“I fucking hate people.”
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Dionne finished speaking and only then did she look back up at the screen. Dorothy ran her teeth across her lips nervously, lost deep in thought.
After a moment, the older nun cleared her throat. “Do we know how badly they are injured?”
Dionne puffed out her cheeks. “It’s hard to say. Assumpta had her arm in an improvised sling, and Bernadette … didn’t look great. I mean …”
She trailed off, unable to find other words.
“Right,” said Dorothy. “Well, I guess we knew that Bernadette would try something eventually. You know how she is.”
“Stubborn as a mule,” said Dionne.
Dorothy nodded. “Hard as it is, we need to put this to one side and focus on the plan. That is the most important thing. That is how we can help them.”
“Agreed.”
“And how are things going?”
Dionne shrugged. “As well as can be expected. Zoya’s doing amazing work on the construction. It’s incredible what she’s done in such a short space of time. The other Sisters and I have been helping.” Dionne hesitated. “Joy had to engage in some … unconventional retail activity.”
Dorothy raised an eyebrow.
“Zoya needed parts from a shop that wasn’t technically open. Joy left cash for everything she took. And for the alarm, the window, and a small porcelain pig she accidentally knocked over.”
Dorothy nodded. “Needs must. What about the church end of things?”
“Joy just picked up Smithy, whose dinner with Freddie went as well as could be expected. As he tells it, Freddie seemed very on edge before Smithy dropped some well-chosen words and made a hasty exit.”
“Do you think it will be enough?”
“Honestly?” said Dionne. “I don’t know. Freddie isn’t crucial to our plan.”
“No,” agreed Dorothy, “but if he is as smart as you say, it would be better to have him out of the way for Mr Diller’s part. That really is crucial to our plans.”
“Yes,” agreed Dionne.
That section of this whole enterprise she was particularly worried about. She didn’t know Smithy or Diller very well, and the fact that key parts of the plan now depended on them made her very nervous. Everything about the plan made her nervous – there was an awful lot that could go wrong, and she had that horrible feeling that they hadn’t even considered most of the ways it could.
At least when it came to the Sisters, she was confident that they could all carry off their roles as required and improvise when necessary. While they hadn’t been through anything quite like this before, they were certainly no strangers to challenging situations.
“Speaking of which,” said Dorothy, “have you shown Mr Smithy his mode of transport for the morning?”
“I have. He’s understandably not wild about it, but he is in. Sister Tatiana has also taken care of the other half of that equation.”
“Well,” said Dorothy, “in that case, it seems as though everything is going as well as can be expected.”
“Yes,” said Dionne.
“So what is wrong, then?”
“Do you mean other than—”
“Obviously, leaving the situation with our missing Sisters aside.”
Dionne went to speak and then hesitated, curious to know. “What makes you think something is wrong?”
“Call it a hunch,” said Dorothy.
Dionne nodded. Maybe she really was losing her touch? She’d never been this easy to read before.
“It’s Bunny,” said Dionne. “He and Breida are in their cell for the night.”
“But?” said Dorothy.
“For a while now, McGarry has been tapping his left knee three times, then his right then his left.”
“Ah,” said Dorothy. “S.O.S.”
“Yes,” confirmed Dionne. “There’s nothing we can do now, though. The plan’s locked in. We can’t change it. We just have to hope that whatever’s wrong, he can handle it until we can get him out of there.”
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Vegas is famous for several things, but somewhere well down the list comes cameras. While the city isn’t keen on the title, given how many cameras there are in every casino, Vegas is the most-surveilled city in North America – possibly the world. The thing is, while there are cameras everywhere bar the restrooms (thank you, Chuck Berry), not all cameras are by any means equal.
The cameras on the gaming tables are watched hawkishly, by sophisticated algorithms and good old-fashioned human eyeballs. Facial-recognition software on the cameras trained on every entrance means that most known problems don’t even get to a table before they’re stopped by the heavy hand-drop on the shoulder and the “Excuse me, sir”.
In Clown Town Resort and Casino, the algorithm might be slightly less sophisticated, and the eyeballs may be tired, underpaid and have résumés out trying to get a gig in any other place on the strip, but they are still there. Watching. The tables. The slots. Most of all, the customers.
The cameras in other areas, though, are not watched anywhere near as much. Sure, the footage of a five-foot-nothing woman called Rhonda, who worked in merchandise for the crazies that had taken over the place for the week, chasing down and body-slamming a drunk dude from a bachelor party who tried to steal the wrong hat, had been watched over and over again, and lovingly saved for the Christmas party, but that was the exception to the rule.
The cameras on the buffet, for example – which was widely considered to be the best thing about Clown Town – were not monitored at all. It was an all-you-can-eat affair, so if there was anybody quadrupling down at the dessert counter, it was really between the individual and their cardiologist.
Still, those cameras offered an unparalleled view of Jackson Diller, under the guise of Carl Worthington, as he entered the breakfast buffet crowded with other members of the congregation at the Celestial Church of New Hope. The following thirty-eight minutes were a textbook example of the epidemiological concept of the “super spreader”. The buffet had become what is known as a SSEV or “super-spreader event”. However, what was being spread was not a pathogen or disease of any kind. No, what was being spread was something equally as contagious – an idea.
Picture Jackson Diller as
