“Who’s that?”
The Latina said, “Try the pool,” and plugged herself back in.
He walked around the building to a metal gate that required a room key for entrance, and hopped over it. The pool was deserted except for a beautiful woman sound asleep in a lounge chair. As he drew closer, the breath caught in his throat. It was Mags.
A tired smile formed at the corners of his mouth. He’d wanted to strangle her a few days ago, but those feelings had faded away. She’d stepped up to the plate when it counted, and shown her true colors. And when she’d gotten sprung out of jail, she’d run straight to him.
His smile grew. He realized that it had all been worth it-the beatings, getting thrown in jail, the whole nine yards. He’d do it again if it meant Maggie Flynn would be waiting for him when it was all over. If that wasn’t a definition of a fool in love, he didn’t know what was.
“Hey.”
Her eyes snapped open. She stood up slowly, uncertain of where they stood.
“I never thought you’d come,” she said.
“I was tying up some loose ends. How’d you find me?”
“I asked your lawyer after he bailed me out of jail. He said a friend of yours was holed up here, that you might come by.”
“My friend split.”
“So I heard. God, do you smell rank. You need a good bath.”
It sounded like an invitation. He didn’t know what to say, and just stared.
“I rented a room. Want to see it?”
They showered together, soaping down each other’s bodies beneath the steaming spray. His body was tense and it took a while before he relaxed. He’d been in some tight spots, but nothing like what he’d just gone through. For the next few hours he was going to pretend that it had never happened and that the brutal memories banging around in his head weren’t real.
They toweled each other off. She led him into the bedroom while holding his prick. She was in control, and he was more than willing to be her slave. She told him to lose the bedspread, and he whisked it away like a nightclub magician and threw it on the floor.
She clicked her fingers and pointed at the bed. He lay down obediently, and she mounted him. He had imagined this moment so many times that he didn’t think it would live up to his expectations. Dreams rarely did.
He was wrong. Being inside her was heaven, and the room started to move as if they were having an earthquake. Shutting his eyes, he thought about the lengths they’d traveled to reach this cheap motel room. The odds of them connecting had to be a trillion-to-one. If that wasn’t fate, he didn’t know what was.
Done, he took several exhilarating breaths.
“Want to do it again?” she asked.
Early the next morning, his Droid started making rude noises. Caller ID said it was Cory, king of the fuckups. Mags was out like a light, and he slid out of bed and took the call in the john.
“What do you want?”
“Hey, Billy, me and Morris just wanted to say hi, see how things are going,” Cory said. Everything’s cool here. No gaming board at the doorstep, ha-ha.”
“Hi, Billy,” came Morris’s voice in the background.
“What do you want?”
“We’ve been working on this cool scam with a hotel concierge,” Cory said. “We need someone with experience to make the play, so we called you. We won’t let you down this time, and that’s a promise from both of us.”
Scams involving a hotel’s concierge were the bread and butter of many hustlers’ existence. The suckers were usually rich suckers with supersized egos and zero common sense. They took their beatings in stride, and their checks never bounced. He realized he wanted to hear what Cory and Morris had cooked up.
“Lay it on me.”
“You want to hear the scam? Really?”
“Yeah, and it’s the only reason. Start talking.”
“Okay. You’re going to love this. This software king from Silicon Valley flies into Vegas each month to host a private poker game at the Palms. Fifty-thousand-dollar buy-in, winner take all. The sucker brings five of his buddies with him and has the hotel concierge invite a local player to round out the field. Now, here’s the good part. The sucker’s afraid of getting cheated, so he buys the cards for the game from the hotel gift shop. Morris bribed the manager of the gift shop, and we stacked the shelves with a hundred decks of marked cards. The sucker will be bringing marked cards to his own game, and he won’t even know it.”
“What marking system did you use?”
“We juiced them. Just throw your eyes out of focus, and the marks pop out.”
“Juiced them how?”
“We used aniline dye mixed with pure grain alcohol and applied it to the borders with an airbrush. We cut glycerin into the mix to help bring back the shine after the dye was applied to the card. It was a lot of work, but the payoff will be huge.”
“Were you smoking dope when you did it?”
“No way, we’re off the dope. We learned our lesson.”
“You still haven’t explained the play.”
“Morris is buddies with the concierge at the Palms,” Cory said, his voice growing excited. “The concierge will front for you and get you into the game. You know the rest. We’ll go fifty-fifty with you, after we pay off the concierge. The sucker is flying in Tuesday night. So what do you say? Are you in?”
Marking cards was an art and a science. If the marks were too strong, they could be seen under a bright light, exposing the scam to everyone at the table. Knowing Cory and Morris, they probably hadn’t let all of the marked decks dry properly, and a couple decks in the Palms gift shop had too much dye on them. If by chance the Silicon Valley sucker purchased a bad deck and spotted the not-so-invisible marks, he and his pals would put two and two together and know that the stranger in the game was at fault and throw Billy off the balcony.
“You must be out of your fucking mind,” he said.
“Why? What did we do wrong?” Cory choked on the words.
“Figure it out for yourselves.”
He ended the call and slipped back into bed. The sheets were still warm, and he snuggled up next to Mags and heard her murmur.
“Who was that?” she asked.
“No one important,” he said.
SIXTY-SIX
They ate a late breakfast in the hotel coffee shop and decided it might be a good idea if they both left town for a while.
“Where do you have in mind?” he asked.
“LA. I’ve always wanted to visit there,” Mags said.
“You’ve never been to LA? It’s my favorite town next to this one.”
“Where should we stay?”
“Venice. The beach scene is really cool.”
They used his Droid to find a boutique hotel in Venice called the Erwin. Mags dug the decor, and he booked a partial ocean view that set him back six hundred bucks. Normally, he’d never spend that much, but Mags had given him what he wanted, and he felt whole again.
His Droid was making noises again. He checked it in the parking lot. His attorney had sent him a text. Desert Springs Medical Center, ICU, #224. He had one last unfinished piece of business to attend to, and he took Koval north until he reached East Flamingo and hung a right.
“This isn’t the way to the freeway,” Mags said.
“I need to see a sick friend of mine,” he said.
“I thought you were taking me to Venice to fuck my brains out.”
He stared at the road. She was trying to control him, show him who was boss. He guessed it was to be expected. “I’ll make it up to you. Promise.”
“You’d better,” she said.
The hospital appeared in the windshield, and he flipped on his indicator.
Desert Springs Hospital Medical Center was known for its trauma unit. Entering through the sliding glass doors, he detoured at the gift shop and bought a basket filled with purple carnations and white daisy pompons before taking the elevator to the ICU unit on the second floor.