Project Northwest

by C. B. Carter

  She was yelling before she even turned around. “What did you call me?” Every head in earshot turned and watched the scene unfold. “I said what did you call me? Correct me if I’m wrong, but did you just call me a bitch?”

  He refused to answer. He instead chose to pull a twenty from his wallet and toss it on the table.

  Two security guys were on the spot before the twenty even floated to the table. One bouncer grabbed him by the back of the neck. His hands were massive and heavy. They escorted him to the door and pushed him out. “Come back when you have a little class and can handle rejection.”

  A second associate, in as many as three days, had been tossed from The Lounge. Mr. Wright’s team was batting zero.

  James walked in as the associate was being forcefully removed. He didn’t take any special notice of the incident. He knew security at The Lounge had a reputation for being tough, a reputation they wanted everyone to know and wanted everyone to exaggerate. He saw Bridget, who was already back to work, thinking nothing of what just happened. James caught her attention and she waved and raised two fingers, their little code for the area she was working.

  He ordered a Saison Dupont and savored the earthy, herbal flavor of the beer. It was the perfect way to wind down what had been a pretty good day. Well, except for the fact that he was breaking the law and there was a good chance he would be in jail or dead before the month was over with. The Dupont did it’s best to make him forget his problems.

  The band was up and started to play its second set.

  James went to the booth area on the stage floor and looked for a booth with an available seat. Soon, he was sitting with three guys from Shoreline, answering questions about what happened to his face.

  “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”

  Bridget slipped James a note:

  “I have every reason in the world to hate you right now, you lied to me. But my heart tells me this is the time to find a reason to love you. And that’s exactly what I’m going to do.”

  James read the note a couple of times, went to the men’s room, balled it up, and flushed it down the toilet.

  When Bridget made her way back to the table, James pulled her into his lap and whispered, “I adore and am amazed in everything about you.”

  “You’d better be.” She snuck a quick kiss and took the drink orders for the table.

  After about an hour of having a good time with the guys, with them congratulating him on landing such a beautiful girl as Bridget, they all felt like they were getting the VIP treatment. Their table was always first, the drinks never empty. James made it obvious that his phone wasn’t working for some reason and pointed at the cell phone on the table. “Do you mind?”

  “Not at all,” said his new friend, pushing the phone toward James.

  James didn’t pick up the phone. He instead dialed Marks number while it sat on the table and put it on speaker.

  Mark DeSantis recognized the area code and answered only with, “Got it. Will know Monday. Check personal pages, Sam.”

  James pressed end–call and watched Bridget light up the room as she visited table after table like a beautiful butterfly.

  * * * *

  Mr. Wright was livid, screaming at the associate who had been tossed. “Don’t you know you don’t call a girl a bitch in this day and age? What the hell were you thinking?”

  “But she was being a bitch. She was jumping all over me with attitude. What should I have done?”

  “What should you have done? Well, get up and walk away is an option that comes to mind. Take the tongue-lashing is another option. Hell, she was walking away wasn’t she?” Mr. Wright was shaking his head in disbelief.

  After he calmed down, he said, “Look, you’re young, so I’m going to cut you some slack, but I’m going to give you some advice that just might save your life someday. Never, ever, call a girl a bitch or cunt. They will flip out on you like a raccoon with wetnaps. Ever seen a raccoon with wetnaps?”

  “No.”

  “It drives them crazy. They lose their fucking minds.”

  The other associates watched and listened to the berating of their fellow team member, chuckled at the thought of the raccoon’s frustration with the man-made wetnap. They were sure it would blow the animal’s mind.

  “I’m fucking running out of associates to send in there, and we still don’t know why she was there Sunday night. If we lose control of this mark, we are screwed in a big way. I mean heads will roll, careers ruined, people hurt,” he snapped. He gave a stern look to the two guys chuckling. The message was clear to everyone in the Tahoe, quit messing up and get the job done.

  “I’ll deal with you later,” he threatened.

  “Okay, so she’s in there until what one A.M., right?” Mr. Wright asked in the general direction of the associates in the back seat.

  “Yes, sir. She’s scheduled from five to one.”

  “Associate one, gear up. You’re going in to keep an eye on both of them, use your cell phone’s video to record any contact between her and him and her and any of her co-workers. Who is working tonight that was there Sunday night? Your cell phone is fully charged, right?”

  “Yes, sir, it is. Tiffany Fitzpatrick and Cindy Stanton were there Sunday.”

  “Finally, someone is prepared. Get in there, stay sober, don’t be obvious with the recording, and for the love of God, don’t do anything to get kicked out. Focus on those two co-workers.”

  The associate donned the bluetooth device, did a radio check, exited the Tahoe, and entered The Lounge. He quickly found Bridget, but couldn’t find James at first. Walking the stage floor, he found him sitting at a booth with three other guys. They were all talking and having a good time. He found a perfect spot near a wall and pretended to record the band, but he was really doing exactly as Mr. Wright had instructed, recording every contact between Bridget and James.

  He walked around and put a face to the names of Tiffany and Cindy and watched and recorded any interaction between them and Bridget.

  Mr. Wright instructed the driver to take him back to the condo, return to this exact spot, and be ready to tail them if they went on another late night love fest.

  When he reached condo 503, he reviewed all the high-lighted footage of the day and didn’t see anything that concerned him. Bridget looked beautiful exiting the shower and she somehow even looked sexy cleaning up the condo. She then made her way to her apartment and as expected, gave notice to her landlord. James had been reined in.

  “We lost a mic in her apartment?” Mr. Wright asked looking at the log.

  “Yes, sir, she watered it by mistake. I replaced it.”

  “Very well,” said Mr. Wright, taking his favorite spot on the couch.

  Except for the inability to keep a live body in The Lounge, all was going as expected.

  He tossed Cricket the log and said, “How are we doing on the pictures?”

  “They came out very good, would you like to see them?”

  “Yes, let’s see how they turned out. I could use some good news.”

  Cricket grabbed the manila folder, sat on the couch next to Wright, and spread the pictures out on the coffee table into two separate piles, one dedicated to the before pictures and the other to the photoshopped after pictures.

  Cricket explained, “This is the original, untouched picture of Spenser and Spain at the Wild Ginger today. You’ll note it looks exactly as it was, two co-workers out for a quick lunch. There’s nothing there to indicate they are having a romantic dinner and nothing to arouse the suspicion of Spain’s girlfriend.”

  “Yes, I see, go on,” directed Mr. Wright.

  “This is the same picture after being photoshopped in Adobe. You can see, I’ve made the table smaller, bringing them closer so that their knees almost touch, and placed a white tablecloth over the bamboo table. Also added two candles and placed in a nice bouquet of flowers toward the back of the table. Of course, I removed anything that was Asian or looked like a lunc
h setting. I changed the art to what I thought was a more romantic Italian theme, darkened the overall lighting, and even went as far as to ensure that the candle’s glow was cast correctly on their faces. Even took the time to reset the face of his watch to 8 P.M.”

  “Wow, this is excellent. So you just, what did you call it?”

  “Photoshopped.”

  “You photoshopped the original image and created an entirely different setting. It’s amazing,” said Mr. Wright as he compared the before and after pictures. If he didn’t know any better, he would certainly think Miss Spenser and Mr. Spain were having a very private, very romantic dinner.

  “So I picked the best seven pictures we had, you know, where the faces matched the supposed romantic mood and photoshopped each the same way. I think they are very good, but I can do additional touch-ups if you wish.”

  “No, they are first-rate, Cricket, they will work perfectly,” said Mr. Wright as he viewed each one. “In my experience, women look at the girl in these types of pictures first. It’s some type of deep-seated threat analysis system. They look at her body language. Noting her smile, looking at the direction of the eyes, the placement of her hands and feet, they’re looking for intimacy. They really get pissed when they shift focus on the male mate and see anything that represents pleasure. The only thing I would suggest is adding some nice jewelry, evening jewelry, to her arm. But other than that, it looks great.”

  “Yes, sir,” agreed Cricket, as he collected the pictures and returned to his desk, disappeared behind the servers, and went back to work.

  Mr. Wright took off his shoes and stretched out on the couch. “Are we piped into the mics on James and Bridget?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Put it on the speaker, but keep it low.”

  A few taps on a keyboard and Mr. Wright could hear James talking to a couple of guys in The Lounge while the band played on stage and he could hear short conversations with Bridget while she was pushing drinks.

  “Sir, I just want to say, I think you’re a very wise man. I mean, the talk about history this morning on the conference call and what a woman looks at in pictures, it’s all very perceptive.”

  Mr. Wright closed his eyes. “Quit trying to kiss up, Cricket. The nickname stays.”

  Cricket smiled and selected a nice diamond bracelet off an internet page, one he could imagine a woman wearing on a romantic date, and began applying it to the photographs. He looked over his monitor and saw that Mr. Wright was asleep.

  Chapter Twelve

  ~ An Official Couple ~

  James and Bridget were in the condo at 1:30 A.M. They did not speak of the note scribbled on the robe and James was relieved. It was obvious to him she understood completely and was willing to put her trust in him. He almost tripped over the laundry basket near the dresser, saw the robe folded on top, and had a crushing feeling of guilt. He was happy when he received the two-ring call that morning, even happier when he read her note at The Lounge. But now, seeing the robe—it brought home what he was asking of her. It didn’t escape him that she did seem pre-occupied during the car ride home. She just wasn’t herself and he was fearful of where this might lead.

  They undressed in the dark, him down to his boxers while she put on her favorite pair of cotton pajamas.

  “Something on your mind, baby?” he asked as he inched into bed and hugged up against her. He didn’t bother whispering, they had nothing to hide. Plus, they were both temporarily deaf from the volume of the music.

  “Yes, there is,” she responded inviting him to essentially guess. She did this a lot, the passive aggressive control technique. It was her clever way of getting him to say what she really wanted to say, but didn’t want to say out loud.

  “Does it have to do with the phone call today?”

  “No, not at all James, it’s, well I did something that may be stupid today,” she said as she pushed her hips and butt into him.

  James’s mind raced. What was she about to unload? His thoughts immediately gravitated to Cindy and some mix-up with the phone. Did Mr. Wright now know of Mark? James reined in his paranoia and decided it best to keep the conversation calm.

  “Well, I trust you, so I’m sure whatever it is, it isn’t that bad.”

  “Really?” She looked for permission to say it.

  “Sure, baby, let’s have it. What did you do that you think was stupid?”

  She was silent for a moment or two. The silence was deafening in the dark room and as she usually did, she let the words pour out and he struggled to keep up with her.

  “Remember last Friday when you were at The Lounge and said you had something important to talk about? Well, I think, I mean, I thought I knew what you were going to say, what you were going to ask and I had been waiting for a month for you to, you know, ask it. So I gave ...”

  She paused, as if she couldn’t believe she was about to say it, “I gave my landlord my thirty day notice today.” She rolled over, pushing her face into the pillow. She let out a giddy scream, unable to hide her excitement at the thought of moving in with him. She was here all the time anyway, but this made it official, this advanced the relationship.

  James pulled her shoulders into his chest. “Yes, I remember, and I was going to ask you to move in with me. How did you know? I take it you’re not saying no,” he teased.

  She rolled over. Now they were face to face. “I’m not sure how I knew, it just felt like the right time, seemed like it was the next step.” She mischievously kissed him, pulled back a little, wanting him to come and get her. He devoured her.

  Their love-making was varied and healthy. It was at times completely sexually charged and aggressive, other times it was more intimate and slow. This time it was pure fun. They giggled and laughed amongst the heavy breathing, both enjoying a newfound bond and the sexual freedom that came with it. They were now officially a couple and they both leapt into this new stage of their relationship, new stage of their lives, holding nothing back. They didn’t even notice that for the first time in a long time, they made love under the covers. The fact that they were being watched had sunk into their psyches and now even their private activities had become clandestine.

  She had fallen asleep quickly afterward, most likely dreaming of how she was going to turn his stark, but in his opinion ‘Crisp and Stylish,’ bachelor condominium into a home. She had dropped the hints constantly over the last eight months, ‘...needs a woman’s touch...’ she would say.

  He didn’t care what she did, but had made up his mind. He would stand his ground if any wall even came close to the color pink. Those were his less important thoughts. What he was really trying to hash out was a plan that would keep them alive, keep him out of jail, allow them to be together forever.

  His inability to devise a plan over the last two days invaded his thoughts like background noise, always there and becoming more and more annoying. At times, it was just white noise, similar to when a TV station goes dead. Other times, it was the sound of a jackhammer, each blow signaling the dismantling of his life.

  He closed his eyes and began the rational process as he always did, with what he knew. Mark had the hair, Mark was trustworthy and apparently still unknown to Mr. Wright. Soon, he’d know the identity of the elusive Mr. Wright and now Bridget was on board. Shelly Spenser had stopped the aggressive flirting and had suggested that she was being blackmailed herself, although she could be playing the part of the wounded female in an attempt to gain his trust.

  That’s where the rational process deserted him. None of what he knew leveled the playing field. He was still out-gunned if a gunfight were to erupt. As the night before, he had the sinking feeling that he was overmatched and could not do this alone. The next logical step—

  he had to bring Mark in deeper. He didn’t want to do it, but saw no other choice.

  He was sure Mark wouldn’t refuse any request for help. They had been best friends since their freshman year in college and in one instance, James had saved his life.
‘Saved’ was entirely the wrong word. There was no saving Mark. The more appropriate phrase is along the lines of he had ‘prevented him from being killed.’ Now the tables had turned.

  James brought his arms under his head and leered into the past, almost seven years ago.

  A smooth tongue can get you far with the ladies and Mark could certainly do that, but it does little to subdue an enraged boyfriend wielding an aluminum baseball bat, a pissed off boyfriend who was willing to take the confrontation all the way.

  Mark, due to his natural ability, and, as most natural abilities go, it had a curse if used in the wrong way, found himself in trouble with jealous boyfriends at least once or twice a year. He’d suffered busted lips, lumps on the head, black eyes, and busted noses, but always failed to understand why he was being targeted. “Why blame me?” he would say. “They should be mad at the girl, not me.” James could never get Mark to appreciate the complexity of the argument of who was more responsible, the drug pusher or the drug user?

  James had just settled into bed after studying for his upcoming chemistry test when Mark burst into the room, winded, with only his boxers and one sock on.

  Mark quickly locked the flimsy door and backed up toward the far wall, stopping when he backed into the desk. Everyone, after the ordeal, could swear they had felt the floor shake as the hulk of a young man, a country boy known only as Bama, because he came from Alabama, ran down the hallway and didn’t even stop when he met the locked door.

  Mark, five inches shorter than Bama, couldn’t put up a fight and took the full force of the aluminum baseball bat to his head. He instantly went limp and fell to the floor.

  It became obvious to James and to the other dorm mates now standing in in his doorway, straining to see what was happening that Bama was not posturing. He didn’t say anything before the first swing. He didn’t ask why or give Mark a chance to talk his way out. He was there to kill him. One freshman from the hall, who had been crossed by Mark earlier in the year, shouted, “Kick his ass!”