Authors: Anthony Bidulka
gave me a sly sidelong look and easily slipped his
left hand into my right and continued to focus on
the music. The simple gesture was astoundingly
seductive. I reacted inside as if I’d just been pre-
sented Jeff Stryker on a platter. No, strike that, I
wouldn’t know what to do with a porn star. I made
a show of being at ease and pretending to listen to
the piano player but really I was studying the
compelling features of James’ profile and quelling
the butterflies in my stomach.
Finally when the set was done James turned to
me with a warm smile and said, “You met my
parents.”
“What?” I sputtered.
“You’re the guy who showed up at their place
last week saying you were an old friend of mine.
My mother gave you my phone number. That’s
how you found me.”
There was no use in lying to him. Obviously
one of his parents, probably his mother, had told
him about my visit and he’d put two and two
together since we’d met that afternoon. I nodded.
“Do you know how I knew it was you?”
I shrugged. I could feel his index finger slowly
running up and down the top of my hand. It made
me shiver and my mouth went dry.
Anthony Bidulka — 293
“Because she told me the man who visited was
very handsome.” And then, without further pre-
amble, he leaned over and gave me a light kiss on
the cheek. Before he pulled back I heard a pull of
air as he stole a gentle whiff of my skin. “It had to
be you,” he murmured. He sat back and let his
eyes caress me. This man was inexplicably beguil-
ing, far beyond his years. “I’d like to kiss you,
Russell,” he said.
I swallowed hard. “I think you just did,” I said.
His head shook so slightly it would have been
easy to miss. “Not like that. I’d like to kiss you on
the lips. In private.”
I was flattered. I was horny. I was weak in the
knees. But I was also thirty-two years old and
knew how I’d feel in the morning if I let my hor-
mones overrule my professional goal in this situa-
tion. So I overcompensated. “My offer still
stands,” I said.
If only I hadn’t said that right then. Or in that
way.
“Offer?”
“Money, James. My client is willing to offer a
great deal of money to put this business behind
him.”
I could see the hurt building in his eyes as cer-
tainly as snow gathers on a doorstep during a bliz-
zard. And no amount of shovelling was going to
stop it now. He didn’t say anything. He first
looked away, then back at me, then away. He
withdrew his hand from mine, slid off his stool
and left The Townhouse bar.
Nice one, Quant.
294 — F l i g h t o f A q u av i t
The several blocks back to the hotel were as cold
and miserable as any December night in
Saskatchewan, heavy on the miserable. But truth
be told, it wasn’t so much the temperature or bit-
ing wind as it was how much I felt like the biggest
louse in the world. My Friday night in the big city
had not ended up the way I’d planned. It had
come close, but as if on purpose, I screwed it up.
But did I have a choice? If James had been anyone
other than a suspect in a case I was working on,
perhaps I’d have been in a much warmer place.
Instead, since James Kraft had a crush on me, I
turned around and crushed him. What a guy. But
what if James
was
Loverboy? He was an actor after
all. How hard would it be for him to put on an act
in order to distract me from my real purpose?
Someone who was capable of blackmail was cer-
tainly capable of trouncing on my feelings to pro-
tect themselves. The problem was, I didn’t know
which was the accurate scenario. In my heart I felt
James Kraft was innocent, but was my heart the
best judge when it came to an attractive man?
Especially an attractive man who found me attrac-
tive too. Had I failed? Had I come all this way and
failed in what I’d set out to do? Was my inexperi-
ence as a private detective beginning to show?
Sure, I had found out the identity of Jo and
tracked him to New York, but then, my options
were limited. What would have been the best way
to find out if he was the blackmailer? I’d tried to
bluff the information out of him. The trouble with
a bluff is that you can never be one-hundred-per-
cent certain whether or not the bluff worked if the
Anthony Bidulka — 295
bluffee is actually innocent. Perhaps I should have
found a way to be invited to James’ apartment—
to find some incriminating evidence. Whatever
that would be.
I let the elevator man take me to my floor with-
out exchanging more than a few words. I was not
in a chatty mood. By the time I reached my door I
was seriously considering calling James. I didn’t
care that it was after midnight. There was some-
thing about him…the way he ran his finger over
the back of my hand. I shivered again at the
thought. What was happening to me? I would call
him. I just had to. It would make me feel immea-
surably better. But as soon as I entered my room
and closed the door behind me, I felt much worse.
The attack was quick and brutal and wholly
unexpected.
I was thumped to the ground with surprising
speed and force. The right side of my face scraped
against carpet and I felt an agonizing burn. Before
I had a chance to react, my assailant grabbed my
wrist and wrenched my right arm behind my back
and pushed it up with one knee while the other
knee pressed into my lower back.
Pain receptors began to fire all over my body.
I wondered if I would survive.
Chapter 16
ONCE THE INITIAL SHOCK WORE OFF, I realized that
whoever was on my back wasn’t very heavy.
Probably a woman or small man. I also realized
that when I stopped struggling, he or she stopped
pushing and pulling my body parts in every con-
ceivable way that could possibly cause me pain.
So I did.
“Who are you?” I asked. The right side of my
head was squished against the carpet so the words
came out like I was speaking through guppy lips.
“Never mind.” A woman.
We remained in that awkward position, my
right arm pinned between my back and her torso,
for another few seconds. I knew that with not
much effort I could probably just stand up—but I
didn’t know whether she had a weapon (other
than her pseudo-brute force). I didn’t think so, or
else why would she have jumped me?
I had to give her credit though. If this was who
I thought it was—Parka Woman—then she had a
lot of balls to think her five-foot-nothing frame
could keep me nailed to the floor. Even though
she’d only said two words thus far, I could tell
from the tone of her voice that she was flustered. I
had probably surprised her as much as she had
surprised me. I would bet her intent had been to
get a look around my room—not to confront and
attack me. She hadn’t expected me back so soon,
but when she heard me coming she’d had little
Anthony Bidulka — 297
choice. It was take or be taken. Unfortunately for
her I probably had sixty pounds and over a foot
on her. She didn’t stand a chance in a hand-to-
hand battle. I could just sit on her (not unlike what
she was doing to me now). I imagined she knew it
too. I almost smiled as I thought about her sitting
up there slowly coming to the grim realization
that she was a dachshund trying to take down a
St. Bernard. That’s why she didn’t want to talk.
She was dancing as fast as she could, trying to
decide how to get out of this without damage to
her physical being or pride. As for me, I saw the
situation as a temporary advantage. As long as
she wasn’t yanking on my arm too much I wasn’t
in any particular discomfort other than a smarting
cheek. And from this position I’d get more infor-
mation out of her than if I was chasing her down
a hotel stairway. So I tried again.
“Who are you?”
“Would you shut up already?” Her voice was
feminine but more deep and strong than soft and
high. “What are you doing here, Mr. Quant?” I
could hear some hesitation as if she were wonder-
ing why I wasn’t fighting back or if maybe I was
too stupid to think I could.
“So you know my name,” I pointed out the
obvious. “Why are you following me?”
“What are you talking about?”
Oh puh-lease. “I know you’ve been following
me. First here at the hotel, FAO Schwartz, then
Rockefeller Center. And certainly you haven’t for-
gotten our little foot race down Broadway
Avenue?”
298 — F l i g h t o f A q u av i t
“Yeah well, maybe you’re seeing things. I’ve
never been to Rocketfellow Center.”
My ears pricked up. Rocketfellow Center?
Rocket-fellow? Certainly no New Yorker would
call it Rocketfellow Center. Who
was
this woman?
Where was she from?
“I want to know what you’re doing in New
York City, bub. Are you here alone? Are you meet-
ing someone? And who’s the fancy broad?”
She’d obviously seen me with Sereena. I didn’t
think most women liked the term “broad”—but
obviously my attacker was not most women.
“What are you talking about?” I thought I’d use
her own line against her. See how she liked it.
“Shit!”
“What?”
“You made me tear my parka!”
“I…?” I couldn’t believe what I’d just heard. “I
made
you tear it? Like I asked you to lay in wait in
my hotel room and jump me from behind like a
wild hyena!”
I don’t know where the hyena thing came from
but it did the job.
“Hyena! Who the fuck are you calling a hyena?
Just because I don’t have a twenty-two inch waist?
You sexist pig-dog bastard!”
She tightened her grip on my arm and pushed
it a little further up my back. I grunted according-
ly like the pig-dog bastard I was.
“I want to know why you’re here in New York
City!”
“I’m doing my Christmas shopping.”
“Don’t be a smartass!” She said with growing
Anthony Bidulka — 299
frustration. How did she know? “We’re on to you,
bub, so just spill it.”
We? Hmm. I turned my face as much to the left
as I could and strained my eyes in that direction to
get a look at the woman on my back. She leaned
away so I couldn’t see her face. I’d had enough
with playing prisoner. I said frankly, “I think I’m
going to get up now.”
The chuckle surprised me. Her too, I think. But
she knew she couldn’t keep me down unless she
had a couple friends helping her. She released my
arm and crawled off my back. I half expected her to
run, but she didn’t. I rolled over onto my back and
she was holding out her hand. I grabbed onto it and
let her pull me up. As I’d guessed, it was Parka
Woman. Up close she was prettier than I remem-
bered, but she still had the look in her eye of a WWF
wrestler and an untrusting set to her jaw. Despite a
diminutive stature, this was someone who wasn’t
used to letting people get the best of her.
After helping me up she began fussing with
the tear on her parka sleeve and her hair which
had gotten dishevelled during our tussle.
I reached over to switch on the light so we
weren’t standing in dimness. “You know who I
am,” I said. “Now will you tell me who you are?”
She stopped playing with her sleeve and gave
me a baleful look. “I’m Jane Cross.”
“You’re not from here, are you?”
“Regina.”
“Saskatchewan?”
“Do you know of another one?” she asked, pre-
senting a snarly attitude that I thought was most-
300 — F l i g h t o f A q u av i t
ly a bluff.
“Well, actually I do. Are you telling me you fol-
lowed me all the way from Saskatchewan to New
York City?”
“I ain’t telling you nothing, bub. Not until you
tell me a thing or two.”
I wished she’d stop calling me bub. “Like
what?”
“Like why are you here? I’m not buying this
‘shop ‘til you drop’ bullshit. Although God knows
you’ve done enough of that!”
Aha! “How would you know that if you
weren’t following me?”
She tried an Elvis lip curl. “Is there any store in
this goddamned city you didn’t go into? You’re
such a woman.”
“Now who’s a sexist pig-dog bastard?” And