Void Moon

by Michael Connelly

  An evil smile slowly spread across Karch's face.

  "So, Vincent, how's the short range looking now?"

  "Jack . . . please . . ."

  "Be sure to say hello to Mom for me."

  Karch waited for the comeback but there was none.

  "You don't know, do you?"

  "Know what, Jack?"

  "Let me tell you a quick story. About ten years ago the old man got sick. Cancer. It was shot through him and the only way he was going to make it was if he got a bone marrow transplant. I wanted to do it and they took my blood for the match test."

  Karch shook his head.

  "No match, Vincent. I told them to do a few other tests and they did. I didn't match because he wasn't my father."

  Karch just stared into Grimaldi's eyes.

  "Thanks, Vincent. Back in there you filled in the last part of the story for me."

  "You mean - "

  Karch squeezed off two quick shots and watched Grimaldi drop on top of Romero's body. He then looked down at his hand and saw the napkin as well as his fingers and the gun bathed in blood. He felt a tremendous rush move through him. Three against one and he had beaten the odds. He looked around as if hoping someone had seen the magic act he had just performed and would applaud.

  And what was more stimulating than the adrenaline blitz of surviving was the release and relief of knowing he was leaving one of life's rooms and going through the door to the next.

  He dropped the napkin and reached down and wiped his bloody hand and gun back and forth on Grimaldi's white shirt until they were reasonably clean. He then tucked the gun back into its pocket in his pants and jerked the gym bag out of the dead grip of Grimaldi's right hand.

  Karch backed up, grabbed one of Romero's legs and pulled his body out into the elevator's threshold so that the bumper would hit it and the door wouldn't close. He then moved from body to body checking pulses and pulling his Sig Sauer out of the waistband of Martin's pants. He checked the weapon to make sure there was no blood on it and then holstered it. He patted Martin's body until he found and removed the silencer from a front pants pocket.

  Finally, he looked around the housekeeping station and saw in the fenced enclosure there was a large laundry basket on wheels. He checked the door but it was locked. He stepped back and shot his leg out, his heel striking the fencing just above the key lock. The door snapped open and inward and he went in for the basket, turning it over first and dumping several stacks of fresh towels onto the floor.

  It took almost all of his strength to load all three bodies into the laundry cart. He then used some of the towels to mop up the blood. When he was done he grabbed a blanket off one of the shelves and used it to cover the cart. He pushed it into the fenced enclosure and closed the door.

  46

  CASSIE heard the series of pops that she knew to be gunfire. It sent an electric chill down the muscles of her back.

  "Cassie?"

  It was Jodie's urgent whisper. Cassie looked toward the reflected glow from the penlight in the duct ahead. Jodie was scared. It was impossible to tell where the shots had come from. She crawled toward the light.

  Jodie was huddled by the bars. She put the light on Cassie as she got closer.

  "Cassie, I heard loud noises."

  "It's all right, Jodie. It's all right. I'm going to go around now and come get you. You wait right there, okay? You wait for me."

  "No! Don't - "

  Cassie had to put her hand over her mouth. When she did it she felt tears on the girl's cheeks.

  "It's okay, Jodie. We're almost done. You have to wait here. It's the only way. I will be coming around for you in five minutes. I promise. Look at that watch and see how short five minutes is, okay?"

  "Okay," she said in a small voice. "I'll be here."

  This time Cassie just reached a hand through the bars that separated them and touched Jodie's cheek. She then started pushing herself backward through the duct toward suite 2001 .

  When she got to the vent she tapped it with her foot to push it out of its frame. It swung down the wall on the one screw still in place. She climbed out feet first and dropped down to the room service table, carrying her belt bag of tools with her. She took the fact that the table was still in place as a good sign. She went to the television console and was about to turn it off so she could hear better when a voice from behind stopped her.

  "Nice move getting in here."

  She turned and Karch was standing in the alcove leading to the bathroom, which was blocked off by the room service table beneath the overhead vent. He held the gym bag down at his side with one hand and a gun pointed at her with the other. She saw the gun had the silencer attached. He pushed the room service table out of his way with a foot and stepped into the room. Cassie backed up against the television, which was showing another Road Runner cartoon.

  Karch smiled but there was no warmth or humor in it.

  "The Trojan horse," he said. "The enemy was inside and they rolled it right in. One of the best magic tricks ever."

  Cassie still didn't say anything. She stood perfectly still and just hoped the television noise was loud enough that Jodie didn't hear this.

  "You know those bars you ran into up there in the duct?" Karch asked. "They were put in after your little spree with Max seven years ago. All the hotels did it. I guess you could say you did your little part to help make Las Vegas what it is today. A safe place for the gambler and his family."

  He smiled again.

  "Where's the girl?"

  Cassie pointed to the bag in his hand.

  "You have the money, Karch. You have me. Let her go."

  Karch frowned as if he was actually considering the suggestion. Then he shook his head.

  "Can't do it. I hate loose ends."

  "She's not a loose end. She's not even six years old. What possible danger is she to you?"

  Karch ignored the question and wagged the gun at her.

  "Let's go into the other room. I like that window better. There's a symmetry to it. That was Max's window."

  Cassie turned and started to move slowly toward the door as she tried to consider options. She decided her only chance was at the door. She had to make a move there, even though he would be expecting it. She gripped the strap of the tool bag tighter and was a few steps from the door when again a voice stopped her. But this one wasn't Karch's.

  "Don't you hurt her!"

  As Cassie turned she saw that the voice had also caught Karch by surprise. He was instinctively turning, swinging his gun hand up toward the air vent behind him. Cassie's eyes followed the movement and saw Jodie crouched in the air duct, looking down on them.

  Cassie acted instinctively, too. She moved toward Karch and swung the tool bag in a wide overhead arc at the same time she yelled to Jodie.

  "Jodie, go back!"

  The tool bag came down on the back of Karch's head, the steel tools impacting heavily and propelling Karch forward and downward. He fired a shot - which was still quite loud despite the silencer - but the aim was way low and the slug spiderwebbed a mirror in the bathroom alcove.

  Cassie moved quickly into him while he was bent over and jerked his suit jacket up and over his head. She then brought her knee up into the tangle of the jacket and felt it connect solidly with Karch's face.

  Karch desperately started turning and swinging his arms. A forearm caught Cassie across the side of the face and knocked her away. Karch turned in the direction of the impact and started firing the gun blindly. Stunned by the blow to the face, Cassie was still able to leap onto the bed and roll across it, coming down into a crouch on the floor behind Karch.

  Karch continued to fire as he swung his arm right to left. The shots peppered the walls and hit the floor-to-ceiling window twice, causing twin spiderwebs to craze across the glass. He finally was able to straighten up and jerk his jacket back down over his head. He dropped the money bag to do so.

  As the jacket came down off his head and his vision clear
ed, Karch was confused by his location. He was looking out at the Las Vegas night through a wall of shattered glass. There was no sign of Cassidy Black. He realized how vulnerable he was and started to turn just as something solid and hard crashed into the back of his thighs and he was propelled into the glass wall.

  The weakened glass gave easily and he crashed through. As he went he let go of the gun and grabbed desperately with both hands for any purchase. His left hand found the curtain and he grabbed on as his upper body went through the glass into the chill night air.

  As the glass fell away into the night Karch was momentarily poised on the precipice like a rappeller on a sheer cliff facing. Clinging now with both hands to the golden curtain, his body hung out into the night and was bolstered by his feet on the edge of the window sill.

  His weight swung him gently to his left and the curtain started to close. He quickly spread his feet to stabilize himself and the curtain stopped at the halfway mark. He looked back into the room and saw Cassidy Black staring at him, both her hands flat on the room service cart she had hit him with. His eyes dropped to the floor and he saw the money bag and the gun. He reached one hand further up the curtain and started pulling himself back into the room.

  With his first pull he heard a popping sound and the curtain gave way a few inches. He froze and waited. Nothing else happened. He looked in at the woman who had put him in this position and their eyes locked. Karch smiled and reached further up the curtain again.

  This time the shifting of pressure and weight on the curtain brought a long ripping series of pops as one by one the curtain hooks gave way. The curtain started coming off its attachments and Karch started dropping. He kept his smile, looking at Cassidy Black until the curtain ripped completely free and he was falling through the night.

  Karch did not yell. He did not close his eyes. To him his plummet seemed to be in slow motion. Above him he saw the golden curtain waving like a flag. The windows went by, some lighted and some not. Above the building he saw the moon in the blue-black sky.

  The void moon, he realized.

  His last thought was of the trick. The mail sack and the crate. The secret zipper and the false bottom. How he had to reach up and place the playing card - the Jack of Spades - in the right spot. He remembered how proud his father was. And the applause from the audience.

  The clapping was loud and ringing in his ears when he hit the atrium glass. His body crashed through and landed in the empty crow's nest. His eyes were open and there was still a smile on his face.

  Glass shattered down on the casino and cries of panic followed. But as the players looked up they saw the gaping hole in the glass and nothing else. Karch's body could not be seen from below. Then the golden curtain dropped through the shattered atrium like a failed parachute. It seemed to open at the last moment as it glided down into the crow's nest. It draped over Karch's body like a shroud.

  A hush settled over the casino and all eyes remained fixed on the gaping, unexplained hole above them. Then out of the blackness of the night sky money came floating down and into the casino. Thousands and thousands of bills came floating in. Hundred-dollar bills. Soon the shouting started again and people began rushing to the money, hands outstretched, jumping and snatching hundred-dollar bills out of the air. A blackjack table was overturned. Men in blue blazers ran into the melee but were overrun by the crowd. Some of them joined in the fight for the money.

  Cassie broke open another brick of hundreds and threw the loosened currency out into the night air. The five hundred bills spread apart and started languidly floating down. She heard screams from far below. She looked down and saw that some of the bills were being carried on air currents out to the fountains at the entrance and even over to the Strip. Cars were stopping, horns blasting. People were running into the traffic and the wading pools. People were fighting over the money. She had needed a diversion for an escape. She had one now.

  She turned and pushed the room service cart back beneath the open air vent. She climbed up and peered into the darkness.

  "Jodie! It's all right. It's me, Cassie. We can go now."

  She waited and then the girl crawled from the shadows of her hiding spot and into the light. Cassie reached her hands in to her and hooked them under her arms. She pulled the girl out and lowered her to the table. She then got down and brought Jodie down. She hugged her for a long moment.

  "We have to go now, Jodie."

  "Where's that man?"

  "He's gone. He can't hurt us."

  As she turned to lead the girl from the room she saw on the floor two green passports. She picked them up and realized they must have fallen from Karch's jacket when she had pulled it over his head. She opened one and saw her own photo staring back at her. Jane Davis. Clipped to the page was an Illinois driver's license with the same name.

  "What's that?" Jodie asked.

  "Just some things I dropped."

  She opened the other passport and looked at the photo of Jodie for a long moment. She then closed it and shoved both passports into the back pocket of her jeans. She took Jodie's hand and started leading her out. As she went she bent down and grabbed the gym bag with her other hand. She hadn't kept count but she was pretty sure there were still more than twenty bricks in the bag. More than a million dollars.

  She looked at the gun lying on the floor near the open window. She thought about it for a moment but decided to leave it. No guns.

  "Let's go," she said to herself more than Jodie.

  As they went through the bedroom Cassie glanced back into the room. In the bullet-fractured mirror she caught a disjointed image from the television. It was Porky Pig doffing his hat. He said, "Th-th-th-that's all, folks."

  The disorder in the casino was still in full thrust when they came out of the elevator alcove and started making their way toward the exit doors. Cassie picked up Jodie and carried her. They skirted around two men who had wrestled each other to the ground as they fought over a sheaf of bills that had apparently fallen without coming apart.

  "What are they doing?" Jodie asked.

  "Showing their true hearts," Cassie answered.

  They made it to the exit doors without Cassie seeing a single blue blazer. Cassie turned to push the glass door open with her back because her hands were full with Jodie and the gym bag. She glanced back across the casino, her eyes rising above the melee to the crow's nest. She saw one corner of the gold curtain hanging over the edge. Otherwise it looked empty.

  47

  CASSIE'S full focus was on getting to the car and then getting out of Las Vegas. So she and Jodie did not speak until the Boxster was on the freeway heading toward Los Angeles. It was as if Cassie could not take a breath until she was far from the neon glow of the Strip. When she had pushed the Boxster into fifth and set the cruise control at seventy-five, she finally looked over at the little girl belted into the seat next to her.

  "Are you okay, Jodie?"

  "Yes. Are you?"

  "I'm fine."

  "You have a bruise on your cheek where that man hit you. I saw him. That's when I hid in the tunnel."

  "Bruises go away. Are you tired?"

  "Nope."

  But Cassie knew she was. She reached across and reclined Jodie's seat to the maximum so that she could sleep. She put the Lucinda Williams CD into the player and put it on low. She was listening to the lyrics and thinking about the choice she had to make at some point on the drive to L.A. when Jodie spoke again.

  "I knew you would come for me."

  Cassie looked over at her. The glow from the dashboard revealed her daughter's face looking back at her.

  "How did you know?"

  "My mommy told me I have a guarding angel watching me. I think it is you."

  Cassie looked back at the road ahead. She felt tears welling in her eyes.

  "Guardian angel, baby. Guardian."

  "I'm not a baby."

  "I know. I'm sorry."

  They drove in silence for a half minute. Cassie
thought about her choice.

  "I know," she repeated.

  "How come you're crying?" Jodie asked.

  Cassie wiped the tears aside with the heels of her palms. She then tightly gripped the steering wheel and willed herself not to shed another tear in front of the girl.

  "Because I'm happy," she answered.