Room 911 would suffice for now. It was just as Gray had left it, with the curtains open and the neon lights coloring the dark desert sky. She changed into jeans, a thick hoodie, and a black baseball cap. A pair of platform Chuck Taylors made her an inch taller, and the Elvis Costello glasses hid most of her face. She slipped the Miyabi Evolution slicer into the Louis Vuitton backpack but left her phone on the nightstand—didn’t want it pinging off cell phone towers and placing her anywhere except here.
Before opening the door, she peeped out of the peephole.
No one there.
She slipped the backpack straps over her shoulders, then slipped out of the room. She crept to the elevator, strolled through the sweet-smelling, still-crowded lobby, and hailed a cab at the valet in front of the hotel.
“Where to, young lady?” The driver was a dark-skinned man with a broad, flat nose hooked over his mustache. His car smelled of Brut and curry.
“Five ninety-five Trail Spring Court, over in Summerlin.”
The cab rolled west, leaving behind the crowds and the lights of the Strip.
Gray thought about Sean’s text messages and the pictures he’d sent. With cautious fingers, she pressed on the cheekbone he’d nearly shattered, the cheekbone that still ached anytime the Santa Anas picked up or an El Niño system lingered over California.
Back then, Sean had presented her with the deed to the house on Trail Spring Court. The Spanish-Californian had a ceramic-tile roof, hardwood floors, a formal dining room, a big backyard, and a whirlpool tub in the master bathroom. He hadn’t bought it, not yet. “I just got the money together to put a huge down payment on it. I just mocked up this deed in Word.”
Natalie’s heart had broken. He’d taken her Jeep and sold it without her permission, and now this? She would have liked to have seen the house first. Because what if she hated it? What if it wasn’t her? She’d wanted to tear up that fake deed.
“I can’t believe you’re crying right now,” Sean had said.
She’d stammered, “It’s just … It’s just…”
“And what the hell do you know about houses?” he had snarled. “You grew up in the fucking ghetto.”
Back then, her friend Zoe had asked, “Is your name even on the real deed? On the title?”
“On the what?” Wide-eyed and beautiful, Natalie had gaped at her friend as though five hundred thousand dollars spent on a house in the desert was merely twenty cents, as though a “title” was a rare Yangtze River dolphin that she needn’t care about since it was so rare.
And now she was returning to that house in the desert.
Was she really gonna do this?
Was she really gonna kill him?
The driver stopped at the security gate of the Paseos. “You have an entry code?”
Gray closed her eyes. Shit. She hadn’t thought … “Six one four seven.”
The gate creaked open and the taxi rolled past.
Relieved, Gray asked the driver to stop at the beginning of the cul-de-sac where she’d lived. From there, she saw the two-story house that, according to land records, Sean still owned. No one loitered on the sidewalks, not at this time of night, not in the Paseos. Many things had changed in Vegas, but some things—like fancy Summerlin neighborhoods—had not.
The driver looked at her reflection in his rearview mirror. “Want me to wait?”
She peeled off twenties to pay her fare and his tip. “You wouldn’t mind?”
“Got nothing else to do ’cept wait.”
“I’ll meet you at the Chevron back on Desert Foothills.”
“That’s almost a thirty-minute walk.”
“Got nothing else to do ’cept walk,” she said.
He gave her his business card. “I’ll be there.”
“Yep, but if I’m not there,” she said, pulling out her set of keys, “or if I haven’t called you by four o’clock, just go.” She hoped the gas station had a public telephone.
“Got it.” He added, “You be careful, young lady.”
She passed dark house after dark house until she reached 595.
The property still looked good, thanks to homeowners association demands. Its desert landscaping hadn’t changed. Neither had the pink sandstone pavers in the drive and walkways. Her eyes skirted the house’s eaves in search of a security or doorbell camera. Nothing. No lights were on.
She gripped the key ring she’d kept in that safe deposit box. House keys, Jaguar key, Range Rover key, mailbox key … Calm, even though her heart roared, Gray tugged on the black gloves, then rolled up the sidewalk as though she belonged there. She stepped onto the porch.
Please let this work.
Holding her breath, she slipped the key into the lock.
49
Click.
The key worked.
Surprised, Gray gasped, and electricity zinged through her blood as she pushed … open … the door … and stepped across the threshold.
The foyer was cold and dark. A vampire’s lair.
She pulled the knife from her bag, then crept into the living room.
An overstuffed couch and armchair upholstered in a busy paisley pattern, and a just-as-busy floor rug with matching curtains.
No more khakis. No more yellows.
To the fireplace …
Framed pictures sat on the mantel: Sean and a pretty Latina who wore lots of eye makeup. A pretty, preteen girl wearing a white soccer uniform. A handsome teenage boy holding a football. Though the kids were too old to be his biologically, Sean was still someone’s stepfather. And they were living in Natalie’s house.
Sean and Natalie Dixon had never divorced. Not that he needed her to sign divorce papers; published notices in a large-circulation newspaper were enough.
Gray glared at those children.
Fucker. He had ended that dream for her.
Was she really gonna do this?
Hell yes.
She floated to the kitchen, and with a disconnected hand she opened the refrigerator.
A gallon of milk. A carton of eggs. A plate wrapped in foil. Wine bottles. Lunchables. Bottles of Pabst Blue Ribbon. Sean loved that beer. That’s why she took the last bottles from the shelf. Opened each. Poured the beer into the sink. Left the empties on the counter.
Fucker.
Did specks of her blood still live beneath the granite island? She’d bled down there, and she’d bled over by the pantry door, too. Once on Fourth of July. Once on the day before taxes were due. And once, that last time, in August …
Gray crept up the stairs. The door to the first bedroom was open. She peeked in.
Posters of LeBron James and Russell Wilson. Certificates. Ribbons. Trophies.
The second bedroom was painted pastel purple. Rihanna posters. Certificates. Trophies. An American Girl doll on a rocking chair.
The master suite sat at the end of the hallway. Its double doors were open.
God’s hand kept Gray upright as she tiptoed toward her old bedroom. She stood at the threshold until her heartbeat slowed from a gallop to a trot. And then she looked.
Fussy paisley-patterned bed linens. Fussy lamps. A chaise. A flat-screen television. A big bed. A pile of laundry sat in the path to the master bathroom. Wasn’t Gray’s bed anymore, not with all those pillows. Not her bathroom, not with those flouncy towels. Sean’s clothes, including the cashmere sweater she’d bought him for Christmas, still hung on his side of the closet, but the clothes on the other side, those heels and belts … not hers. The carpet had changed, too. Blue now instead of white. Gray had bled all over that white carpet. Blood was a bitch to get out of white carpet.
She needed a drink.
Gray returned to the living room and sat on the couch. If the pretty Latina came home first, Gray would tell the woman about the stepfather of her children. If Sean came home first, well … that’s what the Miyabi Evolution was for. Smooth, even cuts every single time.
Four o’clock came and went, and soon golden light crinkled through the b
linds. No one had stepped across the threshold. The car garage door hadn’t rumbled.
Gray hadn’t moved from her spot on that couch. Gray had thought of nothing and everything and had ignored that voice whispering, telling her to leave. She’d ignored the prickle of her numbing legs and feet, the thud of a full bladder, and the creak of her empty stomach.
The house moaned as the sun’s heat warmed wooden beams and ceramic tiles.
At eight o’clock, she finally moved to peek out the living room window.
Across the street, a white woman wearing boxer braids and carrying a Bichon Frise plucked a newspaper from the sidewalk.
“Excuse me,” Gray called out as she crossed the street. “Good morning.”
The woman smiled at her.
Gray asked about the family who lived at 595.
“They’re at Lake Mead,” the woman said. “I think they’re coming back next week.”
Gray let the dog lick her hand as she asked, so matter-of-factly, “Do you know if Sean went with them?”
“Who?” the woman asked.
“Sean Dixon. He owns the house.”
The woman’s thick eyebrows scrunched. “I’m not so good with names.”
“He’s tall, a little darker than me. Cute. You’d remember him if you saw him.”
The woman shook her head. “I just moved in three weeks ago, and I’ve only met Precious and her kids, Cayden and Cierra, so … Sorry.”
The old white guy who lived on the right side of 595—where Phil and Lorraine and their platters of leftover sandwiches had lived until Lorraine’s mother in Rhode Island needed live-in help—knew the family, including Sean. “He travels a lot.”
No one was coming home today.
Gray whispered, “Shit, shit, shit,” as adrenaline drained from her body. Over the two-mile walk to the gas station, she cursed herself. And those three names stayed on her tongue.
Cayden, Cierra, and Precious … Cayden, Cierra, and Precious.
There was a public phone at the Chevron, but she didn’t call the driver of the curry-smelling cab. In under five minutes, another taxi had picked her up, and the cabbie drove her to SD Promotions. Located in a business park just a stone’s throw from McCarran Airport, SD Promotions leased space in a mirrored building. Sean’s office manager had crammed Staples furniture into cubicles and offices the size of cereal boxes. Small pods of smokers hung out at the public ashtrays near the turfed pocket park. Administrative assistants in short skirts and cheap heels drank SlimFast shakes at the benches close to the parking lot.
Gray didn’t know why she’d come here. Was she going to kill Sean at the office? Watch him bleed out on that glass and metal desk he’d spent nearly ten thousand dollars on? The desk where they’d conceived … Faye. That would have been her name, if she’d been a girl.
The white stenciled letters on the closest parking space read “Sean Dixon.”
“Sean Dixon?” the pretty blonde at the reception desk asked.
Gray didn’t know this woman, but then, he’d only let her visit the office a handful of times. “The owner,” Gray said now. “Is he here?”
“Let me check.” She stood, tugged at her short skirt, and strode toward the offices.
“You can call him from this fancy phone right here, you know,” Gray said.
“One minute.” The blonde waggled her fingers and disappeared into the cubicle maze.
Gray’s eyes flicked from the blown-up photos of staged parties and weddings to the burbling pyramid-shaped water fountain on a coffee table.
The blonde returned to the reception desk, wearing that same synthetic smile. “Mr. Dixon isn’t in today.”
Gray said, “Okay,” but she didn’t move to leave.
“Would you like to leave a message?”
“No.” She still couldn’t move.
The blonde was staring at her. “Anything else, ma’am?”
“Do you know where he is?”
“Uh-huh. He went to visit his wife in L.A.”
FIVE YEARS AGO
NEVER YELL “HELP”
Dry-mouthed and barely breathing, Mrs. Dixon dared herself to peek at her panties—no blood. She popped two Vicodin left over from crashing through the glass patio door and receiving stitches for that seven-inch gash. She stood at the mirror—bloody lip and nose—and told her reflection, “I can’t take this anymore.”
Down in the kitchen, Mrs. Dixon said this again—“I can’t. I won’t”—then took three long pulls from the vodka bottle in the freezer. It had been six weeks since her last drink.
She kneeled on the kitchen floor to clean up the food. If he touches me one more time …
The garage door rumbled.
Mrs. Dixon kept scraping Chow’s Chinese into one neat heap.
And just as she’d scraped the last peanut into that neat pile, Sean touched her again.
“Touch” was such a pleasant, intimate word. So, no, he didn’t “touch.” He “slammed” and “punched” and “grabbed.” Rice, chicken, and peanuts stuck to her face, her hands, and the undersides of her feet. She pleaded with Sean to stop, to leave, to forgive her for cutting her hair and burning the rice, but he wouldn’t stop, so she cried to God, and when He didn’t respond, she called for Lorraine and Phil, Chris and Maud, and screamed “Fire!” and “Help!” as his punches and kicks rocked her body.
He wouldn’t stop.
She blindly grabbed at the space around her until her hand found …
Maybe God was listening.
She’d just used that knife to cut lime wedges for her glass of Pellegrino, and now here it was, knocked to the tile along with Chow’s Chinese. She wrapped her fingers around the hilt and energy shot from it like Thor’s hammer. That electricity coursed through her, and with one push of her knee against Sean’s chest, she gained enough space to hold it out before her.
In his rage, Sean didn’t see the knife, and he lunged at her.
The blade tore past his T-shirt, broke through his skin, and sank deep into his abdomen.
He shrieked as he clutched his belly. Fear shone in his eyes, black and shiny as beetles.
She kicked him, scrambled to stand, slipping, sliding in rice, blood, tears, and spit.
On the tile, he moaned and writhed in pain.
She stepped over him.
Even then, he couldn’t help himself, and he grabbed her ankle.
She shouted, “No!” and stomped his hand.
He shouted, “Ahh!” and released her.
She ignored his grasping and his hoarse curses, and she prayed that more of his blood gushed out of him and that God would bleed him like the pig he was.
She grabbed her keys from the dining room table and ran to the garage. The door was barely up enough before she threw the Jaguar into reverse and roared out of the driveway. Racing east, toward the Strip, her eyes darted from the road ahead of her to the rearview mirror and the road behind her. It wouldn’t be long before he climbed into his SUV and hunted her down.
A half hour later, Mrs. Dixon found herself in the parking lot of the Gold Mine Motor Inn off Paradise Road. The two-story 1960s motel dipped on the edges and was fading before her eyes. It was that run-down and that sandblasted—so tragic, so awfully … bad that it was almost funny. She sat in the parking lot, shaking now as the adrenaline wore off. She had no money, no identification, no phone. She couldn’t go back to Trail Spring Court. If Sean had nearly killed her before she’d stabbed him, he’d certainly kill her now. No, she couldn’t go back. But she had no gas in the car and no way to buy any.
Trapped.
Call Dom.
Dominick Rader knew that Sean had been beating her. She could tell that he knew, when they’d bumped into each other at Target just a few weeks before. He’d left his card beneath that box of tampons and had told her to call anytime.
That card … Since then, she’d taken it out from the false bottom of her bathroom waste can countless times. The number was different from the number
Victor had made her memorize back in college. Looking at this new card, Mrs. Dixon had studied Dominick’s new phone number, but she hadn’t memorized it backwards like her dad had demanded. And now she glimpsed part of it in her mind’s eye.
213 …
But the shakes and fear kept her from focusing. Her mind was slippery, and her memory bumped and skidded around “213.”
Nighttime here was the color of kitschy neon and steel. Cars entered and exited the parking lot in a cloud of rusty squeaks and scrapes. Sunburned tourists slurred their sentences as they dragged luggage across the asphalt.
She closed her eyes. Breathe, Natalie, breathe. And that’s when she saw those seven numbers after 213. She scrounged around her car—seats, carpets, ashtray—and found $1.56 in coins. She hurried to the public phone booth near the lobby entrance. Threw cautious glances at those sunburned tourists, at those parked cars.
Focus.
She grabbed the receiver and deposited a quarter. Punched in the number. Deposited another dime.
Two rings, and a man on the other end said, “Nick Rader.”
A sob burst from her gut and she cried for nearly a minute. Once she managed to breathe, she pushed out, “Help me.”
“Where are you?”
She told him.
“Get a room, okay?”
She had no money.
“Go in and I’ll take care of that.”
She told him that Sean had eyes everywhere, that her Jaguar probably had some location device on it, and that he might find out that she was there.
“Don’t worry about that. Tell the desk clerk that your name is Alicia Smith. Lock the door. Don’t let anyone in except me. If you need a weapon, use the curtain rod or the toilet plunger. Plug in the iron, let it get hot, then use that if you have to. See you soon.”
The desk clerk, a bored-looking white woman with frizzy black hair, didn’t blink at the fake name, or at the cuts and bruises on Alicia Smith’s face, or at the bloodstains as big as sin on Alicia Smith’s T-shirt and jeans. She simply handed Alicia Smith a key to room 303 before returning her attention to the iPad on the desk.
Sean would have freaked out if he knew that his wife would be sleeping on a bed in a rat hole like this. But fancy hotels like the Sheraton—hell, like the Travelodge—would force her to be someone. Not-so-fancy places like the Gold Mine Motor Inn only cared if the customer could pay cash. And that was okay for its primary clientele: prostitutes, johns, and estranged husbands. This Shangri-la welcomed the anonymous with its twenty-nine-dollar-a-day rooms and RCA color televisions.
And Now She's Gone Page 27
