Billy didn’t understand what was going on. Why should he be telling Rock about the scam? His eyes found Doucette’s face. The casino owner dipped his chin. Tell him.
He looked back at Rock. The man acted as if he owned the joint. And the other people in the suite acted as if Rock owned the joint as well. Which could only mean one thing: Rock did own the joint; Doucette was fronting for him and was on Rock’s payroll.
It made sense, when he thought about it. Bugsy Siegel had built the Flamingo Hotel with mob money, the Cleveland Outfit had built the Stardust, Fremont, Marina, and Hacienda Hotels with mob money, and Rock had built the Galaxy Hotel and Casino with drug money. The more things changed, the more they remained the same.
The realization made him look at Rock differently. Beneath the clownish clothes and swagger was a man of superior intellect and street smarts who’d built an empire in a business where a single mistake or slipup meant loss of life or a lengthy stretch in the pen. To Billy’s way of thinking, it made Rock smarter than Donald Trump or Warren Buffett, because those men had all fucked up at one time or another in their illustrious careers, while Rock had never fucked up. Not once. Because if Rock had fucked up, he wouldn’t have been standing there.
It also made him look at Rock’s bodyguards differently. The women were not physically imposing, nor did they appear to be carrying weapons of mass destruction strapped to their bodies. But they were lethal. They had to be, because their boss was a constant target.
Knowing these things made him choose his words carefully. If he tried to bullshit Rock the way he’d bullshitted Doucette and his bride, it would end quickly, in bloodshed.
“On Saturday afternoon around four, a wedding party staying in the hotel is going to rip the casino off for a major score,” he said. “The party is named Torch-Allaire, although they’re really part of a Gypsy clan that specializes in taking casinos down for huge scores.”
“Define huge,” Rock said.
“Millions.”
“How long have you known it was these people?”
“Since I spoke with the mother of the bride in the hotel’s bridal shop. Her name’s Cecilia Torch, and she’s as phony as a three-dollar bill.”
“You didn’t answer my fucking question. How long have you known?”
“Not long. Maybe a half hour.”
“Why didn’t you call Doucette and tell him?”
Rock’s fingers tensed on the grip of his stick. If Billy’s answer didn’t ring true, he was going to split Billy’s head open, causing Billy’s lovely brains to ooze out of his nostrils. He took a deep breath, hoping it wasn’t his last.
“I didn’t call Doucette because I didn’t have any proof,” he explained. “Shit, I don’t even know what their scam is. Without knowing that, the information’s worthless.”
“Why’s it worthless?” Rock demanded.
“Say I tell Doucette I think the Torch-Allaire party is the Gypsies. If he tosses them out of the hotel, they’ll just come back under different names and rip the place off. If Doucette has security rough them up, they’re going to fight back, and that could get messy. The best way to deal with them is to figure out their scam and catch them in the act, with videotape evidence as backup. By doing that, you own them.”
The suite fell silent as Rock considered what Billy was telling him.
“That might be true, but it doesn’t explain why you didn’t tell nobody,” Rock said. “You were holding out. I get mad when people hold out on me.”
Billy sat up straight in his chair. “I did tell someone. I told Ike and T-Bird. Ask them if you don’t believe me.”
Rock directed his attention to the punishers. “Is this candy-ass nigga telling the truth?”
T-Bird knew better than to open his yap and get caught in a lie. Instead of responding, he simply nodded, his dreadlocks bouncing on his broad shoulders. Ike took up the slack.
“Yeah, he’s telling the truth,” Ike said. “Cunningham came out of the bridal shop, and I asked him how it went. Cunningham said he’d made the cheaters, now he just needed to figure out what their scam was so he could tell Marcus. Those were his exact words.”
“You think he was trying to pull a fast one?” Rock asked.
“No, suh.”
“Could he have been stalling or plotting something?”
“Cunningham knows what we’ll do to him if he double-crosses us. Marcus told us to keep him in line, and we’re keeping him in line.”
“Is that so. How many times have you smacked him around?”
Ike counted on his fingers. “Four.”
“Did you make him bleed?”
“Yes, suh. Every time.”
The answer seemed to satisfy Rock, and he shifted his attention back to Billy. “I’m buying your story this time. But from now on, no holding back. Next time you learn something of significance, call Doucette right away. Am I making myself clear, pretty boy?”
“He’ll be the first to know,” Billy said.
“How come every time you open your mouth, I think you’re lying to me?”
“I must remind you of someone.”
“You’re right-you do remind me of someone.”
Rock flicked his wrist as if executing a trick Ping-Pong shot. The walking stick became horizontal and sliced the air with a sharp hissing sound. An invisible hand grabbed Billy by the nuts and gave them a squeeze.
The inquisition was over. Rock’s bodyguards sprang to life and went to the door. They both instinctively touched the sleeves of their leather jackets, and Billy guessed each was packing a knife sharp enough to slit a man’s throat. They unchained the door, stepped into the hallway, and cautiously looked both ways. Rock’s enemies were everywhere, their actions seemed to imply, even in a hotel he’d built with his own money.
“We’re good,” one of the guards called into the suite.
The drug kingpin shuffled out of the suite, followed by Doucette, his bride, and Crunchie, who hung back long enough to flash Billy the evil eye. It occurred to Billy that what had just happened was the old hustler’s doing in an effort to take him out of the picture.
“Pistols at ten paces,” he said.
“I can’t wait,” the old grifter replied.
The door clicked shut. Ike was grinning from ear to ear.
“So how’d we do?” Ike asked.
Billy got three cold ones from the fridge and popped the tops. If he’d had any doubt about the punishers’ desire to rip off their boss, it had been erased, and they clinked bottles in a toast.
“I’d say you both have a real future in this business,” he said.
THIRTY-NINE
The afternoon was slipping away, and Billy decided to head out to the Bali Hai golf club for his three-thirty game with Tony G. But first, he needed to transform himself into a sucker and get decked out in an overpriced polo shirt and obnoxiously loud pants in the casino’s men’s shop.
“Do me a favor and call Shaz,” he said to Ike. “I need to leave the property for a few hours and want to get her permission.”
“You think she’ll let you?” Ike said.
“Sure. She’s got a thing for me.”
“What are you going to tell her?”
“I don’t know-I’ll think of something.”
Ike put his half-finished beer on the bar and made the call on his cell phone.
“What do you want now?” came Shaz’s greeting through the phone.
“Cunningham needs to speak with you,” Ike said.
“Is that so? Put him on.”
He took the cell phone and raised it to his face. “I need your permission to go play a round of golf with three members of the Torch-Allaire wedding party. Your concierge pulled some strings and got me invited to their group at the Bali Hai course at the Mandalay Bay this afternoon. I want to schmooze them, see what I can pick up. You cool with that?”