I thought about Pete Wendell’s report and the plethora of off-the-record info he’d had. I thought about Joe Cassidy and Billy Lund two detectives who spent more time working at the Olympian casino than the Eleventh Precinct. “That’s different!”
“Yes,” said Cyndi. “Katsaros has a limitless budget to buy underpaid cops. He does some sizeable business with The Lunatics, giving him influence on that front as well.”
“So was that the reason for your sting operation at Ramacci’s?”
Cyndi gave me a baffled look.
“You know, the video. I made the Keith Moss connection. I get that you reached out to Lenny after Tommy found out about her, but how did you get the camera into a party that occurred weeks before Tommy even knew Keith?”
I could see she was lost. “What camera? What party? What the hell are you talking about?”
My spine began to tingle. My heart raced. “The video of the party. Katsaros’ ‘heirloom’, it’s all he really cares about. I need to get it back to him. It’s my bargaining chip: take this and leave the girl.”
“There’s no fucking video. That monster Moss was bragging to Tommy about how Lenny had still come to him in trouble after he abandoned her to The Lunatics! He got a real kick out of her desperation. How he’d been the first she reached out to when she found out she was...”
Neither of us could speak for several long seconds. There’s no fucking video. Lenny Marquez is pregnant!
We looked at each other. There was no need to speak. We could see horrified understanding in each other’s eyes.
“But, if there’s no video,” I said, “how are we going to barter for Lenny?” There were still options, but they were a lot more ghastly.
Cyndi ignored me. “Katsaros’ heirloom? He said that? You mean he’s the father?”
“Oh my God,” I said. “He’s not going to barter!”
I could see Cyndi on her pReC. She looked at me, eyes wide with terror. “We have to get back to Lenny!”
I tossed another fifty of Katsaros’ bills for a thirty-bill dinner, and the two of us almost tore the door off running out of there. The couple of blocks seemed to stretch for kilometers. My legs felt like I was running through water. I could hear Cyndi leaving a message I feared the recipient would never get.
We reached 110 West Drane Street and bounded up the stairs. The hallway was quiet. I held out a hand and stopped Cyndi. The door was ajar, and I felt the last twinkle of hope leave my soul. I reached for the back of my waistband and missed Jupiter. I frowned and steeled myself.
I drew a deep breath, closed my eyes, and nudged the door with the bottom of my foot. I opened my eyes and watched the curtain pull back on a macabre scene the likes of which I hadn’t seen in years. The room was red with blood. It was on the walls, the furniture, some of it had even splashed the ceiling. I couldn’t imagine that there was any left in either of them.
I stepped into the room and picked my way through the carnage. It wasn’t easy. The floor belonged to a slaughterhouse. They were in the middle of the room, naked and stacked atop each other. Their bodies had lost all color and almost glowed in contrast to the crimson-black in which they lay. I got as close as I could and knelt at their side.
I’d seen a lot of twisted shit in my days: double, triple, quadruple homicides. I’d seen kids and girls, been at the scene of Lunatic Berserkers, but this—this was different. This was so much more personal.
I’d been looking for this girl, trying to save her life for the last two weeks. I’d read her life story, not as some prologue to a vicious end I was trying to solve, but as a living, viable girl in desperate trouble, a girl who was counting on me, even if she didn’t know it. I had a plan to save her, a plan to make everyone happy.
But, instead of being her salvation, I had been a harbinger of death. I had led her killers right to the door and then pulled the only one with enough street smarts to help her away for dinner. I put my face in my hand and rubbed my temples with my thumb and index finger.
“Oh my God!”
I’d forgotten about Cyndi. She’d crept up to the room and stood in the doorway, shaking and pale. Her face was a mask of horrified grief. I thought she might be sick, right there, but she held firm. She looked at me with her trembling grief-stricken face, her eyes wide with fright.
Neither of us had words for this. I hit the recorder on my pReC and took a good look at everything: Tommy, Lenny, the splattered blood. I got as much as I could, and it was time to go. I did my macabre ballerina dance to the front door and took Cyndi by the arm.
She pulled away and stared at me. I knew what she was thinking, and I didn’t blame her. I’m not sure that I would know what to think either. I was sure that we didn’t have time for this.
I leaned into her and lowered my voice. “We need to get out of here, before someone finds this and we have to answer a bunch of questions we don’t want to.”
She looked at me. I could see her senses returning. Anger came with it. “Maybe I have nothing to hide, Mr. Parker.” I’d never heard my name sound so like an epithet.
“Ok,” I said. “But, how are your sources gonna feel about opening up to you when they find out about this? Do you plan on giving up reporting?”
The glare she gave said I hadn’t done anything to improve my standing with her, but her professional judgment seemed to agree. She turned and we walked together down the hall and the stairs.
She stayed with me to the rail trestle. The train was swooshing by overhead. She pulled away from me. “What the hell are we doing? People are dead!” Tears poured and the sobs came.
I reached out to touch her, but she drew back and glared at me. There was savagery in her face and I thought she might try to claw me, but she retained some self-control. “Stay away from me! Don’t you touch me!”
I just frowned. I knew better than to think that anything I could do or say could compete with the horror from apartment 311.
“You did this! They’re dead because of you!”
The truth stung. A new sound reached my ears: the high-low warble of a siren evolved into a chorus. TCPD air cars descended on West Drane Street.
Cyndi and I looked on. An ambulance was mixed in with the cops. It would not be needed. People filled the streets. More and more gathered. Another train passed overhead.
I looked back at Cyndi. Her wet face was sad and exhausted. She wouldn’t meet my eyes. “I need to go.”
There was nothing for me to say.
CHAPTER XVI
I watched the commotion from under the railroad trestle for what could have been hours. It was long enough for the crime scene unit to arrive. I tried to play everything back in my head, every move every decision. Had they followed me? I’d tried to be careful. I thought I was so smart.
I spit on the ground and turned from the scene. I needed answers, and there was only one place I was gonna get them. I turned and walked uptown, towards the hotels and the gambling houses. I stopped in one of the tourist shops and picked up a new outfit, something to make me blend in. I wore a silver T-shirt that said I was “Over the Moon” about Tycho City, a billed cap, and some white short pants.
I pulled what I could of my expense account in cash and took inventory of my bag for the first time: some second-rate burglar gear and a couple of hand tools, nothing to get excited about. I turned to face The Olympian. It stood before me like a tall neon house of horrors. There was no turning back now. I took my first step and moved towards Katsaros’ Carnival of Vice.
I walked in and scanned the place. I saw Joe Cassidy and Billy Lund in their sleek business suits. They weren’t looking my way. I turned my face before they did.
“May I help you, sir?”
I counted out ten one-thousand bills and placed them on the counter in front of the girl. I was looking for a room.
The girl looked at me. “Do you ha
ve a reservation?”
“No.”
She accessed a terminal screen behind the counter and said, “Do you have any preferences?”
“Highest floor I can get.”
“That would be eighty-nine.”
It was only thirty-five hundred. Awesome.
I took the elevator to eighty-nine and found my room. It was three times the size of my flat in The Lower City. The bed had a red bedspread and chilling champagne on the nightstand next to it. I thought of Suzanne naked in the dark. If only I could ignore that call, now. I turned my attention back to what I was doing. Katsaros was sure to have layers of security so getting through the ceiling wouldn’t be like getting into Alyssa’s apartment.
I needed some kind of employee pReC signature for that: an employee with clearance. Room service wouldn’t get it, neither would the concierge. It would have to be security. I remembered Joe and Billy in the lobby. I could make that work.
I took an elevator back to the lobby. They were still at their original post. I took a convenient game machine and started gambling with Katsaros’ expense money. I played for almost an hour before Billy moved towards the main floor. I left my winnings for some lucky sap and followed him to the bathroom.
I scanned the floor for inspiration and spied a janitor’s cart. I walked towards it and found what I was looking for and a bonus. Sometimes it’s better to be lucky than good. I took both and returned to the bathroom. I set the pilfered gear at the front door and did a walk through. A father and son were leaving as I entered. That left Billy as the restroom’s sole occupant. I returned to the door. Two men were there.
“Sorry,” I said in a low voice. “You don’t wanna come in here.”
One of them had to be a smart ass. “You don’t look like no fucking janitor.”
I stood to my full height and projected every bit of authority twenty years on The Floor had afforded me. “That’s because I’m undercover security. Do you want to continue to enjoy your visit, or do we need to spend hours working this out in one of our interrogation rooms.”
His partner grabbed his arm and said, “Come on, Chris. We don’t need no trouble.”
The one called Chris glared as if I was lucky that his friend was here to keep him off me.
I gave him my best go-fuck-yourself smile.
I latched the door behind them and reached for the champagne bottle in my bag. Billy was washing his hands. I made to walk past him but I turned at the last moment and jammed the tip of the bottle into his back.
“Hello, Billy,” I said. “Doing a little moonlighting?”
Billy looked in the mirror. “Frank! Jesus, what the hell are you doing here?”
“Came to pay your boss a little visit. Need your pReC ID code for that.”
“I can’t! I’ll lose my job!”
“Let me put this in terms you’ll understand: I just came back from a murder scene—a pretty fifteen-year-old lying belly-button to belly-button on a grown man. There was enough blood loosed to paint this whole bathroom in two fucking coats! Your job? Not even on my list of priorities, right now.” I pushed the bottle a little harder. “And don’t you be sending no maydays! My partner is monitoring your comms.”
“It’s not that simple, Frank.” His face pleaded with me in the mirror.
“I know. I need you to shoot me a copy. I’ll do the rest.”
He held my gaze in the mirror and my pReC pinged.
I smiled. “Much obliged.”
I reached around, grabbed the stun gun on his hip, and blasted his consciousness into oblivion. It felt a hell of a lot better being on the giving end. I pulled his suit. It was a loose fit, but it was dry. Lucky for me he’d just emptied his bladder. I took the bonus from the janitor’s cart, a roll of tape, and bound his arms and legs.
I couldn’t lock the door, but I left the ‘out of order’ sign on it. I hoped that would keep any nosy people from calling for help, at least until I could get to Katsaros.
I stepped into the service elevator. One-sixty-five was the highest it would go. I pushed the button. A screen flashed and demanded authorization. I rebroadcast Billy’s pReC authorization. It seemed to take forever, but the car began to move.
I wasn’t sure what I was gonna say or do, but someone had to speak for poor Lenny Marquez. The car came to a stop. The doors opened, and I looked into the face of Simon. He was smiling. “Glad you could join us.”
I moved for the stun gun, but Simon was like lightning. He had my wrist before I could even aim. His grip was so strong I dropped it on the floor of the car. He backhanded me and knocked me into the back wall. I tried to take a defensive stand, but there was already a foot in my gut. I think it was an elbow that came across my face. I slumped into the corner.
“Did you think you could just walk in here like you own the place?” Simon’s voice was pure contempt. “Get him on his feet and search him.”
A pair of his thugs jerked me to my feet and patted me down. One took my bag and inspected the contents. He smiled and tossed the bag to Simon.
Simon hefted the bag and held the champagne bottle for all to see. “Planning on doing a little celebrating for a job well done?”
His two goons chuckled in a way that made me think they understood.
“These two savages on your crew, Simon? They gut poor Lenny like a fish for you?”
The chuckling stopped.
Simon stepped closer to me. His voice was low and threatening. “Be careful. I may forget my place and gut you right here.”
“I’d like to see you try.” That wasn’t true. I was pretty sure he could butcher me, with or without the help of his faithful servants.
Simon smiled and motioned the way.
*******
I stepped back out onto Katsaros’ balcony. I was no longer awed by his infinity pool or panoramic view. The Earth, however, was still a beautiful blue crescent, staring down with majesty and splendor.
Katsaros sat in his chair. It was turned to face me. Another one had been set out for me. It faced Katsaros. Simon pushed me into it and took his place to Katsaros’ right. He crossed his arms and stared.
“I understand you thought you could sneak in here,” said Katsaros.
“I came on behalf of Lenny Marquez.”
Katsaros looked at Simon and laughed. “You were right about him, Frost. Thinks he’s some kind of avenging knight.”
I glared at the men’s amusement.
“Is that what you think, Mr. Parker? That you’re something other than a glorified sewer rat?”
“Maybe I am a sewer rat, but I have long teeth.”
Katsaros bellowed a derisive laugh. “You think so, huh? You think that you’re something special because you can knock around a few gangster skulls in The Lower City? You think that makes you tough? You think that makes you feared?” He spat another chuckle. “You’re on a leash, my leash. You might be a bad dog in a fight, but you’d better learn something about loyalty, or you’re gonna be out of this pack!”
“I don’t wanna be in your fucking pack,” I said.
“Always the tough guy.” He looked at Simon. “Looks like we’ll have to terminate Mr. Parker’s employment. Cancel his account and close out his benefits package.”
He looked back at me. “That’s what you want, right? Back to being jobless, destitute? I’m sure your daughter can find a way to make some money, before The Lunatics strip her of, how did he put it? ‘More than her face’?”
Helpless rage consumed me. I wanted to stand, to charge this asshole and throw him over the lip of his fucking infinity pool. I clenched my fists and glared.
“Don’t act so indignant. Who the hell’s paying Piper’s bill in the first place? Of course, we could never have found poor Lenny without that tracker implant! The things Allyssa Ramacci can do with that body of hers!”
Allyssa!
“What? Did you think she was sucking your cock out of love and devotion? You know, for a streetwise cop, you can be pretty fucking stupid.”
I felt pretty fucking stupid.
“We’ve followed you every step of the way. Frost, here, has kept me well-informed: your ManaTech visits, BB, your little romp with E-Rod Taylor. You’ve never been out of our sight. Ole Simon didn’t think we could trust you. Thought your do-gooding cop instincts would mess everything up. Turns out he was right.”
“You mean you didn’t trust me to be a soulless mercenary that would cut that poor girl’s throat?”
“Actually, I split her from—”
“That’s enough, Frost,” said Katsaros.
“What did that poor girl ever do to you, Katsaros? You didn’t have to kill her, there were other solutions!”
“The lion has to eat, Mr. Parker. He cannot mourn the gazelle.”
Gazelle! “She was a girl, a living, breathing girl! Not some fucking animal to be slaughtered for your enjoyment!”
Katsaros gave a patronizing if-you-say-so smile.
“Put your money where your mouth is, Mr. Parker. If you hate me so much, come knock me off my pedestal, push me over the side. You can take me. But, what about Simon, there? He’s no street tough whose only training has been in the school of hard knocks. He’s military trained and armed. So are the guards at your back. Not that we need them. So, you want to take your chances?”
I could do it. I could get there, smash Simon’s knee and take Katsaros over the side before anyone could do anything. But, what about Maddy? I drew a breath and looked up at the Earth.
“No?” said Katsaros. “I didn’t think so. I haven’t yet decided if I need your services, but you have proven very resourceful. I’ll keep you on retainer. For now.”
I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t want to work for this monster, but what choice did I really have? If I didn’t, Maddy was worse than dead.
“Now,” said Katsaros. “Get out of my sight!”
Lunatic City Page 18