“That would be my guess,” he said.

Mabel looked annoyed. “What’s a payoff scam?”

“It’s a method of stealing chips,” Valentine explained. “Albert Einstein said stealing chips was the only way you could beat roulette, and he was right.”

“So it has nothing to do with the equipment?”

“No.” He removed another soda from the pack and popped it open. “You said the dealers were given polygraphs. What about the box man?”

“Is he the person who pays out winners?” Mabel asked.

“Yes.”

“He wasn’t given one. The casino’s director of surveillance personally vouched for him. They’re related.”

“Oh-oh,” his son said under his breath.

Mabel’s head snapped like a spectator at a tennis match. “You think they’rethe ones doing the stealing?”

Gerry turned the legal pad around, and showed her what he’d written. Of the many sentences on the page, he’d crossed out all but two. The first sentence, three spaces down, said, ‘Too much money flying out the door.’ The second, just below it, said, ‘Inside job.’ Mabel nodded; it was the same technique Tony used. Eliminate the obvious, and the answer will often stare you in the face.

“And the director of surveillance was so polite over the phone,” she said.

Valentine stared at the live-feed of the Casino at Monte Carlo on his computer. The player sitting to the box man’s right was sweating, the collar of his starched shirt cutting his neck like a garrotte.

“You taping this?” he asked.

“Of course,” Mabel said. “Want to see something again?”

“The last minute.”

Mabel rewound the tape, then hit play. Valentine and Gerry leaned forward and stared. After the tape was done, they both pulled back. “Got it,” Valentine said.

“Me, too,” Gerry said.

“Oh, I hate you both,” Mabel said. “What’s going on?”

“The player to the box man’s right is stealing the money. He bets red, or black. Forty-five percent of the time, he wins. When the box man slides him his winnings, he overpays him. The player immediately adds his winnings to his stack. The evidence is only on the table for a few seconds. Then, it melts away.”

“Doesn’t the eye-in-the-sky catch on?” Mabel asked.

“The director of surveillance makes sure it doesn’t. He tells the techs manning the cameras to watch the wheel. They never see the overpay.”

Mabel leaned back in her chair, clearly perplexed. “But the director of surveillance hiredus. Surely he had to think you might catch on.”

If there was one part of the business Mabel didn’t understand, it was that casino cheaters didn’t just steal for the money. They stole because they enjoyed the high that came from beating the house. Sometimes they enjoyed it so much, they couldn’t stop. Valentine dialed The Casino in Monte Carlo, and within a minute, had the casino’s GM on the line. He explained the scam, and the GM cursed loudly when he learned who was involved. He thanked the GM for his business, then hung up.

“What will happen now?” Mabel asked.

“Watch.”

Sixty seconds later, four security guards appeared, and escorted the box man and his partner from the table.

“That’s what I call service,” Mabel said.

Chapter 5

It was quitting time. Gerry and Mabel both left, while Valentine went back to work. Since losing his wife, he’d found it the perfect antidote for loneliness. As he sat down in the chair in his study, his private line rang. Only a handful of people had the number, and he snatched up the phone.

“Valentine here.”

“Higgins, here,” Bill Higgins said. Bill was the director of the Nevada Gaming Control Board, and a close friend. “I’m standing in the governor’s office in the Capitol Building in Carson City. Governor Smoltz is here, along with his staff. The governor personally asked me to call you. He needs your help.”

Valentine leaned back in his chair. He’d vowed never to work for Nevada’s casinos after the casino owners had tried to blackball his son. His business hadn’t suffered, and he’d been a better man for the decision.

“Is this about one of your casinos?”

“It’s about allour casinos,” Bill said.

“Tell Smoltz I’m not interested.”

The line went silent, and Valentine stared out his study window. It was growing dark, and he was looking forward to his evening stroll. He’d left his kitchen door open a week ago, and been amazed at the number of critters that had decided to pay him a visit. Five varieties of frogs, a chameleon, a colorful banana spider, and a squirrel had poked their heads in. Palm Harbor was filled with wildlife, and he could either be like his neighbors and set traps, or get a book from the library and learn what the animals were. The latter choice had appealed to him, and he’d started taking nightly walks.

“The governor has asked me to ask you to reconsider,” Bill said, coming back on the line. “This problem could cripple every casino in Nevada.”

“Is your job on the line?”

“No.”

“Then I’m not interested. How’s the weather out there?”

Bill relayed his answer to Smoltz. Valentine heard the phone being ripped out of Bill’s hands, and the governor come on the line. Valentine had met Smoltz when he was the head prosecuting attorney in Las Vegas, and hadn’t know his ass from a shovel. Valentine had told him so, and they’d never bonded.

“Goddamn it, Valentine!” Smoltz thundered. “We’re talking about a problem that could turn the state’s economy upside-down. A catastrophe with a capital C.”

“Still not interested. Put Bill back on, will you?”

Smoltz swore and passed the phone back to Bill.

“So, how’s the weather?” Valentine asked.

“You’re really enjoying this, aren’t you?” Bill asked.

From his desk drawer Valentine removed his binoculars and the notebook he used to jot down his wildlife sightings. “Just sticking to my principles, that’s all.”

“This involves Bronco Marchese,” Bill said.

The smile faded from Valentine’s face. A day hadn’t gone by in the last twenty years that he hadn’t thought about Bronco Marchese.

“How does he figure into this?”

“Bronco got arrested in Reno yesterday. He’s charged with second-degree murder, and for stealing a jackpot from the Cal Neva Lodge. Bronco’s asked the prosecutor to cut him a deal, and it looks like he might.”

Valentine put his binoculars and notebook back into the drawer. Bronco’s gang had murdered his brother-in-law Sal on the Atlantic City Boardwalk twenty years ago. Every other member of the gang was now in prison, and it was the last piece of unfinished business from his days in law enforcement.

“How can they let him skate?”

“Bronco’s claiming there’s a Nevada Gaming Control Board agent stealing jackpots from Nevada’s casinos,” Bill said. “If we don’t let Bronco go, he’s going to release the agent’s name to the media, and ruin our business.”

Valentine whistled into the phone. Bill had just described the casino business’s worst nightmare. If the public thought the people policing the casinos were crooks, they’d stop playing. Overnight, business would dry up, and the casinos would go under. No wonder Smoltz was sweating through his underwear.

“Is Bronco telling the truth?” Valentine asked.

“Not sure,” Bill said. “We want you to have a look, and tell us what you think.”

“Which would put Bronco’s fate in my hands.”

“That’s right.”

Dusk had settled, and Valentine saw his backyard pool into darkness. Perhaps this was God’s way of rewarding him for living a clean life, or maybe it was just dumb luck. Either way, he wasn’t going to pass it up.

“Tell Smoltz I’ll take the job,” he said.

The Internet was a beautiful thing. Five minutes later, Valentine was reading three reports that Bill Higgins had e-mailed him concerning Bronco Marchese.