Unsatisfied, but with no choice, Mercer agreed to go only after getting Ira’s promise that he could be there when Donny was first questioned. Ira relented and told Mercer he’d be at Area 51 in thirty-six hours and they’d interview Randall the Handle together.
He had sat by himself on the flight from the secret base to Las Vegas, trying to think through why Donny had done what he’d done. There was no way he could have anticipated that Randall was planning on a murder in the mine, so he no longer blamed himself for what happened. For now he focused on his anger. The short trip gave Mercer no time to find answers. Nor did he have much time when they landed because the secure terminal used by Area 51 employees at McCarran Airport was a stone’s throw from the Egyptian-inspired Luxor Hotel.
Mercer’s last visit to Las Vegas had been during the spring break of his first year at the Colorado School of Mines. He’d known the city had grown significantly in the years since, but he wasn’t prepared for the scale of the changes. All the hotels were massive, designed upon various themes to entice gamblers, and more recently, entire families. There were fantasy castles and circus big tops, reproductions of New York City and a hotel designed to evoke Venice, Italy. The Luxor, with over four thousand rooms, was one of the largest hotels in the world, and its pyramid design made it the city’s most distinctive. Atop the three-hundred-fifty-foot black-glass structure was the brightest spotlight ever built, at three hundred thousand watts and forty billion candlepower.
While smaller than Egypt’s Great Pyramid, the design and execution of the building stunned Mercer. He became even more impressed when he entered the lobby and realized the hotel was just a shell for an atrium large enough to hold ten wide-body jets.
The statuary, carvings and faux temples could not distract from the hotel’s real attraction. From the lobby, it was just a few paces to the casino floor, where the staccato chime of coins falling into hoppers and the ringing of slot machine bells lured gamblers by the thousands.
A few of the workers made plans to meet at the craps tables as soon as they’d stowed their meager luggage. Mercer’s first interest was a couple of room service drinks and a thirty-minute shower, preferably enjoying both at the same time.
Mercer reached into the soap dish for his vodka gimlet. It was his second drink and a third waited on the nightstand for when he was dressing. He checked the time on his TAG Heuer, assessed the puckered skin on his fingers, and gave himself another five minutes before shutting off the taps.
He dialed his home phone with a towel wrapped around his waist. He gazed out the window overlooking the azure swimming pools a hundred thirty feet below his room. Two workers were cleaning the area and stacking lounge chairs. Beyond, the city glittered almost to the horizon in a thousand shades of neon. The phone rang four times before his machine picked up. He cut the connection and dialed Tiny’s.
“Forget it,” a voice sneered.
“Nice way to answer the phone,” Mercer said to Paul Gordon.
“Hey, Mercer! Sorry about that. I’ve got caller ID,” Tiny explained. “I recognized the seven-oh-two area code but not the number. I figured you were a Vegas bookie looking to give me odds.” Apart from owning the tavern, Gordon ran a rather lucrative illegal sports book. “What are you doing out there? Harry said you were kidnapped by some government types for a job.”
“I was. Is he there?” Talking with Harry always lightened Mercer’s spirits and cleared his head.
“Yeah, hold on.”
Mercer could hear Tiny speaking to Harry and mentioning that he was in Las Vegas.
“You son of a bitch,” Harry rasped when he got on the line. “Why didn’t you tell me where they were sending you?”
“I didn’t know myself,” Mercer said quickly.
“How long are you staying?”
Mercer could sense the wheels already turning in Harry’s head. “Just the night,” he lied, knowing if he’d said two Harry would be on the next plane. He was dressing as he spoke: black slacks, a white oxford and an unstructured sports coat.
“Goddamn it. You just called to yank my chain, didn’t you?”
“Harry. I can’t believe you’d think that of me,” Mercer said innocently. “I thought that maybe you were worried and would like to know I was all right.”
“Screw you and your all right. You called to bust my balls about being in Vegas.”
“I would have called even if Ira had sent me to West Podunk, Wisconsin.”
“And I would’ve said you deserved to be sent there, you bastard.” Harry softened a little. “Where are you staying?”
“Luxor.”
“Do me a favor.”
“You want a shot glass?”
“Why? I steal yours. From the balcony outside your room you look right over the casino. See if you can take the phone out so at least I can hear it.”
Mercer laughed. “Are you that desperate?”
“I haven’t gambled since Tiny and I swiped your Jag to go to Atlantic City.”
“That happened last summer. Are you forgetting you hit the tables pretty hard when we were in Panama?”
Cackling, Harry said, “Last summer? Hell, we took your Jag again a couple weeks ago when you were in Canada.”
Mercer shook his head. He should have known. “Hold on, let me see if the cord will reach.” He slipped his feet into rubber-soled leather moccasins. “Also, I’m on the eleventh floor so I don’t know if you’ll hear much.”
After untangling the long cord from where it coiled behind the bed, Mercer crossed to the door. “Almost there, Harry.”
Because the Luxor’s rooms overlooked the casino floor and sound echoed in the enormous atrium, the doors were soundproofed. When closed the room was silent, but as soon as Mercer swung it open, he was hit by a wall of sound from a few thousand gamblers, the music from a lounge, and the insistent chorus from the slots. “Here you go, buddy,” he said and held the handset over the balcony so that maybe Harry could hear the infectious din.
The scream should have come from down below, the joyous shout of a lucky winner at a roulette wheel or slot machine. But it came from Mercer’s right, down the long corridor that terminated in a corner of the pyramid near one of the hotel’s elevators, called inclinators because they rose at thirty-nine-degree angles. And the scream was an expression of horror, not excitement.
In a rush, three men dressed in matching suits raced from the elevator alcove. The woman who’d screamed tried to run away from them, toward Mercer, but in her high heels she was overtaken in a few paces. Two of the men cradled machine pistols with curved magazines and long silencers. The third appeared unarmed. As they reached her, the unarmed man casually shoved her in the shoulder, flinging her into the waist-high railing. Her scream rose in pitch as momentum tumbled her over the rail. She was gone in a swirl of her orange skirt.
Mercer turned to run, only to see another pair of gunmen emerge from the elevator alcove in the opposite direction. Harry’s voice scratched from the forgotten phone.
The woman’s shriek suddenly cut out.
Without knowing how he knew, Mercer was sure the men were coming for him — to finish the job Donny Randall had failed. He launched himself back into his room, the only direction open to him. The move bought him a little time but also meant he was trapped. There were no connecting doors between the hotel rooms.
Mercer dropped the phone and ran to the bed, where his bag lay open. The Beretta 92 lay nestled atop a polo shirt. He snatched it up along with the spare clip and racked a round into the chamber.
Pandemonium would be erupting down in the lobby. The horror over the woman’s death would spread through the casino, but it would take precious minutes for the hotel’s security staff to figure how and from where she’d fallen. Mercer had just seconds before the assassins reached his room and forced their way in. Even the thickest soundproofed door would eventually fail under the onslaught of so many automatic weapons. The casual brutality of the woman being pushed over the balcony began sinking into his gut. He didn’t notice his hand tightening on his pistol until the knuckles turned white and his wrist shook.