* * * 

Ms. Pierce entered the front lobby of the Devlin casino as the cage-doors lowered back down behind her. Zinio knew her name because he'd already googled her, using the camera on his cell phone. 

He regarded her from the blackjack table. Delaney, following his eyes, caught on to what was going on. "Oh, hell," she said. 

Now probably wasn't the time for a tell-all confession. "Relax, it's not us-trust me." 

"You ready to let me win yet?" 

"Not just. Hit her." 

Dealer happily hit her. She lost, making a sour face. The fate peddler gasped. Zinio allowed himself to be temporarily distracted as Dealer reached into the portable stacked washer and dryer combo he had on the table, each the size of a bread box, pulled a fresh handkerchief out of the dryer, folded it neatly, and wiped the latest sweat off his forehead that was draining into his eyes-just so he could confirm the identity of the cards.  

Zinio returned his attention to the matter at hand. Now, instead of playing conductor, he made jerky movements with his head and neck, which he covered by rubbing his neck, as if just trying to get the kinks out. All the while he was giving more directions to his crew. 

Once inside the casino entrance, Kerry said, "Take me to the video room." 

Sam shook his head. "Lady, we don't need to watch the reruns-this is going out live." 

"The video room." 

Across the way, Kerry noticed a woman doubled over in pain at the black jack table; she could hear her squealing from here. The man seated beside her, rubbed her back with a helpless look on his face. Probably some poor customer with the dumb luck to sit next to her, hoping for a good time, until she threw a pipe wrench into the mix. With a better look at more than his bent over profile from this distance, his hair covering half his face, moreover, she might be able to tell if he had the sense to get medical help or not. But for right now, she had more pressing concerns.

* * *

From the Devlin casino's video room, Ms. Pierce took in the escape antics of Zinio's crew on monitor one. There were thirty monitors in all. Just along this one wall. The room would make NASA think twice about relocating. 

In the basement, a Chinese acrobat scaled the oncoming guard mountain-climbing fashion, finding his first foothold on the guard's arm that was reaching for the gun, and then pressing his second foot down on his shoulder.  

Once "on the summit," he performed a backwards somersault off the guard's shoulder. He kicked the guard in the face as he rotated out of the somersault, knocking him out. 

Ms. Pierce's face alighted watching Acrobat do his thing.  

Sam, regarding her queerly, said, "I see you appreciate genius-whatever form it takes."  

Acrobat sprinted towards the nearest intersecting corridor. He spied the arms with guns attached, feeling the space in front of the guards like sensitive insect antennae, before the rest of the guards' bodies made it past the wall in the adjoining hall.  

He ripped off a strip of molding running along the wall to his right at shoulder level and used it to pole vault over and between the two guards. 

Ms. Pierce gasped with delight, putting her hand over her mouth to stifle a chuckle.  

The poorly trained guards feebly emptied their six-shooters at the target soaring overhead. They watched helplessly as Acrobat landed and used the flexing "pole" to swat them in the faces, blurring their vision long enough for him to get in close. 

Once in-between them, he did a split leap kick, tapping both their windpipes with his feet just hard enough to leave them on the ground gasping for air.  

Ms. Pierce shook her head. "Personally, I think it's a shame what Chinese gymnastics coaches does to those kids to make them so flexible. A damn human rights violation is what it is." 

With Acrobat running interference, the transvestite bolted with the dolly full of money towards the exit-far far down the hall. He held out his purse as a shield. 

"And we just keep upping our import quotas from China each year," Ms. Pierce admonished, still shaking her head at the sight of the acrobat on the monitor. "Forget what they're doing to the poor Tibetan monks. America isn't about pride and glory anymore-just crass consumerism. And I mean crass." 

The transvestite could literally see the light at the end of the tunnel and standing in that light was the guard, who, Kerry realized, was in on the heist; he was holding the door open, smoking a cigarette, and keeping a look out as he waved them on. 

Sam said, "Ma'am?" 

Ms. Pierce pulled herself together. "Sorry. You live alone; you get into a nasty habit of talking to yourself and..." 

She hawked the monitors for signs of her mystery man. "I want to see the blind spots, the areas your cameras don't see." 

Video Guy, nervously chaperoning them, and having to continuously part his long hair acting like blinds over his eyes and his young twenty-some face, indicated spots on the monitor. One just happened to be where a couple was playing poker. Ms. Pierce pointed straight at them. 

"There," she said to Sam. "Have your men take in to custody whoever's sitting there." She couldn't believe it. She had been looking right at them. And finally she understood the look on Zinio's face from the original bank photo. Something was seriously wrong with his wife. Figuring out what exactly could very well advance her investigation-should the two prove as elusive as ever.

* * * 

Within minutes of Ms. Pierce pointing her finger at the monitor, the SWAT team had the poker table in question at the Devlin casino surrounded, guns pointed. 

She approached from behind, parting them like the red sea. In front of their carefully aimed weapons she beheld the poker dealer, hands in the air, who had just shit himself. The others were grimacing from the smell, giving into it and covering their noses as they lowered their weapons. 

"This is New York's finest?" she said to Sam. 

"Just because you're bitchier and cuntier doesn't make you better."  

He should have grown a spine sooner; he swore she'd just cracked a smile. 

SWAT commander Owen Ryder wasn't smiling though. Sam had seen serial killers caught up in the middle of one of their fugues with less lethalness in their eyes. 

Five minutes earlier, Sobber stepped out of the bathroom, carrying one of the diagrams of the bank heist, making sure the bathroom door remained locked behind him and the sign said "out of service." He identified the SWAT commander easily based on the hand gestures he was giving his team to fan out, and approached him with the diagram. This time he did some pointing of his own and some explaining to go with it. Ryder followed him readily to the men's room.  

He brushed Sobber aside, noticed the door was locked and shot it open. Ryder found the sight of the diagrams strewn across the countertops absorbing, and quite the pictogram to figure out. Figuring he'd be detained a while, Sobber slipped away unnoticed. 

Once back in the casino lobby, he signaled Zinio with his hand as if calling a taxi. But the SWAT guys were everywhere. 

That's when the sheriff made his move, leaving his prisoner, for now, chained to the slot machine, and walking away from the cashier's window. He whistled and gestured for the SWAT officers to come over. As they huddled around him, he said, "I'll tell you what I know." 

Zinio grabbed Delaney by the waist and led her away from the cashier's window, which had allowed them to both keep their backs to the SWAT team all this time. As he brushed by Sobber, Delaney missed the handoff of the slip of paper and the nod to proceed to the end of the hallway.  

Once at the door leading out of the casino, Zinio distracted her by pointing to a brick of money that had fallen on the floor so Delaney couldn't see him punching in the combination for the lock. As he figured, she was so excited to step out of that building that she didn't notice the combination lock at all. 

And suddenly they were clear of the lockdown.  

* * *

Outside the Devlin casino, Delaney and Zinio approached the Porsche.  

Throwing a look back at the casino, she said, "What brought that on?" 

"I think the water backed up." Addressing her incredulous expression, he said, "Oh yeah, you don't screw with the fountains in this town. Those tourists pay out the ass for the eye candy. And these people aim to please." 

She made a face as if she really didn't want to know. "Remind me how we got out of there? The place is under siege." 

As Zinio looked back at the police barricade, he started singing, "We get by with a little help from our friends..." He smirked devilishly as he climbed into the passenger seat of the Porsche, continuing with his song.  

As they drove away, she said, "You robbed that casino, didn't you?" 

"I thought it would be romantic; the impossible odds, not to mention the poor sod in the bathroom whose wife was dying of cancer, the tranny who couldn't afford the operation to go the distance, a couple Chinese acrobats living here broke after claiming asylum to get away from the Chinese Gymnastics team and a less-than-desirable life in China, a guard paying alimony on twelve kids, which, in all fairness, he did say was his fault. He never could keep his pecker in place. Still, you can't blame a man for wanting to do right by them." 

Delaney was shaking her head through his entire spiel. 

"I nearly forgot about the sheriff. Didn't realize he was in on it until I started conducting the orchestra." He mimed his conductor-waving-his-wand gestures of earlier to make it clear how he'd gotten over on her. "My guess is he gave us a pass because now he has a new pet who won't be missed while he does God knows what unconscionable things to him. Remind me to drop a dime on him, will you, in the spirit of keeping the theme light around our personal lives."  

"Fine. You think you can prove to me the insanity of my romantic notions about life before I can prove to you the deplorably depressing state of affairs of living under the tyranny of a pragmatist-you're on." 

She ground the gears as she shifted the Porsche into a whole new realm of screaming thunder.

* * *

Standing in front of the third casino that day, Delaney threw the latest bag of money in front of the Porsche. The trunk was now filled with bricks of cash. "Now we never have to leave the house." 

She slammed the trunk closed and climbed in the driver's seat, as Zinio ground his teeth.  

Reading him just fine, she said, "You get tired of the Hot Pockets, we can order in Chinese and pizza until we're too old and feeble to dial the number." 

"That is the practical thing." You asked her to be practical, and she's giving it to you. Boy, is she giving it to you. 

As she gave him whiplash with her acceleration of the Porsche, he thought, I suppose it's vaguely possible I overestimated the value of practicality. I'll be damned if I tell her.