He drank and sat with his mouth full of beer. Then he swallowed, set down his glass, tore up the check, pocketed the pieces, and wrote another. An experienced lawyer can look daggers at you and write at the same time; but an experienced detective can read upside down. I took the check without looking at it and shook his hand.
“When and where? I need to stop and pick up my laundry.” I patted my own left armpit; not that I ever wore anything as uncomfortable as a shoulder harness.
He traded the checkbook for a tablet as thick as a Pop-Tart and looked at the time. “One hour. Penthouse suite in the MGM Grand.” He put it away with an expression like a pickled beet. “Must be a representative. Criminals only return to the scene of the crime in cheap fiction. Especially supercriminals who need to remain invisible.”
I finished my beer and set the glass down in the center of the cocktail napkin. “How many supercriminals do you know, Counselor?”
TWENTY-SEVEN
It was a revolver job. I pack the German semiautomatic in the car just as a spare: That weapon lost two wars. The Zippo action required to expel a bullet is hell on accuracy, and I couldn’t expect a smart schizo like Madam Sing to fall for that wine-bottle dodge a second time. I opened the door to my waiting room and looked at a wicker basket wrapped in cellophane dwarfing the coffee table where old magazines go to die, packed to the eyes with French cheese, Spanish peanuts, Dutch chocolates, and a bottle of Scotch that was old enough to run for president; a United Nations of slow but exquisite poison. A card was attached:
Bless you.
G.
Clipped to the card was a check made out in the amount of $1,500; my standard three-day retainer, making the twenty dollars in my wallet a bonus. Gwendolyn Haas tested as high on bookkeeping as she did on gratitude. Emil Haas had been cleared of suspicion in the death of his partner. I got that from the radio on the way there.
That figured. I’d earned the fee I’d gotten from Carl Fannon when I found Haas and why he’d disappeared, discharged my obligation there to Haas by speaking with him at the Liberty Inn, and given Gwendolyn satisfaction when her father ceased to be a suspect. If I’d followed my gut and refused the second check Philip Justice had given me, I’d be clear of the case. Who was I to trump all the authorities in Europe, Asia, and North America by putting myself right back in Charlotte Sing’s sights?
It was the damnedest job yet. I’d never worked so hard for unemployment and failed so miserably.
* * *
There’s some significance to the fact that the MGM Grand Casino and the traditional headquarters of the Detroit Police Department share the same address, 1300, on streets a few minutes apart. In both places the odds are with the house.
It’s been many years since the last Wonder Bread truck rolled away from the site, but it’s still a shock to the system to drive along the John Lodge Freeway without seeing its name spelled out backwards in iron letters on the roof. The dough made there now doesn’t smell half as tasty or last half as long, and doesn’t contribute a dime to the local economy: With a choice of lounges, nightclubs, and restaurants, four hundred guest rooms, poker rooms, craps rooms, slots lined up as deep as the Terracotta Army, and cigar bars gathered under one roof, the place is completely self-contained, a perpetual-motion profit machine, a city unto itself with its own police department and a population of three thousand employees mostly making minimum wage. The places spring up like weeds in our famous empty lots, choking out all other growth in the neighborhood. Every penny goes into armored trucks bound for Vegas.
I wouldn’t be so sour about the racket if I hadn’t lost ten bucks at blackjack twenty years ago and spent ten thousand trying to win it back.
From the outside, the building resembles the radiator of a showroom-quality Hudson Super Six, eighteen royal-blue floors with chrome trim on a concrete one-story base painted to resemble marble. The windows—like all the others in our town’s public buildings—are bulletproof Plexiglas, and concrete White House–type barriers discourage smash-and-grab artists from driving stolen pickups through the doors, hitching up to an ATM, and dragging it home. Eight hundred million dollars on the hoof, and it had paid for itself in six months.
An electric sign mounted above the parking lot read:
WELCOME GEEK SQUAD
The lot was a sea of Volkswagen beetles painted to resemble police cars.
I went inside and got an immediate rush of piped-in oxygen, an old Atlantic City gimmick to keep the suckers awake enough to keep working the slots. There wasn’t a Rat Pack member in that bunch: Someone had left open the door of the nursing home and the inmates were feeding in quarters from plastic cups, replenishing them from time to time from fanny packs and king-size handbags. You could smell the Bengay clear across the floor.
Practically everything there but the clientele had come from out of state, including half the staff. The antlers bolted to the ceiling of the Wolfgang Puck Grill are supposed to have come from northern Michigan, but there isn’t that much venison in the Northwest Territory.
I climbed onto the stool next to where Philip Justice sat nursing a drink.
“I thought you’d never get here,” he said. “Ten minutes listening to the jingle-jangle of those slots can give you tinnitus for a week.”
The bartender was a polished-looking Pakistani in a green suede vest. I asked if he stocked Purple Gang.
“What’s that?”
“They make it locally. There are only about a dozen breweries within walking distance of this spot.”
“I’m sorry, sir. If your preference is a signature brand, we have a cellar full of imported beers.” He uncovered a blinding set of teeth against dark skin. “Tour the world from the comfort of your bar stool.”
“I haven’t had my shots. Give me a Bud.”
He stopped smiling and went to fetch it.
Justice had switched to a gin-and-tonic. “We’re a little early. No sense looking too eager. You brought it?”
I nodded. I’d gotten tired of the slap-your-coat comedy and anyway the Chief’s Special was riding my right kidney. “You?”
“Sure. Just a couple of gunslingers.”
“Taking on the entire Sioux Nation in one ninety-pound package.”
“You really think she’ll be there in person?”
“I try to stay out of her head. I might not find my way back.”
“I can’t believe she’s as bad as all that.”
“Sure you do. It’s why I’m here, swilling the King of Beers in a cushy whorehouse when I could be outside enjoying the kind of sunny afternoon we don’t get often.”
The bartender brought me an open bottle and a frosted mug, set each on a napkin of its own with the name of the joint embossed on it, and went to the other end of the bar to chase down a spill with his towel. I slid the mug out of the way and tipped up the bottle.
The place was beginning to fill with Best Buy techs dressed like Jerry Lewis: white short-sleeve dress shirts, narrow black neckties, and plastic pocket protectors. A couple of them were playing electronic poker at the other end of the bar, drinking appletinis and calculating the odds on trick wristwatches. It was Texas Hold ’Em. They were too young for tiddlywinks.
“How do we handle it?” Justice asked.
“Go in through the door. I’ve shinnied up enough drainpipes for one day.”
“I don’t mind telling you I’m scared shitless.”
“And I’m not?” The Bud tasted like beer-flavored water. I parked it next to the mug, gestured to the Pakistani, and ordered Scotch neat.
“Yes, sir. Brand?”
“House label’s okay.”
“We don’t have one.”
“Dewar’s, then.”
He brought it in a thimble. I knocked it back cowboy style, asked for a double, and played with it. Justice watched me. “Don’t you think you should keep a clear head?”
“It’s okay. I coated my stomach with Old Smuggler on the way here.”
“I just
remembered why I don’t like you. I never know when you’re pulling my leg.”
“You never heard anyone tell a joke at a wake?”
“And they call me a cynic.”
“I’m not. I’m trying to put the butterflies to sleep. Got any notion what they want from you?”
“I was told it’s a consultation. That could be anything from advice in a divorce action to a case for the Supreme Court. I got the word by e-mail same as always, from a server registered to the same subsidiary I traced back to Peaceable Shore. Except for meeting with the venture capitalist, it’s my first face-to-face. Everything else was handled through the computer. My fee was direct-deposit.” He spun his glass between his palms like a Boy Scout trying to start a campfire. “The message said it’s informal, which I took to mean I should come alone.”
“Uh-huh.”
“You’re not surprised?”
“I’d have been surprised if it didn’t. I was wondering when you were going to get around to telling me.”
“I was afraid you’d bow out.”
“I still can, Counselor.”
“If you do I go with you.”
We drank for a while in peace, what there was of it with a comic yelling jokes in the adjacent lounge over the racket from the one-armed bandits. The four-letter words didn’t come back into his act until after the sun went down.
“I’ll go in first and scope it out,” I said. “Still got that tablet?”
He broke it loose. I found my toy phone and entered his number. “I’ll text you the all-clear. One word: ‘Brazos.’”
“What’s it mean?”
“The Texas Rangers used to wire it to each other when they wanted to gather.”
“Who told you that?”
“Hopalong Cassidy.”
“Funny.”
“It wasn’t meant to be. We could use a little Hoppy right about now.”
“What if it’s not clear?”
“I won’t need to text you that. I’ll come out running.”
TWENTY-EIGHT
The elevator to the penthouse floor was locked out to anyone not registered there. Justice’s instructions were to pick up the key card at the desk. A compact blonde in a blazer looked at his driver’s license and handed him an envelope with the hotel’s logo on it. We entered a car with the same design in relief on bronze plate. The logo was repeated on the walls of the car, which was big enough to carry forty people without jostling. I leaned against the railing just to feel the bulk of the .38 in its belt clip.
Six weeks later the brass in Vegas installed metal detectors at the front entrance; I can’t help feeling we were at least partially responsible for the decision.
He tried to slip the card in the slot next to 17 and came within about a foot of it on the first attempt; two on the second. He handed it to me without comment. I got it in without bending more than one corner on the first try.
We rose on a cushion of air. Except for a slight vibration I’d have thought we were standing still.
Justice was breathing as if he’d run around a country block. It reminded me I’d been holding my breath since we boarded. I let it out with a whoosh. The noise didn’t make him jump any higher than the ceiling.
I grinned at him. “Everybody dies, Counselor.”
“Have I said I don’t like you?”
“Hurts just as much every time.”
We ran out of conversation then. I leaned back against a brass rail and played with a pack of cigarettes. It kept my hands from shaking.
Up and up we went. I’d never traveled that far in an elevator without stopping to pick up more passengers.
At end of track we stepped out onto a red carpet runner deep enough to tickle our tonsils, with the MGM brand embroidered on it in gold every few feet. Bronze wall sconces lined the walls between doors, labeled the same. I figured I’d know the name of the place by the time we left.
If we left.
The door to 1700—at the end of the hall, meaning a corner suite—wasn’t anything special, if you’d grown up in the Winter Palace. It was paneled in coffered mahogany, with its number scrolled on it in gold script. A pearl button was set back inside a brushed-gold socket next to the frame.
“What a layout,” Justice said. “If just one of my clients slipped on a puddle of flop sweat in a gaming room, I might be able to stay up here for a month.”
He was reverting to type. I felt a little better then. “Hero going in.” I laid a finger against the button. The lawyer retreated a few steps and took up a position with his back to the wall and his hands folded at his waist. I pushed. A set of chimes played “Somewhere Over the Rainbow.” I don’t make these things up.
“Mr. Justice?” A male voice from the other side, with a mild urban accent; but then Madam Sing was an equal-opportunity employer, recruiting her squad of hit men from both sexes and every ethnic quarter. She’d have chosen this one to lull us into a sense of safety. I reached under my coattail and loosened the revolver in its cradle.
Justice cleared his throat and said, “Yes.”
“Please come in.”
I twisted the knob, filled my lungs, and swung open the door.
No one greeted me. No one shot at me, either; but the day was still young and there were plenty of places to hide.
It was a suite reserved for the occasional VIP from Washington or the Vatican, but more frequently for high-rollers, to entice them to stay long enough for the house to get even.
You could have moved my house inside that space without scratching the trim. The walls were a restful eggshell, hung with good reproductions in oil of old masters in gilt frames. A wind-torn scene of the destruction of the Spanish Armada took up most of the wall opposite the door, realistic enough to make you hang over the rail. Table and floor lamps bathed the room in soft glow, studded chairs and sofas invited the visitor to sink into glove leather. A liquid plasma TV the size of a bank mural was bolted to a wall, probably using railroad spikes. There were sprays of flowers and complimentary baskets, bowls of chocolates wrapped in gold foil, premium liquors behind beveled glass cabinet doors; and that was just the sitting room. The bedroom would have a swan-shaped gondola upholstered in hummingbird down and sprinkled with buds from an extinct variety of rose. Instead of a wake-up call, a gimmick attached to the telephone spritzed you with Chanel No. 5.
All Las Vegas, and all fake. The people who design penny arcades put more convincing veneers on diamond rings in claw machines. But it was impressive enough for Detroit, where anyone who drinks Schnapps from a glass is automatically an earl.
For all its gaud it felt like a place that had been abandoned for years. I let my arm fall. I’d been holding it bent, the .38 level, so long it had gone numb. The circulation came back tingling, like an electric current.
I spotted something I should have noticed before, a feature I didn’t think came with the down payment on an overnight stay: A micro-tape player, doubtlessly noise-activated, on a table under the bright copper shotgun-barrel door chimes.
That accounted for the voice that had invited me in. I was alone in the suite, a place where my gun was useless.
I dove for the door; not quite in time to escape the incendiaries that turned the world into a ball of flame.
* * *
The back of my coat was burning. I followed through on the dive, propelled by the force of the explosion, belly-flopped to the hallway floor, and rolled, laying a black streak across the MGM logo for yards. I staggered to my feet, slapped out the last shred of flame, and leaned my shoulder against the wall. Down the hall, smoke poured out of 1700, around the door hanging by one hinge. I hadn’t hit it that hard, although I’d tried; the blast had done the rest. Ahead of me the elevator door was closed. Philip Justice was on his way down, his mission completed.
I took the stairs, as we’re instructed to do in case of fire. Here was where the glamour peeled off; the treads were plain brown rubber, the railing painted flat black, the lights ordinary fluorescents
shedding watery illumination down the well.
I didn’t hurry. I couldn’t outrace the elevator, and just then the railing was my closest friend. I pulled myself along it until my ankles turned from Jell-O back to tendon and bone. Somebody was gasping; the sound echoed off the walls, painted a non-threatening taupe. The somebody was me, and he was still smoldering, filling the place with the stench of burning rags. I stripped out of the coat, let it fall, and stamped on the ashes until they lost their glow. I left it there and moved on.
The tan sole of a polished black shoe showed on the edge of the third landing as I came around the corner. A few more steps and there was a black lisle sock and a narrow patch of white skin showing between the top and a rucked-up cuff belonging to a pair of gray trousers. When you see a foot in that position it’s almost never good news. I stopped descending, gripped the railing with both hands, and stood there waiting for my breathing and heart rate to slow down. When it was clear they wouldn’t, I began moving again.
He lay on his back, as neatly as if he’d been caught beneath the arms and lowered gently to the floor, with one arm lying across his chest and the other angled slightly out from his body. His gray suitcoat was spread open, exposing yellow shirt. Light reflected off the button where it had come to rest on the landing after the thread broke. His hair, normally sleek as a seal’s, was rumpled above the left temple, his head turned slightly to the right and one eye open. In death he was winking at me.
I accepted the challenge. I went down on one knee, not touching him. I’d made a New Year’s resolution to quit stripping corpses or going through their pockets. If whatever had killed him didn’t show itself in a cursory examination, someone else would have to handle that end.
Someone else got a break. Leaning close, I peered at what looked at first like a freckle just below and a little behind his left ear. Something had broken the skin, just a prick, slightly puckered and red around the edge. He might have been stung by a bee. He might have stuck himself with a shirt pin. He might have been bitten by a vampire with one fang. That was the likeliest of the three. You rarely hit the jugular purely by chance.
The Lioness Is the Hunter Page 15
