Ace In The Hole

11:00 P.M.

The day had been a total washout. Spector sprawled on the bed, two pillows propping him up. He had the TV remote control in one hand and a bottle of whiskey in the other. It was his bedtime ritual, and helped him feel less out of place.

He wasn't going to get to Hartmann in this building, not unless he was lucky beyond belief. And he'd used up his luck in getting this far. He didn't have access to the areas of the hotel that Hartmann would be in, except during press conferences. And he'd noticed that politicians rarely looked you in the eye unless you asked them a question. He wasn't dumb enough to draw that kind of attention to himself.

He sipped at his drink and played channel roulette. Atlanta had gotten pounded again, this time by the Cardinals. The news was full of political bullshit, of course. Was Hartmann porking this stupid reporter bitch? Did Leo Barnett really think God spoke to him? Spector wished he'd gotten contracts to kill them all. Politicians were mostly people who'd had too little morals and ethics to stay lawyers.

He'd eventually settled on an old movie. It was a period piece, set in France during the revolution. There was a guy in it who talked like Odie Cologne from the King Leonardo cartoons. Spector thought the actor had a double role, but hadn't been paying close enough attention to be sure. None of the colors looked like anything that occurred in nature. Just pastels that blurred and bled into each other anytime someone moved. Ted Turner's movies looked about as good as his baseball team.

It had been weird running into Tony, even weirder finding out that he was a honcho for Hartmann. Tony was a good guy and Spector liked him, but he'd always been something of a bleeding heart.

The actor was in deep shit now, headed for the guillotine. He didn't seem particularly upset about it. Spector would have gone kicking and screaming. He knew what it was like to die.

He could use Tony to get at Hartmann, if there was no other way. Spector had always prided himself on the fact that he never fucked over his friends. He'd never had many, so it wasn't that hard to do. But the job came first.

The actor had just sent a little blonde number up to the big blade with a kiss and now it was his turn. "It's a far, far better thing I do, than I have ever done before. It's a far, far better rest I go to, than I have ever known." The actor stood before the guillotine, noble, unafraid. Naturally, the camera pans up so nobody can see his head flop into the basket.

"What a fucking sap," Spector said, as he zapped the TV off. He downed another slug of whiskey and turned off the lights.