Wild Cards [07] Dead Man's Hand (44 page)

"You," Braun said, glaring at Jay. "We've been turning over half the city looking for you. Where the hell have you been?"

"Jay, Hiram," Tachyon said. He started to rise from the wheelchair. "What's happened? Where's Blaise?"

"The hospital," Jay admitted.

Tachyon made a choking sound. "Is he all right?"

"He has a small fracture of the skull, and he's lost a few teeth, plus some bruises and abrasions, and a bad case of shock. But the doctors figure he's going to be okay. The hospital wanted to keep him under observation for a few days, that's all."

Dr. Tachyon staggered as if Jay's words were a physical blow. Jack Braun clouded up like a thunderhead and came storming forward. "You goddamned jerk. He's only a kid, what the hell did you think you were doing, dragging him into some sleazy--"

Jay pointed, Jack popped. Maybe Braun finished his thought center stage at Freakers. Then again, maybe not. "Sorry" Jay mumbled to Tachyon. "My head's about to split open and hatch, I just can't take any more right now. Should you be out of that wheelchair?"

"It was Jack's idea," Tachyon said. Jay could see how weak the little man still was. When he stumbled, he put out a hand to steady himself, but there was no hand there. His bandaged stump fetched up hard against the back of the sofa, and Tachyon gasped.

"Sit down," Jay said.

Tachyon sat back down in the wheelchair, cradling his stump in his lap. Jay turned back to the bar. "What are you doing?" Tach asked.

"Pouring you a drink," Jay said. "You're going to need one."

He filled the second tumbler up with bourbon and ice cubes, brought it to Tachyon, and put it into his unresisting left hand. " I don't... I don't drink bourbon," Tach said. "Drink it," Jay said.

Tachyon drank it, his pale lilac eyes full of dread. "Tell me," he said when the glass was half- empty.

Jay told him all of it.

To his credit, the alien listened without interrupting. Tears began to roll down his cheeks when Jay reached the part about the centipede man, but still he held his tongue.

"Once Ti Malice was gone, the fight went out of the mounts. Ezili pitched a screaming fit, and the other woman, the girl with the baby, made a break for it. The rest just gaped at us. It was like they couldn't quite comprehend what was happening. I was going to call the cops, but Hiram stopped me."

"Hiram?" Tach said, looking over at the big ace.

Hiram nodded ponderously, as if his head were almost too heavy to move. "We had all done ... vile things. Myself included. What purpose would be served by imprisoning the mounts? We were only his instruments, his hands, his mouth, his eyes. It was Ti Malice who murdered, not your grandson. I told Jay there was no sense in bringing Blaise to trial. The real murderer was already gone. And the rest of them ... were they any different? You knew Sascha long before Ti Malice took him, doctor. He was never an evil man. Ezili was the worst, but even there ... how much was Ezili and how much was the master? She had been his prize mount her entire life."

"They're all going to be living in hell anyway," Jay said. "With me," Hiram added darkly.

Tach looked from one to the other. "Without the kiss ..." Hiram nodded. "You ... you cannot imagine."

"Oh, Hiram," Tachyon said, his voice thick with pity for his old friend. "You should have come to me."

"There are a -lot of things I should have done," Hiram said.

"Anyway," Jay said, "I let the mounts go."

"All of them?" Tachyon said, astonished.

"I didn't figure I had the right to pick and choose," Jay said. "Charm was the only one I thought twice about. He was the one who killed Chrysalis."

"Charm?" Tachyon said. "But why?"

"Chrysalis knew everything about everybody. Ti Malice depended on secrecy for safety. Exposed, he was pitifully vulnerable. She must have found out about him somehow, but what she didn't know was that Sascha was already his. The way I figure, her trusted telepath told his master that Chrysalis was getting close, so Ti Malice sent Charm to take her out. It adds up. The killer
had
to be someone Sascha knew, otherwise he would never have gotten inside the Palace without being detected. Maybe Ti Malice rode Charm personally that morning, to experience the sensation of beating someone to death. Or maybe not. I don't suppose we'll ever know."

"All this time searching for the man who killed Chrysalis," Tachyon murmured softly, "and yet you chose to let him go."

"Charm's fucked up enough," Jay said. "Besides, it wasn't Charm, it was Ti Malice. And Ti Malice is gone." Dr. Tachyon sipped from his drink and thought about that for a long time. Finally the alien gave a short, curt nod. "So much blood," he said. "So much killing. It has to stop, Jay."

"Yeah," Jay said. "Maybe Barnett is right."

"No," Tach said.

Hiram Worchester stood up suddenly. "I should go. I have to pack ... check out. . . ." His voice trailed off.

"Of course," Tachyon said.

"Go on," Jay told him. "I'll come down in a minute." Hiram nodded and stepped out into the hall. When the door closed behind him, Ackroyd turned back to Tachyon. "He's going to need your help, doc. He's an addict, and from what he says, the kiss is a hundred times more addictive than heroin."

"Hiram will have all the help he requires," Tachyon said. "I owe him a debt I can never repay. A blood debt. My grandson's life." The alien shook his head. " I could have helped him," he said plaintively. "Why didn't he tell me?"

"There's a better question. You're supposed to be Hiram's friend. So am I. So how come, all this time, we never noticed that anything was wrong?"

Dr. Tachyon just looked at him. Tears welled up in his eyes, and behind them, guilt.

"Shit," Jay said. He was tired of tears, tired of guilt and shame and fear and pain. "Just forget it, okay? There's nothing we can do about it except try to get him through. Hiram used all the strength he had left in him to kick your grandson in the head. He's going to need us."

"Then we must not fail him," Tachyon said.

Jay nodded. Suddenly he felt very weary. " I better go down and keep Hiram company," he said. "He's still pretty shaky."

"Of course," Tachyon said.

But when Jay opened the door, Hiram was right there, in the hall. His huge body was trembling, and he looked up at Jay from forlorn eyes. "Hiram, what's wrong?" Jay asked.

"It's ... nothing," Hiram began. "I suppose ... an anxiety attack." He blinked, as if to clear his head. "Jay... if you wouldn't mind ... could you ... come down to the room with me? It's just that I ... would rather not be alone right now. Can you understand that?"

Jay nodded. As he took Hiram by the arm, Dr. Tachyon rose unsteadily from his wheelchair. "We'll both go," the little alien announced in a tone that brooked no dissent. Hiram looked at them both gratefully. Jay figured they must have made quite a sight as they limped off together.

While they waited for the elevator to arrive, Tachyon turned back to Jay. "One thing," he asked. "You never said where you teleported Ti Malice."

"Funny thing about that," Jay said. "The way my power works, I have to visualize a place real good before I can teleport anyone there. I have to be able to get a clear picture in my head, really see it in my mind's eye. I got a bunch of places like that, places I know inside out. Sometimes it's just reflex. I don't have time to think about what I'm doing or where I'm going to send someone. I just point, and they wind up the first place that pops into my head."

"Yes?" Tachyon said politely.

"I made a lot of phone calls from the hospital. Ti Malice hasn't shown up in any of my usual places. Somehow, though, I didn't think he would. I looked right into that son of a bitch's face when he was crawling toward me, and the only thing that popped into my mind was this nightmare I've been having since I was a kid." Jay coughed apologetically. "I know that place real well," he said. "So you figure it out."

Dr. Tachyon thought about it for a moment. There was the sound of a chime. The elevator doors opened. Tach nodded slowly to Jay, turned, and entered the car.

1:00 P.M.

Brennan heard the outer door to the suite open, tired voices, then the door close. He stood up, framed in the doorway leading into the bedroom portion of the suite, gun in hand. Tachyon, Ackroyd, and Worchester stood clumped together, astonishment on their faces as they saw Brennan. "Daniel! What are you doing here?"

Brennan knew that Tachyon had lost a hand, but that knowledge didn't prepare him for the pale, drawn, bedraggled figure before him. Tachyon had obviously been through a lot the past week, but, Brennan thought grimly, it wasn't quite over yet.

"Tracking Chrysalis's killer," Brennan said grimly. Tachyon's bloodshot eyes went wide with astonishment. "Surely-"

"What the hell are you talking about?" Ackroyd interrupted. He looked a little worse for wear, himself. His face was puffy and bruised and he seemed to be favoring one side.

Brennan shook his head and gestured with his gun. "Sit on the bed," he said in a cold voice, "and I'll tell you a story about a murder."

Hiram hung back for a moment, then did as Brennan ordered. Ackroyd sat down next to Worchester and kept his hands carefully in his lap.

"Oh, God," Hiram moaned. "Will this never end?"

"Let's give him a chance," Tachyon said.

"Why?" Ackroyd asked truculently.

"Because I know who killed Chrysalis," Brennan said softly.

Ackroyd frowned. "It was Malice's joker goon. Chrysalis had discovered him-"

"No, it wasn't." Brennan took a deep breath so that he could speak in a calm, even voice. "I was Chrysalis's lover," he said. "Perhaps even her friend. That alone might have brought me back to track down her killer. But the murderer added insult to that injury. He tried to frame me for her death." He stared unblinkingly at Ackroyd. "Even you admit that was a clumsy job."

Ackroyd nodded reluctantly. "Yeah. It had me going for a while, but it didn't take me long to realize it was a setup." Brennan nodded, switched his gaze to Tachyon. " I had no idea why Chrysalis had been killed. Any number of things could have triggered the murder. I couldn't isolate the motive, so I concentrated on finding an ace strong enough to crush Chrysalis. But that, too, proved to be a blind alley, because Chrysalis wasn't killed by an ace with super strength."

"What?" Ackroyd said. "That's ridiculous."

Brennan shook his head. "I knew something was wrong at the crime scene when I first saw it, but it took me a while to figure it out. There was very little blood in Chrysalis's office. She'd been killed before being pulped. Her heart had stopped pumping so there was no blood sprayed on the walls, desk, or floor."

Tachyon nodded. "That makes sense."

"Someone was covering his tracks again, pretending that Chrysalis had been battered to death by an ace with extraordinary strength. But who?" Brennan shook his head. "The list of suspects had again become endless, but I thought I could narrow it down by questioning Sascha. He was a telepath, he'd been on the murder scene, and he was acting peculiar. I figured he knew more than he was admitting. He'd disappeared, but I thought I could track him down."

"You couldn't have found him," Ackroyd said. "He was here in Atlanta."

"That's right," Brennan agreed. "But during the investigation I found out that he was in thrall to a mysterious master, someone called Ti Malice. Then I found Malice's apartment, and in the apartment was a closet, and in the closet was a coat, and in the coat were these." He carefully reached into his hip pocket with his broken arm and took out a deck of playing cards. They were ornate, but worn and tattered and of great age and apparent delicacy.

"So what?" Ackroyd asked with a frown.

"These are the cards," Brennan explained, "that Chrysalis played solitaire with, the deck from which the murderer took the ace of spades to frame me. The deck he then absentmindedly put in his coat pocket and took with him after he left her office. Isn't that right, Worchester?" Brennan stared grimly at the huge ace. Hiram tried to speak, but no words would come out. He stuttered, sputtered, and fingered the angry sore on the side of his neck, his face pale and beaded with sweat, his hands trembling.

Brennan dropped the cards on the floor and took from his jacket pocket the ace of spades that Chrysalis had left him in her will. He scaled it at Hiram. The card flew true, struck Hiram's broad chest, and tumbled to the floor where it landed faceup, black and ominous against the carpet.

"Cute," Jay said as the card fluttered to the floor at Hiram's feet. "That mean you're going to start killing people now, or what?" He started to get up.

"I told you not to move." The barrel of Brennan's automatic slid a few inches to the right, until it was fixed on Jay. "So shoot me," Jay said. He got to his feet, looking right at Yeoman. "You got
any
idea what Hiram has just been through?"

"I don't care what he's been through."

"Aren't you the fucking soul of compassion?" Jay said. "I don't waste my compassion on killers," Brennan said. "Oh, I forgot, you're Mother Teresa," Jay said with bitter sarcasm. "Well, pardon the hell out of me. Thing of it is, though, seeing as how you hate killers so much, I can't help noticing you're the only one in the room with a gun in his hand."

"Jay, Daniel,
please,"
Tachyon pleaded. His good hand cradled his bandaged stump, and he sounded weak and sick at heart. "Can't we work this out like civilized people?"

"He's trying to protect a killer," Yeoman said icily. "You got a hell of a lot of nerve calling anyone a killer, Danny boy," Jay snapped back.

"This isn't about me," Yeoman said.

"Stop it!"
Tachyon cried. He looked over at Brennan. "Daniel, there must be some mistake. I know Hiram Worchester. I have known him for close on two decades now, in good times and bad. He is a good man. Even if I believed for a moment that Hiram was capable of such an act, he was here in Atlanta at the convention while Chrysalis was being murdered in Jokertown: He
couldn't
have done it."