Richfield & Rivers Mystery Series 2 - Stellium in Scorpio (22 page)

I
was missile locked on his image in my rearview mirror, something about the way
his green pants hung. "He's not a cop," I said and dialed 911,
handing Callie my cell phone as the man in uniform swaggered toward us.

Callie
asked for dispatch. "They're taking forever!" Her voice contained a
frantic note. The officer was halfway to the car. Someone came on the line and
Callie gave them the squad car number. The officer dropped his pen on the
ground ten feet from our car and leaned over to pick it up. Callie listened to
the operator. The officer's belt buckle and chest blotted out the landscape and
filled our car window. She hung up and repeated almost inaudibly, "Not a
Nevada police car. They're sending backup."

He
bent down and leaned his head in to see us. "Hello, ladies."

My
mind was racing; he could kill us right now. Callie went silent, clenching the
armrest with fingers that went white at the knuckles. He asked for my driver's
license. I reached into my pocket, making a mental note that my gun was in the
console and not accessible, but I had the short-handled fire ax I always
carried next to me between my seat and the door. I could swing the door open as
if getting out, and then smash it against him, giving me time to grab the ax.

"What
did I do, Officer?" I asked flatly.

"Tell
you in a minute," he said and went back to his car and picked up the
radio, seemingly checking my license. I took my gun out of the console,
snapping shut the barrel.

"There's
no safety on these, so don't touch it," I warned, sliding it between my
seat and the console and putting the edge of Callie's purse over it.

He
was back at the window and said, "Ten miles over the speed limit. I'm
going to write you a warning." He looked into my eyes. "You ever had
a warning before?" And before I could answer, he opened his silver book,
wrote something, and ripped the page out, giving me a copy. He sauntered back
to his vehicle, and I let a whoosh of air escape from my lungs as I watched him
depart. I absently handed the warning to Callie.

"Look
at this," Callie whispered.

The
police car pulled out and slowly cruised past us.

"It's
not a ticket. It says, 'Ring the vault,'" Callie said.

My
skin was covered in goose bumps. "I was right; he wasn't a cop. I swear to
God he looked like security-asshole-Ted. That jutting chin looked just like
Ted."

"He's
setting a trap," Callie said.

"What
do you mean, a trap?"

"That's
all I know."

"Well
you know, nobody knows enough! Everybody knows something they can't explain or
share or figure out, and it's just not very damned helpful!" I said,
losing my cool.

"Being
psychic isn't like putting a penny in a gumball machine, Teague. At least not
for me. I get what I get. I don't know why or how or when. So stop berating me
because I don't have the whole story."

"You're
right. I'm sorry. I'm just nervous. Hell, I don't know anything, so you're ahead
of me."

"You
knew he wasn't a real cop. How did you know that?" Callie asked.

"Green
pants. Nevada HP wear blue."

It
seemed forever before the red flashing lights lit up the dark night sky and the
police backup went by us in the opposite direction. We didn't bother to flag
them down. The crisis was long over. We drove slowly back to town, shaken by
what had happened and still trying to piece together the puzzle.

"There's
a boy porn ring. That much we know, if we can judge from Joey," I said.

"But
what does that have to do with Rose? And who's going to such trouble to keep us
out of it?" Callie remarked. "We think Mo wanted the ring broken up;
Karla doesn't seem to think it exists, and someone in the hotel is making sure
the ring stays alive."

"Where
does the money from this ring go? I'm sure it's not tunneled into the hotel
coffers. No one wants that audit nightmare. We need to find out where the
money's flowing," I said. "Ring the vault. Just phone?"

"It
must be the dealer's ring that gets us into the vault. We need to find a way
down into the tunnel. I think the answer's in the tunnel. That's the image I
get when I meditate," Callie said.

"Well,
walking through the cash room of a big casino without being an employee with
security clearance is about like getting into Fort Knox," I reminded her.
"While Ted was jotting us a note, it would have been nice if he could have
told us how to get to the vault."

"Someone
will tell us. They want us there," Callie said quietly.

I
spoke with Loomis at the front desk as we checked in to tell her we'd been
warned not to return and looked into her eyes for a sign that she was the one
who had called us on the road. Her expression was impassive, and she said she
was delighted that we had chosen the Desert Star for our stay. I told her I
wanted security to keep an eye on us and our room, and that I'd let my police
contacts know we were back in the hotel. She didn't have to know that my police
contact was Wade, and he was in Tulsa, not Las Vegas. Saying his name reminded
me to call him. I stepped outside to get reception on my cell phone and to
avoid the glass panels in the lobby, and I rang Wade's desk. After a few
minutes of describing our situation, I could almost hear his big jaw stiffen.

"Teague,
do you really need to check back into that place? Vegas has its share of bad
guys."

"Something's
happening here, and I think we have to be here to find out what it is."

"Want
me to come out?"

"You've
got no jurisdiction here," I said.

"Yeah,
but I got a hell of a lot of testosterone!"

I
grinned at his macho offering. He was a true friend. "Tell you what, keep
searching the players for me, and I'll take a rain check on the hormones."

"Don't
wait until it's too late; I don't own a black suit. By the way, nobody at the
hotel, as far as I can tell, ever worked for the newspaper. Happy?"

"No.
But thanks."

I
returned to the front desk, where Callie was still
waiting for our room keys. She'd requested room 1250, the room we had before.

"You
want the same room?" I whispered.

"So
we can try to find the source of the videotaping." She turned her head so
that no one could hear her as Harem Girl Harriet typed our information into the
computer.

Suddenly
Ms. Loomis looked over Harriet's shoulder, placed her hand lightly over
Harriet's briskly typing fingers, and caused her to pause mid-strike. With a
flick of her finger, Loomis pointed to something on the screen, then looking up
she said, "I think you'll like the view in room 1248, and housekeeping
hasn't cleaned room 1250 yet." Loomis's eyes held mine for just a second
too long, making me wonder what she was up to.

She’s
moved us to a room that doesn't add up to eight,
I thought.

"Six,"
Callie said, reading my mind.

"Thanks
for taking a personal interest in our comfort," I said.

"I
see Mr. Elmo is still with you." She smiled and began talking a moderate
baby talk to him.

In
another twenty minutes we were in 1248, had tipped Desert Bellman Bob, tossed
off our trip-wrinkled clothes, and flopped back onto the bed.

"Shower,"
I said, dragging myself away from her. "Got to do it before I pass out. My
adrenaline high is starting to ebb." I kissed her quickly and headed for
the bathroom, turning on the water and letting it steam up the room, then
climbing in and savoring the hot water pulsing across my back and buttocks.
Callie's hand reached into the shower and turned the water down to tepid.

"Hot
showers zap your strength," she said. "Cool is better."

"No!"
I complained as she stepped into the shower with me.

"Hot
baths killed off the Roman Empire, cooked their sperm so they couldn't
reproduce," she said, placing her hand between my legs.

"Probably
saved a lot of women from having to be pregnant in a very dirty and disgusting
time," I said, rubbing the soap into my hands and then onto her stomach,
shoulders, and back, then turning her away from me so I could gently scratch
and rub her soapy back. She leaned into me.

"Now
don't you love cool showers?" she said and reached back between my legs.

"I
will take a bath in ice water if you will do exactly what you're doing
now." She turned to face me and put her cool, sensual body against mine,
the water flowing down around us like a waterfall. She kissed me until I was so
hot I could have made the water steam from my own body heat, and then focused
on one small area of my anatomy, massaging all the tension out of my entire
body through that single spot.

"Would
you like to finish this in bed?"

"Too
late," I moaned, climaxing only minutes into our lovemaking. "I can
be harder to get?" I tried to defend myself.

"Really?"
she said and resumed where she left off, getting exactly the same results in
only slightly more time. I was a limp rag.

"Okay,"
I breathed. "I am so damned easy it's embarrassing."

Callie
grinned, patted my behind in a brisk upbeat way, and hopped out of the shower,
her voice trailing. "But you're very sexy, darling."

I
stood under the pulsing showerhead, shaking my head in wonder. This woman
really had me, literally and psychologically.

I
dried off and slid into bed next to Callie, anxious to return the favor. She
was sitting up, her shirt off, her glasses propped down on her long,
exquisitely shaped nose, reading a book on energy transformation. She fended
off my advances by capturing my arms and wrapping them around her waist and
continuing to read.

"This
is just one more example of your being in control of the relationship instead
of its being mutual. This is the second time you've fended me off after making
love to me and—"

"I
thought we were just having impermanent sex and not a relationship," she
tortured me.

"Well,
yes, that was the deal, but it has to be two-way impermanent sex," I
insisted.

"You
keep changing the rules," she said, absently massaging my neck with one
hand as she continued to read. I fell asleep before I could complain any
further.

Elmo
and I awoke several hours later. Outside our room other hotel guests in the
hallway were preparing for their vacation sightseeing or their business
meetings. The morning paper slid into the room under the door, and Callie
bounced out of bed to get it and make me some coffee and find herself a Coke.
The front page featured yet another story on Johnathon Burr. The paper said
that he was drunk when he fell to his death. I told Callie that I hated to ruin
her day, but we needed to pick up where we left off, and that meant a trip to
the morgue.

On
the drive over, I rang Rose's cell phone. Callie knew exactly what I was up to,
and she took the phone away so that she could deliver the message in a more
palatable fashion.

"Rose,
it's Callie Rivers," she said when Rose answered. "Elliot said Sophia
was the one who found Joanie's body. We're on the way to the morgue to see
her." There was a long pause while Rose sobbed and attempted to collect
herself. "Is it true that your friend Sophia found Joanie dead?"
There was apparently an affirmation from the other end of the phone. Then
Callie asked if Sophia would talk to her about what she saw when she went to
Joanie's house. That must have sent Rose into a nervous state, because Callie
begged her not to hang up and told her that we desperately needed to talk to
Sophia. The phone went dead.

"Scared
girl," I said. And we drove in silence.

∗ ∗ ∗ ∗

The
morgue was a strange conglomeration of dead misfits. People who'd arrived in
town on a big vacation and had died of a heart attack from too much sex, too
much food, or too much excitement; guys who'd overdosed in their hotel rooms;
and old folks who'd come to gamble their social security checks, and ten
thousand nickels later had keeled over. The guy in charge of the records said
many of the bodies went unclaimed. Maybe they were out of touch with family
before they showed up here. Maybe their families had decided that their
gambling had used up whatever would have covered their burial. Whatever the
reasons, the morgue drawers were crowded and the lobby was empty.

Callie
talked the skinny, pimply-faced desk jockey into violating at least ten rules
by letting us have a look at drawer 137, where Johnathon Burr, aka Joanie Burr,
was laid out. The skinny guardian of the dead turned his back to let us slip
past him into the morgue and said quietly, "Might as well. No one else has
come to see him. Ten minutes."

The
morgue room was depressing and freezing cold. The center of the room hosted
steel tables on sturdy gurneys, the entire area illuminated by lights that
could be lowered over the body during autopsy. Lining the walls were huge steel
sinks which I imagined had unspeakable contents dumped down their drains, and
beneath the sinks lay floors with permanent dark stains in them. Along two
walls were the most recently dead. Drawer number 137 loomed large. I strode
over, trying not to show how much this place creeped me out and wanting to get
the whole thing over with. I slid the long filing-cabinet-type gray drawer
toward me. A dead man's feet emerged with a toe tag and number on it. The tag
read Johnathon Burr.