Parallel Lies (26 page)

“Gail,” she said, her voice now husky and raw. She intended to earn every penny.

“Fernando,” he lied. They shook hands, hers frail and delicate, not at all what he had expected. She kissed him lightly on the cheek and walked past him, the scent more intense. She wore a tailored, blood red jacket, buttoned to emphasize
her chest. Her pleated black skirt reminded him of a schoolgirl, except for the smooth curve of her hips.

She placed her handbag on the bedside table and turned to face him. “In town for long?”

“A couple days is all.”

“You flew in from?”

“Train, actually,” he said, waiting to see her reaction.

She smiled, amused. “I love trains.”

“Last romantic way to travel,” he said.

“I couldn’t agree more.”

He couldn’t have scripted it any better. He said, “Do I pay you now?”

“No business, please. Your credit card was charged when I confirmed you were in your room. You
are
a regular on the site?” she asked suspiciously.

“A friend of Takimachi,” he answered.

She smiled. “Oh, yes. Fine.”

“Ohio,” he said, answering her initial question.

“Do you live in Ohio?”

“No, I don’t live there. It was business. Same as New York.” He moved toward the minibar. “Drink?”

“No, thank you. But go ahead. I’ll just take a minute.” She pointed to the bathroom.

“While you’re in there, please lose the wig,” he instructed her, “and remove the eye makeup as well. I like the feel of a woman’s hair.” He added, “I like a woman plain. God given. I’d like to undress you, if that’s all right?”

“This is your time, Fernando. I’m here for you. Whatever you like. However you like it.” She didn’t look or sound the least put off by his request.
Probably hears a lot worse than that,
he thought. She nodded obediently. “We’re going to have fun, Fernando.”

He found her confidence disarming.

“Leave the bathroom door open,” he told her.

“Excuse me?” Again, surprise.

“I want you to leave the bathroom door open. I want to watch. And remember: I want to undress you.”

“I need a private moment, Fernando.”

“Then take one, but with the door open.”

Now she looked troubled. He wanted her on her heels. “I beg your pardon?” she said.

“Listen,” he answered, “it can’t be disrobing that bothers you. Not even using the toilet—you must have freaks who like that stuff as well.”

Her brow knitted, but then she forced it smooth and she relaxed, letting the customer have his way.

“And if it’s drugs…you should know that the idea of that turns me on: a woman giving up control of herself like that. Not that I want any. Whatever it is, do it in front of me. Right here,” he pointed to the bed. A puzzled expression gave way to submission. She nodded reluctantly. “Never mind the bathroom then.” She slipped a small glass bottle from her purse and spooned a substantial amount of cocaine up her nose, her eyes nearly constantly on him.

“I will undress you now,” he said. “Remove the wig.” He motioned to the room’s mirror. “And also the contact lenses.”

She snorted even more cocaine and put away the small vial. “Fine.” This word she had at the ready.

He took her by the hips from behind and turned her so that she addressed the mirror. She carefully lifted the wig and pulled it off her head. She shook out her hair and asked if he wanted her to comb it out. Alvarez stepped behind her, told her not to worry about it, and then helped her out of her waist-length jacket. He carefully unfastened a hook and unzipped her black skirt. He pulled it down around her ankles, revealing a red garter belt over a red lace thong that disappeared into her cheeks. He sensed no nervousness in her whatsoever, a woman accustomed to others undressing her. His own heart rate had doubled.

“Would you like me to hang it up?” he asked.

“If you don’t mind. Yes, please.” She toyed with her hair, again trying to improve its look. “I can brush it out,” she offered again.

“No,” he said, clipping the skirt to a hanger. He returned, reached around her, making contact with both breasts, and slowly unbuttoned her cream-colored blouse. “Just like that is fine.”

“I’d prefer to leave my face on,” she said. “I made myself pretty for you, Fernando.”

He slipped the blouse off her. “I prefer an honest face to one adorned,” he explained.
And I want the camera to clearly see you.

“What do you mean by an honest face?” she asked, clearly troubled. “Are you insulting me?”

“Insulting? I’m complimenting you, Gail. This face of yours isn’t close to your real face, is it? I think not. Not in the slightest. You’re probably a much more beautiful woman without all of that. Do you use warm water or cold?” He pointed toward the bathroom.

“I’m afraid it’s not negotiable,” she protested. “My face stays as is.”

“How long to redo it? An hour? I’ll pay for the extra hour.” He pulled out a wad of bills. “Cash,” he added.

“One cloth hot, the other warm,” she answered.

Alvarez returned with the two washcloths, and she began working through layers of color, the accents to her cheeks, the highly decorated eyes. “It’s a strange thing to ask,” she said, mostly to herself.

“Have you never been asked this before?”

“Never.” Clearly uncomfortable to discuss such things, she gave in to her client’s questioning and informed him, “Oh, sometimes I add something. Some men prefer a certain look, you know?”

“I like a woman to be herself, not an invention.” He made sure she heard each word that followed. “Except for the occasional
party, my wife never wore any makeup at all. None.” He had hoped she might fish for more information, but not this one. She’d been well trained, well schooled. “My use of the past tense was supposed to incite curiosity on your part.” The bra was black satin. He unhooked it and slid its straps down her arms. No gooseflesh; no response on her part whatsoever. His blood pressure now chased his pulse. His mouth was dry. Her pupils were dilated from the coke.

“Was it?” she asked.

“Absolutely.”

“Then I’ve disappointed you,” she apologized. “I’m sorry. Shall I ask you now?”

“She’s dead, you see,” he explained, interrupting. “It was ruled an accident, but to me it was murder.”

“Murder?” She frowned, disturbing her practiced smile. Alvarez fell to his knees and gently drew the garter belt and the red silk thong slowly down the length of her tan legs. His head came even with her waist. He took her by the hips and turned her around slowly so that she faced the camera in full frontal nudity. The transformation complete, it was no longer a fifteen-hundred-dollar-an-hour call girl with a captivating face and million-dollar body. It was Gretchen Goheen.

She lived for the way they worshiped her, the way they physically responded so quickly to her. She loved this sense of dominance, of total control. They became putty in her company. Grown men. Some of the most powerful—certainly the richest—men in the world. For an hour or two they placed her above all other women on the face of the earth. And though the hour was theirs, ironically most would do anything she asked.

He knew nearly everything there was to know about Gretchen Goheen. She had been educated at Choate and
Princeton, afforded privileges—the private jets, the presidential suites, the limousines, nannies, maids, and kitchen servants—that only a handful of children ever saw. She had lost her mother to alcoholism, although the press had reported the death as cancer, when she was just fifteen. Alvarez assumed that Keith O’Malley, who played cleanup hitter for his boss, had skillfully kept Leslie Goheen’s drug and alcohol abuse hidden inside the walls of private clinics. Reading her
New York Times
obituary, one heard of the philanthropic socialite. It had taken him some digging to discover the Midwestern adolescent swept off her feet by the Machiavellian husband who knew nothing but work, competition, and excess. And girls. Alvarez believed her husband’s philandering had probably driven Leslie Goheen to the bottle in the first place.

Gretchen’s experimentation with drugs and alcohol had begun during her junior year in prep school—she’d received a two-week suspension, as well as a two-week vacation with friends to Amsterdam. He could imagine that the boys had always lined up for her, falling at her feet. Perhaps she’d developed an addiction to their desire that proved stronger than her own ability to resist them. No doubt she had slept with dozens of college boys, always aiming for the older and more experienced. She had learned how to please. With an absentee father, who she knew took women on the side, Gretchen had became overcome with a need for more partners, more attention, more adoration. When they became complacent—even a whiff of complacency—they were out the door.

Some event had precipitated the move to professional call girl. One of her father’s glamorous parties where some drunken executive had cornered her, only to offer her money to keep silent about it? A drug habit that needed financing? A sex addiction that went bad? Blackmail? There was no evidence to explain this, and Alvarez was no psychologist.
But the adoring, rich, absentee father certainly played a big part in this transformation of socialite into elite escort.

Perhaps her psychiatrist (she had seen him twice a week for nearly a year) had said she was trying to hurt her father through her actions. Whatever the case, she had stopped the sessions.

Alvarez believed that sometime around the summer before she headed off to Princeton, Gretchen Goheen had accepted gainful employment as one of the most sought after call girls in New York City. Five years later at the ripe age of twenty-three, she had checked in to an exclusive Arizona “spa”—a treatment center—probably for a cocaine addiction. Alvarez believed that Keith O’Malley had been Gretchen’s savior throughout. Perhaps O’Malley himself had slept with her, or still did, though Alvarez could find no proof of this connection. What seemed obvious was that O’Malley shielded Goheen from as much as possible, including his own family’s problems. It suggested a liaison between O’Malley and Gretchen that Alvarez hoped to exploit.

With Gretchen Goheen stripped naked and standing in front of him in nothing but a pair of black heels, Alvarez briefly felt tempted to help himself to her wares. He told himself that any male would feel the same, despite his moment of self-loathing for being so predictable. Grabbing her wide, sumptuous hips, as if ready to explore her, he instead backed her up to the bed, gently sitting her down on its edge.

“Whatever you like, however you like it,” she said in a warm, womanly purr. “My time is yours.”

He stood, intentionally blocking her way to the door. He stood so that he towered over her, gaining a psychological advantage. He swallowed, clearing his throat and gaining his courage, knowing that if successful this oratory might save
hundreds of lives. Lives that would otherwise be on his conscience forever.

“Ms. Goheen,” he said, immediately having to reach out and force her back down to the bed, preventing her escape. “I’m not the police.” She continued to struggle, so he stepped aside and let her jump to her feet. “If you leave,” he called out loudly to her as she freed the skirt from the closet, not bothering with the underwear, “your father’s life is in your hands alone. I can’t help you.” That won a reprieve. She looked even more sexy to him, with her flushed, bare chest and the skirt cockeyed on her waist. Her rapid breathing was audible. Her lips trembled, and he realized she was trying to speak. He wanted this to be a soliloquy, not a discussion. He continued, “My name is Alvarez. I’m the one your father and O’Malley are after. I’m the one whose wife was killed at the railroad crossing in Genoa, Illinois. You know about this, right?” He saw no indication that she had heard so much as a word, but he stayed with his plan. “Your father and O’Malley must confess the truth of my family’s tragedy. That is all I ask—all I’ve ever asked: the truth. It’s not money I’m after, only the truth—and for all the world to hear. I have tried to get through to your father. I have failed. He has lost a great deal of property, and still he doesn’t listen. But he may listen to you.”

“Oh, my God.” Said like a person coming awake.