Wild Card (Tony Valentine Series)

by James Swain

  “You take up space, and don’t make money.”

  “I still want to know,” Valentine said.

  Finkel finished his bagel, then rose from his chair and went into the adjacent office. When he returned, he was carrying the casino’s financials for the past twelve months. They were huge reports, and he dropped them loudly on the floor.

  “Ready when you are,” he said.

  Lying had never been Valentine’s strong suit. Telling the auditors that he had a meeting with the top brass was dumb. A single phone call to Resorts, and his goose was cooked. He took a deep breath and said, “Okay.”

  Finkel pulled up a chair. Then he picked up the top report, opened it, and started to read. “Resorts’ casino generates twenty million dollars a month in net revenue. Sixty percent from slots, the rest from the table games.” He flipped open to the section that showed the hold, which was the amount of money collected for each game, minus the number of chips sold. “The hold for blackjack was 13% before you started; for craps, 14%; for roulette, 15%.”

  Finkel removed the bottom report from the stack, and flipped it open. “Let’s see. The hold for blackjack after you started jumped to 15%; for craps, 16%, and for roulette, 17%.” He looked up. “I think you’ve got a case, Tony.”

  “They’re still going to hate you,” Carp chimed in. He’d thrown his feet onto his desk, and was blowing perfect smoke rings from his cigarette. “Expect less, and you’ll be disappointed.”

  “How about the other games?” Valentine asked.

  Finkel read the holds for the Asian domino game called pai gow and for baccarat. They had also increased.

  “This is impressive,” Finkel said.

  “Hate, hate, hate,” Carp said.

  Valentine had already known what the numbers said. One of the first scams he’d uncovered at Resorts was a group of pit bosses letting family members and friends take down large credit lines, which they later paid back, interest free. By stopping this practice, the holds at all games had improved overnight.

  “I need to write this down,” Valentine said.

  Finkel crossed the office and opened a desk drawer in search of a pen. Valentine glanced at Carp, and saw that he wasn’t paying any attention. Taking the most recent report off Finkel’s chair, he flipped it open at the tab marked COMPS. There was a six-month summary, and he stared at the numbers.

  ROOMS $7,874,096

  DRINKS $2,360525

  FOOD $2,935,198

  ENTERTAINMENT $1,952,437

  AIR TRANSPORTATION $2,001,887

  GIFTS $1,438,296

  “Makes you sick to your stomach, doesn’t it,” Finkel said.

  Valentine looked up to see Finkel standing over him, pen in hand. He hadn’t heard him return, and sheepishly said, “I don’t mean to be poking my nose where it doesn’t belong, but I’ve always wondered how much free stuff Resorts gives away.”

  “Too much,” Carp said.

  “Eighteen million, five hundred and sixty-two thousand, four hundred and thirty-nine bucks in six months, ” Finkel said.

  “Is that how much this is?” Valentine asked.

  “To the penny,” Finkel replied. He handed Valentine the pen, then took his seat. “The state of New Jersey considers comps to be legitimate ways to encourage business. We have to be competitive with Las Vegas in every arena.”

  “Is this how much Vegas casinos give away?”

  The auditor nodded. “It’s how they keep the high-rollers coming back. Percentage wise, we’re right in line with Vegas.”

  Valentine shook his head, pretending to be astonished by the number. But what he was astonished by was the audacity of Vinny Acosta’s skim. Resorts’ casino had been packed with gamblers since the very first day it had opened. Resorts didn’t need to give away all this free stuff, and it wasn’t. Only Carp and Finkel didn’t know this.

  “Holy shit,” Carp exclaimed, looking at his watch.

  “What’s wrong?” Finkel said worriedly.

  “We have work to do!”

  Valentine got the hint. He scribbled some numbers on a piece of paper, then tore it off a pad and shoved it into his pocket. Standing, he shook the auditors’ hands. Carp gave him the limp fish, and Valentine was reminded why he’d always disliked him.

  “Thanks for the hospitality,” Valentine said.

  Carp brayed like a donkey.

  “That’s a good one,” he replied.

  Chapter 47

  Valentine drove home with dollar signs swimming in his head. When Mink had said a hundred thousand dollars a day was being stolen from Resorts, he had assumed it was a bullshit number, used to suck Mink in. Only the audit backed Mink up. Six months divided into eighteen million dollars was a hundred thousand dollars a day. He made thirty-six grand a year. He would have to work for a thousand years to make that much money.

  Pulling up his driveway, he tried to guess how many employees were involved in the skim outside of Vinny Acosta and his runners. He put the number at a dozen people in the casino and hotel’s accounting departments. Hard-working people who’d decided thirty-six grand a year didn’t cut it, and had decided to go to work for the mob.

  You’re all going down, he thought.

  A young woman stood on the stoop of his house. Early twenties, dirty brown hair, wearing a fake fur coat. Definitely not a ‘I’d like to talk to you about Jesus’ nut. As he pulled up the driveway, she turned around. It was Sissy, the Visine Queen. Parking, he jumped out of the car. If he was seen with another hooker, Banko would have his scalp. Approaching her, he said, “What are you doing here?”

  “Selling girl scout cookies.”

  “Who gave you my address?”

  She eyed him cooly. “I date a cop on the side. He told me.”

  “What do you want?”

  Sissy shot him a nasty look. “You’re not very hospitable.”

  “I’m on suspension. What do you want?”

  “It’s about Mona.”

  “What about her?”

  “She’s missing. I think she’s in trouble.”

  He looked up and down the street for Hatch or any other detectives that might be watching his house. The street was empty, and he escorted Sissy inside. She slipped out of her fake fur, and threw it over a chair in the dining room. She wasn’t wearing trashy clothes, or anything particularly alluring; little make-up, and no perfume. She refused to sit down, and stood next to his dining room table. She was all business.

  Sitting on the table was a box of family photographs that Lois planned to hang around the house to replace those destroyed by the burglars. The top photograph caught Sissy’s eye, and she picked it up. It was of Lois modeling a bathing suit when she was younger.

  “This your wife?”

  “That’s her,” he said.

  “She’s a beauty.”

  Valentine took a deep breath. Sissy was trying to be nice, but it didn’t matter. He wanted her to say what was on her mind, and get out of his house.

  “What happened to Mona?” he asked.

  Sissy continued to admire the photograph. “She’s disappeared. Went to the beach yesterday and never came home. We do buddy checks. When she didn’t answer her phone this morning, I went looking for her.”

  “Any luck?”

  “Just her car. It was parked in the lot of the Catholic church near the casino. I talked to the priest. He said it had been there overnight.”

  “You file a missing person’s report?”

  “No. Do you mind?”

  Before he could object, Sissy removed Lois’s photograph, and picked up the one beneath it. It was of Gerry at his fifth birthday. He was dressed in a Batman costume and was blowing out the candles on a sagging ice cream cake. Sissy rubbed his face with her thumb, then seemed embarrassed and put the photograph down.

  “Why not?” he asked.

  “I’m leaving town. I did what I could.”

  “I thought Mona was your friend.”

  “You think a missing person r
eport is going to make a difference?”

  “It’s a start,” he said, growing angry with her.

  She took her fake fur off the chair, and slipped it on. “I told Mona to stay off the streets until this sicko was caught. She didn’t listen. You know why?”

  He shook his head.

  “There’s an old expression. Quit the business, before the business quits you. Mona didn’t know when to quit.” Sissy walked to the front door, opened it, then turned and looked him square in the eye. “I do.”

  He followed her outside to the curb. Sissy drove a baby-blue Mustang, and it was packed with everything she owned, the clothes and kitchen utensils thrown across the seats like she’d robbed a rummage sale.

  “If you see her again, tell her I’m sorry,” Sissy said.

  Valentine watched her drive away, then went back inside his house.

  He sat at his kitchen table, and tried to decide what to do with the information Sissy had given him. The rules for being suspended were clear: No involvement in any active investigations. He couldn’t call Banko without getting himself in more hot water, only sitting on the information wasn’t an option, either. Not if he wanted to sleep at night, and live with his conscience. He picked up the phone and called Lois at work. His wife was on break, and he told her everything that Sissy had said.

  “You have to call Banko, and tell him,” Lois said when he was finished.

  “Even if I end up getting fired?”

  “Yes,” she said firmly.

  He’d thought of a dozen surreptitious ways of getting the information about Mona to Banko without getting involved. As if reading his thoughts, Lois said, “He may not be happy with you Tony, but he will believe you, and that’s what counts.”

  It made him feel better, knowing his wife was behind him. He told her that he loved her, then hung up and called his superior.

  “Let me get this straight. A hooker drove to your house, and gave you this information?” Banko said incredulously a few minutes later. His tone was severe, and Valentine could feel an invisible noose tightening around his neck.

  “That’s right,” he said.

  “You entertain hookers at your house often?”

  “She dates a cop. Said he gave her my address.”

  Banko swore like he’d banged his thumb with a hammer. “Did she tell you this cop’s name?”

  “No, sir.”

  “Why —”

  “I didn’t ask her.”

  “If there’s a bad apple on the force, I want to know about it.”

  Valentine was standing at his sink, looking at his postage stamp of a backyard filled with cheap kid’s playthings. It was what thirty-six grand a year bought you, and he said, “I was more concerned about Mona, if you want to know the truth.”

  There was a long pause on the other end.

  “All right, here’s what I’ll do,” Banko said. “I’ll file a Missing Person report on Mona, and distribute it to the force, along with her mug shot. In return, I want you to promise me you’ll stay off this case. If you get a lead, you’ll call me. No more rogue police work, understand?”

  Valentine gripped the receiver and felt his vision blur. Banko had called him a rogue cop. He was finished as a detective, and they both knew it.

  “Yes, sir,” he said quietly.

  The phone went dead in his hand.

  Putting his overcoat on, Valentine went outside, and got a shovel from the garage. Crossing his backyard, he stopped at the birdbath, and used his muscle to move it a few inches. It was ugly as sin, and had only stayed because he couldn’t afford to replace it.

  Then he began to dig. Two feet down, he put the shovel aside, and used his fingers. The address book and video tape were buried in plastic zip-lock bags, and he removed them from the hole, then refilled it and went back inside.

  He found a pencil and a legal pad in a kitchen drawer, and spent the next hour writing down everything he knew about the skim at Resorts. In language anyone could understand, he explained how the skim was being reported on the books, and included how Resorts’ hotel routinely over-charged customers, a practice which he’d known about, and now guessed let the hotel off-set giving away an occasional free room to a high-roller.

  Finished, he wrote up the cast of characters, which included Crowe, Brown, Freed, Mickey Wright, Vinny Acosta, the names of the runners in the address book, and the names of hotel and casino employees who did the books, and who he believed were involved. Only one name didn’t make the list, and that was Mink. Losing Marcus was punishment enough for what he’d done.

  Then he reread the report. It was four pages long. The crime he was painting would be easy for anyone to understand, including any of the local reporters he knew. But, there was also a problem. It contained a lot of insider information, and if the papers did publish it, people would know he’d written it, and he would be labeled a disgraced cop with an axe to grind. If that’s what it takes to get the truth out, so be it, he thought.

  He found an envelope in the kitchen cabinet, and sealed the report inside of it. He knew the address of the Camden Union Register by heart, and was writing it on the envelope when the phone rang. Lifting the receiver to his ear, he heard Lois’s voice.

  “I love you,” she said.

  “I love you, too,” he told her.

  “So, how did your talk with Banko go?”

  Valentine stared down at the envelope in his hands.

  “I think it’s time for a career-change,” he said.

  Chapter 48

  “I’ve got a cat in the hat,” Romaine called out.

  It was midnight, and Fossil was running the surveillance control room. It didn’t happen very often, and usually for no more than an hour or two, but it was time that Fossil cherished. He’d worked for thirty years as a department store detective, and had always reported to some asshole upstairs.

  Fossil came over to where Romaine was standing by the wall of video monitors. A cat in the hat was someone who looked out-of-place. Sometimes, the person was simply eccentric, or oddly dressed. Other times, it was a cheater hiding something illegal in their clothes, like a computer or a miniature camera or a hold-out device in their sleeve. Romaine pointed an accusing finger at a player at a craps table.

  “Him,” he said.

  Fossil stared at the suspect. Late thirties, wearing a cheap wig and tinted glasses. The high resolution black and white cameras saw through hair pieces, and Fossil could see that the man had all his hair. Which meant the wig was purely a disguise. Going to the bulletin board, he pulled down a sheet. Back at the wall, he compared the face on the sheet to the one on the screen. The guy in the wig was Izzie Hirsch.

  “Didn’t Tony bust this guy?” Romaine asked.

  “He sure did,” Fossil said. He remembered Valentine telling him about the bust. The Hirsch brothers had given up without a fight. Perfect, he thought. “I think we should take these guys in ourselves. You up for it?”

  Romaine’s face lit up. He was twenty-five years old, and still lived with his parents. They were domineering people, and Romaine yearned to break free of their grasp. It was all he talked about, besides catching cheaters.

  “You bet I am.”

  Fossil jerked his desk drawer open, and removed two pairs of handcuffs. He showed Romaine how to clip the cuffs onto his belt. Then he pulled a blackjack out of the drawer, and slapped it loudly against his palm.

  “Let’s go knock some heads,” Fossil said.

  Fossil knew what the Hirsch brothers were up to. Valentine had explained how they pulled sheep off the floor, and took them back to a rented house for a shearing. He crossed the casino with Romaine glued to his side. Taking out his money, Fossil put the biggest bill on top, and sifted through the crowd until he found Izzie Hirsch. He grabbed Izzie by the arm and in a loud voice said, “Louie, how you been?”

  Izzie gave him a funny look. Then he saw the wad of cash in Fossil’s hand.

  “Terrific,” Izzie said. “How about you?”<
br />
  “Great! This is my pal Romaine. He and I just won five grand playing craps.”

  Izzie’s’s eyes popped. “You won five big ones? Can I shake your hand?”

  “Ha, ha,” Fossil said.

  Izzie’s brothers appeared, and soon they were all bosom buddies. Izzie suggested they go back to their house, and get some food. Fossil agreed, and he and Romaine followed them in his car to a neighborhood in Chelsea Heights.