“Yes. Maybe. That’s why I’m here.”

“Because of your brother?” He thought about it. “I can’t see how. Oh, wait.” He stopped and said something that made Myron’s blood chill. “Yes. I guess, even after all these years, it could have led back to your brother.”

“How?”

Lex shook his head. “My Suzze . . .”

“Please, Lex, tell me what you told her.”

More sobbing. More shaking of his head. Myron had to move him along.

“Suzze was in love with Gabriel Wire, wasn’t she?”

Lex sniffled some more, wiped his nose with his shirt sleeve. “How did you know?”

“The tattoo.”

He nodded. “Suzze drew that, you know.”

“I know.”

“It was Hebrew and Gallic letters combined into a love sonnet. Suzze was so artistic.”

“So they were lovers?”

He frowned now. “She thought that I didn’t know. That was her secret. She loved him.” Lex’s voice turned bitter. “Everyone loves Gabriel Wire. Do you know how old Suzze was when she started up with him?”

“Sixteen,” Myron said.

Lex nodded. “Wire always liked to seduce the young ones. Not prepubescent. He wasn’t into that. Just young. So he let Suzze and Kitty and some of the other tennis girls party with us. The famous with the famous. Rock star with tennis starlet. A match made in celebrity heaven. Me, I never paid much attention to them. Enough girls around so that you didn’t need someone illegal, you know what I mean?”

“I do,” Myron said. “I found a photograph from the Live Wire shoot. Gabriel had the same tattoo as Suzze.”

“That?” Lex snickered. “It was temporary. He just wanted a famous notch on his belt. Suzze was so smitten with him she stuck by him even after he killed Alista Snow.”

Whoa.

“Hold up,” Myron said. “Did you just say Gabriel killed Alista Snow?”

“You didn’t know? Of course. Got her doped up on roofies. But he didn’t give her enough, dumb bastard. He raped her and then she totally freaked out. Said she was going to tell. In Wire’s defense—and no, it’s not a defense—he was stoned out of his mind too. He pushed her off the balcony. It’s all on videotape.”

“How?”

“The room had a security camera.”

“Who has the videotape now?”

He shook his head. “I can’t tell you that.”

But Myron already knew, so he just said it: “Herman Ache.”

Lex didn’t respond. He didn’t have to. It added up, of course. It was pretty much just what Myron had thought.

“We both owed Ache big,” Lex said. “Mostly Gabriel—but he used HorsePower as collateral. He had one of his men with us all the time. To protect his investment.”

“And that’s why Evan Crisp is still here?”

Lex actually shuddered at the mention of his name.