A Little Bit of Luck

“Are you sure this will work?” Mackenzie asked, looking directly at her brother.

“Its our best shot. If not we will have to come up with an even more elaborate plan. This is the easiest way humanly possible. Besides, its not me that Alva hates. All I have to do is get her to agree and I’m in.” Donovan crossed his arms over his chest.

“I guess I’ll go find the rest of the gang. I’m sure they are just dying to know what genius plan we’ve decided on,” Scott said, standing up to go find everyone else.

Once Scott had left the room, Donovan looked at his sister and said, “After we get this settled with them, we are going for a drive. There are some things that we need to talk about alone.”

“Alright. Lets just focus on getting everyone else up to speed and ready to go first. Then we will go. But I’m driving.”

Sebastian was the easiest person to locate in the house. Like most nights, Sebastian was yelling into the headset and playing his Xbox. For a moment Scott was tempted to tease his friend for this, they all did occasionally, but instead just told him to go into the dining room.

Helena was sitting in the backyard, a well worn romance novel in her hands. This was something that she did almost every night for an escape. She enjoyed being away from the noise in the house, Sebastian’s yelling mostly, lost in the story line of a book.

Kurt was sitting on the front porch steps, pondering his life situation. Unlike the others, he sometimes felt unsure of his chosen path. He had a constant fear of being caught and spending time in prison. There was also a feeling of wrong doing, he still hated the idea of stealing. But he felt there was no where else he could go now. These people where his family, they were the only ones who truly cared about him and he didn’t think he could live happily without them.

“You alright?” Scott asked, leaning against the porch railing.

“I’m fine. Just getting some thinking done. Why is it that we are almost always in houses that have covered porches like this?” Kurt pulled himself up, already sensing that the plan was formed and ready to go.

“Kenzie and Donny grew up in a house with a porch like this. We all have our little connections to a simpler time and this is theirs. Come on, everyone is waiting for us in the dining room.”

Mackenzie and Donovan had fallen into a familiar banter and this is what Scott and Kurt were greeted with. Without noticing that the two missing men had entered the kitchen, Mackenzie stuck her tongue out at her brother.

“I told Scott that you are immature and now he can see the proof!” Donovan exclaimed pointing towards Scott and Kurt.

“Oh and you are mature? Because I’m pretty sure you just tried to tattle on me.” Mackenzie rolled her eyes at her brother before turning back to the blueprints.

“So I’m guessing we have a plan,” Sebastian said, pulling out a chair and sitting down.

“The first step is to get someone on the inside. Thanks to a favor that has been collected, there is an opening for a pit boss. Now the screening process for the Diamonti is extensive so it would be impossible to get someone placed with a false background. But we are ninety-eight percent sure that Donovan is a shoe in for the job. He will be calling Clifford first thing in the morning to say he is interested in getting involved with the family business. So long as Clifford’s wife agrees, Donny will be placed immediately.” Mackenzie explained the first step without any help from her brother or Scott.

“Isn’t his wife your mother?” Kurt asked, realizing that he really didn’t know much about the Page family.

“No. He left our mother for Alva when Mackenzie was 17. Mackenzie here started what could be called a war with Alva right off the bat, so needless to say they absolutely hate each other. But she still liked me last I checked, so getting the job shouldn’t be a problem.” Donovan explained, silently praying his sister would stay silent.

“She has just as much say in the business as Clifford does, even though she is completely oblivious to how a business works. This is why I can’t get involved with the infiltration in a public way. The minute that I asked to be involved she will shoot it down and it would be game over. So instead I’ll spend more time working in the shadows.

“The second step is a security takeover. We need to have full control over their security system for multiple reasons. Donovan’s security status will be our way in. He will have full access to the security system and the room which transmit’s the security camera feeds and the alarm feeds. That is when you’ll come in, Sebastian. You’ll need to get in there and tap into all of their security, that will give us the ability to move from place to place and know how they react to situations.

“Next we need to know their security procedures. We already know the one for cheating, so I’m sure the rest will be similar. But we can’t risk being caught by surprise the night we rob it. So Kurt, Helena, and Scott will be triggering various scenarios within the casino over the course of two weeks. In between their stuns Sebastian will hack into various systems and figure the procedures for the automated alarms. There was always copies of the procedures stored on the hard drive of Clifford’s computer when I was younger, I’m sure that hasn’t changed. If they aren’t then they will be in the second safe in his office and I can get to them without a problem.

“Does anyone have questions about things so far?” Mackenzie looked between Helena, Sebastian, and Kurt. She was sure they had understood exactly what she had explained but it never hurt to double check.

“I do,” Sebastian said, “Can I make them see ghosts in the hallways after we get control of the security cameras?”

With a chuckle, Donovan said, “No. If anything seems out of place or unusual in any way, shape, or form they will start poking around for the answers.”

Sebastian sneered at the news. Helena placed a hand on his shoulder, knowing how much he enjoyed toying with people.

“The third part is a little less set in stone. It may have to be changed depending on the security measures. But as of right now we have two different possible strategies for the actual robbery. Donny, do you want to explain this part?” Mackenzie turned to her brother, knowing he liked to explain plans and strategies even more than she did.

He nodded and began, “The first way is the obvious. The vault is opened with a code that is punched into an electronic number pad. I should receive this code when I get the job. What we are hoping for right now is the hallway that leads to the vault,” he pointed to the hallway on the blue prints, “will be empty. The security cameras in that hallway should be routed the exact same way as all the others, so we should have control of them. If this is all true then Sebastian will shut off the live camera feed, we will use my code and walk into the vault.

“But there is no guarantee that things will end up being that way. Even if the cameras are routed a different way they won’t be a problem, but guards in the hallway would be. So the back up plan is to by-pass the hallway and vault door all together.”

“How?” Kurt asked, feeling extremely anxious.

“When the casino was built security measures were much different. The original owner wanted a secret vault entrance that only he knew about. The second entrance would allow him to get into the vault and lock it from the inside if the need arose. The lock that is located on the inside of the vault cannot be beaten from the outside, it has to be locked and unlocked manually from the inside.

“As technology progressed so did the exterior and interior locks on the vault. In 1980 the second lock was redone, right after the first one was done. Now when it is engaged it causes a second door to extend from the ceiling. The second door cannot be opened from the outside, it has to be disengaged from within the vault itself.” Donovan explained.

“So does it take a separate code?” Sebastian asked, fascinated with the ideas the previous owners had had.

“It doesn’t take a code. It takes a metal key. There is only one copy of this key in existence. In my opinion it is the best kept secret in the city. Very few people know about it and some that do even doubt its existence,” Mackenzie said, a smile playing at her lips as if she was telling an inside joke.

“Let me guess the catch. Clifford has it and its kept in a place that is impossible to get to.” Helena wasn’t sure why they were explaining any of this to them. The way Mackenzie was talking it seemed like there was no hope of getting this key. No one would leave it unguarded if it was that important.

“Clifford has never had the key in his possession and he never will. Actually he was never supposed to get ownership of the hotel and casino but he did.” Mackenzie couldn’t keep the bitterness out of her voice at this point.

“I think its time to tell them the entire story,” Scott said quietly.

Donovan nodded and said, “Originally, The Diamonti was built and owned by the Zingarello family. Our great-grandfather opened it in 1947. He owned and managed until 1967, when he passed it on to his son. Lawrence, our grandpa, owned and ran it until 1988. Our mom took over then, with Clifford at her side. Gradually, she let him spend more time in charge while she helped from the sidelines. Truthfully she was more concerned with taking care of and spending time with us than about the hotel at the time.

“Things had started going down hill in ‘87. We were loosing our father a little at a time in different ways and those things got worse when he started running the Diamonti. In late ‘91 Alva came into the picture as his mistress. By mid ‘92 he had disowned our mom and both of us for her. In the divorce he paid off the judge, a judge that was a childhood friend of his, and received the Diamonti.”

“So where exactly is the key?” Kurt asked, wondering which member of Mackenzie and Donovan’s family had it.

“The story isn’t over yet. Even though he knew about the tunnel and the vault, Clifford was told the key had been destroyed years before. Grandpa never trusted him with it so he fabricated the legend of the key’s demise. As far as Clifford knows, there was an incident in 1984 involving the second door. The story is that they were testing it, just to make sure it still worked properly, and it failed. Supposedly the door closed but wouldn’t open so they had to use low-grade explosives inside the vault to open it. So neither Clifford nor Alva know that there is still a key and that the second door works perfectly. Both of them believe that the key was melted down and made into a pendant that was given to Mackenzie when she was a baby,” Donovan carefully explained the lie that might help them pull this off.

“But Grandpa kept the key in a safe at his house. All I have to do is explain to him what we are doing and he will give me the key. He has been looking for revenge against Clifford for hurting Donny and I, for hurting our mom, for taking the casino, and basically for breathing. This will be right up his alley.” Mackenzie had already let her grandpa know she was in town and had planned a visit to his house.

Sebastian, although still fascinated with the history lesson they were receiving, was more anxious to know how they were going to get out after the robbery. “So what is our escape plan. How can we hide millions of dollars in cash well enough to walk out the main entrance?”

“We don’t. Lets just say that Mackenzie and Donovan have some leverage they are going to use to get us out the door. And we aren’t going to use the main entrance. If you will direct your attention to the blue prints, there is a loading dock in the back of the building. That is how they transport the cash, slot machines, poker tables, and roulette tables. But on the night of the robbery it is going to be how we make it out of there. I think its better if we don’t question exactly what that leverage is just yet,” Scott said, saving the Page siblings from having to explain the final, and possibly the most important, part.

***

Mackenzie hadn’t bothered to ask her brother where he wanted to go. Instead she had pulled out of the drive way and headed directly for the strip. The sun roof was wide open, spring air filling the car, and the music on low. This was something that Mackenzie and her brother had done as teenagers, before they chose to live outside the lines of the law.

This was something that Mackenzie did miss. Much like her brother, her chosen lifestyle was something she loved. She loved the adrenaline, the fear of being caught and the triumph of pulling it off. She loved always being in motion, always moving from place to place. But this was one of the few things she missed, just being in the town she’d been born in.

When she was little she had figured out something important about herself. In many ways she was more like her grandfather than either of her parents. The main thing that people knew about Lawrence Zingarello was that he loved his place in this city. He loved the responsibility that came with owning the Diamonti hotel and the reputation that also came with it. She admired her grandfather for this.

Growing up she was proud of who she was. She was a part of a family that had held its own. A descendant of a man that had designed and promoted a hotel and casino of his own. The same man that people said wouldn’t last a day in the city back then, the man that proved them all wrong. She was proud to be associated with who her family was and had planned to make her own place among them.

At any major function dealing with the Diamonti she had spent more time at her grandfather’s side than beside her own parents. She had great admiration for her great-grandfather but she held even more for her grandfather. Instead of dreaming about being like her father she had dreamed of being like Lawrence.

It was when things soured between her parents that her life took its current direction. When her father gained control of the Diamonti she had been just as shattered as her grandfather, immediately thinking of ways to reclaim it. It was after things fell through in that department that she discovered her current love.

“Are you sure you are ready for all of this?” Donovan finally asked.

“Of course I’m ready. The more important question is are you ready. We can’t hide the real endgame from everyone else forever. One of us is going to have to tell them this isn’t just about the money or the revenge.” Mackenzie allowed herself to smile a little, knowing her brother would have more of an issue with things than she would.

“Are you sure we want to tell them before the heist? Couldn’t we just tell them afterwards if it works? That way if it doesn’t work then they never have to know.”

“It will work, it has to work. If he doesn’t want to do it privately then I will make it public and he will have to do something.”

“I really hope you are right about this. It could be the last chance we get for this.”