So Nude, So Dead (2 page)

He opened a door, discovered a closet, and walked to another door on the opposite side of the room. It was the bathroom, and he walked inside, turned on the hot water and let it run for several moments. At the back of his mind was a thought that sent shivers of anxiety down his back. Heroin.

“You’re cute,” she said. She was slightly looped, he thought, and her voice sounded deep and throaty even when she spoke. “I noticed you while I was singing, and I said to myself, He’s cute. I was right.” She looked better close up, much better than she did on the bandstand. She had her hair pulled back tight over her ears, clipped at the back of her neck with an amber clasp, fanning out over her shoulders. The blouse she wore had a deep V sweeping down from her shoulders, terminating in a shadowed cleft between high breasts. He remembered staring at the soft whiteness of her skin as she leaned over the table.

“You’re very cute,” she repeated, and he said, “You’re not bad yourself.”

She blew smoke across the table. “Sparkling dialogue,” she said dryly. “Refugees from a Grade-B stinkeroo.”

“Pardon me. I’m not dressed for repartee.”

“It doesn’t matter, sweetheart. You’d be cute if you spoke Burmese.”

“Thanks. You’re not bad
—”

“I know. I know. I’m not bad myself.”

They laughed then, and she covered his hand with hers on the table.

He dried his face with a towel he found in the bathroom. There was lipstick on the towel and the words “Hotel Stockmere” in blue script embroidered in the left-hand corner. It was almost time. He was really beginning to need it. His hands shook as he replaced the towel on the rack. It was time to start looking for the stuff. Let’s see, where had they put it?

“What’s your name?” she asked, gripping his hand tighter.

“Ray.”

“That’s all?”

“Ray Stone.”

“Eileen Chalmers.” She squeezed his hand again. Then she looked up into his face, her mouth unsmiling, “When did you get your last fix, Ray Stone?”

He looked at her suspiciously. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said.

“Don’t you?”

“Not the faintest idea.”

She pulled her hand back across the table, her fingers moving to the small pearl button on her left sleeve. Deftly, she undid the button and shoved the sleeve back abruptly. She held it up only long enough for him to see the marks. Then she pushed the sleeve down and fastened the button again.

“I thought girls used their legs,” he said.

“My legs are too nice to mark.” She swung her feet out from under the table, pulled her skirt back to the tops of her stockings. He saw the sleek roundness of thigh and calf, the slender ankle. Then the skirt came down again, covering her knees.

“See?” she asked.

“I see.”

He started searching in the bureau drawers because he seemed to remember her putting the stuff there. The top drawer held his wallet, his cuff links, and a half-empty package of Camels. He closed the drawer and opened the middle drawer. Two towels were neatly folded there. Otherwise, it was empty. His face twitched as he opened the bottom drawer. Empty. He took a deep breath, the demand for the drug growing stronger now, and looked anxiously around the room. Perhaps he should wake her? No, he’d find it. It had to be around somewhere. Sixteen ounces of the stuff didn’t just get up and walk away. How many fixes were there in sixteen ounces of pure heroin?

“I asked about your last fix,” she said.

“I heard you.”

“Well?”

“I don’t remember. About ten o’clock, I guess.”

“Man, that’s a long time ago.”

“I suppose so.”

“How would you like a
real
fix?”

“Maybe.”

“Heroin,” she said, almost tasting the word.

“Sounds interesting.”

“Or aren’t you on hero
—”

“I said it sounded interesting,” he interrupted quickly.

She grinned, her lips parting like an opening flower.

“You’re cute, Ray Stone. Maybe we’ll share more than a fix.”

“Maybe.”

“This is the last set,” she said. “I sing two more numbers. Wait for me, Ray.” She rose, her fingers lingering on his arm. She turned then and walked toward the bandstand, her hips straining against the tight skirt.

He searched the closet frantically. All right, he told himself. All right, this is far enough, I want it enough now, I want it pretty damn bad, I want it very much, too damn much, I need it right now. Where is it? Where the hell did she put it? How much longer does a guy have to stand this? Jesus, how much longer do I have to wait for the day to begin? Where is it? Where did she put it? Sixteen ounces. Jesus, where did it go?

He slammed the closet door in a frenzy and stalked into the bathroom.

There in her room, they clung together, trembling with the discovery of their bodies, and trembling with the promise of the drug waiting for them.

That was when she showed it to him. She opened the bureau drawer and took out a small tin candy box.

“Chocolates?” he asked.

“Better than candy, Ray. Much better.”

She lifted the lid, and his eyes opened wide. He looked down, his hands almost reaching for it.

“Is—is that—”

“That’s what it is, baby. Sixteen ounces of it.”

“Sixteen ounces! Jesus, where’d you get—”

“Is it enough, do you think?” She smiled teasingly.

“Enough? Jesus, it must be worth a fortune.”

“We’re going to have a real fix, Ray baby. No scrimping this time. We can use all we want. We can fly, baby, we can really build wings.”

He took her into his arms, kissing her warmly.

He slammed the door of the medicine chest shut. His hands trembled and there was a lurching pain in his stomach. He scratched his cheek nervously, scratched his temple, scratched his cheek again. In desperation, he looked in the shower stall, found only a bar of soap, threw this against the wall in fury. Where the hell is it? his mind screamed. He scratched his cheek again, not knowing what his hands were doing anymore. The muscles along his back began to quiver. He had to have it! Where was it, damn it, where was it?

They did it slowly. They measured out only enough of the white powder to give them wings, just enough to blow off the tops of their heads. Not too much. Not the big fix, the lethal dose an addict never woke up from. Just enough to give them a kick, a kick with an iron shoe behind it.

Each holding a loaded hypodermic, they walked to the bed, and emptied the syringes into their arms.

“Man, this is one big shooting gallery,” she shrieked.

“The biggest, the biggest,” he screamed with her, the drug beginning to take hold.

“I’m pulverized! I’m swinging. Man, I’m stoned!”

“Flying, flying, flying up there! Man, watch out, watch out for me in my brand-new Cadillac.”

The Cadillac dream had taken over then, with Ray behind the wheel. That was all he remembered. It had been one hell of a fine fix.

He went through the bureau again, the closet, the bathroom, even the shower. He went through her purse, scattered her underwear all over the floor, tossed his own clothes off the chair, his shirt, his socks, looking for the elusive candy tin with the white powder in it.

“Eileen!” he called, unable to contain himself any longer, wanting to wake her, needing the shot now as a man on a desert desperately needs water. No kicks this time, no kicks involved at all. This was life and death. This was the difference between being able to breathe, and dying.

“Eileen! Wake up, wake up. Help me.”

He was shivering now, barely able to keep his body steady. He walked rapidly across the room and stooped over the bed.

“Eileen!” he said, his voice a hoarse whisper, a light sweat covering his body with a cold film. “Eileen.”

He reached down and touched her shoulder gently, his fingers trembling. “Eileen. Eileen, snap out of it.”

He shook her more violently, his lips moving frantically, gulping great gulps of nothing in his throat. “Come on, kid,” he pleaded, “come on now, let’s go, come on.”

With a sudden violent movement, he ripped back the sheet, exposing the length of her body relaxed against the whiteness of the bed. He shook her again, and his eyes traveled down to the hollow of her navel.

He noticed the holes then.

They were small holes, just to the right of her navel. They were rimmed with red, and there was a dried river of red across the flatness of her stomach. The redness stretched out beneath her, staining the sheet in gaudy brilliance.

Her shoulders were quite cold.

A horror that was worse than the drumming need for the drug seized him. He realized then that Eileen Chalmers wasn’t breathing.

Chapter Two

He didn’t touch anything. He didn’t touch a thing, even though his mind told him his fingerprints were probably scattered in a hundred places all around the room.

He backed away from the bed, still trembling from the shock.

So that’s what bullet holes look like, he thought. Round and small, and they spill blood over bellies, they kill pretty young girls. He walked back to the bed and pulled the sheet up over her breasts, hiding the ugly holes in her stomach, hiding the blood stains.

“I have to get out of here,” he said aloud, surprised at the hoarse sound of his own voice. He bit his lip, set his teeth tightly. That’s all the cops would need, all right—a hophead to pin this on. Under the influence of narcotics, Ray Stone, hophead. He washed his hand over his face, trying to wash away the title he’d given himself. But I
am
a hophead, he argued, forgetting the dead girl completely. He had reached the point where he could admit it freely, say it as casually as he would say “I am a boy scout” or “I am an Elk,” wasn’t that it? No, no, that wasn’t! That wasn’t it. He could never say it like that, never. He would always carry the shame, always wonder if it showed in his eyes, always roll up his sleeves only so far when washing his hands, afraid the telltale scars would show.

He remembered the dead girl abruptly. He had to get out of there in a hurry. He had to get out of there, and he had to get a shot before he blew up completely.

A shot.

Several shots, and all pumped into her belly. Why hadn’t he heard them? Sure, he’d been blind, but wouldn’t the shots have penetrated, wouldn’t they have shaken him from his stupor? Or wouldn’t someone in the hotel have heard them? Surely someone would have heard the shots.

Unless a silencer were used. And if there had been a silencer on the murder gun, then the killer had come to this room intent on doing murder. This wasn’t a question of Eileen’s surprising a sneak thief or—
I need a shot, I need a shot!

Quickly, he picked up his shirt from the floor. He buttoned the shirt rapidly, slipping his tie under the collar and hastily knotting it. He removed his jacket from the back of the chair, shrugged it onto his shoulders. From the bureau drawer he took his cuff links and fastened them at his wrists with trembling fingers.

He took the crumpled package of Camels from the drawer, put one between his lips, and struck three matches before he finally lighted it. When he looked into his wallet, he found it was empty. His mind almost screamed at the discovery.

When would he learn? When would he ever learn? Good God, how could he leave himself wide open like this? The sixteen ounces of stuff, where was it? Hell, he’d been over the room with a fine comb. The stuff was gone, vanished,
poof!

If he didn’t get a shot soon,
he
would vanish, blow up, dry away; dry up, blow away, he meant. He didn’t know what he meant. Typical hophead, he thought with disgust. Typical muddled jackass. Leaving himself in this predicament. Leaving himself wide open for the monkey to hop on his back. He bit his lip, clenched his hands together. He wanted to feel sorry for himself, but he couldn’t. He had too much pride—yes, pride, damn it— to indulge in self-pity. A strange bittersweet memory of the Ray Stone that used to be crossed his mind, to be immediately stifled by a fresh pang of desire.

He needed money!

What day was it? Saturday? No, it was Sunday. His father would be home. He couldn’t call his father, not after all he’d put him through. But he needed money. He could count on his father, he had to call him. Quickly, he walked to the phone on the end table near the bed. He lifted the receiver, held it to his ear, waited.

“Yes?” the crisp voice asked.

He hesitated, wondering if he should answer, wondering if the girl would remember his voice when the cops started asking questions later.

“Yes?” the voice repeated.

“Line, please,” he said, trying to keep his voice muffled.

“Yes, sir; just a moment.”

He waited until he heard a dial tone, then rapidly dialed, repeating the numbers to himself as he spun the dial, breathing harshly, the pain eating at his insides.

He fidgeted while he listened to the buzzing on the other end.

“Hello.”

“Hello, Dad? This is Ray.”

“Ray! Where are you? Are you all right?”

“I—I need help, Dad.” He felt sick, disgusted at himself for crawling back to his father like a little boy whenever he needed help. His father should refuse. After all the slaps he’d given him, after all the things he’d said, his father should refuse. He waited.

“What is it?” His father’s voice was tired. He sounded as if he’d always been tired.

“I’m in a jam, Dad.”