weighed two hundred pounds, with jet-black hair and coloring that betrayed his Sicilian heritage.
The crowd leaving the casino was moving to its own rhythm. Resorts was a spruced-up pile of bricks in a crumbling city — “A shit house with carpet,” proclaimed a dirty-mouthed comic the opening night — yet no one seemed to care. People came here to gamble, and every night since Resorts had opened, thousands had packed its floors.
Doyle attempted to push his way through the crowd. Stymied, he flashed his badge. “Police,” he announced loudly.
Pimps had better hearing that most dogs. The Prince’s head snapped. Seeing them, he started to run. Valentine drew a snub-nosed.38 from his pocket holster.
“
The crowd parted like the Red Sea, and the two detectives ran past the fountain in front of the casino. The Prince had gotten a good jump on them, and was already a block away. He had a long, relaxed gait, and did not seem concerned that he was being pursued.
“I’m right behind you,” Doyle said.
Valentine hadn’t lost a foot race in years. He picked up the pace, and saw the Prince jump into a pink Cadillac with a Rolls Royce grill. The Caddy pulled away from the curb just as Valentine caught up.
“I’m going to get you!” he declared.
The driver’s window came down, and the Prince flipped him the bird. It made his blood boil and he continued to run, not seeing the monster pothole in the middle of the street.
Valentine didn’t know which hurt more; not catching the Prince, or falling down and tearing out the knees of his jeans. They were his favorite pair, and he sat in an unmarked car with his partner, cursing his luck.
“Maybe the department will reimburse you,” Doyle said.
“Maybe the moon will fall out of the sky,” Valentine replied.
“Look on the bright side. Our shift just ended.”
“Let’s get something to eat. My treat.”
They drove to the Howard Johnson’s on the north end of the island. There were plenty of good places to eat in Atlantic City —the White House Sub Shop, Angelo’s Tavern, Tony’s Baltimore Grille — but Hojo’s coffee was always fresh. Pulling into the lot, they both stared at an Out of Business sign made to look like a funeral notice hanging in the window. Through the window Valentine saw that the restaurant’s trademark ice cream churn was gone.
“Guess they couldn’t compete with Resorts’ $1.99 buffet,” Doyle said.
“Guess not.”
Resorts had the cheapest food in town, and was driving the local restaurants out of business. The politicians had said that legalized gambling would be a boom to Atlantic City. So far, the only boom had been inside the casino.
“Let’s go somewhere else,” Valentine suggested.
Doyle drove south, and found a twenty-four hour Jack-in-the-Box in an area called Snake Alley. The food was garbage, but that was what you got at six-thirty in the morning. They drank coffee and shared a bag of greasy french fries. Valentine’s knees were aching from where he’d fallen. On top of that, he was in a lousy mood and didn’t want to take his bad attitude home to his wife and son. He said, “Heard any good jokes?”
Doyle put his coffee down. He had been cheering Valentine up since they were kids. “This traveling salesman knocks on the door of a house. The door opens, and a ten-year-old kid steps out holding a cigar and a can of beer. The salesman says, ‘Are your parents home?’ And the kid says, ‘What the hell do you think?’”
Valentine sipped his coffee and grinned. The radio on the dashboard crackled, and Marlene, the dispatcher on the graveyard shift said, “Pick up if you can hear my voice.”
“You up for it?”
“You’re the one who fell down.”
“I didn’t fall down, I tripped. There’s a difference.”
Doyle smiled. “Yeah, I’m up for it.”
Valentine answered the call. “Hey Marlene, what’s up?”
“Detectives Crowe and Brown are arresting an armed suspect at the Rainbow Arms apartment complex,” she said. “They’ve requested back-up. Can you help them?”
The Rainbow Arms was less than five minutes away. It had been a long, frustrating night; maybe assisting in a collar would make them both feel better. Doyle mouthed the word yes.
“Tell them we’ll be right there,” he said, grabbing the last french fry.
Atlantic City was the last stop on a railroad to nowhere. It was there because
Crowe and Brown stood beside one of the block’s few trees. The detectives were wearing bulky bulletproof vests and had twenty-gauge Remington shotguns cradled in their arms. They were not the friendliest pair, and wore grim looks.
“Hey,” Valentine said.
“What are you doing here?” Crowe snapped.
