Deadman's Poker: A Novel (Tony Valentine)

by James Swain

  “That’s a home run,” Bill said.

  Valentine certainly thought so. He had everything he needed to put the screws to Jasper. Las Vegas did not let casino people fraternize with mob guys, and Jasper would be run out of town on a rail, and the tournament shut down. The World Poker Showdown was as crooked as a carnival, and needed to be exposed.

  Fifteen minutes later, he pulled into the parking lot of a McDonald’s on the north side of town and found Bill parked beside the kid’s play area. He got out of his rental, and hopped into Bill’s unmarked car.

  “I hear you really shook them up at the WPS,” Bill said.

  Valentine fastened his seat belt. “Good news travels fast, huh?”

  “Jasper is screaming his head off, calling everyone under the sun.”

  “Let him scream all he wants,” Valentine said. “He broke the law.”

  Bill flipped open his cell phone, and called one of his agents. While Valentine had been setting the WPS’s house on fire, Bill had marshaled three dozen of his best field agents and put them inside Jinky Harris’s strip joint. When Bill gave them the word, the agents would raid the club under the pretense of looking for gambling activity. That would give Valentine time to find Jinky, and persuade him to reveal where Gerry and his friends were being held hostage.

  “I need a gun,” Valentine said.

  Bill pointed at the glove compartment. Valentine popped it open, and took out a Sig Sauer. “You remembered,” he said, slipping it into his jacket pocket.

  “It’s the gun of choice of old farts,” Bill said.

  “Speaking of old farts, I need to find a walking cane.”

  “What for?”

  “It goes good with my gray hair,” Valentine said.

  Bill drove to Naked City. Naked City sold sex in the private VIP rooms of strip clubs, in massage parlors, and behind closed doors of dirty bookstores. The only place you couldn’t find sex in Naked City was on the streets. Bill pulled up in front of a medical supply store called ABC Medical and Valentine hopped out.

  Five minutes later, Valentine emerged from the store walking with a burnished wood walking stick. He’d also purchased a pair of dark sunglasses, and a white captain’s fishing hat. As he slid into the passenger seat, Bill stared at him.

  “You bought the hat and glasses in there?”

  “I bought them from the guy behind the counter,” Valentine said.

  “How much?”

  “Thirty bucks.”

  “You got hosed.”

  As Bill pulled out of the lot, Valentine adjusted his hat and glasses. The guy behind the counter had worn the hat with the sides pulled down, like Gilligan on the old TV show. It had a comical effect, and he tried it, then appraised himself in the reflection of his window. He looked like the captain of a shuffleboard team. Perfect.

  Bill drove several blocks, then turned down the street to Jinky’s club. The Sugar Shack was at the very end of the street. The club was doing brisk business, with several black stretch limousines parked by the curb.

  “You sure you’re up for this?” Bill asked.

  “Sure, I’m sure,” Valentine said.

  Bill looked at his watch. “The raid will take place in exactly five minutes.”

  Valentine didn’t need to look at his watch. He knew how long five minutes was, and whacked the burnished walking stick against the palm of his hand.

  The Sugar Shack’s admission fee was fifteen bucks. Valentine asked for a senior discount and thought the cashier was going to physically throw him out the door. He paid up, got his hand stamped, and ventured inside.

  The club was a sprawling, multilevel room filled with pulsating strobe lights, blaring disco music, and exposed female flesh. There were three stages, just like at Barnum & Bailey’s circus, and they were filled with naked women doing exotic dances and swinging on brass poles. He guessed the crowd of guys watching them to number eighty, which meant almost half of them were Bill’s agents. He found an empty spot at the bar and ordered a club soda.

  “Seven bucks,” the bartender said, serving him the drink.

  Valentine slid a twenty his way. “Tell Jinky his appointment is here.”

  The bartender gave him the hairy eyeball. “Who are you?”

  “George Scalzo’s brother, Louie.”

  The bartender walked down to the end of the bar and disappeared through a beaded curtain. Valentine followed him, practicing his limp. The short time he’d been living in Florida had convinced him that older people were invisible, and were therefore entitled to go wherever they pleased. He passed through the beaded curtain without anyone saying anything, and entered a narrow hallway illuminated by a red bulb hanging from the ceiling. He spied the bartender at the hallway’s end. The bartender rapped three times on a blue door, then spotted Valentine.

  “Hey mister, you’re not supposed to be back here.”

  “I thought you told me to follow you,” Valentine said, shuffling toward him.

  “I didn’t say no such thing.”

  “You sure?”

  “Positive. You need to go back inside.”

  Valentine caught up to him, and pretended to be breathing heavily. He put his free hand on the bartender’s shoulder and took several deep breaths.

  “Sorry, son. My hearing’s going. Old age ain’t for sissies.”

  The blue door opened, and a seven-foot-tall black guy emerged. Valentine guessed this was Finesse, the guy with designs on being a professional fighter. Finesse looked like he’d been lifting weights, his pectoral muscles bulging through his turtleneck sweater. He glared down at the tops of their heads.

  “Who’s this guy?” Finesse asked the bartender.

  “Permit me to introduce myself,” Valentine said, touching the brim of his hat. “Louis Scalzo, also known as Louie the Lip. I believe you’re expecting me.”

  “He’s George Scalzo’s brother,” the bartender explained.

  Finesse scratched his chin like a great thinker. “George Scalzo’s brother? How come I never heard of you?”

  Valentine leaned on his cane with both hands and looked up into the giant’s face.

  “Your boss has,” he said.

  Finesse motioned him inside and shut the door. Jinky’s office had a large desk, several plush leather chairs, and several ugly paintings hanging on the walls. Next to the desk was a trestle tray loaded with food, and Valentine eyed the chicken chow mein and barbecue spare ribs.

  “You guys throwing a party?” Valentine asked.

  Finesse put his finger to his lips and shushed him. Jinky was at his desk, talking on the phone while gnawing on a spare rib. He had a napkin tucked into his collar, yet had managed to smear sauce all over his face. Hanging up, he stared at his bodyguard.

  “Who’s this clown?” Jinky asked.

  “Your appointment,” Finesse said.

  “I don’t have an appointment,” Jinky said.

  “You don’t?”

  “No. Get rid of him.”

  Valentine had edged up beside Finesse. Holding his walking stick by its center, he whacked Finesse in the kneecap with the round handle. It made a clean sound against the bone, and Finesse’s mouth opened in a perfect O. Valentine brought the stick straight up, and caught him on the tip of the nose. A torrent of blood spurted across the desk, and Finesse went down clutching his face with both hands.

  There was only so much threat in a walking stick, and Valentine dropped it on the floor, then drew the Sig Sauer from behind his belt, and aimed it a few feet above Jinky’s head. Jinky did not seem terribly concerned, and continued eating.

  “You shouldn’t have done that,” Jinky said.

  Valentine squeezed the trigger. The bullet hit the frame of the painting hanging behind Jinky, ruining it. Jinky’s napkin slowly fell from his collar.

  “You’re crazy, mister.”

  Taking the snapshot of his bloodied son from his pocket, Valentine dropped it on Jinky’s desk, then aimed the gun at an imaginary bull’s eye on Jin
ky’s forehead.

  “You have something of mine,” Valentine said, “and I want it back.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Jinky said.

  Valentine picked up the walking stick from the floor. He was prepared to beat the information out of Jinky if he had to. Jinky looked at him defiantly.

  “Hit me all you want,” Jinky said. “It won’t get you anywhere.”

  Valentine sensed Jinky wasn’t the type to squeal. He patted Jinky down, then made him go down the hallway in his electric wheelchair and through the beaded curtain into the club. The raid was in progress, with club employees and strippers lined up against one wall, the scared-out-of-their-wits patrons on the other. Valentine pulled a Gaming Control Board agent aside, and asked him where Bill Higgins was.

  “By the VIP rooms,” the agent replied. “I think he found the mother lode.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “They’re running a gambling den,” the agent said.

  Next to murder, there was no worse crime in Las Vegas than running an illegal casino, and Valentine tapped Jinky’s chair with his walking stick.

  “You’re going down,” Valentine told him.

  Valentine made Jinky lead him to the VIP rooms. A swarm of agents was standing by a door marked PRIVATE and parted as the two men entered. The room had plush carpeting and subdued lighting, with a bar covering one wall, and four blackjack tables, a roulette table, and a craps table in the room’s center. Bill was standing by one of the blackjack tables and had pulled several decks of playing cards out of the shoe. He looked up as they entered.

  “You crummy piece of shit,” Bill said to Jinky. “You’re running a bust-out joint!”

  Jinky sunk low in his chair. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,”

  “This shoe is short twenty high-valued cards,” Bill said, throwing down a handful of cards in disgust. “You were cheating the players.”

  “I swear to God, it must have been one of the dealers,” Jinky said.

  Bill approached Jinky with a look of rage distorting his face. It was bad enough that Jinky had been running an illegal casino in his own club, but it was worse that he’d been running a casino that cheated. Las Vegas had spent twenty-five years trying to convince people it was a safe place to gamble, and the stain from this would hurt every casino in town, and make Bill Higgins look bad. Bill put his hands on Jinky’s shoulders and shook him.

  “You’re lying,” Bill said.

  “I swear on my mother’s grave, I’m not,” Jinky said. “We just ran the casino to keep the patrons happy. I didn’t know there was cheating going on.”

  Valentine found himself staring at the craps table. It was shaped like a tub, and reminded him of a table he’d seen during a raid of an illegal casino in Atlantic City years ago. That table had been manufactured by a crooked gambling supply house out of Miami. Crossing the room, he went to where the stickman stood at the table, and felt around the polished wood. His fingers found an indentation and he tapped it, and heard a hollow sound.

  “Hey, Bill,” he called across the room.

  Bill turned his head. “What?”

  “Look at this.”

  Valentine pressed the indentation and a hidden compartment in the table popped open, revealing a small shelf containing six pairs of dice. He removed a pair and threw them on the table. They came up a two, or snake eyes. A loser.

  “They’re loaded,” Valentine called out.

  Bill turned, and smacked Jinky in the face with the palm of his hand.

  “That was for your mother,” Bill said.

  48

  Jinky Harris wouldn’t talk.

  Bill had hauled Jinky into one of the VIP rooms, and was giving him the third degree. There were only so many things Bill Higgins could do to make Jinky talk, and none of them were working. Being a law enforcement officer, Bill had to follow the rules, even when someone’s life was at stake. It was one of the job’s great drawbacks.

  Being retired, Valentine didn’t have to follow the rules, and he went back to Jinky’s office and retrieved his walking stick from the floor. Finesse was sitting on the couch and nursing a large purple welt on the bridge of his nose. Valentine removed the photograph of Gerry from his pocket, and tossed it on the coffee table. Then he pointed at it.

  “That’s my son. Know where he is?”

  Finesse looked at him blankly. Valentine was sure he knew something, and raised the stick like he was going to take his head off. The giant cowered in fear.

  “I don’t know anything!”

  “You’re a sorry excuse for a bodyguard, you know that?”

  Finesse didn’t take the bait.

  “I just do as I’m told.”

  Valentine got behind Jinky’s desk and started looking for a scrap of paper with an address or some other clue that would lead him to Gerry. The blotter was splattered with drops of blood, as was the phone receiver. He stared at the giant.

  “You made a phone call, didn’t you?”

  Finesse did not reply. Valentine whacked the cane against his palm.

  “I’m prepared to beat it out of you, buddy.”

  Finesse jumped off the couch and bolted out the door. He was dragging his bad knee but still moved pretty fast. Valentine followed him down the hall, and saw Finesse raise his arms over his head as he entered the strip club. He was going to let himself be arrested, rather than let Valentine work him over.

  Valentine returned to Jinky’s office and slammed the door behind him. In anger he raised the cane and smashed a framed photograph of Jinky with a naked stripper hanging on the wall. He had blown it. If he’d handled Finesse right, he could have made him talk, instead of letting his temper take over.

  He checked Jinky’s desk a second time, just to be sure he hadn’t missed anything. He picked up the phone, and hit the redial button. He got a frantic busy signal and let out a curse. He decided to go back to the club, and see if Bill had gotten Jinky to open up. Gerry’s photograph was lying on the coffee table. As he picked it up, he noticed something he hadn’t seen before. A red smudge on Gerry’s right cheek.

  It was too bright to be blood. On Jinky’s desk was a magnifying glass used for reading. Valentine picked up the magnifying glass, and examined the smudge.

  It was a woman’s lipstick. A kiss.

  Now he had a clue, only he didn’t know what it meant. He went to the minibar behind Jinky’s desk and stole a Diet Coke. He always thought better with caffeine rushing through his bloodstream, and he sucked it down while staring at the photograph. Gerry had called him right after he’d been released from the police station, and said he was going straight to the motel. If Valentine remembered correctly, the motel’s name was the Casablanca. On a hunch he got the motel’s phone number from information, and called it.

  “Haven’t seen your son since yesterday,” the manager said after Valentine identified himself.

  “He didn’t come around early this morning with his friends?”

  “Nope.”

  “Mind answering a question for me?”

  “Go ahead,” the manager said.

  “How far are you from the Metro Las Vegas police station?”

  “Two point three miles.”

  “Thanks. I really appreciate it.”

  Valentine hung up. Gerry and his friends had never reached their motel. Chances were, they’d been nabbed right as they’d left the police station. A pretty girl had talked them into driving her someplace, and given Gerry a kiss for his trouble. His son had always been a sucker for a pretty face.

  He finished his soda still looking at his son’s face. Pete Longo had practically admitted that he had a dirty cop in his department. That cop must have orchestrated this. There was no other way it could have worked so well. He tossed his empty bottle into the trash, then picked up the phone, and dialed the Las Vegas Metro Police Department’s phone number from memory. An operator answered on the fifth ring.

  “Let me speak to Det
ective Longo,” he said.

  Pete Longo was having the day from hell. Besides being asked by Bill Higgins to stay out of a major bust, he’d just learned that Jinky Harris had been operating a bust-out joint right under their noses. It was a big black eye for the city, and no one was going to get more heat over it than the police department. His secretary stuck her head into his office.

  “Some guy named Tony Valentine is holding on line two,” she said. “Want me to get rid of him?”

  “No, I’ll take it.”

  The door closed and Longo picked up the mug of coffee that had been sitting on his desk since early that morning and slurped it down. Then he picked up his phone and punched in line two. “This is Detective Longo. Can I help you?”

  “This is Tony Valentine,” the caller said. “How would you like to do a horse trade?”

  Longo pulled himself closer to his desk. “What are you offering?”

  “I think I’ve nailed your dirty cop.”

  The words were slow to register. Maybe the day from hell was about to show its silver lining. Longo removed a fresh legal pad from his drawer along with a pen.

  “What do you want in return?”

  “Jinky Harris won’t tell us where my son and his friends are,” Valentine said. “I want you to promise me that you’ll make this cop talk, no matter what.”

  “You want me to hurt him?”

  “Just do whatever you have to do. You don’t have to tell me how.”

  Longo realized his hand was shaking. He had suspected there was a dirty cop in the department for over a year, and had lost many nights’ sleep over it.

  “Give it to me from the top,” Longo said.

  “Is that a promise?”

  “You have my word,” the detective said.

  Longo meticulously wrote down Valentine’s theory of how his son and friends had been abducted outside the station house. When Valentine was finished, Longo read it back to him, making sure the times corresponded to the correct events.