Free Dexter in the Dark by Jeff Lindsay

water.
    “Come over here and we’ll have a little talk,” he said, sidestepping a pedestal holding an enormous object that looked like a giant ball of animal vomit dipped in plastic and spray-painted with Day-Glo graffiti. He led the way to a glass table by the window, around which sat four things that were probably supposed to be chairs but could easily have been mistaken for bronze camel saddles welded onto stilts. “Sit,” he said, with an expansive wave of his hand, and I took the chair-thing nearest the window. Vince hesitated for a moment, then sat next to me, and Manny hopped up onto the seat directly across from him. “Well,” he said. “How have you been, Vic? Would you like some coffee?” and without waiting for an answer he swiveled his head to his left and called, “Eduardo!”
    Beside me Vince took a ragged breath, but before he could do anything with it Manny whipped back around and faced me. “And you must be the blushing bridegroom!” he said.
    “Dexter Morgan,” I said. “But I’m not a very good blusher.”
    “Oh, well, I think Vic is doing enough for both of you,” he said. And sure enough, Vince obligingly turned just as scarlet as his complexion would allow him to do. Since I was still more than a little peeved at being subjected to this ordeal, I decided not to come to his aid by offering Manny a withering remark, or even correcting him on the subject of Vince’s actual identity as “Vince,” not “Vic.” I was sure he knew the right name quite well and was simply tormenting Vince. And that was fine with me: let Vince squirm—it served him right for going over my head to Rita and getting me into this.
    Eduardo bustled in holding a vintage Fiestaware coffee service in several bright colors, balanced on a clear plastic tray. He was a stocky young man about twice the size of Manny, and he, too, seemed very anxious to please the little troll. He set a yellow cup in front of Manny, and then moved to put the blue one in front of Vince when he was stopped by Manny, who laid a finger on his arm.
    “Eduardo,” he said in a silky voice, and the boy froze. “Yellow? Don’t we remember? Manny gets the blue cup.”
    Eduardo practically fell over himself grinding into reverse, nearly dropping the tray in his haste to remove the offensive yellow coffee cup and replace it with the proper blue one.
    “Thank you, Eduardo,” Manny said, and Eduardo paused for a moment, apparently to see if Manny really meant it or if he had done something else wrong. But Manny just patted him on the arm and said, “Serve our guests now, please,” and Eduardo nodded and moved around the table.
    As it turned out, I got the yellow cup, which was fine with me, although I wondered if it meant that they didn’t like me. When he had poured the coffee, Eduardo hustled back to the kitchen and returned with a small plate holding half a dozen pastelitos . And although they were not, in fact, shaped like Jennifer Lopez’s derriere, they might as well have been. They looked like little cream-filled porcupines—dark brown lumps bristling with quills that were either chocolate or taken from a sea anemone. The center was open, revealing a blob of orange-colored custardy-type stuff, and each blob had a dab of green, blue, or brown on top.
    Eduardo put the plate in the center of the table, and we all just looked at it for a moment. Manny seemed to be admiring them, and Vince was apparently feeling some kind of religious awe, as he swallowed a few more times and made a sound that may have been a gasp. For my part, I wasn’t sure if we were supposed to eat the things or use them for some bizarre, bloody Aztec ritual, so I simply studied the plate, hoping for a clue.
    It was finally provided by Vince. “My God,” he blurted.
    Manny nodded. “They’re wonderful, aren’t they?” he said. “But so-o-o-o last year.” He picked one up, the one with the blue top, and gazed at it with a kind of aloof fondness. “The color