The End Game

“Anyway, again, no rush, but if you could look into a problem this cute waitress I know from Mario’s Bit of Italy is having with her landlord, we’d have access to a translator whenever we needed it.”

We. This was the peril involved. We.

“I speak Italian, too,” I said.

“You do?”

“I do,” I said. “But I’ll take care of her problem. Just tell me what these businessmen said.”

“The part in Italian was something about Dinino. They said basically that if everything went well, they’d do it again the following month, too. And then they started going back and forth between the languages and all my friend could get was something about money, something about caviar and something about coming back in town for the Super Bowl.”

“These guys,” I said. “You get a name for either of them?”

“Better,” Nate said. “They paid me with a credit card.”

That was better. And worse, shortly, for them.

Nate gave me the name: Domenic Strabo. He may as well have said John Gotti.

“Good work,” I said.

“And one more thing,” Nate said. “The big money was on the Pax Bellicosa to win, up until about two hours ago. Now even people who put huge coin on that are putting even more money on the Pax Bellicosa to lose.”

“They’re betting both ways?”

“That’s what my guy says.”

If you want to be sure that a game is fixed, watch the bets. A smart fixer will bet on both sides of the ticket so that if there’s any investigation, he can show he was just betting for the sake of betting, that he’d even out on either side.

It’s called proportional betting.

In blackjack, it’s what’s known as the d’Alembert method. Increase your bet after each loss, decrease it after each victory. Played out over a long period, and the odds are you’ll end up slightly ahead.

Played out on a single race, like the Hurricane Cup, and it’s mostly just to cover your ass.

Which meant Christopher Bonaventura put out the word, at least to the people he didn’t want to anger. Or was putting out his own money as insurance.

Either way, I’d done my job.

“Good work,” I said.

“That bit of information came steep,” Nate said. “My guy, he’s got a brother in prison. Trumped-up charge.”

“I’m not busting someone out of prison,” I said. “And neither is Slade Switchblade.”

“Right,” Nate said. “Is Fiona around?”

“Nate,” I said.

“Right,” Nate said. “I’ll talk to Fiona later. Whatever. We’ll work it out.”

“I appreciate all of this,” I said.

“Happy to help,” Nate said. And it sounded like he really meant it.

“Do me a favor,” I said. “Tonight. Leave me a tape of the recording you made at my place and then get out of town. See if you can take everyone you talked to out of town, too.”

“Bro, I can handle myself.”

“Domenic Strabo isn’t just a foot soldier. You drove one of the heads of the Calabria mafia tonight and, probably, someone linked to Al Qaeda. If either are smart enough to piece together anything before they wind up in a cell, you’re likely to wake up from a dirt nap.”

“Oh,” Nate said.

“There’s a couple thousand dollars cut into my mattress. Take it and have a lovely vacation with all of your friends. You need more money, call me. But don’t come back until I tell you you’re safe.”

It wasn’t exactly that I was afraid the Mafia might come after Nate; more that I wasn’t sure what Alex Kyle might do if this all blew up and he remained standing.

Not that that was something I thought was in the cards for our new friend.

“Okay,” Nate said. “But remember to call me this time. Last time you sent me out of town you left me in Fort Lauderdale for weeks.”

“That was miscommunication,” I said.

“That was no communication,” Nate said.

“I’m working on that,” I said. “Now go.”

I hung up with Nate, filled Fi in on the salient points-except for the part about the prison break, which I knew she’d gladly take part in and would happily begin planning like she was Martha Stew-art with bomb-making skills-and called Sam. “Mikey,” he said, “glad you called. We need to talk.”

I could barely hear Sam over the sound of gushing wind. “Where are you?”

“Just coming in off the Pax,” he said. “Listen, change of plans.”

“You don’t know the plan,” I said.

“I know my plan,” he said. “One of Gennaro’s guys is in the hospital.”

“What happened?”

“I had to break his arm.”

“Okay,” I said.

“And he’s probably going to have a bit of a speech impediment thing for a while,” Sam said. “Nothing major. You ever bite the tip of your tongue off?”

“No.”

“Heals right back. Like a lizard’s tail. Anyway, we’re heading back in now from another run. Looks like I’m on the team tomorrow. For safety reasons.”

“Okay,” I said. His voice sounded slightly thick, like he was battling the flu. “You all right?”

“These Swan boats? They’re not much for smoothness. Not exactly like being out on the QE Two.”

“Dramamine didn’t help?”