Vegas Knights (4 page)

  The driver got out of the car and waved at us. "Teach and Lafitte?" he asked.

  We nodded, and he opened the car's rear door for us to get in.

  "Where are we off to?" I asked.

  The driver started to answer, but Bill shut him down. "Don't tell him a thing," Bill said. He turned to me. "We're in for one hell of a ride."

 
 

CHAPTER FOUR
 

The pounding on the door of the hotel the next morning almost didn't wake me up because the pounding in my head was much louder. It matched the beat of the house music we'd been dancing to last night. I tried to remember which nightclub that had been in, but they'd all blurred together in my head.

  We'd started out at the other end of the strip, at the Mix Lounge atop THEhotel. Our driver and host – a tall, slick brick of a guy named Mickey Tanaka – brought us up to the place and set us up in the VIP section with our own table service. That included a bottle of Grey Goose vodka brought out in a silver wire tote that included six cans of Red Bull arranged on a set of tiers that rose around the bottle in a spiral.

  The dazzling view from the sixty-fourth floor balcony stunned me. You could see every major casino in the entire city from that vantage point, this blazing island of light swimming on the flat floor of that dark desert basin. I just stood there with the desert winds whipping around me, cackling and drinking and taking it all in.

  After we'd finished up there, Mickey hauled us off to the VooDoo Lounge, another ritzy bar, this one located at the top of the Rio. The bouncer standing in front of the entrance to the elevators, though, took exception to the way we were dressed – all right, to the way I was dressed – and wouldn't let us in.

  I thought I looked all right in a button-down shirt and jeans, but the kicker, it seemed, was my Chucks. No sneakers allowed, and my tattered canvas footwear had no chance of passing muster. The people at the Mix hadn't cared, but the guy at the Rio wanted to be a prick. Bill tried to slip him fifty bucks to let it slide, but he just sneered at the effort.

  "No problem," Mickey said. "We'll just go shopping."

  He led us off to the shopping part of the casino, which was larger and nicer than just about any mall I'd ever seen. On the way in, we passed by a place called Nawlins Authentic, which was filled with all sorts of Mardi Gras and French Quarter crap, the kind they sell in the tourist shops all throughout the Quarter. I guess that made it authentic, but that didn't keep it from being crap.

  The sight of coffee and beignet mix from Cafe du Monde made me miss home though. When I was a kid, my parents walked me through Jackson Square just about every day on our way to or from the French Market. My parents had named me for the place, which was where they'd first met.

  You'd think the Rio would be all about the big city in Brazil, but they seemed to have taken the Carnival from Rio de Janeiro and conflated it with Mardi Gras. The place was filled with all sorts of things that reminded me of New Orleans, but in the same way that Disney World brought to mind the real world.

  Mickey brought us straight to a store called Fashion 101, where a couple of gorgeous ladies set us up with what they said was the latest in club wear. Bill flirted with them relentlessly, but I was too stunned by the price tags to say much. I knew we'd won thousands of dollars, but I'd never dropped several hundred dollars on a single suit of clothes before.

  I wound up going with a sharp black suit, white silk shirt, and the most incredible dress shoes I'd ever worn. All the ones my parents and grandma had ever bought me always pinched my toes and cut into my heel. I'd hated them. Putting on these shoes was like having every spot on your feet kissed at once.

  When we got back to the elevators for the VooDoo Lounge, the bouncer waved us right in. At the top, fiftyone stories up, Bill ordered us a round of Hurricanes. I know they're the drink of the Quarter, but I never did care for them much. They taste too much like Kool-Aid to me. Back home, I generally stuck to Abita beers – especially Turbodog – when I could get them. Here, though, I figured I'd do what the rest of the tourists were doing and enjoy it.

  We walked out on to the wide balcony and took in the view of the Strip from this angle. The Rio sat apart from the Strip, on the other side of I-15. The interstate slashed a canyon of utter normalcy through the neon city, separating us from the glittering gulch of neon that sprawled beyond it.

  I spotted the spire of Bootleggers way off to the left, between Revolutions and the Stratosphere. It stood there like a beacon beckoning to us in the night. We'd had our way with the place tonight, and it wanted us back for another shot. It just didn't know what it was asking for.

  The backs of the Mirage, Caesar's Palace, and the Bellagio spread out straight in front of us. To the south, past the newly opened City Center, I spied the Excalibur, the Luxor, and THEhotel, where we'd just been.

  The spires of the Excalibur intrigued me. When I was a kid, back when my father was still around, he'd loved to tell me stories about King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table. The hotel looked more like a LEGO castle than any rendering of medieval architecture, though, and I suspected it would be just as faithful to the classic tales of Arthur as the Rio was to New Orleans.

  My favorite part of those stories, of course, had been the bits about Merlin. My family had long connections with magic – even if I hadn't known it at the time – and most days the idea of a man in a pointy hat making incredible things happen with a wave of his wand enthralled me. The other days I imagined myself as some sort of modern-day knight rushing in to help those who needed it most.

  That's part of what had drawn me to Vegas – the idea that I could be both a magician and a knight, someone who could use his mojo to make things happen. All that was missing now was a Holy Grail for my quest, or at least a windmill to tilt at. I'd totally expected to flame out hard and spend the rest of the week watching my pennies while Bill lived large on the money his parents had given him for the trip. So far, so good.

  While I'd been taking in the flashing vista, Bill had struck up a conversation with a pair of the hottest women I'd ever seen. Mickey ran off to grab a round of drinks for us all. I tried to wave him off because I was already feeling the spin of the world beneath me, but I didn't get his attention in time. When he came back and put a drink in my hand, I didn't want it to go to waste, so I gratefully accepted it.

  The women – whose names I just couldn't seem to get straight – suggested we hit a dance club. Bill thought that was a great idea. Even though I can't dance my way out of a closet, I figured whatever these beauties wanted to do was fine with me.

  Minutes later, Mickey walked us straight to the front of the line at Pure, this kicking nightclub inside of Caesar's Palace, and slipped us right past the velvet rope. Inside, he escorted us and the ladies to the Red Room, where we sprang for a bottle of Dom Perignon 2000. After downing a flute each, the ladies hauled us out onto the dance floor where someone named DJ M4RC3L0 was spinning electronica like Crystal Method, Delirium, Moby, Fatboy Slim, Chemical Brothers, and even some Prince and Lady Gaga mixed in with the kind of Rat Pack tunes my Grandpa Laveau used to listen too before he passed away.

  We were a long way from Preservation Hall.

  After a while, I needed some air, so I staggered on out to the terrace, an open-air balcony that looked out over the strip. Unlike at the other place, I was only a story or so off the ground. Instead of watching the action from a distance, I was right there in the heart of it, drinking from the fire hose as I tried to take its pulse.

  The next thing I remember, I started to feel sick. Fortunately, the woman who'd followed me out – she had stunning red hair and brilliant green eyes, but that's all I can recall – steered me away from the edge of the terrace and straight to a conveniently placed planter instead.

  It all gets a little blurry after that. The woman went and grabbed Mickey, and he came and gathered me up to take me to the car. The last I saw of Bill, who now had a lady on each arm, was back on the dance floor as Mickey and I passed through. He came over and grabbed me by the collar with both hands. I wasn't sure if he was trying to steady himself or me.

  "Get back to the room and sleep it off!" he shouted over the thumping music.

  I tried to apologize for being such a mess, but he wasn't having any of that. "You deserve a wild night!" he said. "You did great today! No one could have done better!"

  "It's been a hell of a day!" I said, barely able to get the words out around my thick tongue. "You were fantastic too! I'm glad to have you by my side, brother!"

  He grinned at me. "I love you, man!"

  I rolled my eyes and nearly kept going right over with them, but Mickey held me steady. "Are we at that point of the night already?" I asked. "Then it's time for me to head home!"

  Mickey bundled me in the back of the car, leaving me face-down on the back bench seat. He even brought me an ice bucket to hold on to, just in case I still felt the need to throw up. I'm sure that if I'd gotten sick all over the floor, he would have cleaned it up without complaint, but that doesn't mean he wanted to have to.

  Once Mickey got me to my room at Reservations, I tipped him my last hundred bucks. Given what he'd done for Bill and me that night, it seemed like the right thing to do.

  Then I fell over and slept like I was dead – at least until someone started knocking on my door.

  "Open up!" Bill shouted from the other side of the door. "Come on, Jackson! I know you're in there!"

  "Use your key!" I shouted back. My ears still rang from the music at the nightclubs, and the effort involved in raising my head, opening my mouth, and making words come out made me feel like my brain had shrunk down small enough to rattle around loose in my skull.

  "He doesn't seem to have one," said a woman. I didn't recognize the voice, but there was a lot about last night that seemed fuzzy.

  I staggered over to the door, still dressed in my expensive clothes from last night, except for my shoes, which I tripped over on the way. I stank of booze and vomit, and I felt like Mickey had laid me down in the middle of the Strip and let traffic run over me until someone shouted "Jackpot!"

  I glanced back at the clock on the table near my bed. Its glowing blue numbers read 2:05. I suspected that meant pm rather than am, but I wasn't sure of anything at that moment.

  I pressed my eye against the peephole. In the fisheye lens, I spotted Bill swaying there, his head lolling on the shoulder of a young lady in a turquoise blouse. As I tried to get a better look at her, she pounded on the door again, hard enough to smack the peephole into my eye.

  I yelped in pain, but the woman under Bill's arm didn't seem to care. "Just open the damned door!" she said.

  Still holding one hand over my hurt eye, I reached out with the other and pulled the door open. As soon as I'd cracked it an inch, it came flying in at me, and I had to leap out of the way.

  Bill staggered into the room with the woman still under his arm. As he reached the nearest bed – which I'd been sleeping in – he slumped face-down onto the rumpled sheets and started to snore.

  The woman sighed in relief. "Your friend's an idiot," she said. When she'd had a moment to look me up and down. "You look like an idiot too."

  "Pleased to meet you," I said as I stumbled over to the other bed and sat down. The room spun around my head – and not in the same speed or direction as the hotel – and I focused on the woman to try to make it stop.

  She was young, not much older than me, but her wide dark eyes above her small sharp nose burned with a fierce intelligence that her anger couldn't obscure. She had perfect, longbow-shaped lips and flawless skin that the sun had burnished a deep brown. Her long black hair hung in a loose ponytail held back with a silver clip set with turquoise and lapis lazuli stones.

  Had she not been so irritated, I would have told her she was beautiful. As it was, the best I could do was struggle to keep my balance on the bed.

  "Thanks for bringing him home," I said. "Where did you find him?"

  She rolled her eyes at me. "Good job sticking with your friend," she said.

  "He's a big boy," I said, "and I ain't his momma."

  The woman strode over to the window and threw open the curtains. The afternoon sun came streaming in, nearly blinding me. She glared at me, and I realized how horrible I must have looked. It was a long fall from how I'd felt last night when we walked into the VooDoo Lounge. Yesterday had been one hell of a roller coaster ride.

  "He came into the Ghost Dance and started making an ass of himself."

  I shrugged. "Ghost Dance? Last I saw of him was at Pure."

  She sighed. "It's the nightclub at the Thunderbird, where I work. He stumbled into the club about 5am and started stirring up trouble."

  "He didn't have anyone with him?" I glanced over at Bill. He'd started snoring like a bear, which meant he was still breathing. Good.

  "He came in with a couple of party girls, but they lost him after he passed out. Security thought they'd let him sleep it off in the VIP lounge for a while. They forgot about him until the next shift found him. When the new guards woke him up, he started going off about how he was going to use his magic to bring the girls back."

  I winced at that. "She's right," I said to Bill. "You are an idiot."

  He snored right back at me.

  "Thanks for bringing him here." I leveraged myself up to hustle her out the door before she started asking too many questions about Bill's drunken indiscretion. "I owe you for that."

  She stood her ground. "It's not quite that simple," she said. "If you two have been using magic in Las Vegas, you're in a lot of trouble."