John Miller - Smoke and Mirrors

By the time he finally told her he would get up on Wednesday to spend the night, he had initialed the customers’ gripe reports and placed them into a stack for further consideration, probably around the time the temperature of hell finally dropped below thirty-two degrees.

Pierce’s phone buzzed.

“Yeah,” he said.

“Pierce,” Kurt Klein said. “Am I interrupting anything?”

“Absolutely not. I was just finishing up some paperwork. What can I do for you?”

“One of my security men was in the model room a few minutes ago and he reported to me that he caught a man with a camera who claims to be from one of the newspapers in Memphis, taking pictures of the resort model.”

“That room was locked,” Pierce said.

“Maybe one of your people let him in. My man does not think he is who he says he is, and he may be with a competitor. They found some interesting items in his room-number seven ten. I am going to go down myself in a minute. Meet me there?”

“I’ll be right there as soon as I call Tug. He’s very good at this sort of thing. Don’t you think you should stay clear of it?”

“Good thinking. But use Steffan’s people, no need to hassle Tug. Meet me up here after you have a look and we will decide what action is required.”

Pierce hung up. If pictures of the resort were released before the official press conference, it would greatly lessen the impact of the announcement. When over a billion dollars was on the line, care had to be taken.

Pierce tried to call Tug anyway, but there was no answer. He went to the elevator and got off on the seventh floor. One of Klein’s beefy security men waited in the hall beside the door. As Pierce drew close, the man gave him a troubled smile. “Sorry to bother you, Mr. Mulvane,” he said, opening the door. “I think you will find this very disturbing.”

Pierce went through the door into the short hallway and the security man came in behind him. The first thing he noticed were the leather suitcases beside a laundry cart. A sheet of plastic covered the floor and there was more covering the furniture. He wondered what the guest was up to that had made protective covering necessary. When he realized that the suitcases were just like his, the bathroom door opened, and Finch stepped out wearing a raincoat. Even as the guard muscled Pierce farther into the room and onto the plastic, Pierce had no idea why Finch was aiming a gun at him.

Albert White took off his tie and put it in the drawer along with his.38. He took the two speed loaders from his jacket pocket and tossed them in before closing and locking the drawer. In the five years since his wife left him for his second cousin, a roofer, he had rarely spent any of his off time-and there was less and less of that-with other people. He didn’t much care for company. Now he was going to spend the evening with a South African jerk-off and two of his pals. The prospect made him bone-tired. Why the old Kraut hadn’t just given him a cash bonus was beyond him. He was going to sit in a restaurant for a couple of hours, eat a thick steak. Then instead of lying down, which is what he’d want to do, he would have to go out carousing with the sons of bitches. And he’d bet ten dollars against a donut they’d want free trim at casino expense.

He looked at his watch and frowned. Why was it that time passed so quickly when something unpleasant was coming at you, and so slowly when there was something tasty ahead? Well, if things worked out as planned, he’d be getting a nice bump from a real estate deal he’d been working on. He thought about Jack Beals. Although White had never cared for him, he had been useful. He may have been a preening smart-ass, but he would do anything for money, and he and White had made a few hundred grand by taking winnings from people who walked away with money they didn’t deserve. White knew the cash that had been found in Beals’s house was from their little sideline venture.

Albert had his money well hidden, and once in a while he would take it out of the vents and count it. Since he didn’t go on vacations or buy expensive toys, he had more than he needed. When he wanted sex, Albert had a colored gal who would come over and set him right as rain for a fifty-dollar bill.

Albert was saving for retirement. He had bought a small house on a lake in Florida, and when he walked out in five years, six months, two days, and fourteen hours, he would have enough to pad his retirement from the force in West Memphis, his social security, the bundle he’d saved from the years of collecting money to look the other way in West Memphis, Arkansas, and the liberated winnings he and Beals had put together. Nine hundred thousand dollars, but he planned to have well over a million before walking away into the glorious sunrise.

Albert’s thoughts were interrupted by a rapping on his office door. Finch opened it. “You ready, big buddy?”

“Yeah,” Albert said. “Where’s your two guys at?”

“Waiting outside in the limo,” Finch said, smiling. “We’re going first-class all the way, big fellow. We go eat at that steak house you were bragging about, have a few drinks with Tug at that blues club outside town, and then we get some girls and have our ashes hauled. You up for all that?”

“I reckon I am,” Albert said.

“Then let’s have a run at it.”

Albert nodded, took a look at the locked drawer, and followed Finch down the hall toward what he was sure was going to be a pure pain-in-the-ass experience.

Alexa dressed in the living room while Styer and Cynthia looked on.

“You are a very attractive woman,” he said.

She buttoned her blouse.

“I find women of small stature attractive.”

“Girls who look boyish.”

“I didn’t say that,” he said, frowning. Styer’s eyes hardened for a few seconds, then softened.

“You don’t have to. Maybe psychotic young men like Jack Beals are more your speed. I’ll just use my imagination.”

“Jack…?” Cynthia said, startled. “He’s dead?”

“Males have never held any sexual fascination for me. Jack had a high opinion of his mediocre talents with a gun. He never allowed his targets to face him on even ground. He was a thief and a coward, who used a badge to get close.”

“Why did you kill him?”

“ You killed Jack?” Cynthia asked, her lip trembling.

Alexa didn’t know that Cynthia knew Beals. She would have loved to ask her how she knew him.

Styer shrugged. “The young man was supposed to be helping me, but I discovered that he was trying to figure out what I was up to so he could tell certain people with interests contrary to those of my employer. All of this intrigue over the land, and so much duplicity swirling around. As it happened, his body was a convenient sign holder for Massey.” He smiled.

“Did you kill Sherry Adams just to draw Winter in?”

“File that under killing two birds with one bullet. Now, Cynthia, put on your parka. If you so much as look the wrong way, your fashion accessory will spread your lovely body, and unfortunately ours, too, all over the landscape. You get that?”

Cynthia nodded mutely.

Styer made Alexa’s skin crawl. She was fairly sure, despite his assurances, that he didn’t intend to leave her alive after she’d served his purpose. Time was running out, and she had to start looking for a weakness to exploit.

Alexa put on her coat and slipped her purse on her shoulder. After Styer fixed the do-not-disturb sign on the door, she walked beside him down the hall toward the elevators. His left hand, hidden in his coat pocket, held his cell phone. The valise in his right hand contained God knew what.

They didn’t speak as they rode down to the casino, now crowded with Saturday night gamers. The gamblers ranged from fat to fit, rich to poor, and their clothes reflected a wide range of fashion and functionality-from gowns to jeans and halter tops, Armani to hunter’s camouflage jackets and matching ball caps. The air was thick with cigarette smoke and the insipid sounds of ringing bells, as the wheels of a thousand slot machines spun in place.