Trust Me (34 page)

    Out of the corner of his eye Tariq could see an automobile drive up next to him, coming to a stop. The passenger window was down, Ricky leaning across the front seat.

    "I've got a better idea, why don't you get in. Unless you think you can catch her," Ricky said, smiling at him.

    Karen stood at the picture window that extended the length of the living room and looked out at the Chicago skyline. She could see the Hancock building and Water Tower Place and the Affinia Hotel, and below her she saw the Water Works and Saks and Neiman Marcus on Michigan Avenue. If anyone was following her this move to the Peninsula Hotel would keep them off balance, keep them guessing.

    She called Stephanie, her buddy. They'd been close for sixteen years. Stephanie had met a guy named Jerry Hilliker, married him and moved to Chicago. Karen hadn't seen her for six months, although they still talked on the phone every couple of weeks.

    "I can't believe you're here," Stephanie said. "What's the occasion?"

    "I'm making my run," Karen said. "I'm on my own for the first time in eighteen years."

    "How's it feel?"

    "Are you kidding?" Karen grinned.

    "Judging by the sound of your voice," Stephanie said, "it must be good. Where's Lou?"

    Karen said, "I left him in the dust." She looked out the window. There was a cloud drifting through the top of the Hancock building.

    "I had a feeling something was wrong, you show up here by yourself."

    "There's nothing wrong," Karen said. "Everything's right. I'm free and I can't believe how good it feels."

    They agreed to meet at the Tavern on Rush Street at 5:15, Stephanie's suggestion. Karen remembered it, red awnings and sidewalk tables.

    Ricky sat in the restaurant off the lobby and watched Karen check in. The black chick from the registration desk took her up to her room on the sixteenth floor. He saw them get on the elevator together. Saw the floor they went to and went up after them. The black chick came out of room 1616 and passed him in the hall. She said, good afternoon. Ricky said, hey, how you doing? He stood outside Karen's room considering his next move. He could knock on the door and when she opened it, go for her. But he had a better idea. Walked to the end of the hall. He liked the look of this hotel, everything all gold and white. Man, it was classy. There was a maid's cart in the hallway to his left. The door to room 1648 was open. The maid, a Latina in a beige uniform, looked at him from inside the room.

    Ricky said, "I left my key in the room. Stupid, huh?" He smiled. Be friendly, he told himself.

    She smiled back and said, "Sir, it happens all the time. What room are you in?"

    "Sixteen sixteen, right down the hall." He took a $20 bill out of his wallet and handed it to her.

    "Sir, that's not necessary," the maid said, still smiling.

    "Sure it is," Ricky said. He wanted to say, you're a fucking maid you're going to turn down twenty bucks?

    She thanked him and followed him down the hall. She slipped her card in the slot and Ricky turned the handle and opened the door a crack.

    "Have a nice day, sir," the maid said and walked away.

    Oh, he was going to have a nice day, all right. He was going to have a great fucking day. He went in and closed the door. He heard voices, sounded like a TV, glanced down a short entrance- way to the living room. He moved past an open door, and looked into a bedroom. No one was there. He moved to the living room, peeked in. The TV was on, looked like a news channel. There was no sign of Karen. No sign that anyone had been in the place.

    He glanced out the big window at the Chicago skyline. He went into the bedroom. Went through the dressing room to the bathroom. He was hoping Karen was in there taking a bath, open the door, "surprise," but she wasn't. He checked the shower and the toilet room. Everything was perfect like the room had never been used. He went back in the dressing room and opened the closet and there it was, the black suitcase. Identical to the one Karen had rolled out of the Drake, and rolled in the Peninsula. He picked it up and put it on the floor. Ricky was so excited he could barely breathe. Here it was, the way out of all his problems. He was thinking he could take the bag downstairs, get in a cab and take off, leave Tariq in his rental car, wondering what the fuck happened.

    He unzipped the suitcase and folded back the top. But it wasn't filled with money. It was filled with newspapers. He flipped the suitcase upside down and the papers fell out. He could feel himself getting angry, starting to lose it. There was a built-in dresser behind him. He yanked the drawers out and threw them on the floor. They were empty. He went in the bedroom, looked under the bed. Nothing. Went in the living room, flipped the couch over, getting more pissed off. Where was the fucking money at?

    Then he thought, wait, maybe he was in the wrong room. No, a card on the desk in the living room said, "Karen Delaney, welcome to the Peninsula Hotel," signed by the hotel manager. Next to it on a notepad was an address written in blue ink. Ricky took out his cell phone and called Tariq. "Get over to 1031 North Rush Street. That's where she's going. I'll meet you there."

    Karen stood staring at herself in the bathroom mirror. She had second thoughts about going out, meeting Stephanie in a bar, a public place, but decided she was being paranoid. Nobody knew she was in Chicago except Virginia, and Karen had changed her appearance and changed hotels. She wanted to see her friend and this was the only opportunity to do it.

    She left the room and went down to the lobby. It was simple and elegant, with gold-tinted accents and a lot of light coming in from the twenty-foot-high windows in the lobby restaurant.

    She stopped at the concierge desk and got a map of the neighborhood. She studied it and located the Tavern four blocks away on Rush Street. She walked down the wide gold marble corridor to the elevators. The lobby was on the fifth floor. She went down to the street level and walked outside. The doorman was in the street, hailing a cab for a group of Asian men in suits. Karen decided to walk. She took Superior Street to Michigan Avenue and went left. She regretted her decision halfway to the next block. It was hot and humid and she was already starting to sweat. She saw a taxi coming toward her, raised her arm and it stopped. She got in and took it to the Tavern.

    Stephanie was waiting inside the door. She looked at her as if she wasn't sure and said, "Karen…?"

    They hugged, both grinning, happy to see each other.

    "What's with the new look?" Steph said. "I loved your red hair. I know women who'd kill to have hair like that."

    "It's a change of pace." Karen took off her sunglasses and put them in her bag.

    "Well, I think you're crazy."

    They sat at a table in the bar, drinking wine, Stephanie looking as good as ever, still a knockout at age thirty-six, Gwyneth Paltrow with long dark hair.

    "I can't believe you're here," Stephanie said. She picked her wineglass up by the stem and said, "I didn't tell you. I'm single again myself. To freedom."

    They clinked glasses and took sips and put their glasses back on the table.

    Karen said, "What happened to Mr. Perfect?"

    "He wasn't," Stephanie said. "I looked at him one day, coming home half in the bag in his golf outfit, giving me a hard time because dinner wasn't ready, and decided I'd had enough." She paused.

    "There has to be more to it than that," Karen said.

    Stephanie said, "I didn't see that much of him. He'd travel every week and come home, and get mad if his laundry wasn't done, or if I didn't pick up his dry cleaning. I work too I told him, pick up your own dry cleaning. One time he got back from a business trip and said, 'We have no food. There's nothing to eat. And we're out of plastic bags. Don't you make a list of the things we need?'"

    Karen said, "No plastic bags, huh? That sounds like a real emergency. What'd you say when you left?"

    "Get used to making your own dinner. I'm out of here." Stephanie sipped her wine.

    Karen said, "And you took off?"

    "I packed a bag and walked out the door while he stared at me in disbelief, geezing down Grey Goose on the rocks. What'd you say to Lou?"

    "It isn't working and isn't going to," Karen said. "I left him a note on the refrigerator."

    "How'd he take it?"

    "He still won't talk to me," Karen said.

    "You're lucky. Jerry wants me back. Calls all the time, won't leave me alone. I've gone out with a couple of guys. Nothing serious."

    Karen said, "What about your first date's the beginning of the end philosophy?"

    "It's still true," Stephanie said. "More so than ever."

    Karen said, "How's it go again?"

    The waiter put two glasses of wine in front of them. "From your admirers," he said, indicating two dudes in golf shirts, sitting at the bar. They held up their drinks and grinned.

    Karen said, "Tell them thanks, but we'll buy our own."

    Stephanie said, "You don't want to hear their rap, huh?"

    "I'm not in the mood," Karen said.

    The waiter picked up the glasses and walked to the bar and put them down in front of the men.

    Stephanie said, "You know the relationship's doomed before he picks you up—when you're opening the door for him on the first date. It's all downhill from there."

    "If you were so sure what was going to happen," Karen said, "why'd you get married?"

    "I had twenty-one orgasms with Jerry one weekend and I was temporarily blinded by passion," Stephanie said.

    Karen said, "Twenty-one, really?" She tapped a Marlboro Light out of her pack and lit it with a red plastic lighter.

    "It took place over two days," Stephanie said. "I never told you that?"

    "I think I would've remembered," Karen said. "So you let your guard down, huh?"

    "Did I ever," Stephanie said. "I was in stage one of the relationship and didn't know it—infatuation bordering on lust."

    "How long does stage one last?" Karen said.

    Stephanie said, "Anywhere from a couple days to months."

    "Then what happens?" Karen said.

    "Stage two is the slow but sure buildup of contempt, which can go on for a long time—years." Stephanie paused, caught her breath and took a sip of wine.

    Karen could see one of their admirers look over at them and get up.

    "Stage three is the loathing," Stephanie said. "It's also a euphemism for marriage. It's the end of hope—when your soul is sucked out of you by your joyless, loveless life partner—crushing your will to live."

    Karen laughed. "With that positive attitude, how can you miss?" The guy was coming toward them, almost there.

    "But you know I'm right," Stephanie said, "don't you?"

    The guy was tall and good-looking, wearing a tight-fitting black shirt. He had a weightlifter’s shoulders and arms and the confidence of a someone used to getting what he wanted. He walked up and stood between them.

    "Hi, I'm Gil," he said.

    Like they were expecting him. He had dark hair combed back and long sideburns. He checked Stephanie out first, then turned and fixed his attention on Karen.

    "My friend and I were taking bets on what you girls do for a living," Gil said. "Want to join us for a drink, find out what we guessed?"

    Karen turned so she was facing him now. "Gil, listen, we're having a conversation here, okay?" She met his gaze. She was about to say—we don't give a shit what you think we do for a living, but when she looked past him she saw the Arab with the beard, sitting at the bar. It couldn't be, she told herself, but it was. She felt her heart begin to race and her body tense up.

    He sat there staring at her, making no attempt to get up, letting her see him, letting her imagine what was going to happen. Karen said, "I'd like to have a drink with you, Gil, but I've got a problem. There's a man stalking me. He's sitting right over there. Don't look." But she knew he would.