“No, not the Tuna.”
“Then who?”
“If I told you that, I’d be dead tomorrow.”
“Even if the police put you in protective custody?”
“I’d still be dead tomorrow,” Jinky said.
Valentine looked in the big man’s face and knew he wasn’t going to get the name. He didn’t know anything more about how DeMarco was cheating the tournament than he had when he’d stepped off the plane at McCarran yesterday. Worse, he’d nearly lost his son in the process of trying to find out. He opened the rear door and started to climb out.
“What about my deal?” Jinky asked indignantly.
He turned. “What about it?”
“Are you going to talk to Bill Higgins, like you said?”
Valentine paused. As a cop, he’d prided himself on never going back on his word. The oath that went with being a police officer was something he’d always upheld. But being retired was different. He was his own man now.
“No,” he said.
“But you promised me!”
“I lied,” Valentine said.
51
One of the most depressing movies Valentine had ever seen was called Leaving Las Vegas. In the film, an alcoholic comes to Las Vegas, shacks up with a hooker, and proceeds to methodically drink himself to death. The title had summed up the plot perfectly. For some people, the only way to leave Sin City was in a pine box.
Valentine was not going to let that happen to his son, or his son’s friends. He retrieved his rental car from police headquarters, then drove Gerry, Frank, and the Fountain brothers to their motel to get their things and check out, then straight to the airport. It was a tight fit in the car, but he wasn’t going to let them out of his sight until they were safely on an airplane, and headed home.
“The four of you may have to come back out here and testify in a trial,” Valentine said as he parked the rental in short-term parking. “If that happens, I’ll come out as well.”
“I don’t want to ever come to Las Vegas again,” Vinny said as they walked across the lot toward the terminal. “I used to think I understood how this town worked, but I was wrong. This place is like another planet.”
Once inside, Frank and the Fountain brothers went to the American Airlines counter and booked three seats in economy on a flight to Philadelphia that left in ninety minutes. The reservationist kept looking at Frank’s battered face, as if she might consider him a security risk. Valentine leaned on the counter and spoke to her.
“He’s a professional boxer.”
“You his manager?”
“Sort of.”
“He ought to consider another line of work,” the reservationist said, printing out three boarding passes and sliding them across the counter.
“You should see the other guy,” Valentine said.
They walked to the security screening area, stopping on the way to buy Frank a baseball cap and sunglasses so his face wouldn’t cause any small children to burst into tears. As the three men got in line, they shook Valentine’s hand and thanked him for all he’d done. Valentine turned to his son as they passed through the metal detector.
“Think they’ll ever straighten up?”
Gerry waved to his friends. “And do what? Become monks?”
They returned to the ticketing area and went to the Delta counter, the main carrier into Tampa, and Valentine purchased a seat on the ten o’clock red eye for his son.
“Don’t you think I should stay and help you?” Gerry asked.
“No. Remember what I told you before we came out here?”
“Sure. No job is worth getting killed over.”
“Well, I have a new saying.”
“What’s that?”
“No job is worth losing your son over.”
Gerry wanted to say something, only didn’t know how to say it. Instead, he gave his father a bear hug in the middle of the terminal with dozens of people swarming around them. They hadn’t done enough of that kind of thing when Gerry was growing up, and when they were finished hugging, Valentine offered to buy his son a cheeseburger.
“You’re on,” Gerry said.
They walked around the terminal and found a food court where the prices were so high Valentine thought he was in Paris. But there were times when he was willing to pay just about anything for a decent cheeseburger with a slice of onion, and he tossed the menu aside and ordered for both of them. When the waitress had departed, Gerry said, “Hey, look. The tournament is on TV.”
The restaurant had a horseshoe-shaped bar with a TV perched above the bottles of liquor. Valentine spun around in his chair, and saw Skip DeMarco being interviewed. DeMarco was wearing his familiar smirk, and the caption beneath him read World Poker Showdown Tournament leader — $5.8 million in chips. Valentine shook his head in disbelief. Only a few hours ago, Bill had told him that he was heading to Celebrity to shut down the tournament.
The story ended, and Valentine crossed the restaurant, and stood in a quiet corner before flipping open his cell phone and calling Bill.
“What the hell is going on?” he asked his friend.
“As of this afternoon, the World Poker Showdown is being classified as a private event,” Bill replied. “Unless I can prove that cheating is taking place, I’ve been told to lay off.”
“Told by who?”
“The governor of the state of Nevada.”
The burden of proof that was required of the police and other law enforcement agencies in the U.S. was not required of the Nevada Gaming Control Board. The GCB could shut down any gambling operation based on suspicion of cheating. And since the WPS was already on thin ice — from DeMarco rigging the first day’s seating, to dealers with criminal records and a president who hung with mobsters — Bill didn’t need an excuse to pull the curtains. If anything, it was long overdue.
“Can he do that?” Valentine asked.
“Yes,” Bill said. “It’s in his job description.”
“But why would he do that?”
“Because the tournament is a huge success. You don’t screw with success in this town, Tony.”
Valentine put his hand on his forehead and left it there. No matter what it was about in Las Vegas, it was always about the money.
“I got some other bad news this afternoon,” Bill said. “Ray Callahan, our crooked poker dealer, died.”
“Somebody whack him?”
“No. Callahan died from cancer complications. Now we’ll never know how he was involved with DeMarco’s scam.”
Valentine removed his hand from his forehead and pulled out his wallet. The playing card that Jack Donovan had given Gerry was stuck in his billfold, and he peeled back the bills with his fingers and stared at it. Ray Callahan had wanted to know what Jack had died from, and had not seemed surprised when Valentine had told him cancer. It was the clue he’d been looking for and it had been staring him right in the face.
“Let me ask you a question,” he said. “If I can prove DeMarco’s cheating, will the governor let you do your job, and shut down the World Poker Showdown?”
“He won’t have a choice,” Bill asked.
“Even if the WPS is the biggest show in the history of television, and drawing more tourists than Las Vegas has beds?”
Bill laughed into the phone.
“Even then,” his friend said.
Valentine stared at the playing card in his wallet. He’d been baffled by scams before but always managed to solve them. If he couldn’t solve one, then he needed to get out of the gambling business and into gardening or shuffleboard or whatever the hell it was retired people in Florida did.
“I’ll call you later,” Valentine said.
He heard Bill start to speak, then hesitate. “Are you still on the case?” his friend asked.