The dealer was a tanned stud named Evan. Evan removed the six decks of cards from the discard rack and shuffled them on the table.
“Place sure is busy for a Wednesday night,” Billy said.
“The old rock acts bring out the geezers,” Evan said. “They sit in the audience stoned out of their minds and sing along.”
“Hey, I resemble that remark,” Gabe said.
Evan continued to shuffle. Decks of cards in a prearranged order were every casino’s worst nightmare. To prevent this scam from happening, dealers were required to shuffle under the watchful eye of a surveillance camera directly over the table. The shuffling was recorded and would be scrutinized by security if the table lost a large sum of money. Evan was a veteran dealer, and his nimble fingers made the cards purr.
“So what brings you folks to beautiful Lake Tahoe?” Evan asked.
His crew went into their spiels. Lying about your past wasn’t easy, and Billy was pleased at how effortlessly each of them had slipped into their new roles.
Evan slid a yellow plastic cut card toward Billy. Billy had decided to steal three grand from the Montbleu, which would pay for the rented house and their meals.
“Let one of the ladies do the honors,” Billy said.
Evan slid the cut card toward Misty.
“What am I supposed to do?” she asked innocently.
“Stick the plastic card somewhere in the middle,” Evan said.
Misty smiled flirtatiously. It was the perfect distraction, and she let the cut card fan through a slug of six cards, slightly separating their edges as a fiber-optic lens hidden in her fingertip recorded their values. The lens was concealed by flesh-colored plastic that ran into her sleeve and down into a hidden receiver in her purse. From there, the information was transmitted to an LED display stitched into the rim of Gabe’s baseball cap.
Gabe stared into the cap’s rim, spying the six cards’ values. His next task was to communicate to the crew what each of their first cards would be during the round. Gabe accomplished this by toying with his chips. Each player got two cards in blackjack. By knowing the value of one of those cards, the player gained an enormous edge over the house.
Based upon Gabe’s secret signals, Billy was about to get an ace, Travis a ten, Misty a four, Pepper a five, Cory a king, and Morris a jack.
Billy made a large bet, since the odds of him winning with an ace were high. Travis, Cory, and Morris also made large bets, since their odds of winning were also good. Misty and Pepper made small bets, since their odds of losing were high.
The scam took five seconds to execute. Had Evan been paying attention, he might have spotted the optic fiber in Misty’s sleeve. But Evan could not stop looking into Misty’s bedroom eyes, and as a result, he completely missed the play.
Evan cut the cards at the spot Misty had made with the cutter, and slid the six decks into the dealing shoe. “Good luck, everyone,” he said.
Evan dealt the round.
Billy, Travis, Cory, and Morris won their hands, while Misty and Pepper lost their hands. This put them ahead three thousand bucks on a single round of cards.
It was a sweet scam, and it didn’t get old. Like Billy’s mentor Lou Profaci was fond of saying, it sure beat working. Billy decided to end the scam early so they could return to the rented house. In a few short days, they were going to take down a casino for many millions of dollars, and that was worth celebrating over.
Some people get caught in a time warp from which they never escape. The owners of the rented house were stuck in the eighties, and the house’s interior was a tribute to chintz. Sitting at the dining room table, Billy gave his crew a final pep talk.
“For the next three days, we’re going to be given access to a make-believe world called Comp City,” the young hustler said. “It won’t seem real, and that’s because it isn’t. Incredible hotel suites, the most delicious food you’ve ever eaten, servants at your beck and call, shopping sprees, and all of it’s going to be free. Whatever you do, don’t act impressed. Understand?”
“Will we have to sign for anything?” Misty asked.
“No. But you are expected to tip generously. Remember, I’m going to be impersonating a whale, and you’re all my friends.”
“Got it.”
“Are the suites wired?” Cory asked.
“They might be. To be safe, don’t say anything out of character,” Billy said.
“My lips are sealed.”
“I’m confused,” Pepper said. “Our reservations are at the Rio, but we’re planning to scam the Carnivale Casino, which is on the other side of Vegas. How does that work?”
“We’re going to be lured from the Rio to Carnivale by a VIP host,” Billy explained. “Carnivale has the most aggressive VIP hosts in Las Vegas, and they’re known to hit their competitors’ casinos and steal away their whales.”
“Steal how?”
“With incentives. If a whale has a history of losing a million or more a weekend, a Carnivale host might offer him a hundred grand to play with, just to make him switch.”
“Free money?”
“That’s right. Carnivale knows they’ll make it back. They also give whales rebates on their losses as high as twenty percent. Say a whale blows a million bucks in a weekend. In reality, the first hundred grand is free, and he gets rebated another hundred and eighty grand on the back end.”
“Rich people have it made.”
“Yes, they do. Any other questions?”
“You still haven’t told us how this scam at Carnivale’s going to work,” Travis said. “Hell, we don’t even know what the scam is.”
“Yeah, why the secrecy?” Cory asked.
“Don’t you trust us?” Morris chimed in.
His crew was the closest thing Billy had to family, and he would have trusted each of them with his life. But when it came to stealing, loose lips sunk ships, and there was no good reason to add another element of risk to the heist, which was why he hadn’t told them exactly how the scam would go down on Saturday afternoon at Carnivale’s casino.
“If Billy didn’t trust you, you wouldn’t be here,” Gabe said, coming to the defense.
“Do you know what the scam is?” Cory asked.
“Of course I know what it is. I built the gaff to make it work,” Gabe said proudly.
“So why won’t you tell us?” Cory asked.
“Because if more than two people know something, it’s no longer a secret,” Gabe replied. “Would you be happy if I told you it’s going to make us really rich?”
“Stratosphere rich?” Morris asked.
“Close enough.”
“I can dig that.”
“I’d still like to know what I’m getting myself into,” Travis said. The big man had a new wife and two young stepsons and was less risk tolerant than the other members of the crew. “You know, just to put my mind at ease.”
Billy understood where Travis was coming from and said, “What’s the hardest part of ripping off a casino?”
“Getting the money out of the joint,” Travis replied.
“That’s right. If the casino suspects a scam, they won’t pay off until they review the surveillance tapes. It’s ruined more than one heist. Well, I figured out a way around that.”
“How?”
“I can’t tell you that. But it’s rock solid.”
“They won’t feel the loss?”
Billy shook his head. “Not until we’re long gone,” he added.
“This is sounding better all the time,” Travis said. “Can you tell us the haul?”
“It will be more than ten million.”
“How can they not feel ten million?”
“I can’t tell you that. But they won’t. At least not right away.”
“What’s our cut?” Travis asked.
“The usual.”