by Linda Ladd
“Yes, I do. I completely understand that. I’ll be in Nashville overnight and then in Memphis for a book signing, but after that, if you give me a call when I’m back at work, I’ll make time to talk as long as you want.” He fished a white business card out of his inside coat pocket. “Here’s my card. You can call my receptionist, Mary, for an appointment, or you can wait and decide with me a date that suits us both.”
I took the card. Dr. Collins was quite the agreeable sort, but I had only been pitching softball questions at him. Wondered how he’d react to some fastballs. I drooled at the thought. Nothing more rewarding than making a calm and collected shrink stutter and get all rattled. I tried that once upon a time with Black, but he usually maintained his sang froid and made me feel silly. I had a feeling this guy wouldn’t be so lucky.
I said, “I see you got a bit of a black eye there, Dr. Collins. You been fighting with your patients?”
Collins laughed, not in the least offended, I guess. “You should’ve seen it a week ago.”
I wasn’t about to let it drop, “What happened?”
“I got elbowed in the eye in a pickup touch football game with some of the kids. Purely accidental. Hurt like the devil when it first happened, though.”
“Try witch hazel. That’s what I put on all my bruises.”
Dr. Collins smiled but had enough of me, I assume, because he turned to Black and ignored me. Graciously, he signed a book for us, a different one from the one I had, and this one had his picture on the front, after which the two of them had a pleasant discussion about psychosomatic illnesses that was absolutely so titillating that my eyes slightly blurred. Black’s great, but shrink-speak was like watching paint dry. So I watched Boyce Collins’s face as he spoke. He seemed an up-front enough guy, but I wasn’t quite sure. He kept glancing at me and smiling unnecessarily, which made me uncomfortable, suspicious, even. I didn’t think he was coming on to me, though, not in front of Black, so maybe I just had a piece of fried crappie stuck in my front teeth.
Minutes later Collins took his leave in a big hurry, and for good reason. Traffic was horrendous in Branson when the late shows got out. He’d be lucky to make his flight.
“You should’ve offered him a lift to the airport in the chopper,” I said to Black as we stepped inside one of the sleek spotless elevators and let it whisper-whisk us up to the top floor.
“I’ve got better things to do than squire that guy around.”
That sounded like good news to me, and those better things Black had to do started the minute the door of the VIP penthouse Presidential Suite clicked shut behind us. Black jerked off his lightweight black jacket, then stripped off my sweatshirt jacket, then my shoulder holster, then ripped my polo shirt right off the top of my head, as if he’d had plenty of practice. Which he had.
“Cool your engines, boy, we’ve got all night.”
“You shouldn’t’ve given me that coffee. Now I’m wired.”
That made me smile and so did the way he disposed of my bra in nothing flat, but after that I got into the act, too. I helped him take off the sweet little .38 snubnose strapped to my right ankle under my boot-cut jeans, which is always a turn-on, and then I kicked off my tennis shoes, while he stood above me and slipped his black polo shirt off over his head. I enjoyed looking at the ripple effect of hard, tanned muscles until he fell on top of me and away we went.
“Wait,” I managed, holding his mouth off me with both hands, “I want you to tell me everything you know about Boyce Collins.”
“Yeah, right,” said Black, and then his mouth closed over my right nipple and I bid adieu to all reason and hello to pure-D erotic fun and games. Nobody could beat our reunions, no where, no how, and even better, I knew I had this to look forward to all night long in that fancy Chateau on the Lake sleigh bed under all the expensive, rustly 1,000-thread-count sheets. Of course, at home, Black’s were double that and hand sewn in Egypt. Yes, it’s sad but I’m becoming Black-conized and know all about linen thread counts and other such fluff.
THIRTEEN
The next morning around nine o’clock, Black and I sat out on a really skinny balcony that barely held our two chairs and a little table and looked straight down ten stories to a sparkling blue pool, hot tub, two tennis courts, and a playground for the kids. More impressive was the view, a beautiful, 180-degree vista of Table Rock Lake. I watched a couple of early morning speedboats leaving strips of white wakes in that blue water, but I preferred my own lake. Nothing beats Lake of the Ozarks in my book. The lakes around Branson weren’t half bad, though, all three: Table Rock and Taney-como and the ultra-clear Bull Shoals. Missouri does boast some awesome lakes, you can bet on it.
A lovely breakfast of prepared oranges, strawberries, kiwi, and fresh pineapple chunks were arranged on a big white platter alongside crispy croissants, chocolate donuts with pecans on top (Black ordered those just for me), and giant fresh-baked bagels were sitting on the glass-topped table between us, as well as a mouthwatering display of cheese Danish, cinnamon rolls, cherry turnovers, and miniature blueberry pancakes with some kind of chef’s special mango sauce.
Black had finished eating and was working on a speech he was planning to give at his next scheduled seminar, which was going to be held in Houston in a couple of weeks. He was dressed casually in jeans and a dark blue polo shirt with the Cedar Bend logo, which was a little jab at the luxurious Chateau on the Lake digs we now enjoyed, I suspect. He was writing on a yellow legal pad in longhand script. I watched his strong brown fingers hold that beautiful gold fountain pen for a while, then said something on impulse that surprised even myself.
“Something happened last night that I wasn’t expecting.”
Black didn’t look up but kept writing. “Uh hmm. What’s that?”
I hesitated a long moment, then I said, “I had dinner with Harve before I drove down to Springfield with Bud.”
Still concentrating on his work, he said, “That’s nice. How is Harve?”
“He’s good. I was glad to see him.” I hesitated. “Joe McKay showed up, too.”
Black quit with the writing and looked at me. Oh yeah, he did get pinched by jealousy from time to time, unreasonably, of course, especially where Joe McKay was concerned.
“Joe was there?”
“Yeah.”
“And you said something happened that you weren’t expecting?”
“Yeah. I didn’t plan on it happening but it just did. I’m not sure what I think about it, is all.”
“Yeah? Don’t keep me in suspense, Claire. What the hell did you do with McKay?” Black gave me his full attention now. He put down his pen, leaned back, crossed his arms, and stared expectantly at me. Genius that I am, I knew what he was thinking.
“I held Lizzie on my lap for a while.”
First, he looked surprised, but that turned swiftly into relief, and then he smiled. He knew I’d had trouble being around little kids since Zach had died, and he’d been trying to help me deal with it. He hadn’t had much luck.
He said, “That’s good, that’s really good, Claire. Was it your idea or hers?”
“Hers. She just came over and climbed up onto my lap.”
“And it didn’t upset you?”
“At first, I was just startled she did it, but then, no, that’s what surprised me, I guess. I don’t know. I guess I’m trying to say it wasn’t as bad as I thought it’d be.”
Still smiling, he nodded and looked very pleased. “That’s a breakthrough for you.”
I guess I had figured that out. Since Zachary had died, I could barely stand the thought of touching a baby or child because when I did, everything came barreling back and I’d relive the terrible night he died in my arms and I lost the most precious thing in my world forever.
“Want to talk about it?”
“No, I just thought I’d mention it to you.” Suddenly, I felt stupid and emotional and needy, so I shrugged and said, “I wasn’t expecting it to happen, and it did and threw me
a little. I don’t know why, I just wanted to tell you about it.”
“I’m glad you told me. When and if you ever want to talk about Zach, just say the word. I’m here for you, Claire, you know that.”
Suddenly I felt smothered by the subject and didn’t want to talk about my dead son, and was sorry I had brought it up. I didn’t want to talk about little Lizzie saying Zach’s name out of the blue, either. So I changed the topic to something safer. “Hand me the newspaper and let me see if we can catch a performance of those Beijing acrobats while we’re here. I’d like to get a feel for Li He’s parents before I interview them.”
Black picked it up and gave it to me, and I sifted through the pages one at a time, hoping to get a chance to watch them perform before I talked to them. Heck, maybe I was just putting off a very disagreeable obligation. I hadn’t heard from Buck’s office on the hair match, but after thinking about it, I decided it might be better to interview them before they got hit with some very disturbing news, if indeed, Li He turned out to be the girl in the oven.
Maybe miracles did happen; maybe their kid had just run off for some kind of romantic tryst with some suave, sweet-talking college guy, and the two young lovers were sitting around in some hotel like Black and me, enjoying a little alone time together. I could certainly recommend this kind of break, now and then, anyway, especially in the middle of an intense case. Not that I ever took breaks much, and wouldn’t be here if I didn’t have interviews to conduct. In any case, I felt top of the morning, sated, rested, and ready to roll. So did Black, by the satisfied Me-Tarzan-You-Jane-McKay’s-out-of-the-picture look on his face. I guess his possessiveness was complimentary, as long as he didn’t try to order me around, which he didn’t.
Sipping his coffee, he looked at me over the rim of a fancy white Chateau cup. “I do like having you across the breakfast table for a change. Unarmed and stark naked under that terrycloth robe. A perfect start to any day.”
“I liked the way we started the morning out, too, but trust me, I’m rearming the minute we walk outta this room.”
“That’s nice, sweetie, whatever makes you happy,” said Black, but he grinned as he took the newspaper from me and immediately found the Branson showtime schedules. He reads more newspapers than I do, so he knows where to look. “The Chinese acrobats go on at three o’clock. We can enjoy our morning, have lunch sent up, and then see the show. I’ll have the concierge call and get us front-row seats.” Sounded good to me and also put off meeting the parents, so we went inside, got into bed, and had more fun than a barrel of monkeys.
Later, after lunch, I got dressed in the change of clothes I kept stowed away in that leather knapsack in Black’s chopper just in case he whisked me off someplace, which included a clean pair of jeans and a dark green T-shirt with the Remington logo on the pocket. We ordered the rented Lincoln brought around, climbed inside, and headed out into the fun, fun, fun of Branson, Missouri. Outside, it was 96 degrees and humid as hell, and I wished I’d stowed some workout shorts aboard, instead of the jeans.
Tourists strolled around everywhere we looked, and I mean, everywhere. Darting across busy streets, waiting in line at the myriad of theaters lining the strip. Lots of families with lots of elementary-aged kids, retired Baby Boomers, and teenagers in love, who were holding hands, kissing, and more. I declare, get a room like we always do. Black fought traffic and mumbled Cajun curses under his breath when the guy in the car in front of us missed the light because he was reading a brochure. The theater we were looking for wasn’t that far away from the Chateau, although we didn’t know that, so we fought our way through miles and miles of traffic during Black’s supposed shortcut. No wonder he drove a Humvee and preferred limos most of the time.
The Beijing Acrobatic Troupe’s parking lot was crammed with cars behind the big white theater, making me wonder how Black had gotten front-row seats at the last minute, but then again, Black had a way of getting what he wanted when he wanted, so I didn’t even ask. By the looks of the place, however, this show was a popular attraction.
Hurrying out of the broiling sun, we walked around to the front, looking for any kind of shade from the hot glare. Double doors edged by big scary-looking stone dogs on each side led us into the coveted relief of air-conditioned comfort that felt pretty darn good. The lobby was pretty much a scaled-down version of a plush Chinese palace in the Forbidden City, or someplace equally mystical and elaborate and over the top, but with a ticket counter, tiny corner gift shop, and the strong smell of popcorn. We spent a few minutes pre-show, wandering around admiring giant beach-ball-size red lanterns hanging across the ceiling, lots of red, black, and white Oriental masks hanging on the walls, ebony fans with painted dragons, stuff like that, and this little singing rock thing that was drawing a crowd and lots of oohs and ahs. Actually, it was pretty awesome. Even I thought so.
Black hauled off and bought me a little jade bracelet with a tiny Chinese coin hanging off it, one that cost $18.95 and was supposed to be lucky. Just what I needed. And I mean that. Black had a habit of buying me good-luck talismans, and for good reason. Too bad they didn’t usually work.
The bracelet made me think, though, of the bracelets on poor Mikey’s wrists, and when I pulled the beaded bracelet that I’d taken from the crime scene out of my just marvelous and much-sought-after red crocodile Hermès Grace Kelly bag and showed it to the smiling middle-aged Asian woman behind the counter, she shook her head and told me in broken, barely decipherable English that they didn’t carry any. But I wasn’t sure she understood my question or that I understood her answer. Unfortunately, Black didn’t speak fluent Mandarin, either, so he was no help.
We crossed the lobby and stood in front of a wall hung with large color photographs of famous sites in China, including the Great Wall, the Forbidden City, and even more surprising, Tiananmen Square, which I wasn’t quite sure did them any good as far as bragging rights were concerned.
“Know what? I might like to go to China and see these places,” I said to Black.
He said, “I’ll arrange it. It’s nice in the fall.”
Gee, I didn’t even have to snap my fingers. Whoo hoo, Dr. Nicholas Black was a real catch, yes he was. “You’ve been there, I take it.”
“Yes, several times. I’ve done some business in Beijing, and I was invited to speak at a couple of conferences. I especially wanted to walk atop The Great Wall.”
“And is it great?”
“You bet it is, an amazing sight. It’s a beautiful country. You’ll like it, but you won’t be able to carry your weapons there. They’ve got tight restrictions.”
“Then cross that jaunt off my agenda. I’ve got enemies worldwide. China probably isn’t an exception.” I was sort of kidding, but who knows? Trouble seems to find me.
“I doubt if the worldwide category holds, but you’ve had your share, I have to admit. There’s the last call for the curtain. Let’s find our seats.”
Well, lawsy, not only were we front row, we were smokin’ front-row-center. Black was amazing with his ability to make impossible things happen and mucho handy to have around at Branson shows, not to mention in big hotel sleigh beds. The Beijing Acrobatic Troupe performance began with a flourish of sound and music and about twenty pretty Asian girls spinning plates on long sticks under vividly colored spotlights that showed up beautifully in the darkened theater. They wore yellow and pinks and purples, and one after another, truly amazing feats followed their act and never really stopped. It was an entertaining performance, I must say, with all the dazzling acrobatics, mystical music, and elegant Eastern dance. There was even a smattering of magic, a beautiful aerial ballet, playful dances, each one fast paced and exciting. And did I mention the acrobats in yellow leotards who built human towers twenty feet high? Their brochures aren’t bad, either.
Early on, I scanned the program to see when Mr. and Mrs. He were slated to come onstage. Their act came near the end of the show. As it turned out and what really piqued my interest was that
our missing girl’s parents were master contortionists and could they ever contort, geezo peezo and wowza. But that theatrical ability fit nicely into my nasty little equation, too. The unfortunate girl in that pizza oven had folded herself up like a freakin’ aluminum lawn chair.
After reliving that less than enjoyable visual image of said kitchen murder, I quit with the enjoyment of colorful tumbling acrobats and drumming drummers and sat beside Black and thought long and hard about my case. I was eager to talk to the two small, ultra-agile people I’d just seen up on that big bright stage and delve behind their wide theatrical smiles. The show had to go on, no matter what, even if you had a teenage daughter gone missing. So smile they did as they made pretzel makers look like amateurs.
When the finale finally faded away and a large curtain closed, the lights came up and we bucked the audience flood toward the exits and made our way instead to a door that we presumed led backstage, mainly because of the black-and-white PRIVATE—DO NOT ENTER sign. Flashing my badge to a Chinese security guard standing nearby and dressed like a reallive Ninja in black pajamas, I summarily took care of that roadblock.
Insisting we stay put while he informed the Hes of my interview request, the security guy was back inside five minutes with a resounding okay. We followed Ninja Joe down a long corridor, crowded now with a multitude of talented acrobats in their shiny, tight-fitting spandex outfits and enough makeup to almost satisfy Pamela Anderson’s requirements for one day. Prop men were everywhere, all chattering together in runaway Mandarin or some other Asian tongue, I sure wouldn’t know the difference, and looking at us curiously, as if they’d never seen reallive Americans backstage.
Ninja knocked, announced us first in Chinese then in his heavily accented English, and I walked inside, pretty much dreading this meeting worse than a dose of strychnine, with Black right behind me, no doubt feeling a similar reticence. Li He’s parents were sitting side by side on a small but plush damask love seat on one side of the small room. It was the color of a ripe eggplant. The walls were red. Lots of stuff in this theater were either eggplant purple or red. Must be lucky colors in China. There was a low black lacquered coffee table and a bookcase along the wall with a small television sitting on the top shelf. There was a makeup table, and it was long enough for both of them to slather on foundation together, with its multitude of bulbs all lit up and glowing. The two acrobats still wore their makeup and yellow and red satin costumes. They looked smaller in person than they had onstage, but everybody looked small when Black was around.