by Stephen John
I knew where he was headed. I dreaded it. I was getting miffed, “Look, Carter, I can have your back. I can carry my weight in a fight. I saved your butt once...”
“And I’m forever grateful,” he interrupted, “but that was different.”
“How was it different?” I replied.
“I‘d been shot and was unconscious and trapped underwater in a sinking boat,” he said. “It was insane for you to come after me, but you did. Let me ask you something. If I could have kept you away, don’t you think I would have?”
“That’s not fair,” I said, my voice slightly raised. “In those circumstances, you don’t think—you do! You don’t talk it over when it’s all on the line and the clock is counting down.”
Carter was shaking his head, dismissing me.
I hit the table with my fist. It wasn’t a hard blow, but the force of it made the plates and silverware jingle and the sounds drew the attention of everyone on the patio within ten feet of us.
Carter froze momentarily and let out a breath, waiting patiently for the rest of the guests in the restaurant to turn their attention back to what they had been doing before my little snit.
“Fortune, please listen,” he said. “I told you when I was in Iraq, I went on a joint mission with a Mossad Agent, a woman—a woman I developed feelings for. Remember that?”
“I think I may remember something about that, yes,” I replied. That was an epic understatement. I could barely think of anything else since he told me about her.
“Paul Pride was on that same mission, too,” he said. “This agent, the woman I cared for... she died. I almost died trying to save her. My rescue attempt was reckless. It not only didn’t save her, it put my life in serious jeopardy. It was Paul Pride who saved me from certain death. That’s why I have to be here for him. That’s why I have to help.”
“I’m not here for Paul Pride. I’m here for you,” I said. “Let me.”
“You don’t understand,” Carter said, raising his voice just a notch. “I need to focus my attention on helping Paul. This will be very dangerous...”
“But I’m a trained...”
Carter cut me off, “I know what you are. Hear me out.”
I fell silent, slumping back in my chair. My frustration level was close to the tipping point.
“This will be dangerous and if I get you involved your life will be in danger.”
“I know that,” I interjected. “I accept it.”
Carter raised his finger to shush me.
“The point is, if it came down to it, I know myself. If you were in danger, I would abort whatever it was I was doing to help you. If I had to leave Paul in danger to save you, I would. I would ignore the reason I came here because of my feel... because I care for you.”
He paused for a moment, deep in reflection. For once I kept my yap shut.
“I can’t allow that to happen,” he continued, emphatically. “I could not function efficiently knowing I was putting you in harm’s way, and if something went down, I would drop everything to help you.”
I wanted to reply. I wanted to argue. I wanted to fight. I wanted to shake sense into him. But I had just heard the sweetest thing anyone ever said in the most selfless, self-sacrificing manner imaginable. The man who so eloquently just told me to butt out, was without question, the man I wanted to spend the rest of my life with. As upset as I was, I couldn’t deny it.
I had heard this tone in his voice before. I knew he’d made his mind up. I knew I could sit here all night and talk until my face turned purple. I could plead, I could yell, I could cajole, I could make promise after promise, but no matter what I did, I knew I would never convince him otherwise.
I put my hand on his.
“What else can you tell me?” I asked. “You know I will worry.”
He let out another breath, “I can tell you this; I have a plan. To this point, I’ve had to make... preparations. I won’t go into this unprepared. I need to focus and this will turn out all right.”
I looked at him suspiciously, “Carter, you’re just saying that so I won’t worry as much.”
“Not true. I have a plan.”
“What do you want me to do? Just sight-see?”
He smiled softly, “I want you to go home.”
“Go... home?” I had not expected that.
He nodded, “Wait for me. If all goes well, I’ll join you soon.”
“And if it doesn’t?”
“It will.”
He stood, and pulled cash from his wallet and laid it on the table, “I hope you don’t mind. I need to go.”
“Carter, it’s not even ten o’clock. I was hoping we could take a walk on the pier near my hotel and maybe have another drink. I have a lovely suite and you haven’t even seen it.”
“You know what that would lead to,” he said. “It sounds wonderful, believe me, but I can’t have it. I can’t have you in my head right now. I need to focus on what I’m doing. I know you of all people understand that.”
I was flabbergasted, exasperated, and confused, all at the same time. I was over two-thousand miles from home in a beautiful, romantic city, spending an evening with the man of my dreams and I might as well have just said, “Please, Carter, can we go to my room and have sex?”
And it looked like I was going back to my room—alone. It’s hard to describe how that made me feel.
He leaned over and kissed me on the lips. It was light; it was warm; it was passionate, but it also made me wonder if it could be... goodbye? The thought gave me chills.
“I’ll call you tomorrow night,” he said. “And Fortune?”
“Yes?”
“I just want to say... I... Have a safe flight home.”
Chapter 3
“Well, that’s just plain nonsense,” Ida Belle scoffed when I ran the story down to her and Gertie the following morning at breakfast.
“I’m glad Walter left for home already,” Gertie added. “This whole thing would have worried him sick.”
I nodded in agreement. Although Walter was Carter’s uncle, he acted as a surrogate father often, especially in times of crisis. He cared deeply for his nephew. When we were ferreting out the person who had shot Carter and left him to drown, it was the only time Walter did not do his best to talk me out of getting involved in an unauthorized investigation. He merely admonished me to be careful.
It was eighty-thirty, and we were having breakfast at a restaurant near the Sea-Tac Airport, called 13 Coins, which specialized in made-to-order omelets and benedicts. I had my omelet half finished before Ida Belle and Gertie quit arguing about how ludicrous it was for Carter to shut me out.
“Did he at least tell you anything about the situation Paul Pride was in?” Gertie asked.
“Nope,” I replied. “He implied it was dangerous and that he had a plan, and if he succeeded, he’d be home by Sunday.”
“Oh, that’s no help,” Gertie said.
“Really, Fortune,” Ida Belle scolded, “that’s all you could get out of him?”
“I’m sorry. I tried,” I said in an apologetic tone. “I even got the feeling that Sunday was just a random day he pulled out of his butt to placate me. I don’t think he’s very far along. I’m getting a bad feeling about all this.”
“Well, we’re just going to take matters into our own hands,” Ida Belle said.
“And how do you propose we do that?” Gertie said.
I kind of wondered that myself, “We don’t know where Paul Pride lives. I Googled him and found nothing. We don’t know the nature of the problem or where Carter is during the day, what he does, or where he goes. What are our options?”
“We know the hotel where Carter is staying, right?” Ida Belle asked.
“Yeah, it’s called the Camano Bay,” I said.
“And we know that Carter was communicating with Paul’s sister via email, right?” Ida Belle added.
Gertie and I nodded, my mouth full of omelet, which was in-credible.
�
�Therefore, it’s safe to say if we could read Carter’s emails to and from Paul Pride’s sister, we might gain a better understanding of this mess.”
“How do you propose we read Carter’s email?” I asked.
“Easy,” she said. “We know his email password, right? We learned it the day Carter was shot. He used Fortune’s name as the password.”
I shook my head, “You’re talking about the login password on his computer. He has since changed it. The good news is, I have the new one.”
“Really? How did you come by the new one?” Gertie asked.
I blushed ever-so-lightly, “Toothbrush—no pajamas, remember? I wasn’t even looking for the password. He wrote it down on a post-it when he changed it. I saw the post-it on the desk right by his computer.”
Gertie smiled and pointed her finger at me, “So, we’re good then.”
I shook my head, “No. Not even close. The login on his computer is one thing. To access his email, I’ll need his email password, a different password from his computer login.”
“Hmmm,” Ida Belle hummed, as if solving a great riddle. “His actual computer stores his email password. So, when he opens his email account from his own internet browser on his personal computer his user name and password will pre-populate.”
“That’s probably true,” I admitted. I sat up, understanding where she was heading.
Gertie’s eyes brightened, “So all we have to do is get Carter’s computer, use his passcode to access the operating system, and then open and read his email.”
“The only problem with that is that Carter’s computer is in his hotel room. We don’t know his room number and even if we did, we don’t have a key.”
Ida Belle waved me off, “Oh leave that to us, Fortune. We can talk a hotel clerk into anything. I’ll pretend to be his grandmother and Gertie can be his grand-aunt.”
“Why not just his aunt?” Gertie wanted to know.
Ida Belle frowned, “Yeah, I wonder why.”
“I like it,” I said. “Okay ladies, great plan. Breakfast is on me. Let’s go!”
“No, breakfast is on me,” Ida Belle insisted.
“How much is it?” Gertie asked.
Ida Belle looked at the bill and scrunched her face, “You don’t want to know.”
“So, you really think you can talk the hotel clerk into letting us into Carter’s room?” I asked.
“Piece of cake,” Ida Belle insisted. “No problem at all.”
Chapter 4
“Absolutely not,” said the hotel clerk at the Camano Bay Hotel front desk. He was about forty-years old, short, with straight, jet-black hair, slicked down and parted to one side, tall, thin, with horn-rimmed glasses. “That violates our guest privacy policies.”
I turned away from the clerk, sighed, and rolled my eyes. Piece of cake, right?
“But I’m his grandmother. This is his grandaunt and the young woman is his girlfriend,” Ida Belle pleaded. She looked at the clerk’s name badge, “Kent—that’s a lovely name—my grandson told me it would be okay for me to rest in his room until he meets me later for lunch.”
I could tell by Kent’s expression; he wasn’t buying any of what Ida Belle was selling.
“I’m sorry, ma’am, I really am,” Clerk Kent replied, “but I’ve tried your grandson’s room and there is no answer. We ask guests for the number of keys they want for others who might be visiting. He only asked for one key. There are no guests listed, not even his girlfriend or—grandmother. So, I cannot allow you in.”
“Can you give me his room number so I can call back?” Ida Belle said.
“I’m sorry, I can’t give out the room number,” Kent replied. “If you call into the hotel and ask for the guest by name, we will transfer the call to his room?”
He smiled condescendingly.
“How about this, grandma?” I said to Ida Belle, “Why don’t we book our own room here. We’ll rest and wait for him to get back?”
I turned to the Clerk Kent, “Can we book a room near his on the same floor?”
The question seemed to surprise Kent, which is what I was hoping would happen.
“Well, I—I don’t know—I don’t see why not, I guess,” he stammered.
“Great,” I replied. I realized I had not brought my credit card and turned to Gertie. “May we use your credit card, auntie?”
“Certainly,” she said, pulling her card from her purse. “What’s the rate?”
“That will be three-hundred and seventy-nine dollars plus taxes and fees,” Kent said.
Ida Belle whistled loudly, “Whoa. Dorothy, we’re not in Kansas anymore. I know this is a very nice hotel, but...”
“I’m sorry, did you say three-HUNDRED and seventy-nine dollars?” Gertie spouted.
Clerk Kent cleared his throat, “Yes, that is the going rate for same day reservations on that wing of the floor.”
“We want it for one night, not all month,” Gertie replied, her voice in full-blown irritation mode.
I tried to get Gertie’s attention, but she was having none of it. Gertie may be old and tiny, but when she got her dander up, she was as explosive as a powder keg, and no one wanted to be near her when it went boom. I had not seen her this worked up since she got into a physical altercation with Celia Arceneaux over a campaign speech on the day Celia ran for Mayor of Sinful just twenty-four-hours before the election. Celia is a rival of Ida Belle and Gertie’s and possibly the most annoying person on the planet. Celia and Gertie exchanged words, and the argument turned physical. Gertie took a slap to the chin. She promptly turned and bent over, raised her skirt, and mooned Celia with her camo undies. Celia ripped Gertie’s skirt, and both women ended up in the hoosegow.
Once Celia won the election, Ida Belle demanded a recount when they discovered a dead person cast a vote for Celia. The whole thing was stressful for everyone, but Gertie was the most troubled throughout the process. She couldn’t stand Celia, but in all honesty, you’d have a long line of people to stand behind at a carnival booth if Celia were handing out free punches to her nose. Gertie once asked Carter to shoot Celia as a community service...
No... wait a minute. Never mind. That was me, but in fairness, there were valid reasons.
The woman implied that I was handing out “favors” to election auditors during the recount process. And then, she called in a report to the ATF claiming Ida Belle, Gertie, and I were manufacturing and distributing illegal alcohol products, which referred to a new Sinful cough syrup. So technically, it was true, but that’s beside the point. When two ATF Agents came snooping around my house late at night looking for evidence based on Celia’s complaint, I nearly shot them.
Gertie, being Gertie, concocted what might not be viewed as a “measured” response to the whole ATF thing. It involved dumping cow poop in Celia’s back yard and lighting it on fire, and that fire may or may not have set Celia’s robe ablaze—while she was wearing it. I realize it’s not the most mature response we could have made, but sometimes you have to fight fire with fire—no pun intended. At any rate, Gertie exacted her revenge, which you would have thought might have put her in a better mood but she still did not seem herself. I’d planned to keep an eye on her. At the moment, she was still in a full-blown rant about the price of the room.
“For three-hundred and seventy-nine dollars, we should be able to rent the whole damn floor, with Chippendale dancers wearing bow ties and thongs, lined up down the hall, serving us tea,” Gertie barked.
I laughed nervously, then shot Gertie a dirty look, “Relax, Auntie,” I said in a faux sweet voice. “We are a long way from Louisiana, remember. You and I will discuss the bill later.”
I took the card from Gertie’s hand and handed it to Kent and smiled, “Remember, we’d like to be on the same floor and as close to my boyfriend as possible.”
“Yes, of course,” Kent said, swiping the card, rattled at Gertie’s outburst.
“Three HUNDRED and seventy-nine dollars!” Gertie repeated in tota
l exasperation. “Young man, did you know, in Sinful, Louisiana, I could pay my car payment for a month and have enough left over for the best catfish dinner in town?”
“Oh, your last car payment was for a horse and buggy,” Ida Belle chimed in. “Really, Gertie, just let it go.”
“Here are your card keys,” Kent said, avoiding eye contact with Gertie. “Enjoy your room.”
Gertie scoffed, “Three-HUNDRED and seventy-nine dollars. You could feed Liberia for that—the entire country.”
If Gertie had heat ray vision, poor Clerk Kent would have melted into a bloody glob of goo.
I laughed nervously, “Come on, Auntie, we need to go or else we’ll miss your mid-morning medications.”
We entered the elevator and hit the button for the eleventh floor. Clerk Kent was watching us closely the entire time. Making eye contact with Kent, Gertie offered one last parting shot.
“For three-hundred- and seventy-nine-dollars Tom Selleck had better be in that room stripped down to his tidy whites!”
“Okay, we have a room,” Ida Belle said. “Now what?”
“So, we could not get Kent to give up Carter’s room number, but we know that we are the same floor as Carter, and we believe we are near his room,” I said.
“Okay,” Ida Belle replied. “Yes, we are near his room. Do you plan to actually get in, or will we access his computer through astral projection?”
“Hardy har-har, Miss Smarty-Pants,” I said. “We know that housekeeping service begins about this time in hotels.”
Ida Belle nodded, instantly seeing where I was headed, “And we know that the housekeepers have master keys that will open all rooms, but how do we get the key from the housekeeper?”
“Hey, I came up with the good part,” I replied. “Do I need to think of everything?”
“To tell you the truth,” Gertie chimed in, “I’m in the mood to kick her butt and just take the damn key.”
“I’ll pay you back for the room,” I said.
“That’s not the point,” Gertie said.
We opened the door of our room. When I entered, I felt like Dorothy after the house landed in Oz and she opened her door into Munchkin Land.