Jackpot

Chapter 1

Their names were Bo and Karen Farmer. Bronco Marchese had chosen them to be his claimers because they were young and didn’t have criminal records. Best of all, they were about to be married. When it came to cheating a casino, there were no better claimers than a pair of newlyweds.

Dressed in their wedding clothes, Bo and Karen had left northern Sacramento early one Friday morning, and driven four hours to the Cal Neva Lodge in Nevada. The Cal Neva was a favorite spot for couples to get hitched, the lodge overlooking beautiful Lake Tahoe and the snow-tipped mountains that surrounded it.

Bronco was playing a slot machine when Bo and Karen entered the Cal Neva’s casino. The couple didn’t have much money, and had borrowed on their credit cards to rent Bo’s tuxedo and Karen’s wedding dress. It was a beautiful dress, with a long train and a fall skirt complete with stiff crinolines that made Karen look like an antebellum. As they’d walked through the casino to the wedding chapel in the rear of the building, every eye in the place had fallen upon them. Karen was blond and drop-dead pretty, Bo tall and ruggedly handsome, and they looked right for each other.

Bronco picked up his pail of coins, and followed them. There were weddings every half-hour in the chapel, and he slipped into a back pew without being noticed. The ceremony was short and sweet, and he watched them exchange vows and kiss. Two nights ago when they’d gone to dinner in the Old Town section of Sacramento and hatched their plan, Karen had confided in Bronco. She’d told him that she wanted to believe her late mother would have liked Bo, even though Bo had the devil in him.

“Does that bother you?” Bronco had asked her.

Karen had smiled coyly. “Most boys I’ve known did.”

Bronco had smiled back at her. Not everybody was cut out to cheat a casino. Bo and Karen were different. They were young and naive, and both had a touch of larceny, which made them perfect. Bronco had grabbed the check and paid up.

When the ceremony was over, Bronco returned to the casino and sat down at a slot machine. When Karen and Bo walked past moments later, Bronco found himself staring at the young bride. Although he was forty-five and physically out of shape, he still believed that young women found him attractive. Two nights ago, he’d been convinced that Karen had been coming on to him.

Bronco shifted his attention to Bo. To rob a casino, each member of the gang had to play a role. This was important because there were surveillance cameras in the ceiling, and they were always turned on. Bo’s role was the impatient groom. Bronco watched Bo walk up to the front desk and ask the female reservationist if their suite was ready. The reservationist checked her computer.

“Your room’s still being cleaned, Mr. Farmer,” she replied.

“Can’t you do something?” Bo asked, sounding angry.

“I’m sorry, sir, but there’s nothing I can do.”

“Come on, it’s my wedding day.”

“How about I give you a coupon, and you can play the slot machines until it’s ready?” the reservationist suggested.

“A coupon? How’s that work?” Bo asked.

The reservationist opened a drawer, and removed a coupon with the Cal Neva’s logo stamped on it. Handing it to him, she said, “The coupon is worth fifty dollars. Go to the cage, and present it to the lady behind the window. She’ll redeem it for you in quarters, and you and your wife can play the slot machines.”

Karen came over to where her husband was standing. “What’s wrong, honey?”

“Room’s not ready,” Bo sulked. “You want to play the slots?”

“Sure.”

The reservationist removed a second coupon from the drawer. “Here, Mrs. Farmer, you can have one, too. Good luck.”

Bronco found himself smiling. He’d used a lot of claimers over the years, but few took to it as easily as these two. He followed them across the casino to the cage, and watched Bo exchange the coupons for two plastic pails filled with quarters.

“Here you go, honey,” Bo said. “You know what they say about virgin luck.”

Karen blushed up a storm. “Very funny,” she said under her breath.

“It’s an old gambling expression,” Bo said, grinning. “People who gamble for the first time always win big.”

“Always?” Karen asked.

“Just about.” Bo undid his tie, and stuffed it into his pocket. He pointed across the casino at the banks of glittering slot machines. “Follow me.”

“Why those machines?” Karen asked.

“Because they have the biggest payouts,” Bo said. Looking at the cashier inside the cage, he said, “Isn’t that right? You should always play the slot machines with the biggest payouts.”

“That’s right,” the cashier said brightly.

They were better than good, Bronco thought. As they walked away, Bronco saw the cashier look at him.

“What a nice couple,” the cashier said.

Bronco followed the newlyweds across the busy casino floor. Karen walked holding her dress in one hand, her pail of free coins in the other, and looked like she was walking a tightrope. Bo went to a slot machine in the corner called Big Bertha. It stood six feet high, and had a million dollar jackpot as its grand prize.

“This one,” he declared. “Make sure you bet the maximum amount of coins.”

“Why’s that?” Karen asked.

“Because it won’t pay a jackpot if you don’t,” Bronco said, coming up behind them.

Karen turned and stared, not recognizing him. Bronco could not enter a casino without drastically altering his appearance, and his face had taken on dozens of wrinkles since Karen had last seen him.

“It’s me,” he said under his breath. “You kids ready?”

“Bronco?” Karen whispered. “Is that really you?”

“Yeah. Don’t use my real name, okay?”

“Sorry. How did you get so old?”

“Practice, baby.”

Bo put his arm around his bride. “We’re ready.”

“Good,” Bronco said. “Let’s make some money.”

Karen dug five quarters out of her pail and fed them into Big Bertha. She wasn’t very tall, and as she got on her tip-toes to grab the machine’s giant handle, her wedding dress billowed out, allowing Bronco to duck between her and the machine.

“No funny stuff,” she whispered.

Bronco pressed his body against Big Bertha. He never mixed business with pleasure, but with Karen, he might make an exception. Taking a skeleton key from his pocket, he unlocked the machine. One of his great gifts was the photographic ability of his brain: If he saw a key hanging on someone’s belt, his mind would make a mental picture, and he’d later duplicate the key with special equipment he carried in the trunk of his car. He’d opened dozens of slot machines this way, and never been caught.

Taking a small but powerful earth magnet from his pocket, he stuck it against the side of the machine to pacify it’s internal anti-cheating device. Then, he pulled open the door, reached up into the guts of the machine, and carefully lined up the reels to show five cherries. The machine instantly registered that a jackpot had been won, and bells as loud as a five-alarm fire went off. His heart started to race.

Closing the machine, he slipped the magnet and skeleton key into his pocket, then stepped away from Karen’s billowing dress and glanced into her eyes.

“Now the fun starts,” he said.

Bronco walked away from Big Bertha, then turned around to watch the scene unfold. Big Bertha’s bells were still ringing, and several employees were hurrying over to where Bo and Karen stood. Winning a million-dollar jackpot was like something out of a dream, and Karen played her part to the hilt. Dropping her pail of quarters on the floor, she jumped up and down and screamed with delight.

“You see,” Bo said over the clamor. “Virgin luck.”

Karen slapped her husband on the behind. A mob of patrons had assembled around her, and an elderly woman with blue hair stepped forward.

“Can I ask you a favor?” the woman asked.

“What’s that?” Karen said.

“Can I touch you?”

“You want to touch me?”

“For luck,” the woman explained.

Karen let the elderly woman touch her sleeve. Others in the crowd stepped forward and did the same thing. There was something about her wedding dress that made the event seem nothing short of magical.

Soon, a half-dozen casino employees were hovering around the newlyweds. One had a camera, and took Karen and Bo’s picture in front of Big Bertha. Another had a clipboard, and helped Karen fill out the necessary paperwork for the Internal Revenue Service so Karen could claim her jackpot. While this was happening, Big Bertha’s bells continued to ring, the casino happy to let its customers know that every once in a while, people did go home winners.

That afternoon, Bronco followed Bo and Karen around the casino. Everywhere they went, someone wanted to shake Karen’s hand, or get their picture taken with her. The attention seemed to bother her, and her beautiful face turned into a deep frown.

They went to the craps pit. Bo was playing on a line of credit that the casino had extended him, the casino people their new best friends.

“I want to go home,” she said loudly.

“We still have to collect the jackpot money,” Bo said.

“Can’t they send it to us?”

An apprehensive look crossed Bo’s face, and he pulled her aside and lowered his voice. “It will look suspicious. We need to stay and collect the million dollars.”

“But, I want to go home,” Karen said.

Bo glanced nervously at Bronco, who stood a few feet away. “Come on, honey. Just one more day. That’s all I’m asking.”

Karen glanced Bronco’s way as well. Her attitude had changed dramatically, the reality of what she’d done slowly settling in. She spoke in a hushed voice to her husband. Bronco couldn’t read lips, yet knew exactly what Karen was saying. She was living a lie, and wanted it to end. And Bo was trying to pacify her, knowing damn well there was nothing he could do about it.

Bronco stayed at a seedy motel down the road from the Cal Neva. The next morning he rose early, and spent thirty minutes putting fingernail polish on his face. When it dried, dozens of wrinkles appeared, making him look like an old man.

He drove to the Cal Neva, and had breakfast in the coffee shop. He chose a table that let him eat and watch the elevator banks at the same time. At nine, Bo and Karen came downstairs and went to the registration desk. The casino’s GM greeted them, then took them to his office and shut the door. Although Bronco had never been present when a jackpot was paid, he knew the procedure. The GM would make Karen sign some papers, and give her the money in a cheap briefcase. The GM would also ask them if they’d like an armed escort to take the money to their car. Then he’d shake hands, and invite them back to his casino the next time they were in town.

At nine-twenty, Bo and Karen left the GM’s office, and disappeared into an elevator. Bronco paid for his breakfast and walked out of the coffee shop. Normally, he would have met up with the Farmers at another location, and cut up the money. But last night’s conversation had bothered him. People who got scared did stupid things. He went to the house phone and called their suite.

“It’s me. Which suite you in?” Bronco asked

“Number four oh four,” Bo said.

“I’ll be right up.”

A minute later Karen showed him into the suite. As she shut the door, Bronco glanced into her eyes. Still scared, he thought. Bo had spilled the money onto the floor, and was lying face-down in it, doing the Australian crawl. Minus federal taxes, their winnings came to six-hundred and forty-five thousand dollars. Bronco got onto his knees and started stacking the money into two piles.

“You mind my asking you a question?” Karen asked.

“Shoot.”

“How did you get all those wrinkles?”

Bronco looked up at her. “I spread fingernail polish mask on my face, let it dry, then scrunched my face around until it looks like wrinkles.”

“You know all the angles, don’t you,” Karen said.

Bronco finished stacking the money and stood up. There were six stacks of one hundred thousand each, with ten grand on the side. With his foot he pushed two of the one hundred thousand stacks toward Bo, then began stuffing the rest into the briefcase. When Bo did not object, Karen let out a shriek.

“You lied to me,” she said to her husband.

Bo swallowed hard. “It’s still a lot of money.”

“You lied to me.”

“I’m sorry.”

“On our wedding day.”

“I said I’m sorry.”

“God damn you, Bo!”

Bronco found himself feeling sorry for Karen. “How much did he tell you?”

Her eyes had welled with tears. “Half.”

“Three hundred grand?”

“Yes.”

Bronco thought he understood. For three hundred grand, Karen had been willing to stand in front of a slot machine in her wedding dress, and let a man she hardly knew steal a jackpot. But not for a penny less. He edged closer to her. In a quiet voice he said, “You want the rest of your money?”

Karen swiped at her eyes and nodded stiffly.

“I’ll give you my half if you dump this loser, and hit the road with me.”

“What?”

“The wedding dress is perfect cover. We can hit a couple of casinos a week, make out like bandits.”

Karen backed away from him with a horrified look on her face. “Get away from me. Bo, make him get away from me.”

Bronco felt a hand clamp down on his shoulder, and spin him around. Bo was standing directly behind him, his fist cocked. Bronco tried to duck as the punch connected with the right side of his face. He dropped the briefcase as he fell.

“You crummy son-of-a-bitch,” Bo said, towering over him. “You think you’re a big shot with your skeleton keys and magnets and your money. Well, you can keep that shit. Just get out of our lives. Understand?”

Bronco took a deep breath and rose on unsteady legs while staring at Karen. She had that sultry look he’d always liked. As if reading his thoughts, Bo stepped forward and shoved him into the wall. “Stop looking at her like that! She’s mine, understand? I should kill you for looking at her like that.”

But Bronco couldn’t stop looking. Seeing Karen in her wedding dress yesterday had stirred emotions in him that he’d thought had died long ago. She was too good for this loser, and he said, “She won’t be yours for long.”

Bo’s mouth dropped open.

“You lied to her,” Bronco said. “On her wedding day. Think about it.”

Bo pulled his arm back to strike him. Bronco wasn’t going to eat another punch, and drew a silver-handled gun from his pants pocket, aimed at Bo’s chest, and squeezed the trigger. The shot made a loud Pop!, the bullet passing through Bo’s heart like a tiny meteor. Bo crumpled to the floor and did not move.

Bronco tossed his money into the cheap briefcase. Opening the door, he glanced back at Karen. She knelt beside her dying husband and was sobbing. She looked at him, as if to say, Why?

“You deserve better,” Bronco said.

Chapter 2

Tampa Bay Downs was the oldest thoroughbred race track on Florida’s laid-back west coat. Located in the sleepy town of Oldsmar, it was far enough away from Tony Valentine’s home in Palm Harbor to be a nuisance to reach, with the last mile a true test of nerve. Called Race Track Road, it had enough crazed drivers to raise any sane person’s blood pressure.

Valentine didn’t need his blood pressure raised this afternoon; he already had his son, Gerry, to do that for him. They had come to the track to investigate card-cheating in the track’s Silks poker room, only Gerry had disappeared within a few minutes of walking into the joint. His son had never seen a wager he didn’t like, and Valentine guessed he was hanging off the track rail, betting his rent on a nag.

“Mr. Valentine?” a female voice asked.

An athletic woman with frosted blond hair, bronzed skin, and a hundred watt smile had materialized beside him. She extended her hand. “Suzie Brinkman, director of security. I called you this morning about the problem in our poker room. Thanks for coming out so fast.”

She was a dish. Valentine smiled and shook her hand. “My pleasure.”

“My father says you’re the best in the world at catching cheaters,” she said.

Suzie’s father owned the track, and had interests in several Nevada casinos. He was also a client, and Valentine felt obligated to make sure his daughter didn’t get ripped off. “How can I help you?” he asked.

“There’s a rumor floating around that one of our poker dealers is in cahoots with a player. I want to find out if it’s true.”

“Sounds right up my alley,” Valentine said.

“Good. I just spoke with my father, and he said it was okay if you went to the surveillance room, and looked at the tapes of the different dealers.”

They were standing in the bar next to the noisy poker room. Every table was filled, with lines of young men, and an occasional woman, waiting to fill the next available chair. Poker was all the rage, and brought huge business to the track.

“If you don’t mind, I’d like to walk through the room first,” he said.

“May I accompany you?”

“Of course.”

Valentine took a walk through the poker room with Suzie Brinkman glued to his side, stopping at each table to watch the dealer shuffle and deal. The track employed professional dealers who’d been trained in dealer schools. Their actions were uniform in every respect, and Valentine looked for any hesitation on the dealer’s part when they handled the cards. Before any sleight-of-hand move, there was always a tiny, pregnant pause. Hustler’s called these tells. Done, he walked back to the bar with Suzie still beside him.

“So what do you think?” she asked.

“Got him,” he said.

Her mouth dropped open. “Oh, come on.”

“Where are we going?”

A blush rose beneath her tan. “I mean, be serious. We weren’t in there five minutes.”

“Yeah, but I know what I’m looking for.”

She flashed him another smile. He found himself liking her, and pointed into the room at the dealer working Table #6. The man was built like a mailbox, with a thin body and large, square head, and had a way of handling himself that told Valentine he’d been in prison. Most gambling venues didn’t hire ex-cons, but Florida was an exception: The state had six hundred thousand ex-felons, and they needed to work.

“That guy’s your cheater.”

“Milo Kelly,” she said, shaking her head. “My dad caught him stealing chips, and gave him another chance. This is how he repays us. What’s he doing?”

“He’s giving his partner at the table the best cards. It’s called a pick-up stack.”

“I’ll have him pulled off the game immediately. Can you show me what he’s doing, in case I have to explain it to the police?”

There was a real hunger in Suzie’s eyes. She knew she was green, and she wanted to learn the ropes. Valentine wished his son had half her enthusiasm.

“My pleasure,” he said.

They grabbed a table in the cocktail lounge, and Suzie pulled a deck of cards from her purse. She sat directly across from him, her knees knocking against his. As Valentine dealt seven hands of cards onto the table, he adroitly pulled back his chair.

“Kelly deals Seven Card Stud, and has seven players at his table. Each player gets seven cards, with five coming faceup.” He pointed at the third, sixth and seven hands. In each hand, the third card showing was an ace. “Let’s say he wants to give these aces to his partner. He scoops the hands up when the game is over, and makes sure they go on the desk last. Then he false shuffles, and deals out seven cards. Voila — his agent, who’s sitting in the third seat, gets three aces.”

“What’s a false shuffle?”

“It’s a card-cheating move.”

“Please show me.”

The request was delivered with a twinkle in her eye, and he had a feeling that Suzie was enjoying herself. He separated the cards into reds and blacks, and gave the deck a false-shuffle. He’d learned to false-shuffle from a New Jersey wizard named Herb Zarrow, who’d revolutionized card handling with a shuffle which bore his name. Finished, he showed her that the cards were still separated by color. Suzie shook her head helplessly.

“Is Kelly as good as you?”

“No, but he doesn’t have to be.”

“Why’s that?”

“Because he’s the house dealer. Everyone trusts him.”

Suzie put her elbows on the table and looked into his eyes. She was a hell of a nice woman, only he wasn’t going there right now. Dating at his age was never an easy proposition. “I was thinking of firing Kelly, but now I think he should be arrested,” Suzie said. “Do you agree?”

“Absolutely.”

“Whose his agent?”

“The fourth player at the table.”

“The older woman with the wig? You can’t be serious.”

“I’m always serious,” Valentine said.

Gerry the prodigal son had entered the lounge, and was waving to him. There was a panicked look on his face, and Valentine wondered how much money his son had lost.

“I’ll be happy to be an expert witness, if it comes to trial,” Valentine said.

“Thank you,” she said.

They simultaneously rose from the table and practically banged heads. Without warning, Suzie took his head with her hands and planted a kiss on his cheek. It was his turn to blush, and he caught her winking at him as she walked away.

“Lose the rent yet?” Valentine asked as Gerry sat down. His son had just turned thirty-six, and with his salt-and-pepper hair, long Italian nose and dark coloring, bore more than a passing resemblance to his father.

“You know I can’t come to the track and not place a bet,” Gerry said. “Besides, I saw someone I knew at the betting windows.”

“Was it that stripper you once dated?”

“Cut it out, Pop, will you? The guy I saw was a crook.”

“Did you have a nice conversation?”

Gerry leaned forward. There was a look on his face that Valentine hadn’t seen very many times: His serious look. Lowering his voice, Gerry said, “I think the next race might be fixed.”

“Why do you think that?”

With his head, Gerry indicated a couple seated on the opposite side of the lounge. They were straight out of a 1930’s gangster movie; the mustachioed man wore a shiny, sharkskin suit, his moll a baby-doll red dress with her face painted like a Kewpie doll. “That guy came into my bar two years ago, tried to place a huge bet on a horse race at Hialeah. I refused. Later, I heard the race was fixed, and he took another bookie for a huge score. Well, I just saw that guy make a huge bet on a loser named Corky’s Boy. Sound suspicious to you?”

“Fixed the race how?”

“Silking,” his son said.

Valentine leaned back in his chair, surprised that his son was willing to rat out another crook. Gerry had been on the wrong side of the law since he was a teenager, and dishonesty was a hard thing to change.

“What’s silking?” Valentine asked.

“You’ve never heard of it?”

Valentine had policed Atlantic City’s casinos for twenty-five years, and knew every casino scam and greasy hustle ever invented. The ponies were a different story, his knowledge limited to things he’d heard about, and not experienced firsthand.

“No.”

“The bookie I apprenticed with was named Fred Flammer. The first scam Flam taught me was silking. Said it was invented in England, where it was considered an art among cheaters. Look pop, we need to hurry. Corky’s Boy is in the next race.”

Valentine rose from his chair. “Did you see the woman I was just talking to?”

“How could I miss her? She was hot.”

“She’s the owner’s daughter. You need to tell her what’s going on.”

“Sure.”

As Gerry rose, he took a cocktail napkin from a dispenser on the table, and handed it to his father.

“You’ve got lipstick all over your face,” his son said.

Suzie Brinkman’s office was located on the top floor of the track’s club house. Valentine rapped on the door and moments later it opened, and a track steward stuck his head out. He wore a blue blazer and a yellow tie, and was as chummy as a marine drill sergeant. Valentine looked over his shoulder, and saw Suzie Brinkman standing by a picture window that overlooked the track, a pair of binoculars in hand.

“What do you want?” the steward growled.

“Tony and Gerry Valentine to see Ms. Brinkman.”

“Never heard of you.”

Valentine handed him a business card.

“Grift Sense? What the hell is that?”

“My company,” Valentine said.

Hearing his voice, Suzie spun around and smiled. He had become eligible for Social Security a few months ago, and something about that smile told him getting old wasn’t as bad as people thought. Suzie ushered them past the pit bull, and Valentine introduced his son, then asked if there was someplace they could speak in private. Suzie glanced at the steward, who had not taken his eyes off Valentine. “Bern is my father’s right hand. You can say anything you wish around him.”

“My son spotted a known horse-cheater placing a large bet at one of your cages,” Valentine said. “We think the next race is fixed.”

Suzie looked startled. “Do you know which horse?”

“Corky’s Boy in the sixth.”

“Corky’s Boy?”

“That’s right. He’s running at 30 to 1 odds—”

“I know which horse he is,” Suzie said, dropping herself in a chair. “That’s Randall’s horse, isn’t it?” she said to her steward.

“Yes, ma’am,” Bern replied. “Came in this morning from Miami.”

“You know the owner?” Valentine asked.

Suzie nodded. “Randall is a business associate of my father’s, and owes him a great deal of money. Randall called yesterday, and asked that I let his horse run. He said it would be his final race before he put it out to pasture. And I fell for it.”

“Where is your father?” Valentine asked.

“He’s out of the country on business.”

Some of the greatest scams had occurred when the person in charge was gone, and someone inexperienced was handed the reins. Cheaters called these opportunities magic moments, and there was no doubt in Valentine’s mind that Randall had seen a magic moment in Suzie’s father’s absence, and seized the chance to fleece his partner. Gerry cleared his throat. “May I make a suggestion?”

“By all means,” Suzie said.

“I know how to catch these guys red-handed,” Gerry said. “But, it’s going to mean letting the race run, then withholding the purses. You’re also going to have to keep Corky’s Boy in the winning circle so we can expose him.”

“That sounds risky,” Suzie said.

“Trust me, it’s the best way to handle it,” Gerry said.

Suzie put her hand on Gerry’s arm. “You sound like you know what you’re doing. We’ll let the race run.”

Valentine was so impressed he didn’t know what to say. His son was taking charge, and sounding like a responsible grown-up. Pigs can fly, he thought.

“Expose him how?” Bern asked. In his hand was a lab report which the track ran on all horses. “We tested Corky’s Boy two hours ago; his blood came up negative for steroids and amphetamines. That horse is one-hundred percent clean.”

“I’m sure he is,” Gerry said.

“Then how you going to expose him?”

“With a garden hose,” Gerry said.

Chapter 3

Mabel Struck was in her boss’s study sorting the mail when the phone rang. Tony got a lot of mail, mostly from panicked casino bosses, and as she reached for the phone, a handwritten envelope in the stack caught her eye. It was from an inmate in the Jean Correctional Facility for Women in Las Vegas named Lucy Price.

“Grift Sense,” she answered cheerfully.

“Do you sell wrapping paper?”

“Hi, there. Having fun at the track?”

“More fun than a barrel of monkeys,” Tony said. “I want you to turn on the TV to the horse-racing channel on cable, and tape the sixth race at Tampa Bay Downs.”

“Is something special going to happen?”

“The race is fixed, and Gerry figured it out. My son is going to be a star.”

Mabel smiled into the receiver. Tony and Gerry fought more than they played, but the relationship was slowly coming around. This was definitely a promising sign.

“Should I alert Yolanda?”

“Please. I’ve got to run. The horses are being led around the track.”

As Mabel dialed Yolanda’s number, she glanced at Lucy Price’s letter. She had never met Lucy Price, and hoped she never would. Lucy was a degenerate gambler, and was in prison going through treatment for her addiction while serving time for vehicular homicide. Tony was a magnet for women like this, and they always ended up hurting him. She stuck the letter with the junk mail.

“Hello?” Yolanda answered.

“You need to come over,” Mabel said. “Gerry and Tony are going to be on TV.”

Gerry’s wife appeared at the door a minute later, her baby in her arms. Yolanda wore ragged cut-offs and a tee-shirt smeared with baby spit, yet somehow remained a ravishing young woman. Mabel ushered her inside.

“What did Gerry do?” Yolanda asked, sounding worried.

“No, no,” Mabel said. “Tony said he’s going to be a star.”

“Wouldn’t that be a change.”

The living room of Tony’s house had newspapers on the floor, and lots of comfortable furniture. Turning on the TV, Mabel found the horse-race channel with the remote, hit record on the TIVO, then joined Yolanda on the couch.

“Gerry’s been on his best behavior lately,” Mabel said.

“But it’s just not his normal behavior,” Yolanda said. She looked into Mabel’s face and grinned. “That’s a joke.”

“Is everything between you two okay?”

“Just the usual pressures.”

“Which are?”

“Bills, bills and more bills. I’m a doctor, but somehow I never comprehended how expensive having a baby is.”

Mabel put a reassuring hand on Yolanda’s knee. “How’s Gerry taking this?”

“He lies in bed at night, dreaming up get rich quick schemes, some of which probably aren’t legal, and I tell him, ‘Banish those thoughts from your head.’”

“Does he listen?”

“Most of the time. But it’s tough.”

“Oh, look. The race is starting.”

They directed their attention to the screen. There were eleven horses in the gate, and when the starting bell sounded, they exploded forward in a mad rush of muscle and controlled fury. The resolution of the TV’s picture was breathtakingly real, and the dirt on the track flew up before their eyes.

“So what’s going on?” Yolanda asked.

“The race is fixed.”

“How?”

“We’re about to find out.” Mabel increased the volume with the remote. She supposed that if something unusual was going on, the TV announcer would pick it up. Sure enough, as the horses came around the final bend, the announcer began to yell.

“Here comes Buster and Little Sheba around the turn, with Corky’s Boy glued to their tails. What a race this is, folks! They’re in the final stretch, and Corky’s Boy is even with the two favorites. Now, Corky’s Boy is pulling away. We’re coming up to the finish line, and it’s Corky’s Boy by three lengths for the win.”

The picture showed the jockey for Corky’s Boy’s waving to the crowd, and directing his mount to the winner’s circle. As he climbed down, an announcement came over the track’s public address system that the race was under review. The jockey made a face and glanced nervously in both directions. Moments later, the winner’s circle was swarming with people. One of them was Gerry, and he was holding a green garden hose. As he walked over to Corky’s Boy, an older man appeared by his side. His father.

“Why’s Gerry giving that horse a bath?” Yolanda asked.

“Beats me,” Mabel confessed.

Gerry sprayed Corky’s Boy with the hose. Before their eyes, the horse’s color changed from burnt orange to dark black, the dye running off its body to the ground. In the corner of the screen, they saw the jockey being forcibly held by a steward.

“It’s a different horse,” Yolanda said. “How did Gerry know that?”

Mabel shook her head. She’d come to the conclusion that there was a lot about Gerry that they probably didn’t know about it.

“I guess we’ll have to ask him,” she said.

Chapter 4

“Are you serious?” Gerry said an hour later when they were on the road. “It’s really all mine?”

“Isn’t that what I just said?” his father replied.

“That’s awfully generous, Pop.”

Valentine heard skepticism in his son’s voice. Taking Suzie Brinkman’s check for three thousand bucks out of his shirt pocket, he endorsed it to Gerry while driving one-handed. Normally, the split was sixty-forty, with Valentine getting the lion’s share because his name was on the shingle. But this job was different. Gerry had handled himself like a pro, and deserved a reward.

“Thanks, Pop,” his son said.

Valentine heard a crack of late-afternoon thunder as he drove into Palm Harbor. It was late September, and hot as blazes. In a few weeks, the temperatures would drop, and millions of northerners would descend upon the state like migratory birds. Up north, the leaves changed in the autumn; in Florida, it was the color of the license plates. Soon the skies opened up, and rain began to fall in solid, vertical lines. By the time he reached his house, the street resembled a canal.

“What are you going to do with the money?” he asked, pulling into the driveway.

“Bet it on the ponies,” Gerry replied.

He killed the engine and stared at his son.

“Buy early college tuition for the baby,” Gerry said.

Florida had a great program for purchasing college tuition for kids while they were young. Even though Lois was only a few months old, the price was too cheap to pass by. “You’re starting to sound like a father,” he said.

“Scary, isn’t it?” Gerry popped the glove compartment and pulled out Kleenex which he handed it to his father. “Left cheek.”

Valentine looked in the mirror and saw red lipstick smeared on his face. Suzie Brinkman had planted another kiss on him right after Corky’s Boy’s jockey was hauled away by the police, that same wonderful smile lighting up her face. “How old do you think she is?” he asked, wiping away the evidence.

“You thinking of asking her out?”

He shook his head. After he’d lost his wife, he’d become curious about the age of women who still found him attractive. He’d figured that his son, who’d had more than his share of girlfriends, would know the answer.

“Mid-forties,” Gerry replied.

“Think that’s a good age for me?”

“Perfect.”

The storm soon passed. Going inside, they found Mabel glued to the computer in Valentine’s study.

“Where’s my wife?” Gerry asked.

“She went home to feed the baby.”

“Did you see me on TV?”

“Yes. You were dashing. Both of you. Now, take a look at this.” On the computer was a live-feed from a casino surveillance camera. The game was roulette, the table filled with dashing men in tuxedos and beautiful women in long evening dresses.

“Let me guess,” Valentine said. “This is from Biloxi.”

“Time to get your eyes checked,” Mabel replied.

“One of those parking lot Indian reservation casinos?”

“You’re a stitch. It’s from The Casino in Monte Carlo.”

“We don’t do business with Monte Carlo,” Valentine said.

“We do now,” Mabel said. “The director of surveillance called, and I signed them up. We got their check this afternoon.”

Valentine thought Mabel was joking. The Casino in Monte Carlo was the most elegant casino in the world, with the best surveillance money could buy. The idea that he, a retired Atlantic City detective, might be working for them, didn’t seem real. On his desk he spied a Federal Express package with a certified check lying on top. It was from the Casino in Monte Carlo for five grand.

“I thought my fee was three grand,” he said.

“I raised it. You ever see the chandeliers in that place? They’ve got money.”

If he’d learned anything from Mabel, it was that his services were more valuable than he’d realized. “How much have they lost?” he asked.

“A half-million buckeroos,” Mabel replied. “They conducted their own investigation, but came up with air. The director of surveillance said the money’s being lost on this particular table.”

That was all Valentine needed to know. Going to the kitchen, he grabbed a six-pack of Diet Coke from the refrigerator, then returned to his study and pulled up a chair beside his office manager.

“Ready when you are,” he said.

As a cop, Valentine had done his best work with a cigarette in one hand, a caffeinated beverage in the other. The cigarettes were a thing of the past, but not the caffeine. Sucking on a soda, he had Mabel rattle off her checklist of what wasn’t happening at the Monte Carlo casino’s losing roulette table.

“The wheel is clean, and so is the table and the ball,” she said. “All of the apparatus has been given forensic checks. The casino also polygraphed each of the dealers, and they came out clean. With all of those things ruled out, I figured the cheaters were working from the outside.”

Working from the outside meant the cheaters didn’t have any employees helping them. “Working how from the outside?” Valentine asked.

Mabel enjoyed an occasional challenge and said, “My guess is, they’re using an electronic device to predict where the ball might fall.”

“Visual prediction,” he said.

“Yes. You told me about a Serbian roulette cheater who used a cell phone with a laser scanner to track the speed of the ball, and the speed of the wheel, and determine which half of the wheel the ball would fall in. So, I started looking for anyone with a cell phone.”

“Any luck?”

“No cell phones are permitted inside the Casino in Monte Carlo. Which means someone has one hidden.”

Valentine tossed his empty soda can into the trash. Using a hidden cell phone might work once or twice, but wouldn’t win you half a million bucks. “I think something else is going on,” he said.

“Like what?”

Gerry, who was scribbling on a legal pad, said, “Think it’s a payoff scam, Pop?”

Valentine nearly fell out of his chair. His son’s education had yet to include payoff scams, and he wondered how he knew about them. Then he remembered that Gerry had run a bar which had fronted his bookie operation, and was probably familiar with hiding money.

“That would be my guess,” he said.

Mabel looked annoyed. “What’s a payoff scam?”

“It’s a method of stealing chips,” Valentine explained. “Albert Einstein said stealing chips was the only way you could beat roulette, and he was right.”

“So it has nothing to do with the equipment?”

“No.” He removed another soda from the pack and popped it open. “You said the dealers were given polygraphs. What about the box man?”

“Is he the person who pays out winners?” Mabel asked.

“Yes.”

“He wasn’t given one. The casino’s director of surveillance personally vouched for him. They’re related.”

“Oh-oh,” his son said under his breath.

Mabel’s head snapped like a spectator at a tennis match. “You think they’re the ones doing the stealing?”

Gerry turned the legal pad around, and showed her what he’d written. Of the many sentences on the page, he’d crossed out all but two. The first sentence, three spaces down, said, ‘Too much money flying out the door.’ The second, just below it, said, ‘Inside job.’ Mabel nodded; it was the same technique Tony used. Eliminate the obvious, and the answer will often stare you in the face.

“And the director of surveillance was so polite over the phone,” she said.

Valentine stared at the live-feed of the Casino at Monte Carlo on his computer. The player sitting to the box man’s right was sweating, the collar of his starched shirt cutting his neck like a garrotte.

“You taping this?” he asked.

“Of course,” Mabel said. “Want to see something again?”

“The last minute.”

Mabel rewound the tape, then hit play. Valentine and Gerry leaned forward and stared. After the tape was done, they both pulled back. “Got it,” Valentine said.

“Me, too,” Gerry said.

“Oh, I hate you both,” Mabel said. “What’s going on?”

“The player to the box man’s right is stealing the money. He bets red, or black. Forty-five percent of the time, he wins. When the box man slides him his winnings, he overpays him. The player immediately adds his winnings to his stack. The evidence is only on the table for a few seconds. Then, it melts away.”

“Doesn’t the eye-in-the-sky catch on?” Mabel asked.

“The director of surveillance makes sure it doesn’t. He tells the techs manning the cameras to watch the wheel. They never see the overpay.”

Mabel leaned back in her chair, clearly perplexed. “But the director of surveillance hired us. Surely he had to think you might catch on.”

If there was one part of the business Mabel didn’t understand, it was that casino cheaters didn’t just steal for the money. They stole because they enjoyed the high that came from beating the house. Sometimes they enjoyed it so much, they couldn’t stop. Valentine dialed The Casino in Monte Carlo, and within a minute, had the casino’s GM on the line. He explained the scam, and the GM cursed loudly when he learned who was involved. He thanked the GM for his business, then hung up.

“What will happen now?” Mabel asked.

“Watch.”

Sixty seconds later, four security guards appeared, and escorted the box man and his partner from the table.

“That’s what I call service,” Mabel said.

Chapter 5

It was quitting time. Gerry and Mabel both left, while Valentine went back to work. Since losing his wife, he’d found it the perfect antidote for loneliness. As he sat down in the chair in his study, his private line rang. Only a handful of people had the number, and he snatched up the phone.

“Valentine here.”

“Higgins, here,” Bill Higgins said. Bill was the director of the Nevada Gaming Control Board, and a close friend. “I’m standing in the governor’s office in the Capitol Building in Carson City. Governor Smoltz is here, along with his staff. The governor personally asked me to call you. He needs your help.”

Valentine leaned back in his chair. He’d vowed never to work for Nevada’s casinos after the casino owners had tried to blackball his son. His business hadn’t suffered, and he’d been a better man for the decision.

“Is this about one of your casinos?”

“It’s about all our casinos,” Bill said.

“Tell Smoltz I’m not interested.”

The line went silent, and Valentine stared out his study window. It was growing dark, and he was looking forward to his evening stroll. He’d left his kitchen door open a week ago, and been amazed at the number of critters that had decided to pay him a visit. Five varieties of frogs, a chameleon, a colorful banana spider, and a squirrel had poked their heads in. Palm Harbor was filled with wildlife, and he could either be like his neighbors and set traps, or get a book from the library and learn what the animals were. The latter choice had appealed to him, and he’d started taking nightly walks.

“The governor has asked me to ask you to reconsider,” Bill said, coming back on the line. “This problem could cripple every casino in Nevada.”

“Is your job on the line?”

“No.”

“Then I’m not interested. How’s the weather out there?”

Bill relayed his answer to Smoltz. Valentine heard the phone being ripped out of Bill’s hands, and the governor come on the line. Valentine had met Smoltz when he was the head prosecuting attorney in Las Vegas, and hadn’t know his ass from a shovel. Valentine had told him so, and they’d never bonded.

“Goddamn it, Valentine!” Smoltz thundered. “We’re talking about a problem that could turn the state’s economy upside-down. A catastrophe with a capital C.”

“Still not interested. Put Bill back on, will you?”

Smoltz swore and passed the phone back to Bill.

“So, how’s the weather?” Valentine asked.

“You’re really enjoying this, aren’t you?” Bill asked.

From his desk drawer Valentine removed his binoculars and the notebook he used to jot down his wildlife sightings. “Just sticking to my principles, that’s all.”

“This involves Bronco Marchese,” Bill said.

The smile faded from Valentine’s face. A day hadn’t gone by in the last twenty years that he hadn’t thought about Bronco Marchese.

“How does he figure into this?”

“Bronco got arrested in Reno yesterday. He’s charged with second-degree murder, and for stealing a jackpot from the Cal Neva Lodge. Bronco’s asked the prosecutor to cut him a deal, and it looks like he might.”

Valentine put his binoculars and notebook back into the drawer. Bronco’s gang had murdered his brother-in-law Sal on the Atlantic City Boardwalk twenty years ago. Every other member of the gang was now in prison, and it was the last piece of unfinished business from his days in law enforcement.

“How can they let him skate?”

“Bronco’s claiming there’s a Nevada Gaming Control Board agent stealing jackpots from Nevada’s casinos,” Bill said. “If we don’t let Bronco go, he’s going to release the agent’s name to the media, and ruin our business.”

Valentine whistled into the phone. Bill had just described the casino business’s worst nightmare. If the public thought the people policing the casinos were crooks, they’d stop playing. Overnight, business would dry up, and the casinos would go under. No wonder Smoltz was sweating through his underwear.

“Is Bronco telling the truth?” Valentine asked.

“Not sure,” Bill said. “We want you to have a look, and tell us what you think.”

“Which would put Bronco’s fate in my hands.”

“That’s right.”

Dusk had settled, and Valentine saw his backyard pool into darkness. Perhaps this was God’s way of rewarding him for living a clean life, or maybe it was just dumb luck. Either way, he wasn’t going to pass it up.

“Tell Smoltz I’ll take the job,” he said.

The Internet was a beautiful thing. Five minutes later, Valentine was reading three reports that Bill Higgins had e-mailed him concerning Bronco Marchese.

He started with the official police report. According to a statement made by a newlywed named Karen Farmer, Bronco had rigged a million dollar jackpot on a slot machine at the Cal Neva Lodge, allowing Karen and her husband to claim the prize. The next day, while cutting up the winnings, Bronco and Bo had gotten into a fight, and Bronco had shot and killed Bo, then left.

Karen Farmer had called the police and confessed. While being questioned, she had recounted eating dinner with Bronco in Sacramento two nights before, and Bronco paying with a credit card. The waitress had mistakenly presented the card to her husband, and Karen had noticed a different name on the card. Frank Revel.

Using that single piece of information, the police had tracked Bronco to a motel in Reno, and arrested him. While searching Bronco’s car, they had discovered a box of disguises, weapons, a welding kit used to make keys, and a diary with detailed notes about ten slot machine jackpots stolen from Nevada casinos in the past three years.

The second report had been written by Fred Friendly, the director of the Nevada Gaming Control Board’s Electronic Systems Division. The GCB was required to keep records of every jackpot paid out in the state, and Friendly had examined the ten jackpot thefts recorded in Bronco’s diary, and discovered four similarities.

1) All ten rip-offs had occurred in small, out-of-the-way casinos, where surveillance was less stringent than the state’s larger casinos.

2) Each jackpot was for one million dollars.

3) Each machine was a refurbished electro-magnetic model. By law, refurbs were not allowed in casinos, but some casinos used them instead of buying new machines in an effort to cut costs.

4) Each rip-off had occurred during a shift change in the casino’s surveillance control room, when the techs were less likely to notice theft.

The third report was a transcript of a meeting that had taken place between Bill Higgins and Bronco’s attorney, a mob-connected reptile named Kyle Garrow.

Garrow: “Bronco wants to cut a deal.”

Higgins: “No deals.”

Garrow: “Bronco has information that could destroy the gambling business in Nevada.”

Higgins: “Give me a break.”

Garrow: “I’m dead serious.”

Higgins: “You’ve got two minutes. Talk.”

Garrow: “Three years ago, Bronco was casing a casino when he spotted someone stealing a jackpot. He introduced himself, and the two became friends.”

Higgins: “How touching.”

Garrow: “The other cheater was an agent with the Nevada Gaming Control Board.”

Higgins: “An agent in my department?”

Garrow: “That’s right. Want to extend that two minutes?”

Higgins: “Keep talking.”

Garrow: “Bronco and this agent entered into an arrangement. Bronco taught this agent how to play the game. You know, pick dead times to beat the eye-in-the-sky, that sort of thing.”

Higgins: “What did Bronco receive in return?”

Garrow: “The agent told Bronco where all the refurbs were in the state. The agent knew the exact location of every one.”

Higgins: “Does Bronco know how many jackpots this agent has stolen?”

Garrow: “Hundreds. Maybe more.”

Higgins: “That’s (expletive deleted) and you know it.”

Garrow: “No, it’s not. The agent is stealing jackpots under ten grand so he doesn’t have to report them to the IRS. He’s flying under the radar.”

Higgins: “Keep talking.”

Garrow: “Bronco says your agent has developed a unique method of corrupting slot machines. I’m not talking old machines, either.”

Higgins: “Is this agent stealing jackpots himself?”

Garrow: “No. He’s using claimers.”

Higgins: “Different claimers for each jackpot?”

Garrow: “Yes. He recruits them.”

Higgins: “Let me get this straight. He’s corrupted hundreds of people to claim the money?”

Garrow: “That’s right.”

Higgins: “That’s (expletive deleted) and you know it.”

Garrow: “No, it’s not. Bronco taught him how to do it. Look at Bo and Karen Farmer. Neither has a criminal record, yet Bronco got them to help him rip off the Cal Neva.”

Higgins: “How does Bronco do that?”

Garrow: “I honestly don’t know.”

Higgins: “And Bronco is willing to give this agent up, provided we let him go.”

Garrow: “That’s the deal. Take it, or leave it.”

Valentine shut down his computer, and watched the screen become an iridescent blue dot. What Garrow was claiming was pure bull. Modern slot machines couldn’t be corrupted into paying off jackpots. They were sophisticated computers that had more anti-theft safeguards than most banks. At the heart of these computers were random number generator chips, called RNGs, which cycled hundreds of numbers per second, and selected jackpots. They were impossible to corrupt.

His stomach growled. The day he’d lost his wife, he’d stopped eating right. Yolanda was good about feeding him, but he tried not to make himself a regular at Gerry’s table. His son and his wife needed their space.

He decided on hot dogs, and was boiling water on the stove when he spied a note stuck to the refrigerator. It was from Mabel, informing him she’d left pot roast and mashed potatoes in the fridge. He tried to remember the last time he’d eaten homemade pot roast. It seemed like a hundred years ago.

He heated the food in the microwave, then ate with the sports section spread before him. Something was bothering him, and his eyes would not focus on the page.

Picking up his plate, he returned to his study.

Sitting at his computer, he retrieved the transcript of Bill and Garrow’s meeting. His brain had always been good at finding things that didn’t make sense, and turning those things inside-out. He stared at the screen.

Higgins: “Let me get this straight. He’s corrupted hundreds of people to claim the money.”

Garrow: “That’s right.”

Higgins: “That’s (expletive deleted) and you know it.”

It sounded familiar. Opening his desk drawer, he removed a stack of letters, and sorted through them. Lucy Price had written him weekly since going to prison nine months ago. Although he’d accepted that a relationship between them wouldn’t work, he still cared deeply about her. He found the letter he was looking for, and stared at Lucy’s flowing script.

Valentine shook his head. It would be easy to dismiss the man who’d approached Lucy as a masher, only the slot machine he’d asked Lucy to play had paid off, and Lucy had sensed that something was wrong. The man had somehow rigged the machine, and talked Lucy into being his claimer. Which meant that everything Bronco’s lawyer had told Bill Higgins was true.

“Jesus Christ,” he said.

Chapter 6

Gerry Valentine had been gambling since he was ten. Ever since he could remember, placing a bet had gotten his adrenaline pumping, and made him feel good all over.

Until today.

He was sitting at his kitchen table with Yolanda, eating take-out Chinese food from paper cartons. Back when he was a kid, his family had eaten Chinese food this way. Yolanda found it funny but went along with the ritual. Maybe that was why he loved her so much. She put up with his nonsense.

“Why the long face?” she asked, twirling her chicken lo mein with a fork.

He took a deep breath. Along with the three thousand his father had given him, he’d won another six grand by picking the Daily Double at Tampa Bay Downs. Only, the win at the track hadn’t made him feel very good. Through the intercom on the table he listened to Lois talking in her sleep from the bedroom.

“She sounds like you,” Gerry said.

“You think so?”

“Yeah. She whispers in her sleep. You do that.”

“You didn’t answer my question. What’s wrong?”

Gerry couldn’t hide it anymore. He pointed at the money he’d won at the track lying on the table. “This.”

Yolanda continued to eat her food. When it came to gambling, she was as pure as freshly fallen snow, and didn’t understand the odds against picking two horses to come in first in two different races.

“You won,” she said. “What’s wrong with that?”

“I cheated.”

The lo mein noodles on her fork escaped back into the carton, and she put the utensil on her plate. “You did what?”

Normally, Gerry would have lowered his head in shame. This was the classic response to someone getting chewed out; lower your head and beg forgiveness. But, he wasn’t going to do that with Yolanda. She deserved better.

“I cheated the track.”

“Explain yourself.”

“When we got to the track, I grabbed a racing form. On it were the names of two horses that I recognized from my bookmaking days. These horses were excellent runners, only their owner had his jockeys hold them back in races.”

“He made his own horses lose?”

“Yeah. Over time, they became long shots. When I saw them in the first and second races today, I had a hunch he was going to let them really run.”

“Why?”

“Because the Daily Double only happens in the first and second races. If a bettor picks both winning horses, he wins a bundle. Since these two horses were long shots, the odds they paid out were astronomical.” He pointed at the money lying on the table. “I won that on a hundred dollar bet.”

Yolanda stared at the stack of bills. “But there was no guarantee those horses would win, was there?”

“No, but they were sure things.”

“Meaning what?”

“Meaning I used insider-information. Normally, it wouldn’t bother me. But then a funny thing happened. I saw that hustler who nearly scammed me with the silking, and told my father. And we caught him. And you know what?”

“What,” his wife said softly.

“It made me feel better than winning the Daily Double.”

“It did?”

“Yeah. And it made me realize something else. I can’t be a cheater, and also catch cheaters. It had to be one, or the other. So, I’m giving it up.”

“The cheating.”

“Yeah.”

Yolanda reached across the table and placed her hand atop his. In her beautiful brown eyes was a look that was both strange and wonderful. At any other time in their relationship, her look would have disturbed him. It was like she’d been waiting for him, and he’d finally arrived.

“You didn’t tell your father about winning the Daily Double, did you?”

He shook his head. Confessing to his old man would only reinforce every bad image his father had of him.

“But you learned your lesson,” she said.

“I sure did.”

She stared at the money, and Gerry found himself staring as well. Money had never seemed so important as it did once the baby had been born. His wife lifted her eyes to meet his. “Will you give the money back to the track?” she asked.

“Give it back? Are you, nuts?”

“Gerry!”

There was a knock on the back door. He rose, and flicked on the back porch light. Through the glass cut-out he saw his father standing on the stoop. Did he overhear us? He unlocked the back door and opened it.

“Hey, Pop, what’s up?”

“We need to talk,” his father said.

Gerry and his father took a walk into downtown Palm Harbor. As towns went, it wasn’t much, the main street consisting of two family-owned restaurants, a metaphysical bookstore, a real estate office, and a coffee shop. It was Small Pond, U.S.A., but in Gerry’s book that was okay. Palm Harbor’s strict zoning restrictions prohibited fast-food restaurants and strip shopping centers, and he liked knowing the town was going to stay the way it was. They stopped beneath a moth-encrusted street light.

“We have a problem,” his father said.

Gerry sucked in his breath. “We do?”

“Yeah. It has the potential to ruin us.”

“Seriously?”

“Seriously. You want an ice cream cone?”

Gerry hid the smile forming on his lips. His father had never let anything get in the way of eating.

“Sure. Chocolate swirl if they have it.”

His father walked into a restaurant, and emerged a minute later with a pair of double-scoop ice cream cones. He handed Gerry one, along with a paper napkin. It didn’t look like chocolate swirl, but Gerry didn’t complain. The suspense was killing him, and they walked down the street side by side.

“A Nevada Gaming Control Board agent is stealing jackpots from slot machines,” his father began. “I’ve been asked to take the case, figure out who the agent is, and how he’s doing it.”

“What makes that such a big catastrophe?” Gerry asked, licking his cone. “I mean, you’ve caught slot cheaters before.”

“This is different. Once the story hits the news wires, it could destroy the gambling industry in Nevada.”

“You’ve lost me, Pop.”

His father licked his cone, then made a face. “This tastes funny.”

“So does mine,” Gerry said. “I think you got frozen yogurt by mistake.”

“Crap.”

They tossed their cones into a trash bin. His father said, “Do you have any idea how much revenue slot machines account for in Nevada?”

Gerry shook his head. Slot machines had never interested him, simply because there was no way for players to get an edge. The earliest slot machines had given out candy and chewing gum, then some genius had started offering cash prizes, and an industry had been born.

“Take a guess,” his father said.

“Twenty percent?”

“Seventy,” his father said. “Slot machines generate seven billion dollars a year profit in Nevada, thirty billion dollars a year nationwide. They’re the heart and soul of every casino. They’re also responsible for most taxes which are collected.”

“So, this agent stole some jackpots. How’s that going to ruin the industry?”

“He’s a state employee, Gerry. He’s one of them. Don’t you get it?”

“No.”

“Understand the mind set of people who play slots. I’m not talking about your recreational player, either. I mean your hard core slot player.”

“Like your friend Lucy Price,” Gerry said.

“Exactly. Lucy sat down at a slot machine one day, and started feeding money in. She won a little, lost a little. First she’s up, then she’s down. Before she knew it, she was hooked.”

“Hooked how? It’s just a game.”

“Slots are different. The game uses intermittent reinforcement to make people want to play. B.F. Skinner showed how intermittent reinforcement works with a mouse in a box. You heard of him?”

Gerry nodded solemnly. His old man had a highschool education and was quoting B.F. Skinner. He was impressed.

“One day, Skinner put a mouse in a box. The mouse tapped a lever, and a food pellet appeared. The mouse ate the pellet, then tapped the lever again, and another pellet appeared. The mouse ate until it was stuffed.

“The next day, Skinner put the mouse back in the same box. The mouse tapped the lever, but no pellet appeared. After a while the mouse lost interest, and stopped tapping the lever.

“The third day, Skinner put the mouse in the box again. This time when the mouse tapped the lever, the pellets came out at infrequent intervals. Guess what happened?”

Gerry shook his head. He didn’t have a clue.

“The mouse tapped on that lever all day long. It didn’t matter that the mouse didn’t know when the food would come out. The mouse just knew that it eventually would. Skinner called this intermittent reinforcement.”

“And that’s how slot machines hook suckers into playing,” Gerry said.

“Yeah, but there’s a catch.”

“What’s that?”

“Slot players believe the more money they put in, the more likely the machine is to pay a jackpot. They think they’re priming the pump.”

“And they’re not?”

“No. Modern slot machines use silicon chips to control the game. The chip doesn’t have a memory, and can never be primed. Problem is, nobody who plays the slots believes that.”

“Why not?”

“They just don’t. Winning a jackpot is a dream to these people. If they read in the paper that jackpots are being stolen, they’ll think That guy stole my jackpot! and they’ll stop playing. Overnight, seven billion dollars in profits will go up in smoke.”

“Oh, wow,” Gerry said.

Another storm had rolled in from the gulf, and they walked back to Gerry’s house in rumbling darkness, stopping beneath a large cypress tree on the corner.

“How will this affect our business?” Gerry asked.

“This could hurt every casino in the country,” his father said. “If it does, the casinos will pare back, and stop using us.”

“What then?”

“Shuffle board for me, a real job for you.”

Gerry grimaced. “There’s got to be a solution.”

His father pulled a piece of nicotine gum out of his pocket and popped it into his mouth. Gerry knew it was nicotine because his father didn’t offer him any. His father said, “The governor of Las Vegas asked me to take the job. You know my feelings about Las Vegas, but I’m going to help him out. If I can catch this agent and the governor can keep it out of the papers, our business won’t suffer.”

Gerry nodded in the dark. His father had thought the whole thing out.

“Beautiful,” he said.

His father stepped out of the shadows. “There’s one catch. The police got this information from an informant. Bronco Marchese.”

The storm had caught up with them, the sky awash with brilliant flashes of lightning, the booms of thunder drawing closer. Gerry came out of the shadows as well. “The bastard who murdered Uncle Sal?”

“That’s right.”

“I’ve been wanting to get my hands on him for a long time.”

His father frowned. “This is a job, Gerry, not a vendetta. If you go, it’s as my partner. Otherwise, stay home.”

Gerry felt the indignation rise in his chest. Uncle Sal had been like a second father to him, and he forced himself to calm down.

“What do you want me to do?”

“I’m going to question Bronco, see if I can get the agent’s name out of him,” his father replied. “I’m sure he’s not going to be cooperative. I want you to read him.”

“Read him how?”

“Get his vibes.”

“I don’t understand what you mean, Pop.”

His father put his hand on Gerry’s shoulder. “Look, Gerry. I realized something at the track today. You know how criminals and low lifes think. You were one of them, for Christ’s sake. That’s an asset in our business.”

“It is?”

“Yes. So start using it. I’ll interview Bronco, and you tell me what you think is going on inside his head. Sound like a plan?”

Gerry dipped his head. It was a habit he’d picked up as a teenager and never outgrown. It meant “Yes,” only was deeper than that. His father had asked for help, and Gerry wasn’t going to let him down.

“Good.”

They walked up the path to Gerry’s house between scattered raindrops. Reaching the front door, Gerry pulled out his house key and stuck it into the lock.

“One more thing,” his father said.

“What’s that?”

“I overheard your conversation with Yolanda.”

Gerry froze. Busted again. Without another word, his father turned and walked away. He thought about all the bills that needed to be paid, then erased the thought from his mind.

“I’ll take the money back tomorrow,” he heard himself say.

His father waved in the darkness and then was gone.

Chapter 7

Bronco Marchese lay on his cot in his jailhouse jammies, staring at the concrete ceiling. His lawyer, bad-breathed Kyle Garrow, was running late. Garrow had never been late to an appointment before, but Bronco had never been in jail before. Bronco sensed a shift in their relationship that he didn’t like. The moment he got out of jail, he planned to set Garrow straight.

He shut his eyes. It was the strangest damn thing. His first time behind bars, and he wasn’t missing the taste of good food, or the rush of an ice-cold beer. What he was missing were the slots.

He’d started playing in New York forty years ago. Slots were illegal, only most bars in New York had them. He’d been fifteen, and had never experienced the kind of joy that coursed through his body after winning a jackpot. He’d fed his winnings back into the machine, expecting it to happen again. When it hadn’t, he’d gone and gotten a screwdriver, opened the machine, and stolen every last coin.

For the next two years, he’d stolen jackpots all over the city. His parents were dead and he had no friends, and it had kept him alive. One day while sitting at a bar, he’d overheard a conversation that had changed his life.

It was between two hoodlums, and they were discussing a gang of cheaters in Las Vegas who were rigging jackpots. The hoodlums had made it sound like the greatest scam ever invented.

“They’re stealing millions,” one of the hoodlums said.

“You’re garbageting me,” the other hoodlum said.

“No, I’m not.”

“Man, I’d like to get my hands on some of that money.”

Bronco had thought about the conversation for days. He guessed the Las Vegas cheaters were doing the same thing he was, but the jackpots were bigger. Suddenly, his life’s path had been laid out before him: He would go west, and make his fortune. The next day, he’d gone to the Port Authority Bus terminal on west 42nd Street, and bought a one-way ticket to Las Vegas.

The trip had taken a week. When Bronco arrived, he’d been awed by what he’d seen. Las Vegas was a mega-watt shrine to greed that burned twenty-four hours a day. It made the gambling back east seem like kindergarten, and had only further confirmed his decision to come. He had no money, and slept under bridges and ate out of dumpsters, his nights spent in the casinos.

One night at the Riviera, he spotted five people bunched around a slot machine. Their movements looked suspicious, and he quickly made their leader, a red-haired man with a scarred face. When he approached, Red told him to get lost.

“I’m on your side,” Bronco said.

“Prove it,” Red said.

Bronco pointed across the casino floor. “See that guy by the change machine? He’s the house dick. Wait until he leaves before making your play.”

Red had liked that. The house dick wandered off, and the gang went to work. While Red opened the machine with a skeleton key and set the reels, his accomplices stood in front of the machine, blocking it from the surveillance cameras, while a fourth acted as a lookout. Once the reels were set, the gang dispersed, leaving a blonde woman to claim the prize. Bronco stood off to the side, awe-struck.

An hour later, everyone met up in a parking lot across the street, and cut up the jackpot. Red, whose real name was Glenn, handed Bronco five hundred dollars and said, “Kid, you’ve got a future in this business.”

Bronco had stared at the money. It was more than he’d ever seen in his life. He’d handed it back to Glenn, and saw surprise register in the older man’s face.

“You don’t want the money?” Glenn said.

“I want to learn,” Bronco said.

Glenn had taken him under his wing, and become his friend. According to Glenn, any idiot could rig a slot machine. All you needed was a skeleton key and a lot of nerve. The hard part was finding a claimer. They needed to be John Q. Citizens with squeaky-clean backgrounds. Otherwise, the casino would be suspicious when they ran a background check. The blonde at the Riviera was a perfect example. She was a first grade teacher, and had never broken a law in her life.

“But how do you convince claimers to work with you?” Bronco asked one night.

They were eating spaghetti and meatballs at a dump on Fremont Street, and Glenn put his fork down and stared him in the eye.

“You don’t,” his teacher said.

Bronco put his elbows on the table, and stared his teacher in the eye.

“You don’t convince them,” Glenn said. “That’s the secret to this business, kid.”

Bronco looked at his plate of food. He knew everything about rigging slot machines but the important part, and felt defeated. After a moment he lifted his head, and saw a softening in his teacher’s face, and realized Glenn was going to tell him.

“They convince themselves,” his teacher said.

“Hey, punk. Wake up.”

Bronco’s eyes snapped open. A hulking guard stood outside his cell door.

“You the pizza guy?”

“Very funny,” the guard said. “Your lawyer’s here.”

Bronco rose from the cot and held his hands out. The guard entered and handcuffed him, then led Bronco down a hallway to the visitor’s room.

The room was small and stunk of sweat. Garrow stood behind a pocked table wearing a concerned look on his face. Bronco sat down behind the table, and was handcuffed to the leg of his chair, which was hex-bolted to the floor. Garrow remained standing, his hands clasped in front of his chest.

“How you doing?” his lawyer asked.

“Having the time of my fucking life.”

“You’ve opened up Pandora’s box, Bronco.”

“I don’t know any broad named Pandora,” Bronco said.

Garrow unclasped his hands and stepped closer. He was small and greasy and knew how to get under people’s skin. “It’s a figure of speech. You’ve created a shit storm, in case you didn’t know it.”

Bronco knew exactly what he’d created. He stared down at the pocked table. In blue ink someone had scratched the words NO ONE GETS OUT OF HERE ALIVE into the wood. No one but me, he thought.

“Good,” he said.

Garrow gave him a no-nonsense stare. “Listen to what I’m saying. Governor Smoltz has put half the cops in the state on the case. He’s also bringing in outside help. And, he’s putting heat on me.”

“He can’t do that, can he?” Bronco said.

“You’re threatening the state’s livelihood. Smoltz will do whatever he wants.”

Bronco used his free hand to scratch his chin. He enjoyed seeing Garrow sweat; it brought the relationship back to a normal level.

“What kind of outside help?”

“Some casino dick named Valentine.”

“Tony Valentine?”

“Yeah. Don’t tell me you know the guy.”

Bronco dropped his head, and stared at the words written on the table. Not a joke, but a premonition. He wasn’t getting out of here alive if Valentine was involved. “Afraid so.”

Garrow gestured nervously with his hands. “Let me guess. He hates your guts.”

“Yeah.”

“What did you do to him?”

“You don’t want to know.”

“Then we’re sunk.”

Bronco stared up at him. “I can still go to the media. I’ll tell them the name of the crooked Gaming Control Board agent, and the casinos will be fucked.”

Garrow lowered his body so his chin was a few inches from Bronco’s face. “What if the police don’t let you talk to the media? What if they keep you locked up in this stinking jail until they figure out who it is. What then?”

“But I’ve got rights,” Bronco said.

“You’re holding them hostage,” his lawyer said. “Smoltz will do whatever it takes to keep you muzzled. Think about it.”

“Then you talk to the media, and tell them the agent’s name,” Bronco said.

Garrow pulled back. “Me? Are you insane? I’ll be run out of the state. No thanks.”

“So you’re saying I’m on my own.”

“I’m saying give them the agent’s name, and we’ll ask the judge to go lenient on you for shooting Bo Farmer, claim it was self-defense.”

“What kind of sentence are you talking about?”

“Six to eight years, with time off for good behavior. I’ve already talked to the D.A. about it.”

Bronco glanced at the big clock hanging on the wall. The second hand was sweeping in twelve noon. Less than ten minutes had passed since he’d entered the visitor’s room, and his high-priced lawyer had already sold him down the river.

“Listen to me,” Bronco said in a whisper. “If you don’t help me get out of this fucking place, I’ll tell the D.A. about all the crooked shit you’ve done, like laundering money, and hiring hit men for clients. You’ll go to jail for the rest of your life.”

Garrow looked stricken. “I’m doing everything I can.”

“Do more. I need time so I can figure a way to get out of here.”

“Tell me what you want, and I’ll do it,” his attorney said.

Bronco stared at the pocked table. This whole conversation had started because Tony Valentine was involved in the case. That gave him an idea.

“Take Valentine out of the picture.”

“But he’s a cop.”

“Ex-cop. Nobody cares about them.”

“You want him whacked?”

“You’re a mind reader.”

Garrow understood what his client was saying, and nodded solemnly.

“Consider it done,” the lawyer said.

Walking back to his cell, Bronco glanced over his shoulder at the guard who was escorting him. His name was Karl Klinghoffer, and he was as big as a mule and half as smart. As they reached his cell, Bronco said, “You married?”

Klinghoffer lifted his bovine eyes. “What if I was?”

“Want to make your wife happy?”

“Don’t go there,” Klinghoffer warned.

Bronco dropped his voice. “I’m talking about buying her a fancy appliance, or a big diamond. Think she’d like that?”

Klinghoffer unlocked the cell door, and brusquely shoved him in. Then, he closed the door and started to walk away. It was a slow walk, and Bronco knew that he’d taken the bait.

“This isn’t a bribe,” he called after him.

Klinghoffer shuffled back to Bronco’s cell. His shoes were at least a size fourteen and he couldn’t walk without scuffing the floor.

“Then what is it?”

“Free money.”

“Ain’t no such thing.”

“Yes there is.” Bronco pressed his face against the bars. “There’s a casino in Reno called the Gold Rush. You know it?”

“Sure.”

“Go inside, and go to the first row of slot machines you see.”

“Front door or back?”

“Front. Third machine from the end is a Quarter Mania. Put three quarters into the machine, and pull the handle. Then put in two, and pull the handle. Then put in one, and pull the handle. Then you’re set. Make sure you bet the maximum amount of coins after that.”

Klinghoffer stared at him. There was a security camera watching them, and he was smart enough to answer while barely moving his lips.

“Why should I do that.”

“Because you’ll win a jackpot.”

“Machine rigged?”

“Never been touched.”

“Then how?”

Bronco pulled away from the bars and lay down on his cot. He propped his pillow against the wall, and lay on it with his arms behind his head. “It’s free money, my friend. I have the keys to the kingdom, and I’m willing to share them with you.”

Klinghoffer’s mouth twisted in confusion, his conscience battling with the devil called greed. He started to walk away, then halted, and turned to stare at his prisoner.

“Three, two and one?”

“That’s right. Make sure you buy your wife something nice.”

Chapter 8

The next day, Valentine and Gerry flew to Las Vegas to meet up with Bill Higgins. It was six hours of flying with all the stops, and when they got off at McCarren International Airport in Las Vegas, Bill was waiting for them outside the terminal. A Navajo by birth, Bill’s dark suit complimented his jet black hair and steely disposition.

“I’ve got some good news,” Bill said.

“Let me guess,” Valentine said. “You found the bad agent in your department, and we can go home.”

“No, but we did find Bronco’s apartment. He’s been living in Henderson under an alias. I figured you’d want to be there when we searched it.”

“Who’s we?” Valentine asked.

“Two of my best field agents, plus two detectives with the Metro LVPD.”

“And the three of us?”

“Correct.”

Bill was the smartest law enforcement agent Valentine knew who’d never been a cop. But there was something missing from not having that cop experience. As a cop, you got to learn how bad people could really be. Valentine fished a piece of nicotine gum out of his pocket and popped it into his mouth.

“Governor Smoltz said this was my investigation.”

“That’s right,” Bill said. “Smoltz gave you carte blanche.”

“Meaning what?”

“Meaning you can boss around whoever you want to.”

“Including yourself?”

Bill swallowed a lump in his throat. They’d been friends for more than twenty-five years, only Valentine wasn’t going to let that stand in the way of handling the investigation. Gerry excused himself, and ducked into a Men’s Room.

“Including me,” Bill replied.

“If you don’t mind, I want to excuse your two agents and two detectives, and search Bronco’s place ourselves.”

Bill’s face turned to stone. He didn’t like it, and Valentine fished another piece of nicotine gum out of his pocket, and handed it to him.

“Try this.”

“What for?”

“It helps control your temper.”

Bill popped the gum into his mouth and made a face. “That tastes terrible.”

“See, it’s working already. You’ve got your mind on other things.”

Dozens of people were swirling around them in the terminal, and Valentine lowered his voice. “Look, Bill, who’s to say your two field agents aren’t working with Bronco, or that Bronco doesn’t have cops on the police force in his back pocket? I know it’s a stretch, but why take risks?”

“You’ve got a point.”

“Besides the one on top of my head?”

Bill smiled, no longer pissed off. “Besides that one.”

“One more thing,” Valentine said. “I want some form of identification that will let me do this job.”

Bill thought it over. “How about a Nevada Gaming Control Board shield?”

“Beautiful. I’ll also need an ID for my son.”

“Isn’t he here on vacation?”

Gerry had come off the plane wearing khakis and a loud Hawaiian shirt, and had looked like every other person ready to have a good time.

“No. He’s working with me.”

Bill started to protest, then clamped his mouth shut. Bill had come close to having Gerry arrested six months ago, and was not a member of his son’s fan club.

“It’s your show,” Bill said.

Henderson was a bedroom community twenty minutes outside Las Vegas, and had everything the neon city had — casinos, nightlife, good restaurants — but a lot less tourists. As a result, it had less problems, and Valentine had always considered it one of Nevada’s better places to live. Bronco lived in an older housing development on the outskirts of town. The development’s name was plastered on a sign by the entrance, and Valentine forgot it the moment Bill drove past. Inside were endless rows of one-story, sun-bleached houses on streets with names like Whispering Hills and Emerald Greens, even though there were no hills for fifty miles, and nothing was green.

Bronco’s house was at the end of a cul-de-sac, and was cordoned off with yellow police tape. A pair of Metro LVPD’s finest stood in the shade of the front porch, their thumbs hooked in their belts. Bill got out, and flashed his ID.

“We’re here to search the house,” he said. “I want one of you in front, the other in back. If you see anyone come up, yell.”

“Yes, sir,” the officers replied.

Valentine followed Bill across the front lawn with the sun burning on his neck. Gerry walked beside his father, ignoring the two cops’ stares.

“Next time, wear regular clothes,” Valentine said.

Bill used a crow bar to break down the front door. Then, he stepped aside. “It’s all yours,” he said.

Valentine entered and waited for his eyes to adjust, then stared at a living room straight out of a college frat house. On every table were empty beer bottles and plastic ashtrays overflowing with stale cigarette butts. On the floor were piles of newspapers and magazines that dated back several months. Gerry whistled under his breath.

“Reminds me of my room when I was growing up.”

“I was thinking the same thing,” Valentine said. He watched his son head toward the kitchen. “Don’t touch anything.”

“Yes, sir.”

Valentine cased the living room. An 58'' plasma screen TV hung from the wall. He had been thinking about getting a new TV, and had priced the same model at Best Buy, then decided he could live without it. It wasn’t that he couldn’t afford to spend five thousand bucks for a TV; there was simply nothing on TV worth spending five grand for. In front of the TV was a cracked leather chair that looked really comfortable. Next to it, a small table on which sat an empty fifth of Jack Daniels and three ashtrays overflowing with cigarette butts. It reminded Valentine of his father, who killed his evenings in front of the tube, smoking and drinking. He noticed a DVD on the table and picked it up. The writing on the DVD said, MARIE/FIRST DATE.

The remote control sat on the chair’s arm. Valentine powered up the TV, and the screen came to life. He inserted the DVD and hit play. A surveillance tape appeared on the screen, showing a group of people playing craps inside a casino. One woman stood out. Short, dark-haired and vivacious, with a melt-your heart smile. She was throwing the dice, and appeared to be winning.

“Hey Pop, in here,” Gerry called from the back of the house.

“You find something?”

“Yeah, but I don’t know what it is.”

“You didn’t touch it, did you?”

His son didn’t reply, leaving Valentine to believe that he had. As Valentine crossed the room, he saw Bill leaning against the wall with his arms crossed.

“He’s learning,” Valentine said.

He walked through the kitchen. It was a disaster area, the sink overflowing with dirty dishes that looked like science experiments, the counter tops covered with empty beer bottles. Most hustlers tried to stay away from the sauce; it was bad for business. Bronco obviously had a problem he couldn’t control.

“Where are you?” Valentine called out.

“In the garage.”

He found a short hallway that led to the garage. He stuck his head in, and saw Gerry standing at a work table that ran the length of the wall. The garage had been converted into a workshop, and contained every power tool ever invented. Gerry pointed at several boxes filled with rings of keys.

“What are these?”

Valentine walked over and pulled a ring from one of the boxes. There was a tag attached to it that said Harrah’s. He pulled out another. The tag on it said Caesars.

“They’re skeleton keys to slot machines. Bronco can see a key once, and make a duplicate. At one time, he probably could open half the slot machines in Las Vegas,” Valentine explained.

“What happened?”

“The casinos changed all their machines.”

“Because of him?”

“He was one of the reasons.”

Gerry moved down the table. A hundred metal devices that looked like reading lights lay stacked in another box. “What are these?”

Valentine stared into the box. A wireless transmitter lay on top of the stack. He pressed the power button, and the lights on every device began flicking on and off. “Strobes,” he said.

“You going to fill me in, or do I have to hold my breath?”

Valentine turned the transmitter off, and the devices stopped blinking. “They’re called monkey’s paws. Every slot machine has an optical sensor to count payouts. The monkey’s paw is inserted up the payout chute, and causes the sensor to overpay. Slot machines also have anti-runaway relays to stop overpayments. My guess is, the strobe light defeats the anti-runaway relay.”

“But why so many of them?” Gerry asked.

That was a good question. Picking up one of the devices, Valentine noticed two tiny magnets, one glued to the top, the other to the bottom. Smiling, he showed them to his son. “Bronco is leaving the monkey’s paws inside the slot machines. Someone inspecting the machine won’t see it, unless they know what to look for. Bronco picks up money whenever he needs it.”

Gerry shook his head in wonder.

“Sweet,” he said.

Valentine returned to the living room. The surveillance tape in the VCR was still playing, the woman with the great smile still shooting craps. She was on a roll, and everyone at the table was reveling in her good fortune. Valentine guessed this was Marie, whose name was written on the DVD.

He watched Marie throw the dice. His gut told him she was your everyday, average player. He wondered why Bronco would watch a tape of her. Had she been a member of one of his gangs? She was wholesome looking, and didn’t seem the type. Gerry and Bill entered the living room.

“We’re going to search the bedrooms,” his son said. “I know, don’t touch anything I’m not supposed to.”

“Keeping your hands in your pockets will do the trick.”

“Thanks, Pop.”

They walked down the hall and disappeared. Picking up the remote, Valentine started to turn off the player, then saw something strange on the screen. A man was leaning over the craps table, his face exposed to the camera. It was Bronco.

As the banker at the table paid Marie off, he was momentarily distracted. The banker turned his head, and Bronco added chips palmed in his hand to Marie’s bet. It was called past-posting, and Bronco did it as well as anyone Valentine had ever seen.

Marie made a startled face. She’s not part of it, Valentine realized. The banker turned his attention back to Marie, and paid her off the higher amount. Marie hesitated, then picked up her winnings, and hurried away from the craps table.

Moments later, the tape ended.

Valentine shook his head in bewilderment. He’d seen a lot of strange things in casinos, but never anything like this. Bronco had added his chips to her bet, even though she wasn’t working with him.

He was still thinking about it when he heard Gerry emit a blood-curdling yell from the other side of the house. Moments later, his son ran into the living room followed by two man-eating pit bulls.

“I opened the wrong door,” he screamed.

Chapter 9

Karl Klinghoffer’s shift at the county jail ended at two P.M. Instead of driving home and eating lunch like he normally did, he drove straight into downtown Reno. The streets were practically deserted, and he guessed he could have driven around with his eyes closed and not hurt anybody.

He drove beneath the famous Reno Arch on Virginia Street. Neon letters bragged against the clear blue sky, “The Biggest Little City in the World.” On a fine spring day in 1928, the arch had been raised to honor the paving of a two-lane highway over Donner Summit to California. As a band played brassy ragtime, the town’s casino operators and bankers had celebrated their good fortune. So had Klinghoffer’s grandfather, a local bootlegger. It had been a glorious time.

A car’s horn snapped him out of his daydream. He was driving below the speed limit, and goosed the accelerator of his fading Tercel. He’d bought the car the same week he’d met Becky, a preacher’s daughter, at a party where he’d had too much to drink. Three months later they’d gotten married. Six months after that, Karl Jr. was born. The car was a constant reminder of how messed up his life had become since that night.

He turned into the Gold Rush’s parking lot. As he parked, his conscience spoke to him. You can still walk away. He sat at the wheel and thought about it.

There was no question in his mind that the slot machine Bronco Marchese had told him to play was rigged. How else could Bronco know that it was going to pay a jackpot? By Nevada law, Karl was supposed to report this information to the police, or risk becoming an accomplice. But was knowing this really wrong? Every casino in town ran promotions for slot machines that paid off 101 %. The trick was finding out which machines they were. Why was knowing that any different than knowing which machine would pay a jackpot?

It wasn’t, he told himself.

He entered the casino. He was still in his uniform, and saw an armed security guard nod. Karl nodded back, then let his eyes slide across the glittering landscape.

The slots were the first thing he saw. They called them one-armed bandits, but that had never stopped people from playing them. Every sound that came out of a slot machine was a variation of the musical note C. Karl knew a lot about slots, and other stuff as well. Because he talked slow, people thought he was stupid. But he wasn’t stupid. Just unlucky.

He went to the cage and bought a plastic bucket filled with quarters. Then, he sat down in front of the third slot machine from the end. It was a Quarter Mania, just like Bronco had said. He realized his hands were trembling. What if the casino’s surveillance department was watching from the eye-in-the-sky? What if they knew the machine was rigged, and were just waiting to see who played it a certain way? There was still time to back out, go home, and eat his peanut butter sandwich.

“Screw that,” he said aloud.

A woman in a tracksuit at the next machine looked at him. “Excuse me?”

“Sorry, ma’am.”

He started feeding his quarters into the machine. He’d thought it over, and decided he should lose some money before he went for the kill. Otherwise, if would look funny if someone watched the tape later on.

He lost thirty dollars in the time it took for a cocktail waitress to bring him a beer. She was dressed like a cowgirl and sneered at his fifty cent tip. The bottle was cold in his hand, and he took a long swallow of beer. It made him relax, and soon his hands stopped trembling.

Karl did not remember feeding the coins into the Quarter Mania machine in the three, two, one order, but he guess he had, because soon the machine was ringing, and he was staring at the flashing number in the payout bar. He’d won $9980.45.

He’d never won anything in his life. It made him want to run around the casino and pound his chest. After a minute, the floor manager appeared, and congratulated him on the casino’s behalf. Her name was McDowell, and she wore glasses and a sharp-looking suit. She asked him if he’d like another beverage.

“Actually, I’d like to collect my money,” Klinghoffer said. “I need to be getting home to my family.”

“We have to inspect the machine first,” McDowell said.

“Why’s that?”

“Governor Smoltz has ordered us to check slot machines that pay out any jackpots. It’s a new rule.”

Karl brought the bottle to his lips, trying to act nonchalant. To his surprise, it was empty. “What are you looking for?”

“Tampering,” she said.

McDowell escorted him away from the machine. The same cocktail waitress returned and stuck a fresh beer in his hand. This time Klinghoffer tipped her two dollars, and she gave him a wink.

Soon a team of casino employees in work clothes appeared on the casino floor. They opened the Quarter Mania machine, and, using a laptop computer, began running a diagnostic test on the machine’s RNG chip. Klinghoffer felt the beer rise in his stomach as waves of numbers rapidly appeared on the laptop’s screen. When it came to cheating, there was no way to fool a computer. He was doomed.

“Is something wrong, Mr. Klinghoffer?” McDowell asked.

“I need to use the bathroom,” he mumbled.

She pointed the way, and he went into the men’s room and puked in a stall. What a god damn fool he was. The last guy to know about a scam was always the sucker who got caught. Washing his face in the sink, he thought about Becky, and how disappointed she was going to be in him. When he emerged from the men’s room, McDowell was waiting with a smile on her face.

“Everything’s fine,” she said cheerfully.

Klinghoffer thought it was a ruse, and looked around for the police. “It is?”

“Yes. The machine hadn’t been touched. Are you all right?”

He wiped his mouth on his sleeve. “I guess all this excitement’s gotten to me.”

“Well, hopefully this will make you feel better.”

She removed a certified check from her pocket, and handed it to him. He could tell that she was genuinely excited, and it made all the bad things he’d been feeling disappear. As far as the casino was concerned, he’d won the jackpot fair and square. And that was all that mattered, wasn’t it?

McDowell handed him his driver’s license. Klinghoffer didn’t remember giving it to her, and slipped it into his wallet along with his newfound wealth.

“Much obliged,” he said.

Chapter 10

The pit bulls had Gerry pinned in the corner of the living room. Gerry held a cushion he’d grabbed off the couch for protection, and the dogs were ripping it apart with their teeth, the stuffing littering the floor like cotton candy.

Valentine stood fifteen feet away, looking for something to knock the dogs away. Bill came into the living room with his gun drawn, trying to get a bead on one of the dogs, but afraid of hitting Gerry.

“Pop, do something,” his son cried.

Valentine grabbed the gun out of Bill’s hand. He inched closer to his son, while remembering a pair of attack dogs he’d dealt with during a botched jewelry store heist in Atlantic City. Raising his arm, he aimed the gun at the ceiling, and pulled the trigger. The blast was louder than he’d expected, and the side of his head went numb. The dogs hit the floor, their legs splaying out spastically. He let off another round, and they hightailed it back into the other part of the house. He tossed the gun back to Bill.

“Lock them up, will you?”

“How did you do that?”

“It’s the way they’re trained. At least some of them.”

Bill went down the hall to deal with the dogs. Valentine went to Gerry, took the tattered cushion out of his hands, and stood waiting for an explanation.

“Bill told me not to touch the door,” Gerry said.

“So what happened?”

“I opened it anyway,” his son said.

Bill went outside, and found the pair of local cops sitting in their car by the curb. They hadn’t heard the dogs, or Gerry screaming, or the gun being fired. Bill explained what had happened, and asked them to call Animal Control.

Twenty minutes later, a pair of dog catchers appeared. Gerry sat on the couch with a cold beer, and watched the dogs being marched past. Valentine sat down beside him, took the beer, and poured it into a potted plant.

“No drinking on the job,” he said.

“They nearly ripped me apart, Pop.”

“People get hurt at work all the time,” Valentine said. “You think they all stop what they’re doing, and slug down a beer?”

They resumed searching Bronco’s house. The dogs had been living in a spare bedroom with an open bag of dog food, and a water bowl that refilled itself. The room didn’t smell, leaving Valentine to guess that a neighbor had been letting them out. The room was otherwise empty, save for a metal table. On it were dozens of coin holders filled with silver-dollar sized coins. They were slugs, and designed to fool a device in a slot machine called a comparitor. Valentine flipped one to his son.

“I thought only amateurs used these,” Gerry said.

“Slugs cost casinos ten million dollars a year in lost revenue,” Valentine said.

“Can’t the machines detect them?”

“Not if they’re well made. That’s why casino personnel are trained to watch slot players. If they see someone feed a coin into a machine that isn’t shiny, they arrest the player on the spot.”

“Tony, come here for a minute,” Bill called out.

He found Bill in the master bedroom. It had nice furniture, with drapes that matched the bedspread, and felt like a room in a model home compared to the rest of the house. Bill stood by an open closet, staring at the collection of women’s clothes hanging from the racks, the dresses and outfits still in their dry-clean bags.

“Strange, don’t you think?” Bill said.

“Looks like she lives here,” Valentine said. “Any makeup in the bathroom?”

“Just a razor and some shampoo.”

Valentine examined one of the outfits. It reminded him of clothes his late wife used to wear. “These clothes are old,” he said.

“Maybe she split on him,” Bill said.

Valentine searched the room. On the dresser he found a framed photograph of a couple taken on a beach. It was Bronco and the woman Valentine had seen on the surveillance tape. Marie.

He stared at the photograph. What he’d seen on the surveillance tape hadn’t been staged. Bronco had cheated at the craps table, and Marie had reacted in shock. She hadn’t known him. But now here was evidence that she had known him. He put the picture down and looked at Bill. His friend was staring at him.

“Does this make any sense to you?” Bill asked.

“None whatsoever,” he said.

Valentine went outside the house to the backyard. It backed up onto the desert, the baked earth flat and unforgiving. He found Gerry by the pool, torturing his lungs with a cigarette. His son started to throw the butt away, and Valentine stopped him.

“Let me have a hit.”

“I thought you were trying to quit.”

“One hit won’t kill me.”

His son passed the butt with a grin on his face. “Thanks for saving my ass.”

“And your testicles.”

“Those, too.”

Valentine took a drag off his son’s cigarette. It was a Marlboro, the same brand he’d smoked and his father had smoked. He handed it back, and Gerry flicked the butt into the pool’s sickly green water. It floated lazily across the surface, trailing a thin line of smoke.

“Give me your impressions of what you saw in there,” Valentine said.

“My impressions?”

“Yeah. What do you think is going on?”

Gerry fired up another cigarette. The dogs had scared the daylights out of him, but his father asking his opinion scared him even more. When he answered, his voice was subdued. “Based on the condition of the house, I’d say Bronco is on a downward slide. He sits at home at night, chain-smokes and gets blistered. Except for cheating slot machines, he doesn’t have a life.”

“Anything else?”

“One thing did surprise me. Based upon what you told me about him, I expected his place to be filled with high-tech computers and stuff. He doesn’t even own a computer.”

“So?”

Gerry faced him. “Think about it, Pop. Bronco is claiming that a Nevada Gaming Control Board agent is stealing jackpots from new machines, right? Well, there’s no way to corrupt those machines unless you use computers. You agree?”

Think about it. It was the kind of language Valentine had been using with Gerry since he was a kid.

“Okay,” he said.

“Bronco doesn’t have a computer in his house. Which tells me that either Bronco doesn’t know what this agent is doing, or the information is worthless to him.”

“How can you know that?”

“Because he’d be trying to duplicate it, Pop,” his son said. “There’s no honor among thieves. Whatever the secret is, Bronco isn’t using it.”

“Otherwise, we’d have found it.”

“You got it.”

Valentine took the cigarette from his son’s hand. Gerry had nailed the incongruity on the head. He took a drag, this one deeper than the first, and knew he was hooked again. He handed the cigarette back to his son.

“Sure you don’t want one of your own?” Gerry asked him.

“I’d rather smoke yours,” Valentine said.

Chapter 11

Mabel was eating a tuna fish sandwich while trying to catch a cheater.

Sitting at Tony’s computer, she was watching a live feed from the poker room at the Micanopy Indian reservation casino. The Micanopys ran a casino in Tampa where the highway interchanges met. State law let them offer poker, 21, and slot machines. There wasn’t much cheating, and Tony had turned the account over to her. Mabel regularly watched live feeds from the casino’s surveillance cameras.

She bit into her sandwich while staring at the screen. To help her learn about poker cheating, Tony had video-taped himself doing the moves, like dealing seconds and bottoms, doing the hop, and ringing in a cooler. On the tape, Tony had explained the various “tells” Mabel needed to look for. By watching the tape every day, her eyes had become trained.

On the screen, the dealer was starting to deal. He was a native American and heavyset. As he sailed cards around the table, Mabel began to record him. On the third round, he snapped a card off the bottom, and dealt it to the player on his right.

“Gotcha,” she said.

He dealt a bottom on the fourth round as well. Then, Mabel noticed something strange. On the back of his hand was a tattoo. She brought her nose up close to the screen. It looked like a small bird.

“Huh,” she said.

Mabel leaned back in her chair. Normally, she would copy the tape, and e-mail it to the Micanopys. What they did to the dealer was their business. Only she had no way of knowing who at the casino might open the e-mail. What if it was a friend of the dealer, or a relative? That could be trouble. She supposed she could ask Tony, only that seemed like a cop-out. It was her account, and she needed to come up with a solution. She was still thinking about it when the phone rang. She minimalized the computer screen, then picked up the receiver.

“Grift Sense. Can I help you?”

“Is Tony there?” a man with a deep voice asked.

The caller sounded familiar, and Mabel glanced at caller ID. It was Darren Crawford, a likeable FBI agent out of the bureau’s Reno office.

“I’m afraid not. Can I help you?”

“Will you be speaking to him, soon?”

“Perhaps.”

“This is urgent. Please tell him to check his e-mail. I’ve just sent him something that’s for his eyes only.”

“Tony’s out of town, and won’t be checking his e-mail right way,” she said. “Would you please tell me what this is about, so I may relay a message?”

“Do you work for him?”

“Yes. This is Mabel. We’ve spoken before.”

“Hello, Mabel. Can you tell me where Tony is?”

“He’s in Nevada on a case.”

She heard the sharp intake of Crawford’s breath. “What’s wrong?”

“You need to get a hold of him, and tell him to open my email. It’s a matter of life and death.”

“Life and death?”

“Yes. Please tell him. Goodbye.”

The line went dead, and Mabel dropped the receiver in its cradle, then typed a command into Tony’s computer and went into his email account. Within moments, she was staring at several dozen email messages. She scrolled through them and found Crawford’s, which was marked with a red flag. She opened it.

Mabel felt an icy finger run down her spine. A contract on Tony’s life? She thought she was going to get sick, and snatched the phone off the desk. Her boss never kept his cell phone on, but Gerry did, and she punched in his number.

Valentine and his son were standing by the pool behind Bronco’s house when Gerry’s cell phone rang. Gerry answered it, then handed the phone to his father.

“Mabel needs to talk to you.”

“Hey good looking, what’s up?” Valentine said into the phone.

“You’re not going to believe the e-mail you just received.” She read the email Crawford had sent. “You need to stay away from Reno until the FBI finds out whose going to take this contract on your life.”

Valentine stared at the desolate backyard. He should have been shocked, yet he wasn’t. He and Bronco had a history that was written in blood. One day, one of them was going to kill the other, and he had a feeling that day was about to come.

“Maybe you’re right,” he said.

“Of course I’m right. To be forewarned is to be forearmed.”

He found himself nodding. Mabel, the voice of reason.

“Okay,” he said.

“Oh, Tony, I’m worried about you.”

“Don’t be. Remember, I’ve got Gerry to protect me.”

“Now you’re being funny. Please be careful.”

“I will.” He thanked his neighbor and folded the phone. They went inside the house, and found Bill in the living room gathering evidence.

“Change of plans. I’m not going to Reno to interview Bronco,” Valentine said.

Bill looked confused. “How can you conduct this case, and not talk to our only suspect?”

“Bronco’s trying to hire a hit man to kill me. I don’t want to go until I know who the hit man is. Make sense?”

“Sure. Who tipped you off?”

“A little bird.”

“So what are you going to do?”

“Switch to Plan B.”

“Which is?”

“I know an inmate in the Jean Correctional Facility for Women in Las Vegas,” Valentine said. “She sends me letters. In one, she described getting approached by a guy in a casino, who asked her to play a slot machine a certain way. She did, and won a jackpot. I think the guy who approached her was your bad agent.”

Bill stared at him. “She’s actually met him?”

“Yes. It was a few years ago. If I talk to her, I’m sure I can get a description.”

Bill suddenly looked mad as hell, and Valentine guessed Bill was thinking they should have talked to Lucy Price first.

“This woman’s had a hard life,” Valentine explained when they were in Bill’s car a few minutes later. “I didn’t want to implicate her in another crime if I didn’t have to. I know how the courts treat cheaters out here.”

“You think even if she cooperated, we’d screw her?” Bill asked.

“Name a cheater or an accomplice you haven’t screwed.”

Bill shook his head and stared at the road.

Chapter 12

Jean Correctional Facility was situated on the north end of Las Vegas. The prison was a depressing complex of sandy brown buildings surrounded by eight-foot chain link fence topped with razor wire. Bill parked in the visitor lot and they got out. The sun was broiling hot, and felt like an oven.

The prison’s main building was three stories high and resembled a school house. Bill showed his credentials to the receptionist, and the warden appeared in the reception area a few minutes later. Being the most powerful law enforcement agent in the state had its privileges, and the warden agreed to Bill’s request to bring Lucy Price to the visitor’s area as soon as she could be found. When the warden was gone, Bill said, “I guess you’d like to talk to this woman alone.”

“That’s the only way she’s going to cooperate,” Valentine said.

Bill and Gerry headed down the hallway toward a sign that said cafeteria. Stopping at the door, Gerry glanced back at his father.

“Good luck, Pop.”

Valentine went into the visitor’s room and took a seat behind a three-inch sheet of plexiglass used to keep prisoners and visitors apart. The room was empty, and he stared at the vacant seat on the other side of the glass. The last time he’d seen Lucy was the day she’d been sentenced. It had been one of the hardest days of his life. Through the plexiglass he saw a door open, and felt the air catch in his throat.

Lucy entered the visitor’s room and sat down stiffly in the chair across from him. She wore a drab brown uniform, no make-up, and had her dark hair tied in a braid. Her face was filled with sadness. Despite the plainness of her appearance and her dark expression, there was no denying the affect she had upon him. To Valentine’s eyes, she appeared to be spun from light.

“It was the letter,” she said. “That’s why you came.”

He blinked, not understanding. “What are you talking about?”

“Please don’t play games with me, Tony.”

“I’m not playing games.”

“The letter I sent last week. Don’t tell me you didn’t get it.”

He shrugged helplessly. “No.”

“Did you get any of my letters?”

“Yes, of course.”

“Did you read them?”

“Yes, I read all of them. I still have them.”

“But not the letter I sent last week.”

Despite his advancing years, Valentine’s memory wasn’t fading. He shook his head.

“Oh, for the love of Christ, then why are you here?” she said.

“I need your help.”

Lucy leaned forward, her breath fogging the plexiglass. She was a slender, fifty-two year old woman who reminded him more of his late wife than any female he’d ever met. Maybe that was why he’d fallen so helplessly in love with her.

“I can’t help you, Tony,” she said. “I have a shrink inside the prison who I see every week. He wants me to stay away from you. He thinks you’re part of my problem. That’s what my letter said.”

“I’m part of your problem?”

Her eyes were glistening. “In a figurative sense, yes. You’re in the gambling business. I’m a degenerate gambler, and I’ve always been attracted to people in the business. Old boyfriends, my ex-husband, you. My shrink wants me to stop writing you, and break off our relationship.”

Valentine leaned back in his chair. For some reason, he’d thought that Lucy would always be in his life, even if from a distance.

“Forever?”

She smiled like he’d made a joke. “You want to see me when I get out?”

“Yes, of course.”

“Then quit the casino business.”

Lucy would be getting out in five years if she behaved herself. Maybe by then he’d be sick of catching cheaters, and be ready to retire.

“All right,” he heard himself say.

“I mean right now.”

“How can I quit now? I’m on a job.”

“Suit yourself.” She rose abruptly from her chair, and signaled to the guard on duty that she was ready to leave. “Goodbye, Tony.”

“But I need your help.”

“You’re hurting me. Don’t you understand that?”

“Please. It will only take a few minutes.”

She did not bother to turn around as she walked out of the room.

Valentine sat there for a while, staring at the chair she’d occupied. After a few minutes, a guard stuck his head in, quizzed him with a glance, then left. Valentine tried to imagine how he looked, sitting there dejectedly like a jilted highschool kid.

He found Bill and his son in the cafeteria, drinking coffee.

“How did it go?” Bill asked.

“Looks like we’re going to Reno,” he said.

Chapter 13

There were three ways to travel from Las Vegas to Reno. You could drive for eight hours through the mountains, take a throw-up flight on a puddle jumper, or, if the governor was backing your action, go in style on the taxpayer’s nickel. Gerry whistled through his teeth as they boarded Smoltz’s private Lear jet on a tarmac at McCarren.

“Wow, leather seats and upholstery. This guy travels like a rock star.”

Five minutes later they were airborne. The pilot came over the P.A., and announced their cruising altitude at twenty thousand feet, and what side of the plane the best views would be on. After they leveled off, Bill opened his briefcase, and removed a stack of documents.

“I had my secretary Xerox the files of every agent on my payroll,” he said. “She highlighted those agents who had filed grievances, or had disputes with their superiors, plus anyone with a medical problem resulting from the job.”

Valentine took the documents out of Bill’s hands. There were nine hundred agents with the Gaming Control Board, and the stack weighed several pounds. He separated it into three piles, and turned to Gerry. His son had his seat back, and was snoring like a baby. Valentine dropped a stack into his lap, and Gerry blinked awake.

“No sleeping on the job.”

“I was just resting my eyes. What’s up?”

“There’s a bad apple in these files,” Valentine said. “See if you can find him.”

Looking for a crooked law enforcement agent was never fun. It reminded you that even good people turned bad.

In Valentine’s opinion, the Nevada Gaming Control Board had some of the best law enforcement agents in the world. They not only helped casinos protect themselves, they were also responsible for protecting consumers against bad casinos. At any time, a GCB agent could enter a casino, and declare a “freezeout” for a particular game. The equipment would be confiscated, and sent to a laboratory for forensic testing. If the equipment was found to be “gaffed,” the casino would lose its license. Because of these responsibilities, GCB agents were viewed as the knights on the white horses, entrusted to keep things fair. In a place like Nevada, that was no easy task.

As Valentine looked through the files, he tried to imagine why an agent might go bad. Money was the obvious motivator, but he guessed it went deeper. As a cop, he’d known other cops who’d taken bribes, or flagrantly broken the rules. In every case, there had been a prior event that had triggered the event, a turning point.

For a GCB agent to go bad, he imagined the turning point was tied to the job. Why else would an agent cheat a casino, unless he’d seen a casino do something unsavory which he felt warranted a payback? He imagined their bad agent saw himself as an avenging angel. It happened a lot with cops.

“These guys are all boy scouts,” Gerry said after pouring through the agent files for an hour. To his father he said, “You find anything?”

“Maybe.”

His son sat up straight. “Way to go.”

Valentine had pulled out the files of five agents whose primary job was to inspect slot machines. Each had filed a work-related grievance in the past year. Passing the files to Bill, he said, “Tell me what a typical day would be like for one of these agents.”

Bill looked through each file, then removed his glasses and rubbed his eyes. “The five agents you pulled out are part of our field group. There are a hundred and fifty field agents in Nevada. Every day, they enter casinos, and check different slot machines to ensure they’re running properly.”

“You mean freezeouts?”

Bill shook his head. “We used to cart the machines out of the casino and check them, but the downtime cost the casino money. So, we came up with a way to do a test on the floor. The machine is opened, and the agent wires a laptop computer to the machine’s RNG chip. The notebook runs a series of tests to determine if the RNG chip is generating random numbers. Once the test is finished, the information is e-mailed back to headquarters, and the results are checked by a tech.”

“How many of these tests are done per day?”

“About five hundred.”

“Is there any way an agent could use his laptop to corrupt the slot machine?”

“Believe me, we thought about that,” Bill said. “So, we devised a failsafe system to keep everyone honest. There are two agents present whenever a slot machine is tested, and every tested machine is retested a few days later by another team. If tampering is found, the agents who conducted the first test face dismissal and arrest.”

“Has that ever happened?”

“Never.”

“And you keep all this information stored in Vegas?”

Bill nodded. “The information fills several floors. It’s overseen by Fred Friendly, the director of the Electronic Systems Division. Fred and his team examine the results of the tests every single day.”

“And you think they’d notice any discrepancies,” Valentine said.

“Yes. It’s what they’re paid to do.”

The pilot came over the P.A. to announce he was beginning his initial descent into the Reno/Tahoe International airport, and asked them to make sure their seat belts were fastened.

Chapter 14

Instead of going home after cashing his check, Karl Klinghoffer went to a saloon and drank whiskey with some strangers sitting at the bar. Coupled with the two beers he’d sucked down at the Gold Rush, the alcohol had a more powerful effect on him than he would have liked. Driving home a few hours later, he wrestled with the wheel each time his car crossed the double line.

He drove past the amphitheater where afternoon concerts were performed on the weekends during the summer. Crossing Arlington Street, he entered the area of town called “City of Trembling Leaves.” Maybe they should call it ‘City of Trembling Hands,’ he thought. It was the oldest part of Reno, the streets lined with three-story Victorians left over from the Roaring Twenties, when rich divorcees had waited out the six-week residence required for their freedom.

He parked in the street and killed the engine. He lived with Becky and his son behind one of these grand dames in a converted two-car garage. The rent was steep, but Becky was accustomed to a certain standard of living.

He walked down a dirt path to his place. The people they rented from made him use this path instead of the driveway. It had always made him feel like a servant, and he wanted to knock on their front door, and tell them off.

Instead, he climbed the wood staircase that hugged the side of the garage. Their apartment was on the second floor, and he saw lights inside and stopped. He tucked his shirt in, then unlocked the door and went in.

“Hey, Becky, I’m home.”

“Hey yourself,” his wife said from the dining room.

“Hey,” his son chorused from another part of the house.

Klinghoffer stopped in the kitchen. There was a plate of meat loaf and mashed potatoes sitting at his spot at the kitchen table, and he saw a fly buzzing around it. He stuck his finger in the mashed potatoes. They were ice cold.

He went to the doorway leading to the living room and stopped. Becky was hunched over the dining room table, dressed in grey sweats. During the day, she home-schooled Karl Jr. At night, she wrote religious tracts for her father’s church. She did not look up.

“Where you been?” she wanted to know.

“Out and about.”

He came in and peered over her shoulder. Becky’s writing appeared in religious pamphlets that were mass-mailed by her father’s church, and it was not uncommon to see them floating around town during windy days. Her handwriting was poor, and he had to squint.

“Where you been?” she asked again.

He pulled up a chair. At the bar, he’d thought over what he wanted to say. Rehearsed it to the drunk next to him. The drunk had seemed to like it. Sitting, he said, “Has Jesus ever spoken to you, Becky?”

She smiled, still writing. “Sure. He speaks to me every day.”

“He spoke to me today. At least I think it was him.”

Her smile grew. “What did he say?”

“Promise you won’t laugh.”

“Why should I do that?”

“Just promise me, okay?”

She looked up and made eye contact with him. “Karl?”

“What’s wrong?”

“Have you been drinking? Your eyes look funny.”

He’d decided in the bar that if he was going to tell a lie, it might as well be a big one. The drunk next to him had approved of the strategy.

“Jesus told me to play a slot machine.”

Becky swallowed hard. “Jesus told you to play a slot machine?”

“That’s right.”

“You sure it wasn’t some drunk you met?” she said, turning nasty.

“Couldn’t have been.”

“And why’s that, Mr. Alcohol on his Breath?”

Klinghoffer took stacks of hundred dollar bills from his pockets, and tossed them onto the table. Becky’s mouth opened, but no words came out. She picked up the money, her face aglow. Right then, Klinghoffer knew he was going to be okay. She wasn’t going to throw him out, or threaten divorce, or do any of the other childish things she did whenever his behavior did not suit her. She held the money to her bosom.

“Praise the Lord,” she said.

Valentine, Gerry, and Bill Higgins landed in the Reno Airport at eight o’clock that night, and were taken by police escort to the Washoe County Detention Center. The Reno police had been alerted to the fact that someone might be gunning for Valentine, and the show-of-force was befitting a politician.

The detention center was an enormous facility. During his trips to Nevada, Valentine had heard it referred to as a debtor’s prison because Reno’s judges often extended jail sentences when prisoners couldn’t pay fines. Bill had called the sergeant who ran the center before leaving Las Vegas, and told him they wanted to interview Bronco Marchese.

The sergeant was at the front entrance when they arrived. He was a large, gregarious Irishman named Joe O’Sullivan, and he greeted them with smiles and handshakes. O’Sullivan escorted them to his office on the second floor, and after they were seated, explained why the interview wasn’t going to happen.

“Bronco’s lawyer left town,” the sergeant said, sitting at his desk. “Slime bucket named Kyle Garrow. I called Garrow on his cell phone, told him you wanted a meeting with his client. Garrow said he was in California, and wouldn’t be available until tomorrow morning. Personally, I think he’s lying, and was nearby. That’s why I hate cell phones. You never know where the person you’re talking to really is.”

“You think Garrow is stalling,” Valentine said.

O’Sullivan nodded. Pictures of his four kids filled his desk. Like their father, they were fair-skinned and red-haired. “I had him checked out. Garrow’s hardly spent a day of his life in court. Makes his money giving legal advice to crooks before they get arrested. Basically, he tells his clients how to stay out of jail, which in my book, makes him a piece of garbage.”

Valentine had known lawyers that did this, and agreed with O’Sullivan’s assessment of them. He said, “Governor Smoltz has given me unlimited power in my conducting this case. Is it possible for me to meet with Bronco without his lawyer?”

“Anything’s possible,” O’Sullivan said. “But personally, I’d advise against it.”

“Why’s that?”

“It would land you in hot water with the judge presiding over the case.”

“I can do hot water,” Valentine said.

“It will also compromise our case against Bronco for killing Bo Farmer,” O’Sullivan said. “If you want my advice, wait until tomorrow.”

There was a window behind O’Sullivan’s head, and Valentine stared at the garish neon which defined Reno’s skyline. He was itching to get in Bronco’s face, and make him sweat; it was one of the great satisfactions of his work. But he didn’t want to ruin the case in the process. He shifted his gaze back to the sergeant.

“What about the girl? Can I talk to her?”

O’Sullivan’s expression turned blank. “Which girl is that?”

“The bride in the scam. Karen Farmer.”

“That’s not going to be very easy either, I’m afraid.”

“Why? Is Garrow also her lawyer?”

“Karen Farmer tried to commit suicide yesterday. Hanged herself with a bed sheet, only the knot came undone. She’s in the psych ward at the Washoe Medical Center under observation.”

“Can she talk?”

O’Sullivan acted offended. “No offense, Tony, but she’s in a bad way. Grilling her could set her over the edge again.”

“Who told you that?”

“Her doctor at the hospital. I talked to him earlier.”

Valentine’s eyes returned to the window. Then, he glanced back at O’Sullivan. “Here’s what I want you to do, Joe. I want you to pick up the phone, and call the hospital. Tell them I’m coming over to talk to Karen Farmer, and don’t accept any ifs, ands or buts from anyone who says I can’t. I’ll make the determination whether she’s stable enough to talk to me. Understand?”

O’Sullivan looked surprised, then mad. Just as quickly, it all vanished, and he put his professional face on. He picked up the phone on his desk, and punched in a number.

Chapter 15

O’Sullivan drove them to the Washoe Medical Center. While Gerry and Bill waited in the lobby, Valentine went upstairs to interview Karen Farmer.

Psych wards in hospitals were depressing places. Valentine’s mother had ended up in one before she died, his father’s years of abuse having finally taken their toll. Walking down the hall to where Karen Farmer was being kept, a little voice inside his head told him to turn around, and go back to the lobby. Let Bill interrogate her, the voice said.

He stopped outside the ward. There was no shame in walking away. He’d learned that from a book by Ernest Hemingway called Death in the Afternoon. It was about bull-fighting, and Hemingway talked about famous matadors who’d run away from bulls they didn’t like the looks of. He started to walk away when the door opened, and a woman in a starched white nurse’s uniform stepped out.

“Mr. Valentine? We’ve been expecting you. Please come in,” she said.

Valentine followed her through the psych ward with his eyes downcast. Out of the corner of the eye, he appraised the room. Most of the patients were strapped down, like his mother had been. A man wearing a maniacal grin hissed at him.

“We put Karen on anti-depression medication this morning, and she appears to be doing better,” the nurse said. “I told her that she was going to have a visitor, but didn’t say who you were. No point in upsetting her.”

“Thanks.”

His voice was barely a whisper and the nurse shot him a concerned look.

“Are you all right, Mr. Valentine?”

“Fine.”

Karen Farmer’s bed was in the corner of the large sterile room, and had a view of the parking lot. A metal chair had been placed beside her bed. There was an Ace bandage around her neck and a contusion below her left cheekbone. Her eyes looked sore from crying.

“Karen,” the nurse said, “your visitor is here.”

Karen Farmer glanced at the nurse, then at Valentine.

“Oh, boy,” she said hoarsely. “Another cop.”

The nurse left, and Valentine sat down, and placed his elbows on his knees. It was a neutral pose, intended to put a suspect at ease. “Want something to drink?”

“A cigarette,” she said.

“I wish.”

“You trying to quit?”

He nodded that he was.

“Me, too. Bad for my health.”

He fished the nicotine gum out of his pocket, and offered her a piece.

“Have a piece. It’s the next best thing.”

Karen mumbled okay. He leaned forward, and fed her a piece of gum. When she opened her mouth, he saw that one of her lower teeth was busted. She chewed the gum and made a face. “Ugh. You’re not trying to poison me, are you?”

“You don’t chew it for the taste. Give it a minute to work.”

“Whatever you say.”

Valentine tried not stare at her. She had soft blond hair and bedroom eyes, the kind of girl boys fought over in grade school. She didn’t have a criminal record, and he guessed her late husband had talked her into stealing the jackpot. That was how it usually happened: The husband talked the wife into joining the gang. It hardly ever happened the other way around.

“I’m not a cop,” he said. “I used to be, but these days I’m a private consultant. I help casinos catch cheaters. I took this case because I want to nail Bronco Marchese.”

Karen stared at him. “You want to nail him? Like in the movies? Track him down and rub his face in the ground?”

“That’s right.”

Tears rolled down her face and blood rose like a curtain behind her skin. “Well, so do I. Bronco Marchese shot my husband through the heart.” She stifled a sob and brought her head back against her pillow, which was propped against the wall to protect her from hurting herself. She stared at the ceiling like it was a portal that could take her back in time, and everything in her life would be normal again. When she looked back at him, her face had grown hard. “Bo died at ten-fifty eight in the morning. We were married the day before at eleven o’clock. We weren’t married one whole day.”

“I’m—”

“Sorry?”

“Yes.”

She shook her head and the tears flew off her face. “I wanted to spend the rest of my life with him. We met in highschool. My first date, my first love. He wasn’t perfect, and neither am I. But, we were perfect together. Know what I mean?”

Valentine stared at the tiled floor. He’d met his own wife over a Bunson burner in an eleventh grade highschool chemistry class. It had lasted forty-five years.

“Yes,” he said.

“Bo was my future. We were going to have a couple of kids. We had it all planned out. You understand what I’m saying?”

“Yes, I do.”

“Then don’t come in here and tell me how you want to nail Bronco Marchese, you piece of shit cop,” she said, spitting her gum into his face.

Valentine found a sink and washed his face. When he came back to Karen’s bed, he had a pair of soda cans in his hand. He popped them both.

“Promise you won’t do that again, and I’ll let you have one,” he said.

“Fuck you,” Karen said.

He took a long swallow of his soda. He was glad for the walk. He didn’t like being spit in the face, even by someone who’d just lost her husband.

“You know something, Karen—”

“What’s that?” she snapped.

“Everyone has a history.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means that everyone has reasons for what they do. Want to hear mine?”

She looked out the window beside her bed, her eyes peeled to a moving car in the parking lot, and said nothing.

“When I became a cop in Atlantic City, I was introduced to an old guy named Johnson. I don’t know if that was his first name, or his last. Everyone just called him Johnson. He was a drunk, used to live in the bars. Eventually he got sick and died.”

“This is real uplifting,” she said.

“Right after his funeral, I heard his story. Johnson was a cop during Prohibition. Part of his job was to stop the bootleggers from landing on the island’s beaches.”

“What’s Prohibition?” she asked, still not looking at him.

“Back in 1919 the government outlawed the manufacture, sale or distribution of liquor,” Valentine said. “The country was dry for thirteen years.”

“What did people do instead, get high?”

He nearly laughed, then realized she wasn’t joking. “Maybe some of them did. But the majority made liquor in bath tubs, or bought it from bootleggers. The bootleggers bought whiskey from Canada, scotch from Scotland, and rum from Cuba. They brought it offshore in ships, and used speedboats to deliver it to the mainland. Because Atlantic City has thirteen miles of beaches, it was a prime unloading area.

“One night, Johnson gets a call. An informant tells him that two Jews and two Italians from New York are coming to Atlantic City to hijack a shipment of whiskey. The informant says that these four guys are responsible for all the major heists in New York, and are running the city’s illegal gambling. Know who those four guys were?”

Karen finally looked at him. She wasn’t beautiful in the traditional sense, but had a sultry look that made you pause. It had gotten her in trouble once, and would probably get her in trouble again. “Not a clue,” she said.

“Lucky Luciano, Frank Costello, Meyer Lansky and Bugsy Siegel.”

“I’ve heard of them. They were gangsters.”

“They were more than gangsters. They were the beginning of organized crime in America. They later joined forces with Al Capone, and became the mafia.”

“I guess Johnson didn’t get them.”

“No, he didn’t. He figured they’d probably kill the bootlegger, and that would be one less bootlegger. So he stayed at home and listened to a ball game on the radio.

“The hijacking went so smoothly, the four boys from New York took over all of the bootlegging on the east coast. That one night made them all very rich men.

“Johnson later realized what he’d done. He talked about it openly with other cops. His conscience ate at him, so he eventually turned to the bottle. Okay, now you’re probably wondering, what the hell does this have to do with me?”

Her eyes were cold and unfriendly. “Come to mention it, yeah.”

“Well, here’s the deal. I had a brother-in-law named Sal. He was a vice cop with the Atlantic City police. I started dating his sister in highschool. After we got married, Sal talked me into joining the force. He was my best friend.

“One night, Sal called me. He was about to arrest four casino cheaters. Sal told me these cheaters were from New York, and had ripped off every casino in the city. Two Jews and two Italians.”

“Sort of like Johnson,” Karen said.

“Yeah, sort of like Johnson. Sal wanted me there as backup. I drove to the Boardwalk right as the arrest went down. They were all there. There was a full moon, and I saw Sal lying in the sand. I fired my gun in the air, and the cheaters ran. When I got to Sal, I saw he was shot. I held him in my arms, and he died.”

“Did you run after the cheaters?”

Valentine crushed the empty soda can in his hand. It made an angry sound, and the ward grew still. “No.”

“Why not?”

“I couldn’t leave him.”

“Was Bronco one of those cheaters?”

“Yeah. After Sal’s funeral, I made a vow to myself. I was going to run every one of them down, and put them in prison.” He picked up the second can of soda, and held it in front of Karen’s face. “I got all of them but Bronco. You want any of this?” She nodded, and he put the can to her lips. When he took the can away, he saw that the hostility had melted from her face, and decided it was now, or never.

“So, are you going to help me, or not?”

“Bo was playing craps in Reno when he met Bronco,” Karen said, her face lighting up whenever she mentioned her late husband’s name. “Actually, Bo wasn’t playing. He was, well, I’d guess you call it stealing.”

“Stealing how?”

“He’d discovered that people sometimes didn’t pick up their bets after the game was over, so he’d claim them if no one else did. Bo said it wasn’t really stealing, being that the house would take the money otherwise.”

It was stealing — the chips belonged to another player — but, there was no use in soiling Karen’s last memories, so Valentine kept his mouth shut.

“Bronco approached us, and made Bo an offer. Said if we’d claim a jackpot from a rigged slot machine, he’d split the money with us. Bo and I talked it over. We both carry a lot of credit card debt. I figured it was a way to start clean, you know?”

“Sure,” Valentine said.

“Later, when we split the money up, I found out that wasn’t really the deal. Bo had agreed to take less money. It made me mad, so I started yelling at him. Then Bronco said something nasty, and Bo jumped him. Then Bronco shot Bo.”

Her eyes returned to the parking lot. Valentine let a few moments pass before speaking again. “The night before, when you had dinner, what did Bronco talk about?”

“Scams.”

“Did he mention a Nevada gaming agent stealing jackpots?”

Karen thought about it. “Yeah. He said a gaming agent was using laptops to rig slot machines. I didn’t understand what he was talking about.”

“Did he mention the agent’s name?”

“Naw.”

“Did he tell you how the scam worked?”

“He said it was an insider thing, and that he couldn’t use it.”

It was the same thing Gerry had said. Score another one for his son.

“What else do you remember?” Valentine asked.

“Bronco said he had a meeting set up in a few days with a member of the Asian Triads. He was going to exchange the laptop scam for a Pai Gow scam.”

Valentine pulled his chair up closer to her bed. Cheaters didn’t tell you things unless they wanted something in return. There had been a reason why Bronco had told Karen and Bo about the Asian. “Did Bronco want you to get involved?”

Karen blew her cheeks out. “You’re real smart, aren’t you?”

“I know how these people think.”

“Bo was stationed in the Far East when he was in the army, and knew how to play Pai Gow. Bronco offered to stake Bo. Said we’d make a fortune with this scam.”

Valentine leaned against the bed’s iron railing. Pai Gow was played in many casinos in the United States. Each player received tiles shaped like dominos, and tried to beat the dealer’s score with the score on their tiles. It was a tough game to cheat, and he had a feeling this scam was something really good. He saw Karen studying him, the expression on her face almost wistful.

“What’s next?” she asked.

“I’ll tell the DA you cooperated, and gave me lots of valuable information.”

“Think he’ll cut me some slack?”

“Yes, Karen, I do.”

“I hope you’re right. Things haven’t been going so hot for me lately.”

She said it without bitterness, and a wave of sadness overcame him. Not a bad kid at all, he thought. He thanked her for her help, and put his chair back against the wall. He started to leave, then went back to her bed. “I’ll also tell the governor.”

“You trying to be funny?”

“No. I’m doing this job for him.”

“Seriously?”

“Yes. I’ll ask him to go light on you.”

She thanked him with her eyes. Valentine had no idea what Bo Farmer was like, yet could imagine him wanting to spend the rest of his life with this young woman.

“Sorry about the gum,” she said.

“Don’t worry about it,” he told her.

Chapter 16

Bronco got a cell mate right after dinner. His name was Johnny Norton, and he was a dirty-haired street rat with dark shadows beneath his eyes. Johnny took the bottom bunk bed, said he’d been arrested for passing a couple of worthless checks. The catch in his voice said there was more to his story, and Bronco guessed he was hiding from something. Most guys in jail were.

Bronco was standing against the concrete wall opposite the bunk beds, sizing Johnny up. He was a degenerate, and probably used to getting kicked around. A loner, but also capable of seizing an opportunity when it came his way. He’ll do, Bronco thought.

Johnny had stopped pretending to be asleep, and stared at Bronco from his bunk, his eyes shining like a fox hiding inside a hole.

“What you looking at, buddy?”

“What the hell else is there to look at?” Bronco said.

“You got something on your mind?”

“Maybe. You been in this joint before?”

Johnny patted his pockets for a smoke. He snapped his fingers, remembering where he was. “Couple of times.”

“What for?”

“I scammed some old geezers.”

Robbing the elderly. That qualified Johnny for a low-life scum bag award. Bronco hunched down on his knees and looked Johnny in the eye.

“You know the layout?”

“I can find the front door. You thinking of taking a walk?”

Bronco nodded that he was. “I’ve figured out how to get out of the cellblock, and down the hall to the booking area, but from there I’m lost. Interested?”

Johnny drew his head back into the shadows, thinking it over. The truth was, Bronco didn’t need help escaping. His mind had made a picture of the jail when he’d been booked. He knew where the guards sat, the number of electronically controlled doors, and how many steps to the front door. He’d memorized the layout just like he memorized the pattern of every slot machine key he’d ever seen. His brain was good that way. It made pictures, then stored them.

But he couldn’t tell Johnny this. Johnny needed to think he was the lynchpin. That was the key to having partners; the partner needed to think they were in control. Otherwise, they wouldn’t get involved.

“What are you in for?” Johnny asked.

“First degree murder and ripping off a casino,” Bronco replied.

Johnny brought his face into the light and smiled. His upper and lower teeth didn’t match, and it ruined his face. “You’re a regular public menace, huh?”

“That’s right. What about you?”

“I told you, I got arrested for passing bad checks.”

“Is that why you want to break out?”

Johnny frowned, realizing he’d tripped up. He climbed out of his bunk and stood his full height, then shoved Bronco into the wall. Bronco saw no gain in fighting him, and held his hands up in mock surrender.

“You’d better not be an undercover cop,” Johnny said.

“Is that what I look like?”

“You’re trying to trick me, that’s what it is.”

In the light, Johnny Norton was truly dangerous-looking. Someone watching a security camera would stare hard at Johnny if he came into the picture. And that’s all they’d stare at.

Bronco said, “I think we’d make a good team. I just want to know what your deal is, that’s all.”

“You’re not a cop?”

“I sweat on my mother’s grave.”

“You really want to know what I did?”

“Yeah.”

Johnny tugged back the sleeve of his orange jumpsuit. His left forearm was covered with ugly-looking scratches. Bronco guessed Johnny had attacked someone, and his victim had raked her fingernails down his arm. Lucky for Johnny, the cops hadn’t noticed the scratches when they’d booked him.

“I picked up a woman in a bar and slept with her,” Johnny said. “When she asked me for money, I strangled her.”

“Dead?”

“Uh-huh. Satisfied?”

“You bet.”

Johnny rolled his sleeve down, then went to his bunk, and slid onto the bed. “So when are we gonna break out?”

“Soon. Just be patient.”

“Whatever you say.”

And with that, Johnny closed his eyes and went sound to sleep.

Bronco went to the cell door and grasped the bars. It occurred to him that he hadn’t heard from his crummy attorney since that morning. Something didn’t feel right, and after a few moments of hard thinking, he realized what it was.

Garrow had turned on him. There could be no other explanation. He’d given Garrow the secret to the gaming agent’s slot machine scam for safe-keeping. That had seemed the smart thing to do at the time. He’d also told Garrow how he planned to trade the secret for the Pai Gow scam. In hindsight, he realized how stupid that was.

Garrow was going to cut him out. There could be no other explanation for him not making contact. Garrow knew the details, and was going to go solo. Right now, sitting in a seedy motel room in downtown Reno, was a member of the Triad who’d traveled all the way from China to exchange secrets. All Garrow had to do was call the Triad, and do the deal himself. Then, Garrow could take the Pai Gow scam, and make his fortune. He didn’t need Bronco anymore.

Bronco started to sweat. He had trusted his attorney, and that was always a mistake. He needed to break out of here, and set things right. He had thought Tony Valentine was his biggest problem, but in fact it was his own attorney who was the problem.

He stared at the chairs where the guards sat. Karl Klinghoffer would be starting his next shift in a few hours. Bronco couldn’t escape without Klinghoffer’s help, and he waited nervously for the guard’s return.

Chapter 17

Xing Han Wong lay on an unmade bed, staring at the dirty popcorn ceiling. He’d been cooped up in a seedy Reno motel for two days, watching stupid sitcoms and eating greasy take-out food while waiting for the phone to ring. He hadn’t shaved, combed his hair, or bathed, and was bored out of his mind.

The Asian hit man removed a pair of Pai Gow dominos from his shirt pocket. They were made out of thick plastic, and had red and white dots on one side. He’d been given the dominos by his Triad boss before coming to the United States, and been told to give the dominos to a criminal named Bronco Marchese, then say three words:

“Red, not black.”

This was the secret to the devious Pai Gow scam, even though Xing had no idea what it meant. His Triad boss had said that Bronco would understand, and in return, would give Xing the secret to rigging slot machines.

“A secret for a secret,” his Triad boss had explained.

Xing had traveled seven thousand miles to Reno, expecting to hook up with Bronco, and do the exchange. Then he’d turned on the TV in his motel room, and learned that Bronco was cooling his heels in a Reno jail. He’d called his Triad boss, and explained the problem.

“You wait,” his boss had said.

“For how long?” Xing had replied.

“Until he gets out of jail. Don’t leave without that secret.”

“What if he doesn’t get out?”

“You wait!”

“But...”

“You heard me! No fuck-ups this time! Understand?”

His Triad boss had slammed down the phone before he could reply. His words had been filled with anger, their meaning painfully clear. If Xing didn’t get the slot secret from Bronco, there was no reason for him to return to China.

He slipped the dominoes into his pocket and got off the bed. Going to the room’s single window, he lifted the blind and gazed at the ugly six-lane highway that ran alongside the motel. Cars and heavy trucks rumbled past, the noise a cacophony of sound. Reno was like most cities in China. Everyone was in a hurry, but not going anywhere. Just home to their TV sets, or to eat, or sleep.

It was strange how things turned out. Not that long ago, he’d been living the good life, driving fast cars and sleeping with beautiful girls. Then, he’d been told to execute a Chinese gambler who had not paid his debts. The job had broken bad, and his status within the Triad organization had suffered because of it. Coming to Reno to meet Bronco was his punishment which now felt like a jail sentence.

Returning to the bed, he lay down, and resumed staring at the ceiling. Soon his eyelids grew heavy, and he drifted off to sleep.

The Golden Dragon in Macau was like no other casino in the world. Asians were passionate about gambling, and players stood five deep at the tables, with each player trying to put down a bet. Gamblers who couldn’t get near the table ventured upward on a spiral ramp, and lowered their bets down on long, bamboo poles.

It was all about gambling at the Golden Dragon. Everything else was window dressing. The spiral ramp had two sets of moving walkways. One went up, the other came down. Hookers stood on the walkways, showing off their wares. They were not allowed on the casino floor, for fear they might slow down the games.

Xing had entered the Golden Dragon at a few minutes past midnight and gone straight to the bar, which was shaped like an electric guitar. Up on a small stage, girls in skimpy costumes lip-synched to Madonna’s Like a Virgin while doing a dance number. Xing motioned to the bartender, who served him a Ting Sao.

“Which one?” Xing asked under his breath.

“The bloated one with the cute girl on his arm,” the bartender said.

Xing found his victim in the bar’s smoky backlit mirror, an enormous Chinese gambler in a white silk suit playing 21 while snuggling with an underage girl.

“How much does he owe?” Xing asked.

“Too much.”

The bartender slipped away to serve another patron. Xing smoked a cigarette and sipped his beer. He was in no rush to carry out his assignment. Let the fat man enjoy his last minutes on earth, he thought.

It wasn’t the first time he’d had to shoot a gambler inside the Golden Dragon. The casino did not offer credit to its customers, and gamblers often borrowed money at exorbitant rates from the Triad gangs that hung around the bar and restaurants. Gamblers that did not pay off their loans in time were punished, usually with a bullet.

Xing saw movement in the mirror. The dealer was scooping up the last of the fat man’s chips. The fat man had lost all his money, and looked dejected.

Xing unbuttoned his jacket while hopping off his stool. It was every gambler’s dream to die broke, and the fat man was about to fulfill that dream. He walked directly over to the 21 table with his eyes peeled on his prey.

“Out of my way,” he said loudly.

The crowd around the table parted. They knew what was about to happen. It was part of life in the Golden Dragon. Losers died.

The fat man spun around in his chair. Seeing Xing, his eyes grew wide with fear. Xing drew his gun from its shoulder harness and blew a hole in the fat’s man chest. He was dead before he hit the floor.

Xing blew smoke off the barrel of his gun like a cowboy in the Old West. The sound of a man yelling snapped his head. The bartender was pointing excitedly at the exit. Xing shifted his gaze to see another fat man running out the door. The beer in his stomach started to rise. He had shot the wrong man.

The phone rang, snapping Xing awake. Picking up the receiver, he said hello in Chinese, realized his mistake, and said hello again in halting English. He had learned English in school, and from watching American TV shows, which were shown in China with subtitles.

“This is Kyle Garrow, Bronco Marchese’s lawyer,” an unsteady voice said, shouting to be heard over disco music in the background. “I’m ready to do the deal.”

“Is Bronco out of jail?” Xing asked.

“No,” the lawyer said.

“Then how do we do the deal?”

“Bronco put me in charge. I have the secret to the slot scam. I’ll give it to you in exchange for the Pai Gow scam, and you can go home.”

“How do I know I can trust you?”

“You don’t have a choice, pal.”

Xing tightened his grip on the receiver. He did not like this change in plans, or that Bronco’s lawyer was calling the shots.

“I’m at a strip club down the road from your motel,” Garrow went on. “Meet me in ten minutes, and we can do the exchange. And don’t be late.”

Xing’s face burned. He did not like to be ordered around. He wondered if the lawyer knew he was a Triad assassin. Somehow, he didn’t think so.

“Give me the instructions,” Xing said.

Chapter 18

Valentine’s investigation had hit a wall. Karen Farmer had told him a lot, but nothing that would lead him to tracking down the crooked gaming control agent. His case was stalled. He needed to talk to Bronco if he wanted it to move forward.

He drove into downtown Reno with his son, and checked into the Peppermill. It was an old joint, and one of his favorites. The place had started out as a restaurant, and gained fame for the giant fruit dishes it served at meals. That had led to a hotel being built, and then a casino. The rest, as they say, was history.

He and his son were given adjoining rooms. Gerry came into his room, and they went out onto the balcony and stared at the skyline. The sun had set, and the desert was starting to cool down, the sky dotted with stars and passing jets.

Gerry lit up a cigarette, handed it to his father.

“Take a puff before you have a stroke.”

Valentine took the cigarette and stuck it in his mouth.

“That girl in the psych ward really got you worked up, didn’t she?”

Valentine puffed on the cigarette. Talking to Karen Farmer had put him in a funk. She was a decent kid, yet somehow Bronco had corrupted her, her husband as well. It was the one part of this puzzle he didn’t get. Decent people didn’t become thieves at the drop of the hat. Yet, Karen had done it, and so had Lucy Price. He passed the cigarette back to his son.

“She sure did,” he said.

His cell phone vibrated. Caller ID said it was Bill.

“What’s up?” Valentine answered.

“We just tracked down Kyle Garrow,” Bill said.

“Let me guess. You put an illegal trace on his cell phone.”

“I didn’t say that.”

“Yes, you did. Where is he?”

“Garrow’s at a strip club called The Pink Pony, waiting for the Asian to show up so he can do the exchange. One of my men is watching him.”

“You need to arrest him, Bill.”

“I can’t arrest him until the exchange goes down. Garrow hasn’t broken any laws.”

“Yes, he has. He lied to the cops about his whereabouts.”

“You want to arrest a lawyer for lying? That’s a good one.”

“I’m not auditioning for a comedy club. Garrow lied to buy time for Bronco. That makes him Bronco’s accomplice. You need to drag his sorry ass in.”

Arresting a lawyer was serious business, even if the lawyer was pond scum. Bill knew that as well as anyone, and said, “How about if I pick you up, and we arrest him together?”

“Now you’re talking,” Valentine said.

Kyle Garrow had been a dreamer and a schemer all his life. He envisioned himself a master criminal, but didn’t have the spine to really break the law. So he’d become a criminal defense attorney instead. By representing criminals, he stayed close to the action, and felt like he knew the score. He’d represented some of the worst scum bags society had to offer — bank robbers, jewel thieves, casino cheats — and learned something new from every one of them.

Take Bronco Marchese. Bronco had learned how to rip off slot machines from a GCB agent. The problem was, the secret was useless to Bronco. But Bronco was smart, and told Garrow to shop the secret around. There had to be someone out there who could use such a secret.

Garrow had put the word out, and within a few days, gotten a phone call. To his surprise, the call did not come from any of the known syndicates that bankrolled criminal enterprises. It came from a Triad boss in Macau.

The Triad boss had made Garrow a unique offer. His gang was running a devious Pai Gow scam in Macau’s casinos. The scam was foolproof, and the player always won. Was Garrow interested in trading Bronco’s slot scam for the Pai Gow scam? If so, the Triad Boss would send a man to do an exchange.

It had sounded like the kind of money-making opportunity that Garrow had been looking for. He had told the Triad boss yes, knowing that Bronco would agree. The Triad boss had said he’d send his man immediately.

Garrow had hung up the phone with dollar signs in his eyes. He had always been an opportunist, and he decided that he would turn the tables on Bronco the first opportunity he got, and go out on his own with the Pai Gow scam.

Garrow was feeling the champagne when Xing entered the strip club. Xing was a shade under six foot, thin as a rail, with dark bangs that hung lifelessly on his forehead. He wore a sullen expression on his unshaven face, and looked like a punk. Garrow waved him over to his table.

“Have a seat.”

Xing pulled up a chair. A topless waitress hit the table like a shark, and explained the two drink cover. Xing ordered a Heineken, while Garrow got another glass of bubbly. Xing gave him a hard look when she was gone.

“What’s wrong?” Garrow asked.

“You’re drunk,” Xing said.

“Mind your own fucking business.”

Xing grew silent. His face was a blank, and it was hard to get a read on him. They watched a couple of girls get naked on the stage beneath a strobe light. The waitress returned with their drinks. Xing asked her if they served food.

“What are you in the mood for?” she asked.

“Steak. Rare.”

“Coming right up.”

“I’d like some bread.”

The waitress left. Xing took a long swallow of his beer. He acted like he had ice cubes running through his veins. Garrow downed his champagne and slapped the empty glass on the table. The moment of truth had arrived. He was ready to stop being a five-hundred dollar an hour hired mouth, and start being a player.

“Do you have the Pai Gow secret?” Garrow asked.

“Yes. Do you have the slot machine secret?”

“It’s in my wallet. You go first.”

Xing removed two Pai Gow dominos from his shirt pocket, and handed them to the lawyer. The dominos looked perfectly normal. Pai Gow was a simple game where the player attempted to beat the house using the values of the dominos he was dealt.

“What’s the secret?” Garrow asked.

Xing said something in Chinese, then started laughing.

“Say it in English,” Garrow snapped.

“Red, not black,” Xing replied.

“What the hell does that mean?”

“Your client will know.”

“Fuck my client. I want you to tell me.”

“I don’t know what it means. I’m just the messenger. Do you have the slot machine secret? That was our deal.”

The waitress brought the bread to the table, then left. The champagne had gone to Garrow’s head, and the club was starting to spin. His dreams were going up in flames. Without thinking, he said, “I’m not giving you the slot machine secret until you explain how the Pai Gow scam works.”

“I just told you — I don’t know what it means.”

“Then call your boss in Macau, and ask him.”

“That would not be wise.”

“Call him anyway. Otherwise, I’m not giving you the slot secret, pal.”

Xing’s face hardened. Taking out his cell phone, he punched in a long number, and spoke rapidly in Chinese to his boss in Macau while looking menacingly across the table at the lawyer. Garrow found the courage to smile.

“My boss wants to talk to you.”

“Put him on,” Garrow said.

Xing rose from his chair and handed Garrow the cell phone. The lawyer put the phone to his ear, and heard a dial tone. It was a trick, and he stared at the small bread knife clutched in Xing’s other hand.

Valentine blew past the bouncer of the Pink Pony with Bill on his heels. Traffic had been heavy, and it had taken ten minutes to drive to the club. His eyes canvassed the darkened interior. A lone figure sat at a table in the VIP lounge.

“Is that Garrow?” Valentine asked.

“That’s him,” Bill said.

“Where’s the Asian?”

“I don’t see him.”

“Where your guy?”

“I don’t see him, either.”

They crossed the noisy club and entered the VIP lounge. Bill had clipped his badge to his lapel, and patrons were getting out of their way as fast as they could. Valentine stiffened as they reached the lawyer’s table. Garrow was trying to remove a small knife stuck in his shoulder, and was a bloody mess.

“Help me,” the lawyer gasped.

Valentine pulled out the knife, and Garrow screamed. Folding a napkin, he made the lawyer hold it against the gaping wound.

“What happened? Where’s the Asian?” Valentine asked.

“Who told you—”

“Answer the damn question.”

“The Asian double-crossed me.”

“Did he get the slot secret from you?”

“Yeah.”

Valentine checked Garrow’s pockets, just to be sure. His wallet and cell phone were gone. The Asian had stabbed and robbed him, and no one inside the club had bothered to jump in. A waitress appeared, and tapped Valentine on the shoulder.

“His tab’s still open. You going to settle for him?”

“In your dreams,” Valentine said.

He looked around the lounge for Bill. His friend stood in the corner, shaking his head. Hurrying over, he saw a man lying on the floor next to a broken Heineken bottle. His throat was slit from ear-to-ear.

“That your guy?” Valentine asked.

“Afraid so,” Bill replied.

Chapter 19

Mabel could not believe her ears. She was at Tony’s desk, talking on the phone to Joe Silverfoot, head of surveillance for the Micanopy casino in Tampa. Joe had caught the cheating dealer that Mabel had spotted — and videotaped it too boot — yet was telling Mabel he wasn’t going to do anything. It was the stupidest thing she’d ever heard.

“But he dealt off the bottom of the deck,” Mabel said.

“You’re right, he did,” Silverfoot said. “But, it was an honest mistake.”

Mabel shook her head. There were no such things as honest mistakes when it came to gambling. “The man’s a thief. You need to fire him, and alert the police.”

“We don’t have a case,” Silverfoot said.

“But—”

“Hear me out. The player who got the bottom card was not involved. We pulled him into a back room, and grilled him. He’s in town for a convention, and this was his first visit to the casino. He’s never met the dealer. He agreed to take a polygraph in case we didn’t believe him.”

“Did you?” Mabel asked.

“Yes,” Silverfoot said. “I was a tribal policeman for twenty-five years, and I know when someone’s lying to me. This gentleman wasn’t lying. He wasn’t working with the dealer in any way. He was in the casino having a good time.”

“The dealer was still cheating,” Mabel said.

“Afraid not. I personally grilled the dealer, and told him we had a tape of him dealing off the bottom. He said the humidity inside the casino made the cards stick, and that he probably pulled one off the bottom by mistake.”

It was the worst alibi Mabel had ever heard, and she closed her eyes.

“And you believed him?”

“What choice did I have?” Silverfoot said. “There was no crime. How can I arrest someone if there’s no crime?”

Mabel shook her head. Dealing off the bottom was the card cheater’s most prized skill, and took hundreds of hours of practice. It didn’t happen by accident, despite what Silverfoot wanted to believe, and Mabel said goodbye and hung up the phone before she had a chance to tell him what a nincompoop he was.

She took a walk around the block to cool down. When that didn’t work, she returned to Tony’s study and watched the tape of the crooked dealer that she’d made on Tony’s computer. The dealer was big and tough-looking, and not someone she’d want to meet in a dark alley. His nose was crooked, and looked like it had been broken a few times. If that wasn’t the profile of a crook, she didn’t know what was. The idea that he still had his job irritated her to no end.

She didn’t like it. The man was obviously a thief. She remembered Tony’s comments about casinos that let crooked dealers work for them. Tony called these casinos bust-out joints, and said that they were popping up everywhere — on cruises ships, dishonest Indian reservations, and little towns that weren’t properly regulated by local or state government. Some bust-out joints used shaved dice on their craps tables, slot machines that didn’t pay out, and blackjack shoes missing high cards. Others employed crooked dealers adept in sleight-of-hand. The end result was always the same. The customers got skinned alive.

She decided she had to do something. She composed an email to Joe Silverfoot, and spelled out her feelings in plain English. Dear Joe: I was shocked to hear that the crooked poker dealer we caught is still in your employ. Having reviewed the situation, I believe this dealer compromises the integrity of your casino. If this situation is not rectified, I will no longer be able to do business with you.

She positioned the mouse on the Send button, then realized what she was doing. This was her only account. If she ran the Micanopys off, she would lose all the fun she’d been having, and also lose the firm money. She didn’t like either of those options, and stared at the computer screen. There’s a price for integrity, she thought, then sent her message through cyberspace.

Chapter 20

Bronco lay on the cot in his cell, staring at the three crosses on the walls that the shadows had made from the bars. He’d heard about criminals who’d found Jesus in the slammer, and wondered if this optical illusion had anything to do with it.

He heard stirring above him. Johnny Norton, his cell mate, had turned downright friendly when he realized Bronco was serious about escaping. Johnny had switched cots, taking the less desirable upper bunk and letting Bronco have the lower. He saw Johnny’s upside-down head appear over the side of his bunk.

“You awake?”

“No, I sleep with my eyes open.”

“That’s a good one. Think it will be this morning?”

Bronco put his fingers to his lips. Out in the hallway, he heard feet approaching the cell, and wondered if it was the guard Klinghoffer. In a whisper he said, “Yes. What’s the secret password?”

“What secret password?” Johnny asked.

“The password I’m going to give you when we break out of here.”

Johnny hesitated. “Sword swallower?”

“Wrong.”

Johnny scrunched up his face. Last night, he’d told Bronco how he’d been shoved through school, and could barely read and write. Johnny’s brain didn’t have enough folds in it. The more you read and learned, the more folds your brain got. Bronco had figured out long ago that this was the secret to success.

“Come on,” Bronco goaded him.

“I’m trying.”

“It’s from the Marx Brothers movie, remember?”

Johnny continued to struggle. Bronco had told him about the famous scene in the Marx Brothers movie, where the three brothers enter a speakeasy, and Groucho and Chico give the man at the door a secret password. Harpo came last, and because he couldn’t speak, removed a sword from the belt of his pants, and a large fish from his pocket, and shoved the sword down the fish’s throat, gaining him entry into the bar.

“Swordfish?” Johnny asked.

“There you go.”

Bronco saw Klinghoffer standing at the cell door, pointing his baton at him.

“You’ve got visitors,” the guard said.

Bronco slipped out of the bunk, and stood in the center of the cell with his arms out. Klinghoffer entered and cuffed Bronco’s wrists together. Bronco shot Johnny a glance.

“See you later, partner,” he said.

Bronco had learned a lot of tricks over the years. Like learning to write with his left hand when he needed to carp a check. One of his best tricks was speaking without moving his lips. He couldn’t throw his voice like a ventriloquist, but he could communicate without someone watching through a camera knowing it. As Klinghoffer escorted him down a hallway to one of the jail’s interview rooms, Bronco was aware of the camera in the hallway watching them. Without moving his lips, he said, “You play the slot machine like I told you?”

“Uh-huh,” Klinghoffer said.

“You win?”

“Yeah.”

“How much?”

“Ninety seven hundred and change.”

Bronco wished he could see Karl’s face. Klinghoffer’s voice was a monotone, and Bronco couldn’t tell how the experience had affected him. Was he hooked? Bronco decided to go out on a limb, and said, “Buy something nice for your wife?”

“Yeah. Bought her a diamond.”

“I bet she fucked your brains out.”

Klinghoffer shoved the point of his baton into Bronco’s spine. “Move.”

Bronco smiled to himself. They had reached the interview room, and Klinghoffer reached around him, opened the door and told him to go in. Bronco did as told, and the guard shut the door without following him in.

The interview room was a square, with two chairs hex-bolted to the floor, and a mirror on the wall which Bronco assumed was two-way. Garrow sat in one of the chairs, his arm in a sling. His hand-tailored suit was covered in dried blood.

“What happened?”

“I screwed up,” Garrow mumbled.

“What are you talking about?”

“I set up a meeting with the Asian, and he stabbed me.”

“Why did he do that?”

Garrow stared at the floor. “It’s a long story.”

“You tried to double cross me, didn’t you?”

“No, Bronco...”

“I should kill you, you rat bastard.”

Garrow swallowed hard, and said nothing.

“What did you tell the cops?”

“Nothing.”

“Good. Keep it that way.”

Bronco dropped into the other seat, and for a long moment, stared at his attorney. Garrow wasn’t really here to see him at all. He was a prisoner, and the cops had thrown them into the same room just to hear what the two men might say. Rising, Bronco went to the two-way mirror, and brought his face a few inches from the glass.

“I want another lawyer,” he told the cops on the other side.

Valentine stared at Bronco through the glass. Twenty years had passed since that night on the Atlantic City Boardwalk. It was too damn long to be chasing someone, yet he felt himself smile. He’d found the bastard, and that was all that mattered.

“I didn’t hear that remark,” Valentine said. He glanced at Sergeant O’Sullivan, then Bill Higgins, then his son, all of whom stood beside him. “Did you?”

“No,” O’Sullivan said, hiding a grin.

“Me, neither,” Bill said.

Gerry looked at his father. “What are you talking about?”

“I didn’t hear Bronco say he wanted another lawyer. Did you?”

Gerry finally got it. “No.”

Valentine turned to O’Sullivan. “I want to interview Bronco right now, if that’s all right with you.”

“Of course,” O’Sullivan said. “Just give me a minute to get everything ready.”

O’Sullivan left, and Valentine resumed staring at Bronco through the glass. Bronco hadn’t aged well, the excessive drinking and smoking having taken their toll.

“Look at that crummy son-of-a-bitch sitting in there, smirking at us,” Gerry said under his breath.

Valentine glanced at his son. The night of Sal’s murder, he had picked Gerry up from basketball practice, then driven to the Boardwalk. Gerry had stayed in the car, and seen his uncle’s murders run past. Recognizing a family resemblance, Bronco had stopped, and spoken to his son. It had made a lasting impression on Gerry, and not for the better.

“Listen,” Valentine said. “We didn’t come out here to execute this guy. We’re on a job, and we’re going to do everything by the book.”

“But he shot Uncle Sal,” his son whispered.

“Doesn’t matter.”

“It doesn’t?”

“No.”

Gerry continued to stare, his eyes showing a murderous intensity.

“Comprende?” Valentine said.

His son blew out his cheeks. Whenever Yolanda wanted to get Gerry’s attention, she spoke to him in Spanish. Valentine had found it worked wonders.

“Yeah, Pop,” his son said.

Chapter 21

O’Sullivan went into the interview room first, and cuffed Bronco’ left wrist to the arm of his chair. Not handcuffing him earlier was an old ploy, designed to make Bronco think he was more in control of his fate than he really was.

When Bronco was securely locked down, Valentine and Gerry entered, and stood against the far wall. Garrow looked woefully at the floor, shamed by what he’d done, while Bronco stared right at them, having never felt shame a day in his life.

“You boys are in a lot of trouble,” O’Sullivan said, standing between the two chairs while glaring at his suspects. “If either of you have a lick of common sense, I’d suggest you play ball with these gentlemen. It will make your lives a lot easier.”

“I want another lawyer,” Garrow said loudly.

“What’s that?”

“You heard me.”

Valentine took a step forward. Bronco instinctively brought his legs together like a dog expecting to be kicked.

“Garrow’s your lawyer, so we brought him to you,” Valentine said. “You don’t get any more requests.”

“You’re violating my rights,” Bronco said, looking straight into the video camera that was perched in the corner. “I have the right to counsel. This man next to me is injured. He can’t represent me. I want another lawyer.”

Bronco was as cute as an outhouse rat, delaying things as long as possible. Valentine leaned forward, and put his face a few feet from Bronco’s. Up close, he was really ugly, and Valentine thought of the woman on the tape he’d seen in Bronco’s house. She’d seen something good in that face. She was probably the only one who had.

“You want another lawyer?” Valentine asked.

“That’s right. I know my rights.”

“If you release Mr. Garrow as your attorney, you realize he’ll be free to discuss your dealings with him.”

The blood drained from Bronco’s face. Behind his eyes, Valentine imagined he saw the gears churning, Bronco’s mind weighing every conceivable angle that he had left. That was what made cheaters so dangerous; they always understood the odds.

Bronco nodded toward Gerry.

“That’s your son standing over there, isn’t it?”

“That’s right.”

“I remember that night on the Boardwalk. As I was running away with my crew, we ran past a car, and I saw your boy in the passenger seat. Looked just like you, even back then. I stuck my face to the glass, told him what a pussy he was. Know what he did?”

Valentine shook his head.

“He pissed in his pants, just like you’re about to piss in your pants.”

“Why am I going to do that?”

The sensation that Valentine felt between his legs was almost indescribable. Looking down, he saw that Bronco had taken his free hand, grabbed Valentine’s testicles, and was squeezing them for all he was worth.

Gerry remembered the night his uncle Sal had died like it was yesterday. He’d just turned fourteen and was already shaving. He was a man, or at least he thought he was. His father had picked him up from basketball practice, then gotten an urgent call from his Uncle Sal. His father had driven over to the beach, parked on Atlantic Avenue, and told Gerry to stay put. Then he’d gotten out, and started running to the Boardwalk. Gerry had climbed behind the wheel, and pretended he was driving. His father had already let him drive in a deserted parking lot. It had been scary, but also exhilarating. Each time he’d pumped the gas, the vroom of the car’s engine had made his heart race. He was spinning the wheel when four men ran past. Gerry had guessed the men had something to do with his father being here. They looked like bad people, and he had locked the car doors. One of the men stopped, and came over to the car. He was scary-looking, and had stuck his face to the driver’s window.

“Hey, pussy, what you afraid of?” he taunted him.

“Go away!” Gerry yelled.

“Want me to go get your daddy, momma’s boy?”

“Go away!”

He had started punching the window with his fists, making Gerry cry. Gerry had felt something warm between his legs, and stared at the growing wet spot in his crotch. The man had seen it as well, and laughed. Then, he’d run away.

A week had not gone by when Gerry hadn’t thought about that night. Why hadn’t he blown the horn, and gotten an adult to come to his rescue? Why hadn’t he done something besides piss in his pants? It had been the first true test of his manhood, and he had blown it.

But what Gerry remembered most was the mocking look on the man’s face. Later, when he learned that the man and his friends had murdered his Uncle Sal, that look had become burned in his memory. As he sprang across the room to help his father, it was that look that he was determined to wipe away, once and for all.

Chapter 22

Bronco had been punched in the face plenty of times. By security guards in casinos, cheaters he’d double-crossed, and by irate husbands who’d caught him making sandwiches with their wives. But, he’d never eaten a punch as hard as the one Gerry Valentine delivered to his jaw.

Being cuffed to the chair didn’t help; he was a sitting duck, and even though he tried to get out of the way, he still caught most of it on the face. The blow hurt more than he could have imagined, and in Gerry’s eyes he saw the little boy he’d terrorized long ago in Atlantic City. Bronco had imagined that when he died there would be a lot of people waiting on the other side to pay him back for things he’d done, but he hadn’t imagined he’d encounter one during this lifetime.

He released his grip on Tony Valentine’s nuts, and saw Valentine stagger away. Then, Bronco fell forward, his free, uncuffed hand grabbing Gerry’s leg. Gerry had continued to punch him on the shoulders and arms. Several guards came into the interview room, and Bronco waited for them to pull Gerry off of him. To his surprise, they didn’t, and Gerry kept hitting him. Bronco saw stars in front of his eyes, then for a brief instant, nothing at all.

When Bronco came to, he was being half-carried by Klinghoffer back to his cell. The guard had stuck his head under Bronco’s armpit, and was guiding him down the hallway past several other guards going the other way. One guard leered at Bronco, and said, “You do that to him, Karl?”

“Naw,” Klinghoffer said.

Klinghoffer came to the electronically-operated door that led to the cellblock. A black guard sat on the stool with a shotgun in his lap. Normally, weapons were forbidden inside the cellblock.

“What’s with the gun?” Klinghoffer asked.

“Couple of inmates were giving us trouble.”

The guard flipped a switch and the door swung open.

Bronco had regained his senses and glanced upward. Above the stool was a video monitor the guard had to look at when someone wanted to come out of the cellblock. The screen’s picture was grainy.

Bronco felt the strength slowly return to his legs and his head begin to clear. Tomorrow, he was going to feel like he’d been thrown off a cliff, but that was tomorrow. He pretended to still be half-conscious, and let Klinghoffer drag him.

Reaching the cell, Klinghoffer stopped to dig a key ring out of his pants pocket. The cells were still operated manually, and he struggled to find the correct key. Bronco stole a glance into the cell. Johnny Norton lay on the top bunk with a smug look on his face. Bronco winked at him.

“Can you stand on your own?” Klinghoffer asked.

“Yeah.”

“Then do it.”

Bronco stood on shaky legs. Klinghoffer found the key and unlocked the cell. As he did, Bronco removed the pen he’d lifted from Gerry Valentine’s shirt from his underwear. He’d also gotten Gerry’s wallet, which was thick with cash. “In you go,” Klinghoffer said.

“I’ve got another slot machine jackpot for you,” Bronco said under his breath. He saw Klinghoffer stiffen.

“Yeah — where?”

Bronco went into the cell and turned around. “Same routine as before — three, two, and one. Jackpot will be less than ten grand, so you won’t have to report it.”

Klinghoffer stood in the open cell door. “Where?”

Bronco told him, only he didn’t tell him, the word coming out of his mouth a jumble of syllables. Then, he pretended like he was going to faint.

“I didn’t hear you,” the guard said.

There was an open crapper in the cell. Bronco sat on it, and shook his head like he was trying to clear the cobwebs. Klinghoffer stepped into the cell, his huge feet scuffing the floor. A little closer, Bronco thought.

“Say the name of the casino again,” Klinghoffer said.

“Swordfish,” Bronco said.

Johnny Norton leapt off the bunk and grabbed Klinghoffer from behind in a bear hug. For a little guy, Johnny was strong, and for a moment Klinghoffer couldn’t use his arms. A look of desperation crossed his face, like he suddenly realized that everything Bronco had done and said in the past twenty-four hours had been setting him up for this moment. He wasn’t as dumb as he acted, Bronco thought.

Bronco jumped to his feet, plunging the pen into Klinghoffer’s throat, piercing his windpipe and sending a stream of blood spurting out of his neck and onto the floor.

“What in God’s name is wrong with you?” Valentine asked his son. They were driving away from the Washoe County Detention Center in their rental, Gerry holding an ice pack over his bruised hand while staring out the windshield. His son had been disobeying him for as long as Valentine could remember. It was about to stop, or Gerry was going to start working for someone else. “I told you not to touch the guy, didn’t I? His lawyer was sitting right there. Garrow is going to claim police brutality, and you and I will have to explain ourselves in front of a judge.”

“He had your balls in a vice grip,” Gerry said.

“So what? I told you not to touch him, and you disobeyed me.”

His son shot him a look. “If a guy was holding my balls like that, I sure hope you’d hit him.”

Valentine stared at the road. His son didn’t get it. Gerry had let the situation dictate him, instead of him dictating the situation.

“Would you?” his son demanded.

“Beat up a guy squeezing your balls?”

“Yeah,” he said indignantly, his eyes burning a hole in his father’s face. “Or would you just stand there and whistle the Star Spangled Banner?”

They came to a traffic stop. Valentine braked the car while laughing silently to himself. He loved his boy more than anyone in the world, but that didn’t change who Gerry was, or the fact that his son wasn’t going to change his stripes. The quicker Valentine accepted that, the better off he was going to be. He said, “Yeah, probably.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means I’d probably beat up a guy doing that to you.”

“So what makes what I did to Bronco any different?”

“I’m thirty years older than you.”

“So?”

He tapped the accelerator. “I’m not using my balls as much as you.”

They came to a shopping center with a pharmacy, and Gerry asked his father to pull in so he could buy some painkillers for his hand. There was an empty spot by the front door, and he pulled in and Gerry hopped out. Before he shut his door, he stuck his head into the car. “I’m sorry I disobeyed you, Pop, but Bronco had it coming, and I gave it to him.” Then his son went inside.

A minute later, Gerry came out of the pharmacy and jumped into the car, his face a deep crimson.

“What’s wrong?” his father said.

“That son-of-a bitch stole my wallet and my pen!” Gerry exclaimed.

“The guy inside the store?”

“Bronco! He picked my pocket.”

Valentine stared at his son. The first thing a cop did when he got into an altercation was to check his pockets, and make sure they hadn’t been picked. He ran over the curb leaving the pharmacy’s parking lot.

Chapter 23

Johnny Norton walked out of the cell with his arms handcuffed behind his back. Bronco came out behind him, wearing Klinghoffer’s baggy uniform. As he closed the cell door, he glanced at Karl lying face-down on the bunk bed, bleeding to death. He hadn’t wanted to murder him, but sometimes there was no avoiding it.

They walked down the hall toward the electronic door. Beyond that door was the booking room, and beyond that the entrance to the jail. Maybe a hundred yards from here to freedom. Bronco kept his face hidden behind Johnny’s back and whispered, “You’re doing great. Walk with a scowl on your face, and keep talking.”

Johnny obliged him, and spit out a steady stream of chatter. He spoke to the new arrivals, while keeping a running commentary on the crummy food. If someone was watching them on a surveillance camera, they would be drawn to Johnny’s mouth, and not focus on Bronco. Hustlers called it the turn, and had been using it for years to distract casino security.

They came to the electronic door. It was massive, like something you’d see inside a bank. Bronco got behind Johnny and said, “Open sesame.” to the speaker in the wall, trying to imitate Klinghoffer’s delivery. As if by magic, the door slid open.

“Oh, baby,” Johnny said under his breath.

They marched out of the cellblock. In the hallway sat a big, bored black guard with a twelve-gauge shotgun lying across his lap. It was rare to see a firearm inside a jail, and Bronco felt like he’d hit the lottery.

“Top of the morning,” Johnny said.

“Same to you,” the guard said.

Drawing the baton from his belt, Bronco whacked the guard in the head, and dropped him to the floor. Placing the shotgun on the stool, he dragged the guard into the cellblock. Coming back, he closed the electronic door, then picked up the shotgun, and placed it vertically against Johnny’s back.

“You’re one smooth talker.”

“My speciality,” Johnny said.

“I’m going to buy you a steak and a Lowenbrau when we get out.”

They walked down the hallway to the next door, which led to the booking room. Then, they waited. Bronco had told Johnny that he didn’t know how this door operated. Not that it mattered: There were so many prisoners flowing through, he’d assumed the door opened fairly regularly.

“You sure this is gonna work?” Johnny whispered.

“Positive.”

Sweat was pouring down Johnny’s face and drenching the collar of his shirt. Bronco kept whispering sweet nothings in his ear, knowing Johnny was scared. Thirty seconds later, a white cop leading a black prisoner came through the door. The cop was pushing his prisoner like he had a grudge. Bronco gave him room, then grabbed the door before it closed. In the next room he could hear lots of men talking and phones ringing. Stupid sounds, yet beautiful to someone facing a life without them.

“Start walking,” he said.

Johnny stepped into the booking room. Bronco followed him, his eyes doing a quick sweep. A half-dozen cops in uniform, another five or six dressed in street clothes, a couple of secretaries, and a bunch of punks getting booked. The punks sat at desks with their wrists handcuffed to their chairs, giving information to the cops who’d arrested them. Just one big happy family, Bronco thought.

Johnny stiffened, and Bronco followed the path of his eyes. Johnny was staring at a skinny cop with sandy brown hair sitting at one of the desks. Bronco guessed this was the cop who’d arrested Johnny. All the cop had to do was lift his head, and he was going to see Johnny and Bronco and know something wasn’t right. Bronco thought back to the inscription on the desk in the interview room. NO ONE GETS OUT OF HERE ALIVE

No one but me, he thought.

Bronco removed the handcuff key resting in his pants pocket. He shoved the key into the handcuff on Johnny’s right wrist, and heard the lock click open. Johnny whispered “What you doing?” and Bronco said, “Shhh,” then took the baton hanging from his belt, and shoved it into Johnny’s hands. Johnny’s fingers clumsily grabbed the handle.

“This my ticket to freedom?” he whispered.

“You bet,” Bronco said.

Lifting his foot, Bronco placed the heel of his shoe into the small of Johnny’s back, and shoved him into the center of the booking room. Johnny fell forward like a man slipping on ice, then righted himself, the baton clutched in his hands.

“Escaped prisoner!” Bronco yelled at the top of his lungs.

Johnny Norton had killed a girl named Sandy the day before he’d been arrested. He’d met her in a roadside bar and seen she wasn’t all right in the head. That and she was all liquored up had told her she’d be easy pickings. He’d taken her out to his car and screwed her in the backseat. When they were done and Sandy asked for the fifty dollars he’d promised her, Johnny strangled her. There had been no reason to kill her, only a repulsed look in her eyes he wanted to extinguish. All his life, Johnny had been seeing that look in other’s people’s faces. Like he wasn’t clean or something.

The cops were going to find out he’d killed Sandy. He’d left his prints on her clothes and done a crummy job of dumping her body in a deserted lot. The other times he’d killed girls, he’d dumped them in bodies of water, only those were hard to find in the desert. He’d left too many clues, and it was just a matter of time before the police connected him to the crime.

These were the thoughts going through Johnny’s mind as he swung the billy club at the cop closest to him. He was a goner, so he was going to go out in style. It didn’t bother him that Bronco had betrayed him, just that he hadn’t seen it coming. Given the chance, Johnny would have done the same.

The cop shielded his head with his arms, and the club bounced off his forearms. People in the room were yelling, the noise so loud that Johnny couldn’t hear himself think. The cop who’d arrested him, a Pollock named Turkowski, rose from his desk with his gun drawn, and shot Johnny in the stomach.

Johnny flew backwards into a wall, then sank to the floor. He stared down at himself. The hole in his stomach was as big as his fist, his blood gushing out. The baton slipped out of his hand and pools of black appeared before his eyes. He saw Bronco slip out the door with the shotgun cradled to his chest.

As he died, Johnny closed his eyes, and wished it was him going out that door.

“You’re not yelling at me,” Gerry said.

Valentine saw the Washoe County Detention center a block ahead. “Is that a statement or a question?”

“You’re not mad?”

Valentine shook his head. He’d had his pocket picked several times when he was a cop. There was nothing you could do except be more careful the next time.

“Hopefully, the guard that led Bronco back to his cell kept him handcuffed,” Valentine said.

“You think Bronco would use my pen to attack him?”

He nodded. The gambling world was replete with stories of Bronco wrestling with security guards and jumping through plate glass windows rather than allow himself to be captured by the police. He pulled into the visitor parking lot. It backed up on the employee lot, and he saw a cop wearing a baggy uniform running up and down the aisle of cars, pointing his key chain at the vehicle.

“What’s that guy doing?”

“Looks like he’s using the unlock mechanism in his key chain to find his car,” Valentine replied.

“How does that work?”

“You forget where your car is parked, you point the key chain, and press the unlock button until your car lights up. I do it all the time.”

“Holy shit — he’s got a shotgun.”

The cop in the baggy uniform was running directly toward them. It was Bronco, and he raised the shotgun hanging by his side, and aimed at their windshield.

“Sweet Jesus,” Valentine said.

Chapter 24

Mabel was examining a double-sided chip when the phone rang. The chip had been sent by a grateful casino boss, along with a thank-you card. Tony had spotted the gaff while watching a surveillance tape, and alerted the casino to the theft.

The double-sided chip was a marvel of ingenuity. On one side was a $5.00 red chip; on the other, a $25.00 dollar green chip. The scam used two people — a crooked blackjack dealer, and a dishonest player. The player would make a bet with his double-sided chip, with the $25.00 side showing. If the player won, the dealer paid him even money. If the player lost, the dealer would pick the losing bet up, flip it over secretly in his hand, and place it in his tray with the $5.00 dollar chips. The player would toss twenty-five dollars in bills on the table, and ask for chips. The dealer would give him five $5.00 chips, including the double-sided chip. What made the scam so deadly was no matter what happened, the player always came out ahead.

“Grift Sense,” she answered.

“Good afternoon,” a man said. “May I please speak to Mabel Stuck.”

Mabel Stuck? It sounded like some pesky telemarketer.

“The name’s Struck, not Stuck, and this number is on the national Do-Not-Call-Registry,” she informed her caller. “Please remove us from your list, or we will contact the Florida attorney general.”

“Ms. Struck, I’m terribly sorry. Please accept my apology.”

“Who is this?”

“Chief Running Bear of the Micanopy nation,” the man said.

Mabel brought her hand up to her mouth. Running Bear ran the show at the Micanopy Indian Reservation casino. Because of a court fight he’d waged twenty-five years ago, casino gambling was now legal on over four hundred Indian reservations. All Mabel could think was he’d read the e-mail she’d sent, and had called to fire her.

“Hello, chief,” she said.

“Please call me Running Bear.”

“Sure. Please call me Mabel.”

“I’m calling in response to the e-mail which you sent my director of surveillance. You were rather blunt in your assessment of how we are handling this situation.”

Mabel liked the chief’s choice of words. Tony had worked for Running Bear before, and had said the chief was as honest as the day was long. “You have a dealer who has been caught on videotape using known cheating techniques. The fact that this dealer is still working for you is absolutely shocking.”

There was a pause on the other end. Mabel liked how her response had come out. Not too harsh or prickly. And calling their inaction shocking was a nice touch.

“I have shared your e-mail with the elders of our tribe,” Running Bear said. “The elders have final say in these matters. They have asked if you would be willing to come to the casino this evening, and explain your reasoning. You will be compensated for your time, if you choose to accept.”

Something dropped in Mabel’s stomach. Go over to the casino? Talk to the elders? She hadn’t spoken to a roomful of people since highschool.

“Well, I don’t—”

“I should tell you that I am in agreement of your assessment of the situation,” he said, “and would like to see this dealer terminated.”

“You would?”

“Yes.”

“I don’t mean to be rude,” Mabel said, “but if the elders of your tribe won’t listen to you, what makes you think they’ll listen to me?”

“The elders don’t believe a crime has been committed. You make a case in your e-mail that a crime has been committed since the dealer broke the rules of play, which constitutes a breach of trust. I need to hammer this point home, with your help.”

Mabel considered what Running Bear was asking. Because the Micanopys were a sovereign nation, they ran their casinos by their own rules, and not the state’s or the federal government’s. These rules weren’t as strict as other casinos, and as a result, not as good. Running Bear needed help; otherwise, he’d have unscrupulous dealers stealing him blind.

“Our firm charges three thousand dollars for house calls,” she said. “We prefer checks, although we will take cash. Is this agreeable to you?”

“That sounds fine. Will Tony Valentine be coming with you?”

“Tony Valentine is out of town,” Mabel said. “I’ll be coming alone.”

Chapter 25

Bronco was close enough to take both their heads off with his shotgun. Valentine braked the rental and waited. Without a word, Bronco marched over to the car, climbed into the backseat, and shoved the shotgun’s barrel into the seat behind Gerry’s back.

“Drive,” Bronco said.

As Valentine pulled out of the visitor’s parking lot, he glanced in his mirror, and saw policeman spilling out of the jail and frantically running around the grounds. No doubt Bronco had planned to drive away in one of their cars. If he had, the police would have had little problem finding out which car, and tracking him down. But since he was in Valentine’s rental, there was no way for the police to know where he’d gone. Bronco was home free, and Valentine saw him grinning in the mirror.

“Isn’t this wonderful,” Bronco said. “You came out here to stick me in prison, and you help me get out. There must be a name for that.”

“Irony,” Gerry said, staring straight ahead.

“There you go. That’s a fancy word, isn’t it?”

“Just to you,” Gerry said.

Bronco stuck his head between them. “He’s a smart one, isn’t he, Tony? Knows I won’t shoot him while we’re here in the city around all these people. Now, when we get out in the desert, that’s a different story.” To Gerry, he said, “You punch hard, kid.”

“I had a good teacher,” Gerry said.

“Your old man here?”

“That’s right.”

They came to an intersection. Bronco gave Valentine instructions to get out of town. Valentine drove with his eye in his mirror, hoping for a police cruiser to magically appear behind them. He saw Gerry staring at the road, and guessed his son was hoping for a similar miracle.

Ten miles outside of town, Bronco made Valentine pull down a side road, then after a mile take another road, this one made of crushed gravel. It led to a deserted auto graveyard, the rusted carcasses of vehicles piled high in the air, with families of crows nestled within the metal skeletons. Bronco told him to brake and the car came to a halt.

“Get out,” he said to Valentine. To Gerry, he said, “Take your father’s spot behind the wheel. Do it real slow.”

Valentine got out. Except for the graveyard, there was nothing but scrub brush and flat land, with no real place to hide. His mind was racing for an escape, only none were making themselves apparent. It made his soul ache to know that Bronco had outsmarted him, but no one had ever said life was perfect.

Bronco rolled down the back window, and poked the barrel of the shotgun out the window. The look in his face was stone cold evil.

Valentine looked up at the sky. It was a flawless blue, the sun a perfect hole within that blue. As he’d grown older, his fear of dying had ebbed. He’d been married to a great woman, raised a halfway decent son, and had his share of good times. He’d played by the rules, and had no regrets.

“You want to say anything to your son?” Bronco asked.

Valentine glanced over his shoulder. Gerry’s face was white. He mouthed the words I love you. and looked back up at the sky.

“Anything else?” Bronco asked.

Valentine shook his head. He wasn’t going to look at Bronco, and give him the satisfaction of knowing he’d won this fight. In the auto graveyard he spied a car bumper, and in its shiny reflection Bronco aiming the shotgun at his back.

He closed his eyes. His late wife appeared as if my magic. She was standing in a lush forest, holding her arms out, and looked as beautiful as the day they’d met. He imagined himself holding her in his arms and kissing her, and could not think of a more wonderful gift. As Bronco’s shotgun went off, he was actually smiling.

Chapter 26

Valentine heard the shotgun blast and saw his life flash before his eyes. A flock of crows nesting in a car skeleton burst into the air around him. He felt their wings violently brush against his body, and imagined they were taking his soul to the hereafter.

The birds continued to fly upward, leaving him behind. He blinked and realized he was still standing, then heard the sounds of wheels spinning. He spun around and saw the rental race past, it’s rear end fish tailing. The vehicle was halfway across the field before he realized what had happened. Gerry had floored the accelerator just before Bronco had squeezed the shotgun’s trigger.

Valentine watched the rental burn across the field, expecting to hear a shotgun blast at any moment. Bronco would pay Gerry back for doing this. His son was doomed.

But the blast never came, and he guessed Bronco hadn’t shot Gerry because his son was driving too fast. But it was a temporary reprieve from an inevitable situation. Gerry eventually had to slow down, and Bronco would kill him. Valentine took out his cell phone, and powered it up. If he could alert the police, perhaps they could save his son. His cell phone made an unpleasant sound, and he glanced at its face. NO SERVICE. He lifted his eyes, and stared across the field. The rental was a blip on the horizon, his son still driving like he was protecting the Pole at the Indy 500. Tears rolled down his cheeks, and he wiped his eyes with his sleeve.

The back country of Reno was bumpy and uneven. Gerry came to a wide ditch he couldn’t cross, and was forced to slow down. He’d pulled some wild stunts with cars as a teenager, but he’d never driven this fast before without pavement under his wheels. If Bronco was going to kill him, at least he was going to die with adrenalin pumping through his veins.

The ditch was about fifteen feet wide and ten feet deep with brownish water in its bottom. Gerry turned the rental so he was driving parallel with the ditch. As the speedometer fell below fifty, he felt the shotgun’s barrel being scraped across the back of his neck. It felt like a hot wire and he braked the car, then threw it into park. Bronco leaned forward, and put his lips next to Gerry’s ear.

“Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t kill you.”

Gerry thought about it, then shook his head.

“Can’t think of any?” Bronco asked.

“I can think of plenty,” Gerry said. “None of them are any good.”

Bronco let out a mean little laugh. “Get out of the car.”

“You going to shoot me in the back, like my old man?”

Bronco stared back, saying nothing. Gerry realized he was a goner unless he did something. Think, he told himself.

“You’re going to need money,” Gerry said.

Bronco blinked. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“You’re on the lam and don’t have any money. Well, neither do I, unless you think you’re going to get far with my credit cards and the forty bucks in my wallet. You’ll be back in jail before you know it.”

“That’s all that’s in your wallet? Forty bucks?”

“That’s right.”

Bronco chewed on his lower lip, thinking.

“I know how you can make a fast buck,” Gerry said.

“How? Flipping burgers at McDonald’s?”

Gerry grinned. His father had liked to say that even Hitler had a sense of humor.

“With a monkey’s paw,” Gerry said.

Bronco lowered the shotgun so it was no longer touching Gerry’s neck.

“Where’d you get a monkey’s paw?”

“From your house in Henderson,” Gerry said. “The Las Vegas Metro Police found the place, and they let me and my father have a look around. We found the monkeys paws in a box in your workshop; my father explained how they worked. I grabbed one when he wasn’t looking, and shoved it into my suitcase.”

“Why?”

“Because I planned to use it.” Gerry turned his head and looked Bronco in the eye. “I used to be a bookie. My wife talked me into quitting the rackets, and going into business with my old man. Only, I can’t quit. It’s something in my blood. So I stole one of your little devices.”

“You’re saying you’re a scammer,” Bronco said.

“All my life.”

“Where’s the monkey’s paw you took from my house?”

“In my suitcase in the trunk.”

“Show me,” Bronco said.

Gerry pushed a button beneath the dashboard that popped the trunk, then climbed out of the rental with his hands stuck on his head like a POW. He’d gotten Bronco to start thinking about his own salvation, and sensed that Bronco wasn’t as intent on killing him as he had been a few minutes ago.

Bronco climbed out of the vehicle in his baggy guard’s uniform and cheap prison sandals. He aimed the shotgun at Gerry’s face. Gerry dropped to his knees. Bronco went and flipped open the trunk. There were two suitcases in back.

“Which’s one yours?”

“The black Tumi. The monkey’s paw is on top, wrapped in plastic.”

Bronco unzippered the Tumi. Seeing the monkey’s paw, his eyes lit up like someone who’s found buried treasure. He removed the cheating device along with a shirt and a pair of pants, then slammed the trunk closed. Coming around the rental, he shredded the plastic from the slot-cheating device, then pushed the button that made the strobe light flash on its end.

“You took my favorite one.”

“Lucky me,” Gerry said.

Chapter 27

Valentine hiked down the dirt road back to the highway, all the while staring at the face of his cell phone, waiting for a satellite signal so he’d could make a call. Several times the phone lit up like it was working, only to betray him by losing the signal when he tried to call. He’d hated cell phones and always would. Whenever he went to the movies, some guy who couldn’t make the rent was blabbing loud enough to ruin everyone’s good time. He stared at the one clutched in his hand.

“Come on, you crummy piece of junk,” he said.

He came to a rise in the road, and as he reached the top, saw the cell phone light up. Was it really working, or just trying to torture him? He stopped walking and waited for the signal to disappear. When it didn’t, he began to dial Bill Higgins’ cell phone number, thinking it would be best if he had Bill tell the police what had happened, rather than trying to get a police operator to believe him.

He heard the call go through, then saw a car racing across the field in the distance. It was their rental, and it was coming towards him.

“Higgins here,” he heard Bill say.

Valentine considered running, then realized there wasn’t enough time. Instead, he retreated several steps, then lay down on his belly in the tall grass, keeping his head up so he could watch the car, the cell phone pressed to his ear.

“Tony, is that you?”

“Yeah,” he said, watching the rental bump across the field. His vision wasn’t worth a damn anymore, and he strained to see how many people were inside. It looked like two, but he couldn’t be sure.

“Where have you been?” Bill said. “Bronco escaped from jail; every cop in Reno is hunting for him. I tried to call you, but your cell phone was turned off.”

“He hijacked my rental and kidnaped my son,” Valentine said.

“What?”

Valentine explained how Bronco had abducted them, then told Bill the getaway route they’d taken. Bill repeated it back to him, word-for-word. Valentine was still watching the rental approach as Bill finished.

“How did you get away?” Bill asked.

“My son saved my ass,” Valentine said.

The rental was a hundred yards away. Valentine stared at the driver’s side, and saw Gerry manning the wheel. Bronco was in the bucket seat, and had the shotgun stuck against Gerry’s neck. He got a good look at Gerry’s face. His son looked flat-out terrified, and Valentine’s heart did the funny thing it did when he was faced with a situation out of his control. His doctor called it a flutter, but Valentine had always thought it was God’s way of reminding him that life was rarely fair.

The rental flew past, then disappeared down the road. Valentine slowly rose and dusted himself off, the cell phone still to his ear. He started to walk toward the highway.

“You there?” Bill said.

“Barely,” he said.

Chapter 28

“You’re a liar,” Bronco said.

Gerry stared at the dirt road through the rental’s dirty windshield. There was not another car in sight. He had planned to flash his brights at the next car he saw, and alert them so they’d dial 911 on their cell phone. But that option suddenly seemed like a bad idea: Bronco was acting like he was going to kill him the first chance he got.

“What are you talking about,” Gerry said.

“Look at these clothes I’m wearing.” He shoved the shotgun’s barrel into Gerry’s chin. “Look at them!”

Gerry glanced at the clothes Bronco had taken from the trunk and exchanged for Klinghoffer’s uniform. The pants were black, the shirt a white Brooks Brothers with a button-down collar. They were old man’s clothes, and Bronco looked ridiculous in them.

“What about them?” Gerry said.

“These aren’t your clothes.”

“Sure they are.”

“You think I was born yesterday?”

“The day before,” Gerry said.

Bronco cuffed him in the side of the head. The car swerved dangerously over to the side of the road, nearly flipping. Gerry quickly straightened the wheel.

“These are your old man’s clothes,” Bronco said. “The monkey’s paw was in your father’s suitcase. He took the monkey’s paw from my house, didn’t he?”

Gerry resumed staring at the road. Still no sign of another car. If he’d learned anything from the rackets, it was that there was always an angle to exploit. This angle had run its course, and he said, “That’s right. My father said it was the nicest one he’d ever seen. He asked the cops in Las Vegas if he could take it, and add it to his collection of cheating equipment. You had so many of them, the cops said sure.”

“So you made up that stuff about being a scammer to save your neck,” Bronco said.

Gerry glanced at his captor. “That part was true.”

“Bullgarbage.”

“I was a bookie in New York for ten years. I’ve only been clean for a little while.”

“Tell me who the last person was you scammed.”

Gerry told Bronco about scamming the Daily Double at Tampa Bay Downs, while helping his father expose the horse that had been silked. He glanced at Bronco while he spoke, and saw the same surprised look in his captor’s eyes as he’d seen in his father’s two days ago. He guessed Bronco had never heard of silking, either. By the time he’d finished, they’d reached the main highway. Bronco made him hang a left, and a short distance later, another left.

“Where we going?”

“Back to Reno,” Bronco said.

Gerry remembered the route they’d taken from the jail, and this wasn’t it. He watched Bronco reach across the seat, and remove the pack of Marlboros tucked in Gerry’s shirt pocket. Bronco banged one out, then offered Gerry one.

“Sure.”

Bronco lit two cigarettes from the same match, and shoved one into Gerry’s mouth. Bronco smoked his cigarette while studying him. “Let me get this straight. You and your old man were hired by the track to catch some cheaters. While you were there, you saw another scam going on, and you bet money on it, and took the track for six grand.”

“That’s right,” Gerry said.

“Why didn’t you bet more, and make a killing?”

“It’s a small track.”

“And you were afraid it would get noticed.”

“Yeah.”

Bronco blew smoke at him. “How do I know you ain’t bullgarbageting me again?”

“The winning stub’s in my wallet.”

Bronco pulled Gerry’s stolen wallet from his pocket, and extracted the winning stub. Gerry had kept the stub as a memento. In his bar in Brooklyn, he’d framed the first hundred dollars he’d ever made as a bookie, and he’d planned to frame this stub to signify that his days in the rackets had come to an end.

Bronco took his time studying it. Then he removed the money from the wallet, and counted it on the seat. Forty dollars in wilted bills.

“Where’s the rest of it?” Bronco asked.

“What do you mean?”

“You won six grand. Where’s the rest of the money?”

Gerry didn’t think Bronco would believe he’d given the money back. He pointed at the photo section of the wallet. “In there.”

“You keep it hidden, huh?”

Bronco opened the photo section and saw a smiling picture of Yolanda taken when she was a third-year medical student at New York University’s School of Medicine. He stared long and hard at the photo.

“She got it,” Gerry said.

Something resembling a smile crossed Bronco’s face, but it didn’t last very long. Still holding the wallet, he said, “You won the money at the track two days ago, but you told me you quit the rackets.”

“I quit the day I ripped off the track. That night, actually,” Gerry said.

“Why?”

That was a hell of a good question. Why had Gerry quit? He could say his old man shamed him into it, but that wasn’t the truth. He’d done it because his life had gone down a different road, and he needed to change, or risk turning his life into a train wreck. The truth was, he’d finally been forced to grow up. That was why he’d quit the rackets.

“Turn the page,” Gerry said.

Bronco shot him a blank stare.

“Look at the next picture in my wallet.”

Bronco flipped to the next picture. It was of Lois, taken a few days ago, his baby daughter lying on the rug in his father’s house, the same rug Gerry had lain on as a baby.

“I quit because of her,” Gerry said.

Bronco stared long and hard at the photo.

“Didn’t want her growing up thinking her old man was a crook, huh?”

Gerry nodded, surprised Bronco would understand. Then he remembered the woman’s clothes hanging in his closet in the house in Henderson. Maybe in his past there had been a family.

Bronco tossed the wallet into Gerry’s lap. He pointed up the road. They were on a deserted stretch except for a convenience store sitting off to the side. Even from the distance Gerry could read the neon Budweiser sign shimmering in the window.

“Here’s the deal,” Bronco said. “You’re going to take your forty bucks, and make it grow.”

“I am?”

“That’s right. Otherwise, I’m going to kill you.”

Bronco quickly explained the scam. The convenience store, like many in Nevada, had a row of slot machines in the back. Bronco had checked the store not long ago, and discovered an old Bally among the machines. The Bally had a unique feature: A player could stick his fingers up the payout chute, and hold the door open. This turned a small payout into a large one. Since the machine paid out a jackpot roughly every thirty pulls, Bronco believed Gerry’s money could be turned into a quick profit.

“I’m going to stand outside, and watch you,” Bronco said. “Do anything stupid, and I’ll come in and shoot you, then rob the place.”

They were sitting in the car, parked outside the store. The midday sun beat down unmercifully on the rental’s windshield. Behind the counter, a teenage girl with braces on her teeth, probably still in highschool.

Gerry said, “What about her?”

“I’ll kill her, too.”

Gerry stuck his hand out. “Give me the money.”

Bronco took the wilted bills off the seat and laid it onto his palm. “The machine probably has a sensor for overpays. If you leave the payout door open too long, the candle will come on, and an alarm inside the machine will go off.”

“The candle?”

“The white light on top of the machine,” Bronco said. “That’s the candle. They start blinking when something’s wrong.”

“How long will it take for the sensor to come on?”

“Ten seconds, more or less.”

“More or less? What if it’s less? What if the alarm goes off?”

“Then I’ll have to kill you,” Bronco said.

Gerry got out of the rental and so did Bronco. Bronco went to the corner of the convenience store, and stood there and smoked his cigarette, one eye on the road, the other looking inside the store. The shotgun hung at his side, hidden from the street and from the girl working the counter. The guy knew all the angles.

Gerry entered the store. As he came in, the girl behind the counter smiled and said hello. Her face had the wonderful freshness of someone on their first job. He handed her his money and asked for change.

“You okay, mister?” she asked.

He looked at himself in the mirror that was directly behind her. He saw his face, which was white, then saw Bronco staring at him while blowing smoke rings. He looked back at the girl. Real young, sixteen if she was a day.

“Fine,” he said. “Quarters please.”

She handed him a plastic bucket filled with quarters. “Play the machine on the very end. It’s been paying off lately.”

Gerry walked to the back of the store. The slot machines hugged the wall, and took up about a fourth of the available floor space. There were probably as many slot machines in convenience stores and bars in Nevada as there were in the casinos. Gerry found the old Bally, and started to feed in a coin.

“No, not that one,” the girl said, hanging over the counter. “The machine on the end.”

Gerry felt sweat march down his back. He tried to ignore her, and the girl came out from behind the counter, and walked over to where he sat. Grabbing him by the arm, she led him to the machine on the end.

“This one. I think the guy who adjusts it screwed up.”

Gerry sat down at the machine. She stood beside him with her arms crossed, and he saw no other choice than to put two quarters into it, and pull the handle. The machine was themed after Star Wars, and space-age sounds serenaded him as the reels spun. When they stopped, two bars lined up, and realized he had a winner. He looked at the payout bar on the side of the machine. He’d won ten bucks.

He cashed out, and walked with her to the front. He stopped by the cooler, and plucked out a pair of ice-cold Cokes. Paying for them, he handed her one.

“What’s your name?”

“Darlene.”

“Thanks for the tip.”

Darlene took a swig of soda, belched and covered her mouth in embarrassment.

A cell phone rang behind the counter. Darlene answered it, and started yakking to her boyfriend. Gerry went back to the Bally and resumed playing it. Within a few minutes, he hit a small jackpot and stuck his fingers up the chute and hit the cash out button on the machine. Quarters flowed into his hand. He counted to eight, then pulled his hand out.

He continued to play while Darlene spoke on her cell phone, hitting two more small jackpots and stealing three times as many coins during the payout. By now, the hopper was filled with quarters, and he grabbed a plastic second bucket off the machine and filled it, then put the remaining coins into his pockets. When he went back to the counter, Darlene was grinning like a Cheshire cat.

“Well, look at you,” she said.

His total win came to a two hundred and thirty-eight dollars. He walked outside and handed Bronco the money. Bronco peeled off five dollars and handed it back to him, then stuffed the rest into his pocket.

“Go buy me some nail polish,” Bronco said.

“You’re kidding.”

“Just do it.”

Gerry came out a minute later with a cheap bottle of nail polish that Darlene had tried to talk him out of buying. He handed Bronco the bottle.

“Get in the car.”

Chapter 29

Bronco made him drive to a sprawling storage facility on the outskirts of town. A sign said that air-conditioned units were available by the month or year. The facility was surrounded by chain link fence, and Bronco told him the code to open the gate.

Moments later they were inside. Bronco pointed at a unit and Gerry braked in front of it. They both got out. Bronco punched another code into the keypad by the door, all the while holding his shotgun on Gerry. The sliding door went up, and Gerry stared at the brand new Ford Taurus sitting inside the unit.

“We’re going to exchange cars, and park yours in here,” Bronco said.

“Whatever you say.”

They exchanged the two cars. As Gerry pulled the rental into the unit and killed the engine, Bronco slipped out of the car.

“Been nice knowing you,” he said.

Coming around to the driver’s side, he pointed the shotgun at the side of Gerry’s head, then closed one eye and took dead aim.

“Got anything you want to say?”

Gerry shut his eyes, and tried to think of what he wanted his dying words to be. It didn’t really matter, yet somehow it did. He had to say something, only, he couldn’t, his body gripped in fear. Thinking about dying always did that to him.

“No.”

“That’s what you want to say?” Bronco asked.

“No, I’m just...”

“Spit it out, god damnit.”

“...scared, man. I’ve got a wife and kid. She’s three months old.”

“Say goodbye to them.”

Gerry choked on the words. It had taken him a long time to realize that all he really wanted out of life was a woman who loved him, and a child to call his own. And now they were being taken away from him. It was the worst form of robbery, and he shut his eyes and started to cry. Bronco cursed him.

“You little piece of shit. Why did you have to go and do that? Why?”

Gerry was watching his life pass before his eyes and regretting all the dumb things he’d done. Opening his eyes, he turned his head and stared into the shotgun’s barrel.

“Do what?” he said.

Bronco grabbed Gerry by the back of the head, and smashed his face into the steering wheel. “That!”

Gerry looked straight down. His crotch was wet. He’d pissed in his pants, just like the night on the Boardwalk twenty years ago when his bowels had betrayed him. “Why did you do that?” Bronco yelled at him.

“Because I’m scared,” Gerry whispered.

Bronco cursed him some more. Gerry didn’t know what was worse. Dying, or being humiliated right before he died. He waited for what seemed like an eternity, then turned his head. Bronco was staring at him, his face twisted and confused.

“God damn you,” he said.

Walking outside the storage unit, Bronco punched a command into the keypad by the door. Moments later, the sliding door came down, and Gerry was enveloped in darkness.

Gerry listened to the Taurus drive away, and took several deep breaths. He cracked open his door, and the car’s interior light came on. In the mirror he saw the purple-black bruise on the bridge of his nose. He touched it and winced.

He pressed the button that released the trunk. He needed to call his father on his cell phone and tell him he was okay, but first he was going to change his clothes.

He walked around to the trunk, and from his suitcase removed a pair of slacks and clean underwear. His heart was beating a hundred miles an hour and his head was spinning. Growing up Catholic, he liked to think there was a reason for everything. Maybe someday, he’d know the reason why Bronco hadn’t shot him.

He changed in the light of the open trunk, then balled up his dirty clothes and threw them in the corner. He’d had some humiliating things happen to him in his life, and he’d always pretended later that they hadn’t happened. It had seemed like the easiest way to deal with them.

But he couldn’t run away from this one. His father was going to want to know what had happened, and Gerry would tell him how he’d saved himself by pissing in his pants.

And that was the only person he was going to tell.

Chapter 30

Valentine was standing on the side of the highway when his cell phone rang. The caller ID said GERRY. He fumbled hitting the Receive button.

“Hello?”

“Hey, Pop, it’s me.”

Hearing his son’s voice brought a flood of emotions over him that Valentine couldn’t control, and he sat down on the shoulder and began to weep. He hadn’t done that since his wife’s funeral, and the tears burned his eyes.

“You still there, Pop?”

“Yeah,” he choked. “I’m here. Where are you?”

“In a storage facility on the north side of town,” his son said. “I banged on the door, but no one came out. I didn’t see any people when we drove in, so I’m guessing the place is self-serve. I’m going to leave the cell phone on so you can find me.”

A trailer truck appeared on the highway. The driver didn’t slow down, and Valentine guessed it was common to see grown men sitting on the side of the road, bawling their heads off. Rising, he dusted himself off.

“How am I going to do that?”

“Call my cell phone company,” Gerry said. “They’ll know which tower my phone’s signal is originating from. It will be within a five mile radius. Once you know that, the Reno cops can look at all the self-serve storage facilities within that radius.”

Valentine saw another car coming up the road, the driver behind the wheel looking like Bill Higgins. Waving, he said, “How do you know that?”

“I saw it on a cop-show on TV,” his son said.

Valentine said goodbye to his son and killed the connection. Climbing into the passenger seat of Bill’s car, he told him that Gerry was still alive. Then, he explained his son’s clever solution to finding him in the storage facility.

Bill called the Reno police on his cell, and asked them to call Gerry’s cell phone company. Hanging up, he said, “You realize Bronco did this to stall us.”

The same thought had occurred to him. While they were finding Gerry, Bronco would be running away. Bill did a U-turn on the highway, and headed back to Reno. He drove way over the speed limit, the desolate scrub landscape going by in a blur. After a few minutes had passed, Valentine said, “Have I ever told you how smart my son is?”

Bill shook his head.

“Yesterday, when we were at Bronco’s house, Gerry said that he thought your bad agent was stealing jackpots using computers. Well, since there’s no physical way to rig modern slot machines, Gerry must be right. Which led me to realize something. Your bad agent works for Fred Friendly in the Electronic Systems Division.”

Bill looked stunned. “You think the bad agent is in ESD? That’s a stretch, Tony.”

“No, it isn’t. Bronco said this bad agent stole hundreds of jackpots. A field agent couldn’t do that, simply because hundreds of stolen jackpots — even small ones — would be noticed if they occurred in the same part of the state. But, they wouldn’t be noticed if they were spread out across the entire state. Somebody working for ESD could do that.”

Bill’s mouth worked up and down in silent thought.

“You’re right,” he said.

Another minute passed. They could see Reno ahead in the distance, the city a black dot on the brown landscape.

“How many agents work for ESD?” Valentine asked.

“Seventy-five,” Bill said.

“Those are our suspects,” Valentine said.

Gerry had discovered that being a father had its drawbacks. He couldn’t listen to loud music anytime he wanted to, like he had when he was single. So, he’d bought an Ipod, and plugged himself in whenever he got the chance. He was tapping his foot to Arethra Franklin’s soulful singing when his cell phone lit up. He’d turned the car’s interior light off, fearful of the battery dying, and stared at the cell phone’s illuminated face. It was his father.

“Feel up to doing a job?” his father asked.

“I don’t know, I’m kind of busy right now.”

He paused, hoping to hear his father laugh. When he didn’t, Gerry said, “Of course I’ll do a job, Pop.”

“In the trunk are the files of the nine hundred Nevada Gaming Control Board agents,” his father said. “I’ve winnowed the field down to seventy-five.”

“Let me guess,” Gerry said. “You want me to pull those seventy-five out, and find the bad agent.”

“That’s right. Sure you’re up for it?”

Sure you’re up for it? That didn’t sound like his father at all. Maybe saving his old man’s life had erased some of the horrendous crap he’d put his father through over the years. Through the IPOD’s earplugs lying on the seat he could faintly hear Aretha singing about respect, and found himself smiling.

“I’m up for it,” Gerry said.

He hung up, then got the stack of files out of the trunk and returned to the front seat of the car. Leaving the door ajar, he grabbed a handful of files, and began sorting through them. He pulled out every agent who worked for the ESD, and placed those files into a separate stack. When the larger stack was exhausted, he picked up the smaller stack and counted it. Seventy-five files, just like his father had said.

The IPOD was still playing, and he considered plugging himself back in, then decided against it. This was work, and he needed to start acting serious.

He heard the storage unit’s air conditioner come on, and felt the manufactured air cool the car’s interior. His father had once told him that to catch a criminal, you needed to know his motivation. He tried to imagine what the motivation was for a gaming agent to rip off the people he worked for. He’d once had a woman who worked for him as a bartender, and had discovered her stealing money out of the till. When he’d confronted her, he’d discovered that she’d been carrying a grudge because he’d never asked her out. The stealing had nothing to do with money. It was spite. The woman had also taken a lot of sick and vacation days, and worked all the angles.

He thumbed through the stack, and pulled out the file of every agent who’d taken a high number of days off in the past few years. There were seven in all.

He worked through the seven files. Two women and five men. Each had been out of work well above the norm. Maybe they’d been sick, or had to deal with a sick family member. He began to think he was barking up the wrong tree, when a thought occurred to him. If a bad agent was running around Nevada stealing jackpots, that agent needed to be taking time off to engineer those thefts. There was no way around it.

He felt the tingle of excitement. One of these seven agents was their thief. His father was going to be proud of him.

Another first, he thought.

Chapter 31

A few miles outside of Reno, Valentine had an epiphany. He’d been having them since childhood, and he asked Bill to pull the car into a roadside gas station. Bill took his eyes off the highway, and gave him a funny look.

“What’s up?”

“Just pull over,” Valentine said.

Bill pulled into a gas station and parked the car by the air pumps. Killing the transmission, he turned to look at him.

“I want to know why you’re holding out on me,” Valentine said after the engine’s fan had stopped whirring. Bill shot him a guilty look, and Valentine knew he had him. “Last night at the strip club, you knew Garrow was going to exchange secrets with the Asian. Who the hell told you that? I certainly didn’t, and neither did my son.”

Bill stared through the windshield at the desolate empty field behind the gas station. There was a lot of pretty geography in Nevada, but mostly it was a desolate place, and Valentine couldn’t imagine himself taking a nature walk and finding anything but snakes and scorpions and maybe a coyote or two. He waited for Bill to defend himself, and when he didn’t, resumed.

“You know something about this case that I don’t. Normally, that wouldn’t bother me. You’re the head of the largest law enforcement agency in the state, and it’s your business to know things other people don’t. Only, there’s a problem. I’m supposed to be running this investigation. So, tell me what’s going on, okay?”

Bill went inside the convenience store that was attached to the gas station, emerging a minute later with two cups of coffee. Bill liked his coffee black and strong, just like Valentine. Handing him a cup, Bill said, “Maybe I should start from the beginning.”

“That’s usually the best place,” Valentine said.

“How much do you know about what’s going on inside China?” Bill asked.

“Just what I read in the papers. The country is booming.”

“Their economy is growing at an annual rate of ten percent, while the rest of the world’s is stagnant. Any idea why?”

Valentine shook his head.

“The underlying factor is the Chinese government. They will stop at nothing to dominate any business that will make money. Right now, they’re the world’s number one manufacturer of electronic equipment, clothing, sporting equipment, and household appliances. They’re also trying to dominate other markets.”

“Including gambling?”

“Including gambling. The casino gambling on the island of Macau is booming. The government is helping build a number of lavish casinos there. The plan is to attract the high-rolling Asian gamblers who are coming to Las Vegas, and get them to gamble in Macau instead.”

It made sense. Every week, American Airlines flew five luxury jumbo jets from Hong Kong to Las Vegas. These jets were filled with high-rolling Asian gamblers, or what the industry called whales, and were the single most profitable group of gamblers in the world. Of course the Chinese government wanted them to stay at home and gamble. They were worth hundreds of millions of dollars to the economy.

“How does the Pai Gow scam fit into this?” Valentine asked.

“Rumor is, the Chinese government struck a deal with the Triads to gaff every Pai Gow game in Las Vegas,” Bill said. “Since the equipment is manufactured in China, the story makes sense. The Chinese are hoping that if Las Vegas starts losing money at Pai Gow, the casinos will close the games down.”

“And the Asian gamblers will stay home and play Pai Gow in Macau.”

Bill blew on his coffee. “That’s right.”

“And Bronco was the cheater who was going to rip off the casinos with the Pai Gow scam.”

“Right again. Now, there’s a problem with this story, and it’s this. Once I heard the rumor, I had every casino in Las Vegas pull their Pai Gow equipment off the tables, and send it to a forensic lab. They tested for marks, luminous paint and hidden gaffs. Nothing showed up.”

“What about ultra-violet inhibitors?”

“They were tested for those, as well. The dominos are clean.”

“No, they’re not,” Valentine said. “Think about what you just told me. The Chinese government is intent on shutting down every Pai Gow game in Las Vegas. That means every Pai Gow game in Las Vegas can be scammed. There’s something wrong with those dominos. You just don’t know what to look for.”

“You’re right. I don’t.”

Bill’s cell phone went off. He took the call, then hung up and started the car’s engine. “That was O’Sullivan. The cops got a reading on your son’s cell phone. It’s coming from a storage facility on the south side of town. They’re waiting for us.”

The cars wheels spun pulling out of the parking lot.

Ten minutes later, Bill pulled into the self-storage facility where the Reno police had determined that Gerry was being held. The front gate was open, and Bill drove around back and parked. As a cop, Valentine had always hated industrial parks. Every car thief and drug smuggler he’d ever busted had worked out of one, and he considered them a haven for crooks and scum bags.

Eight uniformed Reno cops were standing outside a unit with a sliding metal door. They were all big and tan, wore bulletproof vests and clutched shotguns protectively to their chests. One had a large mallet, and Valentine guessed his job was to break the lock on the sliding door. O’Sullivan stood beside the building, staying cool in the shade.

“I spoke to your son through the door,” the sergeant said. “He thinks his nose is busted, but otherwise he’s okay.”

Valentine felt something drop in his stomach. Gerry hadn’t said anything about his nose when they’d talked earlier. “What happened to his nose?”

“Bronco roughed him up.”

“Did you ask my son if he thought the unit was booby-trapped?”

“Come to mention it, I did. Your son said the interior was clean, but I had my men drill some holes through the door to let some light in. I had your son check the unit visually, and also run his hands up and down the door to check for wires and vibration tape. He didn’t find anything.”

Valentine didn’t like it. It would be a long time before he forgot the hatred he’d seen in Bronco’s face earlier that day. Walking onto the grass, he looked at the line of hills overlooking the facility. They were a half-mile away, and covered with scrub brush. He tried to imagine what kind of animals he’d find if he hiked through them. He guessed snakes and squirrels and maybe a man with a high-powered hunting rifle. He got O’Sullivan’s attention and pointed at them. “I want you to send a pair of men up there, and make sure Bronco isn’t waiting to ambush us.”

“A police helicopter did a sweep fifteen minutes ago. The area is clean.”

Valentine looked back at the hills. Even though he didn’t gamble, he’d learned how to play the odds a long time ago. Bill was standing nearby talking with a couple of cops, and he walked over to him and said, “Do me a favor, and explain to Sergeant O’Sullivan that I’m in charge, and that he needs to do whatever I tell him, even if it means standing on his head and spitting nickels. Okay?”

“Whatever you say, Tony.”

Bill explained the situation to O’Sullivan. The sergeant grew red in the face, then sent two men up the hill. He came over to where Valentine was standing.

“Sorry about that,” he said.

“No problem,” Valentine said.

A few minutes later, one of the cops radioed O’Sullivan, and said the hills were clean. Valentine still didn’t like it, but told the sergeant to break down the door anyway.

The cop with the mallet opened the sliding door with several well-placed whacks. As the door was pushed up, Valentine found himself thanking God, something he didn’t do nearly as much as he should. He’d already had a piece of his heart torn out by losing his wife, and could not stand having another piece torn out losing Gerry.

Sunlight flooded the unit’s interior and the Reno cops swarmed in. The unit was rectangular in shape and contained Valentine’s rental car. Gerry sat in the front seat and got out of the car while shielding his eyes from the sudden flood of light. Valentine went and put a bear hug on him.

“Thanks for saving my life,” Valentine said.

“I owed you one,” his son replied.

They held each other. Valentine’s late wife had gotten him addicted to hugs, and it felt really good. Then they walked onto the grass where Bill’s car was parked, and Gerry took out his cigarettes and lit up. They shared a smoke without saying anything.

“You’re going to be proud of me,” Gerry said.

“I’m already proud of you.”

“I narrowed down your slot cheater to seven suspects.”

“Show me.”

Gerry went back to the rental, and returned holding a handful of paper, which he handed to his father. Valentine counted seven files of gaming agents who worked for the Electronic Systems Division. He looked at his son expectantly.

“I once had a woman who worked for me as a bartender who was stealing money,” Gerry explained. “She also took a lot of personnel days and sick days. The two go hand-in-hand.”

“Stealing money and stealing time,” Valentine said.

“That’s right. The woman who was stealing from me did it out of spite. Well, that fits the profile of your slot cheater, don’t you think?”

Valentine took a drag off the cigarette. “You think this agent has a vendetta?”

“Why else would he steal hundreds of jackpots? Why not just steal one big one?”

Gerry pointed at the files in his father’s hands. “Those seven agents have all taken lots of time off in the past two years for ‘personal’ reasons. I’d bet the rent one of them is your slot cheater.”

The cigarette was down to nothing, and Valentine burned his fingers getting a final drag. Last one, he told himself, knowing it was a lie. Then, he looked through the seven files. The agents were some of the most senior people in ESD, and included Fred Friendly, the man running the show. It seemed inconceivable that one of them might be a slot cheater, yet all the evidence was pointing that way.

“I think you’re right. Good job.” Valentine put the files down and squeezed his son’s arm. Then he noticed that Gerry was trembling. “What’s wrong?”

“Bronco tried to kill me earlier,” his son said.

“Jesus, Gerry. What happened?”

“I talked him out of it.”

“How the hell did you do that?”

“Right before he was going to pull the trigger, I pissed in my pants. Bronco saw it, got real upset. I think it reminded him of that night on the Boardwalk when he murdered Uncle Sal.”

“You think that’s why he didn’t shoot you?”

“Yeah, I do.”

Neither of them spoke for a while. Gerry lit up another cigarette and Valentine broke another promise to himself and took a drag. His son broke the silence.

“I know this is going to sound strange...”

“What’s that?”

“I think Bronco regretted doing that to me. You know, terrorizing a kid.”

“You’re saying the guy’s human.”

“Yeah,” his son said.

“And that he has a heart.”

“Yeah.”

Valentine filled his lungs with the rich-tasting smoke. If he’d learned anything as a cop, it was that there was a fine line between sinners and saints. Even the best people went bad, and sometimes the worst people surprised you. When it came to human behavior, there was no real black and white. It was all a hazy shade of gray.

“I’m still going to nail his ass,” Valentine said.