by James Swain
“The Four Kings is one of the better ones, a member of the ‘All Right to Be Bright Club.' The interior is light and tropical. Old- timers dig the food and the lounge shows. There are some high rollers, but mostly it's just the motor coach market.
“Anyway, the Four Kings has a strict policy about cheating. It's been in force for years, and every crossroader who's ever worked Las Vegas knows about it. If you get caught cheating, they drag you into the back room. And in that back room there's a wall. The wall was originally white, but it hasn't been painted in forever.
“The wall is covered in crossroaders' blood. By the time you leave that room, some of your blood gets added to that wall. That's the deal. If you're new, it's usually just a punch in the mouth. But if they've seen you before, watch out. The Four Kings approach.”
“That's brutal,” she said.
“It is. And you want to know something?”
“What?”
“It works. The Four Kings has been ripped off the least of any casino in Nevada, probably any casino in the world. Don't get me wrong: I'm not advocating beating up criminals. I'm just telling you what works with crossroaders. You have to threaten them, and then you have to be willing to back it up.”
“Is it really necessary?”
He took her hand with both of his. “They killed my best friend, and they tried to kill me. And now they're after you and Eddie. You're goddamned right it's necessary.”
He followed Kat to her daughter's school. Soon Zoe came out. A skinny waif, too much makeup, and a boy's haircut made up the package. She got into the Saturn and immediately started arguing with her mother.
Valentine followed them to the exit for the New Jersey Turnpike. The Saturn went up the long entrance ramp, then stopped. He saw Kat turn and wave good-bye. He waved back.
How Frank Porter had saved his house in Pheasant Run from his ex-wife was one of the great mysteries of New Jersey.
Frank had bought five acres of wooded paradise twenty years before, then saved his dough and built his dream house, a two-story A-frame with a wood deck sitting off the second story. Designed like a Swiss chalet, the house was a favorite gathering place and had hosted many Sunday afternoon football parties.
Valentine inched the Mustang up the long, sloping driveway. Halfway up, he pulled off the road and got out. The underbrush was heavy, and the car got swallowed by the forest.
He knew Frank's schedule about as well as his own. Today, a Friday, was one of Frank's off days. Usually, he stayed at home, tinkering in his shop or working in the yard.
The climb up the gravel driveway got his heart going. The wind was blowing through the trees, creating a thousand whispers. It was strange, but he did not feel apprehensive. The tip of the A-frame appeared above the treetops. Then the rest of the house took shape. Up in Frank's study a light was on.
He went around back and entered the two-car garage.
The door leading into the house was unlocked, and he cracked it an inch. Strains of B.B. King floated through the downstairs. A long time ago, Frank had played a mean blues guitar, then one day upped and quit. New priorities, Valentine remembered him saying.
He walked through the laundry room and into the kitchen. The kitchen had an island in its center, and on it sat a large coin counting machine, with thousands of dollar coin-wrappers arranged neatly behind it.
He walked down a hall and entered Frank's study. The TV set was on, Baywatch competing with B.B. Frank was riding a stationary bike while talking into a cell phone. Their eyes met. Valentine made a hurry-up motion with the .38.
“Got to go,” Porter said into the phone. Then he climbed off the bike. Unshaven, wearing a jogging outfit with sweat pancakes staining both arms, he looked a hundred years old.
“Put the cell phone down,” Valentine said.
“You think I'm going to make a move?”
“You heard me.”
“Sure. Just don't shoot me.”
Porter's desk sat next to the bike. He placed the cell phone on a stack of books, and Valentine saw his fingers imperceptibly twitch. The .38's burp was louder than he expected, like a firecracker exploding in his hand. The bullet tore through the books. Porter jerked his hand into the air.
“Oh, Jesus,” he cried.
Valentine walked around the desk. Hidden behind the books was a .357 Magnum. He made Porter sit on the couch, then pulled up a chair. Porter buried his face in his hands.
While Valentine waited, he stared at the wall behind them. It was covered with autographed sports junk: footballs, baseballs, group pictures of every Super Bowl winner of the past ten years. The last time he'd been in Frank's house, none of it had been there.
“Tell me why you did it,” Valentine said.
Porter reached for the box of Kleenex sitting on a side table. He stopped when he saw the .38's barrel move.
“Real slow,” Valentine said.
He tugged a Kleenex out of the box and blew his nose. “That's a good question. The money, I guess. That, and it was a sure thing.”
“How is stealing a sure thing?”
“It is when you're stealing from a crook.”
“You mean Archie?”
Porter nodded. “Brandi approached me last summer. She said Archie was skimming money off The Bombay. I said, ‘So what?' and she said, ‘He's vulnerable. We can rip him off, and he won't call the cops.' So I said, ‘Who's we?' and she said, ‘Everybody on the graveyard shift.' ”
“So you were the last in.”
Porter blew his nose again. “Yes. I don't know if I would have gone along if so many people weren't involved. But I did.”
“How does the Desert Storm gang fit into this?”
Porter looked surprised. “You did your homework.”
“Answer me.”
“The Desert Storm gang is the core of the group. It includes Sparky, Brandi, Gigi, and Monique. They do the legwork, like getting the money out of The Bombay and laundering it. They also keep everyone else in line.”
“And they're the ones making the bombs.”
“Yes.”
“Whose idea was it to make the Croatians into patsies?”
“Mine. Just in case something went wrong, we could point the finger at them.”
“Was it your idea to buy a white van that looked like theirs?”
Porter nodded. “But then they started bleeding us, so I had a bright idea. I wanted to see if Archie really was scared of the police, so I hired Doyle, knowing he'd sniff out the Croatians right away. Doyle did, and I told Archie.”
“And Archie told you to keep the cops out of it.”
“Uh-huh.”
Valentine rose. “Get up.”
“Where are we going?”
“To have a talk with the district attorney.”
Porter remained sitting. “You're not going to help me out?”
“No.”
“I thought we were friends . . .”
“Get up,” Valentine repeated.
A funny look flickered across Porter's face. Like he was adding up his options. Then his hand dove under the cushion. Valentine shot him in the chest.
Porter flew over the chair, his legs going straight up into the air. An automatic pistol fell out of the cushion and onto the floor. Valentine crossed himself, then walked around the chair. Kneeling, he pulled back Porter's sweatshirt. He was wearing a Kevlar vest, the slug lodged in the indestructible material.
There was a bottle of Evian in the drink holder on the bike. He poured it on Porter's face. His friend blinked awake.
“Two guns. You expecting someone?”
Lying on his back, Porter nodded.
“Double-cross your partners?”
His friend didn't say anything.
“I'd like to meet them.”
“No, you wouldn't,” Porter said.
He marched Porter downstairs to the basement and tied him to a support beam with a piece of rope. “I want to know how Archie's skimming The Bombay.”
&
nbsp; Porter was sweating profusely. “You and everybody else.”
“You don't know?”
He shook his head. “It's Brandi's ace in the hole. If the gang gets busted, she'll turn state's evidence and use it as leverage.”
“She tell you that?”
“Fuck, no,” Porter said, “I figured it out myself.”
“One more question.”
“What.”
“Who killed Doyle?”
Porter looked at the concrete basement floor.
“Don't ask me that,” he said.
Valentine considered pistol-whipping him. Or beating him up. Only this was Porter, a guy he'd known for over twenty years.
Instead, he went upstairs and searched the house. In the master bedroom he found a suitcase packed with tropical clothes. On the dresser, a ticket to Guatemala and a passport.
He dumped out the suitcase and ripped open its walls. Stacks of hundred dollar bills spilled out. He marched down the basement stairs clutching the money to his chest. Opening the furnace, he fed a stack to the flames.
“Tony, please don't do that,” Porter begged him.
“Who killed Doyle?”
Porter stared at the money, then back at him.
“I want the name of the person who detonated the bomb that killed my partner,” Valentine said.
“They wouldn't tell me who did it.”
Valentine fed the rest of the money to the flames.
Porter's driveway was over a quarter-mile long, most of it on an incline. Valentine walked to where his rental was parked and slipped into the forest. Finding a stump, he sat down, then laid the double-barreled shotgun he'd found in Frank's closet on the ground.
Twenty minutes later when the white van appeared at the bottom of Porter's driveway, he was deep in thought.
Of the scores of hustlers he'd busted over the years, only a handful had ever tried to kill him, and that was to avoid going back to prison. But the majority hadn't put up a fight. He supposed it had to do with the fact that they were professional criminals, a group that, for the most part, had few illusions about life. Amateurs were different when it came to crime. They had dreams, and were often willing to kill to keep those dreams alive.
The van came up the hill at a fast clip, its occupants hidden behind the tinted windshield. When it was a hundred yards away, he picked up the shotgun, and stepped into its path.
The squealing of brakes echoed across Pheasant Run. He raised the shotgun and aimed at the windshield. Then hesitated. The van retreated, its back end swerving first to the left, then to the right. Lowering the barrel, he shot out both front tires.
The driver lost control. Valentine watched the van veer off the drive and go crashing through the forest. Flipping on its side, it started to roll. He entered the forest to the sound of screams.
Two hundred yards off to his left, the van lay upside down, its tires spinning furiously. The windshield had imploded and thousands of silver dollars had spilled out, engulfing the car's occupants.
The coins were so thick he had to clear a path. Seeing a hand, he dug until he was looking at an upside down face. It was Monique. Her mouth was open, her eyes lifeless.
He dug some more and found Gigi behind the wheel, her pretty face sheeted in blood. Her eyelids fluttered.
“Help me,” she whispered.
Valentine checked her pulse. It was good and strong. He was no doctor, but had a feeling she'd make it if an ambulance got to her before the bitter cold did her in. Her eyes opened wide.
“Please,” she whispered.
Kneeling, he brought his lips next to her ear.
“Who killed Doyle Flanagan?”
“I can't . . .”
“Tell me.”
“Will you help . . .”
“Tell me.”
She whispered a name in his ear. Rising, he started to walk out of the forest and back to his rental.
“Please . . .” she called after him.
The wind whistled through the trees, their branches carrying the words to a song. She's as sweet as Tupelo Honey. She's as sweet as honey from a bee. He knew every word by heart, because Doyle had sung that song every day of his life. He felt his hands start to tremble and realized it had nothing to do with the cold.
37
Bally's
You know what a pack rat Doyle was,” Liddy said.
Valentine stood in the foyer of Liddy's house, staring at a pile of Doyle's stuff in the middle of the living room floor that she was about to throw away. It was stuff he could relate to. Old record albums, bundled copies of Life magazine, and an old wooden tennis racket in a frame.
“I want you to go out of town for a few days.”
Liddy frowned. “I'm not ready for that, Tony.”
“I think you'd better. I found out who's ripping off The Bombay.”
She sat down on the couch, a pained look on her face.
“Is it bad?”
“Yes,” he said.
Liddy had a cousin in Vermont. She wrote the phone number on a piece of paper and gave it to him. Valentine promised to call as soon as he could. She walked him to the door. Then said, “Wait,” and returned a few moments later holding a fax. “The dry cleaner found this in Doyle's jacket.”
He slipped his bifocals on. It was a purchase order for fifty Series E Micro-Processor–Controlled Slot Machines from Bally's Gaming in Nevada, the largest manufacturer of slots in the world.
“Can I keep this?”
“Of course.”
He stuffed the fax into his pocket and gave her a hug.
He drove to the Philadelphia airport and dropped his rental off. He found Kat sitting on a bench next to the Delta ticket counter, her daughter in a nearby arcade playing video games.
“I need a cigarette,” he said.
Next to the arcade was a special glassed-in room for smokers. He'd always looked down his nose at the people who sat in such places, puffing away furiously, and now he found himself sharing a bench with a couple of diehards. Kat sat beside him, holding his hand.
Zoe sauntered in. “Are you my mother's new boyfriend?”
Valentine hemmed and hawed. The French probably had some cute word for his relationship with Kat, but the English language was void of such niceties.
“That's me,” he said.
“Aren't you a little old?”
“Zoe!”
She stared at her mother. “You know what they call these rooms?”
“No, honey, I don't.”
“Nicotine aquariums.”
She kept up the monologue all the way to the Delta ticket counter. Valentine inquired about the next flight to Tampa. The ticket agent said, “How about right now?”
Valentine looked at the big board above the agent's head. The noon flight to Tampa hadn't left. The agent explained the situation.
“The plane needed some repairs. Nothing serious. I can still get all three of you on.”
“I also need to go to Palm Beach,” Valentine said.
“That's the Tampa flight's final destination,” the agent said.
Valentine laid his credit card on the counter.
“How much luggage?” the agent asked.
“None,” he said.
“Why are we going to Florida without any luggage?” Zoe wanted to know when they were seated in the very last row. The plane had been sitting at the gate for hours and was filled with the living dead.
Kat patted her daughter's arm. “Well, honey, Tony asked me so suddenly, I just didn't have time to pack.”
The pilot came over the PA and announced that it would be another ten minutes before they left. A collective groan filled the cabin. Kat and Zoe started to spar, the little girl masterful at pushing her mother's buttons. Borrowing Kat's cell phone, Valentine ducked into the lavatory. He dialed Mabel's number.
“Oh Tony, you're not going to believe what happened,” his neighbor said.
“What?”
“I took your advice and calle
d my neighbor. He came over and rescued me from Cujo. Actually, he just opened the back door, and the dog ran out.
“Well, everything was fine until an hour ago. I was in the kitchen fixing a cup of tea. I was standing at the stove when I heard this sound. Like a rat gnawing at wood. It was coming from the back door, so I ducked down. Then I heard a voice. It was a man and he was swearing under his breath, saying motherf***ing this and motherf***ing that, like it was the first word he'd ever learned. And then it hit me. It was a burglar. Well, you'll never guess what happened next.”
“A cop showed up.”
“Be serious!”
“Your neighbor came to your rescue.”
“Strike two.”
“For Christ's sake, what happened?”
“Cujo rescued me. He was in the backyard and came flying through the bushes. He attached himself to the burglar's butt, and they went dancing down the street.”
There was a knock on the bathroom door. He opened it. Zoe stood outside, her legs crossed.
“You gonna stay in there all day?”
“Sure am.”
Valentine shut the door. Then said, “Mabel, I wanted to tell you something.”
“What's that?” his neighbor said.
“I met a woman, and she's coming home with me. I wanted you to know.”
For a moment he thought Mabel had hung up on him.
“Does that mean I can't work for you anymore?” she asked.
Valentine felt a lump in his throat.
“No, of course not.”
“I need to do something with my life,” Mabel said. “I admire you for doing something with yours. I just hope this situation won't turn into one where I can't work for you anymore.”
“It won't,” he said.
“Is that a promise?”
“Yes.”
“Thank you,” she said. “Should I meet you at the airport?”
Valentine smiled into the phone.
“That would be great.”
The pilot came over the PA and told everyone to get into their seats. Zoe was still outside when he unlatched the lavatory door.
“Asshole,” she muttered, hurtling past him.
He took his seat and buckled up. Kat was looking out the little window at a man on the tarmac waving orange flags at the pilot. She glanced his way. “You were gone awhile.”
