Bank, and Aces High to the old men and women who’d be here on a regular night anyway. These were people who’d spent their days in front of conveyor belts and video terminals and their nights in front of television sets. And now they expected a machine to give them something in return.
The men seemed more resigned to losing. They put their money in, pulled the levers, and watched the dials tell them something they already knew. But the women were full of hope and determination. Some played two or three machines at a time. When they pulled a lever, they put a lifetime of frustration into it. And when they hit a jackpot, they celebrated like it was the birth of a grandchild, jumping up and clapping their hands with glee.
Their joy was contagious. Between watching them and seeing Elijah fight on past his prime, P.F. felt oddly elated. What was the phrase his father used when P.F. discovered he was having an affair at the age of seventy- seven? Never too old to be bold.
He even felt encouraged seeing Wayne Sadowsky and two other beefy F.B.I. agents striding down the aisle of slots with great purpose.
“So what’s the good word?”
“You-all see a gentleman name of Anthony Russo around here?” Sadowsky asked briskly.
“Why? What do you want from him?” P.F. found himself feeling defensive about the kid. Especially after the talk they’d had about Mike Dillon this afternoon.
“That’s not your concern.” Sadowsky scratched his upper lip with his bottom row of teeth. “Do you know this young man?”
“Maybe I do, maybe I don’t.”
The agent drew himself up to his full six foot two inches. “Detective, this is a federal matter. Your cooperation would be appreciated...”
“Beautiful. Tell me another one. Last time I cooperated with you, I found out you’d been the one telling the casino people all this bullshit about me and Teddy. Why should I help you now?”
The left side of Sadowsky’s face twitched. “Because I will not hesitate to swear out a warrant against you if you impede a federal investigation,” he drawled.
P.F. went belly-to-belly with him like a sumo wrestler. “Fuck you twice.”
One of the other agents stepped between them. “Come on, Wayne. This scumbag doesn’t know anything. We’re wasting time here.”
Sadowsky backed away slowly, shaking out his arms and rotating his head, like he was ridding himself of some taint. P.F. belched defiantly.
“I just hope you’re not protecting this individual,” Sadowsky said. “Because if I find out that’s the case, it could make your life very complicated.”
“My life’s already complicated.”
The three agents brushed past him, with Sadowsky jabbing an elbow into his ribs. As P.F. watched them cross the casino floor and disappear down an escalator, he wondered why he’d had the brief urge to protect Anthony. He’d felt some paternal stirrings during their talk that afternoon. But no, to hell with that. He didn’t know where the kid was anyway. He’d only had the fight with Sadowsky because they hated each other and would do anything to screw up one another’s cases.
He turned to go out the Boardwalk side exit and saw that he’d previously misread the sign above the slot machines. It didn’t say REDEMPTION CENTER. A glass chandelier had been in the way. It was a COIN REDEMPTION CENTER, a booth for changing quarters into dollars. There was a waiting line of sallow-eyed gamblers grasping pink change cups, with their pants hiked up to their armpits.
Things were what they were, he told himself, moving toward the escalators. Only a fool would make too much of them.
68
I HID IN THE darkness for ten minutes, watchingRosemary wait by my car in the garage. I wanted to make sure she hadn’t brought any cops along to arrest me. The world still seemed skewed. All the cars were tilting the wrong way. The casino lights beyond the concrete lip of the garage looked like dots of blood against the black sky. And the pain in my head was like a throbbing supernova.
From twenty yards away, I saw Rosemary lean against the rear fender, cross and uncross her legs three times, and then fire up a cigarette. She looked nervous, maybe even desperate. Maybe even desperate enough to turn me over to the feds, if it suited her purposes. She sucked down a lungful of smoke and held it with all her might. I wondered if I’d be desperate enough to kill her if she was the only witness against me.
I waited another five minutes until the rest of the cars on the fifth floor flared red and drove away. Then I came walking out of the darkness with the briefcase in my left hand.
“Get in on the driver’s side,” I told Rosemary.
“Why, are we going for a ride?”
“You tell me.”
She got in and I slid in beside her in the passenger’s front seat. The dashboard clock said it was 1:27 in the morning. My eyes were bloodshot in the rearview mirror. The gun I’d used to kill Nicky was still in the glove compartment. I’d had it there for weeks, perhaps because I felt guilty and thought I deserved to get caught. But now that I was backed into a corner, I was thinking of using it again.
“That thing you said earlier tonight. ‘Or else.’ What’d you mean by that?”
She looked confused for a moment before her mouth pulled the rest of her face to attention. “Oh. I was just saying I wanted you to keep your promise.”
“But you said ‘or else.’ Or else what?”
“I don’t know.” She shrugged. “Or else I guess I’d have to talk to somebody about it.”
“Yeah, like the police? What would be the point of that?”
She looked at me the way you’d look at a ringing alarm clock. “Listen, Anthony, I’m tired,” she said, rubbing her eyes. “It’s one-thirty, I gotta get up with Kimmy in the morning, and my arms are killing me from carrying the round cards all night. All I am asking is if you brought the money. If you didn’t, we can talk about it tomorrow ...”
“No! I wanna talk about it now!”
I slammed the dashboard with my fist as my voice bounced off the windshield and stayed compressed in the car. Rosemary became very still.
“Well, if you don’t have it, you don’t have it.” She glanced down at the briefcase on my lap and reached for her door handle. “There’s nothing else for us to talk about.”
Which meant she was going downstairs to call the F.B.I., as far as I was concerned. That was the reason she’d come to meet me. My head pulsed once more. She’d been waiting to see if she could get the money out of me before she threw me to the lions. I reached across her body and pulled her door shut with my left hand. With my right hand, I popped open the glove compartment and pulled out the gun.
“Just sit there,” I said, aiming it at her head. “Is this how you wanted it to end? Like this? Don’t you know I’ve been trying to get away from this all my life?”
Even in the dimness of the car, I could see her turning pale. “Anthony, what are you talking about?”
“I know you already called the police about me.”
“That’s not true.”
“Don’t you lie to me, Rosemary! I heard enough lies to last the rest of my life!”
Right at that second, I felt I was capable of killing her. After all, I’d killed Nicky and nothing had happened to me. That was what Teddy and Vin had understood all along. There was no difference between right and wrong. It was just a matter of what you could get away with. And now I was sure I had that same coldness in my heart.
“I never talked to any police officers,” Rosemary said feebly.
“Bullshit! Why should I believe you?”
The car rocked on its springs beneath us. I raised the gun right to the level of her eyes.
“Please don’t do this,” she said.
