Tiffy frowned. “I don’t think Fiona would understand my sharing the room she’s paid for with a man who is not her son.”
“Oh.” That did sound bad. “Ok.”
In the end Danny found a room at a motel just over Coldwater Canyon in Studio City, and it was not until Danny reached the valet stand that he realized Tiffy had the receipt for his rental. He took a taxi over the hill, checked into his motel, and spent the next four hours in his room waiting for Tiffy to return any one of his fifteen phone calls.
“Fiona,” Tiffy said, “just look at you!”
Fiona spun in delight. “You like?”
Woody sat back in a chair across from the television. He put down the remote and smiled. Fiona did look tasty, better than ever, and he was proud to have her on his arm, so to speak. She rarely allowed him to hold her arm in public, and in private it was not usually his arm she was on.
“This California sun has done you a world of good.”
A shadow established residence for voting purposes in Fiona’s eyes. “I’d feel better if it wasn’t for Duncan. He seems to blame you for the break up.”
“All I did was register my disapproval with an unwise life choice.”
“Duncan said you hit him,” Woody said.
“You stay out of this,” Fiona said.
“Cold-cocked him from what Benjamin said.”
Tiffy rolled her eyes. “As if you’d believe that reprobate over me.”
“Nevertheless,” Fiona said, “he blames you. And he has found solace in the devil’s own.”
“You mean that stripper you told me about. Well, don’t worry about her. I am not above competing for my man.”
“You haven’t seen her,” Woody said.
Both turned on him. “What the hell does that mean?” they asked.
Woody shrugged. “I was just saying . . .”
“Go on,” said Fiona.
“Nothing. I wasn’t saying nothing.” He went into the bedroom.
“I didn’t think so.” Fiona turned back to Tiffy. “You should get right over there before that woman sinks her talons any deeper into him. I’m afraid he’ll do something stupid.”
“Like what? Sleep with her?”
“Tiffy!”
“Oh, hell, Fiona. Let him get it out of his system. It’ll make him appreciate me more.”
“I’m not sure I want to discuss this with you.”
“Then let’s not. Besides. First I need to lay by the pool a few days and get a tan like yours. And I want to check out the competition.”
“We can do that right now.” Fiona seemed strangely animated at the prospect. “Woody and I will take you to where she works.”
“Oh, lord,” Woody groaned from the bedroom.
“What is wrong with that man?” Fiona asked. A knock on the door diverted her. “Who could that be?”
“Evening Mrs. Delaney,” Danny said when Tiffy opened the door.
“Now Fiona,” Tiffy said, “there’s no need for you to go to a place like that. That’s why I brought Danny. He’s always made Duncan jealous.”
“God knows why. He’s no competition for my boy.”
“I’m standing here,” Danny said. “I can hear you.”
“I don’t know why you tolerate him sniffing after you like he was a hound dog and you were a bitch in heat.”
“Jesus, Mrs. Delaney! I’m standing right here.”
“No offense,” Fiona said. “I’m sure you’re a fine young man in your own right. But you’re no Duncan.”
“Well, from what I’ve seen and heard,” Danny said, showing a small segment of spine, “I wouldn’t want to be.”
Tiffy said, “Danny, you watch your mouth and wait outside.”
Danny left in a sulk. Tiffy closed the door.
“Don’t worry, Fiona. He’s harmless.”
“I know that. I just don’t know why you have to complicate things.”
Tiffy hugged Fiona. “Don’t worry. I know how to handle your boy.”
Fiona held her at arm’s length and looked into her enormous brown eyes. She was exquisite in her rural way. But Woody was right. That other woman was just as beautiful. Probably more so. Fiona smiled sadly.
“I used to think I could handle him too,” she said.
Duncan woke late that afternoon. Misty had stocked his refrigerator with fruit and yogurt, twelve-grain bread and cheese, apple juice, lettuce, broccoli, and sprouts. He drank a jar of juice. It was cold and sweet and tasted as good as the beer he had intended to have. He made a salad for breakfast. He spent the day reading about the aliens among us in a National Enquirer and staring at his painting of Edward.
“Holy shit,” Benjamin said when he returned, “what happened to you?”
“Got the crap beat out of me.”
“I can see that. It was that Rascowitz bitch, wasn’t it?”
“Maybe. I don’t know.”
“What do you want to do about it?”
“Nothing until I’m sure she did it. Maybe you could just hang around for a while until I feel a little better.”
“Well,” Benjamin looked uncomfortable, “thing is, Angela invited me to her condo in Santa Barbara for a few days.”
“Well, go on. I’ll just do crossword puzzles and feel sorry for myself.”
Misty came to see him the next day. She held his chin and moved his head from side to side. His lip was scabbed but the swelling had ebbed in both his lip and in his wonderfully purple eye.
“You should’ve had your lip stitched. You’ll have a nice scar.”
“Thanks for the groceries.”
“I thought you might not want to go out.” She faltered at the door. “Do you want me to come up later?”
“No thanks. I just want to be alone for a while.”
Duncan sat on the couch with Cat after she left. He listened to the radio and stared out his window at the darkening sky. At nine he went to the mini-mart to buy cat food. As he came out, he saw the Cadillac parked in front of the Hollywood. He sighed and climbed the stairs. He was surprised to find Pris waiting in the studio. She wore a short black dress, black silk stockings, black cowboy boots, and a black imitation cowboy hat with a wide, flat brim. She looked like a fashion conscious cowgirl in mourning. She came to him and touched his lip. Duncan winced.
“Still a bit tender,” he said.
He filled a bowl with cat food and another with water and put both on the floor. He sat on the linoleum and leaned against a cabinet and watched Cat eat. Pris sat on the floor beside him and took his hand.
“Misty told me what happened.”
Duncan panicked. “What did she say?”
“Only that someone had beaten you up. It was Sheila, wasn’t it?”
“Beats me. I was hit from behind. All I heard were motorcycles. That and a woman laughing.”
Pris stood. “I’ll kill her.”
Duncan grabbed her. “Don’t do anything on account of me.”
She softened slowly and tenderly kissed his battered lips.
Duncan smiled. “Ow,” he said.
“Did I hurt you?”
“It was the smile that done it.”
“Be careful, ok? Sheila doesn’t understand you. Or me for that matter.”
“I don’t understand you either.”
She stroked his cheek and smiled. “I’m late for work.”
“Angela arranged for my paintings to be in a gallery opening next Sunday. Would you come with me?”
“What the hell,” she said, “I’ll pick you up at seven.”
From his window he watched her wait at the curb for traffic to clear. He smiled so hard his lip cracked and bled. Her hat fell off unnoticed when she ran across the street. She went inside. He went downstairs and picked up her hat. He heard motorcycles. He turned and looked and dropped her hat on his steps. Sheila, Samantha, and two friends had parked in front of the Hollywood. They wore jeans and t-shirts and leather boots. Sheila wore a black leather vest crossed with
chains. All had short hair, and if it was not for the curves of their breasts and the shape of their hips they could have been men. But that was not what Duncan stared at.
Instead of a helmet, Sheila wore his hat. She smiled when she saw him coming. Her friends stood behind her and watched him come. Duncan stopped a yard away.
“That’s my hat,” he said.
“I don’t see your name on it.”
“Nonetheless,” Duncan said, “it’s mine.”
“I found it in the street.” She turned her back and started toward the Hollywood. “Finders keepers.”
“Aw, look,” said Samantha, “I think he’s going to cry.”
“Damn it! I want my hat back!”
Sheila turned. Samantha circled behind him. Sheila smiled and wrapped a chain around her fist.
“Why don’t you come get it?”
“All right,” he said, “I will.”
He heard more motorcycles behind him. I am a dead man, he thought. Sheila’s smirk changed to a frown. When he looked behind, he saw it was not more lesbians come to participate in a sacrifice of male flesh. Wilson, Marco, and Peewee sat on the newly arrived Harleys, looking like death minus the scythes but with the requisite scars and tattoos, calm and dangerous and not at all to be trifled with. Duncan thought them beautiful. Samantha stepped quietly aside.
Wilson glanced at Sheila and then to Duncan. “Anything wrong?”
“Not a thing,” Duncan said.
He took the Stetson from Sheila’s head, brushed it off, and put it on. By the fury in her eyes Duncan believed she was contemplating taking on the Guardians. But then she sagged and she and her friends got on their motorcycles and rode away.
“Nice bikes,” Peewee said, “friends of yours?”
“More like acquaintances,” Duncan replied.
The Guardians gazed in wonder at the painting on Duncan’s easel.
“Jesus,” Peewee said. “Aren’t we beautiful?”
“How much is that worth?” asked Wilson.
“Whatever you can get for it.” Duncan took the canvas off the easel and gave it to him. “It’s yours.”
“Why?” Wilson asked.
“Why not?”
Duncan took off his hat and with a permanent marker he wrote Delaney in big black letters on the white satin liner.
“All right!” Peewee said. “Roscoe said the painting of him sold for two thousand. I bet we get three for this one.”
“We’re not selling it.” Wilson took a plastic bag full of a fine white powder from his pocket and gave it to Duncan.
“What’s this?”
“Something in return.”
After the Guardians left, Duncan sat on the couch holding the baggie. He heard a siren in the distance grow stronger. He stood in the bathroom until the siren faded past his window. Then he flushed a small fortune in what he could not have known was China White Heroin down the toilet.
While Duncan watched white powder swirl down a porcelain portal, Tiffy and Danny were sitting in the Hollywood at a table near the bar. Tiffy had inadvertently selected amateur night for her reconnaissance, and the bar was packed. A five hundred dollar prize awaited the alleged nonprofessional judged best at removing her clothing to the music of her choice. Tiffy wore a shawl and dark glasses. She had seen Jackie O dressed like this in a photo in which Jackie was surrounded by four burly body guards. Tiffy did not have bodyguards but she had Danny which, she supposed, was better than nothing. She could get the body guards later, when she was . . .
When she was what?
“Go get me a beer,” she said.
Danny went to the bar. Tiffy took off her sunglasses. The place was filled with an eclectic assortment of suits and jeans and various females with large hair and painted skin who could best be described as tramps, harlots, and possibly sluts. Tiffy experienced a strange sense of sisterhood. She shook her head and the feeling left. Danny set two beers on the table and sat. Tiffy drank half her bottle.
“Slow down!”
“Do you believe someone would pay any of these women five hundred dollars for stripping?”
“They don’t look so bad.”
“Oh come on!” Tiffy pointed at a tall red haired girl in a tight red velvet dress. “Take her. Nose job, liposuction, and fake tits. And there. Bleached hair, chin implant, and fake tits.”
“I’ll give you the tits,” Danny said. “But how could you know the rest?”
“I did graduate third in my cosmetology class, didn’t I? And that one. Thirty-five if she’s a day. Lipo, chemical peel, nose job, bleached hair, and fake tits.” Tiffy snorted. “Not a genuine beauty in the lot.”
“Not like you.” Danny blushed. “Your beauty is natural.”
“How sweet!” Tiffy pinched his cheek. “But how would you know that?”
“Hell, I’ve watched you since I was five. Don’t you think I’d know?”
“Hush now.” The lights dimmed. Music began. “They’re starting.”
Over three songs Champagne went from a cheerleader’s outfit with pom poms and bobby socks to a pair of white panties. The crowd, including Danny, appreciated her efforts. She spent two minutes picking up the currency littering the stage.
“I could do that,” Tiffy muttered.
Misty was next. She wore a nurse’s uniform and was down to a G-string and support hose in three songs, including a heartfelt segment involving a stethoscope staged to Stairway to Heaven. She spent several minutes retrieving several denominations of paper money from the stage.
“What’s so special about her?” Tiffy asked.
“Hold on, Tiffy. Give the girl her due. You should appreciate someone who’s good at their job.”
“Maybe you ought to appreciate them a little less and me a little more.”
Danny stopped clapping. “Sorry.”
The room darkened and the crowd hushed. When the lights came back, Pris sat backwards on a chair facing the audience, her arms folded over the seat and her head in her arms. She wore a simple skirt and blouse, silk stockings and shoes with stiletto heels. She slowly raised her head as Only Women Bleed began to play. Tiffy felt an electric jolt.
“It’s her!” she hissed.
The woman on stage exuded an intoxicating mixture of innocence and sexuality. Her eyes were sad and angry and challenging. Tiffy had never before been intimidated by another woman’s beauty, but there it was. This had to be her. Pris stood as if grabbed and pulled to her feet. She fell backwards against the pole and leaned there breathing heavily and looking angrily at nothing before her. She ripped her shirt open. A button flew across the audience and hit Danny in the face.
“Hey,” he said, rubbing his eye, “that hurt!”
“Quiet!” Tiffy commanded.
Pris moved about the stage with the music, as if fleeing an unseen assailant. She kicked out once and her right shoe flew into the audience.
“Ow!” someone said.
“Shhh!” several voices responded.
She kicked again. Her left shoe knocked a pitcher of beer unnoticed into a bald man’s lap. She ripped her shirt off and threw it into the crowd. She unhooked her dress as she writhed in mock combat and the dress floated off the stage. She fell to the floor, unbuttoning her bra and throwing her arms to her sides as though pinned. She kicked and fought, naked except for her plain cotton panties. She started to pull those down. Men and women both held their collective breath. She flipped onto her hands and knees, her breasts moving back and forth, up and down. She rolled violently over and stood. She smashed the chair against the pole. She picked up a broken leg and stabbed the splintered end repeatedly into the stage. The men in the room clasped their hands over their hearts. The music stopped.
“Holy Jesus,” Danny said.
“Amen,” Tiffy whispered.
Pris slowly stood and looked out over the audience.
“I’d like my clothes back, please,” she said, “line forms to the right.”
A man opened his wallet an
d stuffed the shoe he held with twenties. The bald man did the same with the other shoe and a third wrapped a wad of tens in her shirt. They lined up along the stage with men holding nothing but money. Danny wrapped the button in a fifty-dollar bill and got in line behind a man holding a bra he had brought himself and stuffed with singles. Pris smiled at the bald man. He was the only one so graced. He sat down with a face so smug that the heavy metal pretenders in the back resolved to later beat him senseless. Pris clutched her clothes and went backstage. Danny returned and set two beers on the table. Tiffy stood.
“Where you going?”
“To enter that contest.”
“I won’t allow it!”
Tiffy took Danny’s face in her hand and squeezed so hard his cheeks met between his teeth and painful tears came to his eyes.
“Don’t ever tell me what I can or can’t do.”
“Ho kah,” he mumbled. “Har ee.”
Tiffy released him. He rubbed his jaw. She drank deep from her beer.
“All right,” she said, “wish me luck.”
“Good luck.” Danny rubbed his cheek as she elbowed her way to the bar. He regarded the other contestants with pity. Though you’re not the one who needs it, he thought.
“You drive,” Tiffy said.
She got in the Cobra beside Danny. He turned over the engine and shifted into first. He stalled the engine three times.
“It’s a powerful engine. You have to give it more gas.”
Danny lurched into traffic. He drove like a zombie, unnerved and sickly fascinated by what he had beheld. Tiffy took a wad of money from her bra and counted. Danny was afraid and very much her slave.
“You’ve watched me ever since kindergarten but I bet you never saw anything like that.”
“No,” Danny said, “can’t say I have.”
Tiffy had taken the stage seventh out of ten contestants, and after she finished, the remaining three refused to go on. The first six were good, but when introduced for judgment, the audience booed until Tiffy took the stage to unanimous applause. Danny was unaware of her decisive victory until he came out of the bathroom where he was cleaning up after an unfortunate accident that had dampened his lap.
“Spilled my beer,” he had told her.
Duncan Delaney and the Cadillac of Doom Page 14
