“Sure. Was he hanging around with anyone in particular?”

She hesitated. “Look, I’m just trying to retrace his movements,” he said. “I’m not here to bust anyone, I’m just collecting information.”

“No, yeah, sure. He was hanging out with Doozer and his crew a lot.”

“They’re the guys who built the Fire Truck, right?” The Fire Truck had been exactly that, an old hook-and-ladder that had been retrofitted into a vehicle covered in gas jets and flamethrowers; the ladder itself became a mobile fire sculpture extending sixty feet into the air.

“Yeah, that’s them. They’re not here tonight, though. I think they’re pretty busy working on next year’s project. Oh, look, there’s Neon Girl. I’ll, uh, see you later, huh?”

And then she was gone.

“Great,” Greg muttered. “Just great.”

The paparazzi caught Grissom by surprise.

They ambushed him coming out of the police station with Jim Brass, snapping flash pictures and yelling questions. “Grissom! Do you have any suspects in the killing of Paul Fairwick?”

“Captain Brass! Is it true Athena Jordanson has been receiving death threats?”

“Gil! Gil! Is it true Fairwick died of an overdose?”

Grissom stopped. “The Fairwick case is still in the preliminary stages,” he said. “I cannot comment on any details at this time.” He knew it wouldn’t stop the barrage, but it was like tossing a bone to a pack of wild dogs; it might slow them down enough to let him get away.

They followed him to the Artemis Hotel, of course. It was where Athena Jordanson was currently headlining and had been for the past four years. What Brass had discovered was that Paul Fairwick wasn’t just a guy with a backstage pass-he was Athena Jordanson’s personal assistant.

The billboard at the front of the hotel made sure everyone knew who their star was, too: ATHENA JORDANSON, QUEEN OF SOUL glittered in electroluminescent letters twenty feet high and flashing every color of the rainbow.

Grissom parked and went inside, Brass meeting him in the lobby. Hotel security met them and took them to the diva’s penthouse suite via private elevator, leaving the swarm of photojournalists behind.

“So if Athena’s the queen of soul,” asked Brass as they rode up, “what does that make Paul Fairwick? Earl? Duke? Baron-in-waiting?”

“Corpse,” said Grissom. “In morgue.”

The elevator doors opened onto a lobby that looked more like the entrance to a jungle. Palms, ferns, and tropical flowers reached from floor to ceiling, with springy green moss underfoot. Water trickled down the front of an abstract crystal sculpture and into a stone-lined pool. The two hotel security men who had ridden up with them rode back down again, leaving Grissom and Brass alone.

“After you, Bwana,” said Brass.

They made their way along a mossy path that led to a huge living room, just as filled with greenery but with one curving glass wall that looked out over the Strip. It had been widely reported that Ms. Jordanson had asked for-and received-the penthouse suite, built to her specifications, as part of her contract.

The queen of soul herself was reclining on a moss-green couch that looked like it had grown out of the floor. She wore a bright pink tracksuit, her brown feet were bare, and her famous Afro looked like she’d been sleeping on her left side. She had a box of Kleenex in her lap, and used tissue littered the floor like crumpled white flowers.

“Ms. Jordanson?” said Brass. “I’m Captain Jim Brass, and this is Gil Grissom with the Las Vegas Crime Lab. We have a few questions for you, if you don’t mind.”

She shook her head. “No, I-of course. Please sit down.”

Brass chose the other end of the couch, while Grissom settled into an armchair. Its legs seemed to branch out into polished roots.

“When was the last time you talked to Paul?” asked Brass.

“Last night, just before my ten o’clock performance. We talked backstage, I told him what I wanted to eat afterward-that was the last thing I said to him, you know? ‘Make sure my steak is medium-rare.’ I can’t believe it.” Tears welled up in her eyes. “What a stupid thing to say to my best friend. To be the last thing I said to him.”

“Did Paul have any enemies?”

“It’s my fault,” she sobbed. “All my fault.”

“Why do you think that?”

“Because I’m always getting threats. Nobody wanted to hurt Paul-he was a sweetheart, a saint. He put up with me and all my bullshit, and that’s saying a lot. No, the only reason someone would hurt Paul would be to get at me.”

Brass and Grissom had dealt with celebrities before. They tended to live in worlds that centered around them, and any significant event-like a death-was naturally assumed to be about them, not the actual victim. Sometimes they were even right.

“Do you have copies of these threats?” asked Grissom.

“You’d have to ask Paul-oh, God! ” She started weeping again. “How am I going to cope without him? He handled that kind of thing…”

They waited until she got herself under control. “Do you have a chief of security?” Grissom asked gently.

“Yes. He’s with the hotel. I don’t remember the name, though.”

“Don’t worry, I’ll find out and I’ll talk to him,” said Brass. “If his staff has intercepted notes or calls, there may be something we can use.”

Grissom’s phone vibrated. “Excuse me,” he said. He rose from his seat, took a few steps away, and answered. “Grissom.”

He listened intently, then frowned. “David, calm down. Where is he now? All right, good. I want you to meet me outside the morgue, all right? Don’t let anyone else in.”

He snapped the phone shut and headed for the elevator. “I have to go, Jim.”

Brass had been a cop for a long time, and he recognized the tone in Grissom’s voice instantly. “What’s wrong?”

“It’s Al,” said Grissom. “He’s in the hospital.”

7

GROUPS THAT CAME TO Black Rock City organized themselves as theme camps. A theme camp could be as small as one person operating out of the back of their vehicle or number a hundred people or more and involve a structure the size of a circus t ent. Theme camps could be based on literally anything, though in recent years the festival had announced an overall art theme to lend some direction; people were free to embrace or ignore the theme as they chose. There were camps that gave away food, massages, costumes, alcohol, haircuts; camps that offered dating services, minigolf, tea, floggings, live music, swing dancing, trapeze lessons, or meditati o n circles. There were hundreds. Each had its own identity, was run entirely by volunteers, and was responsible for packing out every single scrap of material it brought in.

Doozer’s crew was an art collective who called themselves the Phyre Brigade. They were hard-core pyromaniacs, building vehicles and sculptures that played with flame the way a fountain played with water. The group’s base of operations was an old garage on the outskirts of town, its use donated by a fellow Burner who had no current plans for the property.

Greg pulled up next to the rusting spots where the gas pumps had once stood. He could see sparks and the ultraviolet glare of a welding rig inside, through the narrow glass panes of the rolling panel doors. It was late, but Glowbug had told him Doozer preferred working late.

The front entrance was unlocked; a stuffed deer head gazed at the ceiling from the spot on the counter where the cash register had once stood. A door beside that sto od open, leading to the garage; Greg stood in the doorway and called out, “Hello?”

A man in blue coveralls turned off his welding torch and turned around, flipping up the smoked glass visor. His face was as greasy as his clothes, and a cinder smoldered in his heavy black beard.

“Hi,” said Greg. “You’re, uh, on fire.” He pointed.