Purple Gang, my ass, Spinoza thought. More like the Yellow Gang. And where were they now? Filling bone orchards back east, most of them. A few survivors had retired into obscurity or lived, like Bernstein, on the sufferance of the Brotherhood.
Manhattan owned Abe Bernstein body, soul, and diamond pinky ring the whole nine yards. Spinoza broke the silence, speaking as he would to a subordinate, his voice and manner vaguely condescending.
"Abe, I need your help."
"Whatever I can do," the old man answered.
"We've got some company coming in. A lot of company. They're landing at McCarran in."
"Oh..." he made a show of consulting his Rolex, "let's call it ninety minutes."
Spinoza met the old man's eyes and dropped his bomb.
"They're going to need some rooms."
"How many?" Bernstein asked.
"All of 'em."
Abe's smile faltered, freezing at half-mast.
"You're joking, right?"
Spinoza shook his head, eyes never leaving Bernstein's face.
"I've never been more serious."
That did it for the smile. Old Abe was glowering at him now across the desk.
"It's Friday night. We're almost full, Frank."
"So?"
"So, that's three hundred fifty rooms with paying guests. We can't put all those people on the street. You can't need all those rooms."
Spinoza shrugged, enjoying the game now.
"You're right. They'll only need a third of that. Fact is, I want an empty house."
A hesitation, Bernstein judging just how far he dared go.
"Why's that, Frank?"
Spinoza allowed himself a frown although he felt like laughing in the old man's face.
"I don't owe you any explanations, Abe. But since you ask, our visitors are going to need their privacy." He paused, dragging it out to get the maximum effect from his pronouncement. "It's a head party, Abe. We're going hard."
"I see."
His tone informed Spinoza very clearly that he did not like it. Which was fine. The old man did not have a vote in the proceedings.
"That make you nervous, Abe?" Spinoza asked, toying with him now.
Bernstein shook his snowy head.
"I'm old," he said. "I don't get nervous, Frank. I just get tired."
"Well, save your strength, old man. I'm gonna need you here to man the fort until this thing blows over."
There was weary resignation in his voice as Bernstein answered.
"Anything you say, Frank."
"Good."
"What should I tell our guests? Where are they going to go?"
"I don't care what you tell them. Use your own imagination union problems, broken plumbing... anything. Just get them out. I'm calling in some markers on the Strip to get the rooms we need. We'll have it covered by the time you get them packed."
"The transportation..."
"Is no problem, Abe," Spinoza interrupted him, and he was getting irritated now. The game was over. "They don't have wheels, we'll run the limos, stick 'em on the damn bus who cares? Don't make a problem out of nothing."
"Right."
"We're set, then?"
"Set." The old man nodded confirmation.
"Okay, get on it."
Abe Bernstein let himself out of the private office, and Spinoza was left alone. At once the mafioso put him out of mind, already moving on to other more important things. The old man would do what he was told or he would rue the consequences of his failure.
In the coming hours Frank Spinoza would command an army, finally get his chance to move against the common enemy. A tardy move, no question there, but not too late.
Not yet.
The troops had been reluctantly provided subsequent to his last conversation with The Man.
New York was still opposed to open warfare in the city, but as long as it was unavoidable, as long as someone else had started it, at least they meant to win.
His own accounting of the sniper raid and Julio DePalma's grisly end had turned the trick.
Spinoza was convinced of it. The old oratorical gift coming through for him again as it always had in the past.
He had sensed that many different ears were listening to him as he laid it out the whole Five Families and he had spared them nothing on the scrambled line. He let them see poor Julio the bastard, coming at Spinoza that way splattered on the walls and leaking out his life into the deep-shag carpet. And the others, flopping, dying.... When he had finished, New York asked him what he needed. No more waiting, no more arguments, no stalling. Just a blank check with a single string attached.
He had to make it good and make it fast.
If he should fumble somehow No.
Spinoza put the thought out of his mind. Defeat was out of the question. He had a chance to show the powers that be another side of Frank Spinoza here tonight. And let them see that he could hold his own in battle, not just in the peace negotiations afterward.
If no when he pulled it off, he would be in a position to dictate some rather different terms. Perhaps to cut himself a hefty slice of the pie. Spinoza eased the Browning from his belt and set it on the desk in front of him, its muzzle pointed at the office door. He was looking forward to the opportunity of using it. Tonight, perhaps. Tomorrow for certain. If the campaign lasted any longer.
Spinoza smiled to himself, his mind at ease now.
Seiji Kuwahara had already missed his chance.
Pearl Harbor, hell. It would be frigging Hiroshima and Nagasaki all rolled into one before he finished with the little yellow bastard.
And he meant to plant him personally.
The future capo of Las Vegas owed it to himself.
12
The white phone caught Brognola halfway out the office door. He thought about ignoring it but habit and a sense of duty drew him back. He did not bother turning on the lights. The big Fed knew his office like he knew the inside of his home, and he navigated around the lurking obstacles to reach the desk, lifting the receiver on the fifth ring.
It was a private line reserved for use by agents in the field. The SOG line, every bit as vital to Bolan as the other one that terminated in the Oval Office. Each line without the other formed a broken circuit. Brognola was the link between them, joining them into a working whole and that meant he was constantly on call.
"I ran into a friend of ours out here tonight," the caller told him. He recognized the voice of Tommy Anders instantly. "Out here" was Vegas, naturally. "As for the rest of it..."
"We don't have any friends out there," he answered gruffly.
"Well, maybe one," the comic amended.
"I don't follow you, Joker." The big Fed felt a familiar sour burning in his stomach. Hell, he thought he had that cured. He was lying to the operative, sure... and to himself. He had been getting bulletins from Vegas through the day, and now Brognola knew exactly who the "friend out there" must be.
Mack Bolan, right.
The hellfire guy was out there, living on the edge as always, cutting through the bureaucratic bull in his search for essence. And Brognola could envy him that, his dramatic successes, even as he mourned a sense of loss inside himself.
The comic's voice demanded his attention, small and far away.
"Maybe you can follow this, then." Anders sounded irritated, shifting into flat-out anger. "Our boy's between a hammer and the anvil here. Could be two hammers, if his latest hunch pans out." A moment's hesitation, and the angry voice was somewhat softer when it spoke again. "He could use some help, man."
"Sorry, he's not our boy anymore."
There was something in Brognola's throat all of a sudden, threatening to choke him, and he put a hand across the mouthpiece, coughing hard to clear it.
"Dammit, Hal!"
"Dammit, nothing," Brognola snapped back. "Striker... made his choice. He'll have to live with it."