“It‘s a guy thing,” Diesel said.
“Apparently, it‘s also a monkey thing.”
Diesel remoted the tele vision off. “Yeah. Guys and monkeys have a lot in common.”
“You were right about the branded handprint. The victim‘s name is Eugene Scanlon, and he was Munch‘s boss. He was found in his own car.” I handed Diesel the seven pages Connie had printed out for me. “Here‘s some background on Scanlon.”
Diesel read through the pages and returned them to me. “Fifty-?six years old. Single. Living alone. No arrest history. Some credit problems. Originally from Baltimore. Graduated from BU and got his doctorate at Stanford. Nothing in there about his research.”
“Connie‘s still digging.”
“I‘d like to look at his apartment, but for the next couple hours it‘ll be crawling with police. We‘ll go in to night.”
“You will go in to night.”
“We will go in to night.”
“You can‘t make me.”
“Of course I can.”
“You don‘t scare me. I know you‘d never hurt me.”
“True, but I have ways.”
“Magic?”
“Muscle,” Diesel said.
“You‘d physically force me to go with you?”
“Yeah.”
“Why?”
“It‘s more fun when you‘re along. And you make it diffi-?cult for Wulf to zero in on me.”
“Let me guess. This is about cosmic dust, right? Our dust mingles together, and Wulf gets confused.”
Carl gave me the finger.
“Carl‘s tired of hearing about cosmic dust,” Diesel said. “It‘s getting old.”
“Then maybe you want to explain the whole zeroing-?in phenomenon to me.”
“It‘s not a big deal. You know how sometimes you walk into a room and get a creepy feeling that you‘re not alone? Or maybe you‘re looking for a guy, and you get this feeling that he‘s in the coat closet, so you open the door, and there he is. It‘s like that… but Wulf and I operate at a higher level.”
“Why do I make it difficult for Wulf?”
“When I‘m with you, some of my chemistry changes, and it becomes more difficult to trace my sensory imprint. At least, that‘s the theory. I‘m told it has to do with sexual attraction and expanding blood vessels. There‘s more, but the expanding blood vessels is the good part.”
I‘d never actually seen Diesel‘s blood vessels in all their expanded glory. I had a feeling it was a spectacular sight. And just the thought of it scared the bejeezus out of me.
“As long as they don‘t expand too much,” I said to Diesel.
“Your loss,” Diesel said.
“Anyway, I can‘t go with you to night because I promised my mom I‘d be over for dinner.”