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The first time he met Rusty, Danny wasn't sure if he was being conned magnificently or not at all.
One missing bag of diamonds later, it was clear that he'd been conned magnificently.
-
Approximately three hours after disappearing, Rusty handed back the jewels like they'd come out of a gumball machine and not a state-of-the-art titanium safe. Although, when Danny thinks back on it, it isn't a particularly apt analogy. Rusty would probably have been far more reluctant to part with something that came out of a gumball machine.
In any case, Rusty had given the diamonds back. He slid down into a seat at the bar where Danny was getting very, very drunk with his good friend Jack Daniels, and slipped the small velvet bag back into Danny's pocket. Danny felt the soft weight and started inhaling air instead of alcohol for the first time since Rusty disappeared.
Losing a quarter of a million dollars worth of diamonds when one had a waiting buyer and an unpaid crew of four –two of whom were in munitions– was not a good end to a day.
Everything was rather blurred, but Danny thought he caught a flash of white teeth as Rusty paid Danny's tab and disappeared again. He dragged himself up to his hotel room and, not bothering to take off his rumpled suit or pull back the covers, passed out with the bag of diamonds clutched securely in his hand.
-
Danny woke up the next morning with a killer hangover and a vague sense of panic. Looking down at his cramped hand, he found the bag of diamonds. Unusually fumbling fingers tipped a few of the jewels into his palm. The way they shone might have hurt his eyes if they weren't so goddamn beautiful.
Danny staggered to the hotel-issue desk and gently poured the rest of the diamonds out of the bag. Four. Five. Six... The total added up to seventeen, exactly one less than it should have. Even knowing it was futile, Danny reached back inside the bag hopefully. Instead of a shiny, valuable piece of pressurized carbon, his fingers encountered something thin and papery. Pulling it out, Danny found a napkin with a dubious blue stain and red script that spelled out Paco's Tacos. The back read: For a good time, call 413-243-3999.
Bemused and still a little blurred from all the whiskey he'd knocked back the previous evening, Danny walked unsteadily over to the phone on the bedside table and dialed. The line picked up, and Danny could tell the person on the other end was smiling when they said, "Take some aspirin and meet me at 180 Carson Boulevard. Two o'clock," and hung up.
Danny showered and dressed and by the time he felt remotely human he was wavering somewhere between angry and intrigued.
-
180 Carson Boulevard turned out to be a street café and sitting at a round, glass table for two was Rusty. Danny sat down across from him smoothly and regarded him with a steady gaze, determined to find some high ground.
"Rusty Ryan," Rusty introduced himself. "Want a fry?" He motioned to a half-eaten plate of the greasiest looking French fries Danny had ever seen.
"I'd rather have a diamond," Danny replied.
Rusty pointed to a spot on the table directly in front of Danny. The last diamond sat there innocently, winking in the sun. Danny blinked. It hadn't been there when he sat down, and considering it wasn't covered in grease, he had no idea where Rusty could have pulled it from. He could possibly admit to being a little impressed. And now that he had all the diamonds back, his righteous anger was rapidly draining away, replaced by curiosity. It was an extremely twisted version of a Billy Martin, but Danny was willing to let it go.
He slipped the diamond into his jacket pocket just as a waitress deposited a pre-ordered glass of whiskey in front of him. "What, you don't think I had enough last night?" Danny asked ironically.
Rusty smiled, dazzling, in answer and Danny, a bit taken aback by the power of it, berated himself just a little less about falling for the previous evening's con. Rusty wiped his hands on a linen napkin and then laced his fingers. "I was thinking we might run a con together sometime."
Danny stared at him incredulously. "You set all this up to have a business conversation with me? Why didn't you just, I don't know, ask?
Rusty shrugged elegantly. "I thought I'd do something a little more memorable. And Saul mentioned that you had a good sense of humor."
"Saul said I had a good sense of humor?" Danny repeated, surprised. Saul wasn't known for talking about people's good qualities. Generally because he didn't think most people had any.
"Well, what he actually said might have been more along the lines of," Rusty tilted his head and adopted a reasonable impersonation of Saul, "'So long as he gets his take back, Danny won't put out a hit on you for this idiotic stunt you're going to pull.'" The emphasis put on idiotic was particularly reminiscent of Saul.
"Ah, Saul," Danny said, voice heavy with faked nostalgia.
Rusty held up his glass in a toast before laying out his proposal. "He told me that you were maybe the best idea-man he'd ever met, but you tended to lose track of the details." Danny tried to work out whether that was a great compliment or a vague put down. "It just so happens that I'm in the market for an idea-man," Rusty continued.
"And what am I in the market for that you have to offer?" Danny asked.
"Details," Rusty said, looking at him like he was a little slow.
Danny considered. "How do I know if you're any good?"
"Try me," Rusty offered. "What's your plan for the Renoir heist next week?"
Danny looked at him sharply. "First detail," Rusty said, holding up a finger. "Find a crew that doesn't shoot their mouths off. I'll give you that one for free."
The point was well taken Danny had to concede. Deciding to give Rusty a chance, he proceeded to explain his plan. It started with scaling a 30-foot steel wall under 24-hour video surveillance and ended with confiscating an early period Renoir from a 7-digit passcoded vault surrounded by a succession of laser tripwires and pressure sensors.
After a series of intelligent questions, Rusty informed Danny that unless he had two previously unmentioned crewmembers doing a Reverse Cartwheel and someone pulling a Bobby Kennedy then his plan was as full of holes as he'd be when security caught him.
Danny thought that maybe he should be a little annoyed, but the only thing he felt was something clicking into place. "Well, what would you suggest?" he asked.
The shine of Rusty's smile made him think of diamonds.