"My place or yours?" she cooed.
"Wishever closer."
"I've got oils and lotions in my room. I'll rub them all over you. I'll massage you and lick you clean," she promised.
"Fuckin' A…" Tommy said.
She helped him up and led the teetering mobster out of the High-roller casino. She guided him to the elevator and down to her room on eight. She got the door open and he stumbled in, falling and dragging her down to the floor with him.
"Jeezus, I'm loaded," he said, shaking his head.
"Let's get on the bed," she said. "This is gonna be a great party." She led him to the double bed. He turned and flopped down on it, lying back. He closed his eyes dreamily and she thought for a moment she was home free. But then he opened them again and focused on her. He wasn't going to give up yet. She hoped she wouldn't have to fuck him. Then he stood and stumbled into the bathroom and poured cold water onto a wash cloth and mopped his face with it. Water ran down his neck and ruined the two-thousand-dollar Chinese silk shirt. He dropped the cloth in the sink, turned, and leered at her. "Let's go, baby, get fuckin' naked. Gotta see the wet spot."
Dakota silently cursed her luck, but dropped the straps of her silk gown and let it fall down her perfectly tapered body. She was now standing naked in front of him, still wearing her high heels. Tommy gulped several times, like a trout in the bottom of a boat, then moved awkwardly toward her. He grabbed between her legs and groped her roughly.
"Easy, baby, take it easy… we've got all night," she cooed, pulling away so he wouldn't claw her down there. She decided it was better to just get the job done and be over with it. He'd fall asleep right after he scored. They all did. It was her one universal observation about men. She unbuttoned his ruined green silk shirt and took it off him. He was surprisingly strong. Ridges of power were stacked in useful slabs of hard muscle on his shoulders and short arms. He stumbled out of his pants, sitting awkwardly on the bed. He ripped off his underwear and stood up to face her. He was huge and, for a moment, it startled her. Then she took him into her arms and pressed her body against his. Tommy moaned with pleasure. She led him to the bed and lowered him down. He grabbed for her and she let him pull her down on top of him. Then, with no preamble, she mounted him. Tommy thrust his hips at her savagely. It was a carnal, desperate act of possession. Within minutes he was finished. She rolled off of him and looked down at the despicable little slime who had killed her cousin Carol.
"You're a wonderful lover," she said softly. "You have such stamina, such magnificent equipment."
"Ahhh," Tommy said as he closed his eyes. "Fuckin' room is spinning. Fuckin', goddamn room is fuckin' spinning all over the fuckin'…" And then he rolled over and vomited almost a quart of blended Scotch onto the plush carpet next to the bed. He lay facedown on the bedspread, gasping for air, spit draining out of his open mouth. He is truly a ghastly creature, she thought. It would be so easy to go over to the desk, get the scissors, and end his life right there, but Beano had told her it was his brother, Joe Rina, who had ordered the hit on Carol… Tommy was just the instrument of the act. They needed Tommy to get to Joe. Besides, she mused as he began to snore facedown before her, she wasn't a killer. She was a Bates. A high-stakes player and the best mack on the planet. She always won in the bedroom. The bedroom was her field of combat. She looked down in victory on the snoring killer, then moved to the phone and dialed Beano's room.
"Yeah," Beano said, getting it on the second ring.
"He's out of the play. You're up."
Beano looked at his watch; it was almost three A.M. "Tommy's on ice. You ready?" he said to Duffy, who had the loaded dice all finished and lined up on the table. Duffy picked up the last one and checked to see if the white paint was dry. "Ready," Duffy said.
"Okay," Beano said to Victoria, who was sitting on the bed, "the plane should be at the private air strip at dawn. We gotta be there when it arrives."
They turned the wheelchair upside down and snapped the dice by pairs into the cartridge under the wheelchair arms, so that Duffy could pull out the loaded number he wanted. Then they put the wheelchair right side up, and Duffy got in the seat, back on top of the Porta-Toilet.
"Take Roger, get the van, and wait for us in the parking lot. If anything happens that's not part of the plan, I want you nearby. If the whole deal blows, get on the plane and leave without us," he instructed.
"What about Dakota?" she asked.
"Dakota stays with Tommy either way. She's gotta steer him once we're gone. If the deal jackknifes on us, she's damage control."
Victoria opened the door for them, and then Beano paused for a moment. His blue, sensitive eyes found hers. "Thanks," he said, "for everything."
She nodded, then stepped aside as Beano pushed Duffy out into the hall, over to the elevator, and they took a long, quiet ride down to the casino on the main floor.
Chapter Nineteen.
LUKE ZIGMAN WAS SURPRISED TO SEE THE OLD DEAD-wood player being rolled back into the casino by his nephew at three in the morning. The old duck's head was lolling and he looked half dead. He now knew the man in the wheelchair was named Harry Price. They'd taken hidden-camera pictures of him and his nephew and put the pictures on the big "losers board" in the employee lounge, so that all the casino workers would know them and treat them special. The casino didn't want them getting out of Sabre Bay before all of their money was gone. Harry's chair was parked opposite the Stick-man by his whining nephew, who Luke Zigman now knew was named Douglas Price.
"Jeezus, Uncle Harry, can't we go to bed? It's the middle of the fucking night."
"Got the credit, yessiree, grooved and approved," he rasped. "Yessiree, two hundred big ones, the whole stack. Get the chip girl, Harry wants t'roll the bones, roll the bones."
The Night Shift Manager, Arnold Buzini, was in his office, so Luke picked up the phone and notified him that Mr. Price wanted his whole two hundred thousand in credit delivered in chips to table three.
"Go ahead and give him the ride. He's approved," Buzini said, glad the old leaker was back at the shooter's rail.
Within minutes the tray arrived with two hundred thousand in pre-counted plastic chips aboard. They were piled high on the racks in hundred-dollar blues, five-hundred-dollar reds, and thousand-dollar golds. Beano took them down and stacked them on the table while Duffy watched, wheezing badly.
"What's the limit?" Duffy croaked.
"For you, sir, it's five thousand," Luke said.
"Jesus H. Keee-rist on a bright blue bicycle," Duffy wheezed. "Can't you boys do better than that?"
Luke picked up the phone and redialed Buzini, who gave him permission to "no limit" the table. The main casino room was almost empty at three. In Las Vegas casinos, people played all night, but Caribbean hotels had more daytime than nighttime bettors, so Buzini didn't mind removing the limit.
"Ten thousand on the come line," Duffy said, and he pushed his bet out, reaching over the rail, pressing his skinny, hollow chest against the table and coughing badly.
"Aren't you gonna buy some insurance, like this afternoon?" Luke prodded.
"Nope, nope. Not now, not now. Let's go, gotta roll, gotta roll." And he got the table dice and tossed them down to the end of the table. They bounced off the rail and onto the green felt. His point was ten.
Luke smiled because ten was a hard point for the shooter. There were only three ways to make ten… the six-four, the four-six, and the double five. There were six ways to make seven, which made the odds two-to-one against the shooter on the point, but if he won, the bet only paid off at even money. That was the edge for the house. Luke didn't see Duffy's hand go to his wheelchair arm, extract the doctored dice, then palm the house dice in his other hand. He held the two fives in his palm for twenty seconds, shaking them by his ear, stalling so he could warm the cellophane gas, turning it solid.