Here is a preview from the sixteenth episode of A Grifter’s Song, Rocky Mountain Lie by Michael Pool.
RACHEL
She noticed the sun all at once, poking its head above the eastern peaks in the direction of Vail Pass, where Sam and Rachel had come over the previous evening. Rachel could get used to that, though she would likely never get used to the name Colette. The name had been Sam’s idea taken from the name of a beer he’d had at the airport in Denver. She’d laughed at the idea but liked the challenge of keeping a straight face every time someone used the name. She named Sam after her own beer in return, though shortened it from Odell to a simpler Dell. Lying didn’t always have to be stressful. Grifting was mostly fun, though it could turn violent on a moment’s notice, as they’d discovered many times.
No use running a con if you couldn’t make it fun. Since leaving Philadelphia, they’d had a variety of grifting experiences ranging from unpleasant to terrifying where one of the more extreme experiences had left them marked by the mob and thus always on the move. But anytime she and Sam could find fun in the con, they did so. Not to say they didn’t take it seriously, just that they never forewent the opportunity to enjoy the little things along the road of life.
The idea for their next grift had dawned on her just as suddenly as this morning’s sunrise. They’d taken the light rail from Denver International Airport into an area north of downtown called RiNo. Walking through the city they remarked on how it didn’t seem cold or dreary enough to be winter. Not like back in Philly, where weeks of shivering cold and wet snow were punctuated by short days in the longest, dreariest season.
Denver seemed to have sunshine and a weed dispensary on every corner. So many, in fact, that she’d quipped to Sam the city could give half the continent the munchies and still be stocked up for business the next day. No doubt the state government had a system to regulate and siphon off a chunk of the profits. Politicians were the ultimate grifters, never leaving so much as a buck on the table if they could steal it through taxes, licensing, and overregulation. But that didn’t mean the average potential industry investor had a clue how large the scope of brands and shops and edible companies might be. Not to mention the names and locations of each and every business. An investor could get lost in all that branding. Which was exactly the idea.
Rachel read about the Colorado green rush. The industry had attracted plenty of shadow “cash” investors, the kind she and Sam would be looking to grift. The paperwork and background screenings required for licensure disqualified anyone with a felony conviction. Money and criminality often ran hand in hand, and with regulations keeping felons out of the business, many had bought in by proxy using shadow investors and cash.
She’d done just enough research to make their grift idea come to life, but not so much as to convolute the story to potential marks. Less is more, that was the rule when working a grift. Every lie had to be kept in a perfect matrix with all the others, and each detail added a new layer of complexity to manage. Volunteering too much information always came home to roost at the worst possible time…not that any time was good with sums of money at stake that people would willingly kill each other over.
Rachel found an example copy of a state grower’s license online, sent it to her computer whiz friend, Maya, to forge, along with a request for a website that looked passably like the three example links she included with the emailed request. In choosing the name for their fake cannabis edibles business, they’d decided to stick with the beer reference theme again, and called it Insane Rush Organics after a fruity IPA Sam had enjoyed the night before.
There had to be mountains of that sweet, sweet weed money in a bougie place like Vail. They just needed to find the right mark and coax it out of them like charming a snake from a barrel.
Which shouldn’t be too difficult in the thrush of rich white guys wearing oddball hats that resembled a mixture of Indiana Jones and Robin Hood. She even noticed a store selling the hats near the base area of the ski resort. They’d chosen Vail because it was a playground for the rich and famous. There was no better mark than a person who was desperate to rub shoulders with fame or fortune.
Sam rolled over in the bed and moaned in his sleep. He’d mentioned having strange dreams the last few nights, something she attributed to the edibles they’d been taking in order to build up a tolerance and reinforce the con. They worked on the lingo: sativas are racy, indicas for sleep, vape cartridges, THC, CBD, caviar, shatter, CO2 extraction, sauce, kif. These dope smokers had more lingo than a poetry convention, and more science than Bill Nye. The trick would be to sound knowledgeable without making the mark feel like they needed to do their own research to get up to speed. An easy twenty or thirty grand to hold their made-up investment opportunity was all she and Sam really needed, unless the mark was a truly exceptional twit. They might even rinse and repeat the process in Aspen afterward, if all went well.
Rachel pulled on her puffy coat and knit hat, slipped into the hiking shoes she’d picked up in Denver, and stepped out the front door of the Villa Cortina’s condo complex into the chilly winter morning. A dry, fluffy snow covered the sidewalks and street. Even the fire station next door had taken on a silent sort of meditation with no movement beyond the glass bay doors. She filled her chest with the cold, sharp air and set off down the street in search of coffee. The condo rental had been too expensive for there not to be coffee somewhere nearby.
Which turned out not quite to be true. Fifteen minutes later, she’d given up searching and wandered into one of the fancy hotels in the area, The Grand Hyatt. She rolled into a small market just off the lobby and approached the counter.
“Hi there,” she said when the clerk, a short, middle-aged Hispanic woman, noticed her.
“Good morning, ma’am,” the woman said in a tone that had clearly been trained into her, “How may I serve you?”
“I feel like I might fall right over if I don’t get some coffee in me,” Rachel said.
The woman smiled. “You’ve come to the right place,” she said, gesturing to two large industrial coffee makers behind her. “What size would you like?”
Rachel pretended to consider the question. “Medium,” she said after a moment, invoking her tendency not to go for too much too fast, then added, “Two of them.” Sam would be up by the time she got back. It would be worth carrying two cups the half mile back to see his smile.
“Yes, ma’am, coming right up.”
Rachel waited while the woman poured the coffees, considering whether to grab one of the pastries in the glass case to her left. She decided against it, remembering the boxes of Lemonheads and Milkduds she and Sam had polished off while stoned to the gills the night before. A girl had to watch her figure if she wanted to use it.
“That will be twelve-fifty,” the clerk said as she set the cups in front of Rachel. “Unless I can get you something else?”
“No, thank you, this will do it.” She gave her biggest, most innocent smile, then feigned a look of panic that the clerk picked up on right away.
“Everything okay, ma’am?” the clerk asked.
Rachel didn’t respond for a moment, letting the woman marinate in the faux panic so that the discomfort would make her want to seek a resolution. Finally, she made a show of drooping her body posture and sighing, not too big, just enough to sell what she was about to say.
“I left my purse in the room,” Rachel said in a tone that mixed disappointment and frustration. “I swear I cannot function in the mornings without caffeine.”
“I’m the same way,” the clerk said in a reassuring tone. “It happens a lot, don’t worry. What is your room number? If you’d like I can charge it to your room.”
Rachel let her posture brighten and smiled as if the woman had just complimented her eyes. “Oh my gosh, could you? That would be wonderful,” she said, thinking about how many floors she’d observed the hotel to have. She couldn’t remember if it was three or four, so she stuck with a lower floor to be safe. “We’re in 220, The Eppersons,” she said, already moving away from the counter, making a big show of handling the coffees as if they might set her on fire if she spilled one.
“Ma’am wait, you need to sign…” she heard the clerk say behind her as she continued to walk away.
“Oh, okay, I’ll be right back. I just want to drop these off in the room with my husband before I spill them,” she said over her shoulder. “He drank too much again last night and he’s a real jerk when hung over. I swear this altitude turns alcohol into jet fuel. I’ll be back in two minutes, promise.”
The clerk didn’t reply, and Rachel didn’t look back to give her the opportunity to resist. She just walked right out of the shop toward the elevators, circled the room, and headed for the front door.
She was almost outside when a voice with a thick Texas accent said, “Is that extra coffee for me, pretty lady?” A man in a heather suit coat with a pressed white button up shirt under it and starched jeans over obnoxiously shiny loafers stepped in front of her, forcing her to stop.
She made eye contact with him and, having no other choice, smiled her biggest, most beautiful smile. “Well, aren’t you the charmer,” she said, glancing back over her shoulder toward the coffee shop, where she noted the clerk was already busy serving a tall woman with wavy blonde hair and white pants so tight that nothing jiggled when she moved. .
“I like to think so, yes,” the man said. “And I’m just yankin’ your cord about the coffee, sweetie. See that big, voluptuous woman there in the shop? That’s my wife, Darla. She’s already getting me a coffee…but I’d sure like to try yours sometime.” He winked with a self-confidence that seemed to imply he thought the gesture made him charming rather than creepy. Rachel started to tell him to get bent, but something made her pause. He had the look of a potential mark, the kind of guy who fancies himself a prolific businessman, with the affect of a self-proclaimed “puss hound.” He projected wealth and ego, both of which could be used to separate him from his finances.
“Well thank you, that’s sweet,” she said, “My name is Colette Richards. To whom do I owe the pleasure?”
“I’m Dan Croft, but you can call me DC,” the man said. “We just come in on my King Air for the weekend, ready for some fun. Where are you from, Miss Colette?”
“Mrs., actually,” Rachel said, “My husband Dell and I are up from Denver for the weekend. Speaking of fun, you folks ever try edibles?”
Click here to learn more about Rocky Mountain Lie by Michael Pool.