Sin City Homicide

4

Bill James stood on the balcony of the top-floor suite of the Havana Hotel. The casino was directly below him, covered with a transparent dome, and he watched the people at the tables, letting the dealers slowly suck the life out of them. He looked out at the strip and watched the crowded sidewalks filled with families. He was in his sixties now, and he remembered when Las Vegas was a place for men, where they came to get away from the family, the job, and life. Now it was a vacation spot accommodating the things men used to escape.

“The times, they are a-changing,” he mumbled under his breath.

“Sir?” said his assistant, Jaime.

“Yeah?”

“They’re ready for you.”

“Thanks.”

He straightened his silk Armani tie and checked the gold cufflinks on his shirt before walking back into the suite. The top three suites were reserved for him. He kept one for himself as his home, one for any dignitaries or celebrities he wished to shower with special treatment, and one-this one-he had turned into a boardroom.

The board of directors for MJF Industries, the parent corporation of Havana Inc. and the true owners of the hotel and casino, had already gathered and were conversing quietly around the twenty-seat mahogany table. The twelve of them were all men of wealth and influence, and many of them-oddly enough, thought James-were extremely obese. With the kind of money they had, he figured they would have the best chefs and personal trainers.

James took his spot at the head, in front of the nameplate marking it as the chairman’s seat. The CEO, Milton Henry, sat next to him, playing around on his iPhone, and the CFO, Raj Kamal, was on his other side. The board had asked that these two not be present, so James had made a point of having them here.

Half-eaten Iranian caviar and freshly made pastries were spread out on the table like leftovers from McDonald’s. The board members began pulling out cigars and asking the assistants standing behind them for brandy.

“I think we’re all accounted for,” James said. “Jaime, stop taking minutes, would you? Thank you. So, we all know what we’re here for. We’ve gone back and forth for the past three months, and it’s decision time.”

Cal Robertson, an older man with thick glasses and a ridiculous polka-dot bowtie, leaned forward through his cigar smoke. “Bill, we all agreed that we would sleep on this for the next quarter. Calling this meeting was unnecessary. I was in Boca Raton on this fabulous-”

“We can’t sleep till next quarter, Cal. We need to decide now. This merger is going to secure the future of this casino. It’s going to take us into the next century of entertainment.”

“We’re making a boatload of money as it is,” Kevin Daugherty chimed in. “Why risk it on a venture that could go belly-up in weeks? Anyway, that’s the way I see it. It’s too much of a risk.”

“We’re in the business of risk,” James said, “and we’re at the point where we need to bet the house or go home.” He turned to Raj. “What are the financials like?”

Raj cleared his throat, and an obvious tremor shook his hands as he began to speak. “Um, well, we’ve been losing market share the past three quarters to the bigger casinos. The, ah, gambling demographic has been decreasing over time, as we predicted it would in a bad economy. So, people aren’t gambling as much, and the ones who are have been going to the casinos that give them better comps, like the Mirage and MGM.”

“How much money did we lose?” James asked.

“We’ve lost an average of six million per year for the last three years.”

James looked out over the board for reactions, but he saw none. Some weren’t even paying attention.

Cal said, “I just don’t see the point. It’ll turn around. It always does. All of us here are taken care of, and so are the upper management. If some low-level shits have to lose their jobs, so be it. Let’s just hang on and see what happens.”

“What will happen is that we will go bankrupt, gentlemen. We can’t wait. This merger with Sands Corp will change the playing field. Separately, let’s be honest, we’re mediocre casinos, but together, we could have the emerging gambling markets cornered. We’ll establish ourselves as the gambling destination of the world.”

Cal looked at his fellow board members. “We’ve talked about it, Bill. We’re going to vote against it.”

“Talked about it? When the fuck did you talk about it? Where was I?”

“We’re sorry, Bill. The answer’s no.”

The board members rose and began to file out. James sat, incredulous, watching them as if he were watching aliens on a foreign planet. They were going to allow the company to crumble. They didn’t care-it wasn’t their baby. It was a risky investment for them, and they couldn’t see the future.

Part of the trouble was that they didn’t understand business. They saw the endeavor as a temporary fix, something they could use to make quick money and then abandon. They didn’t care if they left anything behind because it wouldn’t matter to them anymore. He saw it as something else entirely.

James turned to his bodyguard, Phil, who was standing behind him. James gestured for him to come over. He came and leaned down next to James.

“Cal,” James said, “has a mistress he’s keeping in those condos over on Hollywood. You know where they are?”

Phil nodded.

“Go knock her around a little bit. Don’t let anyone know it was you.”

Phil rose without a word and left the room. Milton and Raj sat looking down at the table, pretending they hadn’t heard anything.

“Bad move?” James asked.

Milton shrugged. “It’s just a mistress. Will he even care that much?”

“The old fart’s a sucker for women. He thinks they’re angels, or whatever poetic bullshit he’s bought into. It won’t change the deal, but it’ll fuck with him for a few days.”

“Won’t he retaliate?” Raj asked.

“I got nothing in my life for him to retaliate against. We got more pressing problems anyway. What do we do about the board?”

“They won’t approve this, boss,” Milton said. “There’s no way.”

“They’re idiots,” James said.

“No, they’re cowards.”

James held up his index finger as if a powerful idea had struck him. “You’re right-they are cowards. How do we get them the necessary courage we’re looking for?”

Raj said, “We need to make the alternative worse. It has to be more costly for them not to go through with the merger than to go through with it.”

“And how do we do that?”

“I don’t know yet.”

James exhaled loudly and rubbed his head. He had a massive migraine, and he hadn’t eaten yet that day. “Think about it and get back to me.”

The two men glanced at each other, rose, and left the room, leaving James alone. He leaned back in his chair and stared at the ceiling. He realized he no longer lived in the Las Vegas of his youth, the one where cheats were taken to the desert and forced to dig their own graves. There was a different set of rules at play now.

He pulled out a cigar from one of the silver cases on the table and lit it. He hadn’t given an order like that in a long time. He wondered if that was what he needed, what had been missing in his life. It was a chilling thought, and he pushed it down deep inside him as he sat puffing the cigar and looking out the floor-length windows at the streets below.