“Rose is it?”
“Yes.”
“Listen, Rose, I don’t want to sound rude, but I’ve never been with a hooker before.”
“If you don’t want to sound rude, please just say lady of the evenin’, sugar.”
“Fine. Sorry. Look, I’m…I’m a bit nervous about all this. It seems my wife…You know what, never mind all that. Just...” He took a deep breath and sat down. He looked at her fully; she was young and beautiful, blonde and curvy in all the right places. She could have been Vivian with a little work, he thought. “Please, remove your stockings,” he said, “Slowly.” If he was going to pay for a good time, he was going to have fun with it, and see how obedient she would be. She obliged without hesitation. She sat on the edge of the bed and slowly unhooked her garter belt. Smoke from her cigarette curled around her face, shrouding her in a mysterious haze that seemed to intensify her sensuality. Then with a style only very few women can conjure, she slid each black silk stocking down her long, tan legs, and let them drop to the floor.
“What should I do next, sugar?” she said as she gently licked her firey lips. Her eyes stabbed his and he shifted in his chair, realizing he actually was enjoying this.
“Stand up.” She did. Her black negligee draped down around her body, revealing every curve, betraying every twitch of her taught muscles. “Slip off the negligee,” he continued. She lifted it off her shoulders and let it pool on the floor. She was wearing nothing but a thin black slip now. It was see-through. Hawthorn’s heart began to race with desire, desire for her body, lust for her soul, something he hadn’t felt for another woman since marrying Vivian so many years before. He stood up. “Lose the slip,” he said, and it to fell to the floor. She was naked now, a perfect specimen if ever he saw one. High, firm breasts the perfect size for her body, a lean, flat stomach and a swell to her hips that made him hard before he even touched her. “Come here,” he said and she slowly walked to him until she was right in front of him. He looked at her closely, could smell the scent of her perfume and soap lilting up to him. “Do everything you know how to do,” he said, “I’ll make it worth your while.”
Rose obliged.
1956
I was back in my suite on Tiki Island by one p.m. The maid service had cleaned up the room real nice, and a basket of fresh tropical fruits sat on the coffee table with a note that read, “Compliments of Eliot Hawthorn, enjoy your stay Mr. Riggins.” Outside in the garden, a couple of workers were finishing the filling of the grave where the unknown woman was buried. It was Friday the twenty-sixth of October, and I wasn’t due back to New York for over another week.
I took another shower to wash the heat and dust off of me from the abandoned house, and when I got out I realized I hadn’t eaten a damned thing all day. I was about to call room service when I decided to have lunch in the mermaid bar. I threw on my clean white pants and floral shirt and headed down to the bar.
The lobby was abuzz with dozens of tourists checking in for the weekend. Families with tons of luggage, businessmen with a single suitcase, groups of women laughing, groups of teenagers already drinking. Two little kids were already running around with their Halloween masks on, one a vampire and the other Frankenstein. In the middle of the lobby Bachman was directing people to various desks and elevators. Melinda was nowhere to be seen.
I settled into a small booth near the back of the shipwreck bar where I could watch the mermaids swim. Only one was in there, swimming alone, doing her underwater acrobatics like a true pro. I ordered a double hamburger with French fried potatoes and a side of coleslaw, just the way I liked it. Too much of this vacation food was making me soft. The waiter brought me a Mai Tai without asking, and a dish of oyster crackers. I thanked him and took out my notepad for the first time on the trip.
I wrote down everything, from the minute I left the City until I stepped into the bar a few minutes before. I included everything about Roberts, Jackson, the skeleton, Jessica and her hauntings, Melinda and her unreachable beauty. I wrote notes about Captain Reams and the things he saw after the 1935 Hurricane, and I wrote about driving around in that midnight blue ’57 Chevy convertible. Just as I finished writing, my burger showed up with a fresh Mai Tai. And a damned good burger it was.
I was just finishing up when Melinda walked into the bar. She saw me and stopped, and I think she almost turned around until she caught my eye. Then she smiled, a very professional smile, not the one that made me melt a few days ago. She made her way over to my table through the crowd.
“Hello Melinda! Care to join me for a drink?” She hesitated a little longer than I would have liked, then said, “Certainly,” and sat down across from me. Today she wore a dark, almost black dress with vivid yellow and white flowers, a white floral lei and a white flower in her black hair. The combination was both striking and ominous. “How have you been, Mr. Riggins?”
“Oh, it’s back to Mr. Riggins now, is it?”
She smiled again, the professional one. “It’s best we keep things on a professional level, don’t you agree?”
“Nope,” I said, “I’m on vacation. Nothing professional about it. Mai Tai?”
“Yes please,” she said and I motioned the waiter for two more cocktails. “I’ve really grown a taste for these drinks. I just can’t drink too many of the krazy things or I get loopy.”
“By loopy, do you mean you do, oh I don’t know, crazy things? Things you’d regret when you’re sober?”
I didn’t like that question or the tone she pushed behind it. It was the first time I’d seen her be wicked, and I had a feeling she had a lot more where that came from.
“Maybe,” I said cautiously. “Why, did I get drunk and stuff the towels down the toilet or something?”
“No,” she said, “I just…well, it’s not for me to say.”
“Say it. Remember I’m here on your nickel. If I did something wrong, spill it.”
“It’s your friend, Ms. Rutledge.”
So that was it. The little cat was jealous of the big cat. Damn. “What about her?”
“Well…she’s a very nice person, and an excellent employee, but I’m afraid it’s not such a good idea to have employees…eh…stay…with customers. It gives the hotel a bad name, if you know what I mean.”
I didn’t know what she meant. “I don’t get it. Who’s going to know if some doll spends the night in my room? You? Bachman? What’s the big deal?”
She looked around the room, then down at her glass. “I think it would just be better if you were a little more…discrete.”
So that was it. She didn’t like seeing me with another dame. “Listen, dollface, I like you. I have since the minute I saw you. I thought we had some kind of connection and I really wanted things to work out, but you said the magic words.”
“What magic words?”
“ ‘I can’t’. When a girl says no, that means no. And it’s a drag, because I think you’re tops and we could have had some great fun and laughs together on this trip. And we still can, on a nice friendly level. But now I’ve met Jessica, and believe it or not she means a lot to me. I know I’m only here for another week, and chances are after that we’ll never see each other again. But for right now I’m just trying to pack as much fun into this little fortnight as I can before I have to swing back to the urban jungle, ya dig?”
Melinda swallowed hard, took a second gulp and swallowed again. She looked straight at me, a touch of sadness in her eyes. Then she said, “I know how you felt Bill. I felt that way too, but I can’t get mixed up with a client. Like you said you’ll be gone in another week and I’ll be here. I need something more permanent. That’s why I can’t make love to you, no matter how much I want to.”
Damn it! And she hit me with that smile that made me melt all over again.
“As for Ms. Rutledge…Yes, I admit it. I am a little jealous of her. But that’s not why I want you to be more discrete with her, Bill. You don’t know anything about her.”
“I know
she worked as a stripper, if that’s what you mean.”
“That’s part of it. She’s got a certain reputation among people in Key West, and here. Do you know what I mean?”
“I can guess, and I can only say I don’t care about that. I’m having a good time, the best I’ve had in years and in a week it will all be over and I’ll be back to pounding the icy cold pavement looking for dead junkies and strung-out hookers in the snow. So please, Melinda,” I said while taking her hands, “Just let me have my fun?”
She flashed her old smile again and I got butterflies. “Ok Bill, you can bring her here, but please, just be…”
“I know, discrete.”
“Yes.”
“Thank you. Now that that’s out of the way, turns out she won’t be joining me tonight. So if you’re not busy, how about dinner on the beach? I promise, no funny stuff.”
“I don’t think so, Bill, we shouldn’t…”
“Melinda, remember, I’m your VIP guest,” I said smiling, “You wouldn’t want me to complain to the owner, now would you? I’m a friend of his, you know.”
“Oh, are you?” she laughed, and finally said, “Ok, eight o’clock, meet me in the lobby.”
“Fantastico.” She got up to leave. “See you then kiddo.”
“See you tonight,” she answered with another smile and left.
+++
At quarter to eight, Jessica Rutledge walked the two blocks from her Duval Street apartment to La Concha hotel. She passed right by. A block down she came to another smaller hotel, one not quite as elegant or clean as the La Concha. In the lobby she met her contact, a man named Mateuse. He gave her the work assignment for the evening and directed her to the kitchen where she met up with another man named Appleton. He in turn brought her to the back of the house where she’d prepare for the evening’s work.
“You look a little tired,” Appleton said as she donned the uniform. “Need anything?”
“I slept all afternoon, but yeah, what have you got?”
“Here, take two of these, wake you right up,” he said, “you can give me two bits for them when you have it.”
“Just put it on my tab, Benny,” she said. “Ok, how do I look?”
“Gorgeous. Go knock ’em dead, kid.”
Ginger smiled and headed out to the ballroom.
+++
Friday afternoon went slow and peaceful-like for me. I sat on the beach and read a magazine, swam in one of the pools (the big one surrounded by coconut palms and tropical flowers) and spent some time in the room watching the tube. I really wanted to head back to Key West and find Jessica but I knew she’d be working, and she told me not to try to contact her at work or she might risk losing her job. I wasn’t about to screw things up for her so I just relaxed. I started thinking about dinner with Melinda, and spending Saturday with Jessica. Then it occurred to me that I’d been gone almost a week, and hadn’t heard a word from LaRue on the Johnny Princeton situation. I grabbed the coconut-shaped phone on the bar and dialed the operator.
“Long distance please, New York city, Murry Hill 9734. Person to Person to Detective Frank LaRue.”
The operater said one moment and a bunch of clicks a whirs later I had LaRue on the other end.
“LaRue.”
“You sound tired.”
“I am tired. Who’s this?”
“It’s the guy who’s apartment you’re stealing.”
“Oh, hi Riggins. Thought you were out of town for another week.”
“I’m in Florida, calling from a coconut.”
“Sure you are. How’s the holiday?”
“So far great. I got beat up twice, had to help solve a twenty year-ole skeleton story and shot a cop.”
“Sounds like a blast. Bag any chicks?”
I had the feeling he didn’t believe me. “Just one, but a real looker and more than once.”
“Fabulous,” he said, and I had the feeling he still didn’t believe me.
“How’s our houseboy?” I asked.
“Sitting pretty. All’s quiet on the western front.”
“Groovy. Make sure he doesn’t steal my towels when he leaves.”
“Sure. You hear from the Captain at all?”
“I haven’t heard a word from anyone since I left,” I said.
“Well, he’s got everything smoothed over with that D.A. Turns out the D.A. has some dirty laundry he didn’t want aired out on channel nine.”
“Don’t they all. Tell the Captain hello for me, will ya?”
“Will do Riggins. Oh, that chick was askin’ for ya, your limo driver.”
“Fast Freddie?” I hadn’t given two thoughts to her since I left the state. What a heel I was.
“Yeah, that’s the one. Says to give her a ring when you get the chance. I assume she meant a phone call.”
“I’m sure she did,” I said, then said goodbye and hung up. I picked the coconut off the cradle again and dialed the operator a second time. “Long distance, New York City, Francis O’Malley, Pennsylvania 6569, please.”
The phone rang and rang, but no answer. I tried her office phone next, but got nothing. I’d try her again later in the evening.
My last call was to Jerry. I told him I met his brother and thanked him a million for setting me up so sweet. He asked if I scored any points with the chicks down here yet and told him I hit one out of the park. He whistled and called me a nasty name and we said so long and hung up. That was the only time I missed New York so far on the trip.
I mixed myself a V.O. Manhattan at the Tiki Bar and downed it in three gulps. It was almost seven, and I wanted to catch the mermaid show in the bar before I met up with Melinda, so I headed down once again.
The lobby was absolutely packed now, no less than a hundred people waiting to get up to their rooms. It was nice to see this place doing well, I thought. I wished them luck. I pushed my way through to the lobby bar and was lucky to get a seat at the bar itself, since the tables were all full. I ordered a Mai Tai (it seemed that’s all I ordered in the bar) and turned to watch the mermaids. The crowd applauded as the three girls swam around each other, waved, did little flips and criss-crossed each other in a sort of underwater dance to the music of Les Baxter. They made it look easy, but I had a feeling they did a lot of practice to look that good. I was so entranced by the beauty of the Tiki Island Mermaids that I didn’t even realize that Eliot Hawthorn had pulled up next to me at the bar.
“Good evening Mr. Riggins,” he said as he raised his glass. “Hope you’re enjoying your stay.”
“Yes, very much so Mr. Hawthorn, I especially like watching the mermaids swim.”
“As do I, as do I.” We both looked over at the tank; the three ladies were swimming their tails off for the crowd. “I hear you are having dinner with my daughter tonight,” he suddenly said in his gravelly, old man voice. I almost thought he was going to read me a sermon on the chastity of young women in the Florida Keys. Instead he said, “She is a very special person, Bill. Very special. She is wise beyond her years and will someday inherit and run all of this herself. But you know, she doesn’t need to do it herself, Bill.”
What was this, a sales pitch?
“I don’t follow you, sir.”
He turned away from the mermaids and looked at me. “Bill, you know very well how much she admires you, how much she feels for you. I don’t think she’s felt that way for a man in a very long time. My health is failing. I won’t be around forever. She needs someone to help her, to look after her when I’m gone, someone to protect her from the horrors of the world.”
“Mr. Hawthorn, if you’re asking me to consider marrying her,” I had to laugh a little, “I’ve only known her a few days, and I have a life in New York. I don’t think I could just drop everything and leave it, just as she couldn’t leave this place.”
“Well,” he said sounding somewhat deflated, “At least consider your feelings, and hers. Tiki Island’s not so bad a place to spend the rest of your years, believe me. It�
�s…paradise. As long as you’re with the one you love.”
“I’ll remember that,” I said.
“Good. Then I shall take my leave. Have a good evening, Mr. Riggins.”
“Good night, Mr. Hawthorn.” The old man left slowly, cane in hand. He was met at the door by one of the porters who helped him away. When I turned back around, the mermaids had finished their show.
At a few minutes to eight I found Melinda in the lobby. She was wearing a new dress, a green one with orange and yellow flowers. “How many of those dresses do you have?” I asked as I walked up to her, grinning like a goofy prom date.
“Thirty Five,” she answered, “Plus several sun dresses and a mini skirt.” She gave a little laugh and suddenly spending the rest of my life on Tiki Island didn’t sound so bad after all. I don’t know what kind of Tiki voodoo this chick could cast, but it was some strong stuff.
“Come on, Bill. I have a private table waiting for us on the south beach.”
She turned and I followed. It seemed that every time I set my peepers on this chick I saw something new, something wonderful. This time it was the way her hips swayed from side to side as she walked, sexy but not sleazy, alluring but not trashy. Tropical flowers swaying in the ocean breeze. Long, tan, sensuous legs proudly striding at just the right speed. The perfect walk from the perfect girl. She was so different from any of the other women I’d ever known, sophisticated and down-to-Earth all at the same time. So different from Jessica who was worldly only within the confines of the world of the Florida Keys, not sophisticated but no bubble-headed blonde either. I never planned on falling for a dame down here on vacation. I was in danger of falling for two.
Not good, kid.
The hostess sat Melinda and me at a table far off from the others. We ordered Mai Tais and a Crab Rangoon appetizer, and I settled in with a smoke.
“Cigarette?” I offered.
“No thanks, I don’t smoke.”
“Really? Huh. I thought everybody did.”
Murder on Tiki Island: A Noir Paranormal Mystery In The Florida Keys (Detective Bill Riggins Mysteries) Page 22