the door and dashing for the house and his stash of Hansen's soda and barbecue chips, never giving a thought to the rabbits or the black Lab confined in their cages in the back of the Suburban. That was all right. There was no hurry. It wasn't that hot—85 maybe— and the shade was dense under the trees. Plus, he felt like a beer himself. Just driving around the Valley in all that traffic was work, what with the fumes radiating up off the road and Joey chattering away about any­thing and everything that entered his head till you couldn't concentrate on the music easing out of the radio or the way the girls waved their butts as they sauntered down the boulevard in their shorts and blue jeans and invisible little skirts.

He left the windows down and kicked his way across the dirt expanse of the lot, the hand-tooled boots he wore on weekends picking up a fine film of dust, thinking he'd crack a beer, see what Steve was up to— and the dogs, the dogs, of course—and then maybe grill up some burgers for an early dinner before he went out. He'd have to lift the Lab down himself, but Joey could handle the rabbits, and no, they weren't

going to bait the dogs tonight no matter how much Joey pleaded, because tonight was Saturday and he and Steve were going out, remember? But what Joey could do, before he settled down with his video games, was maybe give the bait animals a dish of water, or would that be asking too much?

The house was in Calabasas, pushed up against a hillside where the oaks gave way to chaparral as soon as you climbed up out of the yard on the path cut through the scrub there, the last place on a dirt road that threw up dust all summer and turned into a mud fest when the rains came in December. It was quiet, private, nights pulled down like a shade, and it had belonged to Steve's par­ents before they were killed in a head-on collision with a drunk three years back. Now it was Steve's. And his. Steve paid the property taxes and they split the mort­gage each month, which for Royce was a whole lot cheaper than what he'd be paying elsewhere—plus, there was the barn, for­merly for horses, now for the dogs. They had parties every couple of weeks, various women circulating in and out of their lives, but neither of them had ever been married, and as far as Royce was concerned, he liked it that way. Tonight, though, they were going out—cruising, as Steve liked to call it, as if they were in some seventies disco movie— and Joey would be on his own. Fine. No problem. Joey knew the score: Stay out of the barn, don't let anybody in, bed at 10, call him on the cell if there were any problems.

Steve drove. He'd never had a DUI, but Royce had, and Royce needed his license up and running in order to ferry people around to his various listings, as if that would make a difference since nobody in his office had sold anything in recent memory. Or at least he hadn't, anyway. They took the 101 into town, wound their way down Laurel Canyon and valeted the car in a lot offSunset. It was just getting dark. A continuous line of cars, fading to invisibility behind their headlights, pulsed up and down the boulevard. This was the moment he liked best, slamming the car door and stepping out into the muted light, the street humming with the vibe of the clubs, the air so compacted and sweet with exhaust it was like breathing through your skin, the night young, anything possible.

Their first stop was a Middle Eastern res­taurant that hardly served any food, or not that he could see anyway. People came here to sit at the tables out front and smoke Star-buzz or herbal shisha through the hookahs the management provided for a fee. Every once in a while you'd see a couple inside the restaurant picking over a lamb kebab or pita platter, but the real action was outside, where just about everybody surreptitiously spiked the tobacco with something a little stronger. The waitress was slim and young, dark half-moons of make-up worked into the flesh under her eyes and a tiny red stone glitter­ing in one nostril, and maybe she recognized them from the week before, maybe she didn't. They ordered two iced teas and a hoo­kah set-up and let the smoke, cool and sweet, massage their lungs, their feet propped up on the wrought-iron rail that separated them from the sidewalk, eyes roaming the street.

After a moment, just to hear his own voice over the shush of tires and the rattling tribal music that made you feel as if you were run­ning on a treadmill, Royce said, "So what nationality you think these people are—the owners, I mean? Iranian? Armenian?"

Steve—he was a rock, absolutely, six-two, 180, with a razor-to-the-bone military haircut though he'd never been in the military—glanced up lazily, exhaling. "What, the waitress, you mean?"

"I guess."

"Why, you want a date with her?"

"No, I just "

"I can get you a date with her. You want a date with her?"

He shrugged. 'Just curious, that's all. No biggie. I just figured, you're the expert, right?" This was a reference to the fact that Steve had dated an Iranian girl all last winter—or Persian, as she liked to classify herself, and who could blame her? She was fleshy in all the right places, with big bounte­ous eyes and a wide-lipped smile that really lit her face up, but she'd wanted things, too many things, things Steve couldn't give her.

"Yeah, that's me, a real expert, all right. I don't know why you didn't just hit me in the face with a two-by-four the minute Nasreen walked through the door"—he held it a beat, grinning his tight grin—"Bro." He was about to bring the hose to his lips, but stopped himself, his eyes fixed on a point over Royce's shoulder. "Shit," he breathed, "isn't that your brother-in-law?"

Feeling caught out all of a sudden, feeling exposed, Royce swung round in his seat to shoot a glance up the boulevard. Joe—Big Joe, as Shana insisted on calling him after she came back from Russia with Joey, who was just a baby in diapers then—was nobody he wanted to see. He'd left Shana with a fractured elbow and a car with a bad trans­mission and payments overdue and she'd been working double shifts on weekends ever since to catch up. Which was why Royce took Joey Friday through Sunday—Joey needed a man's influence, that's what Shana claimed, and besides, she couldn't afford a babysitter. "Ex-brother-in-law," he said.

But there he was, Big Joe, easing his way in and out of the clusters of people making for the clubs and restaurants, his arm flung over the shoulder of some woman and a big self-satisfied grin on his face, just as if he was a regular human being. Even worse, the woman—girl—was so pretty the sight of her made Royce's heart clench with envy. If he was about to ask himself how a jerk like Joe had managed to wind up with a girl like that, he never got the chance because Steve was on his feet now, up out of his seat and leaning over the rail, calling out, 'Joe, hey, Joe, what's happening?" in a voice deep-fried in sarcasm.

Joe was no more than 20 feet away and Royce could see him exchange a glance with the girl, as if he was going to pat down his pockets and pretend he'd left his credit card on the bar at the last place, but he kept on coming because he had no choice at this point. He wasn't that big—just big in relation to Joey and Shana—but he carried himself with a swagger and he had one of those faces that managed to look hard even when he was smiling at you. Which he definitely

wasn't doing now. He just froze his features, tightened his grip on the girl and made as if to ignore them. But Steve wouldn't have it. Steve was over the railing in a bound, wav­ing his arms like a game show host. "Hey, man, good to see you," he was crowing in his put-on voice. "What a coincidence, huh? And look, look who's here"—and now the voice of wonder—"your brother-in-law!"

That moment? Nobody really liked it. Not the couple with the pita platter or the wait­ress or the other smokers, who only wanted to suck a little peace through a tube and dis­solve the hassles of the day, and certainly not Joe. Or the girl he was with. She was involved now, giving him a look: brother-in-law?

"Ex," Joe said, looking from her to Royce and shooting him a look of hate. He was stalled there, against his will, the girl about to say something like Aren't you going to intro­duce me? and people beginning to turn their heads. Steve—he was amped up, clowning— kept saying, "Hey, come on, man, come on in and have a toke with us, like a peace pipe, you know?"

Joe ignored him. He just kept staring at Royce. Very slowly, in disgust, he began to shake his head, as if Royce were the one who'd walked out on his wife and kid and refused to pay child support or even leave a forwarding address, then he tightened his grip on the girl's arm, sidestepped Steve and made a show of strutting off down the street as if nothing had happened. And nothing had happened. What was he going to do, have Steve fight his battles for him? It wasn't worth it. Though if he was Steve's size, or even close, he would have gone over that rail himself, and he would have had a thing or two to say, and maybe more—maybe he would have gone for him right there on the sidewalk so people made way and the pretty girl let out a soft strangled cry.

By the time they settled in at the first bar up the street, he'd put it out of his head. Or mostly. He and Steve talked sports and spun out a couple of jokes and routines and he found himself drifting, but then Joe's face loomed up in his consciousness and he was telling himself he should have followed him to see what he was driving, get a license plate number so Shana could clue the police or child services or whoever. Something. Any­thing. But he hadn't, and the moment was gone. "Forget it," Steve told him. "Don't let that fucker spoil the night for you."

They went to the next place and the next place after that, the music pounding and the lights flashing, and for a while there he felt loose enough to go up to women at random and introduce himself, and when they asked him what he did for a living, he said, "I'm a dog man." That got them interested, no doubt about it, but it was the rare woman who didn't turn away or excuse herself to go to the ladies' when he began to explain just what that meant. Still, he was out on the town and the alcohol began to sing in his blood and he didn't feel tired or discour­aged in the least. It was around 11 when Steve suggested they try this hotel he'd heard about, where they had a big outdoor pool area and a bar scene and you could sit out under the stars and watch girls jump in and out of the pool in their bikinis. "Sure," he heard himself say, "why not?" And if he

thought of Joey, he thought of him in bed, asleep, the video remote still clenched in his hand and the screen gone blank.

He was feeling no pain as he followed Steve up the steps of the hotel and into the dark­ened lobby. Two doormen—studiously hip, mid-30s, with phone plugs in their ears and cords trailing away beneath their collars— swung back the doors on a big spreading space with low ceilings, concrete pillars and a cluster of aluminum and leather couches arranged in a grid against the wall on the right. People—various scenesters, mostly dressed in black—lounged on the couches, trying their best to look as if they belonged. Beyond them, the pool area opened up to the yellow night sky and the infinite lights of the city below. A minute later he and Steve were crowding in at the pool bar—glasses that weren't glass but plastic, a rattle of ice cubes, scotch and soda—while the music infected them and the pool sucked and fell in an explosion of dancing blue light. Girls, as promised. And swimming like otters. "Pretty cool, huh?" Steve was saying.

He nodded, just taking in the scene, think­ing nothing at this point, his mind sailing free the way it did when somebody else's dogs were fighting and he had no betting interest in the outcome. Suddenly he felt

a wave of exhaustion sweep over him—or was it boredom? After a moment he excused himself to find his way to the men's, and that was when the whole world shifted on him. Right in the lobby, set right there in the wall above the long curving sweep of the check-in desk, was a lit-up glass cubicle, maybe eight feet long, four high, with a mattress and pil­low and a pale pink duvet turned back on itself—how could he have missed it on the way in? It was like the window of a furniture store, or no, a stage set, because there was a girl inside, propped up against the back wall as if she were in her own bedroom. She was wearing pajamas—nothing overt like a teddy or anything like that—just pajamas, button-up top and drawstring bottoms rolled up at the ankles. She had a cell phone stuck to one ear and a book open in her lap. Her hair was dark and long, brushed out as if for bed—a brunette, definitely a brunette—and her feet were bare and pressed to the glass so you could see the pale flesh of her soles. That was what got him, that was what had him standing there in the middle of the lobby as if he'd been nailed to the floor: the soles of her feet, so clean and white and intimate in that darkened arena with its scenesters and hustlers and everybody else doing their best to ignore her.

"Can I help you?" The man behind the desk—big-frame glasses, skinny tie—was addressing him.

"I was"—but this was genius, wasn't it, the

hotel advertising what you could do there,

in private, in a room, if you had a girl like

that?—"just looking for the men's "

"Down the hall to your right."

He should have moved on, but he didn't, he couldn't. The guy behind the desk was studying him still—he could feel his eyes on him—probably a heartbeat away from informing him that he couldn't stand there blocking traffic all night and another heart­beat away from calling security. "Does she have a name?" Royce murmured, his voice caught low in his throat.

"Chelsea."

"Does she ?"

The man shook his head. "No."

When Steve finally came looking for him, he was squeezed in at the end of one of the couches in the dark, just watching her. At first, she'd seemed static, almost like a mannequin, but that wasn't the case at all— she blinked her eyes, flipped the hair out of her face, turned the pages of her book with a flick of enameled nails, each gesture magnified out of all proportion. And then, thrillingly, she shifted position, stretching like a cat, one muscle at a time, before flex­ing her arms and abdomen and pushing herself up into the lotus position, her feet tucked under her, the book in her lap and the cell cupped to one ear. He wondered if she was really talking to anybody—a boy­friend, a husband—or if it was just part of the act. Did she eat in there? Take bathroom breaks? Brush her teeth? Floss?

"Hey, man, I've been looking all over for you," Steve said, emerging from the shad­ows with the dregs of a drink in one hand and all trace of his grin gone. "What are you doing? You know what time it is?"

He didn't. He just shook his head in a slow absent way as if he were waking from a deep sleep, and then they were down the steps and out on the street, the cars crawling past in a continuous illuminated loop and a sliver moon caught like a hook in the jaws of the yellow

sky. The cell in his left front pocket began to vibrate. It was Joey. "What's up, big guy?" he said without breaking stride. "Shouldn't you be asleep? Like long asleep?"

The voice was soft, remote. "It's the Lab."

"What about her?"

"She's crying. I can hear her all the way from my bedroom."

"Yeah, okay, thanks for telling me— really—but don't you worry about it. You just get to sleep, hear me?"

Even softer: "Okay."

He wanted to add that they'd work the dogs in the morning, that they'd devote the whole morning to them because there was a match next weekend and if Joey was good he was going to bring him along, first time ever, because he was old enough now to see what it was all about and why they had to put so much time into training Zoltan and Zeus the way they did, baiting them and watching their diet and their weight and all the rest of it, but Joey had broken the connection.

Most of them were creeps, pure and simple—either that or old men who stood there gaping at her when they checked in with their shrink-wrapped wives—and she never had anything to do with any of them, no matter if they sent her 10-page letters and roses and fancy candy assortments, the latter of which she just gave to the maids in any case because sweets went straight to her hips and thighs. In fact, it was against the rules to make eye contact—Leonard, the manager, would jump down your throat if you even glanced up at somebody because that was like violating the fourth wall of the stage. This is theater, he kept telling her, and you're an actress. Just keep that in mind. Right. The only thing was, she didn't want to be an actress, unlike 99 percent of the other girls clawing their way through the shops and bars and clubs seven days a week—she was two years out of college, waitressing morn­ings in a coffee shop and doing four nights a week here, representing some sort of ado­lescent wet dream while saving her money and studying for her LSATs.

Was it demeaning? Was it stupid? Yes, of course it was, but her mother had danced topless in a cage during hippie times— and that was in a bar where people could hoot and throw things and shout out every sleazy proposition known to humankind. She wasn't an actress. Anybody could be an actress. She was going to go into immigra­tion law, help give voice to people who didn't have a say for themselves, do something with her life—and if using her looks to get her there, to get paid to study, was part of the deal, then that was fine with her.

So she was in her cubicle, embracing the concept of the fourth wall and trying to make sense of the logical reasoning ques­tions TestMasters threw at her, good to go sometimes for an hour or more without even looking up, but she wasn't blind. The scene drifted past her as if she were underwater, in a submarine, watching all the strange sea creatures interact, snatch at each other, pair up, stumble, glide, fade into the depths, and her expression never changed. She recog­nized people from time to time, of course she did, but she never let on. Matt Damon had been in one night, with a girl and another guy, and once, just after she clocked in, she thought she'd seen George Clooney—or the back of his head, anyway—and then there were people she'd gone to college with, an older couple who were friends of her par­ents, even a guy she'd dated in high school. Basically, and it wasn't that hard, she just ignored them all.

On this particular night, though, a Sat­urday, when the throngs were out and the words began to blur on the page and nobody, not even her mother, would answer the phone, she stole a glance at the lobby and the guy who'd just stood there watching her for the last five minutes till Eduardo, the desk-man, said something to him. In that instant, when he was distracted by whatever Eduardo was saying, she got a good look at him and realized, with a jolt, that she knew him from somewhere. Her eyes were back on the page but his image stayed with her: a lean short tensed-up guy with his hands in his pockets, blond hair piled up high on the crown of his head and a smooth detached expression, beautiful and dangerous at the same time, and where did she know him from?

It took her a while. She lost him when he drifted across the room in the direction of the lounge and she tried to refocus on her book but she couldn't. It was driving her crazy: Where had she met him? Was it at school? Or here? Had she served him at the coffee shop, was that it? Time passed. She was bored. And then she snatched a look again and there he was, with another guy, moving tentatively across the lobby as if it were ankle-deep in mud—drunk, both of them, or at least under the influence—and it came to her: He was the guy who'd adopted the kittens, the one with the little kid, the nephew. It must have been six weeks ago now. Missy had had her second—and last—litter, because it was irre­sponsible to bring more cats into the world when they were putting them down by the thousands in the shelters every day and she'd decided to have her spayed once the kittens were weaned, all nine of them, and he'd showed up in answer to her ad. And what was his name? Roy or something. Or

no: Royce. She remembered because of the boy, how unusual it was to see that kind of relationship, uncle and nephew, and how close they seemed, and because Royce had been so obviously attracted to her—couldn't keep his eyes off her, actually.

She'd just washed her hair and was comb­ing out the snarls when the bell rang and there they were on the concrete landing of her apartment, smiling up at her. "Hi," he said, "are you the one with the kittens?"

She looked from him to the boy and back again. She'd given one of the kittens away to a guy who worked in the hotel kitchen and another to one of her girlfriends, but there were seven left and nobody else had called. "Yeah," she said, pushing the door open wide. "Come on in."

The boy had made a real fuss over the kit­tens, telling her how cute they all were and how he couldn't make up his mind. She was just about to ask him if she couldn't get him something to drink, a glass of lemonade, a Coke, when he'd looked up at his uncle and said, "Could we take two?"

They were in a hurry—he apologized for that—and it was just a chance encounter, but it had stayed with her. (As had three of the kittens, which she hadn't been able to find homes for.) Royce told her he was in real estate and they'd lingered a moment at the door while the boy cradled his kit­tens and she told him she was looking to buy a duplex, with her parents' help, so the rent on the one apartment could cover her mortgage—like living for free—but she hadn't pushed it and he hadn't either.

Now, as she watched him square up his shoulders at the door, she wondered if he'd recognized her. For an instant her heart stood still—he was going, gone—and then, on an impulse, she broke her pose, set down the book and flicked off the light. In the next moment she was out of the cubicle, a page torn from her book in one hand and her pen in the other, rushing across the cold stone floor of the lobby in her bare feet. She scribbled out a note on the back of the page—How are the kittens? Call me. Chelsea— and handed it to Jason, the doorman.

"That guy," she said, pointing down the street. "The one on his cell? Could you run and give this to him for me?" In her rush, she almost forgot to include her number, but at the last second she remembered, and by the time Jason put his fingers to his lips and whistled down the length of the block, she was hurrying back across the lobby to the sanctuary of her cubicle.

It took three cups of coffee to clear his head in the morning, but he was up early all the same and took time to make an omelette for Joey—"No onions, no tomatoes," Joey told him, "just cheese"—before they went out to see to the dogs. The Lab was in her cage outside the door to the barn, still whin­ing, and he didn't even glance at her. He'd have Joey feed her some of the cheap kib­ble later, but first he had to work Zoltan and Zeus on the treadmills and make sure Zazzie, who'd thrown six pups out of Zeus's sire, the original Zeus, got the feed and atten­tion she needed while she was still nursing. Zeus the first had been a grand champion,

ROM, Register of Merit, with five wins, and the money he'd brought in in bets alone had been enough to establish Z-Dogz Kennels— and a dozen or more of his pups were out there on the circuit, winning big in their own right. Royce had never had a better pit dog, and it just about killed him when Zeus couldn't scratch after going at it with Marvin Harlock's champion Kato for two and a quar­ter hours and had to be put down because of his injuries. Still, he'd been bred to some 16 bitches and the stud fees alone had made up a pretty substantial part of Royce's income— especially with the realty market dead in the water the last two years—and Zeus the sec­ond, not to mention his brother Zoltan, had won their first matches, and that boded well for stud fees down the road.

The dogs set up their usual racket when he and Joey came in—happy to see them, always happy—and Joey ran ahead to let them out of their cages. Aside from the new litter and Zoltan, Zeus and Zazzie, he and Steve had only three other dogs at the time, two bitches out of Zeus the first, for breed­ing purposes with the next champion that caught their eye, and a male—Zeno—that had lost the better part of his muzzle in his first match and would probably have to be let go, though he'd really showed heart. For now, though, they were one big happy family, and they all surged round Royce's legs, even the puppies, their tongues going and their high excited yips rising up into the rafters where the pigeons settled and fluttered and settled again. "Feed them all except Zeus and Zoltan," he shouted to Joey over the noise, "because we're going to work them on the mills first, okay?"

And Joey, dressed in yesterday's blue jeans with smears of something on both knees and a T-shirt that could have been cleaner, swung round from where he was bending to the latch on Zeno's cage, his eyes shining. "And then can we bait them?"

"Yeah," he said. "Then we'll bait them."

The first time he'd let Joey watch while they set the dogs on the bait animals, he'd been careful to explain the whole thing to him so he wouldn't take it the wrong way. Most trainers—and he was one of them—felt that a fighting dog had to be blooded regu­larly to keep him keyed up between matches and if some of the excess and unwanted ani­mals of the world happened to be lost in the process, well, that was life. They were just going to be sent to the pound anyway, where some stoner working for minimum wage would stick a needle in them or shove them in a box and gas them, and this way was a lot more natural, wasn't it? He no lon­ger remembered whether it was rabbits or cats or a stray that first time, but Joey's face had drained and he'd had to take him out­side and tell him he couldn't afford to be squeamish, couldn't be a baby, if he wanted to be a dog man, and Joey—he was all of nine at the time—had just nodded his head, his mouth drawn tight, but there were no tears, and that was a good sign.

He didn't want to wear the dogs out so close to their next match, so he clocked half an hour on the treadmill, then put Zeus in the pit he'd erected in the back corner of the barn and had Joey bait him with one of the rabbits, after which it was Zoltan's

turn. Finally, he took the Lab out of her cage, taped her jaws shut and let both dogs have a go at her, nothing too severe, just enough for them to draw some blood and get the feel of another body and will, and whether it fought back or stood its ground or rolled over to show its belly didn't mat­ter. Baiting was just part of the regimen, that was all. After five minutes, he had to wade in and break Zeus's hold on the ani­mal. "That's enough for today, Joey—we want to save the Lab for maybe two days before the match, okay?"

Joey was leaning against the plywood sides of the pit, his expression unreadable. There was something in his hair—a twig or a bit of straw the dogs had kicked up. He didn't say anything in response.

The Lab was trembling—she had the shakes, the way dogs did when they'd had enough and wouldn't come out of their corner—and one of her ears was pretty well gone, but she'd do for one more go-around on Thursday, and then they'd have to answer another ad or two. He bent to the dog, which tried to look up at him out of its good eye but was trembling so hard it couldn't quite manage to raise its head, clipped a leash to its collar and led it out of the pit. "Put her back in her cage," he told Joey, handing him the leash. "And you can feed and water her now. I'll take care of Zeusy and Zoltan. And if you're good, maybe later we'll do a little Chicken McNuggets for lunch, how's that sound? With that barbecue sauce you like?"

He turned away and started for the house. He hadn't forgotten the note in his pocket— he was just waiting till a reasonable hour (10, he was thinking) before he called her, figur­ing she'd been up even later than he and Steve. Call me, she'd written, and the words had lit him up right there on the street as if he'd been plugged into a socket—it was all he could do to keep himself from lurching back into the hotel to press his face to the glass and mouth his assent. But that would have been uncool, terminally uncool, and he'd just floated on down the street, Steve ribbing him, all the way to the car. The mystery was the reference to the cats, and he'd been trying to put that together all morning—obviously he and Joey must have answered an ad from her at some point, but he couldn't remember when or where, though maybe she did look familiar to him, maybe that was part of it.

He crossed the yard and went in the kitchen door, but Steve was sitting at the table in the breakfast nook, rubbing the bristle of his scalp with one hand and spooning up cornflakes with the other, so Royce stepped out back to make the call on his cell. And then, the way these things do, it all came back to him as he punched in the number: the kittens, a potted bird-of-paradise on the landing, the condo— or no, duplex—she was looking to buy.

She answered on the first ring. Her voice was cautious, tentative—even if she had caller ID and his name came up it wouldn't have meant anything to her because she didn't know him yet, did she?

"Hi," he said, "it's me, Royce, from last night? You said to call?"

She liked his voice on the phone—it was soft and musical, sure of itself but not cocky,

not at all. And she liked the fact that he'd been wearing a nice-fitting sport coat the night before and not just a T-shirt or athletic jersey like all the rest of them. They made small talk, Missy brushing up against her leg, a hummingbird at the feeder outside the window like a finger of light. "So," he said after a moment, "are you still interested in looking at property? No obligation, I mean, and even if you're not ready to buy yet, it would be a pleasure, a privilege and a plea­sure, to just show you what's out there...." He paused. "And maybe buy you lunch. You up for lunch?"

He worked out of an office on a side street off Ventura, not 10 minutes from her apart­ment. When she pulled up in the parking lot, he was there waiting for her at the door of a long dark bottom-heavy Suburban with tires almost as tall as her Mini. "I know, I know," he said, "it's a real gas hog and about as environmentally stupid as you can get, but you'd be surprised at the size of some of the family groups I have to show around... plus, I'm a dog man."

They were already wheeling out of the lot, a book of listings spread open on the console between them. She saw that he'd circled a number of them in her price range

and the neighborhood she was hoping for. "A dog man?"

"A breeder, I mean. And I keep this vehicle spotless, as you can see, right? But I do need the space in back for the dogs sometimes."

"For shows?"

A wave of the hand. They were out in traf­fic now and she was seeing him in profile, the sun flaring in his hair. "Oh, no, nothing like that. I'm just a breeder, that's all."

"What kind of dogs?"

"The best breed there is," he said, "the only breed, pit bull terriers," and if she thought to ask him about that, which she should have, she didn't get the chance because he was already talking up the first property he'd circled for her and before she knew it they were there and all she could see was possibility.

Over lunch—he took her to an upscale place with a flagstone courtyard where you could sit outside beneath a huge twisting syc­amore that must have been a hundred years old and listen to the trickling of the fountain in the corner—they discussed the properties he'd showed her. He was polite and solici­tous and he knew everything there was to know about real estate. They shared a bot­tle of wine, took their time over their food. She kept feeling a mounting excitement—she couldn't wait to call her mother, though the

whole thing was premature, of course, until she knew where she was going to law school, though if it was Pepperdine, the last place, the one in Woodland Hills, would have been perfect. And with the sun sifting through the leaves of the trees and the fountain mur­muring and Royce sketching in the details of financing and what he'd bid and how much the attached apartment was bringing in—and more, how he knew a guy who could do main­tenance, cheap, and a great painter too, and didn't she think the living room would look a thousand percent better in maybe a deeper shade of yellow, gold, really, to contrast with the oak beams?—she knew she would get in, she knew it in that moment as certainly as she'd ever known anything in her life.

And when he asked if she wanted to stop by and see his place, she never hesitated. "It's nothing like what you're looking for," he said as they walked side by side out to the car, "but I just thought you'd like to see it out of curiosity, because it's a real sweet deal. Detached house, an acre of property, right up in the hills. My roommate and I, we're co-owners, and we'd be crazy to sell, espe­cially in this market, but if we ever do both of us could retire, it's that sweet."

The thing was—and he was the one to ask— did she want to stop back at the office for her car and follow him? Was she all right to drive? Or did she just want to come with him?

The little decisions, the little moments that can open up forever: She trusted him, liked him, and if she'd had any hesitation three hours ago he'd more than won her over. Still, when he put the question to her, she saw herself in her own car—and she wouldn't have another glass of wine, though she was sure he was going to offer it when they got there—because in her own car she could say good-bye when she had to and make sure she got to work on time. Which on a Sunday was eight p.m. And it was what, 3:30 now?

"I'll follow you," she said.

The streets were unfamiliar, narrow twisting blacktop lanes that dug deeper and deeper into the hills, and she'd begun to wonder if she'd ever be able to find her way back again when he flicked on his signal light and led her onto a dirt road that fell away beneath an irregular canopy of oaks. She rolled up her window, though it was hot in the car, and followed at a distance, easing her way over the washboard striations that made the doors rattle in their frames. There was dust everywhere, a whole universe of it fanning out from the shoulders of the road and lifting into the scrub oak and mesquite till all the lower leaves were dulled. Mailboxes sprang up every hundred yards or so, but the houses were set back so you couldn't see them. A family of quail, all skittering feet and bob­bing heads, shot out in front of her and she had to brake to avoid them. Scenery, a whole lot of scenery. Just as she was getting impa­tient, wondering what she'd got herself in for, they were there, rolling in under the shade of the trees in front of a low rambling ranch-style house from the forties or fifties, painted a deep chocolate brown with white trim, a barn set just behind and to the right of it and painted in the same color combination. The dust cleared. He was standing there

beside the truck, grinning, and here came the boy—Joey—bouncing across the yard as if he were on springs. She stepped out of her car, smelled sage and something else, too, something sweet and indefinable, wildflow-ers, she supposed. From the barn came the sound of dogs, barking.

Royce had an arm looped over Joey's shoulder as they ambled toward her. "Great spot, huh? You want end of the road, this is it. And you should see the stars—nothing like the city where you get all that light pol­lution. And noise. It's quiet as a tomb out here at night." Then he ducked his head and introduced Joey—or reintroduced him.

The boy was taller than she'd remem­bered, his hair so blond it was almost white and cut in a neat fringe across his eyebrows. He gave her a quick smile, his eyes flashing blue in the mottled sun beneath the trees. "Hi," she said, bending to take his hand, "I'm Chelsea. How are you doing?"

He just stared. "Good." And then, to Royce, "Mr. Harlock's been ringing the phone all day looking for you. Where have you been?"

Royce was watching her, still grinning. "Don't you worry," he said, glancing down at the boy, "I'll call him first chance I get. And now"—coming back to her—"maybe Chelsea'd like to sit out on the porch and have a nice cold soda—or maybe, if we can twist her arm, just one more glass of that Santa Maria chard we had over lunch?"

She smiled back at him. "You really have it? The same one?"

"What you think, I'm just some amateur or something? Of course, we have it. A whole case straight from the vineyard—and at least one, maybe two bottles in the refrigerator even as we speak...."

It was then, just as she felt her resolve weakening—what would one more hurt?— that the screen door in front sliced open and the other guy, the taller one from last night, stuck his head out. "It's Marvin on the phone," he called, "about next week. Says it can't wait."

"My roommate, Steve," Royce said, nod­ding to him. "Steve," he said, "Chelsea." He separated himself from her then, spun around on one heel and gestured toward the porch. "Here, come on, why don't you have a seat out here and enjoy the scenery a minute while I take this call—it'll just be a minute, I promise—and then I'll bring you your wine. Which, I can see from your face, you already decided to take me up on, right?"

"Okay, you convinced me," she said, feel­ing pleased with herself, feeling serene, everything so tranquil, the dogs fallen silent now, not a man-made sound to be heard any­where, no leaf blowers, no backfiring cars or motorcycles or nattering TVs, and it really was blissful. For one fraction of a moment, as she went up the steps to the porch and saw the outdoor furniture arrayed there, the glass-topped table and the armchairs canted toward a view of the trees and the hillside beyond, she pictured herself moving in with Royce, going to bed with him and waking up here in the midst of all this natural beauty, and forget the duplex—she'd be even closer to school from here, wouldn't she? She set­tled into the chair and put her feet up.

And then the door slammed, and Joey,

having bounced in and back out again, was standing there staring at her, a can of soda in his hand. "You want some?" he asked, hold­ing it out to her. "It's good. Kiwi-strawberry, my favorite."

"No, thanks. It's a tempting offer, but I think I'll wait for your uncle." She bent to scratch a spot on the inside of her calf, a raised red welt there, thinking a mosquito must have bitten her, and when she looked up again her eyes fell on the cage stand­ing just outside the barn door in a flood of sunlight. There was a dark figure hunched there, a dog, and as if it sensed she was look­ing, it began to whine.

"Is that one of your dogs?" she asked.

Joey gave her an odd look, almost as if she'd insulted him. "That? No, that's just one of the bait animals. We've got real dogs. Pit bulls."

She didn't know what to say to that, the distinction he was making—a dog was a dog as far as she was concerned, and this one was obviously in distress. "Maybe it needs water," she said.

"I already watered her. And fed her, too."

"You really like animals, don't you?" she said, and when he nodded in response, she added, "And how are the kittens doing? Did you litter-train them? And what are their names—you name them yourself?"

She was leaning forward in the chair, their faces on a level. He didn't answer. He shuffled his feet, his eyes dodging away from hers, and she could see the lie form­ing there—bait animals—even before he shrugged and murmured, "They're fine."

Royce was just coming through the door with two glasses of white wine held high in one hand and a platter of cheese and crack­ers in the other. His smile died when he saw the look she was giving him.

"Tell me one thing," she said, shoving her­self up out of the chair, all the cords of her throat strung so tight she could barely breathe, "just one thing—what's a bail animal?"

The darkness came down hard that night. It was as if one minute it was broad day, bugs hanging like specks in the air, the side of the barn bronzed with the sun, and then the next it was black dark. He was out on the porch, smoking, and he never smoked unless he was drunk, and he was drunk now, because what was he going to do with an open bot­tle of wine—toss it? He hadn't made Joey any supper and he felt bad about that—and bad about laying into him the way he did— but Shana would be here soon to pick him up and she could deal with it. Steve was out somewhere. Everything was still but for the hiss and crackle of Joey's video game leaching down from the open bedroom window. He was about to push himself up and go in and put something in his stomach when the Lab bitch began to whine from across the yard.

The sound was an irritant, that was what it was, and he let out a soft curse. In the next moment, and he didn't even think twice about it, he had the leash in his hand. Maybe it didn't make sense, maybe it was too late, but Zeus could always use the exercise. And when he was done, so could Zoltan.

He took the Lab out of her

cage, taped her jaws shut

and let both dogs have a go

at her, nothing too severe,

just enough for them to draw

some blood and get the feel.