The little Greek said it like he was commenting about the weather. Only his voice was strained, and Valentine realized he was dying inside.
“The Gaming Control Board will take the assets of the thirty employees who ripped you off,” Valentine said. “You can use that to run the casino until you get a loan from a bank.”
Nick laughed harshly. “That’s not going to happen. Chance Newman and Rags Richardson and Shelly Michael control the banks—they run a few billion bucks through them every year. I’m a small fry. I’ve got no juice.”
Juice. It was the magic elixir in Las Vegas, even more powerful than money. Who you knew, and how well you knew them. And Nick was saying he didn’t have any.
“Have you considered selling the place?” Valentine asked as the elevator docked.
“I’ve had offers,” Nick said. “Venture capitalists, banks. Everybody wants to tear the place down, put in a big moron-catcher. Know what I tell them?”
“No.”
“I tell them to get lost.”
As they got out of the elevator, Nick punched Valentine in the arm. It really stung, and Valentine thought he understood. Nick had accepted that his run was over.
“Let’s nail these people ripping me off,” he said.
They found Wily in the surveillance control room, hovering before the wall of video monitors. He was watching the roulette table, and Valentine could tell by the hunch in his shoulders that he was on to something.
“Figure out what Fontaine’s gang is doing?”
Wily nodded, surprising Valentine by not gloating over it.
“So tell us,” Nick said.
“The gang is double past-posting,” Wily replied.
Valentine was impressed. He’d only seen the scam once, down in Puerto Rico, where the game of roulette bordered on high art. The San Juan gang had lightened the house by over a million bucks. He decided not to steal Wily’s thunder.
“How?” he asked.
Wily pointed at the monitors. Because the roulette layout was large, two cameras covered the action. One camera watched the wheel, while the second watched the layout on which the bets were made. It was impossible for anyone in surveillance to watch both cameras at once, a fact known to most roulette gangs.
“The gang has three members,” Wily said. “The dealer, and two women standing at the end of the table.”
He pointed at two women playing roulette. Both were dressed like tourists. One was quiet and reserved, the other a blond woman who liked to bang the table.
“The quiet one’s past-posting. In the last twenty minutes, she’s won five grand. The reason we’re not seeing it is because the dealer and the table-banger are distracting us. Watch.”
They watched the ivory ball roll around the wheel. As it started to slow down, the dealer announced the betting was over. The ball landed, and they saw the table-banger attempt to place a late bet. The dealer stopped her and politely explained that the betting was over. Then he pushed her chips back.
“You see it?” Wily asked.
“See what?” Nick said.
“The dealer is blocking the camera when he pushes the chips back. The quiet one is sneaking a bet onto the layout behind his arm. No one pays attention to her.”
Nick looked at Valentine. “You ever seen this scam before?”
It was the stupidest damn thing, but Valentine found himself feeling proud of Wily. He’d smartened up, something chumps rarely did. So Valentine lied and said, “Heard about it, but never seen it.”
“No kidding.” Nick looked at Wily. “If the past-posting is hidden from the camera, how we going to nail them?”
“Was hidden,” Wily informed him.
“Let me guess,” Nick said. “You sent someone down to the floor with a video cam, and captured the whole thing.”
Wily smiled. “Yes, sir. I was thinking of letting the woman leave and having her followed. Who knows. Maybe she’ll lead us to Fontaine.”
Nick beamed at him. “Good thinking. Tony, the kid’s sharp, isn’t he?”
A few years ago, Valentine had likened Wily to a dog trying to walk on its hind legs. No more. “Real sharp,” he said.
Nick slung his arm around Wily’s shoulder. Then he led Wily across the room to a secluded corner and broke the bad news to him. Wily had worked for Nick for seventeen years, which was a lifetime by Las Vegas standards, and Valentine watched Wily’s face change as Nick explained that the Acropolis was doomed. Wily kept trying to interject, but Nick wouldn’t let him. It was over.
By the time Nick was finished, the head of security was weeping.
At a quarter of four, the thirty people responsible for destroying Nick’s empire began to file into the basement meeting room of the Acropolis.
Valentine watched them on the video monitors. The new hires were laughing and joking, unaware they were about to be busted. Nick appeared by his side, chewing a handful of Tums and gulping down water.
“Fucking rats,” Nick said. “I wish this was thirty years ago.”
“Why’s that?”
“In the old days, casinos shot cheaters in the head and buried them in the desert.”
Valentine glanced at him. “You ever do that?”
“Who cares?”
“I like to know who I’m working for.”
“No. I just had their legs broken.”
“That was civil of you.”
“Didn’t have a choice. There were no surveillance cameras back then. Sometimes you could snap a picture from the catwalk, but it was hard. Usually, it was your word against theirs in court. Juries didn’t buy it, and the cheaters walked.”
“So you broke their legs to keep them away.”
“Just one leg.”
“Why only one?”
“I didn’t want them becoming cripples. A guy with a cane can get around, find a job, lead a normal life. I’ve got principles, you know?”
Valentine’s eyes returned to the monitor. Wily was in the basement, standing directly in the camera’s eye. When all the new hires were present, he would stick a pen behind his ear. That was the signal for Nick to come down without Wily calling him and arousing suspicion.
“How much security is down there?” Valentine asked.
“Twenty of my best guys.”
“Remember those martial arts creeps Fontaine sprang on you last time?”
Nick called downstairs and doubled security outside the meeting room. Hanging up, he said, “If they start to tango, you want a piece of one?”
Valentine looked at him like he’d lost his mind. “Me?”
“Yeah. Weren’t you a judo champion? The TV movie said you were.”
“About a hundred years ago.”
“Come on, you’re not afraid of these young punks, are you?”
Nick was putting on a brave face, and Valentine tried to think of something to say. He almost told Nick the truth, which was that if you lived long enough, all good things in your life came to an end. On the monitor, he saw Wily stick a pen behind his ear. Nick saw it as well, and hurried from the room.
Five minutes later, Nick and forty security guards rushed into the basement meeting room and announced that the new hires were being held on suspicion of cheating the house.
Valentine was the last through the door. He saw several females start to weep. Other employees lay on the
