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Vegas Hearts	By : shockvaluegr Category: G through L > Kingdom Hospital Views: 808 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own the television series that this fanfiction is written for, nor any of the characters from it. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Chapter List
- 4
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- 6
Loco Motion

�Hiya, Frankie,� said Torello, friendly sarcasm coloring his tone. �Goin' somewhere?� he asked, looking at Frank's hand clenched on the shifter. Frank relaxed then removed his hand slowly from it. His face had become hard, a belligerent frown upon it. �Always nice to run into old friends,� Torello said, leaning in closer. �Mind telling me what you're doing out here pulled off the road?� Cori disliked his false, sarcastic friendliness, and scowled.
Torello looked past Frank at her again, and grinned broadly, teeth showing under his bushy black moustache. �Well, hello, Mrs. Luca. Shouldn't you probably be at home in that nice house of yours right now?� She rolled her eyes and looked away, but he persisted. �You know, if you wanted to get back at Ray for something, there's better ways that don't give you cooties,� he said, flicking his eyes in Frank's direction.
Cori fixed Torello with the coldest stare she could muster. �Maybe I like cooties.�
Torello turned back to Frank. �Sure would be a bad thing for you if Ray heard about this somehow.� He paused, letting his full meaning sink in. Frank glared dangerously at him then looked away, shaking his head. �I'll tell you what,� said Torello, �You turn off the engine and get out of the car and maybe I'll forget all about it.� Frank set his mouth stubbornly and glared through the windshield. �What do you say?� said Torello quietly, threateningly. He reached for Frank's door handle, opening it. Frank blew out an angry breath and snapped the ignition, turning the car's engine off, then hauled himself out of his seat.

Frank turned around for Torello to search him, his arms resting on the roof of the car. Cori watched nervously, unsure if Frank had a weapon on him. �So what's the story, Frank? This nice new car of yours break down out here?� Torello grilled Frank as he searched him.

�Yeah, they don't make 'em like they used to,� said Frank cynically.

�Oh, that's too bad,� said Torello, feeling the pockets of Frank's leather jacket. He found a lighter and several casino chips and tossed them over his shoulder onto the road.
Incensed, Cori slid over to the driver's seat and swung her legs halfway out of the car. �This is an illegal search you're doing,� she informed him.
�Stay in the car, please, little lady,� Torello said, without looking at her.
�Where the hell's it look like I am?� she said, irritated at the way Torello treated her as inconsequential.
Torello finished searching Frank and took a step back. �She's got almost as much of a smart mouth as you, Frank,� he said, grinning his hateful grin. �Very well suited to you.�

Frank turned around to face him, his eyes icy. Torello fixed on his furious glare and became grim. �That was quite a stunt you pulled back in Chicago. Little Frankie pulls the fire alarm and the whole school gets in trouble. Maybe you're not as dumb as you look.�
Frank licked his lips and cocked his head to one side slightly, realizing that Torello had nothing new on him, that he had only pulled him out of his car to lecture him and beat his own chest. Cori felt some amusement that Torello had been so aggravated by Frank Holman that he would confront him in this way.
�Yeah. I had a pretty good laugh over it myself,� taunted Frank, his eyes still locked with Torello's. Cori could feel the hatred radiating from both men. She thought of how often Torello had abused Frank, worried that it would turn violent if they continued to bait one another. She prayed to Frank mentally to keep his cool, to not let his hate overrun his control. Frank leaned back against the car, next to where she still sat in his seat. The wind kicked up suddenly, whipping sand against her ankles from beneath the car.
�I like to laugh too,� said Torello, deadly serious. �You know what I think would be funny? The look on Ray Luca's face the moment he hears who his loving wife has been screwing.�

Cori could stand him no longer. �You don't know shit,� she spewed crossly.
Torello looked down at her. �Whatever Ray did to you, he doesn't deserve...this,� he gestured to Frank in disgust. He looked more closely at Frank, as the wind swirled his hair. �Had a few drinks tonight, have you, Frank? Drinking and driving isn't the smartest thing to do, especially when your passenger's as valuable as that one.�

Frank looked as though he was becoming bored with the conversation. He lazily pushed himself away from the car and turned as if to get back inside. Cori moved her legs and started to slide back over to her seat, but Torello pushed Frank's shoulder, hard enough to spin him so they were facing each other once more. Cori's stomach lurched.
�Where's your manners, Frank? Runnin' out on me? I don't think so.�

Frank leaned back against the car again with a thump, impatient. �Look. I need to get back. This is a big waste of time, all right?� He put on a furtive, ashamed expression and lowered his voice. �It ain't as bad as it looked.�
Torello grinned. �I'm sure you're right, Frank. If we'd come by five minutes later, it would have looked a lot worse, huh?�

Annoyed, Frank looked off into the desert. He shrugged. �Well, so what. It ain't a crime, you can't run me in for it.�

�No, it's not a crime to be a cheap, lousy date,� said Torello. �It's better than a crime. It's a very valuable piece of information for me,� he said, pronouncing his words very precisely and slowly for effect.

Torello bent, looking into the car at Cori, and crooked a finger. �Why don't you come out here, Mrs. Luca. I wanna talk to you a minute.� Cori was exasperated more and more, knowing she needed to get back to town, and now Torello was wasting more time. She slid out of the car and followed him around to the other side. �Joey, hang onto Holman while I talk to her,� Torello called back to the young, fresh-faced cop.
Torello took her a distance away in the sand, out of Frank's hearing. Cori faced Torello and folded her arms, waiting for the admonitions, the warnings.
Torello went right into it. �You don't know Frank Holman very well, do you?�
Cori just stared at him, unwilling to admit that she did not. Torello waited, then continued. �I don�t know if this is some kind of cheap thrill for you or what. But I gotta tell you, this has got to be one of the most dangerous things I've ever seen anybody do. And I've seen a lot.� He looked earnestly into her face. For a moment, affected by his obvious sincerity despite her dislike for him, she felt doubts. She glanced at Frank. He was picking up his lighter from the ground, while Joey stared off down the highway.
�Listen to me, please,� begged Torello. �I don't know what on earth appeals to you about Holman, but he's sick. He's sick, dangerous, and he's unpredictable. Now, you being married to Ray Luca, maybe you have the stomach for that, but I'm telling you, Holman's in a class by himself. This is a guy who shot someone once just to wake them up during a home invasion,� he said, making a gun of his hand to demonstrate. Cori did not appreciate unwanted details and looked away, across the black desert. Torello eased off a bit. �I can see you're not going to take any advice on this, but if I can kill your appetite for that piece of garbage, I'll have done my job. If you ever decide you'd like to really know Frank Holman, come on down to the station and I'd be happy to let you sit down with his file.�
Cori finally faced him again, raising her eyebrows, silently asking if he was through.
�You're gonna do what you're gonna do. I just don't like to see women hurt. I don't wanna see you hurt. And I don't mean your feelings, you understand?� Torello said.
Cori was uncomfortable with his concern. Torello was defeated and he knew it. He made a wide gesture with his arm to show Cori she was free to go.
She made her way back over the sand and rocks towards the Thunderbird, more than glad to walk away from Torello and his attempt to sour her feelings for Frank. The wind was blowing more strongly than before, gusting hard enough to scour the highway with sheets of sand.
�Come on, Joey,� said Torello, walking past Frank without a glance, fuming at his ineffectual attempt to warn Cori off. On his way back to his car, he turned, thought a moment, then called into the wind. �Take her back to town, Frank. And then get outta her life. Do her a favor.�

The black car spun out on the sand, then gripped the road and roared past them, heading back to town. Frank flicked his cigarette at the car as it went by him, hitting the back fender with it. Cori watched the taillights fade through the raised dust, and an immense sense of relief washed over her. She had been so afraid Torello would find something on Frank that would cause him to place him under arrest.
Her warm buzz was long gone, as was the passionate rush she'd felt with Frank just before Torello's car had come upon them. The night had turned upside down with no warning. It brought back to her mind an incident from a few days before, when she had overturned on her floating lounger in the pool. One moment she was warm and comfortable, and the next, reaching too far for something, she had plunged into the water nearly headfirst. The sickening lurch she'd felt in her stomach then was very like the one she'd experienced when Torello had first leaned into Frank's window. How Ray had laughed at her dunking in the pool; she could almost hear him laugh at her now.

Frank looked down at her, then at the flashing, blinking sign which had borne witness to it all. He broke into a wry laugh. �Guess it wasn't such a good idea�� At his smile, the unpleasant things Torello had told her about him began to melt away. Torello knew one side of Frank Holman, she knew another. She smiled back, and he pulled her to him, holding her. Cori buried her face in the warm smell of him - the scent of leather, cigarettes and alcohol - all familiar, masculine smells. She caressed the back of his jacket and laid her cheek against his chest, looking at the lights of the town and wishing she did not have to return to them. She felt him rest his chin gently atop her head. Torello's car was still barely visible, and she watched as the two red taillights finally became indistinct and blended with the myriad of other lights on the horizon. Would Torello tell Ray what he had seen?

Frank let her slide in the driver's side and got in after her, cranking the car back to life in a powerful rumble. �I gotta get you back to town. I sure hope nobody's lookin' for you.�

�I doubt it,� Cori said, not wanting to admit that Ray was probably so occupied with some other woman that he wouldn't notice if a bomb went off.
Frank guided the car back onto the road and mashed the gas, making the rear fishtail on the sandy surface with a gritty, sandpapery sound. Heart and Soul by the Cleftones blared from the radio.
�Hang on,� said Frank, throwing her a dangerous smile. Cori had thought the ride out of town had been fast, but Frank's headlong flight back to town was unparalleled. Never had she been in a car moving at such a speed. She could actually feel the heavy vehicle lifting, becoming weightless in its velocity. Sober now, she gripped the side of her seat and prayed. Once she took her eyes from the road to steal a glance at Frank. He drove with his head lowered slightly, his intense gaze focused on the vanishing point of the highway and the city lights, as if he were closing in on imaginary prey. There was a predatory hunger in his face and posture that she found at once frightening and terribly attractive. Her life in his careless hands, she was completely at his mercy. At last he was forced to slow down by traffic as they neared town, and she relaxed her death grip on her seat.

Back in town, Frank was silent as he drove. Cori fretted at his mood, hoping he did not blame her for the encounter with Torello. Frank had already lit another smoke and consumed it moodily as the car crawled down the Strip under daylight-bright neon. The hour was now so late that when Frank pulled into the Lucky Star parking lot, Cori's pink Chevy stood isolated in its section. Frank parked next to it, and Cori searched the lot for anybody who might be watching out for her return. There was only an old man whose hat fell off as he carefully eased himself into his old Ford.
Frank killed the Thunderbird's engine and leaned back in his seat, as though on a sofa. Cori rolled up her window slowly, feeling a bittersweet twinge that they must part. She gathered her small purse and pulled out her car keys, looking at Frank. She wished he could kiss her again, but in the parking lot of the Lucky Star it would be suicidal. She gave him a small smile and put her hand on the door handle, letting it linger there as she waited for parting words, anything, from him.
�Hey�� he said, looking uncomfortable, �What did Torello say...you know, about me?� He looked self-conscious and guiltily embarrassed, like a bad dog that know he deserves a beating. He did not look at her, but straight ahead at the side of the casino, motionless. Cori's mind flashed back to Torello making a gun of his hand, describing that Frank had once shot someone in their home just to awaken them. As she struggled, Frank turned to her, awaiting an answer.
�Just that he thought it was dangerous for me to be out with you. You know, 'cause of Ray,� she said at last.
He snorted derisively. "Yeah, like we didn't already know that," he smirked.
�Aaa, he's just a dumbass,� Cori dismissed Torello, smiling, all the while terrified at the knowledge the cop now possessed. She was rewarded with a wide smile from Frank that sent her blood surging.

Cori flailed in her bed angrily, pulling a pillow over her head. Ray had been home for several days. This morning, in deference to President Kennedy's assassination, all casinos were to be closed from seven in the morning until noon, as a respectful gesture. Ray was having a meeting out on the patio, and arguing loudly with his lawyer Steven Cordo. She gritted her teeth. It was nearly noon but Ray knew how late she slept, and could have been quieter if not so consumed by his rage at whatever the situation was.
She heard Max Goldman, snappishly suave, try to calm Ray, who would have none of it and continued to rage up and down the patio just outside her bedroom, until Cori threw back the covers, tossed her robe on and strode through the house, muttering profanity.

She burst onto the open patio, squinting in the sunlight, her anger directed on Ray like a guided missile. �Hey, will you stop it with all the screamin' and the hollerin'? I'm tryin' to get some sleep in there!�

Her attack temporarily stunned Ray and his company into silence, and Cori took quick inventory of who was present. Ray stood glaring at her insolence, while Steve Cordo kept his lawyerly face prudently impassive. Max Goldman looked as though he wanted to laugh but did not dare, and glanced away. Finally Cori noticed Pauli and Frank sitting at the outdoor table, a large envelope before them. Pauli was smoking, and Frank had a drink. He, like Max, appeared as though he might laugh, and looked down to hide it.
�You wanna sleep? Go back to bed,� Ray dismissed her. He turned back to Steve. Furious, but also more than a little nervous and ashamed of herself, Cori pulled her robe tighter about her body and made an about face. She walked past the table where Frank was slouched, making brief eye contact with him, willing him not to betray any of what was developing between them. His eyes followed her and there was the barest hint of a smile upon his lips but nothing more that would arouse Ray's suspicion. He looked as though he had rolled out of bed not long ago himself with his stubbly jaw and tired eyes. Cori went back into the house, hating that she had to cloak her interest in Frank.

Ray was home for the next few days. With the Kennedy tragedy as a distraction for all, and with Frank dominating her own thoughts, Cori had completely forgotten Thanksgiving. Unprepared, she outright refused to cook an elaborate dinner. She and Ray had Thanksgiving dinner at the Lucky Star with the Goldmans. Pauli was also in attendance, which made Cori even more aware of Frank's absence.
She enjoyed the meal, and Ray even treated her somewhat affectionately, but she could not help wondering where Frank was and what he was doing. Her every waking moment was taken up with thoughts of the time they had spent together, those few brief interludes they had managed to snatch together. The longer she went without seeing him, the more she ached for him.

So she sat at the lavish table and ate the beautifully prepared turkey, had a glass of wine and tried to participate in the conversation as much as possible. She was secretly angry at Ray for not inviting Frank to dinner until Ray, of his own volition, informed everyone that he had asked Frank, but Frank had declined the offer. Cori furrowed her brow slightly. Why would he have turned down Ray's invitation?
�Probably couldn't find a shirt without any cigarette burns on it,� quipped Max, arousing laughter at the table. Cori forced a smile but his joke had rubbed her the wrong way. In play, Max always had an insult at the ready for anyone, but he seemed to have an overflowing stockpile of jabs at Frank. And Frank was not here to defend himself or insult Max in return. For a moment, Cori felt like tossing her drink in Max's face and telling them all she would rather spend the evening with Frank and his cigarette-burned shirts than one more minute with them.
After realizing this, what mild enjoyment she had taken in the dinner drained away like water down the sink. She put in her time and simply waited for Ray to be ready to leave, all the while wondering if Frank was in his room in the building, or downstairs in the casino, or somewhere else in town. Wherever he was, Cori longed to be by his side.

After the dinner, Ray was taken with the mood to go downstairs and play at the tables. Cori accompanied him, but soon was yawning. She kept herself occupied at the bar by watching for Frank, always searching for his blond head in the crowd, and his distinctively slumped shoulders. If Frank was not here, she wanted to go home and go to bed. She put her drink down and hopped off the stool, heading back to Ray at the craps table.

Ray was joking with the stickman, having a good time. �Ray,� she said, putting a hand on his shoulder, �I'm ready to go. I'm beat.� Ray took his toothpick from the corner of his mouth and craned up at her from his seat as if he had forgotten he'd come there with her.
�Hold up a minute, Jack,� he said to the stickman, and got up to lead Cori aside. He was already groping for the keys, and Cori restrained herself from complaining, knowing he intended to stay at the Lucky Star overnight. He dropped the keys into her hand, kissed her on the cheek and turned her toward the front doors. �You go on. I'm gonna stay and shoot a while. I'll be home later.� Cori doubted that.

Cori drove the Strip in her pink Chevy, trying to swallow her hurt pride and anger at Ray. Could he never put her first? He spent so little time with her, and now, on a holiday, he had chosen craps over her. She hated herself, that she could still feel pain at his neglect, and tried to crush it down into nothingness. Frustrated, she yanked the pins from her upswept hair and let it fall, then shook it and mussed it vigorously with her free hand, venting her feelings on it. She drove, profaning Ray, the Lucky Star, the universe. To distract herself from unhappy thoughts, she turned on the radio and her mood was lifted marginally by Do You Wanna Dance.

Just then, her attention was grabbed by the sound of squealing tires. Automatically she flinched, because there were accidents daily on the Strip. She looked in her rear view mirror to see a large car that had just passed her in the opposite direction wheeling madly in the middle of the street in a rushed and sloppy U-turn. As it crossed over the center, leaning perilously to one side, Cori recognized it as Frank's blue Thunderbird, and her heart leapt.

The big Thunderbird just made the turnaround without running up onto the sidewalk. It wavered, then straightened, and accelerated to catch her, engine growling. Cori watched delightedly in her mirror, unable to stop a radiant smile from appearing on her face, so great was her joy and gratitude that someone sought her company so fervently. She eased off the gas so he would catch her more quickly.

Frank pulled up beside her in the passing lane and Cori rolled her window down farther, a pleasantly weightless feeling in her middle at the sight of him.

�Hey, little darlin',� he called.
�Hey, yourself,� she called back saucily, making his grin broaden.
Frank edged his car closer to hers as they drifted down the street, like a daring teenager putting his arm around his girl. �Where you goin'?�

�Home,� she answered, hoping he would invite himself along.
�Where's Ray?� he called, trying to keep his eyes on the road.
�Take a guess,� she said, raising one eyebrow ruefully.
Frank laughed. �All night?� he asked. �Hey, I wanna show you something. Park up there, at The Sands,� he gestured farther up the Strip.
Cori nodded, smiling, her curiosity piqued.

She pulled into the parking lot at The Sands casino, and Frank's car nosed into the space next to hers. �Come on,� he said, beckoning her with a jerk of his chin. Elated, Cori rolled up her window, gathered her purse and locked up the Chevy, then slid into his car. He laughed craftily as he pulled out of the parking lot back onto the road, hitting the curb roughly with one back tire.

�I�m kidnapping you,� he informed her, one eyebrow cocked. He looked well pleased with himself.
�What is it you want to show me?� she asked, in a teasing tone.
�Ah, it's cool. You'll see,� he responded obliquely.

As they rode away from the city, he asked about the Thanksgiving dinner.
�Why didn't you go? Ray said he asked you,� Cori asked.
He shrugged and took a long moody pull on his cigarette. �Wasn't crazy about the guest list,� he said at last. Cori was puzzled by that. There had been only Ray, herself, Pauli, and the Goldmans. She looked at Frank, but when she saw that the was no explanation forthcoming, she decided not to push him. She could only guess at the politics of her husband and his employees.
�Well,� she said, �I wish you'da gone. I woulda had more fun.�

Frank drove. They passed the city limits and ventured out into the dark, bleak desert. Cori was curious and full of anticipation, wondering what there could be out so far in the desert that he wanted her to see. She toyed with the idea that he was taking her away to finally make love to her, and her heart beat faster.

After some time, Frank slowed and pulled off the road. Cori could see, lit by the ghostly headlights, other tire tracks in the sand made by previous vehicles. Frank followed them. Cori sat up a little straighter in her seat, a little nervous at the complete blackness outside the car, slightly apprehensive of where these tracks might be leading them. The car bumped and crunched over the ground and raised dust behind them that glowed red in the taillights.
Dark shapes appeared before them, large blocky shapes that leaned against each other in a haphazard manner that contradicted any sense of deliberate construction. As they neared the shapes, the headlights suddenly picked them out clearly. They were huge sections of old casino signs, propped together or lying on the desert floor, hundreds of bulbs glittered glassily through a sad coating of Nevada dust. As they drove a path into the sign graveyard, Cori saw giant letters, great curved sections, as gaudily colored as carnival rides.

She smiled in wonder. What a strange place, a place of long-dead casinos, the abandoned, castaway lights that had once glowed proudly upon the Strip. There were so many, and their size was surprising. Frank spun the wheel and maneuvered the car to a spot more or less in the center of it all and stopped. He looked at her, and put the car in park.
�Whaddaya think of this place? I just found it the other night,� he said proudly.

Cori was charmed beyond words. Frank was so different from Ray. Where Ray was consumed by the need to impress anyone and everyone with material things, Frank wanted only to enjoy his life as it was, to share experiences with her. His perspective was refreshing in its simplicity.

Frank got out of the car and sauntered around to Cori's side. She emerged slowly, smiling at him and surveying their surroundings. The signs leaned against one another like drunks leaving a bar, towering over her. Most were in pieces, but one was propped diagonally and looked newer than the others. Castaways, the sign proclaimed appropriately. Cori recalled there had been a Castaways casino which had recently changed hands and been renamed.
She began to explore, her heels sinking into the sandy floor of the desert and leaving a dotted track.

�Careful,� Frank grunted, taking her arm. �There's lots of wires and broken glass and stuff around here.� Cori looked up at the sky, tilting her head back. Inhaling the cold biting air, she saw the incredible clarity of the stars. There had never been stars like this in Chicago, she had never realized there was such a multitude of them. They were strewn across the velvet black sky like the shards and chips of diamonds that Ray used to steal. She shivered.

Frank led her back to the car, where he suddenly picked her up by the hips and sat her on the hood of his car as if she were a child, then sat beside her. �The engine heat'll keep you warm,� he said.
Cori looked at him. She had never been as interested in another human being as she was in Frank Holman right now. How did he go wrong? she wondered. She was beginning to see the very first hints of a caring, nurturing man, and yet she knew pieces of the terrible things he had done, and felt cold inside to realize she knew only a small fraction of the destruction he had surely caused in his life. But here he was, sitting her on his car to keep her warm.
Now he was reaching into her hair, ruffling it softly as he stared off at the broken glass of the abandoned signs, deep in thought. She hesitated. "What are you thinking about?" she asked softly, half afraid he would be angered, his face contorting like Ray's would at such an intrusion. Instead, the corners of his lips turned up slightly, and Cori felt such relief she nearly wept.
�Johnny Shaw,� he said, and laughed wryly.
�Who?� Cori asked in confusion, �I never heard of him.�

�Well, you wouldn't have. I grew up with him. He lived on my street when I was kid.� Cori waited. �Johnny was my best friend. I guess. Sometimes he wasn't much of a friend at all.� Frank paused to light a cigarette.

Johnny was a year older than Frankie. He was sarcastic far beyond his eleven years, a dark eyed, troubled boy whose father, a steel worker, regularly striped his back with his worn leather belt. Firey and easily set off, Johnny Shaw was kept in check most of the time by Frankie, who was the more easygoing of the duo, the class clown. If towheaded Frankie Holman was sent to the principal, it was because he had ground all the teacher's pencils down to nubs or had written something witty but inappropriate on the chalkboard. When Johnny Shaw went to the principal, he had bloodied a kid's nose, or in one particularly bad case, had banged another boy's head repeatedly against the floor while holding him down. Frankie broke up more than his share of fights between Johnny and bigger kids, had gotten slugged by Johnny in the process, and was famous for his fearlessness in rescuing his friend, at times only armed with his sense of humor. In return, Johnny would go to bat for Frankie. Nobody could touch Frankie. If they did, they were set upon by a dark-haired fury of eleven year-old frustration. Their relationship changed forever one year.
On a hot summer night, Frankie was sitting on the front stoop, when Johnny came running down the sidewalk. His shoes slapped the pavement, and Frankie turned to see Johnny's white shirt materialize out of the darkness. �Did you hear?� Johnny said, out of breath, �The war. It's over.� Frankie's chin came out of his hand as he straightened. He looked hard at Johnny to see if he was joking, but Johnny rarely joked. He was still standing there, beads of sweat sparkling on his freckled cheeks, breathing hard. There was a commotion of sound across the street, and Frankie looked to see some of the younger neighborhood kids emerging with pots and pans, which they began to enthusiastically beat with spoons and ladles. Some adults were coming outside too, smiling and talking, but he could not hear what they were saying over he racket.

�Is your dad coming home now?� Johnny asked, his eyes piercing. Frankie's stomach knotted in the unsettling combination of joy and fear this news inspired. He abruptly got up from the stoop and shot into the house, to find his mother sitting in the kitchen in front of their little radio, listening. She looked up at his entrance, and her face, worn and drawn these many months, a face too old to be his mother's, was shiny with tears.

Frankie's father never came home. As most of the country celebrated the war's end and the return of their heroes, Frankie and his mother struggled to make ends meet and bear up under the loss. For months, although he knew better, Frankie held out a secret hope that there had been a mistake and his father would come home. He imagined walking in the door, home from school, to find his father sitting in his chair by the window. His mother withdrew into herself, barely able to rise from bed in the mornings, and spent her days sitting in her housecoat in the kitchen staring soullessly at the wall. Frankie could not bear her eyes, the emptiness there and in her tired pale face. Feeling helpless and in dread of her visible pain, Frankie began spending much of his time away from home. Johnny had found an abandoned room in a condemned building and they began to meet there with friends after school, smoking and teaching themselves poker, playing for pennies.

�Hey, look at this!� Johnny called from the stinking receptacle, holding his arm high to catch their attention. Frankie rubbed his frayed mitten across his eyes, trying to see what Johnny had found. They were scrounging in a dumpster, looking for treasures. Frankie watched as Johnny signaled to him, then tossed a box-shaped object in a high arc out of the dumpster.
Henry Paxton tried to elbow Frankie out of the picture as the prize descended, but Frankie was agile and reached over Henry's arms. The box dropped solidly into Frankie's sodden mittens and he nearly dropped it. Henry tried to grab it again, and Frankie gave him a shove. Johnny was climbing out of the dumpster, holding a brass bowling trophy. Frankie turned the box over in his hands. It was metal, and one side had a door with a combination lock.

�Hey, that's a bank,� said Henry, leaning close.
�No it's not,� said Frankie, snorting, �It's a safe.�

�Who cares? What's the difference?� shrugged Henry.
Johnny joined them, tweaked at the combination, then looked at Henry in something akin to disgust. �You see a little slot to put coins in anywhere? It's a safe, not a bank.�

�Then why's it so small?� retorted Henry, determined to be at least half right.

Frankie shook it and they could hear something move inside. The three boys looked at one another, then back at the little safe. Frankie cocked his head to the side and wiped some dirty slush from the side of the safe. A quiet excitement was building within him, a new anticipation. He wanted the safe open more than he had ever wanted anything he could remember. "There's something inside," he said, just wanting to hear the words spoken. Johnny and Henry had broken into excited grins.
Henry made another grab for it and tore it from Frankie's grasp. The safe slipped out of Frankie�s hands as he stumbled away laughing in his nervous way, and it bounced with a metallic crunch onto the frozen sloppy pavement. Frankie lurched towards it, slipping on ice, and came up with it at the exact moment Henry did.
�Let him have it, Henry,� Johnny yelled, brandishing the bowling trophy in a way that made Frankie burst out laughing. Henry relinquished the safe one last time and jammed his hands into his coat pockets.
Examining the safe, Frankie turned the combination this way and that. It grated slightly from the abuse, but seemed undamaged. A big, dirty delivery truck pulled into the back lot where they were standing, and the driver blew the horn at them. �Come on,� said Johnny, �Let's take it back with us.�

The three sat on the wooden crates they used for chairs in the abandoned room and looked at the safe. It sat, holding its secret treasure, on an old end table Frankie had found. Johnny lit a Lucky Strike and puffed it inexpertly.
�Let's just bash it open,� suggested Henry impatiently.
�No,� said Johnny, �Then it'll stick shut. You can't just bash a safe open, stupid.�
Frankie stared at the safe, picked it up and shook it again. �I can get it open,� he said, before he even was aware he had spoken.
Johnny looked at him with narrowed eyes. �Huh?�

Frankie shrugged. He did not know how he knew this, he only knew that he did. He could get it open, of that he was certain.
But his statement did little to inspire confidence in Johnny, who shook his head, �I'll give it to Ben, he can get it open,� Ben was Johnny's older, teenage brother.
Frankie shook his head quickly. �He'll take whatever's inside!� he pleaded, �Come on, Johnny, I can get it open. I swear I can.� His earnest plea made Johnny smile.
�Just bash it open!� Henry said again, frustrated at being left out of the event.

For hours Frankie tinkered with the safe, looking at the door's hinges, the places where it was welded together at the seams, the lock itself. After a time, Johnny and Henry lost interest and began to play cards and leaf through rat-eaten comics. �Having fun over there?� Henry

squealed in a high pitched tone meant to annoy Frankie into dropping the project and rejoining them. Frankie ignored him, bringing a smirk to Johnny's face.
Frankie lit a candle, since the light was now failing and the room had no electricity. He picked the safe up and held it by his ear, turning the combination this way and that. Three turns right, two left, one right, was pretty standard on a combination lock, he knew, but to what numbers? He turned the knob to the right slowly, listening, for what he was not sure. The snow fell silently outside.
Slowly, slowly he turned the dial...and thought he heard a faint "plink". He turned cautiously to see what number. Twenty-eight. Gently, he pulled the lock, just to be sure. The door was still locked. Frowning, he held the safe

to his ear again and began turning the knob slowly to the right for another round. Plink. He looked at the number again. Twenty-eight. Excited, he spun the knob around one more time to the right, to twenty-eight, and was validated with another tiny plink. He stopped for a moment, breathing harder, trying not to become too optimistic.

Putting his ear back to the safe, he turned the know slowly left, so slowly it barely moved. Plink. Fourteen. Holding his breath, Frankie turned it left to fourteen once more, and heard the plink. From across the room, Henry and Johnny burst into loud laughter at something in a comic, jolting him out of his concentration. �Shut up!� Frankie yelled in frustration. Johnny and Henry stopped, watching him.
Frankie licked his lips and put the safe back to his ear. He gripped the dial with his nervous fingers and turned it slowly right. It did not go far before he heard it. Plink. Still holding the safe to his head, Frankie raised his eyes to Johnny's, and something in them made Johnny sit bolt upright. Frankie lowered the safe and looked at the number. Seven. He swallowed and took hold of the dial, then hesitated. He was seized by a moment of doubt that made him feel cold. How stupid he would feel if he pulled on the dial and nothing happened, after yelling at his friends to shut up. They would never let him forget it, and Johnny would take the safe to Ben, or give it to Henry to beat to a crumpled metal pulp. He held his breath and pulled, and to his amazement he saw the sliver of black appear at the side of the door, felt the smooth unimpeded progress of access. He smiled, he laughed at himself in awe. He had done it!

Frank slid off the hood of the Thunderbird, and Cori felt the car rise slightly beneath her from the removal of his weight. He walked a few paces away, circled and came back to stand before her. Cori shivered, the heat of the engine was dissipating. �What was in the safe?� she asked, waiting for the conclusion of his childhood tale. Moving closer, he leaned in to her, putting his hands flat on the hood on either side of her. His eyes pierced hers.

�Money,� he said, and Cori saw the sparkle in the blue depths of his gaze at the memory. Before she could respond, his lips met hers softly. Cori slipped her arms around his body, thrilled to sense the power, the masculine solidity there. As the intensity grew, Frank slowly bent Cori back onto the hood. Grasping her hips, he gently but forcefully pulled her to him. Deliciously, Cori raised her knees and felt his body with the insides of her thighs, squeezing.
Encouraged, Frank fell to kissing and tasting her neck, eliciting passionate shivers from her. She raised her hips to his and immediately felt his evident desire. She let out a soft moan involuntarily. He wanted her as badly as she wanted him. The weeks of tension, of longing, had built within them to enormous pressure, and Cori reveled in the prospect of release at last.

Down the road, the black car sat in the dark, engine ticking as it cooled in the desert air. Torello waited. Danny looked impatiently at his watch, straining to see it in the dark. �How long?� Torello asked.
Danny blew out a bored breath. �Twenty minutes,� he said, looking at Torello. �Tell me again why we're out here? I'd like to be home with the family before the holiday officially ends.� He glanced at his watch again. �Too late, never mind.�
Torello sighed. �Sorry, Danny. Holman's been making drops for Luca, meeting a Chicago contact and giving him the skim. If we put a tail on Holman, sooner or later we're gonna see the switch.�
Danny fidgeted in his seat. �You know, Mike...I'm not sure that passing Holman's car on the highway, then turning around to follow him to this junkyard qualifies as surveillance.�

�It was a lucky break,� said Torello, masking his annoyance. �Any time we can get a look at what Luca's doing we're gonna take advantage of it,� he said, a note of authoritative finality in his tone.
Danny shrugged, undaunted. �We don't even know if he went in there by himself,� he argued, gesturing with an open hand to the spot down the road they had last seen Holman's car enter the junkyard. �We never were close enough to see if there was somebody else in the car with him.�

�And we're still gonna wait until either he comes out, or somebody else goes in,� Torello said. �This could be a midnight meeting. It's just now twelve o'clock, Danny.�

�Yeah. Maybe he'll turn into a pumpkin,� said Danny, desperate to squeeze some humor out of the situation. �Mike, have you thought that maybe he's getting rid of something in there? He's been in there for almost half an hour now, he could be patting down the dirt on someone's grave by now.� Torello stared down the dark road, slowly rubbing his moustache, a sign Danny knew from long experience meant he was considering what he said.

Inside the Thunderbird, Frank rolled the windows up and cranked the car to life, turning the heat on, then proceeded to take his jacket off. He tossed it in the back seat, smiling at Cori. She removed her heels, dumping the expensive shoes unceremoniously on the floorboard, and slid, twisting in front of the steering wheel, onto Frank's lap, straddling him. He took a moment, holding her sides gently, to look into her dark eyes.
Cori could no longer contain herself. She kissed him, wanting no words to spoil the purity of the moment. His hands moved to her breasts, cupping them through the sheer material of her dress, caressing softly. She pushed her body closer yet to his, grinding sweetly, gently in his lap, drawing a soft groan from him. He pulled her to him tighter still, rising to meet her, and once again began to suck gently her throat and the sensitive sides of her neck. Cori felt a heat spreading beneath her skin all over her body, flushing her from within.
She managed to focus enough to unbutton his shirt, and shoved it aside to expose the smooth flesh of his chest and stomach. Her hands explored the luxuriant softness of his skin over the taut, smooth planes of muscles, and she felt the galloping rhythm of his heart beneath. Thrilled that his excitement matched her own, Cori wished her garment was easier to remove.
In a sudden move that made her gasp, Frank pulled her to him tightly, rose from the seat, and in one, fluid, powerful motion, turned and laid her on the seat, and was on top of her. Breathing heavily, Cori pulled her dress off one shoulder, exposing a breast hungrily. Frank took her nipple into his mouth, sucking softly, making a river of fire course through her body. Her entire body was pulsing with heat. She arched her body against his, desperate for all of him. The rest of the world had ceased to exist, there was only Frank and herself, and this sweet, rising heat. His taste, his scent, the sound of his quick, shallow breaths, the feel of his strong, solid body and his tongue and lips upon hers were all she knew, all she had ever known. With something akin to ecstatic relief, she became aware that he was sitting up, his hands working to free himself from his clothes.
Then there was a pause, a cessation of movement from him that made her open her eyes. Frank was frozen, head turned toward his right, looking out the back of the car, and in that exact moment, Cori heard the hum of an approaching engine, the throb of a powerful motor growing in volume gradually, as if the vehicle were creeping cautiously toward them.
Frank rose up straighter, his face refocusing instantly into sharp alertness so quickly it make Cori's heart skip a beat. �Oh�� Cori whispered, it seemed all she had breath to say. Her breast still heaved, and she saw that Frank's rippled stomach did as well. �No, Frank, please�� she pleaded, as he turned and slid back into the driver's seat, looking into his rearview mirror.
�Sorry, baby,� he said, his eyes fixed on the mirror, his hand on the gearshift, waiting. �Think we better go.�
The engine noise increased, and Cori sat up to look behind them. Frank dropped the car into drive and gave the engine a kick, just as Cori saw the orange glow of parking lights appear on the car behind them as the driver turned them on, much closer than she had anticipated. Frank swore and pressed the accelerator, trying not to spin out on the gravel and dust, his hand hovered on the light switch. He was driving blind, but turning on the lights would announce his presence, and there was yet a chance the car behind them had not seen them.

�He's moving,� said Danny, sitting up straighter in his seat. Torello was silent, patient, as he let the car creep along the gravel and sand. From ahead, the back bumper of Frank Holman's car shimmered faintly in the dark, the moonlight rippling on the chrome as it, too, slunk through the junkyard. �Still can't see if he's got anybody with him,� Danny remarked, �Too dark.�
They bumped along the winding path through the discarded signs, neither closing with nor losing the Thunderbird ahead of them. The path meandered in the general shape of a horseshoe, emerging at last back onto the road. As the Thunderbird approached this, its lights went on, and, ludicrously, the left signal flashed before the car pulled out onto the road. Torello and Danny chuckled, exchanged a look. Danny shook his head and grinned. Only Frank Holman could inject sarcasm into something as inane as a turn signal.

Torello stopped the car, still grinning himself. They watched the Thunderbird cruise away, red taillights eventually winking out in the distance. �We're not gonna follow him back to town?� Danny asked at last.
Torello shook his head, started the car moving forward again, to loop back into the entrance to the junkyard. �If Holman was meeting anybody here, we already blew it for him,� he said. �We need to check this place out and make sure he wasn't taking out Ray Luca's garbage for him.�

Torello turned on the headlights and slowly made another circuit of the junkyard. �There's where he parked,� he pointed ahead to a spot where four indentations could be seen in the dusty sand. They stopped just before this, and got out.
Danny, flashlight in hand, examined the surrounding area, poking the beam this way and that for anything freshly disturbed. Torello walked to where Holman's car had rested, and looked down ruminatively. Neither spoke for a few minutes as they searched over the surroundings, the only sound the rhythmic chugging of the big cruiser's powerful engine as it sat waiting.
At last, Danny ceased roaming with his flashlight and rejoined Torello, who was studying the ground intently. �Couple cigarette butts over here,� Torello reported, pointing to the area that would have been directly in front of Holman's car. �So whatever he was doing, he was out of the car.�
Torello pointed to a multitude of footprints, also in front of the car. Danny noted that many of these faced towards the car itself. �Engine trouble?� He scratched his head. �I can't picture Holman driving out here just to look under his own hood,� he surmised.

Torello looked up at Danny. �You didn't notice these?� he indicated the ground again, and Danny followed his gesture to another set of footprints entirely, ones he had not noticed before. Much smaller; and these bore the distinctive posterior dot of a high-heeled woman's shoe. In spite of himself, Danny chuckled. �You mean we just wasted an hour staking out Frank Holman's own personal lover's lane?�

Torello looked up at Danny, serious. �Think about why Frank Holman would bring a woman out here, Danny. Luca's put him up in a nice luxurious room at the Lucky Star, he could bang showgirls there whenever he wanted. Why would he have to come here?� Torello answered himself, �Because this is someone he can't be seen with anywhere in Las Vegas.� Danny nodded, understanding. Torello looked back down at the prints in the sand and the fragmented tale they told with a mix of disbelief and grudging admiration.
�So this is an ongoing thing...does this guy like to gamble or what?� Danny shook his head, incredulous. �Cori Luca��
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Vegas Hearts