Cruising the Strip (22 page)

“I don’t think so. I think there’s nothing happening because it’s lunch time.” Pepper squinted at the schedule.

To her surprise, Sally reached over to pluck Pepper’s glasses from her face. She produced a small squirt bottle of cleaning solution from one pocket, then a soft cleaning tissue from another. A minute later she put the glasses back.

“Wow. Thank you.” Amber, Pepper thought. Sally’s eyes were amber.

“If you don’t have a session, would you like to have lunch with me?” Sally gestured at the escalators that lead down a flight to the concourse that connected several of the hotels on this side of the Strip.

“I’d love to,” Pepper said.

The world’s best cheeseburger was followed by the world’s best frozen custard, as proclaimed on the storefronts.

“That’s just it,” Pepper explained. “I think lesbians know a woman’s heart better than anyone. She has to understand her own, first of all, and then if she falls in love, she has to understand a second one, and that’s twice as many.”

Sally nodded solemnly. “How long have you wanted to be a writer?”

“Since forever. Evidently, I was telling stories when I was just a toddler.” Pepper paused in the act of licking another dollop off her scoop of vanilla bean custard. “I’m really excited to be here. I’m not usually quite so scattered.”

Sally’s eyes said she wasn’t convinced, but Pepper decided to ignore that for now. The important thing was that Sally looked really quite engaging with a dollop of custard on the end of her nose. Pepper used her napkin to dab it off.

Somehow, they forgot to go to their afternoon session. A stroll through the main art gallery had led to a discussion of art history and Sally had explained how cataloging non-fiction worked.

“We’ve got a baseball theme party in about an hour,” Sally explained as they reached the Palace conference area again. “What are you up to?”

“Oh, it’s the big awards night. Everybody who’s anybody. I have two tickets, I bought a spare in case I had a date, and I guess I do.”

“You have a date?”

“Yes, her name is Cara, but it’s not like that. Would you like to join me? I’m sure she’ll understand. Especially if I still pay her the fifty bucks.”

There are situations, Pepper reflected later, that were out of control before they were even begun, but there was no way to know it.

First off, who would think that Bryce Ambrose would remember Sally from that afternoon, and stop to speak to her as they waited near the reader board for Cara to show up? Sally quickly introduced Pepper, who stammered out her own nervous praise as they shook hands and, really, Bryce Ambrose had very warm, strong hands. She and Amelia Wainwright were most certainly an item—the tender, melting looks would inspire an entire chapter for Pepper.

And that was all fine, all good, more than Pepper had hoped for the evening, really, and she’d waited contentedly next to the reader board with Sally, talking about everything. It was the place to be, because Barrett Lancey and Racie Racine stopped right next to them to adjust the straps on Racie’s Grecian-inspired sandals.

While she and Sally watched Barrett’s amazingly articulated hands move up and down Racie’s calves—which was really a treat—Cara arrived.

“Sweetie,” Cara cooed, and she wrapped her emerald-sheathed body around Pepper. “I finally woke up. You left me so exhausted.”

“Um.” Not the best start, Pepper could admit that, but before she could say anything else, Cara looked at Sally, very nicely turned out in black dress slacks and a brocade vest, and asked, “Who’s this?”

“My date,” Pepper said and that was quite possibly the stupidest thing she’d said all day, even if it was true.

Barrett Lancey looked up from Racie’s legs, and Pepper hadn’t really ever aspired to be outrageous to the point where she could distract Barrett from something so lovely.

“Your date?” Cara blinked, and she seemed to be trying to play along, but how could she know, Pepper had to allow her that. “Since when are you into butch?”

“I’m a librarian,” Sally said.

Cara spread her hands. “I don’t have a clue. I’m sorry.”

“Here.” Pepper reached for one of the flailing hands, did the two-hand clasp shake, leaving the folded bills in Cara’s palm. “I’m really sorry it has to be this way.”

“Women, women, women,” Cara said. “You writers are all alike.” Her dramatic sniff was somewhat undercut by her puzzled expression as she walked away.

Sally, looking highly amused said, “Since when are you into high femme?”

Barrett Lancey got up off her knee and smooched Racie. “Does that work better?”

“Yes, darling, thank you.”

Pepper tried to think of something smart to say, something that would supplant Barrett Lancey’s impression of her as a womanizer. “I’m not into butch or femme, I’m into brains.”

“Oh.” Sally looked very pleased.

“It’s true,” Pepper added, and she realized it really was.

Barrett Lancey tucked Racie’s hand into the crook of her arm, but before they walked away, she leaned over to Pepper and said, “This is when you kiss her.” And she winked.

Sally liked the kiss, or Pepper guessed she did because she kissed back, blushing.

By the time the awards program started, they’d dispensed with what Sally termed
poulet du rubber
and two glasses of wine. The expected people won the expected awards, but the big moment for Pepper was Amelia Wainwright’s tearful speech about Carly Vincent’s brave decision to come out more than fifteen years ago.

So Pepper had only a drawer full of rejections for her first novel, and maybe she’d never publish one, but she was a lesbian, and she was proud to join in the thunderous applause. She made mental notes in case she should ever, like in her wildest dreams, be in the same position, and she hoped she was as gracious and kind as Carly was. Thank your partner, Pepper made especial note of that.

Sally liked to dance, that was also noteworthy. Sally liked to make out in the restroom stall; that was also something Pepper would never forget. By the time she was in Sally’s room, naked and halfway to the Land of Happy, several of Sally’s distinct likes were indelibly written on Pepper’s brain.

Sally liked fingers, right there, and when Pepper added her tongue, it was clear Sally liked that, too. The inside of her was hot silk on Pepper’s fingers, and when Pepper asked if Sally was okay with three fingers or should she go back to two, Sally said, “Don’t you dare stop.”

“I don’t want you to think I believe big is better or anything like that.”

Sally wound her fingers in Pepper’s hair and said, “Shut up and fuck me.”

Clearly, when you get that kind of direct instruction, it’s wise to do as you’re told. Pepper kept herself from talking by kissing Sally so hard there was no breath left in either of them.

“I’m really kind of surprised,” Sally said later.

“By what?”

“I thought I was in the seventy percent of women who don’t orgasm from penetration. But evidently not.”

Pepper smiled, pleased. “How do you know stuff like that?”

“That I don’t usually enjoy what you just did quite that much?”

“No, silly.” She smooched Sally on the tip of her adorable nose. “The seventy percent stuff.”

Sally blinked. “I’m a librarian.”

“Are you going to say that every time you want to win an argument?”

Sally just smiled.

When I noticed the little redhead check me out in the mirror for the third time, I grabbed my beer and slid off the bar stool. After four days of a predominately male-populated medical meeting, I was ready for a little female companionship. As I traversed a path between the sofas and chairs to where she sat alone in the lounge with her drink, she gave me a surprised look and then quickly glanced away. Hmm, mixed signals it would seem.

“Hi, I’m Tristan,” I said as I dropped into a plush wingback chair across the small dark wood coffee table from her. “Are you here for one of the conferences?”

“No,” she said abruptly, not meeting my eyes. She hastily finished her drink, grabbed her shoulder bag, and stood up. “Sorry, I’ve got to be going.”

As she spoke, I noticed her look pointedly behind me, and I shifted in my seat to see who was there. I didn’t have any intention of getting in the middle of someone’s relationship. Turned out not to be a who, but a what. A security camera perched in the far corner of the room, one of the hundreds that were discreetly placed throughout the casino, the lobbies, the elevators, hallways, and just about everywhere else, panned in our direction. I guess when an establishment deals with millions of dollars on a daily basis, they get pretty serious about security. I hadn’t thought much about the spy cams until now, but something about that camera was freaking her out. She looked to be a few years younger than me, maybe twenty-five, and her low cut, very clingy emerald green dress went well with her red hair. It also displayed some very nice cleavage and a shapely ass in a tasteful but enticingly flagrant manner. The green eyes that had frankly appraised me a few minutes earlier looked anxious now, and I was curious. Curiosity tended to get me into trouble at times, but what fun was life without a little risk? Women endlessly fascinated me, and at the moment, this one had my antennae—and quite a few other parts of me—abuzz.

“Are you in some kind of trouble?” I asked, making a leap of logic of the sort that had, on occasion, very nearly gotten my face slapped. This time though, I could see I’d hit the mark. When I stood up to walk out with her, her expression became even more uneasy.

“I’ll be fine,” she said, “as long as you stay put and let me get out of here.”

“Are you staying here at the hotel?” I didn’t move as she sidled around me to leave. I didn’t want to make her situation any worse, but I didn’t want her to just disappear either. I wasn’t sure why, but I knew I’d be thinking about her the rest of the night if I didn’t learn her story.

“No. Goodnight.”

“Goodnight.” I waited until she disappeared onto the casino floor, and then I sprinted across the lounge to the exit on the opposite side of the bar, hustled through the casino, across the lobby, and out to the street. She was just flagging down a cab.

“Hey,” I called, hurrying over to her. “If you’re not comfortable inside, how about we take a walk?”

After staring at me for a second, she signaled a waiting couple to go ahead and take the cab and then grabbed my arm. I followed as she dragged me half a block down the street. She stopped in front of the huge fountain that fronted the casino hotel. Intersecting arcs of water, highlighted in rainbow hues by the hidden spotlights focused on them, created elaborate patterns against the night sky.

“Why are you following me?”

“Look,” I said, holding my hands up at chest level. “I’m harmless, and if I’m bothering you or scaring you, I’ll walk away right now. I saw you look at me back there in the lounge, and I thought maybe you might want some company for a while. I know I do.” When she didn’t turn around and disappear, I pulled my wallet from my back pocket and handed her my driver’s license. “Like I said, my name is Tristan. I’m from Philadelphia, and I’m here for the trauma meeting.”

She shook her head as she regarded my license, then handed it back. “You’re a doctor?”

I nodded. “Yeah. An anesthesiologist.”

“Here alone?”

I nodded again. “You?”

“I live here.”

“Are you a professional gambler?” I pocketed my wallet.

“No.” She stepped a little closer to me as a crowd of raucous tourists passed by. “I was waiting for someone who didn’t show.”

I shook my head. “Foolish of…her?” I said hopefully.

She shook her head.

“Ah, sorry. My mistake.” I grinned. “Wishful thinking.”

She smiled then, and the look she gave me as her eyes swept up and down my body said I hadn’t been wrong in my first assumption. “It was a business meeting.”

“So then, back to my original proposition.” Taking a chance, I reached for her hand. “We can take a walk, or I can buy you another drink, or we could go somewhere quiet and talk.”

“Talk?” She emphasized the word in such a way that let me know she knew I was hoping for more than a conversation.

“Would that be a problem?”

“Unfortunately,” she sighed, “yes.”

“Because you’re in some kind of trouble.”

“I could be. It’s complicated.”

I tightened my grip on her hand. “I’ve got all night. In fact, I’ve got all night and half the day tomorrow. I also have a sister who is an attorney…”

“No,” she said quickly. “It’s not that kind of trouble. It’s not even trouble the way you’re thinking of it.” She glanced around as if to be sure we weren’t going to be overheard. “Look. It’s like this. I was in the casino working. Meeting a man. For the night.”

“And he didn’t show?” I’d never met a call girl before. I’ve seen plenty of prostitutes in the ER or hanging out on street corners in Center City, but this woman did not resemble them. If she was selling her body, I didn’t think it was because she had no place to sleep tonight.

“He should’ve called me to let me know where to meet him. He didn’t.”