Flash on Chicago Chronicles

Dr. Liverman / The Klondike Confrontation — Saturday, March 2, 1991, 5:50 PM

Sat, 02 Mar 1991 17:50:00 +0000

Cherry Hills Village / Englewood / Sloan’s Lake / CU Auraria / County Road 73 (Sedalia)

Denver, Colorado

The bartender’s name didn’t matter. Off shift from a place called Hank’s on South Broadway, white button-down untucked, sleeves rolled past forearms that had been pouring rail whiskey since three in the afternoon. He crossed the parking lot toward a Dodge pickup and Flash came at him on a diagonal, fast and easy, and the man never registered a threat.

The Hunters — Friday, March 1, 1991, 5:50 PM

Fri, 01 Mar 1991 17:50:00 +0000

24th Diocese, Five Points

Denver, Colorado

The bench grinder threw sparks against the workshop wall in Cherry Hills. Past midnight. Marcus worked the oak by hand after that, testing each point against his palm until the tip dimpled skin without splitting it. Three stakes between them when he was done. He held one up to the fluorescent tube.

“Tony told us a stake stops the heart,” Marcus said. “He didn’t tell us how you get close enough to use one on something that moves like he does.”

Seek and Ye Shall Find — Wednesday, February 27, 1991, 5:50 PM

Wed, 27 Feb 1991 17:50:01 +0000

Hampden Avenue / Cherry Hills Village

Denver, Colorado

Flash woke hungry and cold. Five nights since the last feed and the body remembered before the mind did. A thinness in the limbs, a looseness behind the eyes, a way the room’s edges softened into something he had to work to see. The basement bedroom in Emerson’s house smelled of carpet adhesive and old cedar and the particular absence of cooking that meant a house where nobody ate. He sat up. His hands shook. Not badly. Enough.

The Gate, The Split, The Broadstreet — Wednesday, February 27, 1991, 5:50 PM

Wed, 27 Feb 1991 17:50:00 +0000

Cherry Hills Village / Lower Downtown / The Broadstreet

Denver, Colorado

The detective was already at the gate when they pulled up the drive.

He stood beside an unmarked sedan at the stone gatehouse, breath coming up white, one hand resting on the post. Not hiding. Not pressing. A man who had been standing there long enough for his shoes to go dark with gutter water and who did not care about the shoes. He raised his hand as the headlights caught him. A wave. Friendly.

The Ranch Visit — Tuesday, February 26, 1991, 5:48 PM

Tue, 26 Feb 1991 17:48:00 +0000

Cherry Hills Village / County Road 73, Sedalia Denver, Colorado

The carpet cleaner smell hit first. Then the cat. Then the television upstairs – body bags at Dhahran, the anchorwoman’s voice clipped and careful, reading the dead like a weather report.

Flash opened his eyes and the basement ceiling was the same ceiling it had been yesterday and the day before and the day before that. Emerson’s guest suite. The low wood-paneled room where five people who should have been dead slept through the days and stared at each other through the nights.

The Police Investigation — Monday, February 25, 1991, 5:46 PM

Mon, 25 Feb 1991 17:46:00 +0000

Cherry Hills Village / Colorado National Bank / DA’s Office Denver, Colorado

The ceiling was nine feet of poured concrete and Flash could hear Wolf Blitzer through it. Tinny, cadenced, the particular rhythm of a man describing tank formations in the Kuwaiti desert. Windsor had CNN on upstairs. The ground war had started. The whole country was watching the same footage and Flash was in a basement in Cherry Hills trying to remember what day it was.

After the Fire — Saturday, February 23, 1991, 5:48 PM

Sat, 23 Feb 1991 17:48:00 +0000

Brighton Street, Capitol Hill Denver, Colorado

Flash came up out of the dark without the small mercies of waking. No grog, no stretch, no slow accumulation of where. The body turned on. Eyes open, the radiator hissing too high, the streetlight bleeding brown through the shade. Saturday evening. The window said it. The cold in his hands said it. His hands knew the time before the clock did.

The clock on the dresser said 17:51.

The Basement -- Saturday, February 23, 1991, 12:40 AM

Sat, 23 Feb 1991 00:40:00 +0000

Prestor’s Townhouse basement / Capitol Hill storm sewers / Grant Street / Five Points apartment Denver, Colorado

The concrete was cold against the back of his skull. That was the first thing. Not a thought – a temperature. February at five thousand feet, slab floor, and Flash’s body reporting facts before his brain had signed back on.

He opened his eyes. Brick ceiling. Lab light on a chain, the filament doing that slow amber throb that means the power is about to go. Smoke in the room, thick enough to taste – chemical, not wood. Something electrical had burned first, and the building was catching up.