Mississippi Roll_A Wild Cards Novel Read online

  But this, this—was this what the others had been feeling all along? Was this what it really felt like to be a hero?

  Sylvia pulled away the ice pack and winced sympathetically. “How’s that feel?”

  “Fine, it’s fine,” he murmured.

  Leaning back, she took a sip of her gin and tonic and watched him from the next barstool over. “You look poleaxed. Big day, huh?”

  Words poured out. “Honey, I’m not a hero. I’ve known that ever since Team Hearts on American Hero—” He’d been voted off the show—discarded, rather—in the seventh round, and he sort of hated that he remembered that detail. He wasn’t supposed to care. It was supposed to be a joke. “But I don’t know now, I just did something because I couldn’t not do something. After what I saw, that would have made me an ass.”

  “A bigger ass,” she said cheerfully.

  “Yeah. I mean. But doing the right thing, catching that guy—that felt really good. And now I don’t know what to do with myself. Because I’m a joker but I’m also kind of an ace and a lot of people say that means I should go out and help people. And maybe I should. I don’t know. I’ve never felt like this. What do I do?” He looked at her pleadingly. He hadn’t taken a single drink of the beer sitting in front of him.

  She slid off the stool and slipped her hands behind his neck. The touch comforted him, grounded him. Stopped him from feeling like he wanted to run all over the ship screaming in a fit of existential angst.

  “What you did? That wasn’t ’cause you’re an ace. Anyone could have seen it and reported it. Anybody who’s decent would have. And you’re a decent guy, Andrew.” She gave him a light kiss on the cheek. “You don’t have to be an ace hero to be a good citizen.”

  She was right. She was exactly right. A good citizen, that was all. He didn’t have to save the world. He just had to be a decent human being. That ought to be easy enough.

  Once Andrew started looking, he saw crime everywhere. Wrongdoers. Malfeasance. People being awful. People breaking the law—and he was in a position to stop them.

  The next day, just after noon, Andrew was wandering along the promenade outside the Grand Saloon. The cruise director, Caitlyn Beaumont, liked for the entertainers to mingle with the guests in their downtime. Smile, wave, take a few pictures. Give the guests a little bit of a thrill, make them feel like they’re part of the action, that there wasn’t a space between the stage and the seats. Andrew happened to agree with her—not that he’d admit it to her face. But it was a good idea. Keeping the guests happy, enticing them to come back for more, making them feel special. All part of the show.

  Hands in his trouser pockets, wearing a spiffy silk T-shirt, he strolled along. Minding his own business, but not really. A couple of his groupies spotted him and rushed over for pictures. Andrew obliged them, smiling graciously, winking conspiratorially. The cell phone snapshots took twice as long to take as they should have, but he was used to that, and the women thanked him. Not a bad gig at all. He wondered if good ol’ Rusty had women rushing up to him demanding pictures.

  Then he looked up the deck to see a young, unassuming woman pull a phone out of an older man’s back pocket and walk away. It was so smooth, so casual, Andrew wasn’t sure he’d even seen it. A group of people stood at the railing, watching barges pass by on the river. She just seemed like part of the group, wasn’t even looking at her target, waiting for the right moment. The moment came—someone called and pointed out an especially interesting view—and she slipped the phone clean out and tucked it up her sleeve. Just like that.

  Oh no. Andrew wasn’t going to let that stand. Not on his boat.

  Nonchalantly glancing out at the forest scrolling past on the shoreline, he strolled after her, as casual-like as he could manage. The woman was wearing slacks and an expensive-looking blouse that rippled as she moved, high heels that clicked on the decking. The blouse had long sleeves, which seemed odd in the sticky southern heat, but Andrew wouldn’t have questioned it if he hadn’t seen her hide the phone up that sleeve. The blouse was a cover.

  She wasn’t in a hurry. Wasn’t drawing any attention to herself. That gave Andrew time to think about how to handle this. Call security? Keep an eye on her until a security guard could arrive? Confront her himself? Maybe use a bit of sleight of hand to steal back the phone? Wasn’t really time to call security, he decided. She couldn’t leave the boat en route, but she could get rid of the goods and claim innocence. He thought he could handle this smoothly. He paused long enough to snap a picture of her with his phone, catching her in a moment when she leaned on the railing, turned toward him, and he could do so without being too obvious about it. There, he could pass along her picture and security could keep an eye on her.

  She strolled on. He had to do something before she got to the door. Too many places for her to duck away among the staterooms and galleries of the boat’s interior.

  “Wild Fox!” someone called from behind him, then giggled. He knew what came next and he didn’t really have time for it.

  He stopped, rolled back his shoulders, and donned his broad stage smile before turning around, arms open. “Ladies!”

  A couple of women, fashionable mom types in their late thirties or early forties, approached with their eyes lit up. Sometimes he never really knew if they were fans of him, or fans of celebrity in general and he was just the most approachable one on hand. They might never have the guts to approach, say, George Clooney—but a has-been from American Hero? Oh yeah. And they’d show the pictures around and someone would say, “I didn’t know he was even still alive!”

  The blond woman said, “We caught your show last night and just wanted to tell you how much fun it was. Just really nice, you know?”

  “Thanks, that’s exactly the kind of thing we like to hear,” Andrew said, delivering practiced responses. Genuine—he really was grateful, and “fun” and “nice” were just what he and Sylvia were going for.

  “You mind if we get a picture with you?”

  He put his arms around both their shoulders and pulled them in as one of them held up her phone for the group selfie.

  In the background of the shot, Andrew could see his quarry walking away. He had to go after her. Without being rude, because Caitlyn would hear about it.

  They’d gotten three good pictures already but the blonde still wasn’t sure about any of them and wanted to try for a fourth where she maybe wasn’t blinking so much. But Andrew cut her off with a light hand on her shoulder.

  “Ladies. Could you do me a big favor?” He met both their gazes earnestly.

  They nodded, agreeing eagerly before he even told them what he wanted. He explained: “Can you get to the end of the deck there, past that woman in the beige shirt, and then maybe block the path? Like, just spend a good long time taking some pictures of the scenery while I corner her. Just for a few minutes. I really need to talk to her.” He might have leered.

  “But what about Sylvia?” one of them asked, clearly unhappy with the idea of him being unfaithful to his beautiful girlfriend. The idea appalled Andrew as well, and he reassured the woman.

  “Believe me, Sylvia is my one true love in the whole world. But this chick took something that isn’t hers and I’m going to get it back. Understand?” He winked and showed a little bit of pointed teeth. That fun-loving Robin Hood predator. His accomplices giggled conspiratorially. They didn’t seem to have a problem with Wild Fox, superhero. That thought gave him some courage.

  They raced ahead, making a whole big show of calling out about this or that other part of the shore, the lacy decoration along the roof over the promenade, sniping at each other about where to stand and who should hold the camera. Way over the top, but somehow that made the scenario seem more authentic, a couple of otherwise normal adults acting like little kids just because they were on a riverboat.

  The pickpocket had been heading for the door but pulled up short, confronted by the low-grade idiocy before her. Hands on hips, she hesitated, seemingly taki
ng a moment to try to figure out how to slip by the women to get to where she was going. That gave Andrew his chance.

  He sidled up to her. “Hey, babe, what’s a low-down chick like you doing on a nice boat like this?”

  Startled, she turned, then drew herself straighter, a posture meant to be intimidating. “What? Who do you think you are—”

  He was pretty sure she was about to either slap him or march away, threatening to report him. He was definitely being skeezy—a little scary how good he was at it. Before she could put on the damsel-in-distress act and let out some attention-getting scream, her grabbed her wrist, the one she’d slipped the phone up, and he really hoped she hadn’t gotten rid of it or passed it off while he wasn’t looking.

  And she hadn’t. He slid back her sleeve, revealing a pouch strapped to her forearm where she’d stashed the phone, a pair of earrings, and a wristwatch. Andrew took them all, putting them safely in his pocket.

  “These”—he held up the phone—“do not belong to you.”

  She could argue. She could fight. Threaten him with an assault charge, whatever. But she didn’t, because she had a thousand or so dollars of stolen goods on her. And she’d probably been at this awhile. She glared at him in a murderous but useless rage.

  He had her arm. She didn’t pull away, just waited for his next move, and he thought about maybe hauling her to the security office in the casino and seeing if he could arrest her for whatever. But the glare in her big brown eyes seemed to dare him to try it. Like, if he made a move, she would then have permission to respond. To fight.

  Andrew really didn’t want to fight. He was pretty sure this woman could take him. A quick stomp on his instep with those heels, he’d be crippled for life.

  He let go.

  He pointed at her. “Don’t try this again. Capisce?”

  She didn’t say a word, just turned and marched away, hips swaying inside those silky slacks. Escaping before he could call the wrath of security down on her. Just as well, probably. He had no idea whether he’d done the right thing.

  His accomplices, the women at the door, stepped aside to let her through; she hardly seemed to notice them, and they looked back at Andrew hopefully.

  “Did it work?”

  “Yeah!” he said brightly, even though his gut feeling was that the whole encounter had gone just a little bit wrong, and that there would be consequences. “Just great! Here, have a couple of drink vouchers. On the house.”

  He paused a moment, took a breath. A shimmer of light, an exhalation later, and he looked like one of the casino security guys, complete with tux and name tag. Only then did he approach the man who’d been pickpocketed.

  “Sir, you dropped this,” Andrew said, pitching his voice right, comporting himself as somberly as he could. The way he imagined professional security guards everywhere must approach their jobs. Very seriously.

  The man looked startled. “What? Oh! Oh my goodness, I didn’t even notice, thank you!”

  “All part of the job,” he said, unable to resist a sly wink. A heroic wink, he thought of it.

  Andrew-as-security nodded smartly and walked off, hands tucked behind his back, surveying his domain, regarding those under his care with an air of benevolent calm. Oh yeah. That was amazing. He was so badass he hardly knew what to do with himself.

  “… and this one’s pickpocketing—so old school, isn’t it? Like what are we, in some Dickens novel? She seems to be mostly working the outside deck.” Andrew scrolled to the next photo on his phone. He and Sylvia had a quick afternoon set in the restaurant, before the Dixieland jazz band got rolling, but after that he’d gone patrolling again and managed to secretly take a bunch of pictures, hoping to ID some of the miscreants he’d spotted over the course of the afternoon. There’d been a surprising number of them. “And this is the guy who’s been palming cards in the poker room. I don’t think the dealer’s spotting it because he’s got this slick little hidden pocket device. You probably want to check this out. And maybe the other table games. I know counting cards is technically legal, and I haven’t really had a chance to watch the blackjack tables to see if there’s anything skeezy going on—”

  “Mr. Yamauchi. Stop.”

  “What?”

  “This isn’t your job,” Captain Montaigne said. “You don’t have to go patrolling the boat looking for trouble. We have crew for that.”

  He was in the captain’s office on the Natchez’s third deck, the texas deck. Captain Montaigne, a no-nonsense middle-aged woman with red hair and a uniform jacket open at the collar, sat across from him at her desk, looking tired, like this was just one more thing.

  “No, it’s not my job, I know—that’s why I’m telling you. The casino guys told me to come talk to you. It’s not like I’m throwing people overboard like some kind of vigilante, I know better than that.”

  “Thank God,” she muttered. Andrew figured he wasn’t supposed to hear that.

  “But I thought you’d want to know. So you can keep an eye on them. Kick them off the boat. I had no idea but there are obviously bad apples out there who see the place as their own little cash till, and I thought you’d want … that you’d want to know.” His voice trailed off. He really did think she’d want to know. And maybe she did. But Andrew had the distinct impression that he’d done something to make the captain’s life harder, not easier.

  “How about I e-mail the pictures to you? Then you can compare them to some kind of database. You guys always have some kind of database—”

  “I’m not the police. I don’t have a database. I can’t just … fine, okay. E-mail the pictures. I’ll keep an eye out. Thank you.”

  Andrew grinned and strolled out of the captain’s office. He didn’t get far before he heard the clicking of Caitlyn Beaumont’s heels coming around the walkway on the deck. She hesitated at the corner, glancing around as if searching for something. Then her gaze rested on him, and she marched. Straight toward him, with determination. Uh-oh …

  She waved to catch his attention. “Andrew, can I have a word with you?”

  That didn’t sound good. Her tone made her sound like a school hall monitor. Like a parent. His ears flattened for just a moment before he perked them back up to listen to her like nothing was wrong.

  “Hey, Caitlyn!” he called back, his smile forced.

  She got up close—but not too close, and he could never figure out if it was because she didn’t like Asians, jokers, or if it was just him—and lowered her voice, glancing around to make sure no guests were nearby to overhear. “Andrew, what are you doing?”

  “I’m just trying to be a good citizen,” he said. “You know, helping out.”

  “I’ve had some…” She paused a moment, as if searching for the right word. The polite word. “Suggestions that whatever it is you’re doing, however well meant, might be looking an awful lot like, well. Harassment.” She winced, as if telling him this personally pained her.

  He spread his arms. “Am I just supposed to ignore it when I see someone palming cards? Or picking pockets? Or running a con? You’d rather I let a bunch of criminals get away with it?”

  “It’s not your job.”

  Just like that. Not your job. Battle cry of the unimaginative. Caitlyn Beaumont didn’t have an ounce of talent in her perfectly turned-out body, but she was the one who got to stand there and decide what he should or shouldn’t do? He could rant about it, but some inner voice that was a lot smarter than he was—and that sounded a lot like Sylvia—made him stop, take a breath, and consider that this was not a fight worth fighting.

  “All right,” he said, his smile tight. “I’ll step back. It’ll be fine.”

  The tension left Caitlyn’s face and she beamed at him. “Thank you so much. I knew you’d understand.”

  “Yeah. Sure. Of course.”

  She stalked off on her stilt-like high heels to take care of her next minor crisis. In the meantime, Andrew had no intention of backing off. He’d just have to figure out how to
be a little more sneaky about the whole thing.

  Coming down the stairs and turning back around to the outside promenade, he ran into a crow. Shouldn’t have been possible. The thing had wings, couldn’t it get out of the way?

  “Heads up! Heads up!” the thing cried, flapping its wings in Andrew’s face while he threw up his arms and rocked back.

  “Hey!”

  “Lenore, get over here,” said an amused voice.

  Finally able to see again, Andrew looked to find the crow—Lenore, Roger Washburn’s sidekick—coming to perch on the man’s shoulder. The Amazing Ravenstone, one of the other acts on the boat. Apparently he’d been famous back in the day.

  God, Andrew hoped nobody ever said that about him. “Hey there, Rodge.”

  “Hey.”

  Andrew got an idea. “Hey, I wondered—does Lenore see a lot of stuff? Like—does she notice when things happen? Bad things. Like, you know, Lassie?”

  Roger’s brow furrowed. His trademark devil’s horns wiggled a little when he did that. “Excuse me?”

  “It’s just I’ve been noticing things going wrong. Like, just small-time cons and things. I thought with an extra pair of eyes we could maybe cover more ground—”

  “Heads up! Cawk!”

  “Andrew—she’s a bird. Even if she did see something wrong she wouldn’t be able to tell us.”

  “But she talks—”

  Roger smirked and tilted his head in an expression that clearly said, Oh really?

  “Yeah, okay, just a thought. Thanks,” Andrew said, quickly backpedaling. He remembered the old show business adage: Never work with children or animals. Sure thing.

  Roger eased past him. “I’m on my way to my cabin. Maybe we should have lunch over the next couple days, compare notes?”

  “Yeah, sure,” Andrew said, and stepped aside to let Roger and Lenore by.

  His cell phone dinged and he looked to find a message from Sylvia.

  We’re supposed to meet for dinner, babe, where are you?