by James Swain
A few minutes later, Billy came through the front doors, his right hand cupped by his side. Frank approached in his rumpled suit and two-day-old beard. Smelling a cop, Billy tried to run. Frank drew his sidearm and took dead aim at the young hustler.
“Don’t tempt me,” he said.
The Hard Rock’s entrance was distinguished by a giant neon electric guitar balanced atop a rectangular concrete awning. Drawing his right hand back, Billy made a heaving motion at the awning. The bottom dropped out of Frank’s stomach. He grabbed Billy’s arm and shook open his hand. The gaffed dice were gone and so was Frank’s case.
Frank went on tilt. He ordered Billy to drop to his knees and stick his arms behind his back. He handcuffed Billy, squeezing the cuffs so tightly that they cut off the circulation in Billy’s hands. Then he smacked Billy in the face.
“You’re going down once I get those dice back,” Frank said.
“What dice?” Billy replied.
“The gaffed dice you just threw onto the awning. I’m onto your scam.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about, mister.”
Deny, deny, deny—that was the hustler’s refrain. A blue platoon of security burst through the front doors and circled the two men. Traffic coming into the casino ground to a halt, causing a line of yellow cabs waiting to drop off fares to back up to Paradise Road and down Harmon. Frank was in deep shit now. He wasn’t supposed to get in the way of casinos making money. But at that point, Frank didn’t care. He hated Billy, hated his lavish lifestyle, his sleek Italian sports car, and most of all, the harem of women Billy had at his disposal. Frank was going to nail this little candy-ass hustler if it was the last thing he did.
A metal ladder was produced, and Frank tried to climb atop the awning. It wasn’t tall enough, and Frank could not get up without fear of falling. By now, the Hard Rock’s general manager was begging Frank to reconsider. Couldn’t Frank see the casino was losing money? Frank told the GM to get lost and summoned Las Vegas Fire and Rescue to bring a fire truck with a retractable ladder to the casino.
While Frank waited for the fire truck, a KLAS news van appeared. Local TV news crews weren’t allowed inside the casinos and were forced to slum around town, looking for stabbings, shootings, and other mayhem suitable for the evening news. The front entrance to the Hard Rock was fair game, and a female reporter stuck a mike in Billy’s face.
“Care to make a statement?” the reporter asked.
“They grabbed the wrong guy. I didn’t do anything,” Billy declared.
By now, Frank was sweating bullets. If he didn’t find the gaffed dice, his long-overdue promotion would disappear, and he’d be stuck pounding the pavement. He got on the horn and asked for a team of agents to help search for the missing dice.
The fire truck was wailing as it pulled into the Hard Rock. A team of gaming agents arrived, including Frank’s boss, a hard-ass named Tricaricco. Under Frank’s direction, the fire truck’s ladder was stretched onto the awning, and the gaming agents scampered up the ladder. Frank was the last to go. He was afraid of heights and kept gazing down at the pavement. He spotted Billy staring up at him, his boyish face curled in a shit-eating grin.
It was at that moment that Frank knew he was fucked.
“Fucked how?” Mags asked.
She continued to kneel by Frank’s chair. She could not imagine how Billy had gotten out of this jam, and she gave Frank’s arm a tug.
“Come on, tell me.”
Frank’s glass was empty. He belched into space, consumed by the memory. “We looked everywhere on that awning for those fucking dice. It was so hot, the soles of our feet got burned. We couldn’t find them.”
“Did they skip over the other side?”
“That’s what I thought at first. We climbed down the ladder and scoured the bushes where the dice would have fallen. The branches were sharp and cut our hands and arms. The dice were nowhere—it was as if they’d vanished. My review was coming up, and I knew this was going to sink me. Ten years busting my ass down the drain.”
She pretended to be sympathetic, only she wasn’t sympathetic at all. She didn’t give a rat’s ass about Frank’s promotion or how bad he’d looked in front of his boss. What she cared about was how on earth Billy had managed to weasel his way out of this.
“What happened to the dice? They didn’t just disappear.”
“They got flushed down a toilet inside the casino.”
“What?”
He found the strength to meet her gaze. “The Hard Rock’s surveillance director broke the news to me. He said the tapes showed Billy passing off the gaffed dice to one of his bimbos before coming outside. She ran to the bathroom and flushed them away.”
“So what did Billy throw on the awning?”
“Nothing. His hand was empty.”
“He faked you out?”
“Yeah, and I fell for it. We had to let him go.”
It was as delicious a cross as Mags had ever heard, and a tiny laugh escaped her lips. Her mother had warned her never to laugh in a man’s face. The difference between men and women, her mother had claimed, was that men were afraid of women laughing at them, while women were afraid of men killing them. Somehow, she’d forgotten her mother’s sage advice.
Frank’s hand slapped her face. The next thing Mags knew, she was lying on her back, watching the room spin like a pinwheel. Frank threw on his rumpled clothes and grabbed his wallet and keys off the bureau. Standing over her, he spoke in a dead, emotionless tone.
“Don’t ever laugh at me again.”
“Sorry,” she whispered.
“You okay?”
“I’ll live.”
“That’s my girl. I’ll pick you up tomorrow at noon.”
“Okay.”
“Mad at me?”
“I’ll get over it.”
“Good answer.”
The door slammed, and Mags listened to his footsteps tread down the hall to the elevators. Only when she was certain he was gone did she pull herself off the floor.
She sat on the edge of the bed. She was seeing double, and she tried to will it to stop. It seemed a perfect metaphor for the two worlds she was living in. She’d gotten herself into this mess, and she was the only one who could get herself out.
The room returned to normal. She went to the slider on wobbly legs and pressed her face to the glass. The Strip’s neon bathed her in false colors, and she forced herself not to cry.
TWENTY-SEVEN
At midnight, Billy scratched the podiatrists off his list of groups the Gypsies might be using as cover. Wearing a waiter’s uniform and balancing a tray on his palm, he’d been canvassing a banquet room where the foot doctors were having dinner. Older, bespectacled, with big marriage bellies and soft hands, they wore suits that only saw the light of day a few times a year, and sat at round tables drinking decaf and discussing such scintillating topics as foot fungus, ingrown toe nails, and plantar fasciitis. Nearly all had spouses, an equally unexciting group of half-asleep women with stiff heads of beauty-parlor hair. None appeared in any great hurry to visit the casino, or take advantage of the other pleasurable pursuits Galaxy had to offer, and he couldn’t imagine any of them being a member of the Gypsy clan. Too dull, too old, and too heavy. The Gypsies had started out as shoplifters, meaning they were fleet of foot and as lean as circus acrobats. Not a single person in the banquet room fit that description.
As he took a final swing through the room, his brand new Droid hummed in his pocket. Caller ID was local but unfamiliar. He walked over to a dessert table with a melting ice sculpture and took the call.
“Billy, it’s me,” Ly said. “I’m in trouble.”
“What’s wrong? What’s that noise in the background?”
“I got busted for cheating at the casino tonight. I only got one phone call, so I call you.”
“Don’t get mad. Not my fault.”
“How can it not be your fault?”
“Because I don’t do nothing wrong. Come bail me out.”
She made it sound like an order. And maybe it was; if he didn’t bail her out, she might get pissed and spill her guts about their little enterprise to the cops. He couldn’t take that risk and decided he’d better spring her out of jail.
“I’ll get there as soon as I can,” he said.
“Hurry. This place scary,” she said.
He put the phone away. A podiatrist at a nearby table with his wildly drunk wife was trying to get his attention. He was done playing waiter and flipped the podiatrist the bird.
He came out of the banquet hall tugging off his waiter’s jacket. Ike and T-Bird hadn’t strayed far, and waited in the hall. Trying to slip away was out of the question, and he said, “Interested in making a quick five grand?”
Money made the world go round. They decided they wanted to hear more and followed Billy down a hallway past the hotel lobby until they were standing outside the entrance to the casino. It was packed, the air electric. A hot zone.
“What’s the deal?” Ike asked.
“I need you guys to cover for me while I bail a friend of mine out of jail.”
“You want to leave the property?” Ike asked.
“Just for a couple of hours.”
“Whatta ya think?” Ike asked his partner.
“We could get our asses fired,” T-Bird said, the voice of reason.
“They ain’t paying us shit anyway,” Ike reminded him.
“I ain’t risking my job for a lousy five grand. Get more.”
Ike shifted his attention to Billy. “You willing to go higher? You go higher, we might agree. Marcus and his bimbo left an hour ago, and old smelly has gone home, too. Nobody will know you left but us. We’ll keep quiet, but it’s got to be worth our while.”
Shakedown time. Billy had half a mind to ask Ike the last time someone had paid him five grand for keeping his mouth shut, but knew that line of reasoning wouldn’t go very far. Ike had him by the short hairs and was going to extract every penny out of Billy that he could.
“I’ll give you five grand apiece,” he offered.
“You’re offering us five grand each,” Ike said, just to be clear.
“That’s right. Cash.”
“That’s good, because we don’t take credit cards. Try ten.”
“I just offered you ten.”
“Each.”
He rocked back on his heels. To pay Ike that much, he’d have to visit his condo and make a withdrawal from his wall safe.
“Come on, give me a break,” he said.
Ike’s eyes turned cold. “That’s my final offer. Take it, or leave it.”
He almost said fuck you. But a little voice inside his head said no, you need to get Ly out of jail before she goes south on you.
“You’ve got a deal,” he said instead.
Ike smiled. “Pay up.”
“The money’s in my condo. I’ll get it while I’m out and pay you when I come back.”
Ike grabbed Billy by his shirt and lifted him off the floor so he was dangling in the air. A gang of pretty young things strolled past and shot pouty looks his way. In any other city, they would have snapped a photo on an iPhone and called the cops. But Vegas had a way of desensitizing people to pain and suffering, and the girls entered the casino without breaking stride. Bringing his face close, Ike said, “We want the money now, asshole.”
“The money’s in a wall safe in my condo.”
“Hear that, Bird? Man’s got so much fucking money, he needs a safe to keep it in.” Ike’s eyes narrowed. “Give us the combination. We’ll take care of the rest.”
“You can’t go into my building. The night guard won’t let you onto the elevators. Trust me, I’ll get the money for you.”
“You’ve got other things to do,” Ike reminded him. “Give me the combination, and we’ll get our money while you’re bailing out your friend. Call the night guard, and tell him we’re coming. That’s the deal.”
Billy knew when he was beaten. “I live in Turnberry Tower, Building B, in the penthouse. The safe’s in the clothes closet. Get a piece of paper, and I’ll give you the combination.”
“Hoowee. You got a penthouse at Turnberry? All the rich motherfuckers live there. Being a cheater must pay real good.”
“It beats working. Let me down, will you?”
Ike lowered him to earth and patted down the front of his shirt. T-Bird got a piece of paper and a pen from the front desk, and Billy wrote down the combination, having to believe it was the stupidest thing he’d ever done. Fifty grand was sitting in the safe along with a Rolex gold submariner he’d ripped off from a snotty trust-fund kid during a not-so-friendly game of backgammon at the pool, and he knew damn well that the punishers were going to take it all.
“What’s the night guard’s name?” Ike asked.
“Joey, but everyone calls him Jo-Jo,” Billy said.
“Call him, and tell him we’re coming.”
Billy called Jo-Jo and set the wheels in motion for the punishers to rip him off. It felt funny setting himself up to be taken down, and he supposed someday he’d have a good laugh over it, just not today. They went outside to the valet area, and Ike patted him on the shoulder.
“Be back before dawn, junior.”
“Yes, Dad.”
Laughing to themselves, the punishers headed down a walkway that led to the employee parking garage, the money already burning a hole in their pockets. They were the lowest form of thieves, and he could not wait to pay them back for taking advantage of him like this.
“It’s going to be about ten minutes. We’re jammed right now,” the valet said.
He waited on a bench for his car. He’d done a bad job of ending his partnership with Ly and had probably hurt her feelings. He needed to fix that, and he went back inside.
The gift shop was just off the lobby. He pored through racks of T-shirts and knickknacks that lined the shelves. It was made-in-China crap, all of it outrageously priced. Once upon a time, Vegas had been a bargain—cheap hotel rooms, inexpensive show tickets, endless buffets. Those days had faded; now the town was a rip-off, everything overpriced. He found a sleeveless blouse that matched Ly’s eyes, and took it to the counter.
“Fifty dollars,” the salesgirl said.
“Can you wrap it in some nice paper?” he asked.
“Gift wrapping is an extra two dollars.”
“I can handle it.”
As the salesgirl wrapped the blouse, his eyes were drawn to a display case. Among the rings and bracelets was a magical gold color.
His heart skipped a beat. They couldn’t be that stupid, could they?
He reminded himself that Doucette was not a gamer, and therefore susceptible to a variety of scams that seasoned casino people would never fall for.
He pointed into the case. “Let me see that.”
The salesgirl slid open the back panel and grabbed a flashy cigarette lighter.
“No, not that. The key chain next to it. The one with the gold chip.”
The salesgirl removed a souvenir key chain with a rubber gold chip and handed it to him. Its gold color looked just like Galaxy’s hundred-thousand-dollar gold chip.
He took the gold chip he’d stolen from Rock from his pocket and compared it to the rubber chip. The colors were exactly the same.
Casinos guarded the formulas they used to make their chips the way Coca-Cola guarded the formula to its soft drinks. Only Doucette had slipped up and let an outside vendor use the gold color to make a souvenir key chain. He looked for the manufacturer’s mark on the chip, hoping it wasn’t made in China. Finding none, he said, “Where do y
ou get these? I want to get some made for my company.”
“A vendor here in town makes them for us,” the salesgirl replied. “The salesman was just here filling up the case. We move a lot of them.”
“Do you have his business card?”
The salesgirl rifled through a drawer and produced the salesman’s card. AAA Novelty & Gift, located on Industrial Road on the north side of town.
“Keep it. I’ll get another the next time he’s in,” she said.
He slipped the salesman’s card into his billfold. His heart was pounding in his chest and he could barely contain his excitement. He’d hit the mother lode.
“That will be another twenty dollars plus tax,” she said, ringing up the sale.
The key chain probably cost nothing to make. Another rip-off, but one that he was happy to swallow. Not many times in his life would he be able to say that he’d turned twenty bucks into several million, and he sensed that his run of bad luck was about to change.
TWENTY-EIGHT
He drove north on the Strip with the souvenir key chain hooked over his thumb. With the help of this fake gold chip, he was going to take Doucette down for the count.
Every casino in Vegas had gotten ripped off by counterfeit chips. The scam was so common that the state required each casino to have a set of spare chips with alternate markings in case the chips on the floor needed to be quickly changed.
He hung a left on Bonneville and was soon at the jail. The Strip did not have its own jail, and people arrested in Strip casinos were transported to the Clark County Detention Center, as depressing a place as he’d ever visited.
He’d been busted several times for scamming. Because he had a slick lawyer and was luckier than a two-peckered puppy, he’d never spent more than a single night in the CCDC. But the experience had still been hair-raising. Cheaters were not liked, and he’d spent ten hours lying freezing naked on a futon before getting to talk to his lawyer.
He parked in the visitor lot across the street and went inside. There was a line of people waiting to speak to the front-desk sergeant. Soon, it was his turn, and he learned that Ly had appeared before a judge, who’d set her bail at ten grand.
