by Jay Smith
The woman in the canary bikini offered a polite finger wave. "Hello, Mr. Casey. I'm Nadeim." I couldn't place her accent. She said my last name emphasizing the "SEE."
"Nod-Yem?" It was part of a question my brain wanted to work out internally but mis-routed to my mouth instead.
"Yes." She moved – writhed is a better word – to the stool next to me. "I am your valet."
This took a moment to process. I looked to Murray for help.
He said. "Nadeim here works with our elite clients. You've been bumped to Grant Parker's bungalow."
Nadeim put a hand on my forearm. "There was a mix-up at the reception desk. Mr. Parker's instructions were clear so I apologize on behalf of the resort."
"What did Park want? I don't understand. Why do I need a valet?"
"It's okay," Murray assured me. "You found a gold ticket. Take the ride. So to speak."
Nadeim had not moved her hand and she moved in closer, more like an old friend wondering if there might be a chance for something more. Her glance was a mix of amused and seductive. "Your suite is ready whenever you are. I'm sure you've had a long day and you'll want to get some rest. Ebetha is not an experience you'll want to sleep through."
"Lady's got a point," Murray hinted.
I experienced another patch of hazy memories. The small clock beside the radio reported it was just after three in the morning. Had I really spent five hours with Murray? I didn't feel sick or exhausted but relaxed. Relaxed is something I don't take for granted. Feeling entirely free of stress gets put up there with a hard orgasm or a good sneeze.
Suddenly I was walking the beach past tiki torches under the stars, Nadeim on my arm to make sure I didn't trip over the sand. We made small talk and she deflected my questions about Park with grace, bringing the subject back to me and how I was feeling about Ebetha, the resort, and life.
"What's a valet," I asked. I knew what the word meant, but not how it applied to this situation. I thought it might be the resort's way of managing its drunk and attention-starved guests. "I thought a valet was a man…I mean male…not a woman, I mean."
Nadeim chuckled. "I was Mr. Parker's personal assistant on Ebetha. The other members have traditional man-servants for their stay."
"Well, that's progressive. And by that, I mean racially insensitive. He didn't ask specifically for a woman to add a layer of sexism on top of it, did he?"
She raised an eyebrow. "You do know Grant Parker, don't you?"
"I – thought I did."
We passed through a cluster of privacy bushes and another distressed metal gate. Nadeim waved her clutch over a sensor pad and the gate clicked open. "Almost there. How are you feeling, Mr. Casey?"
I was staring up at the stars like it was the first time I ever noticed the larger universe out there, a big dopey grin on my face from the artificial feeling that nothing really mattered and – even if it did – so the hell what? Nadeim put a hand on my back to stop me from swaying.
"You look entirely relaxed, Mr. Casey. Do you feel relaxed?"
"I feel …" I turned to Nadeim, her eyes capturing the tiki light, wide with anticipation. "…good."
Oh, that smile on thick, painted lips. She caught me staring and kindly turned us toward the gate. "I am glad to know this, Mr. Casey." She led me through. "Would you mind leaning on me? The breeze is a little chilly."
Always a gentleman, I slid an arm around her slender, naked waist. I didn't notice the chill air from the ocean until I felt the heat of Nadeim's body on my skin. She put a hand on my shoulder and led me up a low slope into a neighborhood of huts and cabins each high enough on the side of a hill to have the same dramatic view of the Caribbean.
As hard as they tried to make a realistic, old European village, the modern signs stuck out. The torches were real, but the doors and window settings in the huts were twenty-first century. The sign posts along the path matched the style of shingles hanging outside the little shops in the open lobby of the resort. We passed a rusty penny-farthing bicycle leaning up against a hut covered in ivy and I laughed.
"What is it," Nadeim asked.
"If I try to escape along the beach, will I get chased by a big weather balloon?"
I recall her look of amusement even if she had no idea what I was talking about. "Sorry?"
"Well, my dear, if you don’t get my fifty-year-old television references, I don’t know if we can be friends!"
"I would be very sad if that were so, Mr. Casey." She said. "Not far now," Nadeim promised as though reading my mind. Though I imagine she probably felt more of a burden keeping my pace on the incline.
"Where?"
She pointed up to the top of the hill and a thatch roofed cottage. "Number 18."
Number Eighteen featured a wide porch in front of big bay windows holding a commanding view of the landscape. I stood looking out into the darkness, squinting at the point where the stars hit the horizon, using a little trick my father taught me to look a little higher than the horizon to bring out the slight contrast between the night sky and the sea. I held the railing tight and shuddered from a sudden breeze.
"Would you like to come inside, Mr. Casey?"
Sudden warmth. Bright lights. Cool water in a plastic bottle.
"Hydrate. Trust me." She smiles at me at the threshold, not like a lover but like a nurse on rounds.
I took the bottle. Taking me by the hand, Nadeim pointed out the important points of interest in a room that never really came into focus. The most important was the long hallway (longer as my strength and consciousness ebbed) leading to the master bedroom at the end of it. We walked by a kitchen lit only by a single nightlight under the cabinets. She guided me back to the master bedroom and a turned down king sized bed, soft night lighting from each wall, and from the on suite.
"I sleep down the hall," she said, taking back her hand as I settled down onto the bed.
She said other things, but the room turned and twisted away into darkness.
Chapter Three
A chirping noise forced me awake just after dawn, the only sign of which was a slight glow around the edges of black curtains. It took me a moment to remember where I was and realize I wasn't back in the hospital with a bowl on my head to keep my brains in. The pain was like having a hole drilled into my skull, but slightly less intense. My feeling of total relaxation left in the night, replaced by the weird, moist feeling of being stuck to the roof of my own rancid mouth.
There was a cricket hiding in my room, chirping away like it wanted to be crushed by the fist of an angry tourist. I rolled out of bed in the same discount rack clothes I wore the night before and let my unconscious reboot the details of the previous night while I emptied my bladder into the bidet.
At least the chirping noise stopped.
Some angel left me a liter of spring water next to the sink with a small plate with what I instantly recognized as two tablets of Naproxen.
When I returned to the bedroom and stood there in the light of morning, I realized whose room I was standing in.
The room was designed to appeal to a westerner of wealth and pretense. Grant Parker left his mark on what had to be his long-term escape from Spartan military life.
For whatever reason, Park liked Philadelphia sports. A football jersey hung over his bed in a display frame. A signed helmet sat in a glass case atop the mahogany wardrobe. At least a half dozen signed baseballs, also in cases, served as paperweights around the dresser and vanity on top of copies of Sports Illustrated and military history magazines.
I took my first nine-spigot shower inside a marble and glass cube with high-pressure jets and wondered if that might be what it feels like to drown inside a sinking submarine. It helped with my head. Someone, probably Nadeim, set out my travel kit on top of the toilet tank. I checked the time on the bedside clock radio. Seven in the morning. I realized I didn't have my cell phone and decided I didn't care. By the time I stepped out of the steaming bathroom it was close to eight.
I went into the
wardrobe and found my clothes hanging alongside Park's. Most of the hanging items were civilian, but he left a Class A uniform behind. I didn't stop to look at it. Seeing the tag and his bars was too much. I found some decent beach clothes and dressed.
That damned chirping started up again. I tracked it to the corner of the room by the dresser and my suitcases before it stopped again.
There were two rooms opposite one another in the hallway leading to the front sitting area. To my right was a second bathroom, not as ornate and it lacked a bidet to confuse idiots like me. I opened the other door before remembering Nadeim saying she stayed in the cabana with me. I was relieved she wasn't in the room. It looked like an empty college dorm room with some generic cabinets and a desk along with a cheap single bed. The only difference was a solid black space rug over the hardwood floor. A few small bags sat at the foot of the made bed. I gathered she didn't live there full time now that Parker was gone.
I made it to the kitchen and in the light of day I could appreciate the space and luxury of the house. Off to one side of the sitting room, I noticed a pair of double doors that were closed the night before. Open, they lead into a den or study dedicated in equal parts to Parker's military career and what looked to be a rather elaborate Dungeons & Dragons campaign.
Before I could investigate, I caught sight of Nadeim stepping up onto the porch. She wore her yellow bikini with a red towel wrapped around her waist. Her skin glistened with beads of ocean water. She struck me as a woman completely at peace with her life and I could see why. She lived in paradise and had the easiest boss in the world to work for – a dead man.
I entered the kitchen looking for coffee as she entered the cabana. "Good morning, Nadeim," I called from in front of the unused coffee maker.
"Mr. Casey," she said, walking up the hall. "I'm sorry. I did not expect you until noon."
"It's okay. I didn't either. But like you said I don't want to sleep through my vacation."
"I can make you coffee and breakfast. The pantry is fully stocked. What is your pleasure?"
I stopped looking and turned to Nadeim. She was busy drying off, rubbing the towel through the tight black curls of her hair. She was tone and just as beautiful without the seimei running through my veins. To have the full attention of a beautiful woman is something I wasn't used to. Giving orders to one didn't make my comfortable. I wanted to tell her it was fine and I'd grab a bagel or something, but her expression betrayed no hint of submission or obligation in the offer. It was her job and she was totally at peace with it.
The sound of that god damned chirping echoed up the hallway from the master bedroom.
"Surprise me," I said to Nadeim. "I've got to go kill a cricket."
I brushed past Nadeim in the archway. She smelled like paradise.
I turned the corner, went the wrong direction, turned again and found myself staring into Parker's main office. The room was more Grant Parker than any place I'd ever seen and yet not like him at all, like the study where the old, rich General Parker might retire and write his memoirs.
Double doors opened into a warmly decorated space. It was a rich man’s space, not one I would have associated with a Spartan like Parker. To one side was an executive’s mahogany desk and a fat leather chair, the desktop covered in reports covering a decade of Iraqi police activities. I took a moment to review the framed medals and ribbons on the wall over his desk as well as his training certificates and commendations for service and bravery. The Pink Floyd poster beside the doors and the ornamental swords crossed above his television were from college.
A black shadowbox the size of a sheet of paper sat to one side of his desk blotter. Inside was a polished, but battered-looking police badge, an old west Marshal’s star on black felt with a scrap of paper beside it and an engraved strip of metal along the bottom of the box. The strip read "Badge Worn by Wyatt Earp as Asst. City Marshal, Dodge City, KS, 1879."
The note read "To Lord Parque: as fine a lawman as any legend of the American West. – In Gratitude, Alan Horus"
I heard the soft chime off in the distance again like an elevator signaling the next floor. The chime continued and I left to track it down.
I marched back toward the guest bedroom, hesitating only for a second as I caught sight of a small white boxes with black glass windows mounted to the ceiling in the corner of the main sitting room. Then another in the main hallway: domes of the kind that hide cameras. I'd forgotten about seeing them the night before. I spotted another one covering the main hallway.
I was being watched.
The chime grew louder as I approached the master bedroom. The "Cricket" was stuffed into one of my suitcases. The sound came from the unwrapped package sent to me by Parker from Iraq.
I took a breath and opened the brown paper packaging, careful not to tear through Parker's hand-written address. I wanted to preserve his handwriting intact. The paper kicked up a small cloud of dust as I severed the taped corners with my thumbnail. Despite the distance and time, fine sand and powdered dirt still made it into the tight folds of the wrapping. Typical Parker, he was meticulous in his triple-wrapping. I made my way through to a small cell phone box.
At first I assumed the box was an afterthought. It was a popular name brand, but the text was in Chinese and the model pictured on the box top was something I hadn't seen in over a decade. It had an antenna and a LCD display. The plastic seals on the box were broken, so I opened it, expecting to see...what, exactly? I had no idea. My sense of dread stopped my imagination at the opening of the paper.
It was a phone. Of course, it’s a phone. It chirped again, this time with a high, sharp pitch of an alarm indicating low battery power in Sleep Mode.
I opened the box and found all the parts in the plastic blister mold. The attachments, ear buds, manual and warranty remained intact. Its old-style LED display seemed so dated in an age of full color touch screens. It was also an ugly olive drab with cheap, silver plastic trim which put this phone in a period when cell phone makers didn’t realize that people tend to drop phones all the time. I pushed and held the power button until a tiny blue light blinked at me. Soon after, the phone booted into service, finding a signal and a welcome message scrolled across the screen. "Hi, Winston." And "WARNING Battery Power 2%"
I found the power cable and plugged it into the wall. A second later, the message flashed a few times and disappeared, replaced by another solid display:
You have (1) new message left unsent. SEND NOW (Y) OR (N) TO ERASE? Y () N
I used the direction wheel to indicate left for YES.
The little hourglass spun around on the screen a while and I took the time to scan the room for another of those black domes. I didn’t see one in the ceiling or on the walls, but that didn’t mean there wasn’t a camera hiding somewhere else.
I plugged the phone into the wall to charge and started back toward the main room and jumped when the phone rang at full volume.
An incoming call. For some reason, I just stared at the plastic turd flopping around on the table on its leash. The phone hit its third ring.
I picked it up. The display read simply:
THE SERVICE.
Its number was restricted.
I touched the green button at the top left.
"Hello?"
A young, female voice, rich in Indian textures asked, "Is that Winston Casey, please?"
"Yes. Who is this?"
"My name is Beatrice with The Service. Mr. Grant Parker instructed us to contact you upon activation of this account. How are you today, sir?"
"Activated what account? The phone?"
"Yes, sir. This service account."
"Okay." It must have been the last unsent message. "What’s The Service?"
"We provide automatic notifications on behalf of our clients, specializing in personal reminders or greetings to commemorate events or provide time-sensitive information with precision. We also provide administrative resources for busy professionals who are unable to
do so. Licensed, bonded and confidential, The Service is your trusted source for the distribution of timely and important information."
"Sounds well-rehearsed, but clears up very little."
"Thank you, sir. Which airport best services you, sir? Is that Harrisburg International or would you prefer Philadelphia, Baltimore or Pittsburgh?"
"What? I live in Harrisburg so…wait…I don’t know…. why?"
"I am arranging transportation for you on behalf of Mr. Parker. I need to know which airport from which you wish to book your departure."
"On behalf of Parker? Miss, he is dead."
"We are very sorry to hear this, sir. However, he has paid for this service and we are contractually obligated to fulfill it. Please to tell me which airport you prefer?"
"Where am I going, Beatrice?"
"Your itinerary includes Las Vegas, Nevada."
"Why?"
"I do not have that information, sir."
"When is this trip happening?"
"Your travel is to be timed approximately 48 hours from this point of contact."
"Monday? I have to be back at work on Monday. I can’t fly to Vegas on -"
"One moment please."
The line went quiet for a moment before Beatrice returned. "Mr. Parker would like you to know that you are confirmed on Western Air Flight 42 from Middletown to Las Vegas leaving 7am Monday morning."
"What if I don't go?"
"I cannot answer that."
I wanted to beat the phone against the wall, but I kept stammering random thoughts, playing this scenario through. "When I get there, then what? Parker’s coming back from the dead?"
"Your accommodations and local transportation are being arranged. Please be sure to check into the airport no later than one hour prior to boarding, sir. Details are being sent to your email address on file. Would you confirm this for me?"
I took a guess which Park used and was right on the first try.
"You are on Ebetha right now, sir?"
"Yes. How did you know?"
