TWENTY-FOUR

“He was completely full of shit, right?” Carter asked as we stepped off the elevator and back into the casino. “Pretty close to completely.”

“He really expected us to believe those guys grabbed us down here and he didn’t know?”

“Two people fighting in the casino,” I said, looking around at the blinking lights and crowd of people. “They didn’t know who we were, they would’ve just thrown us out the door and told us to stay out.”

“Exactly.”

Maybe Moffitt had acted like he didn’t know the names I’d thrown at him, but he knew who we were and he had Gus and Ross bring us up to scare us off. We’d touched on something.

“What the hell’s wrong with that guy?” Carter said, nodding in the direction of the closest bank of slot machines.

A well-built guy about six feet tall, in black jeans and a horrible Hawaiian shirt, was in the face of a slightly smaller man. He had blond hair and a matching goatee, and he was stabbing his finger repeatedly in the man’s chest. The smaller man didn’t look scared, but he didn’t look all that happy, either. Embarrassed, maybe.

I couldn’t make out the conversation over the din of the room. The goateed guy crowded him a little more, bullying like a good bully. The smaller man finally took a step back, turned, and walked away.

The bully watched him go, then moved in our direction. “The fuck are you looking at?” he growled, taking a couple more steps.

“The ugliest shirt I’ve ever seen,” Carter said, leaning forward, staring in amazement. “Pelicans, hula girls, and ukuleles? Was the shirt covered in dog shit sold out?”

The guy’s face reddened, and he glanced down at his outfit. “You take that guy’s lunch money?” I asked. He jerked his head up and took a few more steps so that he was just a couple of feet from us now. “Excuse me?” “You’re excused,” I said.

He looked back and forth between me and Carter. We were both bigger than he was, but that didn’t seem to intimidate him.

“Why don’t you mind your own fucking business?” he said.

“Why don’t you show us how?” Carter said, grinning.

They stared at each other.

“Fuck off,” the guy finally said.

“That’s what I thought,” Carter said, still grinning.

The guy moved his gaze to me. His eyes were slate gray and there was a fading, jagged scar under the left one. His flat nose was a little crooked. I had a feeling he was used to mixing it up. Maybe even liked it.

I had put him in his thirties when I’d first seen him, but up close, I realized he was somewhere north of that. Years of starting fights might give you a nice physique, but you couldn’t hide the wear and tear on your face.

His eyes flickered, and I thought he was going to start with me.

But then the right side of his mouth curled into something between a smile and a grimace, and he chuckled. He spun on his heel and walked back into the circus of bells, slots, and noise. He went all the way through the gaming floor, turned left down a hallway, and disappeared, never looking back.

“This place is awesome,” Carter said.

“Let’s get out of here.”

We walked outside, the midday sunlight startling after the muted lighting inside.

I shaded my eyes with my hand. “Thanks for driving out here.”

“Nothing I like better than a drive out to the boonies with nothing to show for it,” Carter said. “No problem. What’s next?”

“I’m not sure,” I said.

And that was the truth. I didn’t know where to head next. We could go back up and strong-arm Moffitt, but I wasn’t sure that was a wise move. He knew something, but until I knew what it was, I couldn’t just walk in and kick his ass.

“Alright,” Carter said. “Call me when you do.”

“Hey,” I said, as he walked off. “Are we cool?”

He paused, thinking about it for a moment, his features silhouetted against the bright daylight. We had morphed back into our usual routine while we were in the casino, but it still felt like there was something hanging in the air between us.

“We’re getting there,” he said.

He headed off for his car, and I figured that was as fair of a response as I could expect.

I walked across the parking lot and got into the Jeep. Then I started it up and zig-zagged through the aisles, heading for the exit. As I passed the front entrance, I glanced at the giant glass doors and up higher at the top floor where Moffitt’s office was housed.

A figure in a window directly above the entrance caught my attention.

I hit the brakes, checked the mirror to make sure no one was behind me, then looked back up to the window. It was empty.

I let the Jeep idle for a moment and watched the window to see if anyone returned. It stayed empty.

Finally, I stepped on the gas and headed out of the lot, wondering what that goateed bully was doing staring down at me.