by Jonas Saul
Aaron wouldn’t go back to the police station on his own, would he? That would be suicide. If he had, he was on his own. Parkman couldn’t risk going back there. Sarah needed someone on the outside available for her.
Shoulders slumped, head down, he started back for his hotel. As he ascended the stairs to the lobby, his cell phone rang. He stayed outside for better reception. Caller ID came up, private.
“Parkman here.”
“Toronto Police calling you back.” A man this time. “I understand you have a question about a dead man.”
“Who’s this?”
“Doesn’t matter who I am. Who were you looking for?”
“Detective Spencer.” Parkman looked skyward, waiting for an answer.
“And if you were to locate Detective Spencer, what would you need from him?”
Weird question. “We’ll find that out when I locate him.”
“Good luck, then. There’s no such man.”
It sounded final, like the caller was going to hang up.
“Wait.” Breathing on the other end indicated the man hadn’t hung up. Parkman weighed his options and decided to go forward. “I would tell him I just saw Drake Bellamy in Mexico even though Drake Bellamy died several years ago in Lake Ontario. I would ask Detective Spencer how this was possible and I’m sure I would understand his answer. Finally, if Spencer was to take my call, I would express my deepest concern for Sarah Roberts.”
“Why would that be?” The voice had changed, the tone firmer, clipped.
“Sarah Roberts was last seen leaving the lobby of a hotel in Rosarito, Mexico, after a brief visit with Drake Bellamy, who followed her out. As I’m searching for Sarah now, I would be interested in knowing how Drake is alive and what he’s doing here, at Sarah’s hotel.”
The silence that stretched worried Parkman. He looked over his shoulder, then into the hotel. A chill ran through him like he was being watched.
“Drake’s alive, Parkman.”
He frowned. That voice. “Spencer?” Parkman whispered.
“New name. New game.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Too much said over the phone already. Where are you? Rosarito?”
“Yeah,” Parkman said. New name, new game? What the hell did that mean?
“I’ll be there in the morning. Don’t leave the city.”
“How will you find me?”
The line clicked dead.
Parkman lowered the phone from his ear, his hand descending like the slow hand on a large clock.
“What the fuck is going on?” he said to himself, barely above a whisper.
A hand dropped on his shoulder at the exact moment someone shouted from behind him.
“Hey!”
Parkman lifted a foot in the air and twisted at an odd angle, his nervous system in a quandary of sorts. He landed awkwardly, twisting around fully.
Aaron stood there, smiling. “Where did you get to?” Aaron asked. “I left a note on the dresser. When I came back to the room, you were gone.”
“Fucking shit!” Parkman burst out. “I feel like a cat dangling from a shit chandelier. You scared the cank out of me.”
“What the hell is cank?”
“Everything you scared.” He tried to catch his breath. “And then some. And I can see you’re enjoying it, too. That smile of yours.” He held a hand over his chest. “If you weren’t a black belt, I’d drop you right here.”
Aaron’s smile widened as he turned sideways. He offered his right arm. “Here, one shot for payback—”
Parkman drove a fist into Aaron’s arm before he could finish his sentence or reconsider his offer. Parkman added what power he could to the jab, but Aaron barely moved an inch.
“I have to admit, that felt good.” Parkman gestured at Aaron’s arm. “You good?”
“Yeah, but I’ve had houseflies bump into me harder.”
Parkman jabbed at him again. “You little fuck.” Aaron deflected everything Parkman tossed his way until a small crowd had stopped to watch. It was over as fast as it started. They headed for the elevators, Parkman feeling the tension and confusion leaving him after the friendly tussle.
“Where did you go, Aaron?”
“The gym. Needed a workout. Let some of the steam off.”
“Guess I should look for a note next time.”
They got on the elevator. Parkman pushed the button for his floor, then filled Aaron in on his call with Casper. On their floor, they started down the hall while he told Aaron about the strange call to Toronto and how he thought Spencer—with a new name—was coming to Mexico tomorrow.
“It’s very strange. Nothing is making sense.” He pulled the keycard from his pocket. “Why would Spencer change his name? What’s Drake doing here in Mexico? Or has Drake’s name changed and Spencer is his handler. Maybe that’s it. When I dropped Drake’s name to Detective Martin, then asked for Spencer, I got nowhere. That would explain, new name, new game.” He unlocked the hotel door and opened it. “And what has Sarah gotten herself into?”
Parkman entered the room, Aaron close behind. The door shut. The air thickened. His senses pinged. Something smelled funny.
They had company.
He ducked down, lowering his center of gravity in preparation of taking a hit. To warn Aaron, he shot a hand back but Aaron wasn’t there anymore.
“Good afternoon, Mr. Parkman. Mr. Stevens.”
The smell was urine. One of the police officers from the station they had visited stepped into view from the balcony area. His uniform was stained with sweat. He carried the smell of a men’s locker room around with him, permeating everything in the room. Behind Parkman, two beefy cops held Aaron’s arms. A third man had a gun placed under Aaron’s chin to guarantee his struggles were minimal.
“We need to have a word with you two,” the overweight cop by the balcony door said.
Another cop—five in total now—materialized from the left side of the hotel room where the desk and chair sat against the wall.
“Don’t try to run. You will be shot. Don’t try to fight. You will be shot. Resisting arrest in Mexico is a serious offense.”
The speaker crossed the space between him and Parkman slowly, bringing his fetid smell with him. The man stopped when he stood nose to nose with Parkman. Sweat ran down Parkman’s ramrod straight spine. His hands flexed at his sides while he raced through escape options.
That stench!
“Please, don’t try anything,” the overweight cop said again. “We would hate to have to report that we were simply asking questions of an American citizen when they went for my gun and were killed in the ensuing gunfight. Please don’t make me or my men kill you here.” He looked at the carpet as if he’d dropped something. Or was he simply studying the pattern? When he met Parkman’s eyes, he grinned, revealing yellowed teeth. “It would be sad to ruin such a nice Berber floor covering, now wouldn’t it? Killing you outside the city makes for a quieter death.”
A struggle started behind him. When he looked back, Aaron was on the floor, the three men holding him down, knees in his back, forcing his hands together to handcuff them.
“Hey—” Parkman started, but something smacked the back of his head mid-word.
A bright light and white-hot pain shot through his shoulder blades before he fell, unconscious.
Chapter 31
Waking up got less painful for Sarah. Dr. Wesson said she was doing better. Her body was dealing well with the withdrawal symptoms, which caused her minimum unpleasantness. She had ample water and kept the little food he gave her down.
The sun had dropped out of sight, the lone window in the room dark behind the white curtains. The room itself was pleasant enough. Better than a hospital. Light blue walls, white furniture. Pictures on the wall were spaced evenly. All the pictures were landscape scenes of oceans, waves rolling in, sunsets. The one on the farthest wall showed a thin girl holding the handlebars of a bike as she watched the sun set behind a r
ainbow. To Sarah, the pictures were depictions of lost hope. In each shot, the sun was setting. There was loneliness, loss, and a feeling that something was ending.
The vast room wasn’t filled with furniture. Instead, the interior decorator—probably Jane Turner—simply placed a bed, a dresser and a chair by the window in this room, added pics on the walls and left it at that. A perfect guest bedroom. If they wanted to depress their guests.
She closed her eyes and rested, drifting in and out of sleep. Secured to the bed wasn’t so she couldn’t escape, according to the doctor. It was so she didn’t hurt herself during the withdrawal process.
“Hurt myself?” she had said to him. “Yeah, right, and I’ve got a bridge to buy in London.”
A soft knock on the door brought her out of her semi-dream state. She opened her eyes and waited. Did she dream the knock or was there someone at the door?
The knock came again. The doorknob turned.
“Come on in,” she whispered. “Door’s open.” Like I could do anything about it.
Blair eased inside the room and quietly shut the door behind him. Barely above the soft whisper of rubbing linen, Blair tiptoed across the bedroom floor and stopped by the chair beside the window.
“May I?” A hand gesture toward the chair.
“It’s your house.”
He placed the chair by the bed and sat down, resting his arm on the edge of the bed, his head hung low as if the weight of the world was on his shoulders.
“How are you feeling?” he asked without looking up, his tone subdued, demure.
“Couldn’t be better.” She kept her tone low, calm. The drug still pulled at her, but whatever Dr. Wesson was giving her eased the draw considerably.
Blair looked different somehow. It wasn’t the dressed down look in track pants and the loose sweater he wore. It was his demeanor. His smile was gone. He seemed spent, like he’d tried something important and lost. Maybe they ought to move her to another room and give this room to him. He’d fit right in with those pics on the walls.
“Are you angry with me?” he asked, finally looking up.
At this distance, his eyes—windows to the soul that they were—offered insight into his mental state. Something was tearing him apart on the inside. A pained, grief-ridden expression looked back at her.
“Why would I be angry with you? Have you done something that I should be angry about?”
“Well, no.” He avoided her eyes. “It’s just, you’re here and not on your vacation.”
“Why am I here?”
The chair groaned as Blair leaned back on it. “My mother’s crazy.”
“Why am I here?” Sarah repeated.
“Because of my mother.”
“You’re avoiding the question. Those aren’t answers.”
He made a fist and pressed it to his lips, then glanced at the window, letting his hand fall away. Whatever bothered him went deep.
“My mother wants you to help her with something but she won’t tell me what it is.”
“Is that why she’s offering me a forced rehab here?”
“I guess so.”
“And asking about Vivian?” Sarah rolled her head sideways to follow his gaze and look at the window. Blair stared at his fingers as he fiddled with them.
“You tried to save Wallace.” He bit his lower lip. Released it. “You tried to warn Hank.”
“They were in danger.”
“You whispered things. About a man dying. Then Eddie was shot and killed.”
“And? So?” She closed her eyes. Oh shit. Here we go.
“You were right. Then I looked you up online.”
“What did you find?”
“A lot of stuff. Did you know there’s even a website dedicated to tracking the amount of people you’ve saved from accidents, kidnappers and murderers?”
“Can’t say I knew that. Although, I’d be curious to hear where they get their numbers.”
Her backside had numbed. The doctor unstrapped her routinely and rolled her onto her side when he was here, but until he returned, she would remain on her back.
“Anyway, you’re Sarah Roberts. You can see the future.”
“Not exactly.”
“Yeah, I know. What your sister tells you.”
“Are you doing okay?” she asked him. “The accident shake you up?”
“You could say that.”
“How so? What part shook you up?”
After an extended pause, she opened her eyes and looked at the empty chair. He’d gotten quietly to his feet and walked to the window. He stood with his back to her and wiped at his eyes.
She wasn’t in the best of places, the best of times, to be able to read between the lines. Something was going on with Blair and she couldn’t figure it out. She stared at the back of his head, his neat hair gelled in place. The silver earrings in each ear. A tattoo on his left arm. He was in good shape and maintained his appearance, but so did a lot of men. This wasn’t something new or odd.
He had been confident at the casino. But he was deflated now.
“There was another man there that night,” Sarah said. “A man named Drake. I think he was the one who tackled Wallace out of the way.”
Blair nodded.
“What happened to him?” she asked. “Did he get bailed out by your mother, too?”
“Can’t say I recall another man. Never heard that name before, either.”
Drake had been in the red car at the back when she got in the Mercedes. Was he waiting for her? Or watching Jane Turner? If he was watching Jane, then he knew where Sarah was. Based on that, Drake was probably outside watching the Turner house at that moment.
“I’m gay,” he said, barely audible enough to hear. He said it so low she almost missed it.
“Okay,” she replied, not sure how else to respond.
He twisted away from the window.
“That man who got hit by Eddie’s car, Hank Olsen, he and I were going to run away together. He was the pit boss that allowed me to work the casino. We’re in love.”
“Good. Nothing wrong with that. Love is love.” A sudden weariness came over her. If the conversation didn’t end soon, she’d drift out of it on a wave of melatonin.
“Now he might not make it. Still critical at the hospital. Even if he does leave the hospital one day, Hank’s paralyzed from the waist down.”
“I’m sorry,” she said, barely above a whisper.
“That’s why my mother hates me.”
“What?” She forced herself to mentally climb up, out of sleep. “No. She loves you.”
He was close to her again. She could feel him close.
“At fourteen, I told her I was gay.” Blair stood beside the bed. “Her response was to beat me.”
“I’m sorry.”
“As long as I’m gay, there’s no money, no schooling, no nothing. I’m cut off.”
“That can’t be.”
“It is. That’s why I fend for myself. Sometimes I think she wished I were dead.”
Sarah nodded her understanding, her head sinking into the pillow.
Blair continued, “If Hank leaves that hospital, I’ll take care of him. I’ll be there. Gay or not gay, we love each other and that’s what’s important, isn’t it?”
“Of course.”
“My mother would never understand that. She doesn’t know what love is.”
“She has you, doesn’t she?”
“My mother doesn’t love me.”
“I mean she has you to show her what love is. Even when she shuns you, love her back. Over time, she’ll crumble.”
“No, not my mother. She hated my father.”
Silence again. She listened to see if he was walking away or staying close. A slit was all she could muster when she tried to open her eyes. He stood over her, crying, wiping his tears aside.
“I’m sorry,” he mumbled. “This isn’t your problem. Just happy to have someone I can vent to.”
“Of course.”
Blair let it out. He dropped in the chair and wept, leaning his forearms on the bed. Sarah would’ve held his shoulder but her hands were bound. She thought about asking him to untie her, roll her over, but thought better of it. This was his moment.
