Fast and Loose

by Fern Michaels

  “Five minutes,” Abner said.

  “Me too,” Mary Alice said.

  The minute Abner and Mary Alice rolled their chairs backward, Phil let loose with a whoop of pleasure that sounded like a war drum. The kids burst out laughing.

  “Kids, we just crossed the Rubicon. We need to take a break. I have some excellent flavored coffee that’s better than any dessert. Want some?”

  Abner and Mary Alice said they did as they trooped behind Phil to the kitchen.

  “Damn, that was exhilarating!” Phil said as he ground coffee beans, then prepared the pot. “These past two hours were more rewarding than the day I stole my first nineteen dollars from Babylon. I didn’t think anything could beat that moment in time. I was wrong. What about you two?”

  Abner grinned. “It’s not quite the same for us, Phil. We’re just cleaning up your mess. What I personally found rewarding is that the three of us are working together to right a wrong that you committed. That’s what friends do for each other. If any of those casinos ever figure this out, one thing is absolutely sure—it will never be made public.”

  “They’ll never figure it out. Trust me,” Phil said emphatically. The kids believed him implicitly.

  “I bet that’s what you said the first time you helped yourself to their money, and yet here we are,” Mary Alice said.

  “Yes, but by accident. The human factor, which you so aptly pointed out, intervened, Abner. You never did figure out how I did it. Therein lies the difference.”

  “So we’re on target here?” Mary Alice asked.

  “We are on target, Mary Alice Farmer.” Phil smiled, and the smile wasn’t rusty at all this morning.

  The guy is having the time of his life, Abner thought. Just the thought made him feel good, which was really strange. For one brief second, he thought of all the friends he’d left behind back at Babylon. And then the anger started to choke him off. He got up to refill his coffee cup to shake away the ugly memory of how he’d exploded. Water under the bridge now.

  “Hurry up, kids, if you want to stay on target. We’ll break for lunch at twelve thirty. I’ll heat up the leftovers. Thirty minutes for lunch and we go back at it. As soon as we knock off the big casinos, the rest will go quickly. If we stay on target, I think we’ll be done by six o’clock.”

  “Then what do we do, Phil?” Mary Alice asked hesitantly.

  “I never like to make rash decisions, Mary Alice. Ask me again at six o’clock, and I’ll have an answer for you. If you’re ready, let’s make the world right again.” Phil clapped Abner on the shoulder. Abner felt warm all over. He likened the gesture to what a son would have felt had his father given him a pat on the back, even though he’d never experienced that particular feeling.

  He smiled up at Phil, who just grinned from ear to ear. “Phil, you are a true Renaissance man!”

  “If you say so,” Phil said and laughed so hard, his whole body shook. He looked over at Mary Alice, who was giggling, and winked at her.

  Whoa again, Abner thought.

  * * *

  Maggie woke up feeling meaner than a bear with its foot caught in a trap. She took another shower, brushed her teeth, and did her best to tame her wild hair. At the latter, she only partially succeeded.

  What to do? Should she go to MGM and register for her comped room or stay here? She had to go to Charles’s suite and explain what was going on. And she needed to find out why Dixson Kelly had been at Charles’s suite. She thought about Abner as she got dressed, tears blurring her vision. She and Abner had a history going way back. He’d always been a true friend. A true-blue friend. Where was he, and what was he doing? More to the point, what was he feeling?

  Satisfied that she looked as good as possible under the circumstances, Maggie left the suite and headed down the hall to Charles’s suite. She banged on the door with her clenched fist. Jack Sparrow opened the door, a wary look in his eye. He stepped aside to allow Maggie to enter the room. To Maggie, it looked the same as it had five hours ago, when she had left to go to her room.

  Maggie narrowed her eyes as she looked around at the people she thought of as family, a disgusted look on her face. Her foot was back in the bear trap when she demanded to know what Dixson Kelly had wanted. “And what is Bert Navarro saying? Has anyone heard from Abner, or are you all just writing him off? Because”—and she jabbed a finger at the center of the room—“because if you are, write me off, too. Somebody say something and quick, before I shove my foot up someone’s butt. Now is good!”

  Charles, as their leader, stepped forward. “Mr. Kelly stopped by to see if there was anything we needed. He also wanted to let us know he has been unable to reach Mr. Navarro and wondered if we had been in touch. It was pleasant and cordial, but he left after only ten minutes. And, in case no one told you, the search of his condo in town by Mr. Snowden’s people revealed nothing out of the ordinary, with the exception of seventeen more burner phones. Past relationships in which he also assigned phones to his ladies, from what we were able to gather. He appears to keep his MO the same. Clothing, sports equipment, that’s all we found in the closets. We’ve discussed the possibility of trying to gain entrance to the penthouse apartment owned by Philonias Needlemeyer, the man Mr. Kelly met in the Tiki Bar. It’s a thread, but we haven’t attached it to a needle yet. Mr. Snowden is working on that.

  “We have repeatedly tried to reach Bert, with no success. The calls all go straight to voice mail. I feel as bad as you do about Abner. I don’t know what to tell you. We didn’t do anything differently than we did on other missions. We followed our own rules. Abner . . . although he is one of us, stepped off the grid. He did, Maggie, and it pains me to have to say it. Yes, he did help us. Yes, he did warn us that RCHood would have left no trail of bread crumbs to follow. There is no doubt that he had conflicting loyalties. We should have taken that into consideration and allowed for it. We did not, I’m sorry to say.

  “At this time, actually since the moment he walked out of here, Abner has been unreachable. He either took the batteries out of his phones or trashed them. The CIA one-of-a-kind prototype that Mr. Snowden issued to us is junk now. RCHood sent Avery a text telling him he was the one who designed the phone for the CIA. He’s been onto us all along. That about sums it up, Maggie. I’m sorry. We all regret the way it went down. None of us wanted things to end up like this.”

  “Where do you think he went?” Maggie demanded.

  “This is just a guess on my part, but since PIP had no money or ID, Abner is probably driving her back to Arizona, after which he’ll head back home,” Avery Snowden said. “Like I said, a guess. For all we know, he could have headed for Disney.”

  Dennis stepped forward. “I don’t think so. I admit I don’t know Abner as well as you all do, but I think I know him well enough to say I think he and PIP put their heads together out of necessity and figured out where and how to get in touch with RCHood. I think they are on their way to wherever he is right now. Or they have already arrived at his location. They found something, a clue, but when they found it, they weren’t aware of what it meant. I also think it came after the blowup. If I’m right, and it was after, Abner would not feel duty bound to share that information.”

  Ted shook his head. “You know what, kid? You never cease to amaze me. I think you are spot on here, and that’s exactly what happened.”

  “I think you’re on the money, Dennis,” Harry said as he winked at him.

  Jack Emery looked more miserable than anyone else in the room. “Let’s say I agree with you, and I do. Then where does that leave us? Nowhere. Abner is not going to turn in his mentor. I sure as hell wouldn’t if I were Abner. I cannot believe how badly this all got so screwed up on a Bert Navarro whim. I don’t think I have ever felt as stupid as I do right now in my whole life. Don’t look at me like that. You’re all just as stupid as I am,” he said savagely.

  “Have you tried calling him again?” Sparrow asked.

  “Yeah, a half hour ago. Call g
oes straight to voice mail,” Jack said.

  “Keep trying. Let’s give some thought to calling one of the other casinos over there and asking around. Maybe there’s a power problem. Does anyone know Bert’s counterparts at the other casinos?”

  “Yeah, actually, I do. Let me give it a whirl,” Jack said, then moved off to make the call in an area that was a little less vocal and hostile.

  “I believe you might have something to tell us, do you not, Maggie? You left in such a tizzy earlier, we didn’t have time to talk,” Charles said.

  Her foot still in the bear trap, Maggie talked breathlessly about her night out at Kitty Passion’s ranch. And about her move to MGM. “I need to go over there and sign in. But I’ll rumple up the bed to make it look like I’m staying there, and then I’ll come back here.”

  “No need for you to do that, Maggie. One of my operatives can step in for you and at the same time browse around to get the lay of the land, in case you are being set up,” Snowden said.

  Maggie took her foot out of the bear trap and said, “I didn’t even think about that. Good catch, Mr. Snowden.”

  “Maggie, my dear, did you get any sense at all that those ladies were perhaps leading you on, or were they dead serious? Wishful thinking sort of thing. Robbing an armored car just for fun is not something anyone with half a brain would try to pull off,” Charles said.

  “As serious as a heart attack. Forty or so women with half brains still results in twenty whole brains. They have it all worked out. Trust me, they’re going to do it. The big question is, do we do something about it or let them go for it? They said they were going to give it back. True or false? I don’t know. Saying it, then seeing millions of dollars in hand, if they’re successful, might make them think they could actually get away with it. Make no mistake. They definitely want Kelly to pay for trifling with their affections. You know that old saying, ‘Nothing is impossible when it comes to a scorned woman,’ and if you multiply that by forty, you don’t need to be a rocket scientist to know the outcome.”

  “What’s your role in all this? Did you throw up any red flags?” Sparrow asked.

  Maggie sighed and went over it all again, from her story about Jack being her brother and getting fired right down to her torrid pretend affair with Kelly and relocating to MGM. “I think I’m golden. My story was every bit as good as theirs. And I’m the most recent, so it might have carried some extra weight. I’m just waiting for one of the women to get in touch with me to tell me if it’s a go, give me the time, date, and so on.

  “By the way, if you’re serious about getting into Kelly’s room, who is going to shut down the video surveillance that’s in the hallways? Abner did it the last time. You can’t just hit it and steal his phones, unless you rob a few of the other apartments. Ah, already I can see by your expressions that you’re feeling Abner’s loss. Serves you right,” Maggie said bitterly. Her foot was back in the bear trap.

  “I didn’t know we were going to heist the phones,” Sparrow said. “I think Ted and I can handle that, if need be.”

  Ted nodded, until Maggie shot him a look that froze him on the spot.

  Sparrow saw the look and said, “Or not. Why do you want the phones?”

  “My contribution to the armored-car gig. I was going to have Abner backstop some text messages to the girls proving Kelly was behind the heist. To solidify my position, in case any of them had second thoughts about me and my sudden involvement.”

  “I can do that,” Snowden said.

  Maggie yanked her foot out of the bear trap and said, “Then do it!”

  Snowden looked at Charles to see what his orders were. Charles nodded. Snowden and Sparrow moved off just as Jack returned to the sitting area.

  “I finally got hold of Bert,” Jack reported. “He said power was down, rabble-rousers, a storm, Chinese Internet shot to hell, and about a dozen other things. He’s up and mobile again. I brought him up to date. I have to say he gave me a very hard time. He says he is not wrong. He knows what he knows, and someone took the money. He is going to fax me momentarily all his notes. And he is, as we speak, going back into the account and starting over. He’s going to call us. It’s almost eleven o’clock our time. I’m sure we’ll hear something by one, at the latest.

  “Listen, I didn’t have any breakfast, so I’m going out to hospitality to get some lunch. I need to think. Bert would not budge. He says he knows what he’s talking about, and he is not wrong. He was hopping mad when he hung up, in case anyone cares.”

  “Well, I certainly do not care,” Maggie snapped. “This whole thing is nothing but one fiasco after another. This kind of thing never happens when the girls are on a mission. Never!” she said vehemently.

  That declaration sent everyone scurrying for cover. If they had been a pack of cats, their tails would have been between their legs.

  Out in the hospitality area, Jack was oblivious to the tantalizing odors wafting about. Some kind of pasta with a garlic sauce, he thought as he walked over to the sun-darkened window. It looked like another beautiful day out there. He could see Harry’s reflection in the window.

  “That bad, huh?” Harry said.

  “Yeah. I don’t know what to do or what to think, Harry. Kind of a first for me.”

  “It’s a hot mess, all right. What is your gut telling you where Bert is concerned?”

  “He believes a hundred percent in everything he told us. He’s also pissed to the teeth that we even doubted him for a minute. I’m going to tell Charles to hire the best forensic accounting firm in Vegas and have them take a crack at it. Other than that, I am coming up dry. Maggie hit my last nerve with that comment about the girls and how this never would have happened if this were their mission. Is she right, Harry?”

  Harry shrugged. “We’re not the sisters. Our DNA is a little different. Ask yourself how many times we, meaning us boys, rushed to their aid when things got sticky for them. Kind of apples and oranges. The end result is what is going to count once we get to the finish line. The end justifying the means. All for the betterment of . . . what?”

  “Harry . . . an armored-car robbery! All because a bunch of women got emotionally involved with a . . . What should we call Kelly? A lothario, a Romeo, a lover of ladies? They want him to spend ten or twenty years in jail for breaking their hearts! The scary thing here is I can actually see them pulling it off and Kelly doing the perp walk. I’m all for slipping him Lizzie Fox’s business card to give him a heads-up. This is just crazy, Harry. And let’s not forget that Maggie is now in it up to her eyeballs because she went off the rails. None of that mess has anything to do with why we came here.”

  Harry fished a handful of seeds out of his pocket and shoved them in his mouth. “I’m going to get some tea. You want anything?”

  “Yeah, a Sprite.”

  “Jack, I know you well enough to know everything you just said is nothing we can’t handle. What has your knickers in a knot is Abner. Admit it, and we can go on from there. He’s like a brother. The guy does not have a mean or disloyal bone in his body.”

  “Enough already, okay, Harry? I get it. And you’re right. I told you when you appeared out of nowhere that I don’t know what to do. I’m trying to think. I want to make this right. Especially for Abner. I just don’t know how to do it. Yet. I’m waiting for an epiphany.”

  Harry walked to the opposite side of the hospitality area to get a cup of tea and the Sprite that Jack had requested. Upon his return he handed Jack his drink and said, “We should pack up and go home.”

  “If we do that, then we failed. I don’t like that word. I never did. It is not a word that I will ever come to like. Our answers are out there. We just aren’t looking in the right place.” Jack set his glass down and sent off a text to Charles, asking him to bring in a team of forensic accountants. Then he sent off another text to Bert, advising him to authorize the order for Charles. Then he sent off a second text to Charles, telling him to offer to pay double to the firm if they started i
mmediately. “Okay, that’s a start. See, Harry? My epiphany is just around the corner. I think I’m hungry now. You want something?”

  Harry shook his head and poured another handful of seeds, and some sprouts, directly into his mouth this time. He looked at his watch to see the time.

  Both men whirled around at the speed of light when they heard someone in the hall. Charles and Fergus. They both relaxed.

  “A twelve-man team will be here within the hour. I’ve been trying to reach Mr. Kelly, but he is not picking up. Bert okayed the firm and even told me whom to call and whom to ask for. His name carries some weight here. Bert said they can set up shop in conference room three. They are prepared to work through the night, if need be,” Charles said.

  “Maggie?” Jack asked.

  “Texting a mile a minute. To whom, I have no idea. One of Snowden’s operatives left for MGM to register Maggie. Ted, Sparrow, and Avery are working on the surveillance. Avery and one of the operatives will do the actual breaking and entering. They’re only going to have a thirty-minute window. I say that because I don’t think we can keep Mr. Kelly in the conference room with the accountants any longer than thirty minutes. Does Bert plan on bringing Mr. Kelly into the loop, or didn’t he say?”

  “He didn’t say, Charles. He was too busy venting at me and being pissed off at the same time. It’s almost time for him to call, so you can ask him yourself,” Jack said, irritation ringing in his voice.

  Jack risked a glance at Harry, who was studying his cuticles with clinical interest. Jack knew he was listening intently to the exchange and would voice an opinion when he was ready, just not when one would expect him to. Harry was a strange duck at times.

  Time crawled forward as the gang trickled into the hospitality area to help themselves to lunch, which the chef had left in warming trays. Conversation was nonexistent.

  An hour past Bert’s deadline, Jack’s cell rang. He looked up to see everyone staring at him. He clicked on and immediately held the phone away from his ear. The others backed off accordingly as Bert vented yet again, cursing and yelling and saying he wasn’t crazy and asking what in the damn hell they all did. “All those hours I put in, all those notes I took, all shot to friggin’ hell, Jack! Are you listening to me? Everything is different now. It adds up! Well, that’s not quite true. There seems to be . . . more . . . an overage.”