“Maybe.”

His son sat up straight. “Way to go.”

Valentine had pulled out the files of five agents whose primary job was to inspect slot machines. Each had filed a work-related grievance in the past year. Passing the files to Bill, he said, “Tell me what a typical day would be like for one of these agents.”

Bill looked through each file, then removed his glasses and rubbed his eyes. “The five agents you pulled out are part of our field group. There are a hundred and fifty field agents in Nevada. Every day, they enter casinos, and check different slot machines to ensure they’re running properly.”

“You mean freezeouts?”

Bill shook his head. “We used to cart the machines out of the casino and check them, but the downtime cost the casino money. So, we came up with a way to do a test on the floor. The machine is opened, and the agent wires a laptop computer to the machine’s RNG chip. The notebook runs a series of tests to determine if the RNG chip is generating random numbers. Once the test is finished, the information is e-mailed back to headquarters, and the results are checked by a tech.”

“How many of these tests are done per day?”

“About five hundred.”

“Is there any way an agent could use his laptop to corrupt the slot machine?”

“Believe me, we thought about that,” Bill said. “So, we devised a failsafe system to keep everyone honest. There are two agents present whenever a slot machine is tested, and every tested machine is retested a few days later by another team. If tampering is found, the agents who conducted the first test face dismissal and arrest.”

“Has that ever happened?”

“Never.”

“And you keep all this information stored in Vegas?”

Bill nodded. “The information fills several floors. It’s overseen by Fred Friendly, the director of the Electronic Systems Division. Fred and his team examine the results of the tests every single day.”

“And you think they’d notice any discrepancies,” Valentine said.

“Yes. It’s what they’re paid to do.”

The pilot came over the P.A. to announce he was beginning his initial descent into the Reno/Tahoe International airport, and asked them to make sure their seat belts were fastened.

Chapter 14

Instead of going home after cashing his check, Karl Klinghoffer went to a saloon and drank whiskey with some strangers sitting at the bar. Coupled with the two beers he’d sucked down at the Gold Rush, the alcohol had a more powerful effect on him than he would have liked. Driving home a few hours later, he wrestled with the wheel each time his car crossed the double line.

He drove past the amphitheater where afternoon concerts were performed on the weekends during the summer. Crossing Arlington Street, he entered the area of town called “City of Trembling Leaves.” Maybe they should call it ‘City of Trembling Hands,’he thought. It was the oldest part of Reno, the streets lined with three-story Victorians left over from the Roaring Twenties, when rich divorcees had waited out the six-week residence required for their freedom.

He parked in the street and killed the engine. He lived with Becky and his son behind one of these grand dames in a converted two-car garage. The rent was steep, but Becky was accustomed to a certain standard of living.

He walked down a dirt path to his place. The people they rented from made him use this path instead of the driveway. It had always made him feel like a servant, and he wanted to knock on their front door, and tell them off.

Instead, he climbed the wood staircase that hugged the side of the garage. Their apartment was on the second floor, and he saw lights inside and stopped. He tucked his shirt in, then unlocked the door and went in.

“Hey, Becky, I’m home.”

“Hey yourself,” his wife said from the dining room.

“Hey,” his son chorused from another part of the house.

Klinghoffer stopped in the kitchen. There was a plate of meat loaf and mashed potatoes sitting at his spot at the kitchen table, and he saw a fly buzzing around it. He stuck his finger in the mashed potatoes. They were ice cold.

He went to the doorway leading to the living room and stopped. Becky was hunched over the dining room table, dressed in grey sweats. During the day, she home-schooled Karl Jr. At night, she wrote religious tracts for her father’s church. She did not look up.

“Where you been?” she wanted to know.

“Out and about.”

He came in and peered over her shoulder. Becky’s writing appeared in religious pamphlets that were mass-mailed by her father’s church, and it was not uncommon to see them floating around town during windy days. Her handwriting was poor, and he had to squint.

“Is it any wonder why young people are committing such horrible crimes against the innocent, when we protect the rights of atheists, and abolish the recognition of the Lord Jesus in our schools? The diabolical forces of moral corruption walk the halls of Congress, state legislatures and the courts. The gay coalitions, rabid feminist groups, United Nation one-world government radicals, and A.C.L.U., all use their political action committee funds to influence elected officials who force us under protection of law to tolerate their despicable conduct. These are the forces destroying our society!”

“Where you been?” she asked again.

He pulled up a chair. At the bar, he’d thought over what he wanted to say. Rehearsed it to the drunk next to him. The drunk had seemed to like it. Sitting, he said, “Has Jesus ever spoken to you, Becky?”

She smiled, still writing. “Sure. He speaks to me every day.”

“He spoke to me today. At least I think it was him.”

Her smile grew. “What did he say?”

“Promise you won’t laugh.”

“Why should I do that?”

“Just promise me, okay?”

She looked up and made eye contact with him. “ Karl?”

“What’s wrong?”

“Have you been drinking? Your eyes look funny.”

He’d decided in the bar that if he was going to tell a lie, it might as well be a big one. The drunk next to him had approved of the strategy.

“Jesus told me to play a slot machine.”

Becky swallowed hard. “Jesus told you to play a slot machine?”

“That’s right.”

“You sure it wasn’t some drunk you met?” she said, turning nasty.

“Couldn’t have been.”

“And why’s that, Mr. Alcohol on his Breath?”

Klinghoffer took stacks of hundred dollar bills from his pockets, and tossed them onto the table. Becky’s mouth opened, but no words came out. She picked up the money, her face aglow. Right then, Klinghoffer knew he was going to be okay. She wasn’t going to throw him out, or threaten divorce, or do any of the other childish things she did whenever his behavior did not suit her. She held the money to her bosom.

“Praise the Lord,” she said.

Valentine, Gerry, and Bill Higgins landed in the Reno Airport at eight o’clock that night, and were taken by police escort to the Washoe County Detention Center. The Reno police had been alerted to the fact that someone might be gunning for Valentine, and the show-of-force was befitting a politician.

The detention center was an enormous facility. During his trips to Nevada, Valentine had heard it referred to as a debtor’s prison because Reno’s judges often extended jail sentences when prisoners couldn’t pay fines. Bill had called the sergeant who ran the center before leaving Las Vegas, and told him they wanted to interview Bronco Marchese.

The sergeant was at the front entrance when they arrived. He was a large, gregarious Irishman named Joe O’Sullivan, and he greeted them with smiles and handshakes. O’Sullivan escorted them to his office on the second floor, and after they were seated, explained why the interview wasn’t going to happen.