Blake Crouch - Grab

Knocked.

A groggy-eyed man answered.

Sleep lines down the right side of his face

She said, "Mr. Sax?"

"Yes?"

"I'm Amanda, RDM here at the Wynn."

"RDM?"

"Rooms Division Manager. We've had a maintenance issue crop up. It's impacting the air quality for a segment of rooms on floors eight through eleven. Unfortunately yours is one of them. We're going to need to move you to another room."

"But we're already unpacked and—"

"I understand." She smiled. "Of course, we'll be upgrading you to a Salon Suite, which is nearly two thousand square feet, three times the size of your current room. We'll also be giving you two hundred dollars in chips as a token of our appreciation for your understanding. We're terribly sorry for the inconvenience."

# # #

Letty hit a brisk stride on her way back to the Palazzo.

It was almost five o'clock, and she had six hours to kill before Ize's crew was set to rendezvous in the room directly below 1068.

Waiting at the crosswalk on Sands, she dialed Christian's mobile.

"Hi, Letty."

"Something's come up. Can we do an early dinner?"

"Sure, when?"

"I'm free right now," she said. "I just need to change. Let's meet in the lobby in thirty minutes. And wear a coat. I'm taking you someplace special."

"A proper last meal sounds nice."

# # #

She asked the concierge to point her toward the best restaurant in town. At first he demurred. A twenty spot pulled a definitive answer out of him—a French place down the Strip at the MGM Grand. But he feigned doubt that reservations could be procured on such short notice. Forty dollars secured said reservations.

Christian met her at the same bench where she'd found him coming to pieces earlier in the day.

He'd cleaned up. He looked good and smelled good and she told him so, then took his arm as they walked together out into the scorching Vegas evening.

The sun was falling, reflecting off all the chrome and glass.

So hot it seemed like combustion would've been a certainty if there was anything green in sight.

The restaurant sent a limo.

Riding down the boulevard, Letty was struck with the feeling that it wasn't just Christian's last meal, but maybe hers as well. Something about the golden quality of the late light. A sadness, a finality to it.

She stared out the tinted window and thought about her son.

# # #

They went all-in on a sixteen course tasting menu.

It was like eating in a library—hushed and reverent—but the food was out of this world. Letty wouldn't drink but insisted Christian have the wine flight. She had been worried going in that the conversation would be heavy, but they found common ground.

Politics.

Children.

Movies.

Letty sat on a velvet couch, propped up with pillows. Rich royal purple drapes everywhere she looked. Ivy walls. Candlelight.

She had the best lamb she'd ever tasted. Must've been fed gold flakes and the milk of the gods.

The bread cart was legendary.

Like baked clouds.

Everything plated as beautifully as jewelry. The artistic detail more precise than coinage.

Over espressos, Christian said, "I hope that whatever has really brought you to Vegas won't keep you from seeing your son again."

"It's a risk. But I just have this fear that if I were to walk away and drive up to Oregon to be with my son, that within a few months, I'd be broke. Living out of a motel. Strung out. Maybe dead."

"Sounds like your business here could produce the same end result."

"Yeah, but at least I wouldn't be doing it to myself. Truth is, I think about dying all the time. I think about my son finding out. And of all the possible scenarios, Jacob hearing that mommy was found OD'd and decomposing in a motel, is the worst."

"So you are back in the game."

"Are you judging me?"

"No."

"Look, it fills this hole in my soul that I used to throw drugs at."

"Your son doesn't fill it?"

"Only part way."

"So you're saying it's either crime or drugs for you. Can't live without one or the other."

"If I take drugs I will definitely die. If I... ..."

He finished her sentence: "Steal?"

"Then I'll only maybe die. I'm fighting for my life here, Christian."

"And this thing—it's tonight?"

"Yeah."

"Are you afraid?" he asked.

"Of course."

"And do you find fear to be a help or a hindrance?"

"It helps. For sure."

"How so?"

"It keeps me uncomfortable and sharp. Heightens my senses."

"And you have no doubts about going through with it?"

"Jobs like this—they're the only time I don't think about using. You helped me to see that. You haven't asked for any details," Letty said. "Thank you."

"And you haven't asked me if I'm going through with my plans tonight. Back at you."

"Are you?"

"What exactly are you doing?"

They laughed.

"Sounds like a big night for both of us," he said. "The suicide and the thief."

"What would it take?" she asked, "for you to keep on keeping on?"

"It's funny. That's all I've been asking myself lately."

"And?"

"I don't know. Some new experience maybe? Something that made me feel like a different person. Like I was living a different life."

"I hope you find it."

# # #

They rode back in the limo.

It was ten o'clock. She could feel the job looming, but she pushed it out of her mind just a little while longer.

She looked up at Christian as they passed Paris Las Vegas. All of the lights and the neon playing across his face like an ecstasy dream.

Then they were parked out front at the Palazzo and the driver was coming around to get their door.

They embraced in the lobby.

Christian said, "Take care of yourself, Letty."

And she said, "You too. Thanks for everything."

Neither asked the other to reconsider.

Neither said goodbye like how the moment called for it. Like goodbye forever.

The elevator ride up to her room was the only window in which she allowed herself to cry.

15

Room 968 at the Wynn looked like a construction site.

Between the end of the bed and the mini-bar, a folding ladder stood in a pile of sawdust and plaster dust. A man high up the rungs was waist-deep in the ceiling, a large segment of which lay in pieces on the floor.

Letty locked the door after her and made her way inside.

Detected a muffled hum—the work of a quiet motor.

Dust rained down out of the hole in the ceiling.

She spotted a large black duffel bag in the corner, bulging.

Unzipped it.

Zip-ties.

Kevlar vests.

Face masks.

Ball gags.

Shotguns.

"What's this, Ize?" she said, lifting a semi-auto tactical shotgun.

"S'all good," he said.

"How exactly is this all good? Aside from the fact that you said 'no guns,' you fire off one shell and you'll wake the entire Strip."

"We won't be firing any shells."

"How's that?"

"Keep digging."

She thrust her hand deeper into the duffel until her fingers grasped a cartridge the size of a twelve-gauge shotgun shell. She lifted out a clear capsule packed with copper wiring and a four-pronged electrode. TASER XREP had been engraved into the plastic.

"What is this?" she asked.

"Nasty is what that is. It's a taser on steroids. Fires out of a shotgun and delivers debilitating pain for up to twenty seconds. I let Jerrod pop me with one. Standard Taser ain't no thing, but I'd hate to meet a man that shell can't drop."

"It's not lethal?"

"Nah. Only makes you wish you were dead."

Over by the window, Jerrod was cranking down on a clamp that held a large suction cup to the glass.

Isaiah knelt over an REI store's worth of climbing equipment, just the sight of which tightened Letty's stomach. He was in the process of outfitting each harness with a locking carabiner and an ATC belay device.