by James Swain
“That don’t sound so hard,” Ike said.
“It isn’t. The hard part comes now,” Billy said.
“What you mean?”
“This stuff isn’t going to happen by magic. I have to go see my guy so he can counterfeit the chips. I also need to figure out who the Boswells are. And, I need to keep Doucette and his crazy wife in the dark so they don’t get a wild hair and decide to kill me.”
“How you gonna do all that and not get caught?”
“Simple. You two are going to cover for me.”
“We are?”
“That’s right. You don’t work for Doucette anymore, you work for me, and that means you’re going to cover my ass so I can set this thing up. Dig it?”
“But what if Shaz calls us on the cell phone, and wants to speak to you, and we say you ain’t here, and she goes psycho on us? What do we do then?”
“Make up a story. Tell her that I discovered the Boswells are part of a wedding party, and that I’m running around the hotel trying to figure out which wedding it is. That will get her excited. Then call me. I’ll call her back and string her along some more.”
“You think she’ll fall for that bullshit?”
“She will if you say it right. It’s all about the delivery, and the conviction in your voice.”
“Sounds risky, you ask me.”
Every job he’d ever pulled was risky; without the risk, there was no reward. He poked the larger man in the chest so hard that it made Ike’s eyes bulge. Ike wasn’t used to someone half his size pushing him around, and it showed.
“It’s called the big time. The question is, are you guys ready to play?”
“I’m ready,” Ike said.
“Me, too,” T-Bird said.
“Good. I need two things from you. First go downstairs, and buy a few thousand in chips from the cage, and put them in my gym bag. My guy is going to need them so he can set the molds correctly. Then get your car, and bring it around so I can get out of here.”
“You want to use our car?” Ike asked.
“If I drive my own car out of here, I might get spotted. Better to take yours.”
“Well, all right. Our ride’s a refurbished ’68 Camaro. Just go easy on the gas. There’s a tiger under the hood.”
“I’ll remember that. Use the money you took from my safe to buy the chips from the cage. My guy will want to see lots of them. He claims that it makes counterfeiting easier.”
“I thought that was our money,” T-Bird objected.
“It’s our money, and we need it to pull this thing off. By the way, I took my jewelry out of the gym bag and hid it. That wasn’t part of our deal.”
“That Rolex with the diamonds was mine,” T-Bird said, clearly upset. “It went perfect with my Super Bowl ring.”
“You can buy yourself a watch with your share of the haul. Now give me your cell phone numbers so I can get a hold of you.”
The punishers gave him their cell numbers, which he entered into his Droid’s memory bank. Two nights ago, as he was getting the crap beat out of him, he’d promised himself he’d pay Ike and T-Bird back. Revenge was sweet, especially when the other guys didn’t see it coming.
“Our car’s parked in the employee garage,” Ike said. “We’ll bring it around to the rear exit. It’s usually pretty quiet this time of day.”
“I’ll be waiting,” Billy said.
THIRTY-FOUR
He drove to Gabe’s place in the punishers’ vintage ‘68 Camaro. Vegas was the pits during the day, and he kept his eyes on the road. Without a million watts of neon to light the place up, it was just another tourist town, the sandblasted hotels showing every dimple and crack.
The Nike gym bag sat on the passenger seat. As instructed, T-Bird had visited the cage and purchased several thousand dollars of chips, from lowly five-dollar red chips to coveted five-hundred-dollar purple chips. Gabe would need these to make his knock-offs. Not just to duplicate the look and color, but also the feel and weight, which varied from casino to casino.
The Strip ended and the highway turned straight and uninteresting. Gabe’s subdivision was dead ahead, with its manicured lawns and indistinguishable track houses, where nothing exciting ever went on. He couldn’t imagine living in these surroundings. Not in a thousand years.
A parade of cars was parked in front of Gabe’s house: Misty’s Mercedes, Pepper’s Beamer, Cory and Morris’s Infiniti, and Travis’s Windstar. His crew was having a meeting, and he hadn’t been invited. He didn’t have a problem if his crew got together socially, but the fact that Travis was present—Travis who never left home except for work—told Billy this wasn’t a book club meeting. They were talking business without the boss.
He parked and cut the engine. He needed to handle this in steps. Step one: find out who the ringleader was and toss his sorry ass on the street. Step two: sit down with the others and read the riot act to them. He didn’t need them, but they sure as hell needed him.
He stared at the house while working up the courage to confront them. The sheers in the front window fluttered, and a man’s face materialized behind the glass. Suntanned, big jawed.
Travis.
He punched the steering wheel. Travis had been challenging him lately, and he’d passed it off to the fact that Travis had gotten married and now answered to a higher authority. Wrong. Travis was trying to take over and had called everyone to Gabe’s house while Billy was dealing with the mess at Galaxy. The big man had betrayed him.
He shouldn’t have been as upset as he was. Part of running a crew was dealing with problems: members got sick, divorced, thrown in jail, all the usual fun stuff. There wasn’t anything he couldn’t handle except having a knife stuck in his back.
The face in the window disappeared. He could remember recruiting Travis as if it were yesterday. Travis had been drowning in debt, with a house in foreclosure and a car about to be repossessed. Within six months of joining his crew, Travis had been back on his feet, the wolves no longer at his door. And this is how the bastard repays me.
He got out and unlocked the Camaro’s trunk. Pulling up a piece of carpet that covered the spare, he grabbed a tire iron. It felt nice and firm in his hand.
His heart was pounding as he banged on Gabe’s front door. To his surprise, no one answered. “Come on, you chickenshits, open up.”
Nothing. In a rage, he called Gabe’s number on his cell phone and got voice mail. “It’s me. I’m standing outside your front door. Let me in, goddamn it.”
When Gabe didn’t call him back, he hopped off the stoop and pressed his face to the front window, straining to see inside the furniture-less house. His view went straight to the family room in the rear. A group of people was moving through a slider onto the lanai, trying to escape. Bad thoughts raced through his head. Had his crew taken a vote and decided to dump him? Fuckers.
He marched around the side of the house, clutching the tire iron. A little voice was telling him to turn around, nothing would be accomplished by violence. A bigger voice was saying go ahead, break some bones, you stuck your neck out for these people, made them lots of money, and this is how they thank you, the dirty rat bastards.
Coming around the house, he hit the brakes. His crew was on the lawn, trying to scale the picket fence in the back of Gabe’s property. Misty and Pepper had on the skintight exercise outfits that they wore for Pilates, while Cory and Morris appeared to have just rolled out of bed, their boyish faces unshaven, hair uncombed. Gabe was a different story: beat up, face bloodied, his right leg hurting. Travis had a gun and was saying, “Hurry, we’ve got to get out of here.”
A hard object dropped in the pit of his stomach. He’d read the whole situation wrong. Something else was going on here; his crew hadn’t finked on him. Ashamed at his miscalculation, he tossed the tire iron into the bushes.
“Hey, guys, what’s up?�
�� he called out.
Travis spun around and took aim. Billy’s bowels loosened, and he raised his arms into the air.
“Don’t shoot.”
“Billy—Jesus Christ, is that you?” Travis asked.
“No, it’s his evil twin brother. Stop aiming that gun at me, will you?”
The others had assembled behind Travis. The big man lowered his weapon and pointed it at the ground. “Was that you in the pimp mobile out front?”
“Yeah, that was me.”
“You scared the shit out of us. Some guys are after Gabe. We thought it was them.”
“Tony G’s boys?”
“Yeah. He’s into them real deep.”
He saw it clearly now, most of it, anyway. Tony G had sent his enforcers to put the heavy on Gabe. Hurt and bleeding, Gabe had called the crew, being they were the only friends he had, and the crew had dropped what they were doing and come to Gabe’s rescue, because that was what friends did. Billy had been left out because his crew knew he was at Galaxy, dealing with his own problems. No one had betrayed him. It was all good.
“I can fix that,” he said.
They went inside to the living room to talk things out. Except for an old-fashioned La-Z-Boy recliner that populated the room’s center, the space was bare. Folding chairs and stools were brought from the kitchen so that everyone could get comfortable.
Gabe dropped his pummeled body into the La-Z-Boy and gazed at the ceiling, horrified that it had come to this. Billy was late to the party and started by asking Gabe a question that the rest of them already knew the answer to.
“How much are you into Tony G for?” he asked.
“Does it matter?” Gabe said, the shame bunching up his face.
“I can fix this, but you’ve got to be straight with me.”
“You can’t fix this, Billy. I fucked up, and now I’ve got to blow out of here. I’ll go to another state, and get a job in a mall fixing watches. I’ll get by.”
“No, you won’t. Tony G has got a flag in every state,” Billy said.
“A what?”
“Tony G’s got mob enforcers he can call in every state. They’ll hunt you down, and pump a bullet into your head, and send Tony G photos of your corpse. You can run, but you can’t hide. Now, how much do you owe this guy?”
“Three hundred big ones.”
“You’ve got to be kidding me.”
“It’s the truth. That’s why I’ve got to run. I don’t have another choice.”
“You’re not going anywhere.”
“I’m not?”
“No, I need you for a job. Now shut up, and let me think about this.”
The living room went quiet. Billy kept a stash of cash buried in the desert for emergencies, but it wasn’t enough to cover Gabe’s debt to Tony G. Had the amount been smaller, Tony G might have been willing to take a down payment, with the rest coming later. But the amount was huge, and Tony G’s reputation was at stake. If the bookie didn’t collect, every gambler in town who owed him money would renege on their obligations.
The seconds dragged on. Misty got behind Billy’s chair and began to massage the knotted muscles in his shoulders.
“You’re all tense. Relax,” she said.
He tried. The tightrope he was walking was getting harder by the step. The safety net was gone, and the pole he used for balance had fallen out of his hands. If Gabe left town, Billy couldn’t scam Galaxy, and the biggest payday of his career would go down the toilet.
Cory and Morris were checking e-mails on their cell phones. It had to be the worst habit in the world next to picking your nose. Billy remembered they had a scam going at a racetrack in Santa Anita, and he guessed this was how the agent at the track was communicating with them.
“Is that horse-racing scam still alive?” he asked.
“We were about to shut it down, like you told us,” Cory said.
“What would you say if we used it to clean the slate with Tony G?”
Cory glanced at Morris. The horse race scam was their baby, and Billy did not own the rights to it. Cory and Morris could say no, except they were in this for the long haul, and Billy was their ticket to the big time.
“I’m okay with that,” Cory said.
“Me, too,” Morris said.
“Cool. Lay it on me,” he said.
“A horse trainer named Sal Lopez is fixing races at Santa Anita,” Cory said. “Sal’s a smart operator. He only fixes one race a day, and sends us the name of the horse a few minutes before post time. That way, we can get our bets down right before the race starts, and the other gamblers following the race can’t react when they see the odds change.”
“What’s Sal’s cut?”
“Half.”
“What kind of odds are you getting?”
“It varies. Yesterday, the ringer ran at twenty-to-one.”
“How does it work?”
“Sal’s got a stable of Brazilian horses he keeps nearby that are ringers. He dyes the ringers so they’re identical to the horses at the track’s stables, and switches them at night. The only problem is if it rains. Then the dye runs off, and the ringer changes color during the race.”
“I’d like to see that,” Misty said, still massaging Billy’s back.
“It must be the dry season in Southern California,” he said.
“Sal just sent us an e-mail saying the scam was on for today. It’s going to happen during the twelfth race at four twenty-five,” Cory said. “It’s yours if you want it, Billy.”
Billy played with it. He’d once scammed a bookie in Providence with a fixed boxing match, but that was Providence. Vegas bookies were smarter than that. They knew the angles and took precautions to protect themselves. That didn’t mean Tony G couldn’t be fleeced; it just meant that it was going to take a certain level of sophistication to make it work. But before Billy set the wheels in motion, he wanted to be sure that Cory and Morris would not harbor any hard feelings.
“Are you guys sure about this?” he asked. “I’m planning to take Tony G for the full amount Gabe owes him. Tony G might realize the race was fixed, and make some phone calls. Sal could get some heat down the road.”
“That’s Sal’s problem,” Cory said. “We work for you, Billy.”
“Yeah, we work for you,” Morris said.
Billy turned his attention to Gabe. “How do I get in front of this guy?”
“Tony G plays golf every day on the Bali Hai course. That’s where he does most of his business,” Gabe said. “I know the pro at Bali Hai. I’ll call him, and set it up.”
“You’re saying Tony G take bets while he plays.”
“His cell phone never stops ringing. It’s annoying as hell.”
“Do it.” Billy rose from his folding chair. He needed to get back to Galaxy and put in some face time. Gabe was looking at him, as were the others, all put out.
“Something the matter?” he asked.
“You said you needed me for a job,” Gabe said. “You going to tell me what it is?”
In all the excitement, Billy had forgotten why he’d come to Gabe’s home in the first place.
“Hold that thought,” he said.
Going outside, he retrieved the Nike bag from the Camaro, came back in, and dropped it on Gabe’s lap. Gabe unzippered the bag and had a look.
“You want me to counterfeit these, is that the deal?” the jeweler asked.
“No, I want you to counterfeit this.” He took the souvenir key chain from his pocket and showed Gabe the rubber gold chip. “Use the chips in the bag to get the weight and texture, and this for the color. I need eighty of them. They’re worth a hundred grand apiece.”
“How am I going to match the color? There are a thousand different shades of gold.”
From his wallet Billy extracted the AAA Novelty & Gi
ft business card he’d gotten from the cashier in the hotel gift shop. “The company that makes them is local. Go see them, and tell them you need a paint match for a job you’re doing for the hotel.”
Gabe stared at the card. “Shit, I know these guys. Getting the paint won’t be a problem. When did you say you need these by?”
“Tomorrow afternoon.”
“Well, that’s a problem. This isn’t something you can rush.”
“I know that. But if anyone can make it happen, it’s you.”
Gabe was a perfectionist; every job he tackled was handled with the utmost thoughtfulness and care. From the open Nike bag he removed a stack of colored chips and let them fall into his other hand, nice and flat and downward. They fell with a uniform correctness, landing on top of each other with a cushion of air that broke their fall due to their perfect construction. Under his breath Gabe said, “Eleven grams, blended plastic, silver inserts.” He climbed out of the recliner still hurting from the beating he’d taken, and stood next to Billy.
“Eighty gold chips it is,” the jeweler said.
“You’re the man. Later, everyone.”
Billy headed for the front door. Travis was right behind him, and in a breathless voice said, “Are we stealing eight million bucks from Galaxy tomorrow?”
“That’s right. I’ll call you later with the details.”
“Billy, wait!” Misty called after him.
His crew had come out of their chairs, their faces filled with hopeful expressions.
“What about us?” Misty asked. “Are we part of this deal?”
“Of course you’re part of it. All for one, and one for all, and everyone gets their usual cut. I’ll fill you in later, and explain what your roles are. Now let me go. I’ve got work to do.”
He jogged across the lawn and climbed into the oven-hot Camaro, the flesh on his back burning up as it touched the driver seat. His Droid lay on the passenger seat, and he picked it up to stare at its face. He hadn’t gotten any distress phone calls from Ike or T-Bird. No news was good news, and he fired up the ignition and made the engine roar.
