by Sandra Brown
This was the kind of trendy place that attracted singles or marrieds on the make. It was filled with worthless antiques and glossy, gargantuan greenery. The bar created a vortex during happy hour that sucked in yuppies from their BMWs and Porsches by the scores.
While she was analyzing him, he was analyzing her. The gleam in his eyes as they moved down her body indicated that he thought he’d scored big.
“Thanks for the drink,” she said.
“You’re welcome. You are old enough to drink, aren’t you?”
“Sure. I’m old enough to drink. Just not old enough to buy.” They laughed and toasted each other with the drinks that had just arrived.
“I’m John.”
“Fancy.”
“Fancy?”
“Francine, if you prefer.”
“Fancy.”
The mating ritual had begun. Fancy recognized it. She knew the rules. Hell, she’d invented most of them. In two hours—possibly less, if they got hot sooner—they’d be in bed somewhere.
Following her heartbreak over Eddy, she’d sworn off men. They were all bastards. They wanted only one thing from her, and it was the same thing they could buy from the cheapest whore.
Her mother had told her that one day she would meet a guy who truly cared for her and would treat her with kindness and respect. Fancy didn’t really believe it, though. Was she supposed to sit around, bored out of her skull, letting her twat atrophy while she waited for Prince Charming to show up and bring it back to life?
Hell, no. She’d been good for three days now. She needed some laughs. This Jim, or Joe, or John, or whatever the hell his name was, was as good as any to give her some.
Like a freaking Girl Scout, she had run Carole’s errand, but she wasn’t ready to return to the hotel suite and sit glued to the TV set as the rest would be, watching election returns. She would get there eventually. But first, she was going to have some fun.
* * *
Finding a parking place anywhere close to the hotel was impossible. Irish finally found one in a lot several blocks away. He was heavily perspiring by the time he entered the lobby. If he had to bribe his way into the Rutledges’ private suite he would do it. He had to see Avery. Together they might figure out what had become of Van.
Maybe all his worries were for nothing. Maybe they were together right now. God, he hoped so.
He waded through the members of an Asian tour group who were lined up to check in. Patience had never been one of Irish’s virtues. He felt his blood pressure rising as he elbowed his way through the tourists, all chattering and fanning themselves with pamphlets about the Alamo.
From amid the chaos, someone touched his elbow. “Hi.”
“Oh, hi,” Irish said, recognizing the face.
“You’re Irish McCabe, aren’t you? Avery’s friend?”
“That’s right.”
“She’s been looking for you. Follow me.”
They navigated the congested lobby. Irish was led through a set of doors toward a service elevator. They got inside; the gray doors slid closed.
“Thanks,” Irish said, wiping his sweaty forehead on his sleeve. “Did Avery…” In the middle of his question, it occurred to him that her correct name had been used. He glanced across the large cubicle. “You know?”
A smile. “Yes. I know.”
Irish saw the pistol, but he wasn’t given time to register the thought that it was actually being aimed straight at him. Less than a heartbeat later, he grabbed his chest and hit the floor of the elevator like a fallen tree.
The elevator stopped on the lowest level of the hotel. The lone passenger raised the pistol and aimed it toward the opening doors, but didn’t have to use it. No one was waiting.
Irish’s body was dragged down a short hallway, through a set of swinging double doors, and deposited in a narrow alcove that housed vending machines for hotel employee use. The space was lit from overhead by four fluorescent tubes, which were easily smashed with the silencer attached to the barrel of the pistol.
Covered with shards of opaque glass and stygian darkness, Irish McCabe’s body was left there on the floor. The assassin knew that by the time it was discovered, his death would be obscured by another.
* * *
Prime time had been given over solely to election returns. Each of the three television sets in the parlor was tuned to a different network. It had turned out to be a close presidential race—still too close to call. Several times, the network anchors cited the senatorial race in Texas between the newcomer, Tate Rutledge, and the incumbent, Rory Dekker, as one of the closest and most heated races in the nation.
When it was reported that Rutledge was showing a slight edge, a cheer went up in the parlor. Avery jumped at the sudden noise. She was frantic, walking a razor’s edge, on the brink of nervous collapse.
All the excitement had made Mandy hyperactive. She’d become such a nuisance that someone from the hotel’s list of baby-sitters had been hired to keep her entertained in another room so the family would be free to concentrate on the returns.
With her mind temporarily off Mandy, Avery could devote herself to worrying about Tate and wondering where Irish and Van were. Their disappearances didn’t make sense. She had called the newsroom three times. Neither had been there, nor had their whereabouts been known.
“Has anyone notified the police?” she had asked during her most recent call. “Something could have happened to them.”
“Listen, if you want to report them missing, fine, do it. But stop calling here bugging us. Now, I’ve got better things to do.”
The phone had been slammed down in her ear. She wanted to drive to the station as quickly as she could get there, but she didn’t want to leave Tate. As the hours of the evening stretched out, there were two certainties at play in her mind. One was that Tate was about to win the Senate seat. The other was that something dreadful had happened to her friends.
What if Gray Hair had been stalking her, not Tate, as Van had suggested? What if he’d noticed her interest in him? What if he’d intercepted Van this morning as he reported to work? What if he’d lured Irish away from the TV station?
It made her nauseated with fear to know that a killer was in the hotel, under the same roof as Tate and Mandy.
And where was Fancy? She had been gone for hours. Had something happened to her, too? If not, why hadn’t she at least phoned to explain her delay? Even with Election Day traffic, the round trip to the post office shouldn’t have taken much longer than an hour.
“Tate, one of the networks just called the thing in your favor!” Eddy announced as he came barreling through the door. “Ready to go downstairs?”
Avery whirled toward Tate, holding her breath in anticipation of his answer. “No,” he said. “Not until it’s beyond a shadow of a doubt. Not until Dekker calls and concedes.”
“At least go change your clothes.”
“What’s wrong with these clothes?”
“You’re going to fight me on that to the bitter end, aren’t you?”
“Till the bitter end,” Tate replied, laughing.
“If you win, I won’t even care.”
Nelson walked over to Tate and shook his hand. “You did it. You accomplished everything I expected of you.”
“Thanks, Dad,” Tate said a bit shakily. “But let’s not count our chickens yet.” Zee hugged him against her petite frame.
“Bravo, little brother,” Jack said, lightly slapping Tate on the cheek. “Think we ought to try for the White House next?”
“I couldn’t have done anything without you, Jack.”
Dorothy Rae pulled Tate down and kissed him. “It’s good of you to say that, Tate.”
“I give credit where credit’s due.” He stared at Avery over their heads. His expression silently declared just how wrong she had been. He was surrounded by people who loved him. She was the only deceiver.
The door opened again. She spun around, hoping to see Fancy. It was one of the volun
teers. “Everything’s all set in the ballroom. The crowd’s chanting for Tate and the band’s playing. God, it’s great!”
“I say it’s time to break out the champagne,” Nelson said.
When the first cork was popped, Avery nearly jumped out of her skin.
* * *
John’s arm grazed Fancy’s breast. She moved away. His thigh rubbed hers. She recrossed her legs. His predictable passes were getting tiresome. She wasn’t in the mood. The drinks no longer tasted good. This wasn’t as much fun as it used to be.
I thought we were friends.
Carole’s voice seemed to speak to her above Rod Stewart’s overamplified, hoarse sexiness and the din the happy hour imbibers were creating.
Carole had treated her decently in the last few months—in fact, since she’d come home from the hospital. Some of the things she’d said about self-respect were beginning to make sense. How could she have any self-respect if she let guys pick her up in joints like this—this was classy compared to some of the dives she’d been in—and do anything they wanted with her, then dispose of her as easily as they threw away a used rubber?
Carole didn’t seem to think she was a dimwit. She’d entrusted her to run an important errand. And what had she done in return? She’d let her down.
“Say, I gotta go,” she said suddenly. John had leaned over to lick her ear. She nearly knocked him off his stool when she reached for her purse and the padded envelope still lying on the bar. “Thanks for the drinks.”
“Hey, where’re you going? I thought, well, you know.”
“Yeah, I know,” Fancy said. “Sorry.”
He came off his stool, propped his hands on his hips, and angrily demanded, “Well, what the hell am I supposed to do now?”
“Jerk off, I guess.”
She drove toward the hotel with indiscriminate speed, keeping an eye out for radar traps and cruising police cars. She wasn’t drunk, but alcohol would show up on a breath analyzer. Downtown traffic made the irregular maze of streets even more of a nightmare, but she finally reached the hotel garage.
The lobby was packed. Campaign posters bearing Tate Rutledge’s picture bobbed above the press of people. It seemed that everyone in Bexar County who had voted for Tate Rutledge had come to celebrate his victory.
“Excuse me, excuse me.” Fancy wormed her way through the crowd. “Ouch, dammit, that’s my foot!” she shouted when someone backed over her. “Let me through.”
“Hey, blondie, you gotta wait on the elevators same as everybody else.” The complainer was a woman wearing a veritable armor of Rutledge campaign buttons on her chest.
“The hell I do,” Fancy called back. “Excuse me.”
After what seemed like half an hour of battling through the crowd as alive and working as a bucket of fishing bait, she stood up on tiptoe and was dismayed to find that she still wasn’t anywhere close to the bank of elevators.
“Enough of this shit,” she muttered. She caught the arm of the man nearest her. “If you can get me into an elevator, I’ll give you a blow job you’ll never forget.”
* * *
A sudden hush fell over the room when the parlor telephone rang. All eyes swung toward the instrument. The mood was collectively expectant.
“Okay,” Eddy said quietly, “that’s him.”
Tate picked up the phone. “Hello? Yes, sir, this is Tate Rutledge. It’s good of you to call, Senator Dekker.”
Eddy raised both fists above his head and shook them like a winning boxer after a knockout. Zee clasped her hands beneath her chin. Nelson nodded like a judge who had just been handed a fair decision from the jury. Jack and Dorothy Rae smiled at each other.
“Yes, sir. Thank you, sir. I feel the same way. Thank you. I appreciate your call.” Tate replaced the receiver. For several seconds he sat with his hands loosely clasped between his knees, then he raised his head and, with a boyish grin, said, “Guess that means I’m the new senator from Texas.”
The suite was instantly plunged into chaos. Some of the aides jumped into chairs and began whooping like attacking Indians. Eddy hauled Tate to his feet and pushed him toward the bedroom. “Now you can go change. Somebody go catch an elevator and hold it. I’ll call downstairs and tell them to give us five minutes.” He yanked up the telephone.
Avery stood wringing her hands. She wanted to cheer and shout with joy over Tate’s triumph. She wanted to throw her arms around him and give him a kiss befitting the victor. She wanted to share this jubilant moment with him. Instead, she shook like Jell-O, congealed with fear.
When she joined him in the bedroom, he was already stripped to his underwear and was stepping into a pair of dress slacks. “Tate, don’t go.”
His head snapped up. “What?”
“Don’t go down there.”
“I can’t—”
She grabbed his arm. “The man I told you about—the gray-haired man—he’s here. I saw him this morning. Tate, for God’s sake don’t go.”
“I have to.”
“Please.” Tears formed in her eyes. “Please, believe what I’m telling you.”
He was buttoning his pale blue shirt. His hands paused. “Why should I?”
“Because I love you. That’s why I wanted to assume the role of your wife. I fell in love with you while I was still in the hospital. Before I could move or speak, I loved you.
“Everything I’ve told you is the truth. A threat has been made on your life. And yes, a chance for a terrific story presented itself to me and I took it, but…” Here she clutched his shoulders between her hands and appealed to him. “But I did what I did because I wanted to protect you. I love you and have from the beginning.”
“Tate, they’re—” Eddy came barging in. “What the hell is going on in here? I thought you’d be dressed by now. They’re tearing the place apart downstairs, waiting for you to put in an appearance. Everybody’s gone nuts. Come on. Let’s go.”
Tate looked from his friend to Avery. “Even if I believed you,” he said with quiet helplessness, “I don’t have a choice.”
“Tate, please,” she begged, her voice tearing like paper.
“I don’t have a choice.”
He removed her hands and quickly finished dressing. Eddy coached him on whom to thank publicly. “Carole, you look like hell. Before you come downstairs, do something with your face,” he ordered as he pushed Tate through the door.
Disobediently, Avery dashed after them. There were even more people in the suite now. Campaign workers had thronged the corridor and were forcing their way through the double doors to catch a glimpse of their hero. The noise was deafening. Somehow, over it, Avery heard Carole’s name and turned in that direction.
Fancy squeezed through the squirming bodies. Inertia propelled her straight into Avery’s arms. “Fancy! Where have you been?”
“Don’t lecture me. I’ve been through bloody hell trying to get here. There’s a guy out in the hall who’s really pissed off because I welshed on a deal and another one named John who’s—”
“Was there anything in the box?”
“Here.” The younger woman thrust the package at Avery. “I hope to God it’s worth all the hell I’ve been through to get it here.”
“Carole! You, too, Fancy, let’s go!” Eddy shouted at them, waving them toward the door above the heads of the celebrants.
Avery ripped into the envelope and saw that it contained a videotape. “Stall them if you can.”
“Huh?” Stupefied, Fancy watched her slip into the bedroom and shut the door behind her. “Jesus, is it me, or has everybody else gone fuckin’ nuts?” A total stranger danced by and thrust a magnum of champagne into her hand. She took a long gulp.
Inside the bedroom, Avery inserted the tape into the VCR. She backed up toward the bed until the backs of her knees made contact, then sat down on the edge of it. Using the remote control, she fast-forwarded past the color bars to the clapboard. She recognized the station’s call letters. Washington state, wasn’
t it? The reporter’s name was unfamiliar to her, but the photographer was listed as Van Lovejoy.
Excitement churned inside her. Van had sent the tape to Irish’s box, so it must contain something vitally important. After watching for several minutes, however, she couldn’t imagine what that something might be. Was Van playing a joke?
The subject of the piece was a white supremacist and paramilitary group that had a permanent encampment located in an undisclosed spot, deep within the forested wilderness. On weekends, members would meet to plan their annihilation of everybody who wasn’t exactly like them. It was their goal to eventually take over America, making it the racially pure, undiluted nation it should be.
Van, who to Avery’s knowledge, had no political predilection, must have been alarmed by the ferocity of the hatred the organization espoused, for he had documented on tape the war games they played. He featured them swapping arms and ammunition, training newcomers in guerrilla tactics, and indoctrinating their children into believing that they were superior to everyone. They preached it all in the name of Christianity.
It was captivating video and the news hound inside her regretted having to fast-forward through it. She ran it at normal speed occasionally to make sure she wasn’t missing the pertinence of the tape, but she couldn’t find a single clue why Van had considered it crucial enough to mail.
His camera panned across a group of men dressed in military fatigues. They were armed to the teeth. Avery backed the tape up, then slowed it down so she could study each face. The commander was screaming swill into the receptive ears of his soldiers.
Van zoomed in for a close-up of one. Avery gasped with recognition. Her head began to swim.
He looked different. His scalp shone through the buzz haircut. Camouflage makeup had been smeared on his face, but it was instantly recognizable because she’d been living with him for months.
“That all men are created equal is a bunch of crap,” the instructor ranted into the hand-held microphone. “A rumor started by inferiors in the hope that somebody would believe it.”
