“I’ll have it in the bedroom.”
“You’re not wasting any time. I love that. Up the stairs, first door on your right. I’ll be up in a sec.” She poured two Johnny Walker Double Blacks and bustled up the stairs.
She was sitting on the edge of her bed, handing Jonathan his drink while admiring his lithe naked body, stretched out languidly on her side of the bed, when someone began ringing the bell furiously. They were leaning on it.
“Fuck,” she said. “I’ll have to get that. It could only be one person and she’s lethally jealous. What are we going to do with you?” She ran into the closet and threw a pink kimono at him. “Here. Go into the guest bathroom down the hall in case she wrangles her way up here.” She scanned the room. “And don’t forget your fucking drink.” She handed him his drink, muttering, “That’s all I need.” She whispered, “Hurry”, and he wrestled himself into the robe and took off, drink in hand.
“Is it the she-male? Maria?” He tossed over his shoulder.
She nodded.
“So much for sexy moments and head clearing,” she said out loud, racing down the stairs like a mad woman.
She checked the peephole and then flung the door wide, revealing a frantic Maria.
“What the fuck is going on?” Sophia asked.
“You took the words out of my mouth. That is exactly what I was going to ask you. I have been trying to get hold of you for hours. Hours.”
“I just got home. Sit down and I’ll tell you about Amanda’s crisis du jour. It was bad. But, it could have been much worse.”
“Are you alone?” Maria sniffed the air suspiciously, like a persistent bloodhound. She thought she smelled man.
“Of course I’m alone.” Sophia acted indignant.
“Don’t give me that innocent act. I know you’re a sex hound. Just like Gloria. You don’t just look like her. You act like her too.”
“Well, I wasn’t giving Yuri or Dimitri a blow job under the desk, so you can rest easy.”
“Not funny, Sophia. Hitting way below the belt.”
“Why are we getting sidetracked? Oh, I know why. Because you’re an irrational jealous bitch.”
“And you’re not? You smell Gitanes and your green eyes glow like live coals.”
“Yeah, but I’m not about to bash your brains in.”
“You’re really making me mad, Sophia. What’s gotten into you?”
“Sit down and I’ll tell you what.” Sophia took several deep breaths. She strode over to the bar and poured two stiff drinks. After handing one to Maria, she sat down opposite her on the couch.
“Thanks.” Maria calmed down considerably after she swigged her drink.
“I told you about Amanda and how impossible she is. Well, she has a ten year old son. It’s just the two of them and he’s a nervous wreck. Understandably so. She never takes my suggestions. But this time she did and made an appointment for him with a shrink. Anyway, long story short, he ran away. Last night or was it the night before? I’m losing track of time. We went looking for him.”
“Did you find him?”
“Yes. I suddenly was inspired or possessed or something and I knew he was under the Julia Tuttle Causeway. I just knew. It came to me. You know where some of the homeless live?”
“Was he?”
“Yes. We got Jack in on it. Keith -that’s his name- was there with two other kids. Seemingly intact. But who knows? Some yellow-wigged clown, so we know it’s not Rudy, is running around town with some small woman, maybe a midget or dwarf, and luring kids into an old Caddie. They park them at this homeless village. That’s what this nice homeless guy, who looked like Lee Marvin, told us.”
“We know it’s not Rudy.” Maria said, solemn and somber.
“What do you mean? I just said that.” Sophia looked at her, perplexed.
“Brace yourself, hon. We really know it’s not Rudy. Rudy is dead.”
“Dead? But how? Why?” Sophia rose abruptly and started pacing. “Did you do something crazy?”
“Sit down. You’re making me nervous.”
Sophia obeyed and began fiddling with her drink and worrying her ear.
“I did nada. I found him in his apartment with a bullet right between the eyes.”
“Oh, that’s horrible.”
“Not really. That was the relatively normal part. His eyes were gouged out and his killer had carved a swastika into his belly.”
“Sick beyond belief. This is big. Something like eye- gouging, getting right in the victim’s face, smacks of some sort of personal vendetta. Face to face makes it personal. A serial killer?”
“It looked personal all right. Someone took a lot of care to send a message.”
“Did you see his white mouse?”
“As a matter of fact, it was running around in his hair. I grabbed it and locked it in my spare room when I got home. Gloria might think he’d make a tasty tidbit.”
“Rudy brought him over here when he came to threaten me and we anticipated a disaster when Remy took off, heading right for Titi. But we were wrong. They were instant pals. I’ll take the mouse. Otherwise, he’ll live a life of captivity in your spare room. Remy is his name.”
“I told Ma by the way. I found her at Ta’s place. They heard me rummaging away in the hallway, calling out to them, trying to find them. This wild skinny bitch was there too. His girlfriend, I guess. She was made up like a hooker and way off topic when I broke it to Ma. She started babbling about her high wire act as if I hadn’t just dropped a bomb.”
“How did Ma handle it? How am I going to handle Ma?”
“Not well. But Ta took the reins and managed the situation nicely. I think you can count on him.”
“I wonder if they’ll get back together now.”
“I don’t know. The skinny broad has some sexual hold on him. When you have good sex or just sex at that age, you’re not going to sacrifice it.”
“How do you know she has a sexual hold on him?”
“I don’t know. I can smell it. I can taste it. I can feel it.”
“So Rudy’s not a threat anymore.”
“That’s right, hon. He’s not a threat to anyone. You can rest easy on that one.”
“I just have to worry about Ma now. She lost her playmate.”
“I think Ta can console her.”
“I know. That’s a relief. She’s a handful. I’ll have to check in tomorrow.”
“Oh, right. She was worried about you because when Rudy didn’t show for their date, she kept trying you and couldn’t reach you. She thought he was dead and she happened to be right. She thought you were dead too. I guess she was catastrophizing. One of your favorite terms.”
“I have to call her. I’ll wait till seven or eight. I can’t call her now. It’s almost four. She’s bound to be sleeping. She has Ta.”
“I’m bushed. What a relief to finally reach you. I guess I was beginning to think the worst, like Ma.” She stood, gave Sophia, who stood also, a big bear hug, and headed out the door, saying, “I’ll call you tomorrow, or later today. Whatever. Dinner?”
“We’ll see.”
Maria shot her a pained look while heading for the door. Sophia didn’t see her out.
Sophia sat back down, sipping her drink, relieved Maria had buggered off so readily. She wanted to rush upstairs to her prize, but worried Maria might return with some excuse for checking up on her. After a decent interval and the end of her drink, she bounded up the stairs.
Jonathan was back on her bed, arms lazily bent at the elbows, his hands supporting his head. His milky-white skin, shaggy mane, and swelling cock beckoning her to escape the madness swirling around her. She stripped with lightning speed and straddled him. He buried his head in her Strawberry Creams.
Even Mister MI6 was too engrossed to notice two eyes, aflame with unquenchable anger, peering in from the balcony. The flimsy muslin curtain did little to conceal them. Maria, upon her exit, had felt blessed by the avenging gods when she turned the corner o
f the house and found the ladder careless Fidel, the gardener, left against the trellis, exploding with riotously colorful bougainvillea. He meant to finish denuding the trellis of the tasty iguana treat tomorrow. Sophia was sick of rustling iguanas snacking outside her bedroom window.
Maria knew Pretty Boy and Gloria the Second would be too busy to notice the likes of her. She stayed a while, watching the action, which was stoking her burning, lusty rage.
Forty Two
“I need a week away from this madness,” Sophia said. She had been pleasantly surprised to find Jonathan still in bed in the morning. They had enjoyed a leisurely bout of love-making. Sophia couldn’t get enough of his compliments. He loved her hair, her skin, her mouth, and everything she did to him. And, of course, her breasts. He adored her breasts.
“Come with me. I decided I’m going to take a week and go to Barbados. We could enjoy each other thoroughly and I’ll be relaxed. At my best, sexually and otherwise.”
“You’re at your best now, luv,” Jonathan said. He grabbed her right breast and began earnestly sucking her nipple, stiffening with the suction.
“Now you’re distracting me,” she murmured.
“I know how to get all your attention,” he said, winking lasciviously and languorously inching down her thrumming body, his relentless tongue circling its way to her clitoris, wet with anticipation.
When she was sated, he came up for air, grinning wildly, his hair a tangled mess. She looked up at him dreamily. “You look like a satyr.”
“I am a satyr. Let me make us coffee. I need a cuppa,” he said, sliding out of bed and donning last night’s pink kimono, which he had flung onto a chair.
She admired his tight ass before the silky fabric enveloped it. “But you don’t know where anything is,” she protested.
“I’ll figure it out, ducks. You enjoy the afterglow. You are glowing, you know. I may look like a satyr, but you look like an angel. A naughty angel. I’ll be back in a trice.” He kissed the top of her head, greeted by a thick mass of mahogany curls, before bounding down the crimson-carpeted stairs to the kitchen.
Sophia closed her eyes, loose and mindless.
It seemed like seconds later Jonathan was hovering over her, handing her a cup of steaming coffee. She inhaled, quivering, her senses fine-tuned.
“You put something in,” she said. She took a long swallow.
“A nip of brandy. It needed a wee bit of livening up. Good for the pecker, too.” He winked.
“Look, Ginger. I would love to trot off to Barbados with you. I can’t get enough of you. But I’m working and this latest murder, which Maria stumbled upon, heats things up. It’s no longer me, cold case Charlie, slogging through another hopeless mess. Come out on your balcony and have a couple of Sobranies. Don’t put anything on. I want to look at you.”
“Don’t be silly. I’m not going out there naked.”
“You’re on the second floor in the back. Who’ll see you? All I see is a gazebo in the distance.”
“Well for one, Fidel, the gardener, might pop up. He’s denuding the trellis.” Nonetheless, she walked out nude onto the balcony. “This lovely air feels so sexy on my bare skin. That careless man has left the ladder up. Thoughtless,” she said, peering over the ornate wrought iron railing. “We could have been murdered in our sleep.” She laughed. She bounced back in and wrapped herself in one of the red terry robes Maria had thrust upon her, luxuriating in the comforting feel of the material hugging her body.
Once they lit up, happily sipping and smoking, idly watching the smoke curling and inhaling the jasmine scented air, they were lost in their own worlds, separated by a chasm of differences.
Sophia broke the silence. She was on the precipice of extreme change. “I’ve made some tough decisions recently. That’s why I want to get away. I’m breaking with my past life. I want to stop working at one of my side lines. I’m breaking it off with my boyfriend. I want to break with Maria. I’m so over my head with her, with this weird business. Rudy’s no longer a threat but I need out. And I can’t be my mother’s shoulder to lean on. She has my father. She wanted a divorce in her sixties. I can’t keep being her crutch. Now Rudy’s gone, she might fall apart and…”
“Whoa. Ginger, slow down.”
“Yes. I’m babbling. I need a clean slate.” She looked at the slim black and gold cigarette in her hand. “I need to slow down if you catch my drift.”
“That much I understood, but not by half what you were going on about. You’re in a reluctant relationship with Maria? Rudy was a threat?”
“Rudy is too long a story.”
“That’s what Maria said.”
“Yes. Some other time. I’ll tell all. Maria, though. I’m in too deep. I don’t know how it happened. I don’t go for women. Well…” She shrugged. “She’s impulsive, she’s possessive, and she’s done some crazy-ass things. And not just when she was CIA.” Sophia was shaking her head, astonished at her own foolhardiness.
“You know I didn’t just happen upon you while wandering along Biscayne Bay that glorious day. I was looking for Maria. We were too busy to talk.”
“Oh? Sophia sat up and took notice. This revelation bounced her out of her self-involved vortex of woes.”
“Yes. I’m with MI6 and a CIA mate suggested I search out Maria for help in Miami Beach. It actually involves Rudy at this point. Apparently he is number twelve on a serial killer’s list. The killings started in nineteen forty-four in Drancy, a French ghetto for Jews, mostly transported out to death camps in Germany. France didn’t have any. Many must have welcomed that first Nazi officer’s brutal murder right in Drancy. The Nazis’ retribution was forty citizens gunned down in the town. The murders stopped in 1954. Recently one was discovered in Pennsylvania and now Rudy. That’s forty-five years later. So it may be a copycat.”
“I’m gobsmacked as you Brits like to say. So Rudy had hidden depths and you didn’t accidently encounter me that sexy day. I’ve been living with blinders on. Thinking about me, me, and only me. I feel sorry for my daughter.” Sophia started to cry.
Jonathan stubbed out his beautiful cigarette and rose, towering over her. Gently taking hold of her arms, he stood her up and enveloped her in his arms.
“I have to see my mother, book a flight, tell a number of people all bets are off, and cancel my week’s patients.” She said, muffled by his shoulder, in between sobs.
“When are you leaving?” He found a box of tissues and handed it to her.
“I’m aiming for tomorrow or the day after. Whatever I can book on short notice.”
“That doesn’t leave much time for a farewell roll in the hay.”
She followed him in, watching him dress efficiently, smiling wryly. “I doubt I’ll have time for a last roll. All the more reason to visit me in Barbados, where we’ll have all the time in the whole wide world.” She wrapped her arms around him and looked up into his steel blue eyes beseechingly.
“It’s not easy saying no to you. Maybe the case will burst open, like a festering pus-filled sore ready to pop. After all we’ve narrowed it down to two people, three European countries, and two American cities. If that’s the case, I’ll be there in a heartbeat.”
“That’s a wonderful possibility. I’m booking a luxury suite at the most expensive resort I could find. Sandy Lane. They fetch you from the airport in a Rolls.”
“Money bags.”
“That’s a long story too. I’m coming clean with you now. I can’t wait any longer. I’ve been selling sex to these Momma’s Boys. Wealthy, spoiled boys who have Oedipal complexes. It’s lucrative. I have too much money. Way too much. That’s why I’m shutting down. That and it’s wearing me down.” She walked him down the stairs. “I have a lot to tell you. Funny how isolated I am as a therapist. Everyone unburdens themselves to me. I have one colleague who also unburdens. But I don’t reciprocate. I don’t trust her. Or, anyone I guess.”
“Therapist? That explains a lot,” he said cryptically.
“You’re younger than I am,” she said.
“Yeah. I like older women. Maybe I can be your one and only Momma’s Boy. You don’t know how much that is turning me on.” He leaned over and nipped at her ear.
She opened the door. They kissed with the hot velvet air caressing them and the wild green parrots screeching, as if in protest, as they flew among the spiky palms.
Forty Three
Sophia, a bounce in her stride and a silly smile on her face, strolled down Collins Avenue to face Ma and Ta before her trip. Nothing like good sex to buoy her up. And she had to admit Rudy’s death, creepy as it was and distressing as it was to Ma, was a load off her mind. She planned on ending her lucrative side line anyway. But she hadn’t appreciated smarmy Rudy’s menacing threats.
“I always knew that guy was trouble,” she said out loud, causing several heads to turn as she made her way down Collins. “What are they looking at?” she continued musing aloud. She’d seen and heard a lot crazier in this neck of the woods. She smiled more broadly. She had a new love, she was going to Barbados in style, and Ta had Ma’s back, leaving her off the hook as primary consoler. Maybe they would reconcile.
The phone call had been brutal. She had called hours later than she planned and Ma laid on the guilt with a heavy hand, as if she were wielding an overloaded trowel of wet cement. She was inconsolable. Where was Sophia during this tragic loss? How would she survive without Rudy? Her best friend, her companion, her confidant, her admirer. She had finally extricated herself from the call with promises to come right over, when Ma was distracted by Ta’s entrance into the apartment. She dropped her fast enough then.
Her mood darkened as she approached the dilapidated dwelling, squatting on the beach on Ocean Drive. Taking in deep lungfuls of the electric sea air didn’t lessen her anxiety. The final hurdle before a first class week to herself. The anticipated gathering of guilt and pain was reflected in the blackening banks of steel gray storm clouds accumulating over the ocean, like a pod of killer whales, menacing and inauspicious during the hurricane season when they could usher in serious damage.
Time's Harlot: The Perils of Attraction, Seduction, and Desire Page 17