Authors: Gretchen Archer
* * *
“I have to go to Vegas, No Hair.”
He didn’t react immediately.
“It’s Bradley Cole.”
He pushed away from Mr. Sanders’ desk and walked around to me. He put his paws on my shoulders; I went from five-two to five feet. “Sit down, Davis. Tell me what’s going on.”
TWENTY-SIX
4:30: Kickoff Double Dip Final Round
Gift Baskets Delivered to Guest Rooms
Logistically, I couldn’t get to Las Vegas.
We were holed up in Mr. Sanders’ office.
Bradley Cole’s phone would not ping a location, and I couldn’t get any decent information out of Desert Springs Hospital to save my life. He was no longer a patient and that’s all they’d say. No, they wouldn’t fax his signature on the discharge papers so I could authenticate it. No, they didn’t have time to watch their security feed and see who’d picked him up. No, they would not interview the staff who’d cared for him to ask if he’d mentioned my name.
Fantasy looked at commercial flights. Of course, there was nothing direct. If I left the Bellissimo now, I could catch a six-twenty out of Gulfport, and from there, my choices were either the Atlanta, Cincinnati, or Dallas airports to spend the night in, then catch a dark-thirty morning flight to Vegas.
No Hair pulled up the Bellissimo fleet schedule. Booked solid. Three of the four corporate jets were fueled up and flight plans had already been filed for post-Double Dip runs. After the tournament, the three planes were taking Bellissimo high rollers home to Raleigh, North Carolina, Charleston, South Carolina, and Frankfort, Kentucky. The flights were at or near capacity, especially the Frankfort flight, the only one not going in the opposite direction of Vegas.
“What’s their big hurry?” Fantasy asked.
I pulled up the player names and their casino activity during the three-day tournament. Between the registered players on the planes, they’d dropped a combined quarter of a million dollars in the casino. None of them would be in the mood to be bumped.
“Just tell them engine trouble,” Fantasy suggested, “or bad weather.”
“No,” No Hair said. “Let’s look at that fourth jet.”
“Mr. Sanders’ plane,” I said. “Halfway around the world.” I surrendered with both hands. “How’s that going to help?”
“No.” No Hair tilted the computer screen so I could see a blue map of the greater United States with a little bitty plane over California. “He lands in Vegas in twelve minutes.”
* * *
5:00: Player and Audience Cocktail Reception
Stella Lounge
Stack the Deck Jazz Band
“It never happened, Mrs. Sanders,” I assured her. “I don’t think they were ever in the same room at the same time.”
Bianca was weepy, probably something Dr. Spock had given her, and she didn’t take the news well that Mr. Sanders’ return might be delayed again. However, she quickly changed the subject to her overall disappointment in how I’d “behaved” so far at the “casino whatever event,” and she would
never
do another one of these, because she was exhausted from it.
(Really?)
She had a copy of Page Six with the headline “
Bellissimo’s Shiniest Star, Bianca Sanders”
spread out on the table in front of her. I felt confident she would eventually get past how I’d “behaved.” Not that I didn’t fully intend to drop a line in the employee suggestion box as soon as I could get to it: Hire an emcee.
After that, she smoked and whined about not having an assistant. “The cowboy is tolerable,” (puff, puff, puff) “but he runs off. As if he’s being chased. He’s here one minute,” her lit cigarette arced through the air, “and the next, he’s gone.”
“How’s your foot?”
She was wearing kitten heels, working her way back to her beloved stilettos.
“Scarred,” she said, “for life.” Which somehow reminded her of Peyton. “She was a good assistant,” Bianca said, “other than she sulked, she shot me, and she was sleeping with Richard.”
Which is when I assured her that Peyton was a one-man woman, and the man wasn’t Mr. Sanders. The man wasn’t even alive. (Cross, cross, cross.)
“I’m really ready for Richard to be home.”
Bianca
never
said home. She said “Biloxi” or “this wretched place” or “the intolerable hell that is the South.”
“I’ll see you soon, Mrs. Sanders.” I stood.
“Yes, David.” She shooed me out. “Stop by the kitchen and have them bring me a fresh martini. This one has all but gelled during your rambling.”
* * *
5:30: Casino Hosts, Stella Lounge
Bianca Sanders, Dressing Room
Fantasy and I ran past, behind, and under Shakes, then ran the length of the hall to our underground offices. I keyed the code wrong twice before she said, “Move.”
I ran to the shower while she dialed for me, again, then talked for me, too.
“Laney, this is Fantasia. Bianca’s assistant. She’s running a little late. I don’t think she’s going to make it to dinner.”
The zipper on my jeans was stuck.
“She says she’s not hungry.”
I did not say that.
“Look, lady. I’m just telling you what she told me.”
In fact, I was starving.
“I’ll get her there as quickly as I can.”
5:45 Players to Magnolia Ballroom
6:00 Dinner Seating
I’d planned on a two-minute shower, but I stood under the hot water for at least ten minutes without moving a muscle, at which point Fantasy banged on the door. “Your dad’s on the phone, Davis!” I grabbed a towel.
“We have newlyweds,” he said.
“Please tell me they’re not in a honeymoon suite somewhere, Daddy.”
“They’re in the back of my patrol car,” Daddy said. “Snoring.”
“Where’s everyone else?”
“Meredith is driving Eddie’s car, with your mother and Riley in tow.”
I didn’t ask, but he answered anyway.
“Eddie took a shine to the organist at the chapel and said he’d find his own way home.”
“Poor organist,” I said. “You do know half the town’s locked up in Ascambia, right?”
“No, punkin’,” he said. “They didn’t hold them thirty minutes.”
“I’m surprised they put up with them that long.”
6:00 Carrot Ginger soup with Apple Pumpkin Seed Pesto
I had just applied Morocanoil Moisture Repair conditioner to my tortured hair.
“Hey,” Fantasy said, “you’re going to run out of hot water if you don’t hurry.”
I stuck my head out. “Is that what you came in here to tell me?”
“No. Kirk Olsen is texting you.”
“What?”
“He says Kimberli Silvers and Jerry McAllen are actually married. And this is their third tag-team sting. He says their goal is his-and-hers settlements.”
“Seriously?” I asked over the water. “Text him back,” I said from under the conditioner. “Tell him we’re trying to track down Bradley.”
“He knows that, Davis. He says they got a warrant from Judge Clemmer to enter her corporate apartment and found transcripts of phone taps on both yours and Bradley’s phones. And they found your Bellissimo passkey.”
6:15 Endive and Pear Salad with Gorgonzola Cream Dressing
I don’t know how long it had been, but I prayed.
“Davis? Are you ever coming out of that shower?”
“I might, I might not.” I was waiting on the Morocanoil Moisture Repair conditioner to save my tortured hair and I was busy with a Higher Power trying to save Bradley Cole.
6:30 Roast Duckling with Poached Peaches
Pan Grilled Salmon with Sautéed Peas and Celery Root
Chateaubriand with Lobster Béarnaise Sauce
I made it to the salon chair in the dressing house, tongue hanging out.
Laney Harris wasn’t happy, but she was savvy. She didn’t fuss at me for being an hour late or ask why. She was dolled up for tonight’s shindig in a hot-pink sleeveless dress with a chocolate-brown silk scarf draped about her neck, her dark bob swept up and slicked back, and chocolate-brown Tori Burch wedges.
“You look really nice, Laney.”
“Why thank you, Mrs. Sanders.” She winked.
Maybe she wasn’t upset with me, but I didn’t get off scot-free. Seattle had a fit about my extra moisturized hair. My slick blondy-blond Bianca hair, which there was a lot of anyway, was being heaped into a red-carpet updo, except it kept falling down. I felt certain they would pull it out before they got it up. Seattle threw his caulk gun on the floor and screamed at me in the mirror.
“I tell to you! Do not buy
les couleurs
and
les
savon
at the market! Buy the
fruit
and
vegetable
at the market!”
Fantasia led him to a Barcolounger and tossed him a pack of Bianca’s cigarettes. “She’s shot people for way less than that, San Fran. You’d better button up.”
Four girls—two with polish, two with leaf blowers—were attending to my toes, while another team of experts came at me with spatulas and paint brushes.
“Please,” I said, “easy on the makeup. I hugged a woman this morning and she came away with four pounds of my makeup on her clothes.” The guy with an airbrush machine strapped over his shoulder looked offended. “Simple makeup,” I said. “Please.”
“You’re clogging her pores!” (Fantasia. Who was busy hooking Seattle up to a liquor drip.)
At six fifty-nine, a ninety-year-old woman presented me with several carats of pear-shaped diamond solitaire earrings on velvet and a tray of chicken-cutlet bras on a cutting board.
7:00 Ballroom Doors Open
Cocktails
Gulf Coast Symphony Orchestra
Final Round Double Dip
The dress left nothing,
nothing
, to the imagination. Nothing.
The designer was Herve Leger—whoever he is—and he called his creation Asymmetrical Sequined Bandage. No telling what his creation cost. It was asymmetrical, because it only had one shoulder, which meant the neckline was diagonal. (Dramatic.) Sequined, because, well, every bit of it was covered in sequins. (Shiny.) The bandage part, and I’m only guessing here, but think ace bandage. “Hold your arms up,” then someone ballerina spins you until you’re covered. That’s not exactly how this dress worked, because it was not made of ace bandages, rather, creamy, stretchy silk, and it was in one piece, someone had already spun it. (Dizzy.) I would have named it Lopsided Twinkling Curve-Hugger. I doubt Mr. Leger would approve of my description, while I approved mightily of his dress, other than at the moment, it was hanging limp on a headless armless mannequin in the middle of the dressing house. (Creepy.)
The shoes were simple Chanel’s, if you call two-thousand dollar five-inch-heeled shoes simple. They were winter-white leather, the exact color of the dress, with ankle straps and matching straps across my toes, which had just been painted OPI’s “Teal We Meet Again” green. (The color of money.)
Whilst Fantasia and I had been knocking back blueberry martinis earlier in the day, a very talented decorating crew had been having their way with the ballroom. What had been “I Scream You Scream We All Scream for Ice Cream” was now “Nice Day for a White Wedding.” Fairy lights and white organza everywhere. White linens, white china, and two-foot-tall white-rose topiary arrangements on the tables.
The white was set off by silver. Silver ware (silverware—one word), silver candelabras, and silver stanchions with connecting white velvet ropes cordoned off the slot machines. The waitresses were wearing white shiny ace bandages, too, but they’d split one shiny ace bandage between the fifty of them, where I had three bandages all to myself. At least two. Mine was a whole dress; theirs was a whole napkin. Their hair, too, was piled up like mine. Their toenails, peeking out from their Jimmy Choo strappys, were Teal We Meet Again green.
“Do you want to know?” Laney Harris walked me to the stage, passed me the jeweled microphone along with the tap-on, tap-off ring and went over what was left of the evening’s itinerary with me one more time. “Matthew Thatcher always knew. He wanted to know.”
The slot machines’ reels had also been switched out during our Blueberry Martini Matinee. They’d gone from 31 Flavors to one—vanilla, and just one topping—diamonds. One of the machines had three special symbols, three little jewels that would line up for one lucky player. Laney Harris knew which one. (She knew which machine. She didn’t know which player.)
“I really don’t want to know, Laney,” I said. “I’d rather be surprised.”
“You’re sure?” she asked. “You’ll need to let the crowd know when it hits.”
“Won’t the person scream and holler?”
“You never know,” she said. “The person might pass out.”
“What happens if I drop it?”
“Drop what?”
“The diamond. At the awards.”
Laney hesitated. “The winner doesn’t get it tonight. It’ll be delivered by armored courier tomorrow.”
I was so disappointed. (I was so many things—scared for Bradley, anxious for this to be over, worried that I’d have to catch a plane wearing the twinkling bandage, exhausted, and a twinge of sorry that I’d missed my grandmother’s wedding.)
“It’s the insurance company’s call,” Laney said. “Not ours.” She opened a leather portfolio, looked both ways, then let me peek. It was a beautiful sparkly solitaire.
“I’d like to have one of those.”
“Wouldn’t we all?” She tucked the portfolio under an arm, then pulled me to face her. She tucked a stray strand of moisturized hair back into the beehive on my head. “Good luck out there.” She spun me toward the curtains. “Do Bianca proud!”
I froze and looked over my shoulder.
She winked, then pushed me through to the stage.
Cue the lights (house down, spot up), cue the orchestra (Elvis Costello’s “She”), then deafening applause and a standing ovation.
I no longer remember how I got from a town of four hundred to
here
.
I did know the second this was over I would be with, or on my way to, Bradley Cole.
7:10 Welcome
Richard and Bianca Sanders
I floated. (Around the room.) Which was more like
ran
around the room.
“This old thang? I picked it up at a yard sale.”
“I told him this morning, ‘Richard,’ I said, ‘no goofing off. Get back here to see who wins this tournament.’”
“Say cheese!”
“Mrs. Conner, you look absolutely amazing. Monty Conner, you do not deserve her.”
“All I know is someone’s going to win a million dollars. I don’t know a thing about anyone winning anything else.”
“He’s wonderful! Thank you! He’s fourteen now, straight As, and plays lacrosse.”