Lynne Heitman - First Class Killing

“Just answer a few more questions for me.”

MY FIRST STOP AFTER TONY WAS THE BAR, where I knocked back not one but two postfondling margaritas on the rocks. No salt. It was just something, as Tony had suggested, to “take the edge off.” I could still feel his cold, grubby fingers grasping at me. I felt like dousing the area with alcohol to disinfect. Gin would have done nicely for that purpose.

So, Angel had some competition. That certainly thickened the stew. According to Tony, there was a group at the party from Boston, sent out to protect the business interests of Angel’s East Coast operation. He’d also said the LA women had controlled the guest list and stacked it with clients of the Boston ring, mostly using names brought in by defectors from Angel’s group. This wasn’t an introduction party; it was a mass conversion effort. I wondered briefly how the Boston crew had gotten in, then realized how easy it had been for me to get the password.

I took my third margarita with me and started wandering, being invisible and eavesdropping on conversations. At one point, I walked past the front entrance and the massive foyer where the bouncer-greeter remained steadfastly at his post, even though the incoming crowd had dwindled to nothing. He looked bored. In fact, was that…I circled around to get a better look at his computer monitor. Yes, he was playing solitaire. As I watched him, an idea formed somewhere in my fast-pickling brain. I had to wait a few moments for it to float to the surface so I could pull it out and check it over and see if it made sense. It seemed to.

I should steal the guest list.

If the attendees at this party were, indeed, members of the high-roller, Hollywood target market with bulging frequent flier accounts, money to burn, and an enduring interest in extracurricular activity on the road, then a list of their names and addresses was a list Angel would want, especially if they were clients being targeted for conversion away from her group. The names of hooker recruiters and potential recruitees from either coast certainly would be of interest.

I watched for a few moments from the doorway and tried to formulate a plan. Perhaps I could distract the big guy with one hand while downloading, copying, and swiping the file with the other. That might have worked if the guy had been Tony, and it assumed there was even a disk available.

I sipped my drink and tried to discern if I was in any condition to pull it off. I was a little thick by then, but I had all my senses. I could still taste; it was just that all I could taste was tequila. I could still hear, mostly the beat of the music, and I could still walk straight if I really, really concentrated hard. I thought I could pull it off, but I wasn’t positive. What if I got caught? How would I explain? What would I tell Tristan? I should never have started drinking. I knew that, and I had done it anyway. I drained the glass and started back to the bar to think it over some more.

“Excuseme.Walk much? God, watch where you’re going.”

I had bumped into someone. The bumpee twisted in my direction and flipped her hair across my drink. It was Sally, the woman I had photographed with Angel in Pittsburgh. She was standing with Ava and Sylvie and Charlotte and Claudia. Angel’s crew was here, after all, looking scathingly gorgeous in skirts that were micro, boots that were tall, and bell-bottoms lashed low on slithery, tattooed hips.

Having already brushed me off once, Sally had turned away, which meant I was staring at the back of her head. It seemed she hadn’t been quite so impressed with my new look as Dan might have suggested and I would have liked. I was trying to figure out an approach, when Sylvie, who couldn’t have been a day over twenty, gave me a genuine, if fleeting, smile. It wasn’t much, but it was all I needed.

“Excuse me, you’re Sylvie, aren’t you?”

“Yes. What’s your name?”

“I’m Alex Shanahan. We work together. I mean, we’ve never actually flown…I’m based in Boston. You are, too, aren’t you? I’m new. I’ve only been flying about six weeks. I don’t know anyone at this party. I thought I recognized some familiar faces over here. May I join you?”

Now all in the tight nest were staring, with expressions that ranged from completely blank to insulted by my presence. They seemed none too happy with Sylvie, either, who somehow got shuffled to the back of the group.

“We know who you are.” That was Sally again, addressing me as if I were a wad of wax she’d just pulled from her ear. “No, you cannot join us. This is a private thing.” She started to turn away but didn’t. “By the way, did you do that yourself?”

“What?”

“That.” She pointed at my head. “You colored your own hair, didn’t you?”

My hand started automatically toward my head, an instinctive flinch of self-defense.

“Nice outfit,” she said. “It’s so…young. Is this a second career for you?” Her Greek chorus snickered and twittered. She leaned down and whispered, “You shouldn’t try so hard. It’s unbecoming.”

I wanted to make my skirt longer and my heels lower. I wanted to stretch my sweater down to my knees. But what I wanted more than anything was to come up with a bitingly clever, equally demeaning remark that would cut her down to size, or at least keep me from sinking into the hole that was opening in the floor beneath me.

“Here you are, dear.” I heard Tristan’s voice just as I was about to disappear completely. “What are you doing over here with these toxic bitches?” He draped a protective arm across my shoulders. “I see the dirty girls are here. What is this, a call girl confab? A hooker hoe-down? A prostitute parlay? Where’s your Queen of Dairy?”

Sally seemed to have lost her flair for slashing insults, because all she could come up with was, “Fuck off, Tristan.”

He laughed. “So, so clever, Sally, dear. Come, Alexandra. Did she touch you? Maybe we can find some moist towelettes.”

We turned and made our retreat, winding through the crowd. “Oh, my God. What were you doing with them? Didn’t I tell you never to go near that crowd? They are evil, wicked women, and I take it your friend didn’t show up?”

“My friend?”

“The passenger you came here to meet.”

“Oh, him.” That fictitious fellow. Just one of my lies. “No. I haven’t seen him.”

“Poor dear.” He smiled. “I’m sorry. Come out and be with us, the only fun, interesting, and interested people at the party, although most of them are wasted by now. But that shouldn’t be a problem. So are you.”

We walked outside past a large, raised platform that was crowded with dancers. Off to the side was a grouping of lawn chairs. Lounging among the chairs and on the grass like a pride of inebriated lions were beautiful young men, all talking at once-to each other, to cell phones, to people on the dance floor. Surrounding them were empty bottles and used glasses and ashtrays piled high. They were, as Tristan introduced them, his gay LA friends.

They adopted me immediately, and for the first time all night, I started having a good time. They wanted to know about me-if I liked living in Boston, if I was straight or lesbian, if I had seen much of LA, if I liked flying, and whether I wanted to dance. At first I didn’t. Too depressed. But they kept shuttling over drinks from the bar and stroking my ego, and I started feeling better, and eventually that writhing mass on the dance floor started to look like fun, and the next time one of them grabbed my hand to pull me up there, I went.

I climbed up on the platform, where the temperature must have been fifteen degrees hotter than on the ground. I pulled my sweater over my head and tossed it…somewhere.