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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Vendetta" data-source="post: 1749662" data-attributes="member: 14961">Somewhere between Lou's Diner and 5th street, Jack had managed to find a place open and willing to sell him a bottle of vodka.  He didn't remember paying for the breakfast, hell, he didn't even remember eating it.  He didn't know if it was the runny eggs and greasy, charred bacon or the finger of vodka he'd already managed to down that made his stomach rumble like a steam engine locomotive over a poorly made stretch of track.  People filled the streets as they went on their way to work, but as crowded as the sidewalk was, everyone gave Jack a wide berth.  After all, a man staggering down the street, talking to himself and carrying a bottle of spirits in the middle of Prohibition was definately someone to be avoided at all costs!Jack turned into an alley and forcibly discharged the contents of his stomach.  A second heave and he was finished.  Flopping to the dirty ground, Jack swilled a mouthfull of the booze around and spat it out, helping to remove the foul flavor therein.  His head hurt and somehow, sitting forward helped it feel slightly better.  His face was wet, he could feel that now. It was cool as the breeze came down the alley and rolled over his face.  He had been crying.  He didn't even realize it.  He leaned back against the wall again as he lifted the bottle up to his lips... but stopped just before taking a drink.  He looked at the bottle for a long, hard moment before throwing it against the brick wall opposite him.  Glass splashed over the alley and the aroma of liquor spread through the area.  Disgusted by the smell, Jack got to his feet and ran out of the alley.  He’d denied what had happened just over a year ago, denied it and buried it under a small pond of beer and wine… but some things couldn’t be buried or hidden.  What had happened was real, as real as anything he’d ever know or believed before.  And now it was happening again.  Someone else was dead.  Could he have prevented it?  Would it have been him had he tried?  He wished that it was.  But suddenly Jack knew that he couldn’t live with himself any more if he didn’t figure out just what the hell was going on in this town!  And if it killed him… all the better.A minute later, Jack Chance was making a bee line to Prospero House Publishing.  The trail was a year cold, but it was not gone… and he would find it again.</blockquote>

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