Michael Connelly - Void Moon

Karch closed his left fist and held it out toward Cannon. He started manipulating the muscles and balling his fist as if he were pulverizing the coin supposedly held within it to dust. At the same time he moved his right hand in a flat circular motion above his closed left fist. He never took his eyes off his left hand.

"To powder it goes, where it ends up nobody knows."

He made the circle with his right hand wider and wider until suddenly he snapped his fingers and opened both hands, palms out to Cannon. The coin was gone. Cannon's eyes quickly moved from hand to hand, then a broad smile cracked across his face. It was the usual response. The trick was a double misdirection. The skeptical viewer believes the coin never left the right hand but is baffled when the coin shows up in neither hand.

"Fantastic!" Cannon cried. "Where'd it go?"

Karch shook his head.

"That's the problem with this one. You never know where that coin's going to turn up. That part I never got a handle on. I guess you can add two bits to what I owe you."

Cannon laughed loudly.

"You're cool, Jack. How'd you learn that one, your father?"

"Yeah."

"He still around?"

"Nah, he's gone. Long time ago."

"And he used to work the Strip, right?"

"Yeah, here and there. In the sixties. One week he opened for Joey Bishop, who opened for Sinatra at the Sands. I have pictures of the three of them."

"Cool! The Rat Pack. The good old days, huh?"

"Yeah, some of them were good."

Karch had a vision of seeing his father coming home from the hospital after the incident at Circus, Circus. Both hands bandaged white. It looked like he was holding two softballs. His eyes looked like they were staring at something far, far away.

Karch realized he had lost his smile and looked at Cannon.

"Anyway, I better hit the road and get on this thing. Thanks for the help, Don."

He offered his hand and Cannon took it.

"Anytime, Jack."

"I'll find my way out."

He turned toward the steps and started walking away. But then he stopped and leaned on the railing.

"What the…?"

He raised his left foot and worked the shoe off. Without even glancing at Cannon but knowing he was being watched, he looked inside the shoe and then shook it. Something rattled inside and he turned the shoe upside down, dropping the quarter he had planted earlier into his other hand. He held it up and looked at Cannon. The big man banged a fist on his console and started smiling and shaking his head.

"Son of a gun, I told you," Karch said. "Never know where the damn thing'll go."

He flipped the coin to Cannon, who caught it in his fist.

"I'm saving this one, Jack. It's fucking magic."

Karch saluted and headed down the steps and out of the tube room. He waited until he was out of the Flamingo and away from the view of Cannon's cameras before reaching into the breast pocket of his suit coat and removing the handkerchief and the quarter he had dropped into it while circling his hand during the trick.

He would get the dime out of his shoe later, when he had time to sit down.

NINETY minutes later Karch was standing outside the fenced employee lot of Hooten's Lighting amp; Supplies with a cell phone in his hand. Parked directly on the other side of the fence was the blue van that had been recorded driving out of the garage at the Flamingo about six hours earlier. Only now there was a license plate attached to the rear bumper. Karch was pacing a little bit, anxious as he waited for a call-back. The small tickle of an adrenaline rush was beginning to caress the back of his skull. He was getting close. To the money, to the woman. He cocked his head back and that seemed to accentuate the trilling up his spine and into his brain.

The phone rang and his thumb was already poised on the button.

"This is Karch."

"This is Ivy. I got it."

Ivy was a Metro detective named Iverson who ran plates for Karch for fifty bucks a shot. He'd do other things for other prices, using the power of his badge to generate two incomes. Karch was always circumspect about his requests, even on totally legitimate jobs. He had learned over the years to treat all Metro cops – and Iverson more than others – with the same caution and distance as the prostitutes, pawnbrokers and casino sharps he regularly dealt with on his cases.

Karch tilted his head and hooked the phone in the crook of his neck while he got out his notepad and pen.

"Okay, what've you got?"

"Plate comes back to a Jerome Zander Paltz, forty-seven years of age. Address is three-twelve Mission Street. That's North Las Vegas. I ran him on NCIC for you and he's got a clean ticket. I threw that in for free, by the way."

Karch had stopped writing after the last name. He knew Jerome Paltz. Or at least he was pretty sure he did. He knew a Jersey Paltz who worked behind the counter at Hooten's. He realized he had always thought the name Jersey referred to where Paltz had come from. He now realized it was apparently a play on his first and middle names.

"Hey, boss, you there?"

Karch came out of his thoughts on Jersey Paltz.

"Yeah. Hey, thanks, Ivy. This clears something up for me."

"Really? What?"

"Oh, just this thing I'm working on. It's a surveillance outside a construction site. The Venetian. This van's showed up a few times and I was kind of suspicious. But Paltz is on the list of vendors. He works for Hooten's L and S and they're putting in the cameras. So scratch that."

"What do they have over there, a theft problem?"

"Yeah, construction supplies mostly. This Paltz guy's van isn't marked so I thought I'd check it out."

"Back to square one, huh? Looking for a wheelbarrow thief."

Karch guessed Iverson was smiling on the other end of the line.

"You got it. But thanks, man. This'll save me some time."

"Catch you later."

Karch closed the phone and looked through the fence at the blue van while he tried to think about his next move. The trace coming back to Paltz put a curve on things.

Finally, he opened the phone again and called information and got the general number for Hooten's Lighting amp; Supplies. He called and asked for Jersey Paltz, who picked up after a half minute.

"Jerome Paltz?"

There was a pause.

"Yes, who is – "

"Jersey Paltz?"

"Who is this?"

"It's Jack Karch."

"Oh. What's with the Jerome? Nobody ever – "

"It is your name, right? Jerome Zander Paltz. That's where the Jersey comes from, right?"

"Well, yeah, but nobody ever – "

"I need you to come outside. Right away."

"What are you talking about?"

"I'm talking about you coming outside right away. I'm waiting for you. Come out through the employee lot. I'm parked on the shoulder. Right on the other side of the fence from your van."

"Tell me what's going on. I don't – "

"I'll tell you when you get here. Come out now. I can probably still help you but you've got to work with me and come out right now."

Karch closed the phone before Paltz could respond. He then walked over to his car and got in. It was a black Lincoln – a Towncar with the old styling and the big trunk. The windows were tinted an impenetrable black. He liked the car but the tank drained too quickly and he was often mistaken for a limo driver. He adjusted the rearview mirror so he could slouch in the driver's seat and keep an eye on the parking lot entrance thirty yards behind him. He opened his jacket and pulled the Sig Sauer nine out of his holster. He then reached under the seat and up into the springs, feeling around until his fingers closed on the silencer he had taped up there. He tore it loose, snapped it on to the end of the Sig and put the weapon down at his side between his seat and the car door.