Casanegra

by Blair Underwood

  We popped open a little foil package, and April slid the lambskin ring into her mouth, then swallowed me again, her tongue more agile than most women’s fingers. She climbed astride me. Her ass slid across my stomach, her breasts tickling my chest. Her thighs swallowed me, and then she was warmer still. Tighter. Her body grasped me inside her with hardly room to breathe. I held her waist and raised my torso upward slightly, probing, but she shook her head and smiled.

  “Like I said…it’s my turn,” she said.

  While I lay flat and still, April slowly worked her pelvis in tiny motions—up and down, back and forth—releasing her juices. Soon, she was tightand slick. Her hot insides tensed and released, well trained. I helped guide her to an angle that shuts my brain down, and once she learned it, she never strayed, kneading me with her body’s steady bobbing. I held two handfuls of her ass just to touch her and savor her skin against mine, but she controlled her movements. April controlled everything.

  “Thank you…” I gasped, feeling my next orgasm swelling, stronger and deeper than the first. What I meant was,Thank you for believing in me. I don’t usually talk during sex, but I had to. April trusted me, and her trust was something to treasure.

  April’s only response was a rolling motion with her hips and an exotic tug that made my mouth fall open, mute.

  After we made love, I let myself rest inside April Forrest, as deep as I could go. Our hearts pulsed to one rhythm as we fell into sleep.

  After breakfast on our terrace, April and I left a note under Chela’s door asking her not to leave the hotel. I could only hope she wouldn’t.

  “Are you clear on the rules?” I said to April while I drove toward Le Parker hotel.

  “What rules, Dad?” April’s eyes were smug and full of sex, and her smile was an aphrodisiac. I felt my mind try to wander.

  “This isn’t a joke, April,” I said. “Tyra just tried to have me killed, and M.C. Glazer is probably behind it—but he may not be. Assume that both of them are dangerous. We can play our game with Greene, but I talk to Tyra alone—and we don’t talk to Glaze at all. I won’t bring you if I don’t trust you to follow the rules.”

  “Nobody gives me rules when I’m on a story,” April said.

  Shit.My foot eased up on the accelerator. My next chance, I was going to turn the car around and take her back to the hotel. I wasn’t about to end up with April weighing on my conscience, too. Maybe she noticed that the car was slowing, so April quickly went on: “But in this case, I’ll make an exception.”

  “You sure?”

  “I won’t give you any crap, Ten. Promise.”

  I glanced at her to make sure she had a sober expression on her face. She did. “I’ll use a code, as a precaution,” I said. “If I say, ‘It’s time to check on the kids,’ that means I want you to get out of there fast, take the car, and go to the room.”

  “Got it. But how will I know if something’s happened to you?”

  “Give me a half-hour to call or show up in a cab. If I don’t, take off for L.A. On your way, feel free to call the police—but get on the road first.”

  “I will, Ten,” April said softly, resting her palm on my cheek. Her touch was a distraction, and I almost pulled away from her. It was hard enough to consider the prospect of running into M.C. Glazer, but I didn’t know what I would do if April got caught up in it. Caring about April meant I might do something stupid.

  Slowly, April pulled her palm down, her fingertips grazing my chin before her touch was gone. “You know I want this story. And we both want justice. So let’s just be a team, period. I can’t afford for you to be nervous over me, and neither can you. I don’t need a black knight in shining armor—I just need you to be on your game.”

  As usual, April seemed to be able to read my thoughts. I glanced at her beside me, looking officious in a gray Gloria Vanderbilt skirt and jacket her mother bought after she graduated from college, a hint that she should go to law school. To make Mrs. Forrest happy, April and I had decided to be lawyers for the day. We were posing as a married couple who were also business partners. I was dressed for my part in my only three-piece, a blue Armani, and a Ben Nye stage beard applied with prosthetic adhesive—not the cheap spirit gum stage actors can get away with, but the kind of glue that tolerates closeups on an IMAX screen.

  We looked good together. Maybe that was part of it. April made me uneasy, but I didn’t want to take her back to the room. I wanted to see how we worked together.

  “As long as you understand the stakes, I’d rather have you with me,” I said.

  “No more jokes until we get back to our room,” she promised.

  “When we get back to our room, I don’t think I’ll want to hear jokes.” I smiled, indulging myself with one last peek at April’s bright, active eyes. “Remember: We’re not Ten and April. We’re not actors playing roles. We’retourists. My name is Richard.” After my father, of course. My typical alias.

  “That flight from Tokyo last night was awful, wasn’t it, Richard?” April said. Her face was deadpan, already playing her part. A natural.

  Most of Palm Springs looks like a movie set, with midcentury architecture, but the Le Parker unfolded in front of us like our own mountainside country estate. Palm trees and expansive grounds made it feel like the most private place on Earth.

  “Wow,” April said. “I can see why Greene is shooting the video here.”

  It was too bad we were on such serious business—such dangerous business—because the Le Parker was the ideal backdrop for the beginning of whatever April and I were doing together. The Le Parker is one of Palm Springs’ trendiest hotels, a weekend retreat for famous faces. It’s also literally a work of art designed by Jonathan Adler, so no other hotel looks quite like it. Even tourists who can’t afford the high season prices sometimes visit just to see what they’re missing.

  But I couldn’t take time to admire the décor. As I always do, I let myself sink into my character. From the time we deposited our car with the valet at the curb, my facial expression and manner were someone else’s. Impatient. Wealthy. Distracted.

  “Ten!” a man’s voice called from behind me. “What’s up, man?”

  A Latino accent. My spinal cord locked into place. It sounded like Lorenzo.

  But when I turned around, I saw a portly younger man with close-cropped hair in a hotel uniform. Not Lorenzo. It was Enrique. So much for the stealth approach.

  The last time I saw Enrique Gonzalez, he’d been a scrawny kid fresh from Nicaragua studiously making the most of his new job at the reception desk at Le Parker. Five years later, he was thirty pounds heavier, married with a baby, and the five-star hotel’s head of security. I almost didn’t recognize him. He hugged me warmly, whipping out baby photos.

  A few years back, an irate guest who’d spent too much time in the bar confronted Enrique at the front desk, and he was grateful when I stepped in with soothing tones and commanding body language, enabling Enrique to broker peace and look good in front of his boss. That was how our friendship started. It pays to be kind; it’s not only good policy, but you never know where people will land.

  I glanced around to make sure his effusive greeting hadn’t caught the wrong attention, but the lobby was nearly deserted before nine on a Sunday morning.

  “Haven’t seen you lately,” Enrique said, grinning. “What’s going on, Ten?”

  I hate to lie to a friend, so I told Enrique as much truth as I could: April was a reporter (he studied her press pass), and we were investigating Afrodite’s murder. Afrodite’s sister, M.C. Glazer, and a Mr. Stan Greene were people we wanted to observe without being noticed. No bugs. No wiretaps. No trouble.

  Enrique hesitated, worried. “So you need to book a room?”

  “We don’t need to stay,” I said, and he looked relieved I didn’t expect to be comped for the night. The rooms at the Parker don’t come cheap. “But if you’re expecting a late check-in…maybe a poolside/garden view? We could watch the shoot without drawin
g attention. We only need it a few hours.”

  “Perfecto.I’m almost sure that’s no problem,” he said, brightening. “But I must tell you: The guests are already irate about the video, so if I get a single complaint…”

  “Then we’ll be gone. I wouldn’t burn you, man.”Not on purpose, anyway.

  Our temporary headquarters was a dream, of course: colorful, eclectic décor and a featherbed with a sheepskin rug folded across the foot. Plantation shutters led out to the balcony, where the pool was easily in view.

  Downstairs, shooting for the day had not yet begun, although crewmen were setting up their cameras and equipment. The hotel has four pools, but I could understand why guests were complaining: One of the outdoor pools had been commandeered for the shoot, restricted only to extras. The pool area was overrun with curvy brown and black women in string bikinis; I counted thirty. There probably hadn’t been this many black folks by the pool in the hotel’s history, and between them they weren’t wearing enough clothing to cover a nun. The pool was Flesh Central. I knew M.C. Glazer must have paid a small fortune to make his intrusion in the peaceful retreat worth the trouble.

  M.C. Glazer gets what he wants. If he wants me dead, I’m a dead man,I thought. What made me think a thirteen-acre resort would be big enough to keep us apart? Glaze had probably brought an army of bodyguards, including Lorenzo and DeFranco. The only thing I had going in my favor was that M.C. Glazer wouldn’t expect me to be crazy enough to go near him. Suddenly, I wished I wasn’t.

  I squatted on the balcony, staring down through the rails. While my mind frantically tried to make a case for driving back to Los Angeles, I whipped out my Pentax DB100 digital camera/binoculars to gaze down at the pool. Amplified images appeared: blurry champagne glasses, someone’s nose. I adjusted the binoculars, pulling back, and suddenly I saw whole faces as clearly as if I was standing beside them.

  “Any sign of Greene?” April said, sitting beside me.

  “Not yet.” I’d seen Greene’s picture on the internet; he was swarthy and olive-skinned, probably about two hundred pounds.

  Suddenly, I did see M.C. Glazer. He sat in a lounge chair, bare-chested except for his obligatory gold chains and medallions, wearing loose-fitting polo pants. He was holding a meeting with two squatting white men whose faces I did not recognize. The men looked like part of the film crew, not the crew that wanted to stomp me into extinction. M.C. Glazer was up early taking care of business.

  Then, I spotted Serena by the pool. She was five yards from M.C. Glazer, dressed in the flowing white from her “You Want Some?” music video. I blinked, sure I had to be hallucinating. It was only Tyra, of course. But through binoculars, her face was indistinguishable from her sister’s. Even once I knew better, my heart still sped up as I stared at Serena’s ghost. I forced myself to look away.

  “There’s Tyra,” I said, pointing her out to April and giving her a look. “With M.C. Glazer right behind her.”

  April gasped softly. “She looks just like—”

  “Glaze told me he was hiring Tyra to parody Afrodite,” I said.

  “Even now that she’s dead? That’s so tasteless!”

  “You sound surprised.” A thought suddenly into my mind:What if Serena hadn’t been the target at all? What if Tyra pissed off the wrong person, and look-alike Serena just ended up in the line of fire—

  Whatever way it had happened, Tyra had no business playing with Serena’s ghost. Now I was really pissed off.

  “I think we have Greene, too,” April said, excited. She gave the binoculars back to me, pointing the way. I still saw M.C. Glazer lounging, but the squatting men had stood up to make room for another. He was wearing sunglasses, but I recognized his profile and his dark, wavy hair. Greene.

  “It’s him,” I said. “But if these three don’t separate, it’s going to be a long day.”

  “We may have to wait until after the shoot.”

  “Lunch break,” I said, at the same time she did. I noticed her arm against mine, and my skin was prickled, hot, despite the fabric that separated us. I made myself keep my eyes away from her, though. I tried to forget the featherbed in the other room.

  Greene leaned over to say something to Glaze privately, then he walked a few feet away with the three crewmen to point out the mountain range, which sat practically at the pool’s doorstep. It was just part of the long list of minutiae Greene would have to think about before shooting began. Some actors yearn to direct, but I don’t have the patience.

  I sighed. “Maybe we’ll get—”Lucky, I was going to say. Greene suddenly gave a quick wave, and he walked away from his crewmen. Past Glaze, after a deferential salute to him. Toward the lobby.

  “Watch Greene,” I told April, and grabbed the phone. I dialed the extension Enrique had given me, and a woman picked up on the first ring. When I asked for Enrique, she put me on hold.

  “He’s almost at the lobby,” April reported.

  Enrique picked up, lightning-quick. “It’s Ten,” I said, before he could finish his hello. “Stan Greene just left the patio for the lobby. White golf shirt, black khakis, sunglasses. I need a tail to tell me where he goes.”

  Long silence.

  “You there?” I said.

  “You’re trying to get me fired, aren’t you?” Enrique said.

  “Man, you can help us get out of here a lot faster.”

  Enrique cursed in Spanish and hung up. I took that as ayes.

  “I lost him,” April said, still peering down.

  “Not for long.”

  Not two minutes later, the room phone rang. It was Enrique in a hushed voice, breathless. “I found him. He was going into Norma’s.”

  “Still there?”

  “Just got seated. Terrace. He’s alone with a SundayNew York Times.”

  “You’re beautiful, man.”

  “Don’t make me escort your ass out of my hotel.” Enrique hung up. He wouldn’t want any more calls from me, but if I did this right, I wouldn’t need him again.

  “We’re on,” I said to April. “Another breakfast?”

  She grinned. “Most important meal of the day.”

  Even outside on the terrace, Norma smelled like sweets and coffee. The terrace woke up my eyes with its bright orange foam seats, upscale white garden chairs adorned with orange and green cushions, freshly cut flowers—and an open view of the ripe spring greenery defying the desert air around us. Norma’s wasn’t nearly as bustling as I expected, maybe because of the midmorning hour, so Stan Greene had a corner of the terrace to himself. We had gotten to him in three minutes flat, and Greene already had his coffee. Just as Enrique said, he was absorbed by hisNew York Times, reading the paper folded vertically the way New York subway riders do. Old habits die hard.

  With the perky host’s blessing, we took a table two removed from Stan Greene, where he could see us if he looked up but not close enough to crowd him. Greene could hear us if we wanted him to, and that was all that mattered. Every word out of our mouths was in character, part of our chosen scenario. If we played it right, we wouldn’t have to go to Stan Greene—he’d come to us.

  Action.

  “But she’sdead now, darling,” April said, as soon as we’d ordered our French toast and red-berry risotto oatmeal. She pushed the blueblood bit a little far, I thought, but most of acting is selling it, and she was committed. “Instead of getting tied up in litigation, we should cut our losses. We can move forward with the Beyoncé project.”

  “We can’t walk away from losses like that, babe,” I said. “You must still be on Tokyo time: You’re not thinking straight. A quarter mil? And Biggs knows he owes us. Biggs was the one who said to go ahead and hire a screenwriter before we went to the studios. It’s easy for him to spendour money.

  “But we’ll look like vultures if we go after Afrodite’s estate.”

  “Sentimentality doesn’t put our kids through Harvard.”

  “Yale,” I said.

  “Over my fabulous dead body.” />
  And so on. We were so convincing, I almost believed us. By the time Greene’s entrée arrived, we were in a full-blown debate, in polite tones. It reminded me of improvisation exercises in acting workshop classes. April was good at role-playing.

  I only dared look at Greene from the corner of my eye; April had a better view.

  I wrote a note to her in my notepad:IS HE LISTENING ?

  After a glance at Greene, she only shrugged. Our elaborate scenario might be wasted on him, I realized. A busy man like Greene had to learn how to tune out background noise. If he didn’t show a sign of interest soon, we would have to approach him more directly. That was riskier, and he was more likely to be guarded.

  I raised my voice slightly, throwing out bait I hoped he couldn’t resist: “I hear that funeral was a spectacle—a church full of people she owed money, I bet. I’d like to bring Afrodite back just to have one last chance to call her on her bullshit.”

  April raised her eyebrows. “Remember your blood pressure, Richard,” she said. “You can’t—” She stopped, eyes wide. I followed her gaze.

  Stan Greene was on his feet, nearly at our table. I closed my notepad.

  “Excuse me,” he said. “I happened to overhear: Are you talking about Afrodite?”

  I gave him a wary look, and April followed my example.

  “You are…?” April began.

  “Stan Greene,” I said, as if I’d suddenly recognized him. “Of course. The director.” I rose to my feet and shook his hand. “What a pleasure. You didTwisted. And all your videos are so fresh.”

  “I’m still more a producer than a director, but thanks,” Greene said, smiling. No one in Hollywood can resist a compliment, and I was probably one of only a dozen people who’d said anything nice aboutTwisted, Greene’s trite feature film debut. Greene was about fifty-five, but his hair looked thirty, full and richly hued. “No need to stand. I was finishing my breakfast, I heard you talking…”

  “Join us?” April said quickly, pointing out an empty chair.

  Good girl.An invitation from a pretty woman is hard to resist, too.