told Bob and Rae what they’d be doing. And then they all went back to bed.
* * *
—
HE WAS UP a few minutes before six, and Tremanty called right at six o’clock and said the plan hadn’t changed, except that the agent in charge had talked to the sheriff. The FBI would handle it, but the Vegas cops now knew what was happening.
“It’s a political thing, you know, after the mall,” Tremanty said.
* * *
—
LUCAS CLEANED UP, found the bank on Google Maps, called Bob and Rae to make sure they were awake—they were, but they’d be going to the FBI office with their gear, and Bob would be going out to a shooting range—and took the Volvo to a parking structure near the bank and walked over right at seven. Tremanty was waiting inside the door with two other FBI people, including the Las Vegas agent in charge. Lucas could smell the stress.
“We’ll have seven more agents around you, running a box,” the AIC said, poking a finger as Lucas’s chest. “Don’t try to beat any yellow lights.”
“We want you to talk to Harrelson on the phone,” Tremanty said. “He’s already up, but he won’t be here until nine. We want you to hear the way he speaks. You’ll have his cell phone in the car. We’ll be tracking the cell and any incoming calls. And we’ll have both a Cessna and a chopper in the sky, tracking cars. And there’ll be a GPS tracker inside the money bag.”
“What if he asks for identifiers? What if he asks, what tattoo does your wife have on her ass?” Lucas asked.
The AIC said, “Ah. We got that. When you answer the phone, you’ll make sure it’s on speaker. You’ll be carrying a handset that’ll come back to us, and Harrelson, and you’ll have an earbud in your ear. If Deese asks about the tattoo on his old lady’s ass, Harrelson will say, ‘Property of the Hells Angels,’ or whatever, and you answer the question.”
“Cool,” Lucas said. And he laughed. “‘Property of Hells Angels’?”
“The problem is, of course, that they’ll think about aerial surveillance, and all that, and they’ll try something tricky,” Tremanty said. “They’ll have two or three vehicles, maybe a stolen one in addition to the Cadillac and the Lexus, and they’ll dump one or two of them. Something tricky anyway. Like driving into a parking structure and running out on foot. Or whatever.”
Lucas asked Tremanty, “How’s Santos? Is he going to make it?”
“Yes, but he’s messed up. Lost a kidney, a chunk of his stomach. A slug barely missed his spine, but he might have some nerve damage that’ll affect his legs. Won’t know about that for a while.”
“I’m asking because he lost us in Caesars and we were right on his tail,” Lucas said. “He dumped his car with the valet and disappeared into the crowd. I’m thinking Deese and his crew could do the same thing, and we could wind up with guns in a crowd again.”
“Don’t want that,” the AIC said, with a touch of sweat in his voice. “I mean, Jesus, we really don’t want that. You wouldn’t believe the PR hassle we’ve got after that thing at the mall. We’re smoothing it over, but it looks like ten years of good relations with the local cops just went down the drain.”
Tremanty: “If those fuckin’ cops hadn’t come running down the mall—”
“Don’t start,” the AIC snapped. “I already got a headache. So does the sheriff. We don’t need to hear any more about it.”
Tremanty nodded.
Lucas asked, “Real money?”
“We’ve got that going,” Tremanty said. “Not two million, but enough to look like a lot. One-dollar bills, wrapped up in bundles, with hundreds on the outside. Two hundred bundles, so you’ll be carrying a little less than forty thousand. The money bundles will be supplied by the bank but will come from Harrelson. If you lose it, it’s Harrelson’s loss.”
“All you have to do,” the AIC said, “is be Harrelson. That’s it.”
“Sounds easy,” Lucas said. “It never is, though.”
“Not only that, you have to wear silly clothes,” Tremanty said, handing him a sack. Lucas looked inside and found a new pair of khaki slacks and a pink golf shirt.
“Where’d you get these in the middle of the night?”
“This is Vegas,” Tremanty said.
* * *
—
LUCAS GOT on the phone with Harrelson, who had a touch of a dry, Southwestern accent. His vocal range and Lucas’s—mild baritones—were a near match, which helped.