Sure, the prospective escape held some appeal, but he could never get over the loss of control. The first time he’d purchased narcotics, back at Lockland, he wasn’t even trying to get high. He was just trying to end his life, so he could come back better.

Irony of ironies, thought Victor, swallowing the pill dry.

VII

FOUR YEARS AGO

DRESDEN

VICTOR hadn’t spent a lot of time in strip clubs.

He’d never understood their appeal—never been aroused by the half-naked bodies, their writhing oiled forms—but he hadn’t come to the Glass Tower for the show.

He was looking for someone special.

As he scanned the hazy club, trying not to inhale the cloud of perfume and smoke and sweat, a manicured hand danced along his shoulder blade.

“Hello, honey,” said a syrupy voice. Victor glanced sideways and saw dark eyes, bright red lips. “I bet we could put a smile on that face.”

Victor doubted it. He had craved a lot of things—power, revenge, control—but sex was never one of them. Even with Angie . . . he’d wanted her, of course, wanted her attention, her devotion, even her love. He’d cared about her, would have found ways to please her—and perhaps found his own pleasure in that—but for him, it had never been about sex.

The dancer looked Victor up and down, misreading his disinterest for discretion, or perhaps assuming his proclivities went to less feminine places.

He brushed her fingers away. “I’m looking for Malcolm Jones.” Self-styled entrepreneur, specializing in all things illicit. Weapons. Sex. Drugs.

The dancer sighed and pointed toward a red door at the back of the club. “Downstairs.”

He made his way toward it, was nearly there when a small blonde crashed into him, releasing a flutter of apology in a high sweet lilt as he reached to steady her. Their eyes met, and something crossed her face, the briefest flutter of interest—he would have said recognition, but he was sure they’d never met. Victor pulled away, and so did she, slipping into the crowd as he reached the red door.

It swung shut behind him, swallowing the club from view. He flexed his hands as he followed a set of concrete steps down into the bowels of the building. The hall at the bottom was narrow, the walls painted black and the air thick with stale cigar smoke. Laughter spilled out of a room at the end, but Victor’s way forward was blocked by a heavyset guy in a snug black shirt.

“Going somewhere?”

“Yes,” said Victor.

The man surveyed him. “You look like a narc.”

“So I’ve been told,” said Victor, spreading his arms, inviting a search.

The man patted him down, then led him through.

Malcolm Jones was sitting behind a large desk in an expensive suit, a gleaming silver gun resting atop a stack of bills at his elbow. Three more men perched on various pieces of furniture; one watched the flat-screen mounted on the wall, another played on his phone, the third eyed the line of coke Jones was cutting on his desk.

None of them seemed overly concerned by Victor’s arrival.

Only Jones bothered to look up. He wasn’t young, but he had that hungry, almost wolfish look that came with people on the rise. “Who’re you?”

“New customer,” said Victor simply.

“How’d you hear of me?”

“Word spreads.”

Jones preened at that, clearly flattered by the idea of his budding notoriety. He gestured at the empty chair across the desk. “What are you looking for?”

Victor lowered himself into the chair. “Drugs.”

Jones gave him a once-over. “Huh, would have taken you for a weapons guy. Are we talking heroin? Coke?”

Victor shook his head. “Prescription.”

“Ah, in that case . . .” Jones waved a hand, and one of his men rose and opened a locker, displaying an array of plastic pill bottles.

“We’ve got oxy, fentanyl, benzos, addy . . .” recited Jones as the other guy lined the bottles on the desk.

Victor considered his options, wondering where to start.

The episodes were multiplying, and nothing he did seemed to make a difference. He’d tried avoiding his power, on the theory that it was a kind of battery, one that charged with use. When that didn’t work, Victor changed tactics, and tried using his power more, on the theory that perhaps it was a charge he had to diffuse. But that approach yielded the same results—again the buzz grew louder, again it became physical, again Victor died.

Victor surveyed the array of pills.

He could chart the electrical current’s progress, but he couldn’t seem to change it.

From a scientific perspective, it was damning.

From a psychological one, it was worse.

The pain itself he could hijack, to a point, but pain was only one facet of the nervous system. And only one aspect of most opiates. They were suppressants, designed not only to smother pain, but also sensation, heart rate, consciousness—if one kind didn’t suffice, then he’d need a cocktail.

“I’ll take them,” he said.

“Which ones?”

“All of them.”

Jones smiled coolly. “Slow down, stranger. There’s a house limit of one bottle—I can’t go giving you my whole supply. Next thing I know, it shows up on a corner at triple the price—”

“I’m not selling,” said Victor.

“Then you don’t need much,” said Jones, his smile tightening. “Now, as for payment—”

“I said I’d take them.” Victor leaned forward. “I never said anything about payment.”

Jones laughed, a humorless, feral sound, taken up in a chorus by his men. “If you were planning to rob me, you could have at least brought a gun.”

“Oh, I did,” said Victor, holding out his hand. Slowly, as if performing a trick, he curled three of his fingers in, leaving his thumb up and his index extended.

“See?” he said, pointing the finger at Jones.

Jones no longer seemed amused. “You some kind of—?”

“Bang.”

There was no gunshot—no earsplitting echo or spent cartridge or smoke—but Jones let out a guttural scream and fell to the floor as if hit.

The other three men went for their own guns, but their actions were slowed by shock, and before they could fire Victor leveled them all. No dial. No nuance. Just blunt force. That place beyond pain where nerves snapped, fuses blew.

The men crumpled to the floor like puppets with their strings cut, but Jones was still conscious. Still clutching his chest, searching frantically for a bullet wound, the wetness of blood, some physical damage to match what his nerves were telling him.

“The fuck . . . the fuck . . .” he muttered, eyes darting wildly.

Pain, Victor had learned, turned people into animals.

He gathered the pills, dumping bags and bottles into a black leather briefcase he found leaning against the desk. Jones shuddered on the floor before rallying, his attention latching on to the glint of metal on his desk. He started to lunge for it, but Victor’s fingers twitched, and Jones sagged, unconscious, against the far wall.

Victor took up the gun Jones had been going for, weighed the weapon in his palm. He didn’t have any special fondness for guns—they’d been rendered largely unnecessary, given his power. But in his current condition, it might be useful to have something . . . extraneous. Plus, it never hurt to have a visible deterrent.

Victor slipped the gun into his coat pocket and snapped the briefcase shut.

“A pleasure doing business with you,” he said to the silent room as he turned and walked out.

AT THE SAME TIME . . .

JUNE adjusted her ponytail and slipped through the velvet curtain into the private dance room. Harold Shelton was already inside, waiting, rubbing his pink hands on his thighs in anticipation.

“I’ve missed you, Jeannie.”

Jeannie was home sick with food poisoning.

June was just borrowing her body.

“How much have you missed me?” she asked, trying to sound soft, breathy. The voice wasn’t perfect, it never was. After all, a voice was nature and nurture, biology and culture. June could nail the pitch—that came with the body—but her real accent, with its light musical lilt, always snuck through. Not that Harold seemed to notice. He was too busy ogling Jeannie’s tits through the blue-and-white cheerleading outfit.

It wasn’t really June’s preferred type, but it didn’t have to be.

It just had to be his.

She did a slow circle around him, let her pink nails trail along his shoulder. When her fingers grazed his skin, she saw flashes of his life—not all of it, just the pieces that left a mark. She let them slide through her mind without sticking. She knew she’d never borrow his body, so she’d never need to know more.

Harold caught her wrist, pulling her into his lap.

“You know the rules, Harold,” June said, easing herself free.

The rules of the club were simple: Look, but don’t touch. Hands in your lap. On your knees. Under your ass. It didn’t matter, so long as they weren’t on the girl.

“You’re such a fucking tease,” he growled, annoyed, aroused. He tipped his head back, eyes glassy, breath sour. “What am I even paying for?”

June passed behind him, draped her arms around his shoulders. “You can’t touch me,” she cooed, leaning in until her lips brushed his ear. “But I can touch you.”