Authors: J. A. Konrath
A
LAN ISN’T A BAD-LOOKING GUY.
Not as muscular as Lance, but wiry and well proportioned, and easier to lift onto the bed. He’s dirty blond, and has a few days’ growth of beard that is salted with gray. Alex let him keep his underwear on for the time being; she has some questions to ask before they get to the fun stuff.
“Stay still and keep quiet, or I’ll juice you again,” she warns. “Just one more leg to secure.”
Alan stays still. He seems more dazed than scared. A combination of stun gun zaps and slaps to the side of the head make for a pretty disorienting cocktail. She tapes his ankle to the last foot of the bed, then gives the bottom of his foot a little tickle.
In the bathroom, she pours half a glass of water. On the marble sink top she crushes one of the egg-shaped tadalafil tablets she took from the coffee shop Lothario under her thumb, then scoops the powder into the water and stirs with her finger until it mostly dissolves. She brings the water back to Alan and holds up his head while he drinks.
“Do you know who I am?”
Alan swallows. He has a large Adam’s apple, which Alex finds sexy.
“You’re Alexandra Kork. You’re a serial killer. You escaped from a maximum security prison.”
“So Jack has mentioned me.”
Alan shakes his head. “Heard about you on CNN. Jack and I don’t talk.”
Alex runs her hand across his chest, squeezing his pecs.
“You must talk sometimes. Because here you are, hiding out in a hotel. Hiding from me.”
Alan’s face creases, what Alex takes to be his serious look.
“Jack and I are over. We’re divorced. We’re not even friends. Hurting me won’t hurt her.”
Half a smile forms on her face. “Oh, I think it will. But we have time for that later. First I want to show you something.”
Alex collects the AED from the floor. She brought it in from the Hyundai. It’s the size of a laptop computer, in a rugged plastic clamshell case, bright yellow with a red and white medical cross on it. Alex places the device on the bed, opens it up.
“Originally, I was going to do something creative to you with plastic explosives. But I’m going to use this instead. It’s an automatic external defibrillator. Just like on all those TV doctor shows. I put the pads on your chest like this—”
Alex places one high up to the right of his sternum, and one low down on his left side.
“—and press this big red button, and it delivers a nice thousand-volt shock across your heart, resetting its normal electrical rhythm. But if I stick the pads here—”
She removes the protective backings, exposing the adhesive, and places both pads on the left side of his heart.
“—then it will induce a fatal arrhythmia, or stop the heart altogether, or fry your organs. Or it might just hurt like hell. I’ve never done this before, so it’s all theory.”
Alex fingers the button, stroking it sensually while Alan’s eyes get wide.
“What do you want?” Alan finally asks.
“Tell me about your first time. With Jack.”
“You want to know about the first time we had sex?”
Alex nods.
“That’s sick.”
“I’m a psychopath, remember? If you don’t want to talk about it, we can play
press the button
instead.”
She gives the AED a soft caress. Alan’s mouth becomes a tight, thin line.
“It was in a bar. In the men’s bathroom.”
“How many dates?”
“Second date.”
“Second date? Jack moves pretty fast. So what made her drag you into the bathroom? Were you kissing first? Having some chicken wings, feeling each other up under the table?”
“We were standing at the bar, drinking beer, and she dared me to go into the bathroom with her.”
Alex unbuttons her uniform shirt. The bra underneath is black, lacy, tight. True to male form, Alan stares at her tits.
“What did she do to you in the bathroom, Alan?”
“We kissed, then she put my hands up her shirt.”
“Like this?”
Alex brings her hand up her stomach, fingers going up under the underwire of the bra. Alan still looks ner vous, but the initial repulsion on his face is replaced by fascination, perhaps even interest. Her other hand unbuttons her pants and unzips the fly, letting the pants fall around her ankles.
“Keep going, Alan. What happened next?”
“We got into a stall. She…she put her hand on me.”
Alex steps out of the slacks and sits on the bed next to him. She traces a lazy finger down Alan’s chest, slipping it under the waistband of his underwear. It’s too early for the tadalafil to be working, but it doesn’t look like Alan needed it after all.
“Jack sounds aggressive. You like aggressive women, don’t you Alan?”
“What are you doing?”
Alex pumps her hand up and down.
“What happened next, Alan?”
“We had…we had sex.”
Alan closes his eyes, and Alex feels his hips rise. She leans toward his ear and whispers, “Would you like to have sex with me, Alan?”
He shakes his head.
“You can keep your eyes closed, pretend I’m Jack.”
Alan softly answers, “No. You’re a killer.”
She grips him hard, digging her nails in. Alan yelps, his face contorting with pain and fear.
“Good,” Alex breathes. “Sex is so much more fun when it isn’t consensual.”
She slaps him across the face, then grabs the duct tape to make a gag.
Things are about to get loud.
H
OW LONG DOES IT TAKE
to get donuts?
My watch read a quarter to twelve. Phin had been gone for over an hour. I’m naturally paranoid, something my chosen profession compounds, so I was conjuring up scenarios to explain why he was so late, like being grabbed by Alex, or hit by a bus, or caught by the Feds, or killed by Milwaukee cops, or the most frightening of all: ditching me because he thought the sex was a mistake.
I tried the walkie-talkie, but he either wasn’t answering or he had it turned off. I counted and recounted the cash left in my purse, and calculated he either took twenty dollars or a thousand and twenty dollars—I couldn’t remember how much I’d taken from the bank, and couldn’t find the withdrawal slip.
While waiting I spent a good half an hour wondering about Alex, and how we were going to find her. I wound up coming to the obvious conclusion: We couldn’t. Not unless she let us, or she made a mistake, and she hadn’t done either yet.
So I spent the next half an hour wondering if I should put on makeup or not. Just because I’d gone to bed with Phin didn’t mean our relationship had really changed, and the last few times I’d seen him I hadn’t worried if I was wearing makeup. Putting on makeup now would mean I cared about how I looked, which meant his opinion of me mattered, which meant our relationship actually had changed. I didn’t know if I wanted to acknowledge that, or if he wanted to acknowledge that, or how he would act if I acknowledged it and he didn’t, and vice versa.
Basically, I just shouldn’t have sex. But it was too late for that, so I was stuck dwelling on it.
“If he wasn’t here, would I wear makeup?” I asked myself honestly.
Maybe. Maybe today would be a makeup day.
Which was a dishonest answer.
So I didn’t put on makeup, and stopped obsessing over it, and went back to obsessing over where the hell he was.
My ringing cell phone dragged me back into reality.
“Hello? Jacqueline?”
My mother. Mom had met Phin, and I think she liked him. But that didn’t mean I needed to blab to her that I slept with him.
“I slept with Phin,” I told her.
“I’m so happy for you,” she said in a way that sounded like she was so happy for me, “but I’ve got a real big problem right now.”
I remembered Mom’s Alaskan cruise.
“Flight delayed? Or is it TSA? Mom, you didn’t try to bring your brass knuckles on the flight, did you? I told you not to buy those.”
“I didn’t bring the brass knuckles. I’m already on the ship. And I just saw
him
.”
“Saw who?”
“Your father.”
I remembered Dad’s Alaskan cruise, and the astronomically high improbability that they’d both be on the same boat.
Fate’s a funny bitch.
“Are you sure it’s him?” I asked, knowing it was. “It’s been forty years.”
“I’ll remember that deceitful face until a thousand years after I die. He’s still got that smarmy, cocksure look, and that dishonest little smile. But he’s lost the little Hitler mustache. I distinctly remember the little Hitler mustache.”
“He never had a Hitler mustache. You’re projecting.”
“You were too young to remember it, and how he used to goose-step around the house, planning to invade France.”
I sighed. “Look, Mom, you’re both adults. This will give you a chance to work things out.”
“Work things out? Never! He left us, for no good reason.”
“He had a good reason,” I said, “but you made me promise never to mention him again.”
“And I insist you keep that promise. I don’t want to hear about the lies he told you. The fact that you even want to have a relationship with that horrible man makes me think I should have named you Ilsa.”
“He’s actually a nice guy, Mom. You’d like him.”
“I’m going to kill him.”
“Mom!”
“I’ll wait until he’s near one of the railings and I’ll push him overboard. Hopefully the sharks will get him before he drowns.”
“Mom,” I couldn’t believe I had to say it, “please don’t kill Dad.”
“Maybe I won’t have to. There was a welcome brunch, and the food was horrible. Maybe salmonella or E. coli will do the job for me.”
I looked at the front door. It didn’t open, and Phin didn’t walk in. I checked my watch again.
“You need to have a few drinks, relax, and stop plotting murders.”
“It’s too early to drink.”
“It’s never too early to drink. Have a whiskey sour. Or a bloody Mary.”
“Don’t want one.”
“Then a rusty nail. You used to drink those.”
“That’s too strong. I’ll be passed out by dinner.”
“Get a foo-foo drink then. Try a fuzzy navel.”
“What’s in it?”
“Orange juice and peach schnapps.”
“That’s too foo-foo. I’d have to drink ten of them to feel anything. Maybe I’ll have a dirty martini.”
“Good,” I said. “I was running out of drink names.”
“I’m telling you, Jacqueline, I don’t think I can handle ten days of being trapped on a boat with that man.”
“I’m sure it’s a big boat. You probably won’t even see him again.”
“If I do, I’m going to grab a lifeboat oar and knock his teeth down his throat, I swear to God.”
My call waiting beeped.
“I got someone on the other line, Mom. Have a nice cruise. Call me if you get arrested.”
I switched over just as Mom was yelling at some ship employee for vodka.
“Jacqueline? It’s Wilbur. I’m on the ship and I think I saw your mother.”
I sighed again. “You did. It’s her. Imagine the odds.”
“The expression on her face…well, let’s say she didn’t seem pleased.”
“You’re both adults,” I said. “This will give you a chance to work things out.”
“I don’t know if that’s possible. I mean, I’m willing to try, but Mary looked like she was going to come after me with a wooden stake and a mallet.”
Or a lifeboat oar,
I thought. I glanced at the door again. Still no Phin.
“You don’t think she’d actually try to hurt me, do you?”
“Stay away from railings,” I suggested.
“This is horrible. I’ll have to spend the whole cruise in my cabin, with a chair wedged against the door. There was a thousand-dollar cash prize for bingo to night too. I hate to miss that.”
“I’m sure it’s a big ship,” I said, wishing I’d taped my earlier conversation so I didn’t have to have it twice. “Maybe you won’t even see her again.”
“Does your mother like bingo?”
What was it with older people and bingo? Maybe it was something in the genes, and once you turned sixty some kind of internal switch was flipped.
“I have no idea.”
“Maybe I’ll go. I could wear a disguise.”
“As long as it’s not a tiny mustache.”
“Think she’d accept a peace offering? Flowers, maybe? There’s a florist on board. She used to love roses.”
I pictured Dad dead in his bingo chair, two dozen roses crammed down his throat.
“Hiding is probably smarter.”
“I need a drink,” Wilbur said.
“I gotta go, Dad.” I didn’t want to play bartender again. “Call me if she kills you.”
I considered calling Mom back, warning her not to play bingo, but stopped myself. I shouldn’t be using my cell—the Feds could trace it. Besides, they’d thank me for it later, after they worked things out. What child didn’t want to see their parents back together again? Of course, they wouldn’t actually be together. But maybe they could resolve their differencs and pick up guys together.
Or maybe Mom would be serving twenty to life.
I decided to call her back, but the motel door opened mid-dial.
“Sorry I took so long. Had to run an errand first.”
Phin had a bag of donuts and a cardboard container holding two coffees. I had an urge to press the issue, and another urge to do him right there in the doorway. I fought both urges and kept cool, waiting to see how he played it.
“I didn’t know if you took cream or sugar.” He shrugged. “I guess there’s a lot I don’t know about you.”
He handed me a cup. I took it. There was some awkward staring. What was he thinking? Was he thinking what I was thinking? What was I thinking?
I was thinking I should have put on makeup.
“Black,” I said, breaking the silence. “I take it black.”
“Me too. Why dilute the caffeine with all of that other crap?”
I took a sip. Lukewarm. He’d bought this a while ago. Where had he been all this time?
“Didn’t know what donuts you liked either. Got assorted.”
He sat down on the bed, dug into the bag, his foot tapping. Was he avoiding talking about us, or didn’t feel the need to?
Well, dammit, I felt the need to. We couldn’t work together until we figured out where we stood with each other. One of us needed to act like a grown-up.
I sat next to him, hip to hip. He didn’t look at me. Not a good sign. I reached up a hand to touch his face, and he flinched. An even worse sign.
“You’ve got some powdered sugar on your lip,” I said, rubbing it off with my thumb, automatically putting the thumb in my mouth to taste the sweetness.
It was bitter, and made my tongue tingle.
That wasn’t powdered sugar.
I recalled our earlier conversation, in the bar, when Phin told me he needed to stop back at his apartment to pick up some things.
Drugs? Had he wanted to pick up some coke?
And if that was cocaine on his lip, had he bought it with my money?
Phin seemed oblivious to my reaction, tugging out a cruller, eating a third of it with one bite. His foot kept tapping, and there were sweat beads on his forehead.
Years ago, I worked Vice. I knew narcotics. Phin was high.
I didn’t want to get involved with a drug addict. I didn’t want to get involved with a bank robber either. But I was more than involved—besides sleeping with him, I’d enlisted him to help me find Alex. To back me up. I was entrusting him with my life.
And he was offering to help me. Willing to risk his own life, and asking for nothing in return.
Except, possibly, free sex and money for coke.
I wondered why I couldn’t fall for a normal guy, then remembered I had, and just went to his funeral yesterday.
Jesus, what a mess.
“You like chocolate?” Phin asked.
I managed a nod. He handed me a chocolate frosted. I took a token bite, but my appetite was gone. The right thing to do was tell him I appreciated everything, but I didn’t need him anymore. I wasn’t even sure if that was the truth.
“Phin—”
The phone cut me off. Alex’s phone. But it wasn’t her—no 555 number. It was Harry again.
“Hiya, sis. I’m in Gurnee. When can you meet me?”
I stared at Phin. Was this the time and the place to make a big scene? Phin had the car. Would he drop me off in Gurnee after I told him to take a hike? Should I ask Harry to pick me up here? Could Harry and I handle Alex on our own? And was I willing to lose one of my closest friends just because he had some issues? A close friend who was great in the sack?
“An hour,” I told Harry.
“Call me when you’re close.”
I hung up. Phin was working on his second donut.
“We’re meeting Harry in Gurnee,” I said.
He nodded, stood up, grabbed the backpack, and stopped at the door. The moment stretched.
“You okay?”
A ridiculous thing to ask, considering everything.
“Look, Jack, you’ve probably figured out I’m not good with this intimacy thing. I’m out of practice. Hell, when I was in practice, I wasn’t very good at it.”
He paused. I waited.
“I want to tell you…I don’t think this morning was a mistake. And I’d like to know if you feel the same way.”
He’s giving you an out, Jack. Tell him it was a mistake.
“It wasn’t a mistake,” I heard myself say.
“I’m glad to hear that. And there’s something on my mind. If it’s okay we’re talking.”
“It’s fine,” I said to his back. “Say what you need to say.”
“When I took the money from your purse…”
Here we go. He was going to open up about the drugs. About stealing from me. How should I react? Ask him to rob another bank to pay me back? Offer to pay him to help me with Alex? Lecture him about the dangers of drug abuse?
“I know it’s none of my business,” he said, “but I saw it.”
“Saw what?”
“The pregnancy test.” He turned around, his face serious. “You want to tell me what’s up?”