Mortal Crimes 2

by Various Authors

  “She clammed up about the whole thing. I think she would’ve talked before her friend was murdered, but not now. Now she seems terrified. She knows something. My guess is the man we’re looking for got to her first. Possibly threatened her.”

  “So we’re looking for the badass in the garage?”

  She nodded. “He seems to be everywhere there’s trouble. Can you remember what he looked like?”

  “Sure. I’m good with faces.”

  “Okay.” She pushed the files back to him. “Give me a little background on these two while I watch for them.”

  Brad began to read. “Cage, Lucas T., age 40. Single. Lives at number 6 Pioneer Trail,” Brad said. “Caucasian. Six foot, hundred and ninety pounds. Last resided in Tahoe. He worked security at Caesar’s and Harvey’s.”

  “Citations?” She watched monitor number two, the one with its camera set up in the employee checkin desk. A stream of employees were coming and going, some already dressed for work and others in street clothes. She heard Brad shuffling papers.

  “Nothing.”

  “What else?”

  “That’s it for Cage. The other one, Andrews, Thomas Andrews, is 41. Unmarried. He lives in an apartment on Greenbrae, right here in Sparks. Caucasian. Five-eleven, hundred and ninety. Previous employment,” Brad whistled. “The guy’s got police-force background. Moved around a lot. Watts, Miami, Vegas. Big crime hot spots.” Papers rustled. “Citations? Wow, this joker’s got citations. Sexual harassment, insubordination, excessive force in removing D and D’s from the property.”

  D and D stood for drunk and disorderly.

  “Let me see that.” Kasey took her eyes from the monitor to read the report on Andrews. Only two months on the job and he’d been cited four times. The harassment charges had been filed by a fellow employee. No doubt Paula Volger. Insubordination from a superior, and two customer complaints. She knew from past experience that complaints from drunk and disorderly customers held little or no credibility.

  “There he is!” Brad said, pointing at the screen.

  On monitor number four Kasey watched a man in street clothes check in at the desk. He looked about the right height and weight, and his thinning hair, nearly bald in front, was the right length. He certainly looked like the man she’d seen on the past three occasions; yet because of the high angle of the camera and the poor quality picture, she couldn’t make a positive ID. Except for that time in the garage, the other meetings had been brief and in bad lighting.

  “Are you sure, Brad? Remember, Cage and Andrews look enough alike to pass for the same man, at least on camera.”

  “I never forget a face. That’s the asshole in the parking garage.”

  Kasey turned a knob. The lens zoomed in on the man’s ID tag. Thomas Andrews.

  “Well, the file fits the man. Abusive, lack of regard for authority, sexual harassment.”

  Brad dialed Jay. He put him on the speaker phone so Kasey could hear.

  “Jay, I think we found our man.”

  “Good work. Is Kasey with you?”

  “Yeah, she’s right here.” Brad glanced at her, then went on, “His name is Thomas Andrews. Swing security officer. He even has citations. What do you want us to do now?”

  “Monitor him if you can. I’ll have LeBarre put someone on him right away.”

  “Why don’t we just bust him? Eighty-six him?”

  “I explained it at the meeting this morning. So far we can’t prove that he’s done anything wrong. At least nothing the police could bust him for. Besides, even if we were successful in keeping him off the premises, it doesn’t mean he can’t and won’t cause trouble. It’s best to keep him under surveillance and hope to catch him in the act.”

  “In the act of doing what?”

  “Assault, robbery, maybe attempted murder. We’ve had it all in the past week. Have Kasey brief you. I’ll be in the suite the rest of the night if you need to reach me. I want you two to stay put. Don’t do anything except monitor him. I don’t want either of you to place yourself in jeopardy. Understand?”

  “Sure,” Brad said.

  “Kasey, are you there?”

  “Yes.”

  “Do I have your word?”

  “I’m no hero, Jay. I’m a consultant, not a cop.”

  “Good. Don’t hesitate to call if anything comes up. Anything at all. I’ll relieve you when I know LeBarre has him under complete surveillance.”

  Kasey and Brad went back to the number two monitor. While they continued to watch the checkin desk hoping to spot the other officer—the one named Cage—Kasey filled Brad in.

  *

  After Brad’s call. Jay dialed the eye and talked to LeBarre. The chief of security had no trouble locating Andrews on one of the monitors.

  “Can you put someone on him, someone who can work around the clock if necessary? Someone who doesn’t work here at the club?”

  “Sure, no problem. I know a couple a unemployed officers. They dig freelance and could use the bread. I have just the guy. Ex-boxer. If your man spots the tail and gets tough, Corky can take care of himself. I’ll get right on it.”

  “Good. And Barney, if this Andrews gets anywhere near a member of my family, I want to know immediately.”

  “Right.”

  “Who’s on the twelfth floor?”

  “Hollise. He’s staked out in the storage room by the ice machine. From the eye, I can see everyone who comes and goes on your floor. All I gotta do is get Hollise on the radio when someone gets off the elevator. To anyone walking toward your suite, he looks like the guy restocking the vending machines. There’s no way this bastard’s gonna get anywhere near your door.”

  Jay thanked him and hung up. The bastard might not get near his door, Jay told himself, but he bet he sure as hell would try.

  Two hours later, when no one resembling Lucas Cage logged in at the employee desk, Kasey and Brad turned to the other four monitors. They kept two monitors fixed on the elevator lobbies—one on the main floor and the other on Jay and Dianne’s floor. Brad took charge of these while Kasey, who was used to camera surveillance, switched from camera to camera throughout the hotel and casino.

  Ensconced before the monitors, drinking cup after cup of coffee, picking at a meal ordered from room service, Kasey found herself inadvertently doing what came naturally—spotting.

  On the number five camera located in slot section two, she noticed that a bald man playing slots near the exit was acting suspiciously. Instead of concentrating on the reels of his own machine, he seemed distracted, uptight, surreptitiously looking around the packed casino.

  Kasey had Brad call down to the eye and have surveillance focus on the man and his immediate surroundings. The camera zoomed in. A large woman perched on a stool played the machine next to him, her brimming tub of dollar tokens sitting between his machine and hers. Less than a minute later, the bald man made his move. He grabbed the tub of tokens and ran for the nearest exit. Security, in contact by radio, managed to bar the door before he could slip through. An hour later, a team of professional purse snatchers again had her calling security. Theirs was a familiar subterfuge, used often in crowded casinos. While one thief distracted the player, his partner lifted her purse from the floor or between the machines and quickly made off with it. Although this pair had split up, both were apprehended before they could leave the premises.

  In another slot machine area on the opposite end of the casino, Kasey spotted an old, stooped woman in a limp housedress, a woman who looked like hundreds of elderly women who passed through the doors of the casino every day. It was the large canvas totebag and new tennis shoes that marked her as the silver-miner from the day before. The woman seemed more stooped than before, her movements slower. Must be past her bedtime, Kasey thought. But Kasey knew as well as the silver-miner that the later into the night it got the better the pickings. Gamblers got tired—some tipsy from one-too-many free drinks, others eager to move on to something else—their concentration and att
ention lowering considerably with each passing hour.

  Kasey watched her for a while, marveling at the woman’s adeptness and stamina, before moving on to the other monitors.

  In the course of the evening, Kasey spotted Thomas Andrews several times conducting his various duties—chip runs to the pit, escorting bar and restaurant employees to storerooms, carding minors, or just patrolling the floor looking for drunks, rowdies, street beggars, and suspicious characters such as pickpockets and thieves. At one point, she witnessed Andrews escorting a drunken Native American off the premises. Kasey nudged Brad, and together they watched to see if he might use excessive force. But the stocky Paiute went out the door without further hassle and Andrews returned inside and was promptly swallowed up by the crowd.

  Kasey chewed her lower lip, raked fingers through her hair. Something wasn’t quite right about the whole thing. About Andrews. She had a distinct feeling they were watching the wrong man.

  At the end of the swing shift, Kasey and Brad turned their attention back to the number two monitor. It was twelve-twenty when Thomas Andrews checked out.

  While they waited for Jay to contact them, they turned away from the monitors, stretched stiff muscles, and rubbed burning, tired eyes.

  Brad went into Jay’s office and returned with two snifters of cognac. He handed one to Kasey, sat on the sofa, and pulled up a chair to prop his feet.

  He twirled the glass, inhaled the liquor’s bouquet, twirled the glass some more. He peered at Kasey, then lowered his gaze. “Are you good friends with my Auntie Di?”

  “Used to be. We lost touch over the years,” Kasey said. “Do I detect a note of disrespect for your aunt?”

  “There’s not much love lost between us, if that’s what you mean. And it’s not for lack of trying on my part. My mother died when I was a kid. Uncle Jay married Dianne when I was twelve. She was the only adult female in our family. I thought she’d, y’know, be kinda like a mom. I really missed having a mom. She straightened me out real quick. She’s jealous of me and my sister. Has been all along.”

  Kasey sipped the cognac.

  “Where’d you two meet?” he asked.

  “Right here at the club, running cocktails.”

  “When?”

  “About the time you were begging your father, in a voice that was still changing, to let you cruise around with your new driver’s permit.”

  “You don’t miss an opportunity to remind me that you’re a lot older than I am, do you?”

  “I would have phrased that somewhat differently,” she replied with a slight smile.

  “Does old age scare you?”

  “No. But youth seems to bother you. Brad, there’s nothing dishonorable about being in your early twenties. The years go by fast enough as it is. Enjoy each one.”

  “What were you like in your twenties?”

  “Oh, I don’t know. Serious, I guess. I was married, widowed, married again, and divorced in a very short span.”

  “How’d your husband die?”

  “Train hit his car.”

  “Bummer. That must have been tough on you.”

  “Devastating. He was barely twenty-two. He was my best friend. I knew everything about him.”

  “And you were crazy in love.”

  “I loved him very much, yes.”

  “So why’d you get married again so soon?”

  “I guess I bought it would help me forget. Help make the pain go away. It didn’t.”

  “What happened to that marriage?”

  “It didn’t work.” She grinned and added, “He was younger than me.”

  “No shit? How much younger?”

  “It doesn’t matter.” She turned away, pretended to study one of the monitors.

  “Did the second husband remind you of the first?”

  “They couldn’t have been more unalike. Kevin was kind, considerate, and loving. Marty—Martin Zane the Third—was, and still is, bad news. Always in trouble with the law, drugs, creditors. After the divorce I didn’t want my name linked with his, so I took back my maiden name. Went from A to Z and back to A again.”

  Brad sipped the cognac. He seemed to reflect upon her words. Then, he said, “We don’t have to date or go steady or anything. We could just sleep together.”

  Kasey couldn’t help but laugh. Brad’s approach was unlike anything she had encountered before. Coming from anyone else, the proposition would have seemed crude, tasteless. From this young man with his dimples and easy grin, it was amusing and, she had to admit, somewhat flattering.

  “Shades of Mrs. Robinson?”

  “Who? Who’s Mrs. Robinson?”

  “My point exactly.” She faced him again. “Brad, don’t you have a special girl? A good-looking guy like you with such a bright, promising future should have the women crawling all over him.”

  “I do. But none interest me.”

  “Why?”

  “Too immature. They haven’t done anything, haven’t experienced life. Now you, you’ve been around. You have your own business. You know as much about surveillance and the backside of the gaming world as most general managers and CEOs.”

  “And that makes me exciting? The fact that I spend eight to twelve hours a day in dark rooms like this spying on people makes me seem special to you?”

  “Well, yeah, sure. Women my age are either married, still in school, or working for minimum wage—ZZZZZZ. My last date was with a girl who flipped all-beef patties at McDonald’s. That burger aroma was all over her, like perfume. Couldn’t have been a better endorsement for the product. I was hungry all night for a Big Mac and fries.”

  The phone rang.

  Brad snatched it up. “Brad King here. Sure, Jay. Hold it a sec.” He switched to the speaker phone.

  Jay’s voice, soft, yet resonant, filled the small room. “LeBarre’s man followed Andrews home and he’ll keep tabs on him throughout the night. I’d like you both to stay at the hotel tonight. No sense taking any chances. He may decide to come back.”

  “I have a date,” Brad said.

  “Here at the hotel?”

  “No. Uptown.”

  “Cancel.”

  “But—”

  “Kasey, can you stay?” Jay asked, cutting Brad off. When she hesitated, he added. “Keys are on my desk. Room twelve-forty-six. I don’t know what your preference is, or if you have a preference, but you’ll also find a master key to the pool and gym. Everybody seems to be into the workout scene nowadays. You should find everything you’ll need for the night in the room. If not, call room service, the front desk, or me. I’ll be in the suite all night.”

  “I guess it’s settled then,” she said.

  “Good.”

  “Will you need me tomorrow night?” she asked.

  “Tomorrow night, and for as long as it takes. Consider the hotel your temporary home. Sign for everything. Brad,” Jay said, again addressing his nephew, “see that Kasey gets safely to her room.”

  “I’ll do that.”

  “‘Night, you two. Be careful.” The line went silent.

  Brad hung up. “Buy you another?” he asked, pointing at her glass. “The night’s young and my big plans have been shot all to hell.”

  “No thanks, Brad. I think I’ll turn in.” Kasey went into Jay’s office and picked up the keycards. As she passed the bar with its concealed safe, she thought of Brad. She’d had several opportunities to tell Jay about Brad and the safe, but had decided to keep what she’d seen to herself, and she wondered if she were doing the right thing. Over the years Kasey had encountered all kinds. There were the innocent and the not-so-innocent. Brad King, by his words and actions when caught in the act, definitely fell into the second category.

  Brad walked her to her room. He tried to kiss her at the door and got a cheek when she saw it coming.

  “I’m a patient man, Kasey. I don’t give up easily.”

  “Young men have little patience.”

  “There you go again.”

  “B
rad, it would never—”

  “Never say never. Remember, it doesn’t have to be a commitment. I’ll settle for raw, unadulterated sex.”

  “You’re easy to please.”

  “In more ways than you can imagine.” Brad unlocked her door. “I better have a look under the bed,” he said, stepping forward.

  Kasey grabbed a handful of jacket and tugged, pulling him back. “That’s okay. I can check under my own bed.”

  “You make it hard for a guy to be a hero. How am I going to prove myself to you if you don’t give me the chance?”

  “Prove yourself by showing me you’re as patient as you claim to be.”

  He sighed, looked into her eyes, one corner of his mouth quirked up. He pressed the card into her palm, his hand holding onto hers. “I’m right down the hall if you need me. Room twelve-thirty. Sweet dreams.”

  He waited at the door until she was inside. Kasey heard him whistle softly as he walked away.

  After locking the deadbolt and engaging the safety chain, she turned the TV on low and called her mother. Marianne answered halfway through the first ring. Although her mother insisted it wasn’t necessary to check in, she seemed pleased that she had.

  Just as Jay had promised, the bathroom was stocked with the basic sundries. On the bed she found a white terry bathrobe, white nightshirt, a cotton two-piece workout suit, and a pair of slip-on sandals—all items carried in the hotel giftshop, the tags still attached. The hospitality bar and refrigerator were fully stocked as well. She was set for the night.

  She undressed, got into the nightshirt, which reached mid-thigh, and lay down on the bed. The remote lay limp in her hand.

  Staring at the TV screen reminded her of the row of monitors her eyes had been glued to all evening. A grainy, black-and-white image of Tom Andrews in his security uniform came to mind. Damnit, instinct told her something just wasn’t right.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  The next morning Kasey went home. After changing into a pair of shorts and a sleeveless top, she found her mother and George in the orchard, each on a ladder at respective trees, picking peaches. Danny sat on a blanket in the shade of the grape arbor, a box of cut-up magazine pages at his knee, his fingers carefully creasing and twisting the bright, slick paper into new creations.