Fast and Loose

by Fern Michaels

  “Why would you think that, Mr. Justice?”

  “Please, call me Pete.” He thought about her question for a minute, then said, “I really don’t know why I thought that. Dixson must have said something.”

  “Speaking of Dixson, where is he? Do you know? We’ve been trying to locate him with texts and phone calls. They all go to his voice mail. Bert is beside himself, as he’s been trying to reach him for hours. The people I came here with are all out here somewhere looking for him.”

  “He’s not answering any of my pages or texts, either. He’s due back here at ten o’clock to relieve me. He’s never, ever, to my knowledge, been unavailable to Bert, me, or this casino. I hate to say this, but I am worried something happened to him. I’m seriously thinking of calling around to the hospitals and clinics to see if he had an accident or something.”

  Well, this guy is certainly chatty, Maggie thought. He did look genuinely concerned, however, and she knew for a fact, thanks to Abner, that Pete Justice was not involved in anything that was about to go down. A nice, likable guy, but a babe in the woods, was her next thought.

  “Maybe he had some personal business he had to take care of,” Maggie said helpfully.

  “I guess. I have to leave you here and get back on the floor. If you need anything, just call. I really like this dog,” Justice said, scratching Cyrus behind the ears. “Sorry about that mix-up with you checking out.”

  “No problem,” Maggie said, leading Cyrus through the door.

  It was a perfect evening, Maggie thought as she looked up at the star-studded sky. Not even sweater weather. Almost summer weather.

  As she walked along, Maggie wondered what she was doing out here with a dog. She should be back inside, where she could be of help, if need be. She rounded the corner, walked to the end, then turned around and headed back. She stopped twice when Cyrus tugged her to a tree or pole. And then they were back inside the casino, where the slot machines beckoned.

  She fished around in her pocket and found a crumpled ten-dollar bill. Knowing she was going to lose it, she straightened it out and slid it into the slot. She waited, pushing the red button again and again, until finally she heard a blasting whistling sound. She looked down at three diamonds and grinned at Cyrus. “What that means to you is that you can have a porterhouse steak if you want it. I just won three hundred fifty dollars!”

  Maggie carried the winning slip over to the cashier and asked if the Sunshine Foundation lady worked at night. The harried cashier pointed her in the right direction. “Let’s give that little lady a treat, Cyrus. Here. You clamp it in your teeth and give it to her.”

  Cyrus yipped his pleasure and did as instructed. The little lady beamed and held out her hand. Cyrus offered up his paw, and they shook hands.

  Across the floor, by the penny slots, Pete Justice watched Maggie and the shepherd head for the elevators. He’d always prided himself on having good gut instincts, and right now those gut instincts were warning him that something wasn’t right. He looked down at his watch. It was almost ten o’clock, and still no word from the boss. He fired off a text and asked for an update. He didn’t know how he knew, but he was absolutely certain there would be no updated text coming through anytime soon.

  Justice sent off a text to his aide, Artie Ryan, and told him to take over for twenty minutes. Justice was going to the Tiki Bar for a ginger ale. All he wanted to do was sit down in a dark corner and try to figure out what was going on and how it involved him, if it involved him. His gut was telling him that whatever was going on was serious. He carried his drink to the far end of the bar, sat down, and closed his eyes, but not before his phone chirped that a text was coming through. So much for a quiet twenty minutes, he thought when he saw that the text was from Bert, asking if Dixson was back. He hoped his succinct no would end the matter and he could relax. He was way too tense. Way, way too tense.

  Ten o’clock came and went. Justice was back on the floor, having relieved Artie Ryan. His gaze swept the casino floor; he was hoping for a sighting of his boss.

  Nothing.

  * * *

  Director Sparrow of the FBI was proud of himself and had turned himself into a pretzel to pat his own back at how quickly he’d put together a team of agents to hit the casinos and bring in the showgirls for questioning. Admittedly, there had been a lot of shrieking, wailing, cursing, and shouting, with the agents simply flashing their gold shields. No one in authority had intervened when they saw the agents holding up their shields and the huge yellow block letters on the back of the Windbreakers, clearly proclaiming them to be FBI special agents. Their matching ball caps, along with their guns, had confirmed that they were indeed federal agents.

  Right now, Sparrow was standing in the middle of a living nightmare, making him wish with all his heart that he was back in Charles Martin’s suite.

  The women had been separated, eight to a room, with three agents overseeing them in each. Sparrow whistled between his teeth for silence, with no results. The women were caterwauling so loud, his ears hurt. There were feathers everywhere, along with glitter and rhinestones. He winced when his feet crunched down on some oversize rhinestones that had come off their costumes. He sneezed as he plucked a feather that was sticking to his eyebrow. He looked over at the agents and asked them why they hadn’t allowed the women to change.

  One of the agents said, “Because the directive said, ‘ASAP and no excuses.’”

  One of the women was screaming about how much she’d paid for her costume, which was now ruined. “The goddamned FBI better pony up, like, right now. Now!” she screeched at the top of her lungs.

  The others chimed in, and from there on in, it was pure bedlam. Then, as if members of a chorus, they started to chant, “We want a lawyer! We want a lawyer! We demand a lawyer!” The chant turned into an earsplitting scream.

  Sparrow weighed his options. He had none. These women were never going to shut up, and he knew it. Because he was always an agent, and was now the director of the FBI, Sparrow was never without a gun. He yanked it out from the back of his pants and brandished it in the air. It had absolutely no effect on the screeching hellcats. Sparrow clenched his teeth and fired into the ceiling tiles. The room went so silent, Sparrow thought he’d lost his hearing for a second.

  “You all need to be quiet now, or the next bullet goes into one of your kneecaps. Whose? I’ll just pick one of you at random and, poof, your dancing days are over,” he said. “Now, please, give me your undivided attention.”

  Feathers sailed across the front of his face. He brushed at them. Purple feathers! He thought about pocketing one of them so he would always remember this moment in time.

  “Do any of you know why you’re here?” He really didn’t expect an answer, so he wasn’t surprised when the room remained silent. “Okay, here’s a clue. Does the Dixson Kelly Alumnae Club ring any bells? Before you respond, I want to remind you that it is a felony to lie to an FBI agent. Now, who wants to go first?”

  No one wanted to go first. The women tried to huddle closer to each other, but their feathered wings and foot-high, rhinestone-encrusted headpieces kept getting in the way.

  “Take those damn things off,” he ordered.

  “What? What?” the women screamed in unison.

  “So you can see our naked bodies! That is not going to happen, Mister FBI Agent! These wings are sewn onto the costume!” one of them said.

  Properly chastised, Sparrow looked around at his agents, who were trying to look everywhere but at him. Gun in hand, Sparrow waved his arms about. “Okay, I did not know that. Let’s be clear on something right now. No one wants to look at your naked bodies. Let me repeat that. No one wants to look at your naked bodies. So this is what we’re going to do. We’re going to bend your wings, and then you are all going to sit down on the floor and fold your hands. Legs straight out in front of you, like you used to do in grade school, at story time. That will give me a clear shot at your kneecaps. I’m ready to listen to what
you have to say about your . . . club. Talk!”

  A brash blonde with glitter on her impossibly long eyelashes looked straight at Sparrow and said, “We do not know what you are talking about, Mr. Director.” A cloud of pink and purple feathers circled upward. The other dancers agreed with her that they didn’t know anything about Dixson Kelly or a fan club with his name on it.

  Sparrow sighed. He looked over at the three agents, who still had their guns in their hands. “Tell you what. Guys, take these women down to a holding cell. Start the paperwork, but there’s no hurry. We have about seventy-one hours to go. I’ll check the other rooms to see if those women are more willing to cooperate. By the way, there are no bathrooms in the holding cells. I need you to know that. Make sure you put that in the paperwork, Agent Connors. We don’t want any he said, she said comments later. I apprised them of the fact that there are no bathrooms in the holding cells. Feel free to give them all the water they want.”

  The women started to hiss and snarl among themselves. Finally, a luscious redhead tried to raise her arm, which was covered in glitter.

  “Assuming we might know a little something, will you let us leave here if we share it with you?” she asked.

  “Now, that depends on what that little something turns out to be,” Sparrow said, tongue in cheek.

  “So we have this little club. So what!” the redhead said. “We bash Dixson Kelly for breaking our hearts. It makes us feel better. There’s nothing wrong with that. We didn’t harm anyone.”

  “Didn’t you leave something out?” Sparrow asked as more feathers, yellow this time, floated up and about.

  “Well, it goes without saying, we all hate his guts. You being a man and all, plus being the director of the FBI, I thought you would figure that out on your own. Can we leave now?” a silver-haired dancer said.

  “I’m talking about the plot, the plan, whatever you want to call it, that Kelly and your pal Kitty Passion, aka Clare Andreas, hatched to heist the armored car with Babylon’s money in it,” Sparrow said.

  The women as one tried to get up, but their feathered wings got snarled together, and they were forced to remain in place. There were feathers everywhere. Sparrow thought he looked like a rainbow, as the feathers stuck to his sports jacket and trousers.

  “Are you going to confirm or deny?” Sparrow roared.

  “We want a lawyer!” the blonde with the glitter on her eyelashes bellowed in return.

  “Well, of course you do.” Sparrow turned to the agents and said, “Put them all in a holding cell. If they give you any trouble, shoot them.”

  “Yes, sir!” one of the agents said.

  Sparrow bolted from the room as he tried to pluck the feathers from his clothing. He stepped into a small, cramped office that was empty and pulled out his cell phone. He gave Charles an update on what had just transpired. He could hear Charles’s suppressed laughter and winced. He turned serious when he listened to Charles tell him what Abner had sent Maggie.

  “Well, if that’s the case, then I can leave my agents here to take care of things and head back to Babylon.”

  Sparrow poked his head in the door and motioned for one of the agents to step outside.

  “First things first. For God’s sake, don’t shoot anyone. What I said in there was pure theatrics. Second, find them some clothes and don’t let them out of your sight,” Sparrow instructed. “Even though we can legally hold them for seventy-two hours, we’ll let them call their attorneys in the morning. But don’t do it until you check with me first. Let the ladies cool their heels until then, and I guarantee they’ll be falling all over themselves to get out from under. And get someone to clean up those damn feathers and that other junk. The place looks like a bordello.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “You did good, son. You did good. All of you will get a good report. You need me, call.”

  Sparrow walked outside and into the cool evening air and took deep breaths. He did not envy the agents, given what the rest of the night held in store for them. As he walked along, trying to hail a taxi, he couldn’t see the people turning to look at his back and the trail of feathers that were being plucked from his jacket and pants by the gentle breeze. If he had seen the people staring, he wouldn’t have cared.

  “Women!”

  Chapter 20

  Jack Emery knew that he looked like half the tourists in Las Vegas, so he wasn’t overly concerned about his quasi disguise as he leaned up against the side of a plate-glass window so he could keep his eyes on the door of Chezmarie, where Dixson Kelly and Kitty Passion were dining. He yanked at his baseball cap and settled it lower on his forehead as he talked on his cell phone to Charles Martin. As a disguise, he realized it was on the pitiful side, but it was the best he could come up with on his own, without the benefit of Alexis Thorne’s red bag of tricks.

  “I’m good so far, Charles. They should be finishing up shortly. Harry and Dennis are several buildings away. I can’t see them, but I know where they are precisely. Any news?”

  “Avery’s female operatives out at the chicken ranch are on the way back to town. They came up dry. Aside from several changes of clothing—mostly casual wear, shorts, jeans, that kind of thing—there is nothing in the house to indicate anyone plans on staying there. As Maggie said earlier, at first glance, to her it all looked temporary. Little to no food in the refrigerator, the bare essentials in the bathroom. The women spoke to the foreman, who, they said, was quite chatty. He said his orders have always been not to interfere or mingle with anyone staying at the house. He also said he has always been given the name of the current guest for mail purposes.

  “The woman who stayed there before Kitty Passion was someone named Diane Sarrocco from Summerville, South Carolina, along with her daughter, Lisa Pepin, and Ms. Pepin’s young son. Mr. Pepin, the daughter’s husband, was to be a later arrival. Those guests are personal friends of the Boltons. They stayed for two months and left. Very nice people. A week later, Kitty Passion showed up. He said the only time he knows when she’s there is if she throws a party, like she did a few days ago. He can’t be sure, because he minds his own business, but he thinks the party people are the same each time.”

  “So,” Jack said, “where are Snowden’s operatives now? And where is Snowden?”

  “The operatives are on the way back. I don’t know where Avery is. He hasn’t checked in as yet. Maggie got antsy and took Cyrus for a walk, and she ran into Pete Justice on the casino floor. They talked for a few minutes, and no, he has not heard from Kelly, either. Neither have I. Bert checked in, and he is furious at being unable to contact his number one man.”

  “Ted and Espinosa?”

  “Pretending to gamble. They’re scouting the casino floor for anything that seems odd or out of place. Just a minute, Jack. Director Sparrow is reporting in. His agents rounded up the showgirls, and they’re being held at the field office.” A minute later, Charles said, “I understand there was a bit of a to-do with the women, but for now it’s all on lockdown. Of course, they are all demanding lawyers. I think that’s about it. What do you plan on doing, Jack?”

  “I’m going to do my best to stay with Kelly, but this cab situation stinks. There’s no way, with this never-ending traffic, that I can successfully follow him. It would be great if Avery’s people could somehow make it at least halfway here so we could switch off if I lose Kelly. There are hundreds of people milling about in the streets. Harry and Dennis are on Kitty Passion. She drove here from the chicken ranch. The question is, is she going back there after dinner or staying in town? We never did find out if she has a place here. How did that get by us, Charles?” Jack said fretfully.

  “I’ll have Maggie get on it right now.”

  “Since Kitty drove in from the ranch, she might give Dixson a ride, drop him off somewhere. Or he might decide it’s a nice night and opt to walk to wherever he’s going. It’s ten o’clock now, so they should be coming out soon.”

  “Unless they left by the back doo
r, through the kitchen. That’s what they always do in the movies,” Charles said, with a chuckle in his voice.

  “No actual egress. I checked earlier. Deliveries are through the front door. Space here is at a premium. He has to walk through the front door. Anything else?”

  “Not at the moment. The minute you have eyes on, call me. We need to make a decision. Hold on. Hold on, Jack. I have a text coming in from Avery.”

  Jack waited, tapping his foot impatiently, until Charles’s voice came back on the line.

  “Avery said he has a hunch that Kelly is going to go by his own condo. According to the street map I have here, Mr. Kelly could walk to his home from Chezmarie, and that might be why he chose that particular restaurant. But why would he do that when he is supposed to relieve Mr. Justice?”

  Charles’s voice was now as fretful sounding as Jack’s. “Here’s the address, Jack. Remember it, as I know you can’t write it down. Just in case Mr. Kelly gets away from you. Avery will be waiting for you all. Let’s hope his instincts are right.”

  Jack broke the connection and shoved his phone into his pocket. He looked at his watch. He fought the urge to run into Chezmarie and physically drag Dixson Kelly outside so he could beat the hell out of him. Wishful thinking.

  Jack blinked, then blinked again. Straight in his line of vision were Dixson Kelly and Kitty Passion. The couple moved off to the side to allow a party of four to exit through the same door. From where he was standing, it looked like the two of them were deep into an intense conversation. From what he could see from where he was, neither one looked happy. He looked around, hoping Harry and Dennis were seeing the same thing he was seeing.

  Jack was starting off, trying to do his best to remain invisible, when it dawned on him that what he was doing didn’t feel right. He stepped out of the way and leaned against a brick building. He brought his phone to his ear so people wouldn’t give him a second thought or glance. What they were doing was all wrong. He questioned himself, replayed all that Charles had confided.