Lowball: A Wild Cards Novel (42 page)

Asmodeus sank the blade into Marcus’s tail. The pain of it threw him sideways. He couldn’t see anything but blood, no matter how he tried to wipe his eyes free. In a moment of sheer panic, he realized he might lose. Ignoring the man’s blade, Marcus grabbed blindly for him. He pulled him into an embrace, bashing his bloody head into Asmodeus’s face. He pushed him down and wound his tail round and around him. Asmodeus thrashed and yelled, but Marcus got his arms pinned. His coils slid around him. He let go of him with his arms and just coiled and coiled, squeezed and squeezed and squeezed.…

When Marcus awoke, he thought,
I killed a man. That can never be undone.
Was he changed by it? He wasn’t sure yet. He hadn’t meant to kill him. Not really. He wasn’t sure what he felt. In the arena everything was different. Outside the arena … well, it was getting harder to tell the difference. Even Father Squid had admitted as much. Thinking of the priest, a flush of shame warmed his face.

Olena sat on the edge of the bed. She was fully clothed, leaning forward with her head clutched in her hands. She must’ve sensed that he was awake. She didn’t turn, but she said, “Baba Yaga makes a promise to you.”

Reaching out, Marcus touched her back.

Olena snapped, “No! You can’t touch me.”

“Why?” Marcus sat up.

“Because of Asmodeus.”

“I took care of him. He doesn’t matter anymore.”

“He does matter. Baba Yaga is mad. You weren’t supposed to kill him.”

“He had a knife! He was going to kill me. Everyone saw that. I was…” Marcus tried to believe his own words, but it was hard to get them out. “… defending myself.”

“But you didn’t have permission. She didn’t say you could kill him. That made her mad. Oh, she was mad. You don’t even know.”

“So what? What do I care if she’s mad at me? She’s an old—”

Olena shot to her feet and turned to face him. “Stupid! She’s not just mad at you. She’s mad at me. She thinks I made you do it. I didn’t. I didn’t say to kill him!”

“Okay,” Marcus said, trying to soothe her. “I’ll tell her that. I’ll say it’s not your fault.”

“You don’t understand nothing. She was going to kill you, Marcus! I begged for your life. You don’t know how I begged. She didn’t listen to me, but the crowd—to them she listens. The crowd went crazy. They loved watching you kill. They want more. They’ll pay so much. So much. Enough that Baba Yaga thinks again. She thinks of something better than killing you. I tell you how it is. She made a promise to you, and told me to tell it. That’s why I’m here. To tell you.” Looking through a tangle of black hair, Olena looked miserable. And beautiful. Beautiful like nothing Marcus had ever seen before. “She said you have one more fight. She said…”

When she hesitated, Marcus slipped his body forward and grasped her arms, gently. “What did she say?”

She pulled away from him. She struggled to get the rest of the sentence out. “… it must be a fight to the death. ‘You and the other troublemaker,’ she said. ‘Why not put them against each other?’ She will make big money from it. High rollers coming in from Moscow. Billionaires from China. Vietnam. They want to watch a big death match. Is the only way for you to live. Is the only way for me to live. But, Marcus, if you fight, and win, she’ll let us both go. That’s what she said.”

Marcus didn’t hesitate in answering. The words just came straight from his heart to his mouth. And that was it. He was committed.

The Big Bleed

Part Seven

“DIVERSIFIED CONTENT.”

Going by her voice alone, the assistant was a young woman, no older than early twenties, filled with attitude. Or so it seemed to Jamal Norwood when he called Berman’s office.

Jamal identified himself. “I’d like to speak to Mr. Berman.”

“And you are?” There it was again! As if Jamal had interrupted her at curing cancer or, more likely, repairing her nail polish.

“Jamal Norwood, also known as Stuntman. Mr. Berman knows me.”

The assistant sighed, as if the effort of doing her very basic job was some kind of imposition. “Hold on.”

The waiting music turned out to be hundred-strings versions of past Berman television theme songs. Which suggested to Jamal that Diversified was more than just a vanity card, Berman, and an assistant—that it might be a real production company.

The former producer of
American Hero
had his office in the Brill Building on Forty-ninth and Broadway, just north of Times Square. The eleven-story structure had been home to various songwriters, Broadway impresarios, and jumped-up television producers for the past seventy years. Jamal’s
SCARE
research turned up a fifth-floor office number belonging to a Diversified Content, a name that was a perfect fit for Berman’s smarmy self-conceit.

A bit of shoe leather reconnaissance would have told Jamal whether or not it was a real operation—
DC
was listed as a company that had “under twenty” employees, which could mean nineteen, or one. One employee would be easy to deal with. A dozen or more and Jamal’s off-the-books operation would be outed.

He had considered an ambush interview at Berman’s Upper East Side condo, especially since getting that home address had been a greater challenge. (The condo was owned by another of the producer’s endless supply of personal service entities.)

But ambushes were tough to accomplish when you were in a hurry and your window of available time was narrow. Yes, you could stake out the man’s condo and catch him on his way to work, if you had that time—which Jamal didn’t.

The other option was to hit him coming home—but that could just as easily have been ten
P.M
. after a business dinner as seven.

He didn’t want to spend three or four hours lurking without payoff.

A quick cost-benefit analysis convinced Jamal to simply phone the man at Diversified. And here he was, on the speaker. “Jamal Fucking Norwood!”

Jamal wondered who else was in the office with him. “Do I have a new middle name?”

“That’s been your middle name since 2007,” he said, laughing. “To me.”

“Oh, good, I was afraid this was going to be contentious,” Jamal said.

“You knew it was dangerous when you called me,” Berman said. “What’s on your mind? Is this about your new gig? Gonna say good-bye to being a G-man?”

“What new gig?”

“I hear you’re top of Cinemax’s want list for
I Witness
.”

Jamal was momentarily stunned to silence. It wasn’t impossible that Berman would know about the script—scripts floated around Hollywood like dandelion puffballs. But even Jamal didn’t know that the project had been set up at Cinemax … which made it slightly more attractive as an alternative to
SCARE
. Assuming Jamal was ever strong enough to be Stuntman again. “No,” he said, hoping his voice projected more confidence than he felt, “I’m still working for the national interest.”

“Schmuck. What’s on your mind?”

“I need to ask you some questions. About an investigation.”

Suddenly Berman was off speakerphone. “Did I miss your transfer to the
IRS
?”

“Would it speed things up if I said this was an audit?”

“Not a chance. You’d have to get in line for that.” Jamal heard thumping on a desktop—Berman obviously turning the phone or re-arranging some item. “If it’s not my money, it’s what?”

“There are some
DVD
s floating around that are going to cause someone to go to jail. And they all tie back to
American Hero
.”

Jamal had the satisfaction of shutting Berman up for an entire ten seconds. “Well, then, it obviously behooves me to share what I know with law enforcement. When do you want to talk?”

“Let’s start with right now.”

“Let’s revise that to two hours from now, my place.”

“Okay.” Berman rattled off an address that matched what Jamal had discovered.

Then, without a good-bye or even a parting shot, Berman was off the phone.

Which was good. Jamal needed to lie down for an hour. Of course, what he really needed was a shower to remove the taint of a conversation with Michael Berman.

The moment Jamal emerged from the cab at Berman’s building, he was forced to make a further adjustment in his evaluation of the man’s current success.

Berman’s condo was in a building at 675 Madison Avenue, near Sixty-second a block east of Central Park. The building looked like an expensive hotel, the effect enhanced by its ground-floor tenant, a high-end English lingerie store. Jamal could easily picture Berman stopping on his way into or out of the building, window-shopping the models … possibly telephoning their agents while he smudged the window with his nose.

Jamal found the entrance, which was discreetly tucked to one side, and a doorman who granted him access to the elevators.

On this May evening, Michael Berman, creator and executive producer of
American Hero,
former
CBS
vice president of reality programming, current asshole for life, was still on the south side of forty—which, to Jamal Norwood, seemed impossible. He was one of those creatures that grew like mushrooms in Hollywood. More clever than smart, greedy to the point of idiocy, entirely lacking in moral standards, over-sexed, operating on the principle that what was theirs was theirs, what was yours was negotiable, possessing only a single useful skill … the ability to give an audience the things it wants.

Things that are bad for it. Empty calories. Heroin.

He opened the ornate door, and showed that the years had not been kind. True, he was wearing his Berman casual uniform of pressed jeans and tailored white dress shirt unbuttoned a button too far. But he had gained weight: his paunch strained the lower third of the shirt. And he had lost what little hair he had possessed in
American Hero
days. Then Berman had rarely been seen without a baseball cap.

“Boy,” he said by way of greeting, “and I thought I looked like shit.” Jamal knew that he had gained weight, too—thank you, hotel and restaurant food. And while there was no hair loss, he was moving slowly and looking sickly.

But then, strangely, Berman offered Jamal a hug.

“Checking for weapons?” Jamal said.

“Come on, man, we’re foxhole buddies.”

“From opposing armies.”

Berman pointed an index finger at Jamal—his way of saying,
good one
. He indicated that Jamal should take a seat in the beautifully furnished living room, all white floors and rug, glass and white furnishings. “Something to drink or eat?”

“No thanks. On duty.”

“That’s it, remind me that I’m in a world of trouble.”

“Since when do you need a reminder?”

Another finger, as Berman yelled, too loudly for the space, “Mollie, darling!”

Not unexpectedly, Berman wasn’t alone.

“This is Mollie Steunenberg. Mollie, Jamal Norwood, the Stuntman. He’s also an agent of
SCARE
, so be careful what you tell him.”

Mollie offered her hand. She was a plump little redhead, maybe a year past twenty, wearing heels that were higher than absolutely necessary and a greenish summery dress that was so short as to be unappealing to anyone this side of a recent parolee. Someone had probably told Mollie that redheads should wear green.
Not that green, young lady
.