Dead Man s Hand Page 0,2

at peace with himself and the world at the beginning of another beautiful day.

After his third knock went unanswered, Jay stepped inside the Crystal Palace.

The door wasn't locked. That surprised him. Chrysalis had been expecting him,yes, but she'd also been expecting trouble. Otherwise why bother to hire a bodyguard? When you're expecting trouble, you're supposed to lock your doors. Jay poked his head into the darkened taproom. "Anyone home?" he called softly. "Chrysalis? Elmo?"

There was no answer. "Real good," he muttered under his breath. No wonder she needed a bodyguard. He considered turning on the lights, thought better of it, waited for his eyes to adjust. Slowly the outlines of the familiar room began to emerge from the gloom. Straight-back chairs upended on small round tables. The bar along one wall, rows of bottles stacked behind it against a long silver mirror. Booths across the way. And way in back, set off a little from the rest, the antique table in the private alcove where Chrysalis herself held court and sipped her amaretto.

For a moment, in the morning half-light, Jay thought he saw her sitting there, cloaked in shadow, slim ivory cigarette holder held lightly between skeletal fingers, smoke coiling lazily through the clear flesh of her throat as she tossed back her head to smile. "Chrysalis?" he said, walking slowly across the taproom. But her chair was empty when he reached it.

A strange chill went through him.

That was the moment when Jay Ackroyd knew.

He stood quietly beside the table, listening, remembering what he knew of the Crystal Palace. Chrysalis lived on the third floor, her chambers crowded with expensive Victoriana.

Elmo, her dwarf bouncer, lived on the second floor. So did Sascha, the eyeless telepath who tended bar for her. All the public rooms were on the first floor. So was her office. Jay decided to start there.

The office was in the back of the building under the stairs. It had a wooden door, ornately carved, with a crystal doorknob. Jay took a rumpled handkerchief out of his pocket and turned the knob carefully with two fingers. The door swung open.

The room was windowless and black, but Jay didn't need eyes to know what he'd find inside. Death has a smell all its own. The hard coppery scent of blood, the sweaty stench of fear, the stink of shit. He'd smelled it before. The familiar miasma was there, waiting for him, and under it all was her perfume.

"Goddamn you," Jay said quietly to no one in particular. He reached over, handkerchief still in hand, and found the light switch.

Once, this room had had charm. Polished hardwood floors, a gorgeous Oriental rug, floor-to-ceiling bookcases full of leather-bound first editions, a solid oak desk older than he was, big leather armchairs that looked as though they might have come from the world's oldest men's club.

The chairs were shattered, wooden legs cracked and splintered, soft leather upholstery ripped and torn. Three of the high wooden bookcases had been toppled; one had been snapped in two. Splinters as long and pale as knives sprang from where the two halves clung together. Books were scattered everywhere.

Chrysalis lay sprawled on her back across the shattered remains of an armchair, the leather cushions and broken legs a jumble beneath her. The huge oak desk had been tipped over across the upper part of her body, hiding her face. She'd been wearing blue jeans and a plain white blouse. The front of the blouse was spattered with tiny droplets of blood. Her left leg bent the wrong way at the knee, and a jagged red piece of shinbone poked through the denim. Jay squatted by her left hand. He could see her finger bones through the ghostly outlines of tendons and the smooth, clear skin. All five fingers were shattered, the ring finger in two places; her crystalline flesh was suffused with the rosy glow of burst capillaries. Jay took her broken fingers in his own. A faint warmth still clung to her body, but she was cooling even as he held her.

After a moment, he released her hand and tried to lift the desk off her. It was heavy. He grimaced, shoved harder, and righted it with a grunt. Only when the desk was back against the wall did he look back down at Chrysalis.

Her face was gone.

Her skull hadn't been crushed as much it had been obliterated. The back cushion of her chair was sticky with dried blood. Bits of mashed brain oozed out between fragments