by Cassie Cole
“Do you think you can distract him for longer than a few seconds?” I asked.
“Maybe. Okay, probably not. Especially if he’s in a hurry.”
“I’d have a better shot,” Eddie said with a sigh. “I could come up with a security related problem.”
“Like the fact that four casino employees just stole his dirty money?” I said with a big grin. “That would distract him nicely.” Xander chuckled, but he was the only one.
“I don’t know,” Eddie said. “Something about the helicopter maybe. I could tell him the delivery guys want to talk to him. I don’t know if he’d believe that.”
Bryce said, “What about a commotion on the casino floor? A big fight, slot machines knocked over, yelling and screaming.”
“How do you propose we arrange that?” Eddie demanded. “We’d need to bring others into the plan.”
“We could hire some bums to fight,” Xander said. “Like that kid on YouTube a few years back.”
Eddie was shaking his head the whole time. “Say you pay some hobos $100 to start a fight. And say it works, distracting Yegorovich for a few minutes to buy us the time we need to flee the casino normally. Once they do realize the money has been stolen, they’ll probably start asking questions. All it takes is a little pressure and those guys we paid to start the fight will sing like Sinatra.”
“It’s a shitty option, but it’s better than nothin’.”
“Maybe we don’t distract Yegorovich at all,” I chimed in. “Switch the crates, finish our shifts, and pray they don’t lock down the entire casino before we escape.”
“That’s just as bad of a plan,” Eddie said.
“Yeah, that’s my point. It’s just as bad of an option, but at least then we’re not bringing new people into things.”
“If we go the fight route, we could just use Bryce instead of two hobos,” Xander said. “Run inside, pick a fight, cause the distraction.”
“What part of not getting my ass kicked are you not understanding?”
“Heck, you could just attack Yegorovich directly,” Xander said. “Then he’s bound to take you to the back room to exact some revenge.”
“That’s worse! That’s way worse!”
“I’m only half joking…”
I could feel it all falling apart. The risk of the job had skyrocketed since this morning, and it was already pretty risky to begin with. I looked from one man to the next. Xander’s too-easy smile making jokes about the situation and insisting Bryce martyr himself to distract Yegorovich. Eddie’s hard, serious face focused on thinking of a solution. Poor Bryce, his beautiful face marred by his black eye and cheek—although the frozen peas were helping to bring down the swelling.
The looks on their faces told me they were close to walking away from the job. And try as I might, I couldn’t disagree with them.
My phone buzzed in my clutch. I glanced at it—just an email. I started to put it away but I caught a glimpse of the sender:
[email protected].
I swiped to open it. There were no words, just a PDF of a scanned formal document. Four paragraphs of legal jargon.
“Guys,” I said. “We’ve got a bigger problem.”
28
Bryce
I couldn’t believe that I was the one who fucked it all up. The guilt was enormous while I sat in the jail cell waiting for Xander to post bail, and it had only grown since then. I had let everyone down. I wanted to jump in front of a bus. Sure, the plan was still vaguely viable, but we were losing steam.
And then Sage gave us even worse news.
“We’ve got a bigger problem,” she said, tossing her phone onto the table with disgust. “I just lost my job.”
“What!”
“They’re claiming I harassed Zeke,” she said. “That a formal complaint has been made against me, and I’ve been let go while they investigate what happened.”
I grabbed the phone and read the email. “Fuck. They’re essentially trying to stonewall you from pressing charges. Cut you loose, threaten their own legal action, hope it all goes away. They’ll probably send you a settlement offer in a day or two.”
“We’re droppin’ like flies,” Xander said.
I closed my eyes and rubbed the bridge of my nose. This was all my fault. $16 million up in smoke thanks to one impulsive punch.
The others passed around the phone to read the email. Eddie made a face like he’d bitten into something foul.
“Alright, who wants to say it?” Xander dramatically looked at his watch. “Time of death: 1:15am.”
Eddie leaned his head back and stared at the ceiling. “It’s too much to overcome for sure. Two of us can’t do the job.”
“It was a fun ride,” Sage said with a hopeful smile. “Even if we don’t walk away with the money…”
We were so close. Two days from the job and I’d ruined it. Over a stupid ass-grab.
“Do we report them to the authorities?” Sage asked. “The least we can do is bring the bad guys down, right?”
“Are you willing to testify against the Russian mob?” Eddie asked. “You’ll be put in witness protection during the trial.”
“Probably the rest of your life,” I said.
“Oh,” sage said. “It’s, um, tough to be a professional singer if I’m hidden away in Wyoming or something.”
“I wouldn’t mind being a cattle rancher,” Xander mused. “Just the open field ahead and the open sky above.”
“Nothing is stopping you from doing that right now,” Eddie said. “Go nuts, pal.”
“Well, money is stoppin’ me.”
While they went back and forth, Sage put her hand on mine. “It’s lost in all this, but I’m sorry you won’t be playing in the Volga Diamond Poker Classic. I know that was important to you, and that you tried really hard to get in.”
Among all the losses, I hadn’t thought about that. But Sage had. She cared about my personal dreams. She noticed how hard I’d worked.
I squeezed her hand back. Thanks.”
“Maybe you can wear a fake mustache and glasses?” she joked. “Sneak into the tournament that way?”
“With my face looking like this, I can probably get through the security camera facial recognition,” I laughed. “And you joke, but there’s no name or photo ID on my tournament ticket. I could totally sneak in with a disguise.”
“Pull a Mrs. Doubtfire,” she said. “How’s your English accent? With your fair features I bet you could pull off the old lady look.”
“That’s the weirdest compliment anyone has ever given me,” I said. “So is Mrs. Doubtfire the rom com you’re going to make us watch after Indiana Jones?”
“Hey, I never said it would be a rom com! But you can do a lot worse than Robin Williams in drag.”
I started to laugh, then trailed off.
The tournament ticket. I received it in the mail but there wasn’t anything to say it was in my name.
Holy shit. There was another way.
“Bryce?” Sage said, leaning forward to peer into my face. “What’s wrong?”
“It’s you,” I said. “You can join the tournament in my place.”
“I can do what now?”
“Eddie!” I asked, interrupting his conversation with Xander. “I’m on the blacklist. Would they add a waitress who was fired?”
“I doubt it. They try to keep the blacklist for big offenders. If they added every employee who was fired the list would be a mile long.”
“Bryce,” Sage said, a terrified look in her eyes. “I’ve never played poker.”
“It’s easy. I can teach you.” I turned to the others. “The job isn’t dead yet. Sage can use my ticket to enter the poker tournament on Saturday.”
Eddie and Xander shared a long look.
“Maybe you got a concussion when Zeke went to town on you,” Eddie said, “so I’ll speak slowly so you can understand. The point of joining the tournament was to get to the final table and distract Yegorovich. Th
at was already a difficult task for an expert poker player like you. It would be impossible for Sage. And,” he added, “even if she gets to the final table she doesn’t have the rivalry with Yegorovich that you had. It would be tougher for her to coax him into staying.”
I waited patiently while he laid out the roadblocks. I’d already considered them and had solutions.
“The most important part of poker is reading your opponents,” I said calmly. “Sage can wear an ear piece. I’ll watch her opponents, learn their tells. I can feed her information on who is bluffing and who isn’t. Walking her through the process.”
“Dude, we were just talking about the blacklist,” Eddie said. “You can’t set foot in the Volga without big Russians breaking your kneecaps. Are you sure you’re okay? I was joking about the concussion, but…”
“The tournament is streamed online,” I explained. “Live feeds of every single table! I can watch there and tell Sage what to do.”
“There’ll be a delay online. A couple of seconds,” Xander pointed out.
“Better than nothing.”
Sage was chewing it over. “You can feed info to me, but I won’t be able to respond. How will you know what cards I have?”
“Yeah, that’s the downside,” I admitted. “I’ll have no idea what you’re holding. So we’ll need to teach you some of the poker basics so you can make some decisions on your own.”
“You can teach me that in less than two days?”
“If it means we still have a shot at the money, absolutely. It’ll be like cramming for a college exam.”
“But you flunked out of college,” she said.
“Hey, I voluntarily stopped going to class,” I said. “There’s a difference. Besides, I stopped going so that I could play online poker full time. This is my wheelhouse. I’m certain I can teach you the ropes before Saturday.”
“Let’s say Sage becomes rain man in the next 24 hours,” Eddie said. “We’re still missing an important part of the job: someone to accidentally crash into the other money guard.”
Xander removed his cowboy hat and placed it carefully on the table. “I might have a solution to that. It involves some new people, but they won’t know about the plan.”
“Good lord,” Eddie grumbled.
“If you can get me to the final table,” I said. “How am I supposed to distract Yegorovich?”
“We’ll have to brainstorm, sure,” I said. I paused to look around the table, willing them to have as much faith in the plan as I did. “But can we all agree we still have a shot here? That it’s not doomed?”
One by one they nodded. Eddie was last, but his nod was emphatic. “I don’t want my recruitment into their inner circle to go to waste. Let’s do it.”
“Let’s do it,” Sage agreed.
29
Sage
I can’t do it, I thought.
What on earth was Bryce thinking? Throwing me into a huge Texas Hold’Em tournament with a day’s worth of practice? Even ignoring the million dollar purse, the pressure of such a thing would cripple me. I had an awful poker face. Heck, I struggled to keep a straight face when playing simple card games like Uno or Bullshit.
But I didn’t want to be the one to say no. And I was the only one on the team that could take his place in the tournament.
There were still some serious roadblocks. Security might decide that I’m not allowed in the casino after all. I had to play well enough to get to the final table. And then, assuming all of that, I had to find a way to get under Yegorovich’s skin and delay him from checking on the money delivery. And those were just the ones in my court. Eddie still might not get assigned a shift moving the money from the helicopter to S3. Xander needed to find a way to distract the other guard. And then, if everything fell perfectly into place, he needed to smoothly switch the carts without the guard noticing.
Way too many things could go wrong. Yet we were in better spirits as we left the diner because our plan was still viable. Held together with duct tape and string, sure, but viable nonetheless.
“You can ride with me,” Eddie said. “That way you’re not cramped between those two losers.”
“Hey,” Bryce said.
“That’d be great,” I said.
We drove in silence for a few minutes.
“Two days isn’t much time to become a Texas Hold’Em expert,” he finally said.
I gave a nervous laugh. “Even with Bryce whispering advice in my ear, I doubt I’ll get far.”
“I didn’t want to sound like I was doubting you!” Eddie said. “But that’s a lot of pressure.”
“Way too much pressure.”
“But if anyone can stay cool during the tournament, it’s you,” he added. “I believe in you.”
“Thanks,” I said. Then, remembering his phone call, I added, “Do you have anything else going on Saturday?”
“Uhh, no,” he said carefully, looking at me sideways. “Why do you ask?”
Should I push him more? Admit that I’d overheard him on the phone? I wondered how he would react to that. Despite my growing feelings for Eddie, I didn’t know him well. Not really.
“I was just wondering,” I said, trying to think of an excuse. “Maybe you want to watch part of the poker tournament? It would be comforting knowing I had someone in the audience rooting for me.”
“Well I have my shift,” he said. “But it shouldn’t start until 2:00, so I could watch the first two hours of the tournament.”
“I’d like that,” I said.
“Good.” He rubbed his jaw and said, “So are you going to be spending all morning Saturday cramming with Bryce? Playing cards?”
“I would imagine so. I’ve never played Texas Hold’Em before. Literally never! I sort of know the rules about the cards, but the part where you bet chips goes way over my head.”
“Makes sense,” he said.
When we reached my apartment I said a quick goodbye and rushed inside before anything more could happen. Ugh, I was such a tangle of emotions right now! How could I simultaneously be falling in love with Eddie while suspecting him of backstabbing the rest of us?
The heart was stupid.
I let out a loud noise of exasperation once I was in my kitchen. I was such an idiot!
The door to Angela’s room cracked open. “Do you mind? I’m busy.”
“Sorry,” I said as she slammed her door. What’s your problem? I hadn’t been that loud.
I got in bed and stared at my phone. It was late but my mind was still racing. I wanted to text Eddie and ask about Saturday, what was really going on. But that would give him time to come up with a good excuse before responding. I needed to bring it up in person so I could see his reaction. Judge the truth of his excuse based on that.
But when would I see him again before the job? Damnit, I should have mustered the courage to ask him in the car. Now I had no idea what to do.
But I was certain of one thing: I was scared to attempt the heist without first knowing what was up with Eddie.
Once I put my phone away, exhaustion from the evening’s events helped me fall right to sleep. I dreamed of angry Russians watching us through ceiling cameras, pointing and laughing at how foolish we were for going after their money. I dreamed of Zeke in the back room kicking a defenseless Bryce in the gut while he curled up into a ball and moaned. And then I dreamed of the money. Stacks and stacks of it, too heavy to carry. Throwing it on a bed and then jumping on it, making a snow angel with the crisp $100 bills.
I woke to my phone buzzing on my side table. Through crusty eyes I squinted at the screen: two missed calls from Bryce. Before I could unlock my phone a text message appeared:
Bryce: Rise and shine, gorgeous. I’m out front.
Confused, I put on my robe and went downstairs to the front of my building. Sure enough, there was Bryce double parked in front of my apartment building, the engine running. He rolled down the passenger window as I approached.
“Hop in,” he said.
“Time to practice poker. You’ve got a lot of catching up to do.”
I groaned. “I literally just woke up. I’m all gross.”
“I don’t mind.”
“But I do,” I said. “You can wait here until I’ve showered and put on some clean clothes.”
He grinned up at me. “I’m not allowed to wait in your apartment?”
I sighed. “Fine.”
He parked and followed me upstairs. I wondered if he was looking at my ass, plump and fluffy with the robe over it.
“Your face is looking mostly better,” I said. He laughed.
“Mostly better. My cheek swelling is gone, but I’m going to have this black eye for a few days. I’ll be wearing a lot of sunglasses.”
We went into my apartment and I gestured at the couch. “Wait in here. I’ll be a few minutes.”
“You’re not going to offer me coffee?”
“Are you always so needy this early in the morning?”
He grinned. “Only when I haven’t had my coffee.”
I laughed at the ridiculousness of it and went into the kitchen to make two cups.
“I suppose instant will do,” he said as I stirred the pre-made grounds into cups of steaming water.
“It’s that or nothing,” I said. “If you’re going to beg, you’re not allowed to be choosy.”
“Someone ought to make that into a clever saying,” he said while blowing on his mug. I retreated into my bathroom so he couldn’t see my silly grin. Despite the early hour, seeing him brightened my mood. It made me feel like everything was going to be okay.
I showered as quickly as I could, skipping my hair. When I was done I carefully wrapped my towel around my body before peeking out the door. I was a lot more self-conscious knowing there was a boy in my living room. I tip-toed across the hall to my bedroom to get dressed.
When I came out, Angela was waiting for me in the hall with an ugly expression on her face. “First you take a while in the shower, and then you have company over?”
