Shakedown (12 page)

"And now the cash," Sands said.

"The cash?"

"That's right, asshole, the cash," Beadle said as he stepped off the bed. "The money you've made peddling chips."

Leo didn't move. Sands reached into Leo's rear trouser pocket, pulled out his wallet. Inside were three hundred-dollar bills. He pulled them out, tossed the wallet onto the bed. "Is this all?"

"Do I get a receipt for that?"

Beadle punched Leo in the stomach. Leo dropped to his knees, gagged, tried to catch his breath.

Sands shoved the bills into his pocket. "Don't make us tear this room apart."

"That's all the money I have," Leo sputtered. "So help me." His eyes were watering from the blow.

"Mr. Gordon, you're under arrest for the felony crime of possession of counterfeit gaming chips," Sands said as he reached into his shirt pocket, took out a small card. He read: "Before we ask you any questions you must understand your rights. You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can be used against you in a court or other proceedings. You have a right to a lawyer. If you do decide to answer you can stop the questioning at any time to consult with a lawyer. If you cannot afford a lawyer and want one, one will be appointed for you at no cost. Do you understand those rights?"

Leo Gordon nodded his head. "Yes."

"Are you willing to answer some questions?"

A tiny rivulet of blood had crept from Leo's right nostril to the edge of his upper lip. "I'm not sure I-"

"Before we book you," Sands interrupted, "there's a couple more things I want you to understand. First of all, our job at the Gaming Commission is not simply to arrest dealers, middlemen like you. Because gambling is the major source of revenue for the State of Nevada, our goal is to determine where and how counterfeit chips are made... and to put the makers out of business. To do that, the Attorney General has authorized us to deal for information. I mean deal right here and now. Do you understand what I am telling you?"

Leo licked blood off his lips. "You want me to be an informer."

"You might say we're offering you the opportunity to cooperate and assist the State of Nevada."

"That bitch Monica is working for you, isn't she?" Leo said. "She set me up."

He cringed as Ray Beadle stepped close to him. "We ask the questions, clown," Beadle said.

Sands eyed the telephone on the dresser, nodded to Beadle. "Call for booking approval," he said. He turned back to Leo. "Of course she's working for us. We have a forgery case on her, and she decided to do herself a favor and cooperate. The lady has smarts. She saw the light."

Leo blew air through his bloody nose a few times. Sands pulled him to his feet, ushered him to a chair near the window. "How long can I get for this?" he said.

Beadle picked up the phone receiver. He dialed.

"Five years," Sands said. "Ten if you have a previous record. In Nevada there's no slap-on-the-wrist-and-probation for chip-counterfeiting cases. The judges here are all ex-casino mouthpieces. They'll knock your dick in the dirt."

Leo moved his gaze from Sands to Beadle, then back.

"Lemme speak to the on-call deputy DA," Beadle said in a tone of voice that Sands thought was a little too histrionic.

"What happens to me if I tell you what I know?" Leo said.

Sands leaned against the wall. "That depends on what you tell us."

"What if, say, I knew where the chips are coming from ... who's making them?"

"Then I call my boss for approval and we make a deal."

"This is Agent Trout," Beadle said to the receiver. "Gaming Commission. We've just arrested a male adult with a load of those Stardust chips that have been going around. I'd like approval to book and a bond recommendation."

Leo looked at Beadle, then back to Sands.

"Yesterday Monica was sitting in handcuffs like you are right now," Sands said. "A big forgery jacket hanging over her head. Now her case will be dismissed. The State of Nevada helps those who see the light."

Leo made a contorted attempt to wipe some of the blood from his upper lip onto his shirt. He missed, looked at Sands as if to ask for help. Sands stared coldly at him.

"Does a deal mean I won't have to spend any time in jail?" he said.

NINETEEN

Sands sat in the backseat of the sedan
with Leo Gordon. As Beadle drove
   
slowly down Tropicana Boulevard past the Convention Center, Sands
          
gazed out the window with a bored cop-escorting-another-asshole-to-jail expression on his face.

Beadle, his collar soaked with nervous perspiration, was driving. Sands wished he would stop glancing in the rearview mirror every three seconds as if he were driving a truckload of dynamite.

"Why will I have no chance to post bail?" Leo said.

"Because you're not a U.S. citizen. If the judge granted bail you might run back to Liverpool or wherever the fuck you're from."

"I've never been in an American jail."

"Should be real interesting cross-cultural experience," Sands said. "Particularly if you enjoy being fucked in the ass by red-blooded American Negroes," Beadle said. "They'll be drawing straws for your hips."

"Very funny."

Beadle had slowed to about thirty miles per hour. He made a turn on Fremont. The jail was less than a block away. He turned in the seat and made eye contact with Sands. Sands blinked twice to reassure him.

Beadle drove directly into the jail parking lot, pulled into an empty parking space, turned off the engine.

Two uniformed policemen walked past them on their way to a radio car.

Sands hoped that Leo wasn't looking at the rearview mirror, because Beadle's face had a confused, tortured expression.

"Last chance to play
Let's Make a Deal,"
Sands said as Leo stared straight ahead at the imposing modem jail building. He could hear the other man's breathing.

"I scored the chips in the Bahamas ... in Nassau," Leo said.

Eddie Sands felt a sense of relief which, he admitted to himself, approached actual sensual pleasure.

"From who in the Bahamas?" Sands said.

"From the bartender at the Colony Inn. I placed an order for the chips. This chap delivered to me three days later. I paid two percent."

"Got a name?" Beadle said. He was now fully soaked with perspiration.

"Uh ... the bartender's name was Cyril. I never knew his last name."

Beadle looked about nervously. He took out a handkerchief, wiped his face and neck.

"Where are the rest of the counterfeit chips?" Sands said.

"That's all I had. I swear to God."

"And the cash? The money you made from dealing? Where is it?"

"You said if I agreed to cooperate I would be released."

"Part of cooperating is turning over the fruits of the crime. To make a clean breast of things."

"Are you going to keep my money?"

"The money will be booked as evidence and you'll be given a receipt. When I have your case dismissed you'll receive the cash back. Of course, the state keeps the phony chips."

Leo Gordon, clammy-pale, cleared his throat. "The rest of the money is at the airport," he said.

Beadle started the engine.

At the Las Vegas Airport parking lot, Sands removed Leo's handcuffs. Inside the terminal, Leo led them to a rental locker. He handed Sands a key. Sands opened the locker. Inside was a leather briefcase. Sands snapped open the latches. He counted the small bills it contained. "Seven thousand two hundred dollars," he said. Sands reached into his inside jacket pocket, removed a small printed form-"Evidence Receipt"-which had the logo of the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department in its upper-right corner. Beadle handed Sands a pen. Sands filled in the amount on the form, separated the carbon copy from the original. He handed the receipt to Leo.

"Now what?" Leo said, shoving the receipt in his pocket.

"Now you set up a buy of chips from Cyril the bartender," Sands said. "When he delivers we arrest him."

"So that means we are going to Nassau."

"No shit, Kemo Sabe," Beadle said.

Sands checked his wristwatch. "Do you have a credit card?"

Leo nodded.

"Buy a ticket to Nassau. We'll meet you there tomorrow after we book the evidence and get the deal formally worked out with the district attorney."

"How will I find-"

"Name a hotel," Sands said.

"The ... uh ... the Crown Retreat."

"We will meet you in Nassau at the registration desk of the Crown Retreat Hotel at five p.m. tomorrow," Sands said. "If you're not there when we arrive, we'll have a warrant issued for your arrest. It will be waiting if you ever try to travel to the United States again or cross an international border." He checked his wristwatch as if considering a deadline he had to meet.

Beadle took the briefcase. Leo stared at it for a moment, then at Sands and Beadle. He turned and headed toward the ticketing area. After he was out of sight, Sands and Beadle hurried out of the terminal. Outside, they shook hands and broke into a fit of laughter so uproarious that tears streamed from their eyes.

"What would you have done if he hadn't caved in at the jail parking lot?" Beadle managed to say between fits of laughter.

"How the hell do I know?" Sands said.

"I wonder how long he'll wait at the hotel?"

For a moment, standing among hundreds of passengers hurrying in and out of the terminal, they just looked at each other. Then they broke into laughter again.

A young brunette secretary with thin, clear skin showed Bruce O'Hara into Mickey Greene's office. As usual, the gray-haired and goateed Mickey was on the phone. He shook hands with O'Hara and, keeping the phone to his ear, motioned him to a chair in front of his enormous cluttered desk. As O'Hara sat down, Mickey Greene motioned apologetically with his hand.

As he sat there waiting for Mickey Greene to get off the phone, O'Hara surveyed the room with its futuristic plastic and glass furniture. The walls were covered with framed photographs -Mickey on his boat, Mickey and his dumb former Miss Universe wife, Mickey standing in front of his collection of restored antique cars, Mickey with things he owned. At that moment, it occurred to O'Hara that although he had visited the office many times before over the period of twenty years he had known Mickey Greene, he had never seen a law book. Not one. Even in the clutter on Mickey Greene's desk there was none to be seen. There were piles of thick entertainment contracts, but not one book. That was Mickey-a telephone to his ear, winging it, getting paid to push people to the limit. If there was a cartoon caricature of him, thought O'Hara, it would portray Mickey Greene with an oversized goatee and phone, sitting beside the pool at the Beverly Hills Hotel.

"You say you've learned a lot about the entertainment business?" Mickey Greene shouted into the phone, finally getting a word in. "Well, tell me this!
Did you learn not to fuck yourself?
That's the first lesson! Never bend your tool backward and
fuck yourself!
Because that's what you'll be doing if you don't sign the contract! Gotta run. See you at the Springs." He tossed the receiver back onto the cradle.

"Talk to me, Bruce. Tell me you've finished your crapola Foreign Legion movie. The screenplay made me throw up. You shoulda never done it. Dreck written by a shmeckler."

"I have a problem," Bruce O'Hara said softly.

Mickey Greene stroked his goatee. His face became somber. He moved a few feet to a cabinet, took out a bottle. Efficiently, he poured drinks, handed one to O'Hara, touched the intercom button on his desk. "Stop all calls!"

He sat down on the sofa and nodded to O'Hara.

"It finally happened," O'Hara said suddenly, finding that his throat was dry. He sipped the drink, almost coughed. "Someone found out about... uh ... the ... the things I do."

"You mean about the broads."

O'Hara looked at him.

"I want you to tell me everything," Mickey Greene said. "Leave nothing out."

"A few days ago this Las Vegas cop comes to my house. I mean, at the time, I thought he was a cop." O'Hara sipped more scotch and, in soft and quiet tones, related the entire story of the blackmail. By the time he was finished, Mickey Greene had refilled his glass three times.

"How do you know his name is Eddie Sands?"

"The FBI agents that came to the movie set showed me a photo. They asked if I knew him," Bruce O'Hara said angrily.

"What did you say?"

"Nothing. I played dumb."

"At least you did one thing right."

"I didn't come here for a goddam lecture."

Mickey Greene plucked the glass from O'Hara's hand. He sauntered slowly to the liquor cabinet. He refilled their glasses and, using his hand, though tongs were available, dropped cubes of ice into the drinks.

"So that's about it," O'Hara said. He felt stupid, angry, embarrassed.

Mickey Greene handed O'Hara a full drink. "I'm sure you realize something has to be done. We have to move on this thing."

O'Hara left his chair, followed Mickey Greene across the room to a bay window which looked down on the sprawling Beverly Hills Country Club.

"You're Mr. America," Mickey Greene said. "You're wearing John Wayne's hat. If this trash comes out in the
National Enquirer you
won't be able to get a job as a fifty-dollar-a-day extra."

"I need your help, Mickey. You and I have known each other for more than twenty years. We've made millions of dollars together. I want you to handle this for me."

Standing in the light of the window, Mickey Greene, who had one of the deepest Palm Springs suntans in Hollywood, looked Mephistophelian. It's the goatee, thought O'Hara.

"Have you mentioned this to anyone else in the world?" Mickey Greene said.

"No."

"Have you even
hinted
to anyone else in the world about this problem?" Mickey Greene maintained eye contact as he spoke.

"No. You're the only one I can talk to. You know that."

"There's no going back once I set things in motion," Mickey Greene said after a while.

"Is there any possible way it could ever come back to me? I want to know if there is even the remotest possibility that anything could ever come back."

Mickey Greene shook his head. "No. These matters are handled by people who will never know of you or me. Even the one man I deal with, whom I have known for as long as I have known you, won't know the reason for the request."

"How much will it cost?" O'Hara said.

"A lot less than you've already shelled out. I'll make all the arrangements."

"This Sands. He screwed me out of a hundred grand. Humiliated me."

Mickey Greene hoisted his glass to O'Hara's. "It's over now," Greene said.

The glasses clinked.