Wild Cards V: Down and Dirty Read online

  “Oh, Victor, why?” He didn’t really expect an answer, and he didn’t get one.

  “Oh, yes, since we’re going to be friends you should know my true name. Friends don’t lie to each other. My name is Georgi Vladamirovich Polyakov. But you can call me George. Victor is dead—you killed him.”

  Addicted to Love

  by Pat Cadigan

  THE VIEW OF THE city from Aces High was breathtaking, even inspirational. Beached on the shores of the afternoon, Jane stared blindly down at it from the kitchen window, frustration and unhappiness doing their usual waltz in her stomach. Behind her the kitchen staff worked away at winding down the afternoon luncheon service before preparing for the dinner custom, politely ignoring the fact that she’d left the salad they’d made for her untouched. Her appetite was poor these days. Lately she had even abandoned the pretense of wrapping the food up for later and tossing it out on the sly.

  She knew there were whispers that she’d gone anorexic, not exactly the best advertisement for a place such as Aces High. It was like a bad joke on Hiram, after he’d increased her responsibilities at the restaurant from hostessing to pinch-hit supervising. Hiram was pretty weird himself these days, but he wasn’t shedding any weight. He’d been on a round-the-world goodwill tour. Hiram Worchester, Goodwill Ambassador. It beat the hell out of Jane Dow, Mafia Dupe.

  Memories of the time with Rosemary drove her deeper into depression. She missed her; rather, she missed the person she’d thought Rosemary had been and the work she’d thought she’d been doing for her. It had all sounded so fine and noble—trying to counteract the antiace, antijoker hysteria that had been building up, fueled by hysterical extremist politicians and evangelists. Rosemary had been a real hero to her, someone with a shining light around her; she’d needed a hero very badly after all the nastiness with the Masons and the terrible, grotesque murder of Kid Dinosaur. Her own brush with death had not left much of an impression on her, except for the contact with that horrible; evil little creature called the Astronomer. She had seldom thought of it afterward, and Rosemary had been the antidote to the Astronomer’s poison.

  Until March, when she began to find herself thinking that it might have been better if Hiram had just let her plummet to the street.

  She seemed to have an unerring instinct for getting mixed up with exactly the wrong people. Maybe that was her real ace power, not the water-calling ability. She could hire herself out as a bad-guys detector, she thought sourly, change her name from Water Lily to Dowsing Rod. Yes, I just love these people, I’d follow them anywhere, do anything for them—call the cops, they must be white slavers and kiddie pornographers.

  Her mind gave her an image of Rosemary Muldoon, smiling at her, praising her for her hard work, and she felt a pang of disloyalty and guilt. There was no way she could think of Rosemary as a truly bad person. A big part of her still wanted to believe that Rosemary had been sincere about the work, that whatever else she had been involved with as the head of a Mafia family, Rosemary really had wanted to do something for the victims of the wild card virus.

  Yes, she thought fiercely, there was plenty of good in Rosemary, she wasn’t like all the others. Maybe something awful had happened to her that had driven her to accept and embrace the Mafia. She could understand that; God, could she understand it.

  Her mind shoved aside the memory and came to rest on the man named Croyd. She still had the phone numbers he’d given her. Anytime you want some company, someone to talk to … I bet I could listen to you for hours. Maybe even all night, but that would be up to you, Bright Eyes. No one had ever showed quite so much panache flirting with her. Mirrorshades Croyd, calling her Bright Eyes; she was unaware of smiling at the memory. There had been no link exposed between him and Rosemary’s organization. Either it was buried too deeply or he’d been another idealist like herself. Since she wanted to believe it was the latter, that most likely meant it was the former—and she was still tempted to take out those phone numbers and surprise him by calling him. There was no way she could ever really bring herself to do it, which could well have been why he’d given her the numbers in the first place.

  Her whole life was upside down and backward. Maybe that was what the wild card virus had really done to her, fixed it so she would live as the butt of every practical joke the world could play on her.

  Abruptly Sal’s voice seemed to be speaking to her in her head: You’re not being fair with yourself. You never believed the Masons were good, you weren’t blind to what the Astronomer really was. And as for Rosemary, she was just a whole lot smarter than you, street smart—she took advantage of you and that should be her shame, not yours. If she even has the capacity to feel shame.

  Yeah, Salvatore Carbone would have said something very like that to her if he’d been alive. The fact that she could come up with it herself must have meant she wasn’t completely hopeless, she thought. But the idea didn’t improve her mood or bring her appetite back.

  “Excuse me, Jane,” said a voice behind her. It was Emile, who had started at Aces High not long before she had and was now the new maître d’. She wiped at her wet face hastily, glad that she had managed to gain more control over her tendency to pull enormous amounts of water out of the air when under stress, and turned around, trying to smile at him politely. “I think you’d better come down to the loading dock.”

  She blinked at him in confusion. “Pardon?”

  “A situation has developed and we think you’re the only one who could handle it.”

  “Mr. Worchester always—”

  “Hiram isn’t here and frankly we doubt he’d be much use if he were.”

  She stared up at Emile tensely. Emile was one of the most vocal (and unforgiving) critics of Hiram’s behavior, a group that seemed to gain more members every day, all of them disgruntled employees and all of them, to her complete dismay, more in the right than she wanted to admit.

  Ever since his return from the tour Hiram had been … strange. He seemed to have little real interest and no enthusiasm for Aces High these days, acting as if the restaurant were some awful albatross around his neck, a burdensome annoyance that was keeping him from something of greater importance. And he was behaving abominably toward his staff; his almost courtly manners had disappeared, and he ranged from distracted to abusively rude. Except for herself. Hiram was still friendly toward her, though it seemed to be an enormous and obvious effort to control himself and focus his attention. He had always been attracted to her; she’d known that since the night he had saved her life, and she felt guilty for not feeling the same way toward him. Being obligated to someone who cared for her when she couldn’t return the affection was one of the most uncomfortable situations she could imagine. She had repaid him for the expensive clothes, and she had made every effort to be the best employee he could have asked for in exchange for the security of the job (and the generous salary) he’d given her. Lately that meant taking up for him, even against people who had known him far longer than she had and supposedly had many more reasons to be devoted to him. Some of these were the most virulent, maybe because they had so many more better days to remember at Aces High. If only she could get through to Hiram, she thought, looking into Emile’s cold green eyes. If only she could make him understand how badly he was eroding his own authority and credibility and respect, he would be able to halt this terrible decline, turn it around, and become Hiram Worchester, Grand Master Restauranteur, again. Right now, it was as if he were dying.

  “What kind of situation?” she asked carefully.

  Emile shook his head in a small, tight way that was more shudder than anything. “It’s easier if you just come,” he said. “What we need right now is quick, decisive action from someone who has the authority to take it. Please. Just come down with me.”

  Taking a deep breath, she forced composure on herself and went with Emile to the elevator.

  The scene on the loading dock was like something out of a Marx Brothers movie, only not quite so funny�
��like something out of a remake of a Marx Brothers movie, she thought, watching the dock crew work furiously at reloading a truck while two employees of the Brightwater Fish Market kept unloading it (or perhaps re-unloading it, while a third Brightwater employee stood on a box nose to nose with Tomoyuki Shigeta, the new sushi chef. Brightwater’s man was a short, stocky nat who appeared to have high blood pressure; Tomoyuki was a slender seven-foot ace who, during the period of the new moon, lived as a dolphin between the hours of eleven P.M. and three A.M. Together they looked like a comedy team rehearsing an act, although Brightwater’s man was doing all the yelling, with Tomoyuki occasionally putting in a couple of soft words that seemed to provoke the other man to higher volume.

  “What’s going on here?” Jane asked in her most business-like voice. No one heard her. She sighed, glanced at Emile, and then hollered, “Everybody, shut up!”

  This time her voice cut through the air, and everyone did shut up, turning toward her almost as one.

  “What’s going on?” she asked again, looking up at Tomoyuki. He made a slight bow.

  “Brightwater has delivered a shipment of bad fish. The entire load has gone over, and it went over quite some time ago.” Tomoyuki’s cultured, Boston Brahmin tones held no hostility or impatience. Jane thought he was the most professional person she had ever met, and she wished she were more like him. “Some time before it was loaded onto this truck for delivery here. Unless Hiram has another source, we will be unable to offer the twilight sushi bar this evening.”

  Jane tried to sniff the air without being obvious about it. All she could smell was overwhelming fish, as though the greater part of the ocean had been caught and dumped in the immediate vicinity. She could not tell whether the odor was good or bad, only that it was offensively strong, and if the load stayed on the dock much longer, it would go bad if it weren’t already.

  “Look, lady, this is fish and fish stinks,” said Brightwater’s man, rubbing his upper lip directly under his nose, as though to emphasize the point. “Now, I been deliverin’ loads of stinkin’ fish to Hiram Worchester and a good many other people for a long, long time, and the stuff always smells like this. I don’t like the way it smells, either, but that’s just how it is.” He glanced up at Tomoyuki in disgust. “Fish is supposed to smell bad. Nobody’s gonna tell me different. And nobody’s gonna tell me to take my load back unless it’s Hiram Worchester himself.”

  Jane nodded very slightly. “Are you aware that Mr. Worchester has empowered me to act as his agent for all business transactions having to do with the Aces High menu?”

  Brightwater’s man—Aaron was the name on his shirt pocket—tilted his wide head and looked at her through half-closed eyes. “Just say it, okay? Don’t try and jack me around with double-talk, just look me in the eye and spit it out.”

  “What I meant,” Jane said, slightly embarrassed, “is that any decision I make is a Hiram Worchester decision. He will back it one hundred percent.”

  Aaron’s gaze traveled from Jane to Emile to one of the dock crew and came to rest on Tomoyuki, who stared down at him impassively. “Oh, for chrissakes, what am I lookin at you for? You’ll back her up a hundred percent.”

  Tomoyuki turned to Jane, raising his eyebrows in a silent question.

  “Is the fish bad, Tom?” she said quietly.

  “Yes. Definitely.”

  “Is that what you would tell Mr. Worchester?”

  “In a minute.”

  She nodded. “Then it goes back to Brightwater. No arguments,” she added as Aaron opened his mouth to protest. “If it isn’t off this loading dock in fifteen minutes, I’ll call the police.”

  Aaron’s broad face twisted into an expression of hostile disbelief. “You’ll call the cops? On what charge?”

  This time Jane’s sniff was as audible as she could make it. “Littering. Illegal dumping. Air pollution. Any of those would stick. Good day to you.” She turned sharply and fled back into the building with her hand over her mouth and nose. The smell had suddenly become too nauseating to bear.

  “Well done, Jane,” Tom said as he and Emile caught up with her at the elevator. “Hiram himself couldn’t have carried it off much better.”

  “Hiram couldn’t carry it off, period,” Emile muttered darkly.

  “Don’t, Emile” she said, and felt him staring at her in surprise.

  “Don’t what?”

  The elevator doors slid open and they all got in.

  “Don’t badmouth Hiram. Mr. Worchester, I mean.” She pushed the button for Aces High. “It’s bad for morale.”

  “Hiram’s bad for morale, in case you hadn’t noticed. If he’d been on top of things, Brightwater wouldn’t have even thought of trying to pass their rotted stuff off on us. It just shows the word must be out on him, everyone must know he’s no good anymore—”

  “Please, Emile.” She put a hand on his slender arm, looking into his face imploringly. “We all know something’s wrong, but every time you or one of the other employees says something like that, it diminishes the chances of his being able to put it right again. He can’t recover from whatever is wearing on him if we’re all against him.”

  Emile actually looked mildly ashamed of himself. “God knows if anyone wishes him well, I do, Jane. But the way he is these days, he reminds me of a—well, a junkie,” He shuddered. “I detest junkies. And all addicts.”

  “What you say is very true, Jane,” said Tom, from the opposite corner of the elevator where he was standing with his arms folded against his sleek body, “but none of it gets us a twilight sushi bar for this evening, and Hiram never saw fit to let me in on his backup plan for this kind of eventuality. So unless you know what to do, or can find Hiram and get him to tell you, Aces High is actually going to renege on an offering. Which may well be its ruination. A little bird told me Mr. Dining Out has reservations here tonight, specifically to review the sushi bar for New York Gourmet. I don’t have to tell you what it would mean for Aces High to get a bad review.”

  Jane rubbed her forehead tiredly. This must be what they call black comedy, she thought. When everything just gets worse and worse and you think you might start laughing and never stop till they take you away.

  Casually Tom moved to the other side of the elevator to stand near Emile. Just as casually she turned away so they could touch without her seeing. No one was supposed to know they were lovers, but she wasn’t sure why they were so fanatical about keeping it secret. Something to do with AIDS perhaps, she thought. The perception of all gays as AIDS carriers had brought renewed persecution to homosexuals. She could almost be glad that Sal hadn’t lived to see that.

  “I can find Hiram,” she said after a bit. “I’m pretty sure I know where he is. Emile, you keep order until I get back.” She handed Emile the spare key to Hiram’s office. “You won’t need this, but just in case of something. When I come back, we’ll have a sushi bar. The selection might be a little more limited than we’d like, but we can carry it off if we do it with enough … um … panache. Can we, Tom?”

  “I am panache,” Tomoyuki said, his face completely impassive while Emile suppressed a smile. The sight of the two of them made her feel suddenly and unbearably alone.

  “Good,” she said miserably. “I’ll just get my purse and be on my way.” The elevator stopped to let them off at the Aces High dining room. “With any luck you’ll hear from me in about an hour.”

  “And without any luck?” said Emile, pressing, but, she could tell, not unkindly.

  “Without any luck,” she said thoughtfully, “do you think you could get sick, Tom?”

  “I could have done that to begin with,” he said, a little curtly.

  “Yes, but then we would not have tried. Would we.” She tried to look up at him as if they were eye to eye. “We’ll continue to try until there’s nothing to try for. Do you understand?”

  Both men nodded.

  “And one more thing,” she said as they started to turn away. “From now on, refer
to him as Mr. Worchester.” Emile frowned slightly. “To everyone, even to me. It will help morale. Even ours.”

  Emile bit his lip tensely and then, to her relief, nodded. “Understood, Jane. Or should that be Ms. Dow?”

  She let her gaze drop for a moment. “I’m not power mad, Emile. If you really understand, you know that. I’m trying to save him. Mr. Worchester. I owe him that.” She looked up at him again. “We all do, in our own particular ways.”

  Tom was staring at her, and for the first time she saw a fondness in his smooth, cold face. Feeling awkward, she excused herself to retrieve her purse from Hiram’s office and call a cab. There was a sense of victory within her as she rode down in the elevator again. The temperamental Tomoyuki liked her, no small achievement, and she had managed to get Emile on her side, at least for a while. He must like her, too, she thought, almost giddy. Perhaps it was a terrible weakness to want to be liked so much, but she certainly was getting a lot accomplished because of it. Or she would if she could just get Hiram to come through on the promises she’d made, or implied.

  The cab was waiting in front of the entrance for her; she climbed in and gave the driver an address in Jokertown, ignoring the double-take he gave her. I know, I don’t look like much beyond a bite for the Big Bad Wolf, she thought at him acidly as she settled back in the seat. Wouldn’t you be surprised to know that I’ve killed people—and that I could return you to the dust, too, if you gave me any trouble.

  She suppressed the thought, feeling ashamed. She’d lied when she’d said she wasn’t power mad. Of course she was—it was hard not to be when you had an ace ability. It was the dark side of her talent, and she had to struggle against that all the time, or she might become like that awful Astronomer, or poor Fortunato. She wondered briefly where he was now and if he remembered the way she did.

  They stopped at a red light and a ragged joker with enormous donkey ears threw himself halfway onto the hood to wash the windshield. Blocking out the sound of the cab driver’s yelling at him, she tried to compose herself for the inevitable confrontation with Hiram. She wasn’t supposed to have this address, and she wasn’t supposed to know whose address it was. Hiram might just fire her and throw her out without letting her get a word in edgewise, while Ezili stood behind him laughing.