Diva Las Vegas (Book 1 in Raven McShane Series) (4 page)

The next day brought the warmest weather of the year: according to the morning news, it would reach 110 degrees around 3:30 in the afternoon and then taper off to a balmy 84 overnight.  It was a good day to spend indoors, and I spun my wheels for most of it.  I reviewed more of Leslie Trondheim’s stories online and pulled up some of the earlier ones about the Mastersons from the society pages.  There were more stories about Cody than Amy, which I found amusing.  From her pictures, Amy was definitely a good-looking woman, but Cody’s looks and his history as the star of a male revue apparently made him a juicier target for local gossip columnists. It seemed that every time he was spotted in public with a woman, the press wondered if she was “the one.”  But then inevitably he’d be photographed a few months later with a different bimbo on his arm.  And once he married Amy, of course, the press lost interest.

In the afternoon I received a call from Barbara Finley, a distressed sounding woman from Indiana who wanted to hire me to keep tabs on her husband while he was in town for a bachelor party.  He’d said he was going to Florida on a golf trip, but she had learned otherwise.  A couple of months ago I’d set up a rudimentary website, which was only half completed.  But thanks to a fee I paid some anonymous teenager in India, my site came up on the third or fourth page of any Google or Yahoo searches for “LAS VEGAS DETECTIVE,” and it had proved a decent enough magnet for attracting business from out-of-towners, most of whom were people exactly like Mrs. Finley.  They proved to be good clients and didn’t seem bothered by my high rates.  I figured that three or four thousand bucks isn’t that much to pay to learn whether your husband is a cheating scumbag or not, and clients seemed to agree.  But Mrs. Finley was different, and she became very quiet after I told her what I would charge.  I faxed her my standard form retainer agreement but didn’t expect to hear back from her.

For dinner I ordered takeout from an Indian place nearby.  I was beginning to think that my talk yesterday with Phil d’Angelo wasn’t a complete bust after all.  He was very bright, it was clear, and he figured out what I was driving at without me having to spell it out.  But it would have been simple enough for him just to say that he didn’t know anything that would help me.  Instead, he’d said that the Mastersons had been good to him and he wasn’t going to betray them.  But what was the point of discussing betrayal and loyalty if there was nothing to betray in the first place?  He was talking like a guy who knew something.

After half a bottle of champagne, it seemed like a great idea to call Mike and bounce it off him.  He listened patiently to my recounting of the afternoon’s events, and when I was done he chuckled softly.

“Okay.  Did you ever think that the middle of the casino wasn’t the best place for you guys to sit down and discuss the idea of him selling out his boss?” he suggested playfully.

“I did come on a little strong,” I admitted.  “But he seemed pretty clear that the family had been good to him and he wasn’t about to turn on them.”

“How much would your client pay d’Angelo for help?  A lot?”

“Yeah.  Maybe a few hundred thousand.”

 “Okay, then I don’t get it,” Mike said.  “This is Las Vegas.  Who would give up a chance at hundreds of thousands of dollars to protect a murderer just out of loyalty to the family?  And Cody isn’t even part of that family—he married into it.”

“True,” I said.

“I would go talk to this guy again,
outside
of the casino.”

“I guess it’s worth a try.  In fact, I didn’t even get the chance to talk specifics with him.  Thanks for talking it through with me.”  Mike had a good point, and it wasn’t like I had any other plan.    

I couldn’t resist asking him one more question.  “You wearing your rodent exterminator’s uniform again today?”

He sighed and hung up on me.

The next morning I looked up Phil d’Angelo’s address online and plugged the address into Google Earth.  It was a swanky address in a private development about ten miles east of the Strip.  Since Phil had been working last night when he found me at the casino, I figured there was a good chance he’d still be at home if I called him in the morning.  

I phoned d’Angelo at home around noon, but he didn’t pick up.  I didn’t have a cell number to reach him and couldn’t think of any way of getting it.  I had nothing else on my schedule for the day, so I thought it might be worth a visit to check out his house.  If he was home, he might be more willing to talk to me on his home turf.

I got my car from Tommy the valet and headed out into the haze.  I knew from the computer image that it was a big place, but I wasn’t prepared for the monstrosity that Phil d’Angelo’s house actually was.  It was surprisingly luxurious, built in the French country style with a kind of pink brick that gave it a strangely feminine appearance.  It looked like there was a pool in back.  I did a quick drive-by and circled around to park out front.  Phil wasn’t home, or at least he wasn’t answering the doorbell.  I lingered for a minute and watched a fat, overly tanned man across the street watering his flowers.  The man had no business appearing in public without a shirt, but when he looked up I gave him a friendly wave.  After a minute I got back into my car and fired up the air conditioning. 

I checked my watch.  It was close to one o’clock, and I determined to stick it out an hour and then head over to the Outpost if d’Angelo didn’t emerge first.  Phil’s house looked thoroughly empty, though, and the man watering his flowers started giving me nervous looks.  Who was I kidding?  I didn’t have the patience to sit here doing nothing.  I cut my visit short and got out of there by 1:15.

I headed back to the north end of the Strip and pulled into the Outpost, reluctantly giving my car to a guy who looked like the inbred cousin of the valet who had been working the day before.  I hadn’t wanted to approach d’Angelo again at the casino, but at least I thought I could give him my card and arrange for a meeting in a more neutral location.  This time the lobby was deserted, and I asked at the front desk whether Mr. d’Angelo was available.  The woman behind the desk didn’t think so, and she didn’t offer to check for me.  I decided I’d find someone more helpful to ask after I grabbed a bite for lunch.

I found a seat at the café.  The cheeseburger I’d had yesterday had been disturbingly good, probably due to the glob of mayo they’d snuck in there.  I ordered another one and got a Diet Coke to wash it down.  The bartender filled a glass mug he pulled from a freezer beneath the bar.  I’d only been outside a grand total of three minutes all day, but for some reason the ice cold soda really hit the spot. 

I watched the small TV above the bar while waiting for my food to arrive.  It was tuned to a women’s softball game on ESPN, which seemed an odd programming choice—it was one of the few sports they didn’t take bets on in the sports book.  I looked up and down the bar and found that everyone’s face was directed away from the TV screen down at the bar itself, which had video poker machines built into it.  Tuning the TV to women’s softball suddenly made sense: don’t distract the gamblers from their gambling. 

As I tilted back my still-frosty soda glass, I sensed someone sitting down next to me.  My mind immediately jumped to the conclusion that Phil d’Angelo had seen me on one of the closed-circuit cameras and decided to pay me another visit.  It wasn’t Phil, however.  This man was paler and much thicker through the neck.  He was younger than Phil, probably forty, although his hair was nearly all white.  His face was pink and pockmarked, and he wore a name tag that read “E. Holman” above the word “SECURITY.”  He was looking at me as though he knew me.  I offered a generic smile, but he didn’t smile back.  I soon sensed another presence looming behind me, a presence that wore a particularly objectionable kind of cologne.  The presence gave me an unfriendly tap on my right shoulder. 

“We’d like you to come with us,” said the surprisingly soft, husky voice behind me.  I was still facing the white-haired man on my right and had to crane my neck to face the voice.  The speaker was a much taller man of athletic build with dark brown hair and a mustache.  He wore a black dress shirt underneath a gray sport coat, and he wore no name tag.  He looked a little like the man who used to be on the Brawny paper towel packages, but without the Brawny man’s warm and fuzzy outlook on life.

“Um,” I stuttered, standing up fully.  “No thanks.  Just finishing my drink.”  I pointed lamely to my half-finished mug.

“It won’t take long.  Please, miss,” Holman said, gesturing warmly with his hand.  He was polite but insistent.

The Brawny man’s hand came down on my shoulder, and I found myself being scooted out of my seat.

“Okay.  But I’m meeting my boyfriend in a few minutes,” I lied, “so I don’t have long.”

The white-haired Holman grunted.  Instead of walking back through the casino, the two led me through a small door next to the bar that I hadn’t noticed before.  I was beginning to get a twinge of nervousness, but I hadn’t done anything wrong.  I figured either Phil d’Angelo wanted to see me in the privacy of his office or they had me confused with some two-bit card counter.  Or they thought I was a hooker.

If the Outpost’s public face was somewhat tarnished and trashy, behind closed doors the place looked like a fleabag motel that hadn’t seen any maintenance since the Carter Administration.  The hallway they led me down was dimly lit by unattractive rectangular wall sconces, but even the dim lighting couldn’t hide the stained linoleum floor that creaked under our weight.  They ushered me into a small room furnished only by a small square table and two plastic chairs that looked like they were lifted from a Soviet dentist’s office.  It smelled like an old Catholic school gym.  A fluorescent light buzzed and flickered overhead.

“So,” Holman began in his soft voice, “we understand you were asking to see Mr. d’Angelo, is that right?”

“That’s right,” I said, “but it was really nothing urgent.  I can catch him some other time if it’s a problem.”  The room was ominously small, and I began rethinking my willingness to follow two beefy strangers into the privacy of the hotel’s back rooms.

“Well he’s busy, and he asked that we make ourselves available to answer any of your questions.  Please,” he said, gesturing, “have a seat.”

“No, that’s really not necessary.  It was just a matter between me and Mr. d’Angelo,” I explained.

The three of us stood in the small room in awkwardly close proximity.  I could smell the cheap aftershave wafting off of the Brawny man to my right, and Holman stood directly in front of me underneath the light, which cast an eerie halo effect over his features.  Like the moon in a lunar eclipse, I thought, with just as many pockmarks.  He offered a pained smile and held up his hands as if to say everything was all right.

“That’s where we might have a little disagreement,” Holman said, enunciating his words carefully.  It seemed like he was overcompensating for a native New Jersey accent.  “You see, our boss explained what it is you’re interested in talking about, and that’s something that could affect all of us.”  He let the vague but pregnant statement hang in the air.  At this point the big man put his hand on my shoulder and pressed me down into the seat.  The two goons loomed menacingly over me.

“I see,” was all I could muster.  I could feel my stomach doing cartwheels, and my mind raced to catch up with the situation.  I hadn’t considered the possibility that d’Angelo would share our little visit with his staff.  Nor had I considered the possibility that the staff wouldn’t be too keen on me upsetting the applecart.  Apparently an entire business could have a vested interest in keeping a murderer out of jail.

“So you appreciate our position, then?” Holman asked softly.  He wore a muffled smirk that would have produced a more violent response from me if I hadn’t been outnumbered.

“I guess I do,” I said meekly.  I felt like I was back in Sister Madeline’s office at St. Dominick’s grade school.  “I will definitely keep that in mind,” I added, beginning to stand up.  This time Holman touched me gently on the shoulder before I was fully upright.

“Just so there is no confusion,” he said, “you are not to enter this property ever again.”  His tone reeked of contempt.

 “Not a problem,” I said, trying my best to appear cool.  “I’ll just show myself out,” I offered, and both of them merely nodded.  Holman’s hand was still on my shoulder.  He eased up for a second, but then he began digging his fingers into the tendons at the base of my neck.  I could feel his stubby fingernails and the hardened calluses on the tips of his fingers as he pressed into my bare skin.  It hurt like a bitch.

I squirmed out of his grasp and stood up.  They were loving this.  Holman and Brawny man stood there grinning like high school jocks.  Big on intimidation, short on brains.  I had an idea.  I got close to Holman.  Real close.  My chest was pressing against the front of his shirt, as though we were dancing to a slow tune.  I tried to put a sorrowful, apologetic look on my face.  I made my lips pouty and looked up into his eyes.  He looked confused, but interested.  But mostly he looked idiotic.

“I’m sorry,” I pouted.  I brought my left hand up and slowly ran my finger across his chest.  I slid two fingers between the buttons on the front of Holman’s cheap dress shirt, and then I executed my rudimentary plan.  When you’re an exotic dancer for ten years, you develop certain muscles below the waist that have no business being on any honest woman’s body.  I could climb a dancing pole without using my hands.  In a pinch, I could crack a walnut between my thighs.  And with a little practice, I could probably kick a field goal from fifty yards.  Maybe it wasn’t a fair fight, but I did what any other woman would do.  I grasped Holman’s shirt tightly, for support, and with all my force I whipped my right knee up between his legs.  It was a full
Rockette
kick, except that his scrotum got in the way.  Oops.