by David Archer
He was smiling and actually trembling by the time they got into the room itself, and she had no trouble convincing him to let her cuff him to the bed. She had taken off the dress to expose the black silk teddy she wore underneath, and Landry had been unable to take his eyes off her ever since. When she told him to lie down and put his hands above his head, he had done so without a single word.
Then she had pulled a couple of nylon ropes out of her purse, and before he knew what was happening she had his ankles tied to the bed frame, his legs spread wide. She had stood at the foot of the bed for a moment, letting his eyes feast themselves on her, and then she climbed onto the bed on her hands and knees, and crawled up his body.
Hovering over him, she leaned her face down close to his and whispered in his ear. “I want to know everything,” she said. “I want to know everything you know about Mac and the deal for the chip. If you tell me the truth, this is going to be a very pleasant night for you. If you don’t, I’ll show you what true torment really is.”
He looked up at her and licked his lips. “I’m sure you already know more than I do,” he said. “What could I possibly know that you don’t? I don’t know who you work for, but they obviously know more than I do. Why would they send you to ask me?”
“Let’s just say that there are some trust issues between my employers and your clients. My employers think you might be of value to them, but your clients have implied that you, shall we say, are less intelligent than you present yourself to be. We think you may have figured out some things on your own, and if you have, then we have uses for you. If not, then you’re nothing but a liability. People like my employers do not care for liabilities.”
Landry’s face had grown paler while she was speaking, and his eyes were wide and round. “But—but I’m not a liability. It doesn’t matter what I know, I never talk. You can ask anyone I've ever dealt with, I never, ever give up any details to anyone.”
“Jonathan, it’s not your ability to keep a secret that we find interesting,” Summer said, her voice dripping with sexual energy. “We need someone with your abilities who can think on his feet. Now, there are a lot of things about this whole operation that seemed to be a bit confused, from the reports we’ve been getting. We want to know whether you’re the kind of man we can trust in the future to handle these things. To put it simply, the kind of man we need is one who can read between the lines, deduce the little details that are not mentioned clearly. Are you capable of such things? Because, if you are, I’m going to be in a very good mood. I promise that you’ll really, really like me when I’m in a good mood.”
Landry swallowed again, and Summer thought that his Adam’s apple was probably wearing itself out. She leaned down and planted a chaste kiss on the tip of his nose, then slowly lowered herself so that she was sitting on him.
He moaned, then licked his lips. “What do you want to know?” he asked, his voice husky.
“Tell me about the deal for the chip. I want to know everything about it, but especially the things that you figured out on your own.”
Another swallow. “Mac came to me a few weeks ago,” he said, “said he needed some work. I put out a couple of feelers and got a hit from down in Chinatown. Jimmy Cho said he had some people who were after something from one of the tech companies, and that it was a big job. I asked him to put me in touch and I got a call from a Chinaman named Fei who wanted to meet up. We went down to Wong’s in Chinatown and he told me about the job. About the chip. He offered some good money, so I took it back to Mac and told him what they wanted. He said it would take him a few weeks to put together, but that he was sure he could do it.”
He looked up at her, and Summer smiled at him as she wiggled her hips. She could tell she was getting to him—it was obvious—so she leaned down and nibbled on his left ear. “Keep going,” she said. “This is my foreplay.”
When she rose and looked down at him again, his face was turning red.
“So, Mac calls me about a couple weeks ago and says he got to somebody inside the company who wants to deal, but he’s asking for an awful lot of money. I asked him how much, he says the guy wants a hundred mil. Now, the old Chinaman, Fei, he had said money was not an issue, so I told him to check back with me the next day while I sent word that I had a possible deal. Fei sends me word to meet at the same place and I went, and when I said the inside man wanted a hundred million, the only thing he asked was how he wanted to get it. I called Mac right then and asked that question, and he said it was this doctor, Williamson, and he wanted the money to be split up in several accounts that could not ever be traced. I told Fei and he said he would pay it, so I told Mac to get it set up and let me know when and where.”
He paused again, so she treated him to a bit more of her lower body control. He gasped, and she whispered, “Don’t stop now, you’re getting me hot.”
“After I get Mac off the phone, Fei tells me that he’ll get the hundred million to me so I can start setting it up, but that Williamson won’t ever get to spend it. He says the money will just be lost in limbo because they can’t take a chance on trying to bluff. He says he’ll pay me an extra three million for handling it, so I say okay. I got the money wired in, then I spread it out several ways and moved it around a lot for a few days, then I got it set up in some trusts so it can’t be traced. I told Fei and he sent somebody to pick up the debit cards and documents, then they come back to me later that day in a sealed envelope. Fei says don’t open the envelope for any reason, so I didn’t. I gave it to Mac and told him the same thing, and he set up the trade for the next day. He got Williamson to get the chip and bring it to the meet, and he was supposed to hand over the envelope once Fei confirmed that the chip was real. They let Williamson leave, but the next morning I hear that he’s dead. Later that day, I got word that Mac was dead, too. I called Fei and he said Mac wasn't very good at keeping secrets, so they decided to make sure he couldn't ever tell. I hated to lose Mac, but business is business. If they were worried he might talk, that could ruin me, too. Guys like Mac aren’t that hard to find, so I kept my mouth shut.”
Summer wiggled. “Oh, baby, you were doing so good for a while there. Why did you leave out the part about Mrs. McGill?”
Landry swallowed, but he smiled. “I just didn’t get there yet,” he said. “That was another whole deal. See, Mac tells me the day before the trade that he’s a little worried they might doublecross him, maybe even kill him. He said he’s worried about Becky, his wife, if anything happens to him. He had some money hidden away in some offshore accounts, and he told me to get it all set up in a trust for her, but that he was also thinking about trying to grab that hundred million. I asked him how he thought he could get away with that, and he said all he needed to do was convince Becky to go get it once Williamson was dead, and he was sure he could do that. I had told him what Fei said, that Williamson wouldn’t even make it home alive. I guess he told Becky to watch when Williamson got home, and I guess she saw the driver dump his ass in the alley. That was his plan, anyway, because he figured the driver would toss him out. He said he found out what kind of poison they used and knew how to neutralize it, so he showed Becky. Then he told me that if anything happened to him, he would fix it so Becky would come to see me. I was supposed to give her all the trust stuff, so she wouldn’t ever have to worry about money. I guess that was in case she didn’t get the stuff from Williamson, but when the cops found his body, they didn’t find the debit cards. That’s how I knew she got it.”
Summer ground herself into him. “Oh, you’re really getting excited, aren’t you? So what happened when she came to see you?”
Landry chuckled. “You know how much of Mac’s handwriting I’ve got? It wasn’t hard to put together a letter in his handwriting that told her to get me those debit cards and all the documents. The letter made it sound like keeping them would get her killed, and that there was enough in the trust to make sure she was comfortable for the rest of her life. She said she would have to go get
them from wherever she had them hidden, so I offered to take her, and that’s when she hit me with this stupid stun gun. Knocked the crap out of me, and then she took my gun and ran out the door, the little bitch. It wasn't until later that day when Fei called to tell me they knew she had it, and they wanted her. He was the one who told me about the bus, that they were going to get her when she got off.”
“Ooh, yeah,” Summer said. “Why did you want the stuff in the envelope? Were you trying to get that hundred million for yourself?”
“Oh, no, I’m not that stupid. I made a deal with Fei to get it back for him if I could, and he promised me half of it as a reward. That’s all that was about.”
Summer leaned down again and nibbled on his earlobe, making him moan even more loudly than before. “And who does Fei work for?”
Landry froze. Summer realized her mistake, but it was too late.
“You should know that,” he said. “You said they answer to your employers.”
“Damn,” Summer said. “This was going so well, too.” She climbed off of him and picked up her dress from the floor. She pulled it over her head as he stared at her. “Okay, Jonathan, here’s the deal,” she said. “You just blew it. Remember how you told me a little while ago that you never give up any information?” She withdrew her Windlass Security ID from her purse and held it out to him. “You just handed me everything I need to put you and this Fei away for the rest of your lives. Now, I suspect he’s going to be pretty upset about that, don’t you?”
“Oh, my God,” Landry was saying. “Oh, my God. You can’t do this, you can’t do this to me. Do you have any idea what they’ll do to me? They won’t just kill me, they’ll disembowel me while I’m still alive. Please, Summer, don’t do this.”
“Me? I’m not doing anything except giving you a choice. You can roll over on Fei and give me everything else you know, or you can wait till this all blows up in your face. Personally, it sounds to me like Fei might be the kind of guy who could reach out and touch you no matter where you go, probably even in federal prison. What do you think?”
Landry stared at her. “If I help you,” he asked breathlessly, “will you leave my name out of it all? Never let anyone know I talked?”
She sat down on the bed beside him. “I could agree to that,” she said, “provided you don’t hold anything back. If I find out you do, all deals are off, got that?”
Landry looked into her eyes for a moment, then nodded. “I agree, and I understand. I won’t leave anything out, I promise. Now, can you untie me and take the cuffs off?”
Summer looked at him through narrowed eyes. “Ummm, no. Not until you tell me everything.”
12
Becky awoke to a loud beeping noise, and rolled over onto her back. Correction: she tried to roll over onto her back, but she ran into…
“Good morning, beautiful,” Pat Gordon said. “Did you sleep well?”
She smiled. “Better than I have in days,” she said. “How about you?”
“Better than I have in years. You have made an old man very happy, little lady.” He looked into her eyes. “You don’t have any regrets, do you?”
Becky finished rolling over and threw her arms around his neck, then kissed him passionately. “What do you think? Does that alarm mean we have to get up now, or can we spare a few more minutes?”
Pat laughed. “We can take a few more minutes,” he said. “Damn doctors can wait.” He wrapped his arms around her and pulled her close, and they lost themselves in one another for a few minutes.
Twenty minutes later, Becky stepped into his guest room shower. Forgive me, Mac, she thought to herself. I just needed to feel alive, and I think old Pat needed the same thing. I miss you, and I hate that you’re gone, but I’m still here and I’m still living. I hope you understand.
She hurried through the shower and then got dressed as quickly as she could. When she came out of the guest room, Pat was sitting on the couch and pulling his boots on. Becky had already stuck her dirty clothes into her bag, so she pulled her own boots on and smiled at him. “Ready when you are,” she said.
Pat looked at her, and the smile on his face made him look ten years younger than his fifty-nine. “I’m just about there,” he said. “Listen, when we get to Denver, are you going to be in a big hurry to get away from me? I’d love to take you out to dinner tonight. No strings, I’m not expecting any kind of repeat performance, I’d just like to enjoy your company a little bit longer.”
She sat and looked at him silently for a moment, then smiled. “I’m not in any hurry,” she said. “The job can wait another day. Maybe, if I’m not being too forward, maybe we could even keep in touch? I mean, if you want to.”
Pat gave her a sly look. “Becky, I’d love that,” he said. “Just do me one favor, sweetheart. If you get tired of me, just be honest and tell me so, okay? I mean, let’s face it, while it might be possible we can have some fun together, I know I’m way too old for you, so…”
“Pat,” he said, cutting him off. “Pat, my husband was only six years younger than you. I don’t think your age or mine has anything to do with whether or not we could be attracted to each other. I like you, but I’m still—I’m still dealing with a lot, you know? Now, if you think I’m just too young, I can understand…”
“I didn’t say you were too young. Did you hear me say you were too young? I’m quite sure I never said you were too young.”
They both burst out laughing. Becky slung her bag over her shoulder and got to her feet, and Pat led the way out to his truck, where he opened her door once again. She tossed her bag into the back seat and climbed up the way she had done the day before. Pat closed her door and walked around, and a moment later they were headed for the interstate and Denver.
The highway was just starting to get busy when they came off the ramp and merged into the flow of traffic. Becky watched the scenery for a bit, and then the easy vibrations of tires on the road lulled her back to sleep, and Pat couldn't help smiling when he heard her snoring softly.
Rhonda wouldn’t believe this if he told her, which he wasn't even about to do. He didn’t think she would get upset with him about it, though; she had had a short relationship with Andy Coffey a while back, and Andy had been a couple years ahead of Pat way back in high school. If she could date an older man, she wouldn’t judge him for dating a younger woman.
And Becky said it wouldn’t be her first rodeo, either. Her late husband was close to Pat’s age, she had said, so she probably knew about some of the things that go with a man’s golden years, like the enlarged prostate and having to get up and go pee several times a night. Things like that were what had kept him from asking any of the women he knew for dates, because he felt he was just getting to be too old and decrepit.
Amazing how a night like the one he had just had could change your entire outlook on life. And she wanted to keep in touch, which meant that might not be just a once in a lifetime thing. He wasn't so much worried about sleeping with her—though it had been wonderful—as about just getting to spend more time in her company. She made him smile in ways he had almost forgotten about.
Becky woke when Pat pulled off at Glenwood Springs for coffee, and she took the chance to run inside and use the bathroom. Pat got his coffee and waited outside the ladies’ room for her, and that’s when he actually started to believe in Providence.
Two Colorado State Troopers walked into the station and went up to the counter. One of them spoke to the clerk and Pat could just make out what he was saying.
“Sir, have you seen this woman come through here in the past couple of days?” He seemed to hold out a photo, and the clerk looked at it for a moment, then shook his head.
“No, I’m sorry,” he said. “If she came through on my shift, I’d remember her, she’s cute. She in trouble?”
“FBI wants to talk to her is all we know,” said the second trooper. “Something about her husband being murdered. If you happen to spot her, give us a call, will you?”
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“Hell, yeah,” the clerk said. “She killed her husband? That pretty little thing?”
“I don’t think she killed him,” the first trooper said, “but they think she may know who did, so there’s an all-points out on her. Thanks, Billy.”
The troopers turned and walked out the door as Pat heard the toilet flush behind him. He didn’t know why he did it, but he backed up and leaned against the ladies’ room door, so Becky could not push it open. When she tried, he turned his head and said, “Stay in there for another minute, something going on out here.”
“Pat?” she asked. “Is that you?”
“Yeah. Stay there a minute, that’s all. When you do come out, go straight to the truck and get in, okay?”
She hesitated for a second. “Okay.”
The clerk was watching the troopers, and seemed to relax when they drove away. He looked over at Pat, and the old man knew the clerk had been shown a picture of Becky. “They’re gone,” the clerk said.
“Okay,” Pat said to Becky, “come on out and go to the truck. Keep your head down and—wait a second.” He walked a few feet away, where a selection of western hats was on display, and chose a pink and white one. He waved it at the clerk, who nodded, then went back to the ladies’ room door and pulled it open. “Put this on and keep your head down, go get in the truck.” He put the hat on her head.
“Pat, what’s...”
“No time, go!”
Becky saw the clerk looking her way and did as Pat said, ducking her head and hurrying to the truck. She opened the door and got in, and was buckling her seat belt when she saw that the keys were hanging in the ignition.
Pat walked up to the clerk inside and set his coffee and a bottle of water on the counter. “The hat was nineteen-ninety-five,” he said. His eyes were on the clerk’s eyes the whole time.
“Yeah,” the clerk said. “They had a picture of your girl, there.”
