Loaded Dice Read Online Free Page A

loud LeRoy Neiman paintings and chrome furniture, the color scheme painful to the eye. On the coffee table he spied a suicide note, her name at the bottom of the page. Lucy Price.
    He stepped into the dining room, and through the slider saw her sitting on the balcony railing. She’d closed the slider behind her when she’d gone out, another bad sign.
    “Lucy Price,” he said.
    She swung her head around. Early fifties, Italian, with a slender nose, high cheekbones, and dark, penetrating eyes. Not his wife, but from the same tree.
    “Stay away from me!” she shouted.
    He crossed the room and opened the slider. Sticking his head out, he said, “I need to talk to you.”
    “Didn’t you hear what I just said?”
    She was glued to the railing, the wind whipping her skirt up into her face. Embarrassed, she tried to flatten her skirt out, lost her balance, and started to scream.
    He stepped onto the balcony and stuck his hand out. He’d known a cop in Atlantic City who’d grabbed a jumper, and they’d both ended up falling to their deaths. He braced himself. “Take my hand,” he said.
    She regained her balance and glared at him. “They stole my money! I finally got my life sorted out, and they stole my
money
.”
    “Who?”
    “The bastards that run this place!”
    He didn’t believe it. Nick was a lot of things—womanizer, foulmouthed thug, Neanderthal—but not a crook. Down below, he saw six firemen inflate a giant mattress and position it directly beneath where Lucy stood. He stepped forward.
    “Take my hand. You don’t want to die.”
    “Yes, I do.”
    “No, you don’t.”
    “But they ruined my life . . . ,” she sobbed.
    He was close enough to grab her. Their eyes met, and he saw an emptiness where her soul had once been. The desire to kill herself was real, and he realized that if he didn’t act right now, she was going to jump. He reached out and took her arm.
    “Everything’s going to be okay,” he said.
    He made her face him. The railing was waist-high, and he pointed at it. “I want you to swing your legs over, one at a time. I’ll hold you steady.”
    She started to say something. A helicopter came around the building, and drowned her out. It sounded lighter than a police chopper, and Valentine guessed it was from a local TV station. Lucy shook her fist at it.
    “Leave me alone!”
    She lost her balance and let out another scream. Shooting her hand through the railing’s bars, she grabbed the waist of his pants. They fell down, and a cool breeze shot through his jockeys.
    He envisioned them both going over. Grabbing her by the shoulders, he lifted her clean over the railing. She was crying, and looked terribly ashamed.
    He pulled up his pants. The TV helicopter came around the building again. He lifted his head and saw a grinning cameraman in the copter’s open doorway give him a thumbs-up.
    Valentine flipped him the bird.
    4
    C hance Newman stepped away from the window as the TV helicopter flew by. The last thing he needed was to be seen on the news, leering at a suicide.
    In the window’s reflection he saw Rags and Shelly standing behind him, their faces set in stone. Sal, the blackjack dealer, remained at his post on the other side of the room.
    “You can leave now,” Chance told him.
    Sal departed. Moments later, the door to Chance’s study opened, and a shaven-headed man in his late forties emerged. Dressed entirely in black, he was thin to the point of being unhealthy, his once handsome face marred by a zipper scar running from cheek to jowl. He approached the three casino executives.
    “This is Frank Fontaine,” Chance said.
    Shelly and Rags nodded stiffly. Fontaine sized each man up, then crossed the suite and picked up the Deadlock equipment sitting on the blackjack table. He shook his head.
    “Shit,” he said.
    “Shit is right,” Shelly practically shouted. Coming over to the blackjack table, he wagged his finger in Fontaine’s face. “You told us that nobody in North