Vegas Knights (32 page)
Authors: Matt Forbeck
I winced. "Please don't tell me you're a talking zombie too."
Siegel snorted. "Hardly. I faked my death back then. I made a few bad deals – trusted the wrong people a little too much – and I knew Lansky would send some of his boys around to take care of me.
"It wasn't anything personal. Meyer had already stood up for me for as long as he could. Years, it seemed like. It was either take me out or deal with an all-out war in his ranks.
"Houdini offered me the chance for a new start with him, and I took him up on it. He helped make my substitute so convincing, the poor guy. I've been working for Harry ever since."
I didn't know too much more about Bugsy Siegel than I'd seen in the movie
Bugsy
, which Dad had watched with me more than once. I suspected now that he'd been researching the man and taking me along for the ride. He was a charmer – and a sociopathic killer. That fit Gaviota to a T.
Bugsy
, which Dad had watched with me more than once. I suspected now that he'd been researching the man and taking me along for the ride. He was a charmer – and a sociopathic killer. That fit Gaviota to a T.
"Are we here for a social visit or to play cards?" I tried not to show that I was impressed at all. I figured Siegel had revealed his true identity to rattle me. If that was so, my best chance to shake him was to pretend I didn't give a damn about him at all.
Powi made a great show of counting all the cards in the deck and then shuffling the cards several times. As she did, she kicked me in the leg again. I knew she was mad at me, but I figure that this had to be about more than just that. She wasn't the sort to act petty in the middle of something as serious as this.
I felt around with my shoe and realized that there was something on the floor under the table in front of me. I slipped off my shoe and sock and felt around with my toes. I found two playing cards sitting there.
Powi must have dropped them when she'd spilled the deck earlier. I'd watched her count the cards earlier, and unless she was a lot slicker with card tricks than I suspected, she had found all fifty-two of them.
Then I remembered that there were two other playing cards in any Poker deck, ones that didn't get used in most games, especially in Vegas: the Jokers.
I picked the two cards up with my toes and guided them into my lap. I figured I'd stuff them into one of my shirt sleeves when Siegel wasn't looking. For that, I might need a distraction, but I suspected that Powi would be willing to provide one for me when I needed it.
"We going to cut for the deal?" I asked.
Siegel snorted at me. "Like it matters in a game like this? You can have it."
Powi made two stacks of chips from the tray in front of her. She gave us each ten of the yellow chips worth a thousand dollars each. Then Powi dealt two hole cards to each of us.
Instead of worrying about what my hole cards might be, I focused on the two in my sleeve. I turned them into a pair of Knights, both red – the Suicide King and the Man with the Axe.
Siegel didn't bother to look at his hole cards, but I peeled mine back out of sheer habit. A pair of Jacks – the one-eyed ones: Hearts and Spades – stared back at me.
In a regular game of Hold 'Em, I'd have been thrilled to find a couple of Knaves looking after me from the hole. In Mojo Poker, though, I knew they weren't likely to last long.
Since I had the deal, I tossed a single chip into the center of the table as the little blind. Siegel threw in two for the big blind. Since it was before the flop, it was my bet.
I shoved everything I had into the middle of the table. "All in," I said.
Siegel responded in kind, shoving his chips in without saying a word.
"None of that card-erasing bullshit," Siegel said. Now that the chips were down, he dropped his casual demeanor and let his naked determination show. "Mr Weiss plugged that loophole as soon as you found it."
"Do I need to consult the rulebook on that?"
"Take my word for it."
"All right."
Powi dealt the flop. I concentrated on making the cards come up the way I wanted them to. I figured Siegel would try to shove through on all three cards, so I let him have the first one and focused my efforts on the last two.
They came up the Aces of Hearts, Diamonds, and Clubs. From that, I knew that Siegel was going for the same kind of hand that I wanted him to think I was shooting for: four Aces.
I left my two Jacks unguarded. Let Siegel play with them as much as he liked. I just needed to get one of the next two cards to show up the way I wanted.
The turn came up the King of Clubs.
Siegel stared at the card and then at me, both concerned and confused. This was not what he had expected.
I focused on the river, and it popped up as the King of Spades. That left a Full House on the table, Aces full of Kings. Normally that would be tough to beat, and we'd probably have to split the pot. Not in this game though.
"Ready for the showdown?" Powi asked.
Siegel and I both nodded as we picked up our cards. Powi gave him a vicious smile, and while he leered at her, I pulled the cards out of my sleeve and swept the other two into my lap.
I winked at Powi with my right eye, the one that Siegel couldn't see.
She pointed at both of us. "Three. Two. One."
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
On the unspoken beat for "Zero," Siegel and I flipped our cards. While he was looking at my pair of Kings, I reached out with my mind and altered the cards on the table.
"Too bad, kid," he said. "Four Kings aren't going to cut it tonight." He reached out to shake my hand. "It's going to be good to have you in the Cabal."
"Hold on a second," I said. "Don't you need to show me your hand first?"
"Sure thing, kid." He turned over his Aces. "Read 'em and weep."
"But that only gets you a Full House," I said. "Looks like you need to show me the way upstairs."
"What?" He looked at the common cards. Instead of the two Kings and three Aces he'd been expecting, he saw two Kings and three Jacks.
He stood up and stared down at the cards again. "That's not possible," he said. "Those were Aces."
"Maybe you need to get your eyes checked," I said. "How old are you again, Bugsy?"
"Don't call me that." A menacing sneer grew on his face. "Nobody calls me that. Everyone who ever called me that is dead."
"Don't call you what? Bugsy?" I put the smuggest grin I had on my face. "All right. How about 'Loser' instead?"
"Look here, you little punk." His eyes blazed as he loomed over me. He punctuated every beat of his words by stabbing a finger down at me. "I don't care who your dad is or how bad your mojo might be. No one talks to me that way. One more word out of your cheating lips, and I'll stop your heart in your chest."
I put my feet up on the table between us, cocked my head to one side, and said, with perfect enunciation, "Loser."
Siegel grabbed my feet and tipped me and my chair over onto my back. I scrambled away, sure he might try to kick me while I was down.
"Fine!" he said. "The game is yours. You win. But you'll never be able to collect because you'll be dead!"
As he surged toward me, Powi unloaded her pistol into him.
I'd distracted Siegel too much for him to have time to make the bullets disappear. They knocked him sideways as they tore through him, ripping holes in his lungs, neck, and heart.
He hit the ground like a slab of meat, the blood pouring out of him. I got to my feet and stared down at him. His eyes were open and rolled back into his head, and the pool of crimson in which he lay kept growing. If he wasn't dead, he was doing a fantastic job of faking it.
Powi made a choking sound and dropped the pistol on the table. It landed on top of the chips and sent them scattering. I came around to her and saw that her hands were still shaking.
"Thank you," I said.
"I've never killed anyone before."
She shuddered, and I put my arm around her. "Me neither."
"He deserved it." Her voice started out soft and kept rising as she spoke. "I mean, if anyone had a violent death coming to them, it was him. I just– I just–"
I hugged her. "It's all right. You're right. He would have killed me."
"You provoked him."
"He would never have let us upstairs to stop Houdini. We had to get past him."
She opened her mouth to say something, then shut it and hugged me back. We let each other go, and she walked around the table to kneel down next to him. "I'm sorry," she said. She reached out and closed his eyes.
I reached into his pockets and turned them inside out. They were empty. I tried the pockets of his jacket. Nothing.
"This can't be," I said.
"Don't tell me we killed him for nothing," Powi said. She put her hand over her mouth.
I stared at the dead man. This made no sense. A man like Siegel wouldn't walk around without anything on him. I'd expected a wad of cash and maybe even a gun to go along with the key card.
"You think he kept all his things with Misha?" I asked.
"I saw him curled up at the far end of the bar," Powi said. She got up to go check on the man.
I stared down at Siegel and realized what I'd been missing. I slipped his Rolex off his wrist and turned the band inside out. A pocket appeared inside of it.
"Don't worry about it," I called to Powi. "I found it."
I turned the pocket over on the table, but nothing happened. Wherever the space on the other side of the watchband actually was, it respected its local gravity.
I peered inside the pocket and spotted a tin of breath mints, a switchblade, an automatic pistol – identical to the one I'd taken from Siegel before – a couple boxes of ammunition, a huge roll of hundred-dollar bills, and a keycard.
I grabbed the keycard and handed it to Powi, along with the gun. I took the ammunition and used it to reload my pistol, which only had a single bullet left, the one already in the chamber. Then I twisted the watchband back and slid it onto my wrist.
"Let's go," I said.
"What about Bill?"
I looked over at my friend, who was still curled up in agony in the shopping cart. "He's safer down here for now. We'll come back for him after we stop Houdini."
"I like your confidence, Jackson." She shook her head. "I just wished I shared it."
We strode to the elevator and removed the table that had been blocking its door. I waved the keycard over the authorization spot and pressed the button for the penthouse. The doors closed, and the elevator started on its way up.
Houdini's home looked much like it had the night before. The only real difference was that someone had cleared off his desk. Without the computer or papers on it, it now looked like an altar.
Houdini and my father sat on top of the altar, each in the lotus position, meditating. Their eyes opened as we walked into the ballroom-sized living room.
"Welcome," Houdini said. "I've been wondering where you might be. I had thought Mr Gaviota would be with you."
"He's been detained," I said. "Permanently."
Houdini nodded, impressed, as he unfolded himself and hopped down off the altar. "Well done," he said. "I didn't think you two had that in you."
"Get out of here, Jackson," Dad said. "You shouldn't be here."
"How about you, Dad?" I said. "You're actually helping bring about Armageddon?"
He remained on the altar, unmoved. "Don't be melodramatic. You know why I'm here."
"I don't think Mom would appreciate what you're doing in her name."
"If this all works out, we can ask her ourselves in a few minutes."
"What?" I said to Houdini. "You haven't already taken care of this? I figured I'd come up here, and you'd pull a
Watchmen
on me."
Watchmen
on me."
He gave me a blank look of mild amusement.
"You know," I said. "'Do you seriously think I'd explain my master-stroke if there remained the slightest chance of you affecting its outcome?' No?"
Houdini shook his head at me as if I were a sweet but slow child. "There's no chance of anyone stopping me at this point," he said. "I have been preparing for this moment for years – decades, even. We only needed one more element to fall into place: the sacrifice."
I didn't like the sound of that at all. "So what are you planning to sacrifice? A virgin?"
"Why?" Houdini raised any eyebrow. "Are there any here?"
Powi shuddered. "That's just wrong."
Houdini smiled. "Actually for this part of the ritual, I need something a bit rarer than a virgin in Las Vegas. I need an extremely powerful magician."
"Draining the powers from your entire Cabal wasn't enough?"
Houdini snorted. "They are fine people, good and loyal servants, but they barely have enough magic among them to pull off a good illusion, much less break down the barrier between life and death. No, for that I need someone with far more raw power."
I did not like where this was heading.
"I think Gaviota – I mean, Bugsy – is still breathing. We can bring him right up for you."
Houdini shrugged. "To be honest, he was my backup plan. In a worst-case situation, I might have decided to sacrifice your father to the cause instead. Now that you're here, though, I won't have to go so far."
"Harry, wait." Dad looked like someone had just kicked him in the stomach.
I took a step back. "What the hell are you talking about? I'm about as below-average a magician as you'll ever find."
Houdini smirked. "How ironic that you honestly feel that way. That you've been taken in by all the others, seduced by your damaged sense of self-worth into thinking that anything you can do anyone can do better."
He shook his head and smiled. "Honestly, I've rarely seen such a powerful magician in all my many years in this world."
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