Richfield & Rivers Mystery Series 2 - Stellium in Scorpio (4 page)

"I
will be happy to upgrade you to a suite free of charge, and the hotel is sorry
you've experienced this inconvenience," she said in a decidedly unsorry
tone.

Callie
thanked her. Harem Girl Gloria yanked the printout off the machine, slapped two
room key cards down on the desk, and rang for the bellman. We were headed to
suite 1142.

"Gotta
get one more piece of luggage," I said.

"What's
in it? Can't we get it later?"

"Elmo."
I grinned.

"You
brought Elmo?" She lit up. "How are you going to get him in
here?"

"Can't
tell you or I'd have to kill you!" I teased.

"Don't
say things like that. Words have power," she said, somewhat shocked.

"Sorry,
meant to say that information is classified," I replied. "Be right
back."

Borrowing
a luggage cart from the lobby, I wheeled it out to the Jeep, opened the empty
suitcase with the air holes I'd cut in it and said, "Okay, guy, hop
in." Elmo jumped in just like I'd taught him. I carefully removed the suitcase
from the Jeep and lifted it onto the cart. "No barking, no moaning,"
I ordered as I pushed the cart across the parking lot, handed the doorman my
car keys, and asked him to have someone get the remainder of my luggage from
the Jeep and bring it to my room before valet-parking my vehicle.

I
joined Callie and the bellman and the three of us, plus the incognito canine,
stepped into the elevator. Two golden rams on the elevator doors came together
butting heads, and the elevator swept us silently up eleven floors.

Elmo
got wind of Callie's perfume and began to wiggle and make a very tiny sound of
excitement. I coughed to cover it, but Elmo moaned incessantly and Callie
giggled uncontrollably.

The
bellman unlocked the door to 1142. It was a gorgeous bedroom with two
king-sized beds and off to one side a sitting room with swag curtains pulled
back on either side of a huge chaise lounge. Everything was desert brothel
motif. Callie and I moved through the room, grinning at our good luck. A
wonderfully stocked refrigerator, the mattresses were so new you could bounce a
quarter off them, and the view of the Strip was breathtaking. The bellman
started to lift Elmo in his suitcase from the cart.

"Whoa,
leave that one, please. I'll take care of it in a minute, and I'll push the
cart outside." He paused, but I tipped him generously and to the point
that he left not caring what I had in the bag.

I
closed the door on the world and put my arms around Callie Rivers and felt her
soft, warm, full lips slide effortlessly over and around my mouth. We held each
other gently, just our fingertips touching each other's waists, a space between
our bodies, so that only our lips met, only the softness of our mouths greeted
one another as if any other pressure might take away from this most sensual of
hellos. It was hypnotic, and I swayed slightly from the amazing heat that
spread down my neck, across my chest, and into my groin. It was the
unquenchable hunger of ten weeks. It was the insatiable lust often weeks. It
was the moment I had envisioned endlessly—for ten weeks!

"My
God, I just want to devour you," I whispered.

Suddenly
the suitcase began to move and Elmo whined, battering at its sides to get out.

"Elmo,
sorry, here, honey." I unzipped the bag and he escaped into Callie's arms,
his tail wagging furiously. He let out a large bark and we both tensed and
shouted, "Shh!" at the same time, giggling like teenagers.

"How
will we disguise him to get him up and down stairs to walk him?" Callie
asked.

"He
can wear your clothes. You won't be needing them." I grabbed her and began
unbuttoning her shirt, burying my face in her breasts.

"Stay
right where you are. I'm going into the bathroom for just a moment..."

"Based
on the size of this room, there may be a swimming pool in the bathroom." I
kissed her again, unable to let her go.

Callie
disappeared into the bathroom for only a second and then, shrieking, backed out
of the room and crashed into me. "Call security!" She slammed the
bathroom door shut. "There's a dead man in the tub!"

I
pushed the bathroom door open and saw the man lying there, wearing a tuxedo,
his head jammed back under the faucets, his arm dangling over the side of the
tub. On his little finger a gold signet ring bore the image of a bird, its leg
poised in the air, its claw extended to do battle.

"Teague,
close the door, please. I don't want to look at him," Callie whispered,
and Elmo growled in agreement, seemingly ready to attack the corpse for the
intrusion.

Security
had said they'd be right up. We stood outside in the hallway, waiting. A maid
scurried up to us with a load of linens on her arm.

"I
forgot the towels, sorry." She reached around me to put her master key in
the lock.

"Don't
go in there!" I nearly shouted.

The
maid jumped back, apparently startled. I took the towels from her, saying we'd
put them inside for her. I laid them on the floor as Callie fidgeted. We were
both in a state of shock. There's something about seeing a dead body, even if
it's only for a few seconds, that imprints on your mind. A gray, thick-skinned,
rubbery corpse lying in state at the local funeral parlor is upsetting enough,
but freshly killed bodies, stiff but still pink, blood still oozing, are enough
to give you the creeps for months. I'd seen a lot of bodies during my brief stint
as a police officer, and like snakes, I was okay with them as long as I wasn't
surprised by them. If I went to a crime scene, I expected to find bodies, but
finding one in the bathroom of our luxury hotel room was an entirely different
matter.

Like
a kid wanting to cut and run, I told Callie we could speed this whole process
up if we went down to security ourselves. Callie said maybe we should guard the
hotel room door. I assured her that the dead guy didn't need guarding, and the
two of us headed down the long corridor toward the elevators with Elmo in tow.
We quickly spotted two hotel employees in bright red jackets heading back in
our direction. The older, shorter man had his sparse white hair sheared into a
flattop and moved in the strained way of a pudgy person in a hurry—his creased
pants tugging with each step. His jacket had the word Security emblazoned over
the left pocket. I was comforted that his name tag simply stated Roy. Not Harem
Guard Roy or Tent Tender Roy, just Roy. The younger man looked like he could
lift an SUV with one arm on any given afternoon and wore the name tag Ted. I
skipped the introductions and told them to follow us.

"You
say he was in your room when you got back?" Roy asked.

"We
weren't back from anywhere," Callie said. "We'd just checked
in."

Roy
let me know how seriously the hotel was taking our call when he drew his gun,
popped the lock with his master key, and he and brick-shit-house-Ted slipped
inside alone. Seconds later, Roy pushed the door open and beckoned us to enter.
The bathroom door was open, the tub clearly visible. There was no body in it.

"The
guy was in the tub, you say?" Roy sagged into an adrenaline low.

Callie
and I stared at the pristine bathroom. Nothing out of place, certainly no dead
guy lounging under the faucets. I went into action opening closets, looking
under beds, checking balconies. There was no one there.

"Wearing
a tuxedo," I said. Ted shot Roy a look that said
these ladies may just
be bonkers.

"Could
be some drunk stumbled in here while the maid was cleaning, you know, behind
her back and fell into the tub. We've had stranger things happen." Roy let
out a sigh of relief on behalf of hotel security, legal, and public relations.

"This
man was dead," Callie said.

"You
seen a lot of dead people, miss? I mean, excuse me for saying so, but when
you're upset, you know..."

Roy
was giving her the dumb-blonde dismissal.

"The
guy was dead," I said, backing her up. "And we weren't out of this
room two minutes. Just the time it took us to walk down the corridor to the
elevators and meet you. So somebody's been rehearsing a two-minute drill on
removing dead guys."

Roy
decided not to argue. He said he'd fill out a report and file it with the hotel
and with the LVPD so there would be an official record. There wasn't much else
to be done. Having been a cop, I knew—no body, no crime.

"We'd
like to move you to another room. You know, so we can keep an eye on this one
and to let you get on with your vacationing. Ted, help the ladies with their
luggage, and by the way, no dogs allowed in the hotel," Roy said.

"What
do you think, Roy? Would the maid rather deal with a decomposing body in the
bathtub or a little dog hair on the porcelain? We're not talking psychological
damage and suing the hotel. All we're asking for is dispensation for our..
.police-trained drug-sniffing dog." It was a stretch, but I did have some
interaction with drug-sniffing dogs in my former line of work. Granted,
drug-sniffing dogs usually had longer legs and came when you called them, but other
than that, Elmo could fill the bill.

Security
guard Ted chose not to press the point and scooped up our luggage, putting it
under one arm as he held the door for us with the other, while large sweat
droplets fell off his forehead, landed on his jutting chin, and plummeted onto
his shirt front. We followed him to the elevator. He used his free hand to
radio the front desk. There was a great deal of static as he spoke into the
radio.

"I
got 1142 moving to 611, over," Ted said in a businesslike manner.

Someone
on the other end okayed 611 and we were back in the rams' head elevator heading
down to the sixth floor. Ted opened the door to 611 with his master key and
said someone from the front desk would bring us new electronic keys right away.
We thanked him and he hulked off.

"Not
as nice as our upgrade," Callie said.

"Yeah,
but the bathroom's not being used as a morgue," I said, checking to be
certain.

Callie
and I plopped down on the bed in a heap. The events of the evening had taken
some of the wind out of our desert sails. I wanted to know if someone put that
guy in the tub for our benefit, but then, why would someone do that and how
would it even be possible? After all, we didn't know what room we'd be in until
minutes before we got on the elevator. Nonetheless, it just seemed uncanny that
out of 126,000 hotel rooms in Las Vegas, ours was the one with the dead body.

"Must
be our energy together," Callie mused, somewhat unconcerned. "Very
high sexual energy draws other energy to it."

"Like
dead guys who miss having sex?" I asked.

"I
try to explain and you start that negative humor. Are you going to stop
it?" Callie's voice had a playful lilt to it.

I
swore I would. Of course, I was swearing to anything these days to make Callie
happy. She was unquestionably the center of my universe.

I
kissed her and her mouth radiated heat and longing, and I felt myself about to
dissolve. Elmo shook himself loudly, jangling his dog tags, and I paused just
momentarily to tell him to "settle." The mere mention of Elmo sent
Callie into swoons of adoration toward my large satchel-shaped companion.

"I'm
so glad you brought him." She recited our agenda for the next few days,
telling it directly to Elmo. "I see lots of good food, short walks
and"—she looked up at me—"hours of mad, passionate lovemaking."
She slid into my arms and kissed me. It was almost physically impossible for a
human mouth to be that hot. I dropped all interest in what happened to the dead
and focused entirely on what could happen to the living. She ran her hands up my
sides and let them travel down the curve of my waist, and the sensation it
created on my skin disconnected my mind from my body. I was floating against my
will, the way one floats in heavy salt water, happily unable to sink to the
bottom. My body was shaking slightly and involuntarily as if it had been
exposed to extreme cold, and yet, I was so molten hot that I was about to
erupt. The anticipation of falling into her silken breasts and cupping her
small buttocks in my hands, and being inside her, had created a laserlike focus
on my senses, driving me through ten weeks of wanting, to this moment, and now
that I was here, I was almost immobilized by the intensity of the sensation.

She
stopped kissing me long enough to lock eyes with me, those celestial blue eyes
that saw through me to my very core. "I have ached night after night
wanting you," she said.

"Then
what in the world took you so long..."

"Anticipation
isn't always a bad thing." She teased me with her mouth, starting to kiss
me but pulling back, brushing my throat with her lips, then pulling away.

I
placed my hands on her waist and in a move that surprised even me, I lifted her
up and sailed her backward onto the bed as she gasped, her eyebrow raised in
amused surprise.

"I
will not be toyed with," I said in mock-macho fashion.