Sophie Katz 06-Vanity, Vengeance and a Weekend in Vegas Page 6

  And a disturbing little voice in my head told me that if there was someone out there who had harmed my Anatoly I could kill again, with no guilt whatsoever.

  And another little voice told me this was a very strange question for a reader to be asking. “Are you asking if I’m a murderer?” I asked. “Because obviously the answer to that would be no.”

  “Interesting,” the woman mused, “and yet you write about it so convincingly. Have you ever interviewed anyone who does have experience with killing? Like, have you interviewed ex-cons, or cops or military guys?”

  “I think the experience of a soldier fighting to defend his country is significantly different from the experiences of someone who kills for personal interest,” I glanced toward the entrance. Perhaps when a pink stiletto-wearing stranger tries to start up a conversation about murder the appropriate response is to just get up and leave.

  “True, but I didn’t necessarily mean American military,” she continued. “You know in some countries there’s a lot of crossover between the police, military and crime families. In Russia for instance—“

  I snapped my head back in the woman’s direction. “Excuse me?”

  “I was just saying that in Russia being part of the military doesn’t preclude you from involvement in crime or even in the Russian mafia….or as they call it the Bratva.”

  I felt myself go rigid. “Who are you?”

  Her smile broadened. Leisurely, she checked her diamond Cartier watch and stood back up. “You should go back to San Francisco and write another one of your wonderful books. Vegas is no place for a novelist. It doesn’t provide a conducive ambiance for creativity.”

  “What are you saying?”

  “I’m saying that there’s nothing for you here. Go back to San Francisco. Tomorrow morning if you can.”

  She started to turn but I immediately got up and grabbed her arm. “Where’s Anatoly?” I hissed.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “The hell you don’t! Who are you?”

  “Do I need to call security over?” the woman asked, her voice sweet and sympathetic. “They might even call the police. Would you like to talk to the police tonight?”

  I let go of her arm. “Just tell me where he is.”

  “There you are!” Marcus’ voice carried across the lobby tinged with notes of anger and panic. I turned to see him striding toward me. He grabbed me by both my arms and squeezed a little too tightly. “I can’t believe you just took off like that! Tonight!”

  “She knows where he is! This woman knows everything!”

  Marcus gave me a puzzled look and then glanced behind me. “What woman? You mean that redhead you were just talking to?”

  I broke free of Marcus and whirled around. I caught a glimpse of her as she stepped out the front doors of the lobby

  “No, no, no, no!” I cried and then took off after her at full speed, Marcus close on my heels.

  “Who are we chasing?” he asked as we ran outside.

  I came to an abrupt halt and swiveled my head back and forth trying to get a glimpse of red. No one should be able to move that fast in stilettos. It just wasn’t possible, was it?

  “Do you see her?” I asked urgently.

  “No, she must have jumped in one of the cabs or something. Who is she?”

  Desperately I stared out at the street that was littered with cabs of various colors. “She’s gone,” I whispered.

  “Who!” Marcus demanded again. “Who’s gone?”

  “I don’t know. But she gave me a warning. She told me to go back to San Francisco first thing tomorrow.”

  “Or what?”

  “Good question. But I guess we’ll find out because I’m not going anywhere.”

  Marcus released a heavy sigh. “Are you really going to stay here and risk our lives to rescue your horny, married, mafia-lovin’-boy-toy? Because that song’s even too pathetic for Nashville.”

  “Anatoly is not a boy-toy.” I snapped.

  Marcus brought his fingers up to the bridge of his nose. “You need sleep, Sophie. You’re not going to be able to do anything without that.”

  I bit down on my lip. I knew he had a point. I could feel the exhaustion tugging at me and without sleep I would be left with a debilitating hangover when the sun came up. Perhaps if I had been more rested I wouldn’t have allowed Little-Miss-Evil to get away so easily. But I knew that if I lay down the images of that woman in the closet would come back to haunt me and yank me out of unconsciousness. I sighed and started walking toward the strip.

  “Where are we going now?” Marcus asked as he matched my pace.

  “Isn’t it obvious?” I asked. “I’m going to see if any of the local drug dealers peddle Ambien.”

  CHAPTER 6

  “The vibrator was the fifth domestic appliance ever to be electrified, coming over a decade before the vacuum cleaner. It’s comforting to know that every once in a while society gets its priorities right.”

  --Death Of The Party

  We never did find a dealer who sold Ambian but we did find a very nice prescription drug addict who allowed me to bum a couple of Valium off her and after twenty minutes more of staring at the ceiling of my hotel room I was finally able to get to sleep.

  I dreamt I had a closet full of monsters and standing between it and me was the redhead in her pink stilettos…and in her hand was Anatoly’s gun.

  “Who are you?” I asked.

  “You know who I am,” she replied, coyly. Behind her the monsters scratched at the closet door.

  “Are you guarding me against the monsters?”

  “I haven’t decided,” she whispered. In the real world the whisper would have been too soft to hear but in my dream it was as clear as a scream. “The problem is,” she went on, “I’m a monster too.”

  And that’s when I woke up. The room was empty and completely silent. It took me a moment to put together what was a dream and what wasn’t. There were no monsters in the closets. Just dead bodies. The mysterious woman wasn’t here…but she had to be somewhere…and so did Anatoly.

  That was unsettling on several different levels. I propped myself up on my elbows. The door adjoining my room to Dena and Marcus’ was open but from what I could see both of them were out.

  I closed my eyes again and tried to predict what the day would bring. There was a distinct possibility that I was about to be arrested for murder. I glanced at the clock. 9:45 a.m. Would I have time to get a frappucino before being sent to prison? I was pretty sure impending incarceration justified splurging on a Venti.

  I heard the door to the other room open and close and I immediately tensed. Oh God, what if I get arrested before I’ve had my coffee?

  “Sophie?” Leah called out. I exhaled loudly as she appeared in the doorway, a frappuccino in one hand and a small brown Starbucks bag in the other. “Marcus gave me his key. I thought you might be hungry.”

  She sat down on the edge of the bed and handed me my breakfast. Gone was the suit from the night before. Now it was twill white pants, a fitted white tank, a cotton/silk blend navy pointelle cardigan and a short strand of pearls that looked fake but I knew were real. She looked like she was about to jump on her yacht and win the America Cup.

  “Thank you,” I breathed, jamming a straw into my drink. “Are they coming for me?”

  “Is who coming for you?”

  “I don’t know, the police, the mob…anyone really. If anyone is coming for me I’d like to know about it.”

  “Are you planning on going on the lam?”

  “No, but if I’m going to be arrested I need to do my make-up. I want a cute mug-shot, preferably something I can use as a publicity photo later.”

  “Naturally,” Leah said with an understanding nod. She ran her hands over the pristine white trousers. “You think I shouldn’t have come.”

  “I did tell you not to.”

  “You did, but you need my help.”

  “I already have Marcus an
d Dena.”

  “You need me too,” Leah insisted. “When the man you were living in sin with turns out to be married and then murders a bimbo and sticks her in a closest…well it’s times like these that a girl needs her sister.”

  “Anatoly didn’t kill the bim…that woman. He’s not capable of that.”

  “If you say so,” Leah said mildly. “Perhaps he was one of the few pacifists employed by the Russian mafia.”

  “Leah—”

  “I don’t think you’re going to be arrested this morning,” she said cutting me off. “There’s nothing in the news about a murder taking place at the Hotel Noir or anywhere else.”

  “Maybe the maid hasn’t cleaned the room yet.”

  “Well…it was the sixth floor, right? Those lower floor rooms usually get cleaned pretty early in the morning unless…did you put a Do-Not-Disturb sign on the door?”

  I slapped my forehead in frustration. “No! Why didn’t I think of that?”

  Leah wrinkled her nose in disgust. “Ugh, that means that housekeeping probably has been in the room and they just didn’t clean the closet. Do you think housekeeping ever cleans the closets? Maybe they don’t! That’s it, I’m never going to hang anything in a hotel closet again. Just think of the germs!”

  “Yeah,” I said, my mouth full of cinnamon sugar coffee cake. “Lots of germs on a dead body.”

  Leah shuddered at the thought. “Well hopefully they at least had the professionalism to do a thorough cleaning of the rest of the room. If so your fingerprints have been wiped away and any strands of hair that you might have inadvertently left behind have been vacuumed up.”

  “There’s still the security cameras.”

  “True,” Leah admitted. “But the longer it takes them to find the body the harder it’s going to be for them to pinpoint time of death. You might be able to argue that when you were in the room everybody was alive and well…or better yet, that they weren’t there at all.”

  “Listen to you! You sound like an old pro at this.”

  “Please. You can’t be related to Calamity Jane without learning how to clean up a mess.”

  I smiled. For once, everything my sister was saying was making sense. The longer it took the police to find the body the easier it would be for me to create reasonable doubt.

  “Where’s the rest of our little group?”

  Leah rolled her eyes. “Mary Ann slept in but she’s getting ready now to join Marcus and Dena at that awful trade show. She’s actually excited about going…well, I suppose it’s not completely inappropriate since this is supposed to be her Bachelorette weekend.”

  “I can’t believe you tricked her into thinking we all came here for her. And now she’s getting the worst Bachelorette weekend ever.”

  “In my defense, I thought I was crashing a pity party, not a mafia perpetrated homicide.”

  “Still—”

  “Still what?” Leah snapped, cutting me off. “When exactly were you going to plan her Bachelorette party? Even before this most recent mess you were absorbed with the mess of your break-up and if Dena had planned it we all would have ended up in some horrible sex dungeon getting ball gags as party favors. This way Mary Ann gets her little celebration and Dena doesn’t have the chance to plan a party that would end with the eternal damnation of all our souls.”

  “We’re Jewish,” I reminded her. “We don’t really have an eternal damnation place.”

  “Well being stuck in a sex dungeon for an evening would be a pretty close second.” She got up and opened my closet. I bit down into my lower lip. It was going to take some time before I was comfortable with closets again.

  “You should get dressed. They’re expecting us.”

  I laughed but then stopped short when I realized she wasn’t joking. “Are you kidding? I know you don’t want to go and I sorta have other things I have to deal with.”

  “You’re right, I’d rather run a marathon…and you know how I feel about running. But if our story is that you didn’t see a dead body last night we can’t act like you did. And that means sticking to your precious itinerary.” She turned back to the closet. “What is one supposed to wear to a sex toy trade show, anyway?”

  I eyed her outfit and smiled. “Probably not Brooks Brother’s.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous, Brooks Brothers works for everything.” She pulled a pair of wide legged pants out of my closet and a loose, silk, red tank from my dresser and laid it out on the bed next to me. “Get yourself together. I’m going to go see what’s taking Mary Ann so long.”

  I sipped my frappuccino as she left the room. She had a point. I needed to keep up appearances as much as I really, really didn’t want to. I got up to take a shower but the ring of my phone stopped me. My mother’s number flashed across the screen.

  “Hi, mama. Checking up on me?”

  “Mommellah, something terrible has happened!”

  My heart dropped as I lowered myself back down on the bed. “Are you okay?”

  “Yes, yes, I’m fine.”

  “Mr. Katz? Is Mr. Katz okay?”

  “What is this? You ask after a cat before asking after your own nephew? Not that there’s anything wrong with your nephew, or your cat for that matter, but still, what would people think of your priorities? Is this how I raised you?”

  Maybe this wasn’t the time to tell her that she had apparently raised me to hang out at sex toy trade shows. “So if everybody’s okay, what’s the problem?”

  She hesitated a moment before continuing. “I came to your house to feed the kitty but…oh, mommellah, someone has been here!”

  And again, my heart went diving toward my toes. “Someone’s been…in my house?”

  “And such a mess they left!” my mother went on. “The cushions on the couch are slashed open, the books are on the floor, it’s—”

  “But Mr. Katz, you’re sure he’s okay? Is he with you?” my hand clenched the sheets beneath me.

  “You’re cat’s with me. He was hiding behind the curtains.”

  “Oh, thank God!” I breathed. I bent over holding my stomach with one hand, literally overcome with relief.

  “I’m surprised they didn’t tear up the curtains too!” Mama went on.

  “What’s missing? The television? Stereo? Did they take my computer?”

  “No, no, not all that. These were strange burglars. They took the computer but as far as I can tell that’s all. Who does something like this? I think it’s all that MTV the young people are watching these days.”

  “Mama, the young people who used to watch a lot of MTV are now middle aged people watching Ellen. All they took is the computer?” I silently thanked the writing gods that I had taken my MacBook with me. I was only three chapters away from completing my next manuscript.

  “All your checkbooks are here, your jewelry, the Waterford Leah gave you…they even left that Lennox Kiddush cup! And I paid a pretty penny for that! I tell you, these crooks are meshuggeneh!”

  “Yes, that or they were looking for something specific,” I muttered. “Mama, the desk my computer was on, is that still there?”

  “Yes, it’s here.”

  “And the USB stick that was in the top drawer…is that still there?”

  “Hold on…”

  I bit my lip and waited as she made her way through what I imagined was my trashed living room. The thought of anyone violating my home like that made my skin crawl.

  “Such a mess! They dumped everything in that drawer onto the floor. Real schmucks this people are!”

  “Have the police already been there?”

  “Oh, the police, they always make such a mess of things. I called you first.”

  That was silly. But in this particular case I was glad she had been imprudent. Eventually the Vegas cops were going to find that body. The last thing I wanted to do was to bring myself to the cops’ attention now. Reporting the burglary might also put Anatoly on their radar. Anatoly who was armed, M.I.A., and might easily be considered a mu
rder suspect too.

  “Are you sure you kept the USB sticks in that drawer. Those are the little grey sticks, right?”

  “Yes, it looks just like the one I gave you to back up your recipes…what about CDs…or any discs at all? Are any of them there?”

  “I don’t see them. So what was it these people were after? USB sticks? You told me they weren’t very expensive!”

  “They’re not valuable,” I said distractedly. But whoever took them clearly thought that what was on them was. Of course the only thing that was really on them were my manuscripts. I had a hard time believing that this whole fiasco stemmed from the Russian mafia’s interest in expanding into plagiarism.

  “Listen Mama…I don’t think you should call the police. As you said, they usually just make a mess of everything.”

  “Yes, but on second thought this place is pretty messy already! Listen, I didn’t call the police until I was sure the kitty was okay and your jewelry was safe, but when someone breaks into your house and turns it into a pigsty you call the cops.”

  “Normally, but they didn’t take anything very valuable—“

  “They didn’t take everything very valuable but the computer is still quite a pricey item! Just because you can afford to replace it doesn’t mean you should give it away to hoodlums!”

  “Trust me on this. I just need you to hold off on telling anyone anything,” I said firmly. “Take Mr. Katz back to your place and don’t let Jack torture him.”

  “What have you gotten yourself into this time?”

  “Nothing too bad, I just need a little time to think, okay? Love you!”

  I hung up the phone before she could start interrogating me. There was a knock on my door. Leah and Mary Ann stood there looking polished and ready to go.

  “I’m so excited about this!” Mary Ann squealed. “It’s going to be so interesting! Don’t you think it’ll be really, really interesting?”

  “Someone broke into my house,” I said quietly.

  They both stood in my doorway with blank looks on their face. Finally Mary Ann raised her hand as if she was in a classroom.

  “Um, didn’t we already know that? I mean, that’s how they got your clothes and old overnight bag, right?”