Don't Order Dog: 1 (Jeri Halston Series)

by C. T. Wente

  He pretended to admire them as he strolled by the desk towards the elevators, smiling casually at the beautiful, slender young Nigerian concierge as he passed. Feeling her eyes on him, he wondered briefly if she, like so many of the young women in Port Harcourt, had been “trained” in the African style of customer service. He reached the elevators and stepped into the first one that opened its gold-mirrored doors. As the floors ticked off, he mentally re-checked the contents of his backpack, absently humming to a voiceless, synthesized version of Elton John’s “Your Song” that drifted from the overhead speakers.

  The eighth floor hallway curved gracefully as it followed the hotel’s serpentine design. His footsteps drummed a fast rhythm that echoed out into the open atrium as he paced down the bright mahogany-walled corridor. Stopping at the door of suite 814, he glanced quickly to both sides before sliding the key card through the electronic lock and stepping inside.

  Turning to close the door, he flinched in surprise as a man’s voice cried out behind him.

  “Well good morning to ya, Chilly!”

  Recognizing the thick Irish accent, he rolled his eyes as he stepped through the entryway. “Christ, I should have known it would be you,” he smirked, raising his eyebrows at the stout, middle-aged man sprawled across the couch. “Sleep well?”

  “Fook yeah I did,” the man replied. “Nicest feckin’ place I’ve stayed at since I can remember. Never expected this in feckin’ Africa.”

  He nodded at the man he called Dublin, silently noting that this would be their third job together. Although he knew Dublin’s real name, he would never say it. Not on a job, not ever. Nor would Dublin ever say his. Agency rules. “So you’re my fixer on this one, eh?” he muttered as he shrugged off his backpack and looked around the swank, lavishly appointed room. “Makes perfect sense. Your mouth is the only thing filthier than this city.”

  Dublin’s raucous laugh filled the room. “Yeah, and that’s sayin’ a lot,” he said with the gravelly voice of a smoker. “S’one nasty feckin’ town down there. Some beautiful lookin’ girls, but I’d put on four condoms before I laid my hands on any of that strange if I were you.” Dublin barely finished his sentence before convulsing once again into laughter.

  He wondered how someone like the loud, foul-mouthed, overweight Irishman now stretched out in front of him managed to get by in this particular profession. Then again, maybe those qualities were exactly why he got by in this profession. Whatever it was, he didn’t object; he was just glad to have Dublin on his team. As far as fixers go, Dublin didn’t just get by, he was the best in the business.

  “Well, if anyone can get his hands on something, it’s you,” he replied as he walked over to the wall-sized window of glass that looked out on the decaying city. “Of course that’s probably especially true for venereal diseases. Personally, I like to keep my nose and other parts clean.”

  “Yeah, yeah– bein’ the feckin’ saint that you are,” Dublin retorted as he fished a pack of cigarettes from his pocket. “Prob’ly just as well. If I stay any longer, my fookin’ meat and potatoes will rot off.” He lit a cigarette and stared at his colleague for a long moment. “Speakin’ of rot, you’re really stayin’ at some shite hotel in town, huh?”

  “I am. It’s actually much nicer than this,” he replied. “I doubt you even get complimentary roaches here.”

  Dublin’s face split into an incredulous grin.

  “Bugger-off mate! That’s the daftest thing I’ve ever heard.”

  He shrugged as he stared down at the colorful crowd swarming like ants around the market below. There was no need to defend himself on the subject of hotel accommodations. He had his own reasons for staying in the slums – none of which his colleague needed to know about. Besides, he wasn’t here to live it up. In fact, blending in was a necessary part of the job. And regardless how good the money might be, this was certainly not the job of a rock star. Well, perhaps it had a few similarities, but not many of the good ones.

  He turned from the window and dropped into an oversized leather armchair that sat across from the sofa. “Alright, let’s get to it.”

  “Right.” Dublin snapped into focus as he sat upright and snuffed out his cigarette. Looks and language aside, he’d still not forgotten who was in charge.

  “What’s the status on the package?” he asked. This was always the first question, the most important question. Without the package, nothing else mattered.

  “Package acquired, of course,” Dublin answered. His eyes darted instinctively at the three cell phones lying on the coffee table in front of him. “Not that it was feckin’ easy. S’like bein’ in the feckin’ dark ages around here. And I’m beginnin’ to think my job is almost as messy as yours for chrissake.”

  “Sure,” he said dismissively. “And you confirmed the specs?”

  “Yeah, yeah, confirmed,” Dublin replied, a trace of irritation on his face. “I am a feckin’ professional ya know.”

  “Of course you are, Dub. Why do you think I always ask for my favorite Irishman when it comes to the tough projects?”

  Dublin stared back at him with slits for eyes as he lit another cigarette. He wasn’t used to being made fun of.

  “And our staging area?” he continued.

  “Room 805. Visually checked. Everything as expected.” The Irishman’s mouth exhaled a long trail of smoke as he laid back on the couch. A thick roll of ghost-white skin revealed itself beneath his vintage KISS t-shirt.

  “Time?”

  “Package’ll be delivered tonight. 9pm. You’ve got my guarantee on that as always. 805 will be open for business by 6pm. I managed to get it logged by maintenance as a corporate hold until show time tomorrow, which means every employee in the building will think some executive fuckety-fuck is in there shagging his mistress. Trust me, you won’t have any interruptions.” He paused and took a long drag on his cigarette. “Tha rest is up to you, mate.” Smoke poured from his nostrils as Dublin’s mouth formed into a grin. “Got a long night ahead of you, eh? Ha! Fook yeah ya do!”

  He smiled and nodded. “I suppose so. And what about you? Your work’s done for now. Off to some charity event this evening? Or perhaps lend a hand at the soup kitchen?”

  “No rest for tha feckin’ wicked, mate,” Dublin said as he glanced at his watch and suddenly shot up from the couch. “I’m off to the airport. Wheels up in an hour.”

  He listened as the Irishman shuffled into the suite’s master bedroom and quickly collected his things. On the coffee table, one of his cellphones suddenly vibrated to life.

  “You’re being hailed.”

  Dublin grunted from the other room as his phone buzzed in a stop-and-go dance across the table. “Feckin’ wife,” Dublin muttered as he paced out of the bedroom with two small bags of luggage. He dropped them next to the coffee table and snatched up the phone in his thick hand. “She’s always harrassin’ me whenever I’m gone for more’na few feckin’ days.”

  “Aren’t you almost always gone?” he asked.

  “Fook yeah – and thank god for that. Otherwise I woulda feckin’ killed her years ago.” The sarcastic smile on Dublin’s face turned serious as he read the message on the screen. He looked up with surprise. “You’re in luck, mate. Package’ll be delivered by eight o’clock tonight. You’ll be able to get an early start on making a bloody feckin’ mess.”

  “Perfect. I guess that means you can now officially get the hell out of here.”

  Dublin shoved the phone into a holster on his belt and pocketed the other two. He glanced quickly around the suite before collecting his bags and walking to the door. “Have fun stormin’ the feckin’ castle my friend,” he said as he stood in the doorway.

  “Go home, Dublin,” he replied without turning around. “And try spending some time with your wife.”

  “Ha! You try spending time with my wife,” the Irishman replied. “Then you’ll know what I’m talking about!”

  The door shut with a gentle click behind him. He gra
bbed his backpack and set it on the coffee table, then emptied the contents onto the glass surface. The small steel tools reflected the light like intricate mirrors as he quickly examined each of them. Satisfied that everything was there and in order, he returned the tools to the backpack and placed it under the table, making sure it was out of immediate view. He then pushed the armchair over to the window and sank into it.

  There was nothing left to do until the package arrived. Nothing to do but rest. He closed his eyes and inhaled the rich, earthy scent of the chair leather. The sounds of the market rose up from the street below in a cacophony of white noise, and in seconds he was asleep.

  10.

  It would suck to die alone.

  The means wouldn’t matter. Freeze to death. Burn to death. Fall from a ladder. Jump from a bridge. Whatever. This wasn’t about the ‘how’. This was about the ‘who cares?’ This was about the simple fact that the only thing more depressing than the verb “die” was an accompanying adjective of “alone”. This was about passing into the black void of eternal nothingness without a warm hand to hold or a loved face to look upon. This was about watching the nothingness creep into the corners of your vision while the pulsing rhythm of your chest stutters and fades. This was about the going, going, gone–

  and having no one there to grieve about it.

  Jeri tried to push the words from her mind as she poured another beer from the tap. It was a cold October evening and the saloon’s dark, body-warm interior was busy, but not busy enough to quiet the morbid monologue playing in her head. Unfortunately she already knew the words by heart. They’d been echoing repeatedly since her disastrous dinner with Rob the night before.

  She lined the drinks up along the bar and quickly glanced around the room. The usual mix of young co-eds filled the bar, all giddy with the excitement of newly achieved legal-age adulthood. A twinge of jealousy coursed through her as she watched them laugh and mingle. Every face seemed to glow with the unblemished beauty of youth and optimism. The cheerful atmosphere of the room only made Jeri feel worse, her dark mood lurking like a black hole surrounded by bright, sparkling young stars.

  “Are you okay, Jeri?” Chip asked from his usual spot at the bar.

  Jeri glanced over at the only older person in the saloon and nodded. She realized she’d barely said three words to Chip all afternoon, and a sudden pang of guilt briefly shook her from her funk. Noticing his glass was nearly empty, she sighed and walked over to him.

  “You seem a little distracted,” Chip said, his blue eyes smiling at her as she approached.

  “No, just busy,” Jeri replied flatly. She pointed at his glass. “Need another one?”

  “Oh, yeah… sure.”

  She could feel Chip’s stare burning into her as she turned and filled his pint glass. It wasn’t the first time he’d sat there trying to decipher her mood and formulate the best way to shake her out if it. This was Chip the professor, Chip the problem solver, and Jeri knew he was looking at her now the same way he would have looked at an archeological site. He was reading the jagged landscape and judging where to dig.

  “Here you go, old man,” she said as she placed a fresh pint of beer in front him.

  “Thanks, Jeri.”

  “Any time,” she replied, a hint of warmth into her voice.

  Chip latched his hand around the sweating glass and glanced around the room. “Kids,” he said irritably, as if reading Jeri’s earlier thoughts. “They turn twenty-one and what’s the first thing they do? Come running to the bars looking for a drink.”

  “Don’t tell me you weren’t doing the same thing when you were their age.” Jeri retorted sarcastically.

  “No, I was,” he mumbled, looking at the crowd over his shoulder. “I just don’t think I looked that young. Or that stupid. Christ, just look at what they’re wearing.”

  Jeri smiled at Chip. Even in her current mood it was hard not to give in to his cynical sense of humor. “Right. Well, obviously no one else around here is as together as you are, or I should say were, Chip. But most of us have to start somewhere.”

  Chip turned and stared thoughtfully at the amber-colored beer in his glass. “True. But you know, I never worried so much about where I started. I’ve always believed it’s where you end up that counts.” He looked up at Jeri with a shrewd smile. “Wouldn’t you agree?”

  Jeri felt the color flush to her face as Chip’s icy blue eyes smiled back at her. The digging had begun.

  “It’s probably the wrong night for this conversation, Chip.”

  “Why’s that?”

  Jeri shrugged and shook her head. What could she even say? That the night before she had blown yet another potentially great relationship? That she had once again found a single grain of fault in a handsome, intelligent man and turned that lone grain into a swirling sandstorm of doubt and disinterest? That it wasn’t him, it was her that didn’t quite fit right, though really in the hidden corner of her mind, an all-too-familiar voice was always blaming him, him, HIM!? Would Chip, or any man for that matter, really want to know that, without ever intending to, she had become a man-mashing, hope-killing, love-doubting, over-analyzing, alarmingly cynical bitch?

  She tucked a loose strand of coppery hair behind her ear and looked up at Chip with wet, hazardous eyes. Chip met her stare, quietly reading the landscape of her face before shaking his head and dropping his gaze to his beer.

  “Never mind. None of my business.”

  Jeri noticed a tall young man standing the far end of the counter and immediately moved towards him, happy for an excuse to end the conversation. She forced her mouth into a smile as the man leaned over the bar and nodded.

  “Get you a drink?” she asked quietly.

  “Sure,” the man replied with a grin. “Whiskey and coke, please.”

  Jeri avoided eye contact as she poured the black and caramel-colored liquids into an ice-filled glass. She could tell the man was watching her from her peripheral vision, his eyes tracing slow lines from her hands to her face. Despite her current disposition, his stares were managing to stir a warm blush on her face. The man was extraordinarily good looking, with a dark complexion and short, tousled curls of ebony hair. But he was young. Way, way too young.

  She set his drink on the bar and looked at him, her smile coming easier this time.

  “There you go. That’ll be five bucks, or you can start a tab.”

  The young man’s grin stretched into a broad smile of brilliant teeth as he reached out and handed her a crisply folded bill. “Thanks Jeri. Keep the change.”

  She looked at him with surprise. The warm blush on her face flared with new heat. “I’m sorry– have we met before?” she asked.

  His eyes, as enticingly dark and liquid as the cocktail, widened in a mock expression of shock as he took a long sip of his drink. He studied her for a moment before waving his hand towards the wall next to him.

  Jeri glanced at the wall. There, pinned to a large bulletin board made of wine corks, hung the letters and Polaroid photos from her unknown writer. Taped across the top of the board was a printed banner that read “Tales from the Last Stander”, while along the bottom, another banner read “Reveal his identity and get a free t-shirt!” Wrapped limply around the board in a final tasteless gesture only Joe himself could have conceived, a single strand of silver Christmas tinsel sparkled in the dim light.

  “The letters,” the young man responded. “I read the letters and, well, I just assumed you must be her.” He watched with eager eyes as Jeri tucked a lock of hair behind her ear. A brief cloud of emotion seemed to cross her face as her smile suddenly twisted and faded.

  “And why would you assume that?” Jeri asked.

  The young man detected a new tone in her voice, as subtle and dangerous as a thin layer of ice forming on the surface of a dark road. “You just seem like the only one working here worth writing to,” he replied confidently. He then grinned and narrowed his eyes, casting Jeri his most disarming expression. His frater
nity friends didn’t call him the snake charmer for nothing.

  “In case you haven’t noticed, I am the only one working here. Period.”

  “Right,” he responded apologetically. “Well, anyway, I can see why he would write to you.” He shifted his face into one his most attractive expressions, but Jeri’s stare remained strangely unreadable. For the first time in recent history, the young man quietly wondered whether his charm was working. “So, what time do you–”

  Jeri quickly held up a finger. “Hold that thought.”

  The young man watched Jeri’s thin, beautifully proportioned frame as she walked to the far end of the counter and poured a beer. His pulse quickened as she flashed him a look and handed the beer to an older, gray-haired man sitting in the corner. The two exchanged a quick word before the old man turned and smiled at him. That’s it… she’s mine he thought confidently as Jeri slowly strolled back towards him. He looked away nonchalantly, feigning interest in a stack of large books tucked behind the bar next to a stool. The books all had long titles like Global Trade in the Digital Communication Era, The Conundrum of China, and Supply Chain Best Practices – whatever the hell that meant. He was wondering who could possibly be interested in such nonsense when Jeri suddenly stepped in front of him.

  “So tell me why,” she said, flashing him a brilliant smile as she rested her elbows on the counter and leaned seductively forward. He was momentarily caught off guard; awed by the silky, alabaster beauty of her face and yet confused by the cold, unblinking stare of her eyes that refused to match her otherwise inviting expression.

  “Why… why what?” he stammered.

  “You said you knew why he would write me,” Jeri replied. Her amber eyes locked on his as she rested her head in her hand. “So explain it to me.”

  He smiled shyly and quickly ran his hand through his dark curls of hair. Checkmate he thought to himself. The boyish approach was working. It always worked. Now he just had to tell her what she wanted to hear, and this one would be in the bag.