"What the hell," Danny said. "Are you doing here?"
Mickey laughed. "Good to see you too, Danny."
Danny, in response, could only stutter. Ash and Stacie exchanged glances, trying desperately to suppress laughter.
"You're in prison!"
Mickey shrugged. "I had to say something to get you all in the country didn't I?"
"What d'you mean, get us in the country?"
"As in, I need you all to help me," Mickey said, leaning inwards on the table to face the other three, his tone businesslike. "Now ideally, Albert would be with us, but you never know, we'll keep trying and maybe he can fly out here in a few days."
Despite his anger, Danny found himself listening to Mickey.
"Ok. I've got us a mark."
He couldn't pretend that he hadn't seen this coming, but Danny couldn't not feel a little annoyed that Mickey had just interrupted them, and dragged them out here for no particular reason.
"We had a mark!" he said in protest. "Why d'you need us here, Mickey?"
"Because I can't do this alone."
"Ok, fine, but what about Albert's friends you were selling the Sydney Opera House with? What happened to them?"
Mickey shrugged. "We finished that about a month back, I haven't seen Chris and Mary since. And I really need you all to help me with this. Can you do that?"
The other three exchanged glances.
"I'm in," Ash said, breaking the silence.
"Yeah, me too," Stacie agreed, a grin dancing across her lips.
Danny was the only one not to speak.
"Danny?"
He thought about it. He didn't want to say yes, it seemed like giving in. But he saw his friends' faces and knew he'd couldn't look at them and just deny the fact that, actually, he really, really wanted to do this.
"Yeah, well, what would you do without me?"
They all laughed, and Danny found himself joining in. Someone handed him a glass of champagne, and the four of them lifted their glasses and clinked them together.
"Ok then. The con is on."
***
Danny didn't sleep much.
He should have done, really, because of jet lag and the fact that he hadn't slept for over 24 hours, but he couldn't sleep. Mickey's arrival had changed a lot of things.
He got up and put a sweater on over the t-shirt and tracksuit bottoms that serviced as pyjamas for him. It was too late to call room service, but he was sure he'd find some form of alcohol in the fridge.
He was wrong.
Feeling a little defeated, he poured himself a glass of orange juice with ice and took it out to the balcony. It wasn't cold like he'd expected it to be, it was actually really warm. Australia was a weird place.
He thought about Mickey. A few days ago, Danny had not been expecting Mickey to come back into his life again. The fact that he was coming back one day was always there, it was just that he'd been gone so long that it had sort of disappeared now. They'd almost been thinking about recruiting someone else, since Billy moved to America with the woman that was now his fiancé and Mickey still hadn't returned.
"You ok?"
Danny jumped a little. He hadn't noticed the tall dark figure appear behind him.
"God, Mickey!"
He chuckled. "I'm sorry."
"I thought I locked the door!"
"Yeah, you did," Mickey replied, mysteriously.
The two of them stood in silence for a while, leaning against the balcony edge.
"It's really freaked you out, me turning up, hasn't it?"
Danny opened his mouth to speak. It was impossible to lie around Mickey. "Yeah, a little bit."
"I'm sorry about the whole jail thing, I just really wanted to be sure you'd all come," he replied.
Danny didn't say anything, just took a sip of his drink and smiled slightly.
"I'm also sorry I just turned up out of the blue like this. If you want after this con I can disappear… I'll tell Ash and Stacie I'm resigning or something."
"No, don't do that. We're better with you, you're a better leader than I can be," Danny shrugged. "I'm fine with that now," he said, not entirely truthfully. "We need you."
"Listen to me," Mickey said, turning to look at him. "You're a brilliant grifter. You sold the Hollywood sign without me. You took three million from a casino without me. I wasn't there but from what Ash and Stacie said this afternoon, you were a great leader. Danny, you do not need me."
He found himself unable to argue back.
"They want you to come back, though, Mick. Ash, Stacie, Albert…" Danny paused momentarily. "And I, you know… wouldn't mind."
Mickey laughed. "Thanks, Danny."
Danny proceeded to take a sip of his orange juice but found the glass was empty, apart from a few ice cubes. Instead, he played with the straw, absentmindedly.
"What really happened with Albert's friends, the Australians?" Danny asked.
Mickey shrugged. "I just never really got on with them, I didn't like the way they did things. The cons Chris and Mary did were all very similar. After the Sydney Opera House they asked if I wanted to stay with them for a while."
"And?"
"And I declined."
Danny shot Mickey a strange look.
"I thought it'd be right up your street… selling huge, expensive landmarks and risking jail."
"Every day? I'd get bored," he laughed. "I couldn't stand using the same plan, all the time, everything's scripted and there's no element of randomness, nothing to create. I don't want somebody else to breathe for me."
Danny nodded slowly.
"I think it's also because I just didn't like them that much… as people. Of all the people I've worked with, Danny, with you lot it's always been the best. It's like we're family, you know?"
"Yeah," Danny said, truthfully.
Neither of them spoke for a while.
"I don't know when that part of it all clicked with me. When I first joined I always felt like I didn't fit in… you, Ash, Albie and Stace all knew each other a long time before. I don't know when the whole family thing sunk in… but it did."
They smiled at each other, in a comfrey silence.
"Ok, I'm going to go. We have a busy day tomorrow," Mickey said.
"Yeah, night."
"Night, Danny."
Danny watched as he left, and walked through the living room area of the hotel room them out of the front door. He should probably have gone to sleep, as Mickey had said, they had a busy day tomorrow but he couldn't summon up the willpower to do anything but stand there, thinking about what Mickey had said.
So maybe they didn't need Mickey. But could things be the same without him, if he left a second time around? Would Danny be able to just not tell the others that it had been him that had asked Mickey? Could he lie to Ash and Albert? Could he lie to Stacie?
He also realised that regarding all of this, he sort of wanted Mickey back as well. Finally at rest, he left his glass on the balcony and headed straight to bed.