Streets of Shadows Read online

  I drew on the liquor shop owner, but I didn’t fire. Caesar did. And when he got caught, he ratted and said I’d shot the guy. So when Caesar got back from spilling his guts, I spilled them for real. I was human then. I believed in revenge. I opened a three foot slash in him with four-inch blade.

  I watch murder silently. I stare after ambulances racing down my streets toward hospitals. Cars pile upon each other, ram bicyclists out of the wheel, rollerbladers, pedestrians, children playing. Blood runs in my gutters alongside tears and harsh laugher. My own blood seeps between Lou’s fingers and beneath the bank. Joycie will undoubtedly use him in her alibi scheme. She’s got those kind of eyes.

  I was a hook and book, a smash and grab. If I was going to be ambitious I should’ve gone to school and become a doctor, not try to take down a bank with a junkie idiot partner and a .45. Like everyone else in New York, I got what I deserved. The city, which is me, is just.

  I am the outskirts of paradise, the wells of hell, I am full of bimbos in limbo. I am the story of purgatory. I have rhythm, I am song, I am scream, I am the angel of death and I do death’s work. I am thick with sick. I am homosexual madman murderer stalking the Port Authority Bus Terminal men’s room. I am chickenhawk with short eyes watching girls escaping small towns arrive in big city to achieve their dreams. I am the Circle Line Ferry packed with paranoia, waiting for terrorism jihad to strike. I am stink, I am sex, I am endless weeping, I am empty churches kept alive with the donations of gangsters and pedophiles. I am the breath and moody weight of St. Patrick’s Cathedral.

  Zacko fires again. He can’t hold the hostages by himself and is going crazy. There are police surrounding the place. He’ll be dead soon too. My human heart ceases beating and the spraying blood ceases.

  I am whores along the highway, under the 59th Street Bridge, I am homeless shelters, drug rehab clinics, soup kitchens. I am fervid, febrile university students. I am film school, I am college sexual experimentation, and the need to contribute their verses to the great song of the world.

  Zacko finally makes it down the stairs. I know he’s going to kill Lou. I mutter my objection and all the bank boxes spring open at once. Zacko is terrified. So are Lou and Joycie. Those pearls would’ve taken care of me for at least five years.

  Zacko stomps down the marble steps and straight across my ocean of blood. Why not leave more evidence behind? Red footprints showing his shoe pattern. His super-hero mask is askew. He probably pulled it up to catch his breath and showed his face to everybody. I want to slap this shit out of him, what is left of me to anger. I am pimp, police, pianist, prima donna, priest, and painter. I am clippy-clop hooves of horse-drawn carriages parking in front of Penn Station at Madison Square Garden.

  Zacko shouts my name again. Lou looks up. He pulls the exact same move on Zacko as he did me. Quick-draw barely clearing the holster, firing into dumb meat. It takes him higher since Lou is on his knees. Zacko falls face first, his shotgun sliding across the slick floor. Joycie catches it beneath her heel with careful and unexpected agility. She picks it up. She’s got a plan for Lou.

  He turns too slowly.

  I could drop the entire bank on her, but I am not a purveyor of fairness or man-made law. I never was.

  I am Big Apple.

  I am what you know to be true, in your bones, the base of your brain, in the pits of your eyes, I am the greatest city on the face of the earth. I am death, and I am life, and I am the haunting power of all deities, and I will eternal remain.

  * * *

  Tom Piccirilli is an American novelist and short story writer. He has sold over 150 stories in the mystery, thriller, horror, erotica, and science fiction fields. Piccirilli is a two-time winner of the International Thriller Writers Award for "Best Paperback Original" (2008, 2010). He is a four-time winner of the Bram Stoker Award. He was also a finalist for the 2009 Edgar Allan Poe Award given by the Mystery Writers of America, a final nominee for the Fantasy Award, and he won the first Bram Stoker Award given in the category of "Best Poetry Collection".

  A Game of Cards

  A.C. Wise

  Times like this, it’s like I never left the ring. The crack of fist to jaw, spitting blood, and that first bitter-sweet pulse of heat that’ll be a beautiful bruise by morning. Except there are no spotlights, no crowds shouting my name, and it’s a lucky elbow thrown with a wild prayer rather than a punch thrown with skill that catches me.

  One thing is the same: It hurts like a motherfucker.

  The blow lands in just the right spot to send pain along an old fault line, the one that ended my career. Now I’m pissed.

  I’ve got at least ten pounds on this guy, all muscle. He’s skinny as a rag soaked in kerosene; wiry is one thing, if you know how to use it, but he doesn’t. He’s flailing, cornered. He got one lucky shot. He won’t get two.

  The nice thing about working the door at The Lucky Bitch (named in honor the boss’ ex-wife, if you’re wondering) is no one cares if I get a little rough in the line of duty. Why hire a former IFBA Middleweight Champion if you don’t want her to crack few skulls?

  I drop the punk, and it’s a thing of beauty. Precision, clock-work tight. All the guy needs is a love-tap, and he folds, stick limbs going loose. A rare summer rain left the strip slick with neon glow, and he manages to land right in a puddle, shattering all that pretty reflected light.

  Even if they aren’t chanting my name, there’s still a crowd gathered at the velvet rope outside the casino. I flip my braids over my shoulder, beads clacking, and pop my knuckles for dramatic flair.

  “Didn’t your momma ever teach you not to hit girls?”

  I can’t help grinning at the smattering of applause. Damn, it still feels good. But the punk rolls onto his side, looking up at me. Despite his grimace, he gathers his stick-limbs under him, like he’s ready to go one more round.

  “You don’t want to do that,” I say.

  He licks his lips, gaze darting past me, like he’s weighing his options. I nod at Sal and Vinnie, and tilt my head toward the mess at my feet. I’m hoping once he sees my clean-up detail, the slabs of beef who keep me company on the Lucky Bitch’s doors, the punk’ll make the smart choice and stay down.

  Just as Sal and Vinnie draw even with me, the punk does just that, but it’s wrong. He glances at his watch, of all things, then slumps back, jaws clacking together even though his head never hits the pavement. His body jerks, heels drumming the sidewalk, as his breathing turns erratic.

  “What the shit?” I drop to my knees beside him. “Someone call 9-1-1. He must have swallowed something.”

  I reach for him, but my arm freezes. It lasts only a second, long enough for the soft sound of displaced air, which shouldn’t be audible over the crowd erupting into chaos, but is. It’s like a door opening. An electric charge trips the length of my spine, knowledge chasing it. Something just stepped through, something big; the man convulsing on the sidewalk is a decoy, a distraction from the real shit that’s about to go down.

  I’m on my feet, moving toward the Lucky Bitch’s doors, already knowing I’m too late.

  “Athena? Where are you going?”

  I touch Sal’s shoulder as I pass, his confusion falling away behind me. “Take care of him,” I shout, but it’s too late for the man on the sidewalk, too.

  I burst through the casino doors, into the world of oxygen-enhanced air, no clocks, and glittering bright machines dispensing just enough coins to keep the junkies hungry for one more spin. I see him immediately – a man in a suit so black it seems to suck in the light. Shadows buzz around him, thick as flies, making him hard to see. Everything about him wants to resist my gaze, make it slide away. I clench my jaw, ignoring fresh pain flaring through the bone.

  The man hefts an axe from his back – heavy, ornamental, impossible, and definitely not there a moment ago. My legs won’t move fast enough. My voice is gone. All I can do watch as the man swings the axe and beheads a slick-looking customer in an Armani suit, standing at the near
est craps table.

  The world snaps back into true all at once, time resuming its normal course. Armani’s body, minus its head, crumples. The woman standing nearest him screams. The head itself rolls to a stop against a bank of slot machines, the man’s wrap-around sunglasses askew over his shock-wide eyes. Fresh chaos erupts, the scene outside merging with the scene inside. Sirens wail and everywhere, everything is panic.

  Except for the man in black, who slings his axe over his shoulder, turns to face me, and winks. He reaches into the pocket of his immaculately-tailored jacket and flicks something toward the fallen body. Then he vanishes. Not metaphorically, literally. The displacement of air, the door opening and closing in reverse, and he’s gone.

  My knees fold, but it isn’t weakness. It’s gut instinct, and before my conscious mind has caught up, I’m crawling toward the body, taking advantage of the general chaos to retrieve the object the axe-man threw. A playing card.

  Shit.

  I slip the card into my pocket, standing before anyone notices. It’s time to call in a favor, and go see an old friend.

  * * *

  As soon as the cops are done taking statements, I’m back outside in the neon-tinted desert air. My jaw is starting to stiffen up. There’s a coppery ache behind my left ear, ground zero for the fault line opened by Mayflower Jones during the ’03 title bout, which currently sits just under the not-quite-yet-bruise delivered courtesy of the punk being carted away from the Lucky Bitch in a body bag.

  I need a drink like nobody’s business, but instead of heading back to the Pink Flamingo and the bottle of Jack waiting in the room rented semi-permanently under my name, I walk further down the seedy side of the strip. I manage to ignore the siren call of several bars that’d be willing to sell me a bit of relief at the friends and family rate, heading away from the brightest lights, down the slickest alleys, to where the lowest of the low games of chance play out in the shadows cast by Vegas’ bright-bright glare. Dice rattle in tin cups; dominoes clack, head-to-tail; cards snap, oddly crisp for all that they’ve been worn down by greasy palms.

  I stop at the mouth of an alleyway sandwiched between two non-descript buildings. Ahmed’s maintaining his usual post at the far end. I hang back, allowing myself the luxury of watching a pro at work. Ahmed’s hands are a blur. I almost feel sorry for the sucker whose money is on the three cards shuffling into one and splitting off again. The eagerness in the mark’s expression is painful, like his last hope is pinned to that lost queen, which it probably is.

  My pulse kicks. I know how he feels.

  It’s tempting to warn the man, but anyone stupid enough to bet their last dime on three card monte gets what they deserve. Even if Ahmed wasn’t cheating. Which he probably doesn’t even realize he’s doing.

  On the surface, Ahmed is a small time con man with a knack for making the cards go his way. But there’s a ghost beneath his skin, shadows even Vegas’ brightest lights can’t chase away. Ahmed is one of Lady Luck’s children, one of Her oldest. A long time ago, he walked away from the game, went into hiding, so deep sometimes even he doesn’t remember what he used to be. Like right now, he probably doesn’t even notice the pale glow tripping his long fingers as he shuffles the cards. It’s there and gone and so is the mark’s money and the last of his hopes. The house always wins.

  The mark slinks away, and I slide in to take his place. Ahmed’s halfway to dealing out the cards before he looks up.

  “Athena.”

  “I need your help. I’m calling in a favor.” I tap the table for emphasis. His shoulders hunch, as if expecting a blow.

  Luck is a tricky thing. Despite everything Ahmed’s done to walk away, to forget, he’s still here, in Vegas out of all the places he could have gone when he ran away. Luck can quit you anytime, but it doesn’t work both ways. As long as the Lady still wants him in the game, he’ll never be able to fully let go.

  Still, I pull my punch, uncertain how much he remembers and how much he’s forgotten. I don’t mention the word sibling, or say anything about the game.

  Instead, I say, “I just watched a man beheaded by a spooky motherfucker with an axe.”

  Ahmed’s mouth actually drops open; I can’t help the edge of a grin. “Come on, let’s get a drink.”

  Ahmed’s shoulders hunch further, resigned, and he runs a hand through his dark, wavy hair.

  “Fine, but you’re buying.”

  He sweeps up his cards, disappearing them into one of many pockets, and leaves the table squatting at the dim end of the alley like some ancient riddling beast. I steer us to a bar called Blue. Friends and family rate also means non-watered-down drinks. I try not to send my vodka and cranberry the same route as Ahmed’s cards - disappearing it down my throat - and force myself to suck through the dinky plastic straw.

  Trying to trip Ahmed’s memory gently, and not send him running scared, I say. “The man with the axe wasn’t human. But he was working with a human accomplice, someone he paid or threatened into causing a distraction – one that ended up getting him killed. So that’s two murders, I guess.”

  “Athena. Stop.”

  The expression of sorrow in Ahmed’s eyes when I look up nearly takes my breath away. In some lights, those eyes are almost gold, time-burnished, worn. Just like an old coin.

  “I remember. I’ll help you. But I can’t make any promises.” Ahmed pulls out his deck, not the one he uses to grift, but one worn just as soft at the edges.

  The glow comes back to outline his fingers, stronger now. He plucks a card from the deck, flipping it front to back. I’ve seen him do it a dozen times, just a warm up exercise, but this time it drops my heart into my shoes. The card’s face changes from the Queen of Spades to the Queen of Hearts, blink-quick, then both vanish back into the deck.

  Just like that, my own ghost - the shadow hidden under my skin - jumps up and smacks me in the face. Mel, her angles sharp against Las Vegas’s glare. Her hair the color and smell of honey; her lips the taste and shade of cherries. Her cheekbones dusted with glitter, her lids rimmed with smoke and kohl. There’s nothing real about her on the surface, but behind the doll-bright gleam in her eyes when she dances – danced – up on the Gold Dust Lounge’s bright-lit stage, she was there. Mel. My Mel.

  A memory, sudden and sharp, follows on the heels of the image - Mel sitting amidst rumpled sheets, clumsily shuffling a desk of cards. Concentrating, she bites her lower lip – already bitten and tasting of tequila and lime, her lipstick faded and all but gone.

  “Pick a card, any card,” she says, holding them out to me. I comply. Despite my best efforts, glitter still dusts the curve of her breasts, the pink of her nipples; it’s impossible not to stare.

  “Don’t show me,” she says. “Now put it back in the deck.”

  I comply with this, too, watching her shuffle, watching the light from the window move across her bare shoulders. She pauses to snag the bottle of tequila from the dresser, necking it for the last sip.

  “Is this your card?” She holds out the Queen of Spades, closing one eye to squint at me.

  I shake my head, trying not to look at the empty bottle now resting against her knee. She turns it around, looking between it and me, one eye still closed. Her voice slurs, more sleepy than drunk, a smile tugging her smudged lips.

  “Of course it is, see?” She holds it next to my face, as if comparing a photograph. “Athena is another name for the Queen of Spades. Didn’t you know?”

  I shake my head again, and she smiles, rising up on her knees and twisting around. “Athena is the Queen of Spades, and I’m the Queen of Hearts.”

  She tugs at the waistband of her pink, cotton panties, the only thing she’s wearing. I see the double-heart tattoo at the base of her spine, one above the other, mirrored.

  “If you say so, your highness.” I keep my tone light, because something tingles in sympathy at the base of my spine, a shiver of electricity I want to ignore. I lean forward, nipping lightly at the tattoo and Mel giggles, twis
ting away. I catch her, pin her down, the electric feeling is replaced by another, making it easy to forget.

  Ahmed sets the worn deck on the bar, keeping his attention on it, while busying his hands with a single gold coin. He runs it over the backs of his fingers, making it vanish, making the image stamped on its face change. The tightness eases in my chest, but only somewhat. I concentrate on Ahmed, trying not to think about what I saw in the deck, what I thought I saw.

  The air around Ahmed brightens, making the rest of the bar dim in comparison. Ahmed is hard to look at, like the man with the axe, but bright where the other was shadowed. Sometimes, it seems as though Ahmed’s hands vanish with the coin, slipping into another space before coming back again. My eyes water.

  A thin sheen of sweat beads Ahmed’s forehead. Under the stubble darkening his cheeks, there are shadows that have nothing to do with the light in the bar. Lines of shimmering gold surround him, threads of luck, which he traces through the city, back to their source.

  “The dead man outside the casino was named Sonny Malone.” Ahmed’s voice is husked, low, but it makes me jump nonetheless. “He had a two of diamonds sewed inside his jacket pocket when he died.”

  “A token of allegiance?” I say, but Ahmed ignores me.

  His lids are half-lowered, seeing elsewhere than the bar, following a map of luck through Las Vegas.

  “The dead man inside the casino was Carmen Estavez. He was just about to hit the jackpot. High stakes poker.”

  The coin in Ahmed’s hand flickers fast, blurring like a succession of tiny moons rolling across his knuckles.

  “Estavez had cards on him, too. A full deck, brand new, no box. It’s gone.”

  “Where?” Again, Ahmed doesn’t answer, maybe doesn’t even hear me.

  “There was another card,” he says.