17. Reed #3
“Shut that shit up and watch the footage I sent you. I’m sure I’ll see you soon.”
“I don’t know about that. My wife and daughter are here.”
“Wife and daughter? What the hell are you talking about, Reed?” Nicholas interjected, revealing that he was on the call.
“He got Faith back, and they have a daughter,” Sawyer mentioned.
“I thought she was doing a report on the casino or something,” Nicholas remarked.
“She is.”
“Wait a minute. You have a daughter? How old is she?” Nick asked.
“She’s six. We can talk about all of that later. Right now, I’m in the bathroom on the phone, trying not to wake my wife.”
“If you’re on the phone with another woman on my first night here, I swear to God I’m going to find my clothes and the keys to that Range Rover and leave your ass here right now,” Faith grumbled in the distance.
“It’s Nick and Sawyer, baby. It’s a work call,” I said, placing my hand over the receiver like that shit actually worked.
Nicholas chuckled. “Damn, I didn’t mean to get you in trouble. I guess she’s in the right place since she’s looking for dirt on us.”
“Man, shut shit that up,” I snapped.
“Well, go ahead and watch the videos and let me know how you want to move going forward,” Sawyer said before ending the call.
Phone in hand, I headed out to my bedroom to find Faith sitting on the side of the bed.
“They sent some videos over for me to watch,” I explained because the fire in her eyes said that she wasn’t buying that work call shit.
“Can I ask you a question?”
Aww hell, this scenario never ended well.
“Faith, I haven’t even had time to think about another woman since the day you came back to me. I wouldn’t even take that kind of chance with you after God sent you home.”
“You make it sound like I died,” she said, rolling her eyes. “Anyway, for some odd reason, I trust you. My question was about the investigation.”
“What is it, baby?” I asked, sitting on the bed to load the video.
“You really didn’t know about the stuff that Darius was doing?” she asked, studying my face as if she knew my tells.
I took a deep breath hoping that my answer would satisfy her. “No. There was a time when we weren’t completely legit, but once we got Cashville up and running, we vowed to keep everything on the up-and-up. Some people just don’t know when enough is enough, case in point.”
She nodded. “OK.”
“Actually, that whole situation affected me more than I want to admit. There weren’t many people I trusted as it was, due to growing up in my family.
Still, I found my crew, and to me, we were all solid.
I’ve always considered myself a good judge of character and an observant person, as my daughter put it.
When I found out how much bullshit was going on right under my nose, I was floored.
It made me question everybody around me, including myself.
How could I have been so blind? It took a while for me to realize that I didn’t see what was going on because I was always so busy dealing with the obvious.
I was too busy mowing grass to see the snakes that were going around and getting in through the back way. ”
“Understood,” Faith said, bobbing her head as if what I said made perfect sense.
Looking down at my phone, I pressed play on the first video.
Nothing looked out of place aside from the ghost dealing blackjack.
There was another video showing a female dealer that I was vaguely familiar with working a roulette table.
Then the third video seemed to show the same table from a different angle.
“Wait a minute,” I mumbled, going back to the first video to verify the common denominator. “You’ve gotta be fucking kidding me.”
If there were only two videos, it could have been a coincidence. There were five different videos from the tables where the counterfeit chips were traced, and they all had one thing in common. Fucking Paula.
The time stamp on one of the videos even reflected a night when she was supposed to be on vacation.
I wasn’t even in the building, so why the hell was she delivering chips?
That wasn’t even in her job description, although from time to time, I had known her to help when the cashiers and dealers got backed up.
There was nothing that could tell me that this wasn’t on me. I had given her too much access. This could not be happening. No wonder Nick and Sawyer were blowing up my phone. I turned my phone to make sure Faith saw what I saw. Silently, she shook her head. She didn’t have to say a word.
Swiping out of the video, I called Paula’s number. I wasn’t surprised to find that her line was disconnected. I could have spit fire if I tried, but I didn’t want to burn my house down with my family in it.
There was no way around this shit. The evidence was piling up faster than anyone could explain it away. Nick always said that betrayal hurt worse when you didn’t see it coming. I’d be damned if he wasn’t right again. I hit Sawyer’s number and called him back on speaker.
“You want to handle it, or should I?” Sawyer asked.
“Find her first, and let me know when you do.”