Or an impostor.
Being illegal was a superb pretext for having no personal information in the system. For now Evan would have to work off Katrin White.
He said to Tommy, “I need to confirm someone’s identity.”
“In the system?”
“She checks out in the system,” Evan said. “I want it from another angle.”
Tommy scratched at his arms again.
“What the hell are those things all over your arms?” Evan finally asked.
“Nicotine patches.” Tommy slurped coffee over a lower lip pouched out with dipping tobacco. “I’m trying to get off the smokes.”
“One step at a time.”
“What I’m sayin’.” Tommy creakingly found his feet, his unoccupied chair rolling back into the shadowed recesses of the shop. “Okay. Who’s this broad you’re trying to confirm?”
Evan called up the photo he’d snapped of Katrin on the futon, the close-up of her sleeping face, and held it for Tommy to see.
Tommy made a gruff sound of approval. “Intimate.”
“I’m trying to help her.”
“Looks like it.” His hand tugged at the scraggly ends of his horseshoe mustache. “Helping women who ain’t who they say they are seems like a fool’s venture to me.”
“A woman who may not be who she says she is.”
“Ah.” The stub of a forefinger circled the air, pointing at Evan in warning. “Tryin’ to play hero, huh?” Tommy’s laugh came out as a half cough. “You wanna be a real hero? Get old. Peel yourself outta bed every morning with your back like this and your knee like that.”
“Okay. But first let’s confirm this ID.”
“That ain’t my bailiwick.”
“She’s a big-time gambler,” Evan said. “Which means she’s done it before. A lot. At a lot of places. I was thinking, you’re a Vegas guy—”
“That I am.”
“—maybe you have a hook at one of the casinos could run some facial-recognition software off this photo. Some places store footage from the floor going back years. See if she’s opened a line of credit, what name that line of credit was under. Like that.”
“If she’s not who she says she is, why do you believe her if she tells you she’s a gambler?”
“The best cover’s composed of more truth than lies.”
“That it is.” Tommy gave a terse little nod. “I know a guy, got a bit of horsepower over at Harrah’s. Let’s see what rocks we can kick over.”
“I’d appreciate it. Want me to text you the picture?”
Tommy’s face wrinkled up in disgust. “I don’t fucking text. E-mail that shit. You know the account to use.” His broad, rough hands restacked a scattering of bullet-mold blocks on the bench between them. “Need anything else? Some Chuck Four?” He reached under the bench, came up with a brick of C4. “The most effective way to turn money into noise.”
“I’m good on explosives.” Evan turned for the door, double-checking, as always, that the security camera was unplugged. “Thank you, Tommy.”
“Hey, man. I’ll call the guy, that’s all. There are no guarantees.” Tommy dug the wedge of tobacco out from his lip and thunked it into a dusty Carl’s Jr. cup. “Only guarantee is we ain’t gettin’ outta this incarnation alive.”
32
Nowhere to Go
A five-figure cash tip to the manager of the Hyde lounge procured for Evan the premiere table for as long as he needed it. The booth stuck out from the base of the vast Bellagio Hotel over the eight-acre lake like the glass-walled prow of a ship. From his position in the cushioned seats, he could take in the majority of the nightclub, a sliver of the casino floor, and the walkway along the water’s brink. He assumed his post at noon.
Right away he noticed a problem. Past a curved stretch of the lake, maybe a quarter mile away, a Chinese restaurant called Jasmine jutted out onto the water. It was new since he’d last been here. His instructions to Morena’s sister had been imprecise—Tell her to meet me in the Bellagio Casino at the restaurant overlooking the dancing fountains. Now he had two venues to cover. The miscalculation ate at him, a gnawing little worm near the base of his brain that kept him on edge. At least he had a clear view through Jasmine’s floor-to-ceiling windows.
He sat for six unbroken hours, keeping watch for Morena even as his hopes for her appearance diminished. He wore jeans, a black jacket, and a baseball cap to shield his features from myriad eye-in-the-sky cameras. For Morena to feel safe, he’d chosen a casino as a meeting spot — the only place with more security cams than an airport.
On occasion women dropped by the table to ask if he wanted to buy them a drink. He certainly looked like a man seeking company, and the professionals took notice. He declined politely. His high-profile position here ran against every instinct in his body, but given how fearful Morena seemed to be, he wanted to be front and center so she could spot him before making her approach. Based on what Carmen had told him about her meetings with her sister, this was Morena’s preferred method of making contact.
He finally got up to use the restroom, then returned and sat alertly as the sun finished its brilliant chariot arc across the sky, finally dipping behind the Strip. When lavender dusk at last faded into full dark, the world’s greatest night-light display morphed into splendid existence, the Paris Hotel’s faux Eiffel Tower igniting into a spire of neon gold, overpowering the moon. The dancing fountains exploded into color on the lake surface laid out before Evan, misting the glass around him, a bizarre choreography timed to an Andrea Bocelli — Sarah Brightman duet. Evan eyed the doors, the flurry of activity by the casino entrance, the hall to the bathrooms. The music wailed—Con te partirò—as the fountains shattered the still of the lake. Soon enough a deejay with a sideways Celtics cap took up the turntables in his booth inside, remixed and mashed-up Rihanna competing with the pop-opera duet. The dance floor filled up, sauced bachelorettes and boisterous frat boys, cut-loose businessmen and drag queens in heeled thigh-highs, a jam of fluid limbs strobe-cutting the disco beams—I love the way you lie.
Evan pictured Carmen sitting on the swings, isolated on the crowded playground, praying for her big sister’s appearance. The school day was long gone. Perhaps Morena had decided to wait for cover of night to make her way to the Strip. Or perhaps she hadn’t come to the playground at all and Evan would stay here, pinned to this spot tomorrow and the day after that. He searched the crowd again, everyone in full-blown what-happens-in-Vegas mode, talking too loud and too close or snapping duck-faced selfies. Slot-machine payouts ring-ding-dinged over Eminem’s rap interlude. Across the street fake Europe glowed. Everyone here was chasing a different dream, an alternate version of their same self, freshened-up identities as fake and real as Evan’s own, dropped into this fantasy wonderland only to be left behind at the airport departure counter like abandoned baggage.
Amid the masquerade a few simple realities burned through. He needed to find a scared seventeen-year-old girl. He needed to protect her. And he needed to learn whether she’d given his phone number to Katrin White or to Memo Vasquez.
Evan sipped water, craved vodka, scanned the dance floor, the neighboring restaurant, and then scanned them again. He settled back against the upholstery, stretching his neck. When he next looked through the window up along the curve of the lake, a movement inside Jasmine caught his eye.