4. Nikolai
Nikolai
I’m back on the floor by ten the next morning.
I don’t have to be. I could run the operation from my office, but I’ve always believed you learn more about a business by walking its floor than by reading its reports. I trust what I see.
I move through the casino the way I always do. Unhurried. Watching.
It’s quieter in the afternoons. A different crowd. Retirees mostly, working the slots in the hopes they’ll win a jackpot. A handful of overnight stragglers who don’t know when to quit.
I stop near the center of the floor.
She’s there.
The blonde dealer from last night. She’s at a different table than yesterday, running a morning game with three players. I watch her.
She’s smaller than I remember. Pretty, but that isn’t what holds my attention. She has dark brown roots despite the blonde hair. Her hair is dyed—I’d noticed that last night. Her natural color would be darker. Black, maybe. Almond-shaped honey-colored eyes and full lips.
I think about the way her lips parted when she looked at me yesterday, startled but unwilling to look away.
She says something to one of her players, and the old man laughs. She isn’t flirting; she’s working. That’s how they make tips. And the old men are eating it up. Can’t say I blame them.
Pasha materializes beside me like a large, blond ghost.
“She’s pretty,” he says.
I pull my gaze away from her.
“I know.”
“You could have let security handle the situation last night,” he says.
“Security should have handled it faster.”
“I don’t think she was in any danger.”
“Are you suggesting I allow my employees to be harassed and abused?”
He laughs. “Never.”
“Some things I handle myself,” I say.
“And you are a very hands-on kind of man.”
We take the elevator down to the basement level. Pasha scans the electronic lock. The doors open into the counting room corridor, which is climate-controlled, camera-dense, and accessible to fewer people than almost anywhere else in the building. Pasha scans us through the next door.
Vadim, the manager on duty, looks up from the counting table when I walk in. He quickly hands me the receipts—both sets: the IRS version and ours.
The numbers are good.
They’re always good, which is what the Italians hate most.
I think about the attack on my armored truck six months ago that sent two men to the hospital, one of them for three weeks. They’d been watching our routes. They either had inside information or patience. Either way, they’d done their homework.
I've done mine since.
“Anything irregular in the last forty-eight?” I ask Vadim.
“Clean,” he says.
After verifying the deposits, Pasha and I leave.
“You know, you could just call down here,” Pasha says.
“I could, but my people need to see me. It’s harder to steal from a man you have to look in the eye.”
In my office, Pasha goes to the sidebar and pulls the top off a carafe of whiskey. He pours himself two fingers and one for me.
“The Italians.” I sip my drink.
Pasha settles into the chair across from my desk.
“Sal Vitale is the name that keeps coming up,” he says. “Not the don. No one directly connected to the Castellano family. Which means it’s sanctioned but they want distance.”
“Cowards.”
“Smart cowards.” He leans forward with his elbows on his knees. “They’re not trying to stop the hotel anymore, Nik. That ship has sailed. They’re trying to make it cost you enough that you think twice about the next property.”
“But if they can stop it, they will.”
“Of course. Right now, they can fuck with you. Slow you down. Scare the locals.”
“And we’ve got the opening stuff handled.”
“I’ve got three interviews with marketing firms lined up for the Tatiana launch campaign. End of next week. Your assistant put it on your schedule.”
“Handle it.”
He looks up.
“I’m not sitting through marketing presentations,” I say. “I have no patience for people who spend forty-five minutes clicking through slides to tell me something that belongs in two sentences.”
He laughed softly. “You need to approve the direction.”
“You know the direction. Luxury. Exclusive. Palace-level service. High-roller privacy.”
“Fine. I’ll handle the interviews.”
“Good.”
I turn back to the window. The Strip bakes in the July heat. Tourists in every state of dress crowd the sidewalks. Even the triple-digit temperatures won’t keep them away.
“The dealer,” I say after a minute.
“Be specific.”
“Last night’s table. The blonde.”
“What about her?”
“How long has she been on staff?”
He smiles. “Thought you’d ask, so I pulled her file.” He swipes his finger across his phone screen.
“Three months,” he says. “Clean background check. Solid reviews from the pit bosses. No issues before last night. Doesn’t hang out with any of the other staff. Keeps to herself.”
“Where did she come from?” I ask. “Another casino?”
“No.”
I look at him. “We hired someone who’s never worked in a casino?”
“Application says she worked in Atlantic City and up in Reno. Not here.”
“How old is she?”
“Nik...”
“It’s a valid question.”
He doesn’t believe me. “Twenty-four.”
Before I can ask him more, his phone rings. “It’s one of the PR firms.”
He gets to his feet. “I’ll be around.”
He walks out of my office and down the hall to his. I walk to the window overlooking the casino and search the floor for her. I still don’t know her name. That should have been my first question.
I take the stairs down to the floor. I avoid the elevators as much as possible. People see me, they know me, and they want to make small talk.
The employee area is on the sub-level, below the casino floor. Break room, lockers, HR, scheduling. I don’t make a habit of chatting with my employees, but they need a face to put with the signature on their paychecks.
I’m strolling down the corridor when I hear a familiar laugh. The kind that’s designed to be annoying to everyone over the age of ten. A high-pitched laugh and some kind of nautical horn. I know the cartoon when I hear it, because Mila loves the damn show.
Usually, there’s music or some stupid talk show on in the break room. I’m curious to see who’s reliving their childhood.
I push through the door. The television mounted to the wall is showing exactly what I thought it would be.
And on the couch, with his feet dangling off the edge, is a child.
A small one. Four, maybe five years old. Black hair that needs a cut. A dinosaur-shaped backpack sits on the cushion beside him. He’s focused on the screen and doesn’t look up when I walk in.
I stand in the center of the room and look at him.
He keeps watching the television.
I wait. He doesn’t move. Doesn’t look over. Doesn’t startle or scramble or do any of the things a child should do when a stranger is nearby.
I know he knows I’m there. He’s ignoring me. I’m hard to ignore.
“Why are you in my break room?” I ask.
He looks at me then. Blue eyes. Very calm for someone his size being addressed by someone my size. I know I’m intimidating with all the tattoos. That’s kind of the point. He looks at me once, then back at the television.
What the actual fuck? He dismissed me.
“Are you lost?”
“No.” He doesn’t elaborate.
He’s still watching the screen. SpongeBob is waving around that damn spatula. The child does not laugh. He watches with a serious, measuring expression.
I scan the room, certain I missed the adult the kid belongs to. No one. The room is empty.
I look back at the boy.
“Hey,” I say.
The disinterested expression on his face almost makes me laugh.
We lock eyes for a moment. He isn’t frightened. He isn’t particularly interested, either. Most people, regardless of age, have some kind of reaction to me walking into a room. This child is giving me the same energy he’d give a piece of furniture.
It’s unexpectedly disarming.
Mila talks constantly. From the moment she sees me, she's pulling on my sleeve, telling me about school, or asking if I want to see what she can do now. She fills every available silence with noise. Her presence is enormous for someone so small.
This child is the opposite.
“What’s your name?” I ask.
He studies me. Considers the question. Looks back at the screen.
I wait.
He doesn’t answer.
I’m not going to interrogate a four-year-old. I’m also not going to stand here while one ignores me. I turn and walk back out into the corridor.
Davis is passing at the far end of the hall.
“Davis.”
He stops and turns and walks toward me.
“There is a child in my break room,” I say.
He blinks. “Sir?”
“A child. Small. Dark hair. Watching cartoons on my television.” I pause. “Someone brought a child to work. In a casino. Or he’s lost. Do we have a missing kid report?”
Davis panics. His throat works as he fumbles for the radio clipped to his belt. “I’ll find out right now.”
“Do that.”
He walks away, talking into his radio. I lean against the wall with my arms crossed and wait. The cartoon is audible through the break room door.
Davis returns a few minutes later, and the look on his face tells me he doesn’t have an answer.
“Find out,” I say. “I’ll stay here. I don’t want a kid wandering the casino floor.”
“On it, sir.” He scurries away.
And now I’m pseudo-babysitting a kid that wants nothing to do with me. Never just a regular damn day.