6.
The sunset bled tangerine in long streaks across the desert sky. The Vegas Strip came to life and fired up the neon, unleashing its clarion call to the gamblers, the pleasure-hunters, the hungry of all appetites. I looked at the ghost of my reflection in a floor-length window. Suited up, Italian loafers, paisley silk handkerchief with a razor-sharp crease.
We’d rented a conference room at the Flamenco. Pixie came early, swept for bugs, and jetted before the meeting started. I did my part at the same time, hunting for witch-eyes and scrying spells. The room was clean. The attendees weren’t, and most of them were wearing a small stolen fortune on their backs or their wrists. We’d turned the place into a den of thieves, the head honchos of the city’s biggest crews coming together for our regular sit-down.
“You look upset. I get nervous when you look upset.”
Chou Yong, the recently promoted Red Pole of the 14K Triad, stood on my right. He’d earned his stripes in the field after his boss got eaten by a shape-shifting assassin, so I could understand where he was coming from. His double chin bobbed as he looked me up and down.
“Had to disappoint somebody today,” I told him.
“I do that every day.” Yong rolled his eyes to the darkening sky outside the window. “My mother. And she makes sure to remind me.”
“Think we’re about ready to get rollin’,” Jennifer called out. She took her seat at the head of the long, oval conference table, mahogany inlaid with black leather and an alligator-hide sheen.
I sat at her left hand and took a long, slow look around the room as everyone got settled. In the wake of Nicky Agnelli’s downfall, the self-proclaimed King of Las Vegas escaping just ahead of a federal dragnet, Jennifer had taken the feuding factions of the city and forged them into a more or less united front. We had the top men in the Cinco Calles and the Fine Upstanding Crew sitting side by side, after five years of scrapping. The 14K and the Inagawa-kai were being civil to each other. Even the Blood Eagles had come to the table, taking time out from their busy schedule of roaring down the desert highways and stomping anyone who looked at them sideways. Our feud with the Chicago Outfit had cost us, but we came out on top and tighter than before.
“We’re starting to look like a serious threat,” I murmured.
Jennifer cracked a bottle of Perrier and gave me the side-eye. “Sure thing, sugar. Thanks to…the guy.”
I struggled not to bury my face in my palm. On the far side of the table, Emma Loomis was getting settled in; we’d exchanged a brief hello when she arrived and not much else, while I tried to decide how much to tell her about Melanie’s little adventure last night. I was still deciding. Emma looked like a wealthy, coiffed suburban soccer mom, but the demon that lived under her stolen skin didn’t take prisoners.
Jennifer waited until everyone simmered down, pushed her chair back, and took command of the room.
“Let’s tackle the elephant, first things first,” she said. “Did my damned best to stop it, but Nevada made pot legal and that’s just how it is. Good news is, saw this comin’ way back when, and made nice with a couple of our congress critters. My people were first, second, and twentieth in line for dispensary licenses.”
Eddie Stone, war chief of the Bishops, smoothed the lapels of his peacock-blue suit. His upper lip curled back and flashed a golden tooth.
“How many we talking?” he asked.
“Enough to recoup some of what we’re losing in street deals. Low risk, pure profit. For the ones we don’t control, I reckon we shift gears and move into…helpin’ these good folks take proper care of their income.”
“You’re talking about protection.”
“Sure,” Jennifer said. “It’s a cash business, and most banks won’t do business with dispensaries. They’ll be needing our help to keep that money tidy and safe. And if they don’t want our help, well…lots of bad things can happen.”
Chou Yong raised one stubby finger. “Can we talk about the reclamation?”
That was what we were calling the slow, grindstone march toward taking back all of Nicky Agnelli’s former rackets. His overnight downfall had created a power vacuum in the city and a gigantic mess. Lots of smaller crews and independent operators going rogue, carving out their own little fiefdoms. There were a lot of people who had faithfully paid out to Nicky for years but didn’t quite grasp the change in management. Yet. We were working hard to convince them.
Jennifer looked his way. “Whatcha got, sugar?”
“My people have been focusing our efforts on the Transport Workers Union. Taking control of McCarran Airport—quietly and seamlessly—is key to any number of future endeavors.”
Winslow leaned back in his chair and waved his long-necked bottle of Bud at Yong. The grizzled biker was the top dog of the Blood Eagles, not to mention the personal firearms concierge to almost everyone in the room.
“Lotta cargo coming in and out of McCarran. Be nice to have somebody on the inside who can finger the best stuff, get us schedules and plate numbers.”
“My thoughts exactly,” Yong replied. “The union has a board election scheduled next month, and two seats are up for the taking. If we can place a pair of faithful hands—”
“Pick your dogs,” Winslow rumbled. “Anybody who doesn’t look like they’re gonna vote right, my boys’ll be happy to point out the error of their ways.”
“Where are we on Donaghy Waste Management?” Jennifer asked.
Eddie shook his head and stared at the table. “We’re nowhere. Can’t even get these people to take a meeting, let alone get any leverage and dig our hooks in. Their corporate structure’s all kinds of screwed up. Managers that don’t exist, paper trails that all lead offshore…pretty sure these dudes are more crooked than we are.”
“Don’t fret,” Jennifer said. “As I recall, Nicky never managed to dip his beak in neither. We’ll crack ’em sooner or later. Somebody give me an update on—”
Three sharp knocks sounded at the door. One of Jennifer’s hired hands poked his head in; he’d traded his street gear for an off-the-rack suit that bulged in all the wrong places. She waved him close. He whispered in her ear, and one of her eyebrows lifted.
“Speak of the devil,” she said. “Looks like we’ve got a special guest. Send him on in.”
The last time I saw Nicky Agnelli, he was being raced into Sunrise Hospital by a team of paramedics. We’d both gotten bushwhacked by the Chicago Outfit, hauled off to be tortured, killed, and dumped out with tomorrow’s trash. I managed to cut myself loose, the hard way. Habit made me glance down. One sleeve of my dress shirt rode up just far enough to flash the ugly webwork of scars on my wrist. A permanent reminder marking where the soldering iron had scorched through the duct tape and charred my skin.
Just a bad memory now. Before that week was over, Winslow’s boys managed to track down the Outfit’s torture specialist. They served him up to me on a platter and I made sure to pay him back with accrued interest, for me and Nicky both, before I buried him.
For a man who had nearly been beaten into a coma—not to mention fleeing Vegas with the feds hot on his heels—Nicky was looking good. That’s the nice thing about being half demon, I’m told: the blood keeps you young and healthy. He had his hair greased back, his Porsche Design glasses in place, and a new suit tailored to fit. His escorts didn’t hurt, either. Juliette and Justine, the twin blondes poured into little black cocktail dresses.
I wasn’t fooled. Skintight dresses or not, they were both armed and deadly. Not that they needed weapons to turn a meeting into a massacre at the drop of a hat. The rest of the room was feeling the same vibe. Shoulders tensed up, eyes narrowed, and a few hands dipped dangerously under the conference table.
“So, uh…hi,” Nicky said.
He cringed under the weight of a roomful of silent stares.
“All right.” He nodded. “This is awkward as shit, not going to deny it. Seeing as you all used to, you know, work for me. And now you don’t. Hey, we had some good times though, right?”
Eddie Stone folded his arms tight and snorted. “Bitch, please.”
That looked like the general sentiment. Jennifer hovered her palms a few inches over the table and pushed down the rising tide of dissent.
“Hear him out,” she said. “We can give him that much.”
Juliette flung out her hand and pointed. “Listen to her. Listen to the voice of reason. Even if she sounds like a total hick with that accent. Which she does.”
“And she smells like patchouli,” her twin added. “Patchouli, sadness, and failure.”
“And she dresses like she shops at thrift stores. Not good ones. Cheap ones for poor people.”
Jennifer closed her eyes and took a slow, deep breath.
“I will shoot you both,” she said.
“Ladies,” Nicky said. He regrouped and tried again. “Look, I ain’t trying to come back. That ship’s sailed and we all know it. I’m starting fresh. Setting my sights up north.”
“How far north?” Winslow asked. “Canada?”
“Reno,” he replied.
Not that far north, then. Four hundred and forty-odd miles northwest, a hop and a skip from the California border. Within grabbing distance of Carson City, too. I flicked my gaze across the table and took the temperature of the room. Cold skies, light turbulence.
“The city’s primed to pump gold,” Nicky said, “and right now it’s just some old-school Vegas Mob refugees from the eighties and a handful of feuding crews running the place. One good push could drive ’em all out, easy.”
Jennifer tilted her head, sizing him up. “And you’re tellin’ us as a courtesy, or…?”
He dug deep, looking like a kid who couldn’t leave the table until he ate his broccoli.
“I need your help. The damn feds took everything; they cleaned me out. I had contingencies on contingencies, but they foxed me good. To make this happen, I need liquid cash and I need shooters.” Nicky glanced my way. “Some occult firepower wouldn’t hurt, either.”
Nobody said a word. Nicky wrung his hands and shifted his weight from foot to foot.
“I’m not asking for old times’ sake, okay? This is pay for play. You help me out, then once I get a foothold you can…you have no idea how much it fuckin’ pains me to say this, but you can dip your beak in Reno. You’ll be repaid with interest. More importantly, let’s talk long-term strategy. We’ll be partners, with a mutual defense pact. After the spanking we just gave Chicago—”
“‘We’?” Jennifer asked.
Nicky pouted at her. “I was here. I did my part. Anyway, you’re making waves now. You’ve got people talking, and bigger sets than the Outfit—I’m talking about the Detroit Combination, I’m talking about the Five Families—are sizing you up. Maybe you don’t need a friend close to Vegas—a friend who can move fast to cover your back, and keep an extra ear out for trouble—but can you really say you wouldn’t want one?”
“Give us a minute,” Jennifer told him.