Shortly after Malkin started his second Bud, one of the card players emerged and walked to the bar.
“Bobby,” he called to the bartender. “Another round back there, okay? Make sure it’s Jack in my Coke this time, not that piss you’ve been sticking me with.” He turned to the man on Malkin’s right. “Murph, you seen Kaplan?”
“Not today,” came the response.
Jack and Coke grunted. “Sully ain’t happy.” He went back through the door.
Sully, Malkin assumed, was one of the men playing cards in the back room. And the fact that Sully was displeased by Kaplan’s absence tonight suggested that Sully wanted something from him. What would make a man unhappy that another altered his routine and didn’t show up at a regular card game?
If Kaplan owed Sully money, and if it were a large enough sum, it might be something that Malkin could exploit.
Malkin decided it was worthwhile to stick around to see what he could learn. Two beers and about an hour later, the card room door opened again. A lean, muscular man, in his forties, walked to the bar. “Bobby,” he said, motioning to the bartender, who was emptying a plastic bucket of ice over a cooler filled with longneck beer bottles. “Yeah, Sully. Right there.”
“Kaplan hasn’t shown his face?” Sully growled as Bobby approached.
“Haven’t seen him.”
Sully shook his head in disgust.
“That son of a bitch. Twenty grand, and he stops coming around? I never should’ve trusted him.”
The other card players filed out of the room, the game finished for the night. They’d apparently had enough liquid refreshment, because they exchanged good-byes and left. Malkin had anticipated the need to time his exit precisely, so he’d already paid his tab and nursed his beer down to the point where he could decide either to leave what was left or to change his mind and order another, all without bringing too much attention to himself. When it appeared that Sully was on the verge of going, Malkin stood, said a friendly good night to the bartender, and walked out.
Once on the street, he fast-walked to his car, from which he could see Sully when he departed. His target was close behind, and Malkin saw the lights of a BMW coupe parked a few cars ahead of him blink as Sully drew near it. Malkin had to learn what he could about the man to whom Kaplan was indebted for $20,000, so he followed as the Bimmer pulled away.
#
Sully led Malkin to a quiet neighborhood of colonial-style homes, about twenty minutes from Arnold’s. The BMW pulled into a driveway, and Malkin noted the address but continued past as the garage door slid open. He rounded the corner before Sully even exited his car.
Upon arising the next morning, Malkin accessed the county clerk’s online database of real estate records and found that the housepurchased nine years previously for just under $400,000, with a $320,000 mortgagebelonged to one Christopher Sullivan. He then turned to Facebook, which reported more than a thousand members bearing that name. But thanks to the social network’s apparent desire to abet stalkers of all ilk, restricting the search to the city in which the desired subject lived narrowed the field to five. Filtering for the approximate age zeroed in on one.
The profile picture on this Sullivan’s Facebook page confirmed that he was the man Malkin wanted. Sully enjoyed sharing information online, so Malkin learned that he had a wife, Doreen, a ten-year-old son, Adam, and a chocolate Labrador retriever, Max. Employment status: Broker with Relo Realty, a local agency. Pulling Sully’s credit report required a bit more finesse, but Malkin was not without the required resources. The report showed that Sully spent within his means, more or less, and had a satisfactory FICO score.
His only obvious vice was that he enjoyed playing poker.
Nothing in Sully’s background suggested that he was much of a threat to Kaplanother than being mighty pissed off at being stiffed for twenty grand. But a debt of that amount, while not enormous, was large enough to serve Malkin’s purpose.
#
Malkin considered visiting Relo Realty but thought better of it, as Sully would likely consider the business Malkin sought to conduct inappropriate for his office. Not wanting to bring it to Sully’s home, and wishing to avoid being seen again at Arnold’s, Malkin waited the next evening in the parking lot of the strip mall where Relo was located. At a few minutes past seven, Sully left work and headed for his car. As he approached, Malkin called to him.
“Mr. Sullivan.”
Sully looked up as Malkin reached him.
“Yes. And you are?”
“Does your wife know about the card games at Arnold’s?”
“What? Who are you?”
Sully’s face and voice confirmed what Malkin already suspected. Doreen Sullivan did not know about her husband’s gambling. Or perhaps she knew about a problem but thought that Sully had stopped. Either way, Malkin was willing to bet that the nightly games and the $20,000 debt from Kaplan were things that Sully would prefer to be kept secret.
“Who am I? I’m the man who’s going to pay off Mr. Kaplan’s obligation.”
“Uh…Kaplan send you? I’ve been looking for him. He seems to have vanished since that run of bad hands.”
“No, Mr. Sullivan. Mr. Kaplan did not send me. I am, nevertheless, prepared to pay you what he owes.”
“What’s your angle? You a friend of his?”
“That’s not your concern, Mr. Sullivan. As I said, I’m prepared to pay Mr. Kaplan’s obligation. All I require is some evidence of that debt. He gave you his marker, I assume?”
“Yeah. A worthless piece of paper. I should have known better than to trust him.”
“Then our business is simple. You give me his marker, and I will pay you $20,000.”
Malkin removed an envelope from his jacket pocket.
Sully looked around the parking lot, surprised.
“Here? Right now? Just like that?”
“If you have Mr. Kaplan’s marker with you, why not?”
Once more, Sully looked around, as if for witnesses. As if he were engaged in activity that nobody should see.
“No need to be nervous, Mr. Sullivan. Simply give me the marker, and the money is yours.”
“And what? You’ll collect from him?”
“He will become my problem. But you’ll have been paid, and he will owe you nothing.”
Sully hesitated for only an instant more. Then he looked relieved. He took out his wallet and retrieved a folded up piece of paper, which he handed to Malkin. Malkin looked at it, re-folded it, and put it in his pocket. He handed the envelope to Sully.
“Do you mind if I, uh, count it?”
“By all means, please.”
Sully keyed his remote, unlocking his car. Although there was no one else in the lot, Malkin assumed he was uneasy about examining the contents of an envelope full of money in the open. Sully got into the driver’s seat and removed the bound packets of hundred dollar bills. He performed the task efficiently, counting just one of the packets, thumbing the others to ensure that they all contained hundreds, and comparing their sizes to confirm they had the requisite number of bills. Satisfied, he turned to Malkin.
“Thanks, I guess. So, who are you, anyway?”
Instead of answering, Malkin just nodded and walked to his car.
#
Malkin would have preferred avoiding direct contact with Sully. When something untoward came to befall Kaplan, the unpaid debt would provide a possible motive. A competent investigator would find Sully, and Sully would tell authorities that he had sold the marker.
But so what? Sully did not know Malkin’s identity. More importantlyand this was the ingenuity of Malkin’s business modelMalkin did not intend to do Kaplan any harm. Nor did he intend to direct, or even suggest, that any harm come to him. In the unlikely event that the authorities should ever show up at Malkin’s door, they would have no evidence that he had done anything unlawful.
That’s not to say that Kaplan would not meet a tragic end. Or that the unpaid debt would not be
the reason. Malkin simply had to find a man who would not appreciate someone ignoring a financial obligationand who had no qualms about administering the appropriate penalty for acting dishonorably.
After a series of phone calls to various connections, Malkin found Hector Navarro, resident low-life of Atlantic City.
#
Navarro, Malkin learned, was a thug with a lengthy criminal record reflecting offenses ranging from petty theft to extortion to aggravated assault. He’d beaten murder charges on two occasionsone of which involved a victim said to have skipped out on a $10,000 gambling debt he’d been owed. According to news reports, the debt arose from a regular poker game played at a “social club” Navarro frequented. The other murder victim was someone who Navarro believed to have been cheating at that very game. Both acquittals came after prosecution witnesses decided they had been mistaken when they’d previously identified Navarro as the culprit.
Before heading to Atlantic City, Malkin had Bornstein replenish the deposit for expenses. A small part of the initial $25,000 had gone to living expenses, and the rest to buying the marker from Sully. Malkin would need more for his activities in AC. To his creditor as an indication of how desperate he was to rid himself of his partnerBornstein did not balk at the requirement of an additional $25,000. On deposit, as before, to be refunded if not used.
#
Malkin considered his second round bet, having been dealt the two draw cards he’d requested. The three other men sitting around the table had each gone in for $500. He needed to lose this hand, which he could do simply by folding, but after the first round of bets he had only $150 in, and he wanted to lose more. The dealer had fortuitously helped him by doling out useless replacements for the pair of aces he’d discarded. He still couldn’t figure out what this guy’s story was. A well-dressed man with a businesslike appearance and demeanor, he looked out of place in a skeevy Atlantic City bar lounge, blocks away from the boardwalk. But he might just be a degenerate gambler who simply didn’t care who took his money. Whoever he was, he’d done Malkin the favor of ensuring him a losing hand.
Sitting with a pair of threes, Malkin met the five hundred and raised the bet by another two hundred. The dealer and one other opponent folded, while the remaining playerHector Navarrogrunted as he tossed in some bills and called. Navarro was not a terribly talented poker playerhis game of choice was five-card draw, considered to be the simplest variant of pokerand he was incapable of masking what he thought of his cards. The grunt told Malkin that his host didn’t expect to win this round. He’d be pleasantly surprised.
Malkin mucked his cards, throwing them face down into the pile in the center of the table. “So much for bluffing,” he said, with a practiced air of resignation.
“You can’t bluff me,” Navarro said, although Malkin had established over the course of the last few days that this was not true. It didn’t matter whether Malkin wanted to win while holding a garbage hand or lose while holding a flush, Navarro had proven adept at believing what he wantedand he apparently believed that no one would have the nerve to try putting one over on him. Bluffing a man like Navarro was risky. Generally speaking, the commercial casinos did not afford players the right to look at mucked cards. If your opponent folded, presuming you to have a better hand, you could toss your cards in face down, and take the pot, and no one could demand to see the hand you’d just discarded. Such a rule would work to Malkin’s favor when he wanted to throw a hand as well. He could muck a full house to someone’s pair of aces, and no one would be the wiser. But here, at Navarro’s club, the rules were whatever Navarro said they were, and Malkin didn’t doubt that if his host wanted to take a peek at a discarded hand, Malkin’s citation to a contrary rule would not be very persuasive. Thus far, however, no one at the table had yet made any attempt to look at a mucked hand.
Navarro picked up his winnings and counted. He concentrated for a momentapparently straining at the effort of mental calculationsand smiled. “You’ve got to be down about $10,000, eh?”
Malkin knew to the penny how much he’d lost since he’d started three nights ago, but he paused to give the impression that he was verifying Navarro’s reckoning. He nodded. “I’m afraid that’s right.”
“Oh, don’t be afraid, my friend. We’re having fun, aren’t we?”
Malkin shrugged. “Depends on your point of view, I guess.”
Since the play had begun, Malkin had been up and he had been down. Right now, he was down. As Navarro had just pointed out, he was about ten thousand dollars in the hole. But poker was primarily a game of skill, not luck, and Malkin was precisely where he’d intended to be. Indeed, since he’d first sat down at this table earlier in the week, he had been able to orchestrate his position with near exactitude. Accomplishing this was made easier by the fact that Navarro evidently recognized his own limitations when it came to playing poker. This game was by invitation only, and he tended to invite players who were not too proficient. Malkin’s source had known the right things to say in order to secure a place for him at the table, and his winnings and losses were meant to project the image of a gambler not afraid to take risks and not always that “lucky.”
“Another hand,” Navarro declared. “I want more of your money, and you, no doubt, want to try to win some of it back.” He looked around the table.
The man to Malkin’s left shook his head. “I’m done for the night. It’s after twelve.” To Malkin’s right, the well-dressed fellow who’d dealt the last hand agreed. “That’s it for me too.”
Navarro looked at Malkin. “You bailing out too? Too much heat for you?”
This was the situation Malkin had been engineering since the beginning. Down by a sizable amount, and just Navarro and him left in the game. If the others hadn’t dropped out, he could have kept going, but now was as good a time as any to finish it off. But he had to proceed carefully.
“Hector,” he began. “I find myself in an awkward position.” He cleared his throat, as if reluctant to continue. “That was my last seven hundred. I’m through.”
Navarro’s eyes opened wide. “You, my friend? You can’t be completely tapped out. I cannot let you leave without giving you a sporting chance to regain at least some of your pride.”
Malkin shifted uneasily in his seat.
“Come. Tell me what’s on your mind,” Navarro prodded.
“I have a marker. Someone who owes me $20,000.” He retrieved it from his pocket. “You’re a gambling man, Hector. One hand. For twenty thousand dollars.”
Navarro gazed at him in silence, aware that the others were watching for his reaction to what seemed to be a challenge. He tongue flicked his lips, and he smiled.
“A gamble, yes. If I win, I get a marker from someone I don’t know. Surely you don’t expect full value$20,000if you win. We must even the odds, if I am to play along.”
Malkin appeared to consider Navarro’s point.
“That would be fair, I suppose. The marker carries an element of risk and should be discounted to a degree. Would fifty percent be fair? If you win, you get the marker. If I win, I make back the $10,000 I’ve lost since we started.”
Navarro thought for a moment and then nodded.
“Do we understand that I do not guarantee this man’s payment?” Malkin asked. “If I lose and you take the marker as yours, collection is up to you, and I bear no responsibility.”
At this, Navarro smiled broadly. “Ah, you’ve come to know me well these past few days. Yes, I like a gamble. The risk will be mine. There are not many who owe me and fail to pay, so I have little to worry about thereonly, perhaps, a bit of extra sport. This would be what I believe bankers refer to as a non-recourse transaction. You have my word, as a gentleman, that if I win that marker, I will not look to you for payment of the debt.”
“Then let’s play.”
Navarro counted out ten thousand dollars and placed the bills in a pile in the center of the table. He motioned to Malkin, who placed Kaplan’s marker on top.
/> The other two men had watched this exchange in silence. Neither moved to leave, and they seemed intent on seeing the anticipated hand play out. The one Malkin had come to think of as the businessman finally spoke out.
“How about if I deal?”
Navarro nodded. “Yes. You deal.”
“Name’s Walker,” the dealer said, looking at Malkin, as if it should mean something to him.
Walker passed cards around, and Malkin kept a practiced expressionless face as he saw that he had just been dealt a royal flushthe ten, Jack, Queen, King, and Ace of clubs. The odds of were astronomical. Indeed, Malkin knew them to be almost one in 650,000. Careful not to look up from his hand, he could see out of the corner of his eye that Walker was watching him. One way or another, Malkin had to lose this particular hand. His face still blank, he looked across at Navarro, who was silentno customary grunt to telegraph a weak hand. That was good. Better that he thought he held a winner when Malkin ultimately folded.
Malkin had to make some kind of play, so he removed the Jack, King, and Ace from his hand and placed them face down next to the pot. “Three,” he said to Walker. Rather than looking at his new hand right away, he kept his eyes on Navarro to see his move.
“Two,” Navarro declared, placing his discards on the table.
Navarro picked up the cards that were dealt him and broke out into a huge grin when he looked at them.
“Top that,” he said, and he laid down a full houseAces over Kings.
Malkin finally checked his cards, and it took every bit of self-control not to react. It was almost as if Walker were purposely dealing him a winning hand. He had retained the ten and Queen of clubs, and his new cards were the three remaining Queens.
He had Navarro beat. He’d have to muck the hand if he was to pass Kaplan’s marker off to this goon.
The Thrill List Page 12