Phoenix Heart (17 page)

“Valet? I have some clothes that need some emergency
pressing. Suite 1702. As soon as possible. Then sooner than possible! You tell
whoever that if they can make it up here in less than three minutes there’s a
$20 tip in it for them. Yes. Thank you.”

“Maid service? I need some towels in my room. I’m standing
here dripping wet and there is not even a wash cloth to dry myself. What is
going on here? Thank you.”

I stood for a moment, my hand poised over the phone, one
finger tapping it, then dialed once more.

In the bathroom, I washed as much blood off my hands and
sleeves as I could, but ended up rolling up the cuffs of the ruined sweater to
hide the dark stains. I loosened the shower head, turned on the shower and
water began to spray around the room. I held the shower curtain over me and,
using a knife from the dinner tray, loosened the screw holding the faucet
handle so that it spun loose. I grabbed the last of the towels, ducked out of
the room, and threw them behind a chair. Andrew’s jacket followed the bandages.
The debris from the bandaging I kicked under a table. I adjusted the dinner
cart as best I could to cover the blood stain on the carpet.

In the closet, Andrew lay as I had left him. But the face he
turned toward me was different. The paleness was there, the lines of pain and
weariness, but there was something else too, something more than weariness in
his eyes.

I squatted down and pulled at the blankets, straightening
them, tucking them behind him.

“You should have gone,” he said.

My hands paused, then moved on. “I almost did.”

“Why didn’t you?”

I sat back on my heels and looked at him. “I wouldn’t give
my parents the satisfaction.”

He looked startled, then puzzled.

I sort of half-smiled. “I’ll explain someday.”

He nodded. “Okay.”

I straightened the already straight blanket then sat back on
my heels and looked him in the eye. “Andrew, you’ve got to do me a favor.”

He didn’t blink, didn’t smile. “Anything.”

I laughed weakly. “Never say that to a Brenner. Look, all
hell is going to break loose out there in about two minutes. You’ve got to just
stay in here and keep quiet. Okay?”

“Okay.”

“Thanks.”

He reached out from under the blanket, took my hand, and that
harmonic energy flowed again, this time at the place where my fingers rested on
his. Stronger even than before, it sent a rush of warmth through my core. My
eyes met his and it went from coals to flame.

“Melanie,” he said, “I...”

A knock on the door made us both jump. Andrew winced and his
fingers tightened on mine. “Be careful,” he whispered.

I nodded and started to rise.

He squeezed my hand. “Promise me. If it starts going wrong,
scream for the police.”

I tried to smile. “Count on it.” I quickly backed from the
closet and closed the door firmly behind. I took a deep breath, let it out,
took another, then walked over and pulled open the front door. The two men from
the airport stood there.

“Well! It’s about time!” I reached out, grabbed the sleeve
of the short, blond man and pulled him into the room. “Will you for Christ’s
sake do something about that water before I drown?” I spun to the bathroom door
and flung it open. “I thought this was a first class hotel and look at that
bathroom! Just look at it! And look at me!” I stalked back across the room and
flung my arms wide as I stared into his face, trying to concentrate only on his
narrow features and not on the fact that this might have been the man who shot Andrew.
I continued talking loudly and gesturing wildly, never allowing the movement
and noise to stop. “I’m soaked, my hair is
ruined
and I was on my way
out to a reception. How am I going to go like this? Hmmm? Well? Don’t just
stand there!”

The man with the beer belly had followed his partner into
the room and the two men looked at me in stunned silence. “Well, if you’re
going to stand there like two pole-axed mules, I’m just going to have to call
the manager.”

At that, Beer Belly moved forward and grabbed my arm. His
large hand completely encircled it. “I don’t think that would be a good idea,” he
growled.

I know it should have scared me, but I wouldn’t let it. Maybe,
too, by that point he was one too many people in my life to have tried to frighten
me, tried to force me to be and move and act like they wanted, not like I
wanted. I gave that man look that would have withered a cactus and plucked his
massive hand from my arm. He looked to his partner, confused, and let me do it.

“Just who do you think you’re manhandling? I’ll report you
to the manager, and don’t think I won’t.”

There was a knock on the open doorway. The busboy who had
delivered my meal stood there timidly.

“Well! You again!” I spun carefully past the two men and
headed for the door. “How dare you bring me a meal with a cockroach in it? I
have never had such a shock in my life! Look at this!”

I lifted the domed cover off the dinner tray with a broad
flourish and my meal sat as it had been all along--perfectly prepared and
presented. I gave the busboy a look of righteous triumph as he leaned over to
inspect the salad.

“I’m sorry ma’am, but I don’t see anything.”

“Don’t see anything?”

A stocky, older woman in a maid’s uniform tapped at the
door, her arms full of towels. “You called for linen?”

I glared at her. “Yes, of course I did. Put them over there.”

The maid moved past me, eyeing the two men and raised an
eyebrow at the busboy. He shrugged and shook his head as there was another tap
at the door. The valet stood there with a burly plumber standing behind him. “You
had some clothes that needed pressing?” He glanced at his watch pointedly.

I sneered. “You’ll get your tip, just wait a minute! Now
look here you.” I grabbed the arm of the bellboy and turned him toward the
tray. “Right there, big as life. Oh my god! It’s not there. Where is it? It’s
crawled away! It’s in the room!”

I ran over to the door and grabbed the arm of the plumber. “I
won’t stay in this room with bugs running around! Do something!” I looked up at
him then stepped back a pace. “Wait a minute. Who are you?”

“The plumber ma’am. You have a problem with the bathroom?”

I pointed to the two men who had moved apart and were trying
to search the room surreptitiously. “If you’re the plumber, who are they?”

All eyes focused on the two men. Everyone froze. The sound
of the water drumming on the tiles in the bathroom seemed to grow louder. Beer
Belly was just entering the bedroom; Short Blond had his hand on the door of
the closet. I tried to keep from staring at that hand. If it moved; if he tried
to open that door. Then I looked up at his narrow face, and once again I had
the eerie feeling that I knew him from somewhere, somewhere before the airport.

I looked away and found myself staring into the eyes of the
larger man near the bedroom door. When I was thirteen, Maggie and her then
boyfriend (later husband) took me with them on a late season camping trip up in
the Angeles National Forest. We found a pond back in a hollow, and though there
were patches of ice on the edge, Maggie had dared me to jump. After a brief
round of chicken, am not, I’d leapt into the water. Hitting the water had
driven the breath from me, numbed my limbs, fogged my brain. But, the icy
malevolence, the chilling malice in Beer Belly’s face as he stood at the
bedroom door, and that it could be directed at me, chilled me more deeply even
than that the plunge into that dark pond. The water had chilled my body; his
malevolence reached to a place water could never touch.

 I clung to the plumber’s arm and without difficulty made my
voice soft and tremulous. “They told me they were from hotel maintenance.”

And then, as if on cue, the result of my last call stepped
to the door. “Hotel security, ma’am.” The two security men stood in the doorway
complete with uniforms, side arms and plenty of bulky muscle. The older of the
two, looking world-weary and bored turned to me. “You had a problem?”

I pointed a shaky finger at the two men. “Those two men said
they were from hotel maintenance.”

The two men didn’t move.

“Gentlemen, is that true?” asked the guard.

Short Blond’s hand still rested on the closet doorknob. He
looked over to his partner, started to say something, but Beer Belly shook his
head sharply. The small man’s lips closed and his hand dropped away from the
door. Both men stood still, arms at their sides, not responding in any way to
the guards.

The older guard’s eyes narrowed and the look of boredom
vanished. He walked across the room and jerked his head at the busboy, the
valet and the maid. The three of them moved aside. The maid pushed back against
the cart, moving it slightly, and her heel came to rest on the edge of the dark
red stain of Andrew’s blood. I forced my eyes away, and looked once again into
the eyes of Beer Belly. His lips twitched. He looked from me, to the stain and
back again. His head dipped just a bit and he grinned.

I looked away, toward the guard who was standing in front of
Short Blond. “Sir?” asked the guard. “Are you a guest of the hotel?”

The little man neither moved nor spoke. The other security
guard crossed to stand behind Beer Belly near the bedroom door. This guard was
younger and had a look in his eye that bespoke of long hours in front of a TV
set dreaming of such high adventure.

The older guard gestured toward the door. “Perhaps you
gentlemen should come with us and we can clear this up.”

Beer Belly nodded to his partner and the two of them walked
to the door, followed by the two guards.

I watched them down the hall to the elevators, and when they
were out of sight, slammed shut the door. It took a few seconds leaning on the
doorknob to will the jelly that had become my knees back into bone and muscle. When
I turned, the four hotel people had backed into a semicircle. The maid was
clutching the towels in front of her and the plumber was fingering the handle
of the pipe wrench in his belt. The bellboy and the valet looked to be
regretting that they hadn’t taken that karate course when they’d had the
chance.

And, you know? I don’t think it helped their peace of mind
one whit when I burst out laughing and continued laughing until I collapsed on a
chair in tears.

I closed the door behind the plumber and sagged back against
the wood. He had been the last to leave, a fat tip tucked in his jeans, still
looking puzzled, and still not letting his hand wander too far away from the
handle of his pipe wrench. His behavior had pretty much matched the others as I
had pushed twenty dollar bills at them and shoved them out the door insisting
that I no longer needed my dress pressed and the meal was just fine and no more
towels are necessary, thank you and I’ll take care of the mess in the bathroom,
just go, and thank you, thank you.

The closet door was still tightly closed. No sound came from
behind it…

…because no sound could come. As I had played my little
scene in the living room, in the closet Andrew had lain, his last breath
gasping in, sighing out, blood pooling beneath him, his face twisting in agony,
his eyes open but the light within fading, fading, fading. I leapt for the
door, wrenched it open.

Andrew rested in the corner, the blankets drawn up around
him, pale and sweating, but smiling up at me.

“You were great,” he said.

I sank down in the doorway like a hot air balloon ripped
open by a sudden, violent shift of wind. “Oh, my god.”

“That was incredible,” he said. “You were amazing.”

I looked down and stared at the floor between my knees as
the shaking started. With the trembling came tears, and try as I might, this
time I couldn’t stop them.

“Ah, Melanie. I’m sorry.”

“It’s all right. It’s just reaction or something.” I pulled
a tissue out of my pocket and my hands were shaking so badly it fluttered like
a wounded bird. “Look at that,” I laughed, and then I started really crying.

“Oh, please don’t cry.”

“I have ne… ne… never been so s... s… scared in my life.”

“I know. I know.” His hand twisted in the material of the
blanket.

I shook all over, my nose ran, my eyes swelled and, I knew
from past experience, turned red. When I cry, I am not a pretty sight. I
blotted at my face, blew my nose, and tried to get myself to breathe without
hitching.

“God, I’m sorry. I’d give anything if I had never got you
into this.”

I looked over at Andrew. The short rest in the closet had
done him a little good, but he still looked terribly sick. And he was wasting
precious energy worrying about me.

So, I wiped at the tears, took a deep breath, and said, “You
know? You are really beginning to piss me off.”

His eyes widened.

“I told you that I am in this because I chose to be.
You
didn’t get
me
into anything. Nobody gets me into anything I don’t want
to be in.” I scrambled to my feet and stood over him, hands on hips, feet
spread wide. “Do you understand me mister?”

He blinked. His face was most carefully neutral. “Yes ma’am.”

“Well you’d better! Just stop apologizing and let me cry if
I want to. Just because I choose to be here doesn’t mean I’m not going to get
scared, and not going to cry. Do you understand me?”

He bit his lip and nodded.

I towered over him, hands on hips. “You’d better not be
laughing at me.”

He pressed his lips together and shook his head.

“Andrew?”

He shook his head again.

“Okay.” I smoothed down my skirt and brushed back my hair. “Okay.”

“Feel better?”

“Yes, thank you,” I said. “And you?”

“Yes, thank you.” He reached up from under the blanket and
took hold of my hand. His fingers felt hot; mine were damp from the tears. “Thank
you, Melanie.”