Take Down

by James Swain

  This was going to work. The pieces were falling into place, the stars aligning in his favor. By tomorrow night, he and his crew would be rolling in dough, while Marcus Doucette and his murderous wife would be scratching their asses, wondering where the hell their money was.

  He pulled onto the street. His crew had come outside to stand on the front lawn. They began waving to him. They looked so damn happy that he welled up with emotion. He hadn’t had much of a family life growing up—his mother in prison for stabbing a man to death with a pair of scissors, his father having to cheat at cards to make ends meet—and he’d always wondered what it would have been like to have a gang of brothers and sisters to hang out with. He guessed this was the next best thing, and he waved as he burned past.

  “We love you, Billy!” Misty shouted.

  THIRTY-FIVE

  Mags stood outside her town house, cooling her jets. Frank had said noon, and it was now twelve fifteen. He could have called, but that would have been the polite thing to do.

  The desert air was heating up, the air scorching hot. Sometimes, she toyed with the idea of skipping town and starting her life over in another city, but deep down, she knew that wasn’t going to happen. Her contract with the gaming board was ironclad. In it, she’d admitted to her crimes and had agreed to work off her punishment by becoming a paid informant. If she ran away, she’d become a wanted felon, and the police would run her down at warp speed. Hanging on her kitchen wall was a calendar that she used to count off the days. In eleven months and twenty-six days she’d become a free woman. If she only lasted that long.

  Twelve twenty came and went. Murphy’s Law said light up a cigarette when you want something to happen, so she fired up a Kool and took a few puffs. Sure enough, Frank pulled into her drive and his window came down.

  “Get in, and get rid of that butt,” he said.

  She ground out her cigarette and hopped in. Frank had cleaned up. His unruly hair had gel in it, and he was wearing a pretty blue necktie. A box of candy appeared on her lap.

  “I’m sorry about last night,” he said.

  She undid the bow and popped the lid. Chocolate-covered strawberries. Considering he’d smacked her in the face, she’d been expecting a piece of jewelry. The candy made her feel cheap, and she placed it on the floor between her feet.

  They drove in silence. The relationship was starting to feel like a bad marriage. Sleeping with Frank had been a good idea at the beginning of their arrangement. It had let her exert control over him and had given her the upper hand. Now that control was gone, and she felt apprehensive when they were together, never knowing what he might do.

  Soon they were driving past a wasteland of strip malls on South Decatur. Frank pulled up in front of a breakfast joint called Mr. Mamas and parked.

  “Sit in the back. I’ll be in after I make this call,” he said.

  “You want something?” she asked, trying to act nice, when all she wanted to do was hurt him.

  “Get me some coffee and a breakfast burrito,” he said. Any mention of food always perked him up. “Order yourself something as well; just don’t go overboard.”

  She went in. The restaurant had black linoleum tables, a counter with stools, and tables filled with Mexican workers eating chicken-fried steak smothered in gravy. She took a table in back where a printed menu sat on the table. She decided on a Greek omelet and ordered from a waitress who gave her a sympathetic look. She glanced in the mirror behind the table and saw the puffiness around her jaw. It made her want to hurt Frank that much more.

  Coffee came, and she sucked it down. How was she going to pay Frank back for last night without fucking up her already fucked-up situation? She didn’t know. All she knew was that when the opportunity presented itself, she was going to stick the knife in.

  Outside, a black sedan pulled up. A thickset man wearing a dark suit climbed out, said good morning, but didn’t shake Frank’s hand. The man’s face was a blunt instrument. His eyebrows were connected, his forehead sloped. This had to be Frank’s ill-tempered boss Trixie, who’d denied Frank a promotion after Billy had pulled the wool over the gaming board’s eyes at the Hard Rock. They spoke for a minute before coming inside and sitting down.

  “This is my boss, Special Agent Bill Tricaricco,” Frank said. “Bill, this is Maggie Flynn, the paid informant I’ve been working with for the past year.”

  “I’ve heard a lot about you,” Trixie said.

  “I’m sure it was all lies,” she said.

  Their food came. It smelled delicious, and she blew on a mouthful of omelet before taking a bite. Frank’s breakfast burrito also looked good, although Frank didn’t touch it. The waitress asked Trixie if he cared to see a menu. He grunted no and told the waitress they wanted some privacy. He placed his wallet on the table so his gold badge was showing. The waitress shot Mags another sympathetic look before walking away.

  “Sure you don’t want a bone to gnaw on?” Mags asked.

  “Don’t get cute on me, little lady,” Trixie said. “I can make your life miserable in more ways than you can imagine.”

  “More miserable than Frank has? That would take a lot.”

  Frank leaned in. “Bill has a deal for you. Listen to what he has to say.”

  “A deal? As in, Let’s Make a Deal? Oh boy, I can’t wait.”

  “Just shut up, and hear Bill out.”

  She liberally sprinkled salt on her eggs and resumed eating. A broomstick was about to get rammed straight up her ass, and there wasn’t a damn thing she could do about it. The knuckle-scraper sitting across from her cleared his throat.

  “You have eleven months left on your contract with the gaming board,” Trixie said. “What would you say if we tore your contract up?”

  “Who do I have to sleep with?” she asked.

  “No one. Frank tells me that you ran into Billy Cunningham at Galaxy’s casino last night, and that Billy is doing a job for Marcus Doucette. Is that true?”

  “Yeah, that’s right.”

  “Frank also said that you two know each other from the old neighborhood.”

  She rested her fork on her plate. With cold eyes she gazed at Frank, then at his boss. “If you’re asking me to do something that will hurt Billy, the answer is no.”

  “Billy’s a menace,” Trixie said. “He and his crew have ripped off every casino in town, many of them multiple times, and we’ve never been able to put him away. Now we can, and you’re going to help us.”

  “Take the potatoes out of your ears. I said no.”

  “No is not an option. If you don’t play along, I’m going to take you downtown and throw your pretty ass in jail, and no smart-talking lawyer in town will be able to get you out. I’ve got the goods on you, Maggie. Take a look if you don’t believe me.”

  Trixie parted his suit jacket and removed a folded sheet of paper. He smoothed out the creases before placing it on the table in front of her. On the page were five cancelled checks captured on a color Xerox machine. Each check was from a wealthy widow who’d made the mistake of playing a friendly game of gin rummy with Mags poolside at one of the Strip’s fancy hotels, fifty cents a point. The amounts on the widows’ checks ranged between $2,500 and $4,000, payable to Maggie Flynn.

  Fuck, fuck, fuck, she thought.

  “These checks are from five wealthy dowagers who recently visited Las Vegas,” Trixie said. “You cheated these women at gin rummy, and stole their money. That’s shameful.”

  “Those checks don’t prove a thing,” she said, unwilling to go down without a fight. “You’re drinking your own bathwater, Trixie.”

  “Who told you my name was Trixie?”

  “A little bird.”

  “I’m afraid you’re wrong. One of your victims, Mrs. Goldie Hill of Pembroke Pines, Florida, filed a complaint with the Vegas police, who passed the case to the gaming board. I handled the inve
stigation because I knew you were on our payroll. I called Mrs. Hill, and she told me how she’d written you a personal check to cover her losses, and that you got all teary eyed and said you didn’t want her money. You tore up the check and burned it in an ashtray. End of story, or so Mrs. Hill thought. When she returned home, a bank statement was waiting for her, saying the money was gone from her account. Admit it, you ripped Mrs. Hill off.”

  The walls of the restaurant were starting to close in, the air difficult to breathe. Mags shifted uncomfortably in her chair, feeling trapped.

  “I contacted your bank to see if there were more victims,” Trixie said. “They provided me with four more cancelled checks. I called the women whose names were on the checks, and got the same story. A pretty Irish lass cleaned them out at gin rummy by the pool, took a personal check, then had a fit of conscience and tore it up. When they got home, the money was withdrawn from their bank accounts.”

  “That still doesn’t prove I cheated them,” she said.

  “You’re not going to play ball with me, are you?”

  “Not if it means hurting Billy.”

  “Have it your way. Give me your purse.”

  “No.”

  “Give it to me, before this gets ugly.”

  “Do it,” Frank said.

  Mag’s satchel purse hung off the back of her chair. She tossed it to the gaming agent and the bag struck him in the face. Trixie reached for his belt as if to grab his handcuffs, then thought better of it. He poured her purse’s contents onto the table and sifted through the lipsticks, birth control pills, and other personal items as if prospecting for gold. The waitress hovered by the counter, watching with the same morbid fascination that drew motorists to car wrecks.

  Trixie hummed to himself while picking through her things. Stripping Mags of her dignity was the kind of dehumanizing activity that made his day. Frank, on the other hand, was not having any fun at all and sadly shook his head.

  I’ll get both of you back, Mags promised herself, if it’s the last thing I do.

  Trixie checked her wallet last. It was made of faux leather and matched her purse. He pulled it apart, tossing her money and credit cards onto the pile. Inside a hidden compartment he found a stash of folded checks, which he held triumphantly in the air.

  “These blank checks are my proof,” Trixie said. “When your victim is writing you a check, you dive into your wallet, find a check that matches the color, and hide it in your hand. The victim gives you the check, and you go into your act and pretend to tear up the check. But you don’t—you rip up the blank and burn it, destroying the evidence. That’s the scam, isn’t it?”

  Mags was beaten. The scam was called the Tear Up and had been devised by card cheats to be used on long railroad trips, the idea being that the sucker would forget about the loss once the check was destroyed. It was one of the first scams that Lou Profaci had taught her.

  “Now, are you going to play ball, or do I run you in?” he asked.

  The moment of truth had arrived. Long ago, she’d decided that she was willing to do just about anything to stay out of prison. She took a deep breath before replying.

  “What do you want me to do?” she asked.

  “Tell her,” Trixie said.

  “We want you to make sure that Cunningham is inside Galaxy’s casino on Saturday afternoon,” Frank said. “We’re going to take Cunningham down along with Doucette.”

  Her skin for Billy’s. Another deep breath.

  “All right,” she said.

  “You’re going to have to connect with Billy before the raid,” Frank said. “Find out where he’s staying inside the casino and tell us. He’s a slippery little shit, so we’ll need to know.”

  “If I do that, will you tear up my contract?”

  The two gaming agents nodded solemnly, as if those gestures meant anything.

  “And this shit with the checks will go away?”

  They both nodded again.

  “I want it in writing,” she said.

  “You’ll get it.” Trixie consulted his watch and rose from the table. “I’m glad we came to this understanding, Mags. I’ll let Frank fill you in on the details.”

  “There’s one thing I’m not getting,” she said. “How are you going to take Billy down? You don’t know what he’s doing in there.”

  “Doesn’t matter,” Trixie said. “Billy’s scum. We’ll trump up a charge if we have to. Just make sure he’s inside the joint when the raid happens. If you do that, you’re home free.”

  She drew back in her chair. “You’re going to frame him? What kind of assholes are you? Just because you can’t catch him doesn’t give you the right to trump up a charge.”

  “Keep your voice down,” he cautioned her.

  “You’re pathetic excuses for human beings. Both of you.”

  “Watch your damn mouth.”

  “Fuck you.”

  “We’re out of here.” Frank threw down money for the food. “Let’s go.”

  Standing, she began tossing her things into her purse, the words spilling out in a mad rush. “Billy comes into your casinos and beats your games in front of your cameras and your so-called security experts, and you’re not clever enough to figure out how to stop him. People do that at the racetrack or the stock market, and they call them geniuses and give them their own fucking TV shows. Not you guys. When someone’s smarter than you, you frame him. And you wonder why people in this town think gaming agents are shit heads.”

  “Don’t play self-righteous with me, you little cunt,” Trixie said. “Cunningham is a plague, and I’m going to do whatever I have to do to put him away. Did you know that he went to MIT on a full scholarship? Kid’s a mathematical wizard, could have been the next Steve Jobs or Bill Gates, but no, he decides to quit after a year, and come out here, and start stealing. He could have made a difference in the world, but he chose not to. That makes him a world-class scumbag in my book. And so are you for thinking he’s some kind of prince.”

  She tossed her purse over her shoulder. The difference between cops and criminals was that criminals knew when they were breaking the law, while cops rarely did. Trixie had stepped over to the dark side, just as Frank had stepped over, and there was nothing she could say to either one of them that was going to convince them how wrong it was.

  “Whatever you say,” she said, and headed for the front door.

  THIRTY-SIX

  Billy parked the Camaro in the employee garage. It was easy to tell it was the employee garage; half the cars were falling apart. He knew a cheat named Ace who frequented bars where casino employees hung out. Ace would scour the lot to see whose car was in the worst shape, find the owner, and begin the recruitment process.

  The elevator was on the blink so he took the stairwell. He had a lot on his plate, all of which needed to get done in the next thirty-six hours. He had to make the Gypsies, get Tony G off Gabe’s back, and prepare his crew for an eight-million-dollar takedown. A few hours ago, he might have said forget it, but not now. Being around his crew did that to him. By himself, there was only so much stealing he could do. With his crew, the possibilities were endless.

  A blast of cold air greeted him upon entering the casino. Urban legend had it that the casinos pumped oxygen to get customers to gamble more, but it wasn’t true. They just kept the joints bone-chilling cold, and the lure of easy money did the rest.

  He found Ike and T-Bird inside the sports book, an area reserved for gamblers wanting to bet on sporting events. Both wore new designer threads that signaled a step up in the world. As the scores faded away on the digital screen, their betting stubs were tossed to the floor.

  “Know how to make a small fortune inside a casino? Start with a large one.”

  “Shit, man, we got to gamble,” Ike said. “What else is there to do in this town?”

  “No gambling wh
ile you’re doing a job with me. People will get suspicious if you start losing money they don’t think you have. Got it?”

  They reluctantly nodded agreement.

  “Good. Now what’s going on?”

  “We got everything under control,” Ike said, his tone indicating a willingness to impress. “Crunchie had to go see the doctor because his ulcer’s bleeding. He called me from the doctor’s office, and I told him we were watching you like a hawk. Then we got a call from psycho bitch. She was at the airport picking up a rich oilman flying in from Houston. She says, ‘Put that sneaky little bastard on, I want an update,’ and I messed with her real good.”

  “What did you tell her?”

  “I said, ‘Billy thinks the Gypsies are part of a wedding party. He’s inside the chapel, checking out a rehearsal. You want him to call you?’ and psycho bitch says, ‘Just keep an eye on him,’ and hangs up.”

  “She wasn’t suspicious?”

  “Nope. Everything’s good.”

  “What time did she call?”

  “About a half hour ago.”

  “I want to know the exact time.”

  “I told you—about a half hour ago.”

  “Take out your cell phone and check.”

  “You think I can’t keep track of the fucking time?”

  “I’m sure you can keep track of the time. I just think you’re wrong.”

  Ike took out his cell phone and found the incoming call in the memory bank. Casinos were designed to make people lose track of the time—no clocks, no windows, the outside world shut out—and Billy would have bet Ike was wrong, only he didn’t want to make an enemy.

  “Holy shit, she called an hour ago,” Ike said.

  An hour was a lot different than a half hour. In an hour, Shaz could meet the oilman at the airport, bring him back to the hotel, and check up on Billy. And if she didn’t find Billy at the chapel, she’d know that Ike had lied to her and that his allegiances had shifted.