Cloisters doesn’t have so much in the way of billboards and guilty handles. We have three gentlemen’s clubs that you wouldn’t know were there unless you knew they were there, with nothing but a small neon sign, square of red carpet and a velvet rope to drop a wink to those on the lookout. There are eight casinos in Cloisters, each one marked by a sign that city regulations restrict to a size slightly larger than a pizza.

After my transatlantic phone call, I take a brisk walk through the rain to the bus station to pick up my savings, then cross town to the strip and announce myself at the casino door.

‘Ta-dah,’ I sing, spreading my arms wide.

Jason gives me the diamond-fang smile. ‘Hey, Dan, buddy. Where the hell you been? Fucking Ireland or some shit? Seriously, Victor lost his nut here yesterday. Fired your ass in absentia.’

This is bad news, but I was expecting it. You don’t pull a no-show on Victor Jones and expect him to let it slide. Victor never lets anything slide.

That fucker wouldn’t let anything slide at a baseball game.

I chuckle. Zeb made this pronouncement one night after Victor cut off his tab.

Jason is not expecting a chuckle in response to his litany of doom. ‘I respect your balls, Dan. Chuckling and shit, showing up here like it’s business as usual after missing a shift, but you’re gonna have to pull some hocus-pocus outta your hat for Victor. You feel me?’

I envy Jason his ability to confidently use phrases like you feel me or off the hook, another of his favourites.

‘Okay. I better get inside and grovel.’

Jason cracks his neck, which always makes me wince.

‘Come on, Jason. I hate that. Do you want to give yourself arthritis?’

‘Sorry, Dan. I’m aggravated. We got no customers yet, so Vic’s rolling a couple of the new girls.’

Rolling the new girls is not as bad as it sounds.

Okay. Maybe it is as bad as it sounds. Just different bad.

Rolling the girls is one of Victor’s favourite pastimes, and he’s going to keep on doing it until one of the rolled girls goes crazy and spikes his Dom P with rat poison.

This thought brings on a dreamy sigh.

‘Hey, Dan, you dreaming about Oirland again?’

It’s Marco, the little barman, peeking out across the empty bar, smiling but not laughing because I’m a lot bigger than he is.

Then he notices my bruised face and his smile shrinks a few molars. ‘Holy shit, man. What happened to you?’

‘I was dreaming about Oirland,’ I say straight-faced. ‘And this guy interrupted me, so we had a talk. You should see the state he’s in.’ I mime drinking through a straw in the side of my mouth.