Brian Freeman - Stripped

It wasn’t like Raul to whisper, but even when Beatrice craned her neck and cupped a hand behind her ear, she could barely make out a word.

“Speak up, Raul,” she said to the television.

Beatrice was frustrated, because she recognized the attractive woman in the old photograph on the screen, and she wanted to hear what they were saying about her.

“Can you hear that, Rowena?” Beatrice called to her roommate. “I think the television is broken again. Or maybe the remote control needs batteries.”

Rowena was in the other bed in the one-room studio they shared in the assisted living facility in Boulder City. Beatrice looked over and saw that Rowena was sleeping again. She slept most of the time. Beatrice had gone through three roommates in the past year, and she was afraid that Rowena would be gone soon, too. It was too bad, because when she was awake, Rowena was a stitch. She had raised six children on a dairy farm in Iowa, and the stories she told could keep you laughing for hours.

Like the one about her eight-year-old daughter trying to “milk” a bull. Well, wasn’t that a surprise for both of them!

Beatrice stared at the television again and sighed. Raul had moved on to another story.

She looked out the window at the main street of Boulder City. Cars whizzed by, heading off to Lake Mead or Hoover Dam. Flora had taken the residents on an outing to Lake Mead the previous month, and although the wind had mussed her hair, it had been lovely to see the water again. Not that Lake Mead was as pretty as Lake Tahoe, where she had lived for so many years, but it was good to be outside again. She enjoyed the heat, although she did miss the chill of those winter nights long ago, when she and Emmett would snuggle under the quilt together. She couldn’t handle the cold anymore, though. That was why she had retired in the southern part of the state.

Flora came running into the room, her hands over her ears. She made a beeline for the television, clicked it off at the switch, and then put a hand over her heart, breathing heavily. She wagged a finger and said something that Beatrice couldn’t hear.

“You’re mumbling again, Flora,” Beatrice told her. “Speak up, will you?”

Flora came up to the side of the bed and looked like she was shouting, but the words were far away. “Bea, honey, you forgot to put in your hearing aids.”

“Oh, dear.”

Flora rustled in the nightstand drawer by Beatrice’s bed and came out triumphantly with two beige plugs that Beatricefitted in her ears each morning. She helped Beatrice insert them and then stood back, laughing. Flora was a three-hundred-pound Filipino woman, and her body jiggled all over when she laughed.

“Is that better, honey?”

“You don’t need to shout, Flora,” Beatrice said, which made Flora laugh again.

“Do you want the television back on?” Flora asked.

Beatrice shook her head. “No, I missed the story I wanted to see.”

“Wha t story was that?”

“Well, I missed it, so I don’t know! But they were showing a photograph of a lovely girl I knew back when I was a nurse.”

“That’s nice,” Flora said. She was bustling around the room, straightening up, and had stopped paying attention. “Did you see they caught that terrible man? The one who killed all those people? Shot him off the top of a building. Bang, bang.”

Flora fussed at the bedside. She nudged Beatrice forward, then grabbed and fluffed her two pillows with a meaty brown fist. “It’s romantic, though. He killed all those people to get revenge for his mother. His mother! My boys, it’s hard enoiigh getting them to show up for my birthday party.”

“Who was his mother?” Beatrice asked.

“What? Oh, one of those showgirls from the 1960s. She had to give up her baby. Isn’t that tragic? Can you imagine? I would go crazy giving up one of my babies. I’d be happy if they were living here when they were fifty. Of course, the way my boys are going, they might well be!”

Beatrice frowned. “Are you talking about Amira Luz?”

But Flora was already on her way out of the room and didn’t look back. Beatrice was alone again, except for Rowena, who was snoring. She remembered now-that was why she had taken her hearing aids out. Rowena snored like a 727 on takeoff.

Beatrice thought about Amira Luz and smiled. It was so funny to see this beautiful, pregnant woman on the balcony of the suite, trying to do these strange, erotic dance moves while her bulging stomach got in the way.

Flora must have been talking about Amira. Why else would her picture be on television after all these years?

It didn’t make sense, though. Flora must have got it wrong.

Beatrice turned on the television again and quickly lowered the volume with the remote. She waved at Raul, then began switching channels to see if someone else would have the story. Amira? No. They had made a mistake.

The invitation came, just as Stride expected. The following night at ten o’clock, they found themselves back in the bone white foyer of Boni’s penthouse suite in the Charlcombe Towers. Boni himself let them in through the double doors and guided them into the mammoth cowboy room. The light was low, just a few pale lamps and the glow from the tower outside.

Boni wore a dark suit again. Stride caught the aroma of cigars and cologne. He still had an easy, charming smile, and Stride wondered if he was like the Cheshire cat, who could disappear and leave only the smile behind to fool people. He used a two-handed grip to shake both their hands.

“You saved our lives, Detectives. Me and Claire. I felt I owed you a celebratory drink.”

“That’s why we’re here?” Stride asked, suspicion in his voice.

“Of course. You will drink with me, won’t you? You’re certainly not on duty now.”

Message received and understood , Stride thought. This was all off the record.

“Ms. Dial, I know you’d prefer mineral water or juice, of course. Detective Stride, what about you? Brandy?”

Stride nodded.

“I have an excellent brandy I think you’ll like,” Boni told Stride. He retired to the bar to pour a glass, as well as three fingers of whiskey for himself.

Stride took a sip. It seemed to melt on his tongue.

“Good, huh?” Boni asked.

“Outstanding.”

“Where’s Claire?” Serena asked.

“I thought she needed a break,” Boni said. “These last few days have been stressful for her. I flew her down to St. Thomas. She’ll be back soon.”

“I’d like to talk with her,” Serena said.

“Of course. I’ll give you the number for the resort before you go. I’m sure she’d love to hear from you.”

Stride took another sip of brandy. He wondered how this game was played. Who would start? How would they dance? What it really came down to was who would say the name first. It was foolish to pretend they didn’t all know what this was about.

As it turned out, Boni moved the first pawn.

“There’s someone here who would like to meet you,” he told them. “I bet you’d like to meet him, too.”

Stride heard a swish of movement behind them, and when he turned, he saw the silver-haired governor of Nevada joining them from one of the interior rooms of the suite.

“Mickey,” Boni called. “Come on in here. Meet those detectives who saved my neck.”

Mike Durand was tall and imposing. He was heavily suntanned, but his aging skin was tight and unblemished. A face-lift, probably, with laser surgery to burn off the blotches of sixty-five years. Capped teeth, too, that gave him a huge alabaster smile. He was dressed in a black tuxedo that practically glowed, and he already had a whiskey in his hand, twice the size of Boni’s. Stride also noticed something that he hadn’t spotted before when he saw the man on television or in photographs. Durand had the meanest, most cutthroat eyes he had ever seen, worse than any hardened criminal’s. He could smile as he slit your throat. A perfect politician.