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“Any idea what that is?”

He turns it around in his hands. Looks at it from all angles. When he finds the recessed button, he pushes it. The thing slides open and he lets it close again.

“Beautiful work,” he says. “Did you notice there was no sound? That’s some ace engineering.”

“Yeah, wonderful. But what is it?”

He takes it to his workbench and examines it under the big magnifier attached to an adjustable metal arm.

“The metal is cold iron,” he says. “High quality. Beautiful workmanship. The teeth at the end of the boring mechanism are in perfect alignment.”

“Boring? So, it’s some kind of drill.”

“It could be,” he says, and brings the dildo back to me. Opens it up and points to small clips inside the body.

“They hold something. My guess is it’s for seating small mechanical parts in a larger mechanism.”

“Any idea what?”

He shakes his head. “It could be anything.”

“Maybe a box? C

ould you use it to make a small box? Something with delicate metal parts?”

“Definitely. If you want to leave it with me for a while, I can play with it and tell you exactly how it works.”

I take it out of his hands.

“Can’t do it. I liberated it from the car of one of our betters, so you don’t want to be caught with it.”

“No, I do not,” he says, walking back to his workbench.

I follow him over and show him the bottom of the drill.

“What’s this?”

“It looks like a maker’s mark,” he says.

He puts it back under the magnifier and shines a light on it.

In a minute he says, “Damn.”

“What?”

He hands it back to me.

“Whatever that is, it cost someone a fortune. Atticus Rose made it.”

There’s a familiar name. Rose was one of the most famous Tick Tock Men in L.A. At least until me, Candy, and Brigitte busted up his workshop. No one has heard much about him since, but it looks like he’s far from retired.

“Do you have any idea where he might be? Any rumors in the Tick Tock world?”

Mike picks up a tiny saw. Plays with it while he talks. I don’t need to see his eyes or hear his heart to know he’s nervous.

“Nothing. Personally, I think if he’s still around—and it sure looks like he is—he’s got one full-time private client.”

I put the drill back in my pocket.