At first, their strategy doesn’t seem to be working. We maintain something like equality among the three of us. We’ve already established that this will be the way forward, at least until one of the Southern generals goes out altogether.
But slowly, Raj manages to get into Wallace’s head. Wallace doesn’t outwardly seem to believe Raj’s constant insinuating palaver, but Raj does have a point: only one of us can win, and I have managed to maneuver myself into being indispensable to the North’s cause. I try to keep our fragile alliance together, but Raj’s only shot is turning one or more of us on the other side into copperheads, giving the South a chance to recover.
It is well after midnight before we start to enter the last stage of the game, where captured soldiers become five times more valuable and where it costs twice as much to keep armies in the field.
“You know,” Raj says to me, grinning across the table, “I’m glad you were able to join us for a game today, but I have to say: Kimberly Drummond, you look like shit. What’s the deal? It actually feels kinda bad to play a game against you for money with you looking like this. Are you dying of cancer or addicted to meth now or something?”
“I guess I’m not feeling great”—I cast him a sharp glare—“and not looking great, as a result of my dad dying and somebody murdering my brother.”
“Whoa,” says The Kid. “Didn’t know he was murdered. Just thought it was an elevator accident?”
“No, it might be murder,” I say. “The whole thing is very complicated.”
“Is that why you have these security goons?” asks Raj. He looks at Mel and Ed blankly and then grins. “No offense, of course. Though I’m sure people have called you goons much worse.”
Raj turns his attention back to me. “Did you know that only fifty percent of homicides are ever solved in the United States? That’s a pretty good rate for murderers. Way better than most countries. If you kill somebody here, you have an even chance of getting away with it.”
“Hey, man,” says Isabel. “Low blow.”
“It’s fine,” I say. “I can take his charm.”
And it’s true. I am immune to him strategically. But when I excuse myself to use the bathroom, I find myself looking up Raj’s statistics. It turns out he isn’t lying. New York City has a much higher clearance rate than most big cities, but it certainly isn’t anywhere close to where I thought it would be. They always figure out who did it on TV. It’s actually suddenly insane to me how easy it is to get away with murder. Then I think about the cops on our case, the Midtown tunnel and elevator detectives, and it all seems like a sick joke.
“Whoever is doing this is going to get away with it,” I mutter to myself. “They are going to keep getting away with it until there’s only one of us left.”
I start thinking about Henley and Ben and the girls. I wish Henley were here with me, giving me shit while slowly getting wasted. I wish Ben were here with me, bored with Henley’s stories, waiting for me to finish up so that he could take me home and pound his frustration out in my ass like a good, patient little lad. Guaranteed he’s not getting that kind of action anywhere else these days. And in this moment, I can’t help but miss it. I might even miss Ben.
I choke on my own sobs.
When I stumble out of the bathroom, I am not ready to give up, but I am ready to get good and drunk.
“Somebody pour me a damn drink,” I say. Mel obliges, fixing me a bourbon from the sideboard and putting it in my flexing hand as I hunker over the board.
“And keep them coming, alright?” I tell him, scowling. “What am I even paying you for? What is the point of having bodyguards if you can’t get totally wasted and let them carry you home?”
Time passes in a blur. Night turns into morning. It is close to dawn before we finish the game, after several long breaks for food where we spend the whole time arguing about the state of the board. Mel and Ed went from sort of interested to so deeply bored that they are taking turns standing guard while the other sneaks a nap in the gaming library.
At some point, I pass out. I feel myself lifted up by big hands, and I throw up down somebody’s big strong back. I’m pissed that they don’t even care that I’ve ruined their clothes.
“Don’t you have any dignity?” I shout. “I am a monster! Defend yourself!”
“You aren’t a monster, ma’am,” says Mel or Ed. “You are just very drunk. We’re happy to help you out. You made us very rich tonight.”
“I did?” I say.
“We bet on you to win,” says Ed or Mel, chuckling. “Like you told us to. And you won.”
“I did?”
“You don’t remember? Everyone was very upset.”
“Fuck them,” I say. “Fuck Henley. Fuck Bernard. Fuck Gabriella. Fuck Raj.”
“Here we are, ma’am, your bed,” says Mel or Ed. We’re in my bedroom at Nylo Corporation. I have no idea how we got here. My room swims out in front of me and then everything goes black. It is the first oblivion I have tasted in far too long.
I dream of my childhood home, of the White Room, covered in blood. My mother is there, grinning at me, dressed all in white, but drenched in red. I look down at my hands. They are alabaster, lacking all my normal blue veins and tan freckles. They are too white, except where they are also smeared with blood.
I wake up in stages, struggling for consciousness half-heartedly, eventually falling from an exhausted state of panic into something like restful annihilation. I forget why I should be awake and instead luxuriate in
