The Skin Collector Read Free

pocket came a few seconds later. Reminding him of the time; Billy often got lost in hiswork.
    Just let me get God’s knuckle perfect, just a minute more …
    A clattering came from a bud microphone in his left ear. He listened for a moment then ignored the noise and took up the American Eagle machine once more. It was an old-style model, with a rotary head, which moved the needle like a sewing machine’s, rather than modern devices that used a vibrating coil.
    He clicked it on.
    Bzzzz…
    Face shield down.
    A millimeter at a time, he inked with a lining needle, following the bloodline he’d done quickly. Billy was a natural-born artist, brilliant at pencil and ink drawing, brilliant at pastels. Brilliant at needles. He drew freehand on paper, he drew freehand on skin. Most mod artists, however talented, used stencils, prepared ahead of time or – for the untalented – purchasedand then placed on the skin for the inker to trace. Billy rarely did this. He didn’t need to. From God’s mind to your hand, his uncle had said.
    Now time to fill. He swapped needles. Very, very carefully.
    For Chloe’s tat, Billy was using the famous Blackletter font, known more commonly as Gothic or Old English. It was characterized by very thick and very thin strokes. The particular family heused was Fraktur. He’d selected this font because it was the typeface of the Gutenberg Bible – and because it was challenging. He was an artist and what artist didn’t like to show off his skills?
    Ten minutes later he was nearly done.
    And how was his client doing? He scanned her body then lifted her lids. Eyes still unfocused. Her face gave a few twitches, though. The propofol wouldn’t last muchlonger. But of course by now one drug was replacing the other.
    Suddenly pain coursed through his chest. This alarmed him. He was young and in very good shape; he dismissed the thought of a heart attack. But the big question remained: Had he inhaled something he shouldn’t have?
    That
was a very real, and lethal, possibility.
    Then he probed his own body and realized the pain was on the surface.And he understood. When he’d first grabbed her, Chloe had fought back. He’d been so charged he hadn’t noticed how hard she’d struck him. But now the adrenaline had worn off and the pain was throbbing. He looked down. Hadn’t caused any serious damage, except for tearing his shirt and the coveralls.
    He ignored the ache and kept going.
    Then Billy noted Chloe’s breathing becoming deeper. The anestheticwould soon wear off. He touched her chest – Lovely Girl wouldn’t have minded – and beneath his hand he could feel her heartbeat thudding more insistently.
    It was then that a thought occurred to him: What would it be like to tattoo a living, beating heart? Could it be done? Billy had broken into a medical supply company a month ago in anticipation of his plans here in New York. He’d made off withthousands of dollars in equipment, drugs, chemicals and other materials. He wondered if he could learn enough to put someone under, crack open the chest, ink a design or words onto the heart itself and sew the victim back up. Living out his or her life with the altered organ.
    What would the work be?
    A cross.
    The words:
The Rule of Skin
    Maybe:
        
Billy + Lovely Girl
4 Ever
    Interesting idea.But thinking about Lovely Girl made him sad and he returned to Chloe, finishing the last of the letters.
    Good.
    A Billy Mod.
    But not quite finished yet. He extracted a scalpel from a dark-green toothbrush container and reached forward, stretching out the marvelous skin once more.

CHAPTER 3
    One can view death in two ways.
    In the discipline of forensic science an investigator looks at death abstractly, considers it to be merely an event that gives rise to a series of tasks. Good forensic cops view that event as if through the lens of history; the best see death as fiction, and the victim as someone who never existed at all.
    Detachment is a necessary tool for