Phalaenopsis

The sun had just begun its dip behind the splinter-bricked skyline, casting long, jagged shadows that seemed to reach down to claw at the pavement. The city was a kaleidoscope of neon and fractured brick, but his business this night was in a flower shop. Not the kind where hopefuls bought roses and lilies for skeptical partners, but the kind where a secret could bloom like a nightshade in the dark.

Blake pushed open the door to Petal & Thorn, a quaint spot on the corner of Seventh and Main. The bell above the door tinkled two-and-a-half times as he entered. The smell of fresh flowers hit first, like a late-summer breeze, before some slower, insidious notes of dead vegetable matter.

A woman stood behind the counter, auburn hair in a loose bun, cigarette dangling unsteadily from her lips. She looked up from a pale arrangement, green eyes narrowing as they settled on him, cutting through the smoke, fingers hovering like the pincers of a mantis. Blake stepped around the counter and she didn’t try to stop him — she didn’t move at all. He pushed open the door marked Private and entered a combination toilet, storage closet, and office.

It was jammed with boxes and vases and somehow included a battered little desk and chair. The stench of overripe petals was overpowering. On the chair slumped Victor Malone. There was a bottle in his hand and fear in his face … fear to the point of desperation.

Well of course, he managed to say. Bet you’re proud of yourself.

You know why I’m here.

He looked left and right as if searching for an escape route. Ridiculous.

I can’t supply him, Blake. There’s nothing left to work with.

Not my problem. But it will be if you don’t come quietly. Business is business … the other way around and it’d be you calling me.

Victor slumped further in the chair, the bottle slipping from his fingers to land upright, bottom-biased, on the floor. He looked up, defeated. All right … I’ll go.

Blake reached down to help him to his feet. He was mostly dead weight, legs bent and barely helping. The woman at the counter watched them pass, saying nothing. Blake took note of her profile, of the curve of her lumbar and the recurve below.

Found what I came for. I’ll be back later for something better.

They walked out of the shop, the bell tinkling behind. The night air was cool and crisp and a relief from the ripeness inside. Victor was maneuvered into the passenger seat and Blake got in behind the wheel.

Victor stayed silent at first, staring out his window at the passing storefronts. When he finally spoke, his voice was barely a whisper.

What are you going to do with me?

I’m going to deliver you, Vic. I’m in the pick up and delivery business tonight.

I can’t go back. You know why … you know what he’ll do.

Maybe you should have thought of that a week or so back.

They drove in silence a while longer, the commercial sector unwinding, replaced by sodium-vapor lamps at quarter-mile posts, each of which put out a poisonous orange-yellow that hung in the night like a halo of piss. They finally pulled up outside a dingy warehouse on the northeast of town. Blake got out of the car and pulled Victor out and upright, then walked with him — arm in arm — to the door. One knock and it swung open and an endomorph in duty blue, with thick belt and thicker shoes, looked them over.

He grunted something unintelligible, as his mouth was full at that moment. A crumb of breading was glued by grease to the bottom of his lip.

He’s yours.

Victor tried to tug away, but it was no use. Glossy fingers reached out, took hold of his shoulders, and dragged him inside. The door slammed and Blake went back to his car, extracted and struck a Lucky, and then swung out the way that he came.

The next night, after two, came a call from the Department with directions to a westward address. The night was as thick and suffocating as a velvet curtain, pulling away for mile after mile in a streaming soft loop. The location was near the airport, at the verge of the marshland, and turned out to be a specialty hothouse. It was a sprawling, glass-paneled structure that glowed eerily in the moonlight.

A motor pool van and an unmarked sedan were parked out front; Blake recognized the man who was closing the car’s trunk, but they didn’t speak when Blake parked and stepped out. Both vehicles were headed away by the time he got the hothouse door.

The hinges creaked like broken bedsprings and from the first step through them he was enveloped in a hot, heavy blanket. The air was sick with the scent of damp earth and exotic blooms, a heady mixture that attached to the back of his throat. This was air with the thickness of margarine, but a thousand orchids seemed to thrive on it, their vibrant colors and lurid shapes casting shadows on each other and on the floors and on the racks and the walls.

A corpse was ripening on the floor, flesh pale in a puddle of dark purple juice, red pulled toward blue by the overhead fluorescents. It was Victor, of course, with his head angled down, throat wide enough to expose broken windpipe and bone, the slash extending most of the way around the side. His heart had stopped, and with it the spurting, but blood was still actively exiting due to metabolic pressure in a pungent, dark, and viscous mess.

A young woman leaned against one of the water pipes, staring wide-eyed at the wreckage on the floor.

Were you here when they did this?

She didn’t move, just kept staring, stringy hair falling forward. She had on a striped apron and there was a gardener’s glove in one hand. The other one was lying at her feet.

They say anything?

Six seconds went by. He was about to repeat himself when she answered.

Only that I shouldn’t talk to anyone. And that someone was coming … someone who’d know what to do.

Blake stepped in front of her, blocking her view.

I’m not anyone.

She shook her head and wiped her nose.

I’m the someone.

She nodded.

So tell me, who owns this?

She told him.

You have shovels, yes?.

She nodded.

We’ll need two.

The lab was a sleek, modern building, all glass and black steel, jutting up from a ruined block of midcentury factories and immigrant sweatshops. The air was thick yet again — this time with a sharp, toxic mix of solvents and flowers that had Blake reeling for a second when the door closed behind. His shoe leather squeaked on the polished floor once he moved toward the lobby’s gateway and desk.

The receptionist looked up when he reached her, presenting a practiced indifference.

Are you expected?

I'm here to see Erwin Carter. Tell him it’s Blake.

She gave him a once-over, then picked up a handset to tap in a three-digit number. After a few words she hung up and nodded him through. Fifth floor. His assistant will meet you.

The elevator was slow, smooth, and unusually silent, due to the car being tightly sealed. When the doors slid open there was an audible hiss and Blake could feel a pressure change in his ears. The corridor smelled distinctly of orchids this time, without the disturbing cut of chemical compounds. The assistant was a young man with an aluminum clipboard and he led the way to an office at the end of the hall.

It was spacious, brightly lit, with a spartan table and seats and an absurdly long sofa. The walls were lined with shelves filled with unlabeled vials of varying size and shape and color. Dr. Erwin Carter was standing by the window, back turned, staring down to the brickwork below.

Dr. Carter turned crisply, his expression inscrutably level. He was striking in a way, with sharp features and the bearing of a man who knew his baccarat banque from his chemin de fer.

Mr. Blake, he said, lightly smiling. What can I do for you?

It’s just Blake.

He helped himself to a swank but badly engineered seat. I buried one of your employees last night.

He pulled out his Zippo. He was planted in the moist, loamy soil of one of your properties.

Carter’s smile faded, albeit slowly. I’m not sure …

… oh, you’re sure.

He held up his free hand, fingers half-curled in a lazy half-fist. You know, it took a while to scrub that dirt from my nails.

Carter sat down behind his desk. There’s no smoking anywhere on the premises.

I’m not anywhere, Erwin. I’m right here, right now, with you.

Carter sat and stared coldly, waiting, calculating, as Blake sent a cloud of cured tobacco his way.

His death was a shock to all of us.

His death was your decision, one way or another. I’d like to know why.

I don’t see where you have a claim …

… I delivered him to his fate, watched him bleed out the following night, then dealt with his stench as I dug his hole with a shellshocked kid. Pretty sure I’ve got a claim on the matter.

Another pause. It lasted long enough for Blake to notice the HVAC at work, dispersing his spiraling fumes.

It was clean work, I’ll grant you. A correctly curved knife and a pull from a practiced hand. I know the name and badge number that goes with that hand … he and two partners hung out there until I arrived. They made a point of that, along with doing him directly on your turf. Why?

The man’s expression didn't change, but he tried another tack. Victor could be difficult. He quickly acquired enemies.

Blake leaned back and flicked his ash on the paste-waxed wenge. What did he do for you, anyway?

Carter didn’t blink.

He was a courier. We deal in fairly complex chemistry here — across a broad range of products — and some of those products require delicate handling.

And your customers?

They vary.

Demanding, are they, at times?

Carter could have been a Buddha.

Blake turned his head, a tobacco mote on the tip of his tongue, and blew it free in a parabolic arc past the corner of the desk. Like a tiny dark shooting star.

So, I couriered a courier. I don’t think irony does justice to that.

Are you expecting something from us?

No. I’ve been paid twice already on the back of that schmuck. You don’t owe me a dime. But you owe someone else. Pull out a pencil.

Drizzle ran down the windows and crept along the pavement of a city short on water and patience. To the ear, it was the middle movement of a half-forgotten symphony — a lesser effort by Brahms — each drop a gently coordinated, consoling, and contributing note. Storefront lighting reflected from the gloss of the asphalt, bouncing colors across rivulets and ephemeral puddles.

Blake pushed through the door to Petal & Thorn, the bell doing its two-and-a-half rings again. And again the scent of roses, lilies, and a score of cloying blooms … along with the ambergris whiff of a woman who’d like to be noticed.

He took a leisurely look around, as he wasn’t intent on a target this time. A slender small figure, familiar, tended succulents off to the left. Flowers in scores of colors and shapes filled the rest, arranged in vaguely harmonious chaos — a riot of petals and leaves that formed a loose composition. In the middle of it all stood the auburn-topped owner, this time with her bun a bit tighter and no cigarette in play. Her hands moved like a surgeon’s among stems, branchlets, and thorns.

Can I help you? she asked without looking up. Her voice was low and smooth, like bourbon over one ounce of ice.

I'm looking for something special.

Blake leaned against the counter. I’m looking for a flower that tells a story.

She glanced up and then stood up, eyes narrowing as she dialed him in. What kind of story?

The kind that starts in the middle, cuts back to the start, and doesn’t play cute at the end.

She smiled slightly, slowly, but it stopped a little shy of her eyes. I might have just the thing. Follow me.

She led him to the back of the shop, where the light was dim and the air was owned by the weight of eighty orchids. She stopped in front of a segregated, inset display, where exotic and tropical petals seemed to glow in the limited light.

These are called 'Midnight's Whisper' she explained, her own voice barely more than a whisper.

They're hard to find and hard to keep alive. They need just the right conditions.

And what conditions would those be?

He was leaning beside her shoulder to get a closer look.

Poised between desire and contempt. They're temperamental, like a few woman you’ve probably known.

Blake reached out to one of the petals and she took his wrist, the grip surprisingly strong.

Careful … they're fragile.

Like all beautiful things, he said, pulling back. How much?

More than you’d expect, she said, releasing his wrist. But for you, a small discount.

Blake pulled out his wallet and held up a razor-crisp hundred-dollar bill. She took it without a word, slipping it into the pocket of her skirt. She carefully lifted the pot with its pale orchid and wrapped it all in tissue paper, her movements deliberate and sure. As she handed him the package, she leaned in closer than he had earlier, her breath warm against his ear.

Be careful with this, she murmured. It's been known to cause trouble.

I'll keep that in mind. He took the package.

As he walked out of the shop he glanced back to see the skinny kid at the window, her head a cameo in the O of Thorn.

A better place for her. But best not to return … flowers can fend for themselves.