by Doug Ball
As they left the theater, Chuck asked, “Do you ever feel like you are two people, one at home and another at work?”
“Being an on-my-own single I really don’t have that feeling, but I was raised as an Army brat. My father was in some kinda sneaky stuff and was gone from home a lot. He always said that when he was home he was the father, husband, lover, friend, neighbor, and so on, but when he threw his duffle over his shoulder and walked out the front door for whatever he did he was all soldier, it was all about the job. I still don’t understand that.”
“I find that I do that. I sit in the apartment and I’m just single Chuck with bills to pay, investments to watch, plans to make, and all that stuff, but when I get in the car to go to the office or wherever for this job, I am all cop. It seems to me I even change looks.”
“You look fine to me,” Rachel wasn’t looking at him when she said it.
Chuck almost blushed. “Well, you look really fine to me.”
“Is this discussion going into the mushy stuff now?” she looked at him and grinned.
He did not speak. He was driving to the spot. A nice quiet dance oriented place where the music ruled and dancing was expected. He had reserved a table close to the dance floor, but out of the path of the crowd. The way the lighting was set up that table was almost in the dark compared to the rest of the dimly lit night club.
When he did speak, he said, “You’ll like this next place I have chosen for us.”
“Where or what is this place.”
“It’s a quiet little place, very exclusive, up along Camelback Road.”
“Oh?”
He drove with a smile as they exited 51 for Camelback Road. As they drove along the road passing higher and higher fences with stronger and stronger gates, he let his smile grow as she sat quietly in the passenger seat looking straight ahead. After making five signals in a row while they were green, he turned left into a quiet, tree lined drive that had just enough curving to hide the building that presented itself after a quarter mile drive.
Rachel noticed there there were no signs and no warnings of any kind as to the purpose of the road. The building had no signs on the front. The parking lot along the side of the building was well enough lit to see what was going on, but nothing bright and gaudy. A uniformed man moved out of the cove surrounding the door at the side of the building and, seeing Chuck, waved them to stop.
Chuck triggered the window down.
“I’ll take it from here, sir. You go on in and enjoy. Your table awaits.”
Chuck jumped out, leaving the car in park and the engine running, and walked calmly around the back of the car to Rachel’s door. After she began to move, he offered her his hand, which she took, and levered herself out of the vehicle. Chuck shut the door. The valet drove off with the car allowing Chuck and Rachel to walk straight to the door.
At the door another man, equally as well groomed as the first, opened the door and said, “Mr. Benson, your table is ready as requested. If you will wait just a moment, MaryAnn will be along to be your hostess.”
Rachel looked at Chuck with a whole new attitude as she took in the sedately lit facility. The hangings were a quiet burgundy, as were the linen table clothes. The music was hypnotizing and soothing. The crowd was calm, chatty, and dancing. Only one table had a single person at it, a man, and there was a second wine glass across the table from him awaiting its owner’s return. Every other table had either no one or at least one couple present. Only two tables were big enough for two couples and they were both empty.
A stunning young woman walked up to Chuck, “Introduce me to you companion, Mr. Benson.”
“Oh,” Chuck was startled by it all, “This is my date, Rachel DeMont. Rachel this is MaryAnn.”
MaryAnn said, “Pleased to meet you. We have anxiously awaited your arrival. Come this way, please.”
Rachel didn’t know what to say. She followed MaryAnn as Chuck guided her with his hand at the small of her back.
“I believe this is the table you requested, Mr. Benson.”
“Yes. Yes it is.” He assisted Rachel with her chair.
“What would you like tonight? Champagne, a gentle wine, or something from the bar?”
Rachel seemed to have her tongue tied and her eyes blown open as she sat uncomfortably in her black velvet covered chair. There were no liquor signs on display. No menu on the table. The table didn’t even have the wrapped set of silver or upside down glass or flute. She finally said, “A Virgin Strawberry Daiquiri, please.”
“And you, sir?”
“I’ll have a Grand Canyon Lager, please.”
“A Virgin Strawberry Daiquiri and a GC Lager.” She nodded and left.
The band was playing their rendition of “A White Sport Coat and a Pink Carnation” from the 50’s. Chuck said, “Would you care to dance?”
“No. I’d really like to understand this place. Do you come here often?”
“Never been here before.”
“How do they know you then?”
“Part of the reservation system they have is I give them a good picture, a description of the car, and a description of my date. You are my one and only date in this place. A friend of mine from high school had to recommend me for entrance to this club. Would you care to dance?”
“No. You are a cop. I know how much you make and have seen your paychecks, because I deliver them in the office. How can you afford this place?”
“I can’t afford it except for once in a lifetime. I had to give my credit card number before I could get in. There will be no check. There is no menu. If they don’t have it, they will get it. Might take a while, but it will arrive. They do not close if there is a client present. I will be charged not only for the food and drink, but the number of hours we spend here. The more clients they have present, the less per hour the charge. Gratuity is included in the bottom line. Now, would you like to dance?”
“No.” She sat back and looked around.
“Why not?”
She did not respond.
The drinks arrived. Her’s with all the frills including a pair of perfect strawberries skewered across the top of the glass. His beer in a frosted and etched pilsner glass. “Will there be anything more, Mr. Benson, Miss DeMont?”
Both of them said, “Not now, thank you,” together, like they had practiced and practiced until it came out perfect, and then broke out laughing.
“I would say that’s unanimous.” MaryAnn walked away.
“Would you like to dance, now?”
“No. I’d just like to relax. For some reason I feel like I can really relax here.”
Chuck took a deep drink from his glass and looked at Rachel. His gaze was so intent that she got nervous.
“Why are you looking at me like that? Is this all so you can seduce me after a couple of heavy drinks or something?”
“Or something.” He smiled.
“Okay, I’ll bite. Why, if you are only going to come here once in a lifetime, have you invited me to this wonderful, expensive place? I’m not that hard to please and surely not worth that much to seduce.”
“Yes you are.”
“What?”
He finished his beer and sat it down.
“Another, Mr. Benson?” MaryAnn was at his shoulder.
“Not just yet, I’ll signal.”
“Very well, sir.” She walked away.
He looked at Rachel, “Now, where were we?”
“We were, and are, in a very expensive place for the purpose of seducing me, or something.”
“I am not here to seduce you. I can do that in a cheap Chinese joint.”
“What! I am not that cheap.” She was smiling.
“Let’s dance.”
“No.”
“Who’s gonna win the World Series?”
“You are trying to duck the issue, aren’t you? Why have you brought me here?”
“To dance with you.”
She took a sip of her drink, “Okay, let’s da
nce.”
They no sooner got up and on the floor when the band ended their song with a flourish and announced a ten minute break with an engraved sign they place in the spotlight. Chuck almost fell trying not to laugh. Rachel watched him laughing and began laughing herself as she moved toward the table.
They both sat down, still laughing, and Chuck waved his glass in the air. MaryAnn arrived almost instantly.
“Yes, sir?”
“I’ll have another.”
“And the lady?”
“Bring me a whiskey on the rocks. Gentleman Jack with a water back.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
MaryAnn left.
Chuck asked, “What is Gentleman Jack whiskey?”
“It’s the smoothest, rarest of the Jack Daniels line of whiskeys. My father used to drink that year round.”
“Your father have a problem with his booze?”
“No, silly, my father got one bottle of Gentleman Jack once a year and it took him the whole year to drink it. He had a drink once a month, one on the Fourth of July, Veteran’s Day, Memorial Day, Christmas, and Mom’s birthday. He even poured one for Mom on her birthday. That killed the bottle. In some years that last couple of shots were a mite small.”
Chuck laughed at her story and bobbed his head showing it was a good laugh. “I was a bit taken by your order. Why now?”
“Well, if it’s a once in a lifetime night for you, I thought I’d make it a once in a lifetime thing for me, too. I don’t drink, normally. This will be my second time. The first time it took me stops at six bars until I found one with Gentleman Jack and drank my first drink to the memory of my Dad right after his funeral.”
“Rachel will you marry me?”
“Sure, why do you think I’m here? I didn’t come for the music, and, I don’t dance.”
Chuck sat in his seat wondering what had just happened until MaryAnn dropped in with the drinks. “Bring me a nip of the Gentleman Jack, please.”
“Yes, Mr. Benson.”
When she returned the combo had just started up. She put the drink on the table and asked, “Will there be anything else for you two?”
“Not right now, unless you issue marriage licenses and do weddings here.”
“If that’s what you want, we can make it happen. All except the license that is, and even then we can drive you downtown in the morning in our limo, bring you back here, provide a crowd of well-wishers with whatever level of gifts you would like to have, and send you on the honeymoon of your choice. There is a problem of the credit card limit, will it cover all that? She rattled it all off like it was routine, until the last. There, she was dead serious.
“We’ll stick with the plan for tonight, thank you.”
Rachel said, leaning across the table at Chuck, “They can do all that.”
“This club prides itself in being able to provide what the customer wants, except when death is involved.”
“How’d you ever hear of this place, let alone get us in?”
“Don’t ask. I can’t tell.”
She lifted her glass, “To us.”
“To us,” repeated Chuck. “Now let’s dance.”
“I don’t dance.”
“Once in a lifetime.”
“Let’s dance.”
Her ring was on the table when they returned.
23
Boraggo was standing next to his car four doors down when Tan got into his truck and drove off in the morning. He followed until the Interstate and then returned to watch the house. If he was to get his family back, ‘I will have to be observant and innovative where this man enters the equation, I think,’ he thought to himself and no one else. “I will make you a trade, Mr. Brown.”
Two hours later Tan was on his way to Prescott. Borrago had been seen in that town the day before. Halfway there he was rerouted to Flagstaff for the same reason. Before he had even passed the turned off to Prescott, he decided the local cops could do their job and he would wait for the call. He pulled a U turn through the median and returned to Phoenix and his office to find everybody celebrating an engagement.
“Hey, that’s all well and good, but which one of you moves out of the office. State policy says two members of the same family blood or marriage cannot work in the same office. Who leaves?”
Tank said, “Wanna draw straws. I can make sure Chuck gets the short straw. She is the best lookin’ one of the pair.”
That got a laugh out of everyone, including Chuck, who added, “I hope so.”
Rachel jumped in with, “Oh, you want to leave the office, huh?”
“No,” he stammered a bit, “No way. You go. I’m the cop, you’re just a secretary.”
Everyone ooooohhhhed at that.
Rachel just sat down at her computer and said, “Just a secretary? Anyone wanna challenge me for the job?”
The Governor walked in. “No challenges. Rachel stays. Chuck, did you really ask this secretary to be your wife?”
“If I remember rightly I did, but I was getting pretty tipsy after that one beer, so I am not really sure, but that’s what she tells me.”
Again laughs. Cups were refilled with coffee and the donut box took a beating until they were all gone.
The Governor said to Tan, “Gotta talk with you.”
Tan nodded toward his office and they both slid that way through the crowd.
Tab closed the door. “Have a seat, Governor, and what can I do for you?”
“I just got a call from the south. The Mexicans are going to begin building their half of the fence Monday. They are going to make it bigger and better than our design. Boraggo’s hacienda has been reoccupied. The Cartels are fighting over who gets his territory. I will not issue immunity or asylum grants to his family. I may transport to California. They are inclined to take in everyone who wants to come in even though their population does not agree. Their population is increasing by 250,000 a year and they are running out of everything including water.”
“All that sounds scary. So, what do you want me to do?”
“Get them out of my state. They still have their contacts in the south. Cut off the communications and eliminate the problem.”
“I disagree. If they are here, we can watch them and stay on top. The dragon you know is much easier to control that the dragon you haven’t even met yet.”
“Let me think on that. Damned if you haven’t just ruined a week’s worth of thinking.”
“What is the thinking of your friends in the legislature?”
“They say it is up to me, naturally. It’s a tough decision and I get all those, just to make the next election more interesting of course.”
“This office will have a much easier job watching what we know to watch than finding what we are to watch when we don’t know what it or where it is or who it is. It’s that simple. We can work either way, but I’d rather see us work smarter than harder.”
“Okay, okay. We’ll go your way. I will grant immunity to the women and asylum to all if they ask and cooperate. Mr. Boraggo will be a problem with the charges against him, but we can work a deal if offered. Let’s go back to the party.”
“Sounds like a plan. My group hasn’t had a lot to celebrate lately with all the hurts and dying. Even when we win, we still are in the midst of death.” Tan watched the Governor move to the door. “Oh, happy thoughts. That’s what we need, happy thoughts,” he said, as he opened the door.
“Oh, get off it, Tan. You guys should celebrate. You won.”
“We might lose Leon still. He is not a happy camper. If he loses control of hands and feet he will go south on us in a minute. I don’t mean going to Mexico, I am talking about his mental health. That’s the kind of results that make cops eat their gun.”
“You tell him he had better not. If he does I will give a very important job to another cop with guts. You tell him that.”
“What job, mine?”
“You’re stuck where you are. I haven’t figured one for him, but I will if
we need it.”
“You are one tricky lady, Gov. One tricky lady. How about we send Rachel to cop school?”
They entered the depths of the party. “More coffee, Governor. This is real good coffee.”
“Not at this time. I still have a speaking engagement in an hour.”
“I could get it postponed, Governor,” Josie chimed in.
“Not you, too?”
“It’s all part of a rough job, but someone has to do it.”
Rachel, Josie, and the Governor laughed with the crowd as the Governor found her way to the door and the three bundles of muscle that follow her around each work day.
#
Borrago, alias Bart Ramage, was totally surprised when a very pregnant woman left the home Tan had come from hours before. He walked toward her as she walked to the mail box and stood, awaiting the mailman driving up the street.
As the mailman drew near he stuck his head out the window of the jeep, “What’s you waiting for this morning, Mrs. Brown?”
“Just a catalog of stuff for the baby’s room. It’s a girl and all we have is boy stuff.”
“Well, here it is.” He passed the mail directly into her hand.
Borrago walked on by. He had all the information he needed.
Two hours later Bart Ramage walked out of the furnished home he had rented only two blocks away from the Brown household. The garage door opener was tested and worked if pushed while turning the corner and would be completely out of the way when he turned into the driveway. Curtains hung only in the ground floor rooms, but that was enough for his needs. A trip to the grocery, a TV with built in dvd player, and the pool filled made it into his new home which would be used for exactly three days, maybe less, but no more. Someone would be terribly disappointed because the 2 year lease he had signed was worthless.