Certified Male (13 page)

D
EL SAT AT A TABLE IN THE
conservatory café at the casino, waiting for Gwen to finish swimming laps and come meet him for breakfast. In the meantime he sucked down orange juice and reviewed his notes. Between hands the previous night he'd been scribbling madly and interviewing players. Now he pondered and framed his actual article.

Movement flickered in his peripheral vision and someone sat across the booth from him. It wasn't Gwen, though, but a dark-haired guy with a narrow face.

“Can I help you?”

“You're Del Redmond, right?”

Del blinked. Five hundred miles from his home, it was the last thing he'd have expected to hear. “And you are?”

“Pete Kellar, stringer for the
Globe.
” The guy's speech was staccato. His chin punched the air assertively. “Greg Jessup asked me to look in on you.” He squinted. “I gotta say, your head shot in the paper doesn't do you justice.”

“So, what are you looking in on me for?” The kid didn't look old enough to be a stringer. He barely looked old enough to have graduated college. It didn't stop him from settling in as if he'd been invited, though. He'd apparently read all the books on getting ahead in journalism.

“I talked with Jessup yesterday about assignments. He said you were running down some kind of theft or con
spiracy story. I've got contacts with local law enforcement you might be able to use.”

“Law enforcement's not involved.”

“You don't know that,” Kellar countered. His eyes were close-set and aggressive. Del imagined he practiced the look in the mirror. “They could be undercover. What's the deal with this anyway? Jessup couldn't tell me a whole lot.”

And Kellar wasn't about to find out anything further from him, that was for sure. It was pretty obvious that the kid was a scrapper, Del thought, taking a drink of his juice. Kellar wanted to make points with the story, prove himself. “It's still too early to say what's going on. I'm just looking into things.”

“Pass me a list of your sources, let me help.”

Fat chance, kid.
“I'm all set for now. Give me your card and I'll call you if I need anything,” Del said pleasantly.

He held the card between his fingertips and looked at it. Stringer was an exaggeration. The card said freelancer, which explained Kellar's eagerness. He was probably looking for a means to shoehorn his way into the
Globe
organization. Jessup no doubt figured it couldn't hurt to have two people working on the same story. Or fighting over it—some editors believed in editorial Darwinism, and Jessup just might be one of them. Well, the story wasn't going to give Kellar a way in, that was for sure. If anyone was going to get mileage out of this story it was going to be Del.

He glanced across the room and saw Gwen walking in under a tree fern. “My breakfast date is here,” Del said, “and you're in her seat.”

“An interview?” Kellar's eyes lit avidly.

“No, just a date.”

“Oh.” Kellar rose. “Okay, I'm out of here. You'll call me?”

“I'll let you know if I need anything.”

Kellar took a long look at Gwen and gave an appreciative nod. “You do that.” He walked away.

Gwen arrived at the table and gave Del a kiss. “Who was that?”

“Just a guy I know.”

She glanced at the business card on the table. “A freelance newswriter? Just a guy you know?” She stared at him a long moment, but he didn't say anything.

“Well, let's order some breakfast.”

 

V
EGAS WAS ALL ABOUT
transporting reality: the Manhattan skyline of New York, New York, the gondolas of the Venetian, the scale-model Eiffel Tower of Paris. Restaurants like Nobu of Manhattan and Olives of Boston had established branches in the desert to cater to the more discerning palates of the visitors accustomed to luxury. She wasn't so surprised to see them, but she'd never in a million years have expected to discover an outpost of the Guggenheim there. The themes were still typically Vegas—the pursuit of pleasure—but the quality was surprising. Not only that, it was right off the gaming floor, so gamblers could take in art in between hands of cards.

“So, how do you want to do this?” Del asked her.

The polished wood underfoot rang as they walked through the open gallery. The blond maple ceiling soared overhead, above the copper-colored walls.

“You mean tonight?”

“Well, we could talk about your gallery strategy, but yeah, I think talking about tonight would be more practical.”

Around them the space was mostly empty. Gwen guessed that the slots and gaming tables held more appeal for the guests than fine art. Most would duck in to see the exhibit just so they could say they had, so they could feel a little less dissolute after a week spent eating, drinking and gambling.

“What time are you meeting Jerry?” She stopped in
front of a painting of a group of peasants drinking in a tavern, a red-faced man playing a guitar and singing a no doubt ribald song, judging by the expressions on the faces of his audience.

“When play is done. Ten or so, I'm guessing. We'll grab bar food at the strip club.”

“Lucky you. Is he planning on making a night of it?”

Del circled around a Rodin marble of Romeo and Juliet clasped together in a frozen desperation, passion in the touch of their hands, the lines of their bodies. “I'm guessing Jerry will get there, knock back some drinks, get a few lap dances. After that, who knows? He strikes me as the kind of guy who wouldn't blink at going looking for a pro.”

“Class act all the way,” she said with distaste.

He grinned. “Teach you to interview a little more thoroughly in future.”

“Hey, he's a con man,” Gwen protested. “Everything checked out on him initially. I got the impression from my sister, Joss, that he partied, but nothing too far out of control.”

“So maybe he's making up for a month of clean living.”

They walked onward to a tableau of lords lying about in a forest clearing. Above their heads a woman was swinging, skirts afroth, breasts nearly exposed in her low-cut gown.

“How long do you see him staying at the bar?”

Del considered. “I don't know, a couple of hours, maybe?”

“So I should watch for you to leave, add a half hour for safety and clock an hour for the search,” she calculated. “That gives me slush time at both ends.”

Del considered. “I don't like it. Too risky.”

“What would you suggest?”

“You've got a cell phone, right?”

She pulled it out of her purse and held up the flat silver handset. “Don't leave home without it.”

“Okay, so we exchange numbers. I call you when we get there, let you know we're in. That gives you the thumbs-up to go on up to Jerry's room and search. Try not to get too messy with any of it, though, nothing you can't straighten up in a hurry. We don't want him to know you've been there.”

“Aye, aye, Captain.”

He gave a faint smile. “Keep an eye on your watch. Call it ninety minutes from the time I call you, no more. When we leave the club, I'll call you again, give you plenty of warning.”

“And Jerry's not going to notice you wandering away to make all these phone calls?”

“At the club? Trust me, he'll be preoccupied. I figure I'll just head up to the bar or something.”

“How about after? It'll look suspicious if you wander away at both the beginning and the end.”

“True.” He thought a moment. “Okay—I'll check my messages when we leave the club, make like I've got to call someone back for work. Instead I'll call you. That'll be your signal to beat it.”

“That could work. What would the code be?”

“Elvis has left the building?”

“Funny.”

“The series on search engines is over?”

“You're a regular laugh riot.”

“Okay, how about this?—I'll say ‘I've filed my interview.' Jerry will like that because he's the interview.”

Gwen studied the painting before her, an unholy excitement buzzing through her veins. Tonight could end it all. Tonight she could find the stamps and finish this business. “I like it.”

“Good. You know how to search a place?”

“I've read my share of police novels,” she told him. “I
know the procedure. Besides, it'll be easier because it's not his home, it's only a hotel room.”

“True.”

“And stamps aren't like gems or coins. There are only so many places you can hide them.”

“Well, if you want to be sure, we can go upstairs and you can practice your searching techniques on me.” He pulled her against him for a kiss.

Gwen laughed up at him, her hands on his shoulders. Then she sobered. “Thank you for doing this. I'm really not sure how I would have done it on my own.”

“I think you would have figured it out. Nina's a pretty tough cookie.”

And Gwen wasn't. She needed to remember that. Whatever chemistry was between them existed between Del and Nina, not Gwen and Del. She gave him a quick peck and made a move to separate.

“Hey.” He scooped her closer. “I don't think we're finished yet.”

Nina wouldn't be, Gwen reminded herself. Nina would take all she could get. And so should she—before it ended.

 

F
LASHING LIGHTS AND ROCK
music filled the club, the bass throbbing until it vibrated Del's bones. Chrome glittered on the rack above the bar, outlining the edge of the stage, on the vertical poles that the dancers swung and twirled around.

In this environment the naked bodies of the women dancing were just another part of the glossy show, the relentless spotlights above the stage picking out one pair of pneumatic breasts after another.

Del took a swallow of his overpriced bourbon and squinted down into the glass. Maybe he should just start downing them like Kool-Aid. It would be one way to make the evening less painful.

He worshipped the female body as much as the next guy. Especially certain female bodies, he thought, remembering Gwen's curves. But sitting in a club with a roomful of horny guys staring at a cavalcade of cartoonishly well-endowed, untouchable women twisting onstage was hardly his idea of a good time. He preferred a little quality one-on-one time with a woman he could connect with mentally as well as physically.

Still, he'd promised Gwen two hours, minimum, and that was what he was going to deliver.

Jerry nudged him. “How about that redhead, she hot or what?” The redhead grabbed the pole and did something Del would have sworn was anatomically impossible. “She comes offstage, she's going to be dancing right here, partner,” Jerry boasted, slapping his thighs and signaling the waitress for another beer.

“Knock yourself out,” Del said and took another swallow of bourbon. “Just don't expect to get your rocks off.”

“Hey, man, it's all about the fantasy,” Jerry said.

Sure it was about the fantasy—guys like Jerry had the fantasy that they were going to get off with the women dancing and the women had the fantasy that they were going to empty out the guys' wallets. He had a pretty good idea whose fantasy had the higher likelihood of coming true.

He thought of Gwen, hot and silky against him, and his cock stirred. Now that was his idea of a turn-on. Consoling himself with the knowledge that he'd end his night with Gwen, he checked his watch and eased back in his seat.

 

T
HE ELEVATOR STOPPED AT THE
concierge level. Gwen wiped her damp palms on her denim miniskirt and waited for the doors to open. It would be okay, she told herself. Sure, the concierge level had an attendant at the lobby bar, but that person's job was to take care of the guests, not to police
them. She had a key, after all, so who was going to stop her as long as she acted as if she belonged? It was just like playing Texas Hold 'em, she reminded herself—bluff, bluff, bluff.

When the doors opened, she squared her shoulders and walked out onto the floor.

A young, blond attendant stood behind the bar in a vest and bow tie. “Good evening.”

Gwen gave him a brilliant smile. “Hi.”

He smiled back at her, dazzled.

She walked by without stopping, trying to read the numbers on the doors without appearing to look too much.
Act like you belong here.

She saw it on the right, just a couple of doors in from the lobby. Holding her breath, she slid the card key into the lock and pulled it out. With a little electronic peep and a smooth metallic snick the door unlocked. Relief made her weak. Telling herself the front-desk clerks hadn't recoded Jerry's lock the night before was one thing, being sure was another. She slipped inside and stood in the dark, waiting for her heart rate to level.

The light switches were by the door, just like every other hotel room. When the lights came on, though, it was clear that this room wasn't like any old hotel room. It wasn't a suite, it was a sybaritic palace. What seemed like half an acre of plush carpet covered the living room area, running from where she stood, past a built-in bar to a wall of windows. A glance into the bedroom showed her that it was just as large. How she was ever going to search it all in an hour, she had no idea.

Methodical. The thing to do was be methodical. She knew what she was looking for, knew that it couldn't be tucked into the bottom of a toothpaste tube. It had to be in an envelope or fold of cardboard and it had to be some
where clean and dry. No matter how big the rooms were, there were only so many hiding places in them. It would be easier because she wouldn't have the kitchen area to go through. Or much of one, she amended, glancing at the built-in bar, with its glossy black marble counter and backlit bottles of liquor.

She started in the living room, moving around the perimeter from the door, checking the back sides of the art, the mirrors, the undersides of the lamps and side tables, the back of the armoire that held the television. She pulled out every drawer she could find, checking the backs and undersides. The area behind the bar had a surprising number of them, not to mention bottles of liquor and boxes of snacks. None of them were opened up, though, so she figured she was okay.