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The residents of that building never complain because the owners of the nameless club have at least three security people watching the entrance at all times. There’s no mugging, drug dealing, or prostitution above the basement—ever.

I had not been to the club before, but I knew of it.

“Looking for Mel?” asked a lovely blond black young woman standing behind the cast-iron podium at the bottom of the stairs. She wore a little black dress, black hose, and a microchain silver necklace that had a red stone as its jewel.

“Yes, I am.”

She took me through a doorway behind the podium, down a slender hallway, to another flight of stairs that led to another large room with fewer occupants.

“At the opposite wall,” she said.

I saw Melquarth Frost waving at me from the place the hostess indicated. I couldn’t help feeling that I was actually about to make a deal with the devil.

He stood up when I approached the table. I got the impression that this was a show of great deference. We shook hands. His powerful paw felt like a winter glove filled with concrete.

“Mr. Frost.”

“King—I got your text. Did they let you in like I said?”

“They sure did.”

We sat and appreciated each other a moment. He wore a lemon-colored suit that was loose but hung well. The shirt was lapis replete with errant silver and golden threads weaving through. I wore a felt-lined brown trench coat, black trousers, and black leather shoes with rubber soles.

I had thirteen years on the force, six of those as a detective, and Frost was the most dangerous criminal I had ever come across. Our few meetings had convinced me that he felt in my debt, though we had never discussed this obligation after his first visit to my office.

We might have been about to start speaking, when a mid-height, slump-shouldered man wearing a white jacket and black pants walked up to the small round table.

“Mel,” the man said in a voice that was hard and clear.

“Ork.”

“Who’s your friend?”

“Nobody for you to worry about.”

“A guy up at the bar told me that he looks like a cop he used to know.”

“Go back to him,” Mel said, “and say that he should mind his own business.”

Mel and Ork peered at each other maybe a quarter of a minute. The latter’s nostrils flared, then he walked away.

“Friendly place,” I commented.

“Crooks are a skittish lot,” Mel countered.

“I thought you gave all that up.”

“I just like the atmosphere. Sometimes you get the need to talk to people who have the right language behind their eyes.”

I nodded.

“What can I do for you, King?”

“Tell me why you came to my office that day,” I said simply.

“I told you already.”

“Maybe pad it with some details.”