the pair had disappeared. After that the news didn’t get any better. The pistol Stone had taken from Mike was sterilized; the van stolen. Their kidnappers had not mentioned Bagger’s name, so there was nothing to connect any of it to the casino chief. They didn’t even have enough to bring him in for questioning. The authorities were not happy about coming up empty. In the future it was made very clear that the cavalry would not come running when called.
It seemed to put them back at square one in their war with Bagger.
Yet it was Oliver Stone who was the most worried. Sterilized weapon, stolen van, no IDs, bound people disappearing in the night with no trace? What if it hadn’t been Bagger’s men who’d kidnapped them? What if instead of being after Annabelle they were after him?
CHAPTER 50
WHEN MIKE AND HIS PRISONERS didn’t show up at the pre-arranged spot, Bagger didn’t shout or throw objects. He was far more introspective than most people realized. You didn’t get to his level without thinking things through from every angle.
The casino boss knew that losing Mike was not a good thing. Worse than that, he didn’t know who he’d lost Mike to, or what Mike might be saying to them. The town was crawling with feds. You could spit on any street corner and hit five of them, easy. Bagger’s instincts had allowed him to survive many dangerous moments. He could sense this was one of them. He could hop on his jet and make a run for it. Yet that cut against everything he’d built his career on. Jerry Bagger never ran from trouble.
He made some calls. The first one was to bring down some reinforcements from Atlantic City. Bagger then called Joe, his PI guy, and instructed him to dig up some more information that Bagger felt he would need as this whole thing unfolded. The last call was to his lawyer, who knew more of Bagger’s secrets than anyone. The man immediately began constructing alibis and legal strategies in case the feds knocked on his client’s door.
With that business finished, Bagger decided to take a stroll alone. Unlike Atlantic City, D.C. closed shop early. On a weeknight there were few restaurants, bars or clubs open this late. Yet after about a ten-block jaunt, Jerry found a neon-lighted dive, went inside, grabbed a stool at the bar and ordered a whiskey sour with a chaser from a bartender whose features clearly showed that life had come down on him like a sledgehammer. The fat guy seated next to him gazed droopily into his beer while an Elvis Costello song drifted from the dented jukebox that was coated with decades’ worth of beers and tears.
Bagger had grown up in places just like this, hustling for scraps. Nearly sixty years later he was still hustling, only the scraps were now valued in the millions. Yet sometimes he wished he were again that dirty-faced kid with the infectious smile and mile-a-minute mouth ripping people off for dollars with tried-and-true scams, the marks never knowing what had hit them until he was long gone and on to the next scheme.
“So what do people do for fun in this town?” he asked the bartender.
The man started mopping the bar and said, “It’s not a town built for fun, least that’s my opinion.”
“Serious business here, you mean?”
The man grinned. “Only place that can nuke you and tax you.”
“Some people think we’d all be a lot better off if somebody nuked this place.”
“Hey, just give me twenty-four hours’ warning.”
“I’m from Atlantic City.”
“Cool place. Afraid I dropped enough of my retirement dollars there, though.”
“Ever been to the Pompeii?”
“Oh yeah. Neat casino. Guy who runs it is bad news, so I’ve heard. Real hardass. But I guess you gotta be to make money in that racket. So more power to the man.”
“You been tending bar long?”
“Too long. I wanted to be a Major League pitcher, but my stuff wasn’t quite good enough. By the time I realized it, pouring drinks was all I knew how to do. But with three kids to feed, you do what you gotta do.”
“What about your wife?”
“Cancer, three years ago. Just when things were looking good, life kicks you right in the gut. Know what I mean?”
“Yeah, I do.” Bagger laid ten Franklins down for a tip and rose to leave.
The stunned bartender said, “Mister, what the hell’s this for?”
“Just a reminder that even assholes aren’t all bad.”
Bagger walked back to his hotel. His cell phone was buzzing, no doubt his security detail checking up on him. He had a lot of enemies and his boys didn’t like him being out alone. It wasn’t because they loved him, Bagger knew. If he went down, their jobs went away. In Bagger’s world you got loyalty either at the end of a gun barrel or by waving enough dollars in front of someone. He didn’t bother to answer the call.
He passed by the Washington Monument and stopped. The 555-foot-tall obelisk wasn’t capturing his attention, it was the man and woman walking hand in hand along the path near the monument.
Bagger had never had a serious relationship with any woman; he’d been too busy hustling for his fortune. All the women he’d been involved with had either been paid for or looking to get some action from old Jerry in return for giving in. He knew they didn’t really care for him and so he never cared about them.
That was his life until Annabelle Conroy had come along and turned him upside down. There had been something about her right from the get-go that had hit him in a place he didn’t think he even had anymore. He’d allowed himself to believe that she actually cared for him and not because he could do anything for her.
And then the bottom had dropped out and here he was in the city he hated almost as much as Vegas, looking to kill a woman he could’ve loved forever. The loss of the forty million hadn’t destroyed him. He could always make more money when it came down to it. Yet Annabelle Conroy had stolen the unthinkable from him: his heart.
So enraged was Bagger by this sense of betrayal that if he’d had a gun, he would have shot the couple passing just a few feet away from him. It was all he could do to keep himself from running over and pounding both of them into the dirt.
He turned and walked quickly back to his hotel. When he got there he was in for another surprise. Mike Manson and his sidekick had just returned looking bloody and disheveled.
Before Bagger said anything to them he motioned to one of his other men and mouthed the word, “Clean?”
“We searched ’em,” the man said. “No surveillance devices.”
Bagger looked at Mike. “What the hell happened?”
“We blew it, Mr. Bagger,” Mike admitted. “We had ’em in the van, then the old guy got the gun away from me and tied us up. Took us all this time to get free and back here.”
“We had to walk five miles,” the other man said.
“I don’t give a shit if you had to crawl using your tongues,” Bagger roared. “You let a woman and a damn librarian get the drop on you?”
“It wasn’t the librarian,” Mike said. “He was an older guy, but he was one serious dude. He stuck a finger against my ribs and my whole body went numb.” He pointed to his wounded ear. “Then he took a chunk of my ear off with a round from my gun like it was nothing. He was a pro, Mr. Bagger. We weren’t expecting that kind of trouble.”
“Mike, if I didn’t know you’re not a screw-up, I’d put a round right through your head.”
Mike said nervously, “Yes sir, Mr. Bagger. I know. We crawled behind some trees, and Joe found a chunk of glass we used to cut the ropes off. Right as we were taking off the cops showed up. They must’ve called them. They didn’t see us, though.”
“You’re sure?”
“Yes sir.”
“The guy who nicked you was a pro, huh? What’d he look like?”
Mike told him.
“Maybe a fed?”
“He wasn’t dressed like a fed. And he was a little old for that. But the guy was still a pro. And he and Conroy were tight.”
Bagger slowly sat down in a chair. Who the hell was Annabelle hooked up with?