Sucker Bet (20 page)

37

I-95 was the usual madhouse. His son was handling the wheel and kept shooting unhappy glances at his father. Finally he couldn’t hold it in, and said, “That was rude, Pop.”

“Those people aren’t our friends,” he said. “We don’t owe them anything.”

“But you helped them. And they wanted to say thanks.”

“I help a lot of people. They can say thanks by paying me.”

“That’s not my point. You didn’t have to be so crummy to them.” A car cut them off from the right lane, and Gerry punched his horn. “By the way, why were you so crummy to them?”

Valentine stared out the window. Back home, in his closet, was his yellow suit. In its pocket, an airplane ticket to Memphis. He took a deep breath. “Standing in front of the elders, I was reminded of why I enjoyed being on the road with Kat so much.”

“Why’s that?”

“Because sometimes, I hate working for casinos.”

“Is this one of those times?”

“Yeah.”

“Are you thinking about getting back together with Kat?”

What he’d been thinking about was flying to Memphis next week and watching her from the audience. Showing his support without stepping foot in the ring.

“Yeah.”

“So, what you’re saying is, you’d like to get away every now and then, but not shut down the business.”

Valentine nodded. “That’s exactly what I’m saying.”

“Sounds like you need a partner.”

Valentine’s head snapped. Gerry momentarily took his eyes off the highway, and they stared at each other. Then his son’s eyes shifted back.

“You’re kidding,” Valentine said, “aren’t you?”

“Mabel says you have more business than you can handle. I’m going to sell the bar. If I have anything left after I pay you the fifty grand I owe you, I wanted to buy into Grift Sense.”

Valentine blinked. Pay him back? Buy into his business? The past three days did not balance out the last twenty-two years, and Gerry did not sit high on his list of potential business partners.

“I figured you could teach me the ropes,” his son went on. “It would be fun. And you could see me and Yolanda more, and your grandson.”

Valentine blinked again. “You’re going to have a boy?”

“Uh-huh. Yolanda got tested.”

“You pick out a name?”

“We sure did.”

“What is it?”

His son laughed. “Wait until he’s born, Pop.”

Valentine watched the cars hurtling past them. Gerry was offering to share his family. It sounded great, but was Valentine really ready to be around his son and Yolanda and an infant? It would be like stepping back in time, something he was not sure he wanted to do. His cell phone rang. The caller ID said
UNKNOWN
. He answered it anyway.

It was Bill Higgins.

“Tony,” his friend said. “I’ve been shot.”

The emergency room at Mount Sinai Medical Center was filled with the elderly and frail. Higgins, one of two gunshot victims, was in a room with two patients attached to respirators. Saul Hyman, the other gunshot victim, was down the hall.

Valentine pulled a chair next to Bill’s bed. His friend’s eyelids were at half-mast. Then they snapped open. “Get my chart, will you?”

Valentine got the clipboard hanging off the bed. Bill said, “Tell me what it says.”

Valentine read the description of Bill’s wound. The bullet had missed the bone in his leg. From what Valentine could surmise, the doctor expected him to heal without complications.

“Good,” Bill said. “I wanted to be sure he wasn’t lying to me.”

Valentine put the clipboard back. Out in the hallway, a uniformed cop stood guarding the door. North Miami was a haven for the retired, and shootings were not the norm, like they were a few miles west and south.

Bill motioned him closer. “Rico Blanco shot us.”

“You sure?”

“He was wearing a stocking, but he said something when Saul opened the door. Saul made his voice. It was that scumbag.”

“When did you talk to Saul?”

“In the ambulance. They brought us over together.”

“Did Rico steal your cell phone?”

“Yeah. How did you know?”

“I called you earlier. Rico answered, and threatened to kill me.”

“Jesus,” Bill said. “You have your gun?”

Valentine shook his head. He’d left his Sig Sauer at home.

“Get my jacket,” Bill said. “It’s hanging in the closet.”

Valentine brought Bill’s jacket over to the bed, and Bill removed his hotel room key from a pocket. “Room 784. There’s a safe in the closet. My piece is in it.”

“I’m not going to shoot him, Bill.”

“No, you’re going to run him in.”

“I’m retired, remember?”

“Ex-cops count for something, and you’ve got me backing you up. Gather your evidence and take him to the police. You’ll be doing everyone a favor.”

A doctor in a white gown accompanied by a plainclothes female detective entered the room. Valentine had introduced himself to the detective earlier, and she’d given him the green light to visit Bill. “Time’s up,” she said. “I need to talk to your friend.”

“Combination is 7474,” Bill whispered.

Valentine patted him on the shoulder. “Talk to you later.”

Saul Hyman’s room was at the end of the hall. A uniformed cop sat outside the door, reading a dog-eared copy of
People
. Valentine glanced through the doorway. Saul had a private, and lay on a bed with tubes running up his nose and pumping fluids into his body. He was unconscious, his arms and legs in casts, a step closer to the great beyond.

“What’s the prognosis?”

“He should live.”

“The guy who shot him might try again,” Valentine said.

The cop stood up. “Please identify yourself.”

Valentine gave him his card, then said, “He was helping me on a case.”

The cop put the card in his pocket. “Can you give me a description?”

Valentine gave him Rico’s description right down to the color of his mustache. Normally, he didn’t care what happened to crooks, but this was different. Saul had helped him and, in doing so, nearly gotten killed. Valentine owed him.

“Don’t worry,” the cop said, “we’ll get this guy.”

Not if I get him first,
Valentine thought.

38

Slash shook Mabel awake early Monday morning. He let her use the bathroom, then tied her legs back to the chair. She was hungry, but that didn’t concern him. He wanted to learn how to use the David card-counting computer.

The David was strapped to his waist, with two wires going down to his crotch, where they were separated by a Y-connector, with separate wires running down each pants leg to the special boots. Inside each boot were two switches, one mounted above and one below the big toe. The switches corresponded to the switches on the practice keyboard, which Mabel held in her lap.

“Show me again,” he said.

Mabel stiffly nodded her head. She’d awakened feeling numb, like someone on a lifeboat who’s discovered they’ve run out of water. She was going to die; it was just a matter of when. She removed a legal pad off the desk and pointed at the chart she’d drawn the night before.

“The David will calculate the best way to play blackjack, based upon the cards dealt. The information that the computer requires is input through numerical codes.

“There are fifteen codes. Each of the switches in your boots represents one of four numbers—eight, four, two, and one. By tripping the switches separately, or in combination, you can input any number from one to fifteen. With me so far?”

Slash made a face. “Don’t lecture me. How does the rest of it work?”

“I’m getting to that,” Mabel said.

“Do it with the cards,” he said.

Mabel looked around the study for the cards. Slash had held them last, and now they were gone. He misplaced things constantly, then lost his temper. In exasperation she said, “I don’t know where you put them. We’ll have to use a fresh deck.”

Slash rifled the drawers in Tony’s desk. In the bottom one, he found several unopened decks of cards. A pack landed in her lap.

“There,” he said.

Mabel unwrapped the cards while staring at the desk. In a middle drawer she saw the open box that contained Tony’s Sig Sauer semiautomatic handgun. He’d shown her the gun the first day she’d come to work for him. Did the empty box mean Tony had taken it with him? Or was it someplace in the house?

“Hurry
,
” Slash said.

Mabel shuffled the cards. Tony spent most of his time here, so it was logical that the Sig Sauer was also here. Only, Slash had searched the room last night, and no gun had turned up.

“Come on,” he said.

Mabel dealt two cards onto the desk. The first was a nine, the second a two. Slash stared at them for several seconds. Then he studied Mabel’s chart.

“Fuck,” he said.

“First you input a twelve to tell the computer that it’s a new deal. Then input one to tell the computer how many decks are in use.”

Slash wiggled his toes in the boots. “Okay,” he said, still sounding unsure.

“Now input eleven to indicate the combined value of the two cards.”

“Okay,” he said.

Mabel dealt two cards to herself, one faceup, the other facedown. Her faceup card was a six. Slash input its value without being told. Then grinned. The David communicated in a Morse-code-type signal that was felt against the skin, and she guessed the computer was talking to him and telling him how to play his hand.

He said, “It just buzzed me twice. What does that mean?”

“Were the buzzes long or short?”

“Long.”

“It means you should double-down your bet,” Mabel said.

“I’m going to win the hand?”

“That’s what the David is saying.”

“Okay, so I double my bet. Deal me another card.”

Mabel dealt him a third card. It was a ten, giving Slash twenty-one, the most desirable outcome possible. She turned her facedown card over. A ten, giving her a sixteen. The rules called for her to deal a third card for herself. It was a seven. She had busted.

“You win,” she said.

Slash looked perplexed, and Mabel realized he still hadn’t grasped how the David worked.

Thank God,
she thought.

His Honda drew a glare from the Loews valet.

Valentine had spent the morning talking to Gerry about becoming his partner. Typical with his son, he had not thought things out—like where he planned to live, or what money he’d use to buy a car for Yolanda and the baby—and Valentine was having second thoughts when he pulled up to the hotel. As he handed over his keys, he remembered something. Gerry planned to pay him back after he sold the bar, which meant Valentine would have fifty grand to play with. Looking at the valet, he said, “Time for a new car, don’t you think?”

Bill’s room was on the seventh floor. Valentine opened the door with Bill’s key, stuck his head in, and said, “Anyone home?” then went in.

Fresh flowers were on the night table, and a mint creased the pillow. His son pilfered it. Valentine said, “Put it back.”

“But, Pop, you said he wasn’t coming back here.”

“Doesn’t matter. You didn’t pay for it.”

Gerry put the mint back. Opening the closet, Valentine spotted the safe above the clothes rack. From his wallet he removed the slip of paper with the combination Bill had given him. He punched it in and heard the safe make a whirring sound. Inside he found a .45 Glock and a spare clip.

“So, what do you think?” his son said.

The gun felt good and solid in his hand, and he slipped it into his jacket pocket. He knew what his son was asking.
Make a commitment, Pop. Say yes right now.

“Something’s bugging me,” Valentine said.

“What?”

“Why this sudden urge to go legit?”

His son didn’t flinch.

“I don’t want my kid knowing I was a criminal.”

It was the right answer, only Valentine wasn’t sold. This was Gerry he was talking to.

“One thing at a time,” he said.

“What do you mean?”

“First you sell your bar, pay me back, then you relocate, then you start working for me.” He paused and looked Gerry square in the eye. “As in, I’m the boss. Understood?”

His son dutifully nodded his head.

“Understood,” he replied.

39

Club Hedo was located on a narrow street in South Beach, the windows papered with eight-by-ten glossies of naked lovelies.
TOPLESS, BOTTOMLESS, TWO-DRINK MINIMUM
. A meanlooking bouncer sat on a stool outside the door.

Ray Hicks found a parking spot at the block’s end. Mr. Beauregard sat beside him, listening to the radio. Leaving the hospital, Mr. Beauregard had managed to snatch a green surgeon’s hat off a passing tray, which he now wore comically on his head.

Hicks stared at his friend. Mr. Beauregard’s previous owner had neutered him, but Hicks had long suspected that the surgeon’s knife had not cut deep enough, and a vestige of manhood still remained. Mr. Beauregard loved women. He loved to stare at their pictures, or when they walked into Hick’s trailer. The fact that he’d never acted on these impulses meant nothing. He had them, and that was the problem.

Hicks shut the radio off. Mr. Beauregard flapped his gums disapprovingly.

“We are going across the street,” Hicks said. “There will be women inside. Naked women. You must not touch them. Is that understood?
You must not touch them.
”

The look on Mr. Beauregard’s face was forlorn. Hicks had once found a
Playboy
in his cage. All the naked pictures had been pawed until the colors had faded. The chimp let out a sigh.

“Thank you,” Hicks said.

They crossed the street, looking no stranger than any of the dozens of bizarre couples Hicks had spotted driving through South Beach. The bouncer leapt off his stool.

“You can’t come in here!”

“Deal with him, Mr. Beauregard.”

Even in his weakened state, Mr. Beauregard was more powerful than any man, and the bouncer sailed over the hood of a parked car and hit the pavement with a dull thud. Mr. Beauregard thumped his chest triumphantly.

The club was cavelike, the patrons bathed in fruity-colored strobe lights. Hicks walked through the beaded entrance. Up on-stage, three naked women were dancing. Mr. Beauregard let out a primal yell.

It was a frightening sound, and the patrons dived under tables or into the johns or out the front door. From behind the bar, a man in a ruffled tuxedo shirt ran out, swinging a baseball bat. Mr. Beauregard took it from him, then whacked him.

“Give me that, Mr. Beauregard.”

The chimp tossed him the bat. Hicks crossed the room. A smoky mirror hung on the back wall, and he hit it with the bat. Glass rained down, exposing an office on the other side. Hicks and Mr. Beauregard entered through the door.

At a desk sat a startled Hispanic with his pants off. Beneath the desk hid a naked girl.

“Where is Rico Blanco?” Hicks said.

“Get that fucking ape away from me! I’m just the DJ.”

The naked girl was crying. Hicks pointed the bat in the DJ’s face.

“Answer me,” Hicks said.

“He’ll be at the basketball game tonight,” the DJ said.

“What time?”

“Seven, seven-thirty.”

“Where?”

“American Airlines Arena.”

“Is that nearby?”

“Up the road.”

“Will he be driving his limousine?”

“It’s the only wheels he’s got.”

“I would suggest that you avoid calling him,” Hicks said.

The DJ was shaking. Mr. Beauregard had seen the girl and was drooling.

“Get him away from me!”

“Do you know what a chimp’s greatest sense is?”

“No . . .”

“Smell. I could set him loose on South Beach, and he’d find you in an hour. Maybe less. And do you know what he’ll do?”

The DJ didn’t want to know. He removed the gold cross that was hanging around his neck, and said, “I swear to God I won’t call Rico.”

Back in the car, Hicks gave Mr. Beauregard a Snickers bar as a reward for not touching the girl. The chimp tossed it out the window. Seeing so much flesh had set his heart on fire, and Hicks watched him pick up his ukulele. The song that came out was instantly familiar, and one that Hicks had not heard in years.

Layla.