Void Moon

by Michael Connelly

  "Really?" Grimaldi interrupted. "A little bird told me she's already been here. Come and gone, as a matter of fact."

  Grimaldi nodded to the man who had led the procession into the suite.

  "Check him."

  The man came over to Karch, who raised his arms outstretched. He held the napkin hanging loosely from his right hand. The man held his gun in his left hand and pointed at Karch's gut while his right hand went inside Karch's jacket and pulled the Sig out of its holster. He then patted down the rest of Karch's body, finding the silencer barrel in a coat pocket. His hands went up under his crotch without hesitation and he finished by flipping up the cuffs of his pants looking for an ankle holster. It was a professionally thorough job but not thorough enough. The whole time Karch watched him and tried to place where he had seen him before. When the search was finished the man shoved Karch's Sig under his belt and silently stepped back to the side of Grimaldi.

  "What's going on, Vincent?" Karch asked.

  "What's going on is you fucked up, Jack. Letting her go like that, it puts a big kink in my plan. I'm going to have to chase her down now."

  "What plan is that?"

  After removing the first three, Cassie loosened the last screw of the air-intake vent and carefully pulled the vent forward and pivoted it on the remaining screw. The duct was now open and the vent hung below it. She then looked down from the room service table on which she was standing and signaled Jodie up. The girl climbed onto a chair and stepped up onto the table. Cassie lifted her up, careful not to lose her balance, and pushed her toward the opening into the duct system. Jodie struggled and put one hand out and against the wall, stopping Cassie from pushing her in.

  "It will be all right, Jodie," Cassie whispered. "Just go in and I'll come in behind you."

  "Noooo," the girl replied in a small voice.

  Cassie pulled her down into a hug and whispered in her ear.

  "Remember you told me you weren't a baby, that you were a big girl? Well, this is something a big girl would do. You have to go, Jodie, or I have to leave you here."

  Cassie closed her eyes, the last threat making her feel awful.

  The girl didn't say anything. Cassie raised her toward the duct again and this time she climbed in. As she moved into the opening her knees banged on the aluminum siding and Cassie froze. But the stern tones of the voices in the other room continued without interruption. Once Jodie had crawled completely into the vent, Cassie handed her the penlight and told her in a whisper to go farther in. Cassie then hoisted herself up and climbed into the duct, catching her belt pack on the edge of the duct at first. Once in the duct, she unbuckled the tool bag and pushed it through the vent in front of her.

  The space was so tightly confining that she could not reach back to pull the vent cover back into its place on the bedroom wall. She urged Jodie forward to the main air-return duct, thinking she would have room to turn around there and then crawl back to pull the vent cover back into place.

  But after they were only twelve feet or so into the duct there was a junction where another similar-sized duct joined it. Cassie looked down this branch and could see light and hear voices. She realized it was Karch asking, "What's going on, Vincent?"

  Silently she went past this duct, then backed into it. She then turned and slid herself back in the direction of the bedroom. When she got there she reached down to the vent cover and slid it up the wall and back into its place. She then started backing herself up in the duct.

  Karch was rapidly trying to assimilate the situation and figure out what was happening. He then hit upon the only possible explanation.

  "She called you, didn't she, Vincent?"

  Grimaldi didn't answer, just as he hadn't when Karch had asked him about his so-called plan. Grimaldi just stared with eyes that seemed dark with anger and hatred.

  "Look, Vincent, I don't know what she told you, but it's bullshit, okay? She hasn't been here yet and I don't have the money. I'm waiting, Vincent. She's gonna call and I'll get her up here. I'll take the money and she and the kid go out the window. Like I said, synchronicity."

  As he said the last word Karch felt an internal falter. He remembered he had let the word slip when Cassidy Black had called. He wondered if that had been enough. Had he given her enough with that simple slip to read his plan and come up with a counter?

  "Look, Vincent, please. Tell me what's happening here."

  Grimaldi's eyes were scanning the suite.

  "What's in the bedroom, Jack?"

  "Not what. Who. The kid's in the bedroom."

  Grimaldi nodded to the man who had searched Karch and the man went to the bedroom doors. He disappeared inside the room and Karch and Grimaldi just stared at each other while they waited. Romero took two steps to his left. Karch guessed he thought this put him in a better position in case he had to make a move in the room.

  "I'm telling you, she's playing you, Vincent," Karch said. "She's play - "

  He stopped when he saw the man emerge from the bedroom carrying a black gym bag. Its zipper was open and Karch could see into the bag. He saw the face of Benjamin Franklin. Several times. The bag was filled with bricks of hundred-dollar bills. Karch's mouth dropped open. Cassidy Black, he thought. She had somehow made the switch. He started toward the bedroom door but the man with the gym bag and Romero both raised their weapons and told him to hold where he was.

  "There was a girl," he said.

  "Sure," said the man with the bag. "There ain't now."

  He walked over to Grimaldi and pulled the two handle straps wide, opening the bag and completely exposing several of the plastic-wrapped bricks of cash.

  "Vincent, that's not . . ."

  He didn't finish. He didn't know what to say and he could see Grimaldi was intent on the money, not him. Grimaldi put his hand into the bag and laid it flat on one of the bricks as if touching the shoulder of a long-lost friend. He then nodded to the man holding the bag.

  "Okay, Martin, close it."

  Karch watched the bag being closed and then he looked at the face of the man who held it. Martin? He remembered the videotape. Hidalgo riding the elevator up with his security escort. Martin. Who was supposed to be dead. Martin, whom Grimaldi had asked Karch to bury in the desert.

  "Martin?" he said.

  He looked from Martin to Grimaldi as it all came to him. It was all a bluff, all part of a more elaborate plan.

  "You," he said to Grimaldi. "You staged this whole thing. It was all a setup."

  He then looked at Martin, who held the gym bag in his right hand and his weapon in his left. He remembered Hidalgo's body on the bed. The bullet in the right eye, delivered by a gun held in the left.

  "And you," he said to Martin. "You're the one who hit Hidalgo."

  One side of Martin's mouth turned upward in an approximation of a proud smile.

  "It wasn't the girl," Karch said, looking back at Grimaldi. "All she did was take the money you wanted her to take."

  When Cassie turned around in the junction she heard intense voices from the sitting room. She didn't wait to listen. She headed toward the main air duct and covered the ground in about ten seconds. She saw the penlight that Jodie was holding and realized the girl was still in the smaller tributary vent and had not moved into the main conduit.

  As she got closer she realized why. Jodie had reached a dead end. Metal bars criss-crossed the opening to the main duct. Cassie reached around the girl and out into the larger duct. She felt the end of each bar to determine how they were attached to the wall of duct. She felt the smooth metal weld joints. They could go no further.

  "What - " Jodie started to say before Cassie got her hand over her mouth. She gave the silence signal and the girl continued in a whisper. "What do we do?"

  Cassie gripped one of the bars. She shook it and then braced her back against the upper wall of the duct and pushed on the bar with all of her strength. The bar didn't move or show any weakness in its weld points. Cassie shook her head. The operators
of the hotel had put bars in the air ducts but hadn't bothered to replace the half gears in the deadbolts. It made no sense to spend money in one area and not the other. That was why hitting this dead end was so surprising and distressing.

  "What do we do?" Jodie whispered again.

  Cassie looked at her innocent and beautiful face in the shine of the small light. She then looked at the bars and realized something.

  "Jodie, you can fit through."

  "What about you?"

  "Don't worry about me. You go through. I'll go out and come around and get you."

  "No, I want to go with you."

  "No, you can't. This is the only way. You squeeze through and wait for me to come get you."

  She pushed the girl toward the bars. Jodie reluctantly stuck her head between the bars and into the larger duct, then worked her upper body through. She then pulled her legs into the new space and looked back at Cassie.

  "Good girl," Cassie whispered. "Now you wait there. I'll come around as soon as I can but I have to wait for those men to leave the room, okay?"

  "How long will that be?"

  "I don't know, darling. You'll have to wait. Do you know how to tell time?"

  "Of course, I'm almost six."

  Cassie took off her watch and handed it through the bars. She showed her the button to press to light the face. She then gave the girl her cell phone and showed her how to open it. Jodie said her daddy had one but never let her play with it.

  "If I don't come for you by twelve o'clock you open that phone and call nine-one-one. Do you know how to do that?"

  The girl did not immediately answer. Cassie took the cell phone back and showed her what to do.

  "You press nine-one-one and then this button - the send button. You tell whoever answers that you are stuck on the top floor of the Cleopatra. Can you remember that?"

  "Of course."

  "Where are we?"

  "The Cleo-pah-tra. Top floor."

  "Good girl. I'm going to go now and listen for the men to leave. Then I will come around and get you. Come here."

  The girl leaned forward and Cassie leaned her face through the bars and kissed her forehead. She could smell her hair again. She hesitated and then started backing toward the junction, where she would be able to monitor what was happening in the suite.

  Cassie saw Jodie wave to her through the bars and had a premonition that she was seeing her daughter for the last time. She waved back and then blew her a kiss.

  Grimaldi was beaming as he watched Karch come to an understanding of his scheme.

  "I was just like Leo and the girl, a piece you used," Karch said.

  "A piece I used beautifully and that performed beautifully," Grimaldi responded.

  "And Chicago, did they have anything to do with this?"

  "That was the beauty of it. I used Chicago and they didn't even know it. But I knew just the mention of the Outfit would get your blood boiling and you'd go off like a loaded gun. Leo Renfro had markers with some people I know. I bought his paper and sent Romero and Longo over to L.A. to let him know there was a new sheriff in town. They told him they were from Chicago, that they worked for Tony Turcello. He bought it and started shitting his pants. Then they gave him a way out: hit Hidalgo on the hot prowl and his debt is clear. He went for it. Just like you went for it, Jack."

  Karch nodded.

  "Yeah, I went for it. My job was to follow the trail, wipe out all parties and collect the money."

  "And you did a fine job - all except for letting the girl go. Now she's a loose end but we'll take care of it. This is the important thing."

  He raised the gym bag full of money. Karch tried to keep any physical showing of his anger in check.

  "You're making a big fucking mistake, Vincent. I didn't - "

  "I don't think so, Jack. I don't think so at all."

  They stared at each other for a long moment, their hatred enough to warm the room.

  "So what happens now?" Karch finally asked.

  "What happens now is that we still need someone to disappear with the money. Someone Miami can send their people after."

  "And that would be me."

  "You were always a smart man, Jack."

  Karch shook his head. The shortsightedness of Grimaldi's plan was staggering.

  "And you always thought small, Vincent. Short range. You should have just gone along with the plan. That bag of money would have been just a drop in the bucket once Miami got the license and got into this place. You sold off the long run for the short end; one bag of money. That was stupid."

  Instead of getting angry, as Karch expected he would, Grimaldi laughed loudly and shook his head as if amused by a child's na‹vet‚.

  "You still don't get it, do you, Jack?"

  "Get what? Why don't you tell me, Vin-CENT?"

  "Miami will never get the license. Don't you see? There never was going to be a payoff. This is the new Las Vegas, Jack. Miami will never get in here. I set this up from day one. Me, Jack! I called Miami and said they had a problem and it would cost them five million to get it fixed and to get in here. Half up front and half after the license app was approved. They're greedy and they went for it. Just like you."

  Now Karch saw it. A perfect plan. Grimaldi would get away with two-and-a-half million and Miami would forever search for Karch - only he'd never be found because he was about to be escorted out to the desert on a one-way trip. Karch dropped his eyes to the floor. He no longer wanted to look at Grimaldi.

  "You know what your problem was, Jack?" Grimaldi asked. He was so full of himself and his success that he couldn't help but turn the knife further. "Your problem was that you thought too long range. I know all about you. The looks, the comments behind my back, the bullshit. You wanted to get to me and you thought this was the way. I knew that and I used it, man. I played you like a fucking piano and now the song's over. So fuck you, Jack. Tonight you sleep in the sand. We're gonna take the service elevator down and then we'll use your car - it probably knows its fucking way. You already have the shovel in the trunk, right, Jack of Spades?"

  Grimaldi waited for Karch to respond but there was only silence in the room. Grimaldi then delivered his last turn on the knife.

  "We'll pick a nice spot for you near your mother."

  Now Karch brought his eyes back to Grimaldi's. The older man nodded.

  "Yeah, I know all about it. You and your old man - the favorite spot out there. But here's something I bet you didn't know. I was the one, Jack. I took her away from him. Ten years I was with her behind his back. But she wouldn't leave him because of you. I loved her and then he . . . Tell me, what kind of kid helps his old man bury his mother? You sick fuck. I'm going to enjoy this. Let's go."

  Martin and Romero took two steps back and maintained a safe distance as they escorted Karch out of the suite. As Karch walked his mind grew dark with pain and rage. He concentrated his vision on the man walking in front of him. Vincent Grimaldi. Now Karch knew every last secret.

  The four men moved down the hallway until Grimaldi directed them through the push doors into the housekeeping station. Martin hit the button and they waited for the elevator. Karch had his head down and still carried the cloth napkin in his right hand like a flag of surrender. Grimaldi saw it and smiled.

  "How was your last supper, Jack?"

  Karch looked at him but didn't answer. When the elevator arrived Romero stepped on first to hit the door-open button. He kept the black hole of his gun's muzzle focused on Karch's body the whole time. Grimaldi then stepped on, passing for an instant between Karch and Romero. It was the instant Karch had been waiting for. He raised his right hand toward Martin, who stood to his side. Martin watched the hand holding the napkin come up toward his face.

  There was a pop as the . 25 hidden in the napkin and Karch's hand was discharged. Martin's head snapped back in the same instant, the bullet catching him in the left eye and entering his brain. At the same moment he was falling lifelessly to the floor of the ho
usekeeping station, Karch was swinging his arm over Grimaldi's shoulder. He fired the first shot at Romero too early. The slug hit the wall of the elevator, a foot to the right of Romero's face.

  Romero straightened his shooting arm but hesitated. Grimaldi was in his shot. The delay in his action was all the time Karch needed to correct his own mistake. His second shot hit Romero on the left cheek. The third hit his forehead, snapping his head back. The fourth shot hit the soft underside of Romero's chin and went up into the brain. He dropped to the floor of the elevator without ever getting a shot off.

  Karch grabbed Grimaldi by the tie and yanked him to the door of the elevator. Karch had his foot firmly planted against the bumper so the door would not close. He drove the . 25 up under Grimaldi's chin so that his face was angled upward while his eyes looked downward and back at Karch.