Rarities Unlimited 02 - Running Scared

all the gold, not just the one piece. Before he could be that dumb, he shut up and pulled another figurine out of his backpack. Then a pin. Then the armband.
    “This is worth twice any of the others,” Socks said, remembering what Tim had told him.
    Joey wanted to disagree, but his mouth was dry. He knew just enough about old jewelry to realize that the heavily decorated gold band was likely worth an arm and a leg and a testicle if you had access to the right market. He didn’t. Smith-White wouldn’t even return his calls. Half the time Cochran wouldn’t either.
    But Shapiro could get through to Cochran.
    Visions of that South Seas cruise his wife had been bugging him about swam delightfully in Joey’s mind. “Two and a half yards for the lot of them.”
    That was more cash than Socks had ever held in his fist at one time. Robbing convenience stores was a hand-to-mouth way to live. Most of the time he was lucky if he got a hundred bucks plus all the booze he could carry for a night’s work.
    Twenty-five hundred dollars.
    And lots more gold where that came from.
    “I need a cold gun,” Socks said. “Forty-five.”
    “Only got a nine-millimeter now. Try me in a few weeks.”
    “The nine is cold?”
    Joey nodded.
    “Guaranteed?” Socks pressed.
    “Hell yes. You think I’m dumb enough to piss off someone that whacks guys for a living?”
    “I don’t whack guys. I just stick ’em up.”
    “I wasn’t talking about you.”
    “Oh. How much?” Socks said.
    “A thousand.”
    “What! Fuck, you’d think the gun was made of gold!”
    “Gold would melt if you used it for a gun barrel,” Joey said impatiently. “Look, just for you, just this once, I’ll throw in the silencer and sell it for five. That leaves you with two thousand bucks in your jeans. We got a deal?”
    Arithmetic had been one of the many subjects Socks flunked on his way out of public schools, but the figure sounded about right to him. Best of all, he would have the gun, too. With that he could get more money.
    “We got a deal.”

Chapter 20
    Las Vegas
    November 2
    Early afternoon
    C herelle licked up the last bit of shrimp cocktail off her fork, mopped steak juices from her plate with the final bite of her third French roll, finished her second double Cosmopolitan, and sighed happily. “Now, that’s food . And it’s free! How can you work here and not weigh two hundred pounds?”
    Risa smiled. Watching her old friend eat her own lunch—and half of Risa’s—had left her with a good feeling, as though she was giving back to Cherelle some of the help that she had given to Risa when they were much younger.
    “Usually I’m too busy to eat lunch,” Risa said. “Otherwise my butt would be a yard wide.”
    “Nah.” Cherelle stretched. “ Two yards.”
    Risa laughed, but her amusement faded as soon as she noticed the ripped seams under Cherelle’s arms. Along with her friend’s worn jeans, run-down shoes, and outright hunger, it added up to a woman who was on the ragged edge of poverty. Motels, even the worst of them, weren’t cheap in Las Vegas.
    The thought of Cherelle sleeping in her car or picking up some man in a bar just to have a place to spend the night made Risa feel angry and guilty at the same time. She was sure it wouldn’t be the first time Cherelle had traded a “ride” for a bed to sleep in.
    But it was the first time Risa had been able to do something about it.
    “Hey, I have a great idea,” she said. “I’ve got to get back to work right now and don’t have any vacation time coming, but there’s no reason we can’t get together and play at night, is there? One of the perks of this job is an on-site apartment, complete with maid service. I’ll call the front desk and tell them to leave a key to my casino apartment for you. You get your stuff and go on up and enjoy the man-size bathtub, order more food from room service if you’re hungry, another drink from the bar, whatever. Take the bedroom on the left and treat it like your own hotel room.”
    The two potent drinks Cherelle had gulped made her wonder if her hearing was going. “You mean it?”
    “Absolutely. I’ll call down to the desk right now. They’ll program a passkey for you.”
    “Well, go do it, girl! I can feel that steaming bathtub already. Uh, you mind if I borrow some of your clothes?”
    “No problem. They might even fit. I’ve lost a little weight.”
    “Yeah, I saw that. Why you’d want to dump those inches . . .”