Retreat

by J. F. Gonzalez

  “Can I get you anything else?” Anna asked.

  “At this moment, no,” the man said. “But thank you.”

  “Very good. Do you need a minute to look at the menu?”

  “Yes, please,” the woman said.

  “I’ll be back shortly, then.” Anna nodded and turned away from the table, prepared to head to another table when Shane’s voice called out to her.

  “Waitress! Waitress, please!”

  Groaning inwardly, Anna turned around and put on her best smile. She approached the table, thinking use your best skills at method acting, kid. You’re going to need it with this group. “What can I get for you?” she asked.

  “We have a new person in our party,” Shane said, smiling drunkenly. Jackie sat beside him, laughing at something. Shane cocked a thumb at a balding man wearing a white golf shirt. “He’d like to place an order.”

  Anna directed her attention to the newcomer. “What can I get for you sir?”

  The man took a quick glance down at his menu. “I’ll have the Peking Duck in Mango Salsa.”

  “Very good, sir.” Anna turned her attention to the others at the table. “Can I get anything for anybody else?”

  “My room, tonight,” Shane said, a leer on his face. “You got nice titties. Between you and Jackie, I can have a tittie sandwich!” With that, he laughed drunkenly.

  Anna felt herself go flush with embarrassment as laughter erupted around the table.

  “I’ll go put the Peking Duck order in,” Anna said. She made to step away when Shane grabbed her by the wrist.

  “Hold on a minute,” Shane said. His grip was strong.

  Anna gasped, her heart lodged in her throat. She steeled herself for more abuse. “I didn’t say you could go,” Shane said.

  “Sir, I have to put your friend’s order in.”

  “You asked me if I wanted anything else.” The man’s breath was heavy with 151 Rum. His snooty friends were hiding their amused laughter behind cupped hands. “I could have a talk with your manager if you do that to me again.”

  “I’m sure you could, sir,” Anna said, struggling hard to keep her emotions at bay. “Now, if you’ll let go of my wrist, I will put in your friend’s order and check on your food.”

  Shane seemed to consider this, then released her. Jackie laughed again, looking at Anna and not really seeing her. Anna rubbed her wrist, which was numb from Shane’s grip. “Go check on our food, bitch. And be quick about it!”

  Without a word, Anna headed toward the kitchen, her rage threatening to overwhelm her.

  When she reached the pass, she called out the Peking Duck order. Then she asked for a status check on Table 13, which was the Daniels table. A moment later the pass chef called back. “Five minutes, Anna.”

  “Thank you,” Anna said. She glanced back at her station. The half dozen tables she serviced were all taken care of with no service expected until Table 13’s was up. She retreated to the bar and glanced at her watch. One hour left till her measly fifteen minute break. Damn.

  “The Daniels couple at you again?” Martin asked. He’d sauntered over during a break in the action from filling waitress orders.

  “I would so like to bash that motherfucker’s face in,” Anna muttered.

  “I saw him grab your wrist,” Martin said. “Not that anything will happen, but you might want to mention the incident to Rick.”

  “Rick? Why?”

  Martin shrugged. “He’s new. Young. Very personable. He’s the best thing the staff has had in an operations manager for some time. Alex won’t do shit for you. He’s so far up Wayne’s ass, he’s breathing the man’s bad breath.” Wayne Salle was the CEO of the Bent Creek Country Club. “But Rick? He may be management, but he’s been very good to us so far. He tries to smooth things out between customers and staff. We had a waitress last year who went through the same thing with the Daniels couple. Rick told Alex that he was to have her moved to another station every time the Daniels couple happened to be seated where she was supposed to service tables. Made Alex abide by it, too. I’m sure Rick would do the same for you if you explained the situation to him.”

  “Alex has already chewed me out once tonight,” Anna said, not looking in the direction of her station. No sense in telling Martin that Rick probably wouldn’t help her, not after the other night.

  “It still wouldn’t hurt,” Martin stated. “Seriously, Anna. Don’t let the Daniels couple do this to you. They’ve had three waitresses fired in the past two years, and they made one of my best bartenders quit. I know Wayne insists on going above and beyond the call of duty in making these people happy, but let’s be serious. The Daniels couple have been abusing Wayne’s rules for too long. I bet if you told Rick what happened, he’ll have a word with him about it.”

  “You think?”

  Martin shrugged. “I don’t see why not. Something like this might take his mind off a bigger problem he has. It might drive him to actually do something about the Daniels couple for once.”

  “What kind of big problem does Wayne have all of a sudden?”

  “You haven’t heard about the missing money?”

  “What missing money?”

  Martin leaned forward, his voice lowered so they wouldn’t be overheard. “Here’s the Cliff Notes version. One of the guests, guy who’s CEO of some investment bank in New York, had money stolen from his room sometime early this morning. Paul and his staff are freaking out over it.”

  “Really?” Anna felt a small burst of excitement at the news. A theft at Bent Creek Country Club and Resorts? It seemed unheard of. “How much?”

  “A quarter of a million dollars.”

  “What—” Anna stopped, realized her voice had taken on a higher note of excitement. She lowered her voice. “Two hundred and fifty thousand dollars? In cash? Who’d be stupid enough to leave that much cash lying around in their room?”

  “Somebody who thinks of two hundred and fifty k in cash the way you or I would think of five bucks,” Martin answered.

  Martin had a point. Still, it boggled the mind. “Somebody broke in to his room? How’d this all happen?”

  “I don’t know all the details,” Martin said. He grabbed a dishtowel and began wiping down the end of the bar Anna was standing at, trying to appear busy. “But what I heard was that the guy in question had the cash stashed in a briefcase he kept in his room. Made no bones about having it, either, at least to his friends. The money was supposed to be for some private gambling he and his friends were going to partake in. Highly discouraged, of course.” Anna nodded. Bent Creek didn’t have many rules, but one of them was that management frowned on gambling. “Anyway, I guess he checked his briefcase this morning and the money was gone. He flipped out, called security, and Paul and his guys have been tearing their hair out ever since.”

  “He didn’t put that cash in the room safe,” Anna observed. All the rooms and suites had stainless steel safes, each one equipped with its own combination lock.

  “Obviously not,” Martin answered. “Depending on what denominations the guy had, that much cash might not have fit. He surely didn’t claim the money when he checked in.”

  “You think somebody in housekeeping could have done it?” Anna asked.

  “That’s the obvious choice, but it looks like they already might have a suspect. Do you remember Brian Gaiman? Groundskeeper?”

  Anna shrugged. She’d only been on the job long enough to know everybody in the dining room and the kitchen on a first name basis, but not the names of housekeeping and the maintenance people, much less anybody else. “Sorry, the name doesn’t ring a bell.”

  “Brian’s one of the groundskeepers,” Martin continued. “They should have more on staff, if you ask me. Anyway, Brian skipped out late last night or early this morning. Nobody can find him. Groundskeepers have keycard access to all the rooms and suites.”

  “That doesn’t mean he stole the money,” Anna said.

  “Brian’s an ex-con. Served just under
two years for aggravated robbery, burglary and other things. He was on work release.”

  “Oh.” That changed everything. Anna had no idea Bent Creek management would allow a guy on work release on the premises.

  She voiced this to Martin, who began making drinks for a new order that Carol, one of the other waitresses, had just delivered. “I heard management has a work release program,” he said. “It has something to do with their corporate structure or something. Some kind of charity thing they’re involved in. Bringing guys like Brian back into the mainstream, helping them out, that kind of thing. Guess it gives them the warm and fuzzies in their otherwise cold and calculating capitalistic hearts.”

  “Is that the only proof they have?” Anna asked.

  “Brian’s work area the previous day was in the East Wing of the resort,” Martin answered. He finished the drinks—a Manhattan and a Screwdriver—and placed them at the edge of the bar for pickup. “The guest who reported the theft is in the East Wing. In fact, Brian was seen in the area a few hours before the guy turned in that night. Paul and Rick put two and two together. I mean, who else could it be?”

  “You got me,” Anna said. She glanced toward the kitchen, saw the first of her orders had just been placed at the pass. She turned to Martin. “Duty calls.”

  “Okay,” Martin said. “And Anna?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Talk to Rick. You may have to work here like the rest of us, but you don’t have to take Shane Daniels’s shit. Tell Rick what happened. You owe it to yourself to get him involved now, while he’s still new and green to the job. You shouldn’t have to put up with the Daniel’s shit for the next two days we’re here.”

  “I will.” Anna smiled at Martin. She liked Martin a lot, and had come to think of him as the older brother she’d never had. Or maybe uncle was a better word. “And thanks.”

  “Don’t mention it.” Martin turned back to his job and Anna headed to the kitchen to retrieve her first of many orders for the night.

  CHAPTER 4

  Seventeen Months Ago

  Joe Taylor was on the phone in his home office, talking to Danielle Winters, a childhood friend of Carla’s. Tracking Danielle down had not taken much effort, but arranging a conversation with her had proved challenging. Danielle was a third year medical student at Harvard.

  “Anything you can tell me will be a big help,” he told Danielle.

  “I wish I could remember something,” Danielle told him. She sounded tired and worried over the phone. “I just can’t. I told that detective everything I could remember.”

  “I know, and I appreciate it,” Joe said. “That’s why I thought I would call. If there’s anything you’re nervous about telling the detective, you can tell me.”

  “I’m not nervous about anything,” Danielle said.

  “Okay.” Last week, Dean Campbell had uncovered forensic evidence from Joe’s personal home computer that was dated from before the estrangement. The evidence indicated Carla had used this computer to access her email account on Gmail. Messages had been sent to Danielle from Carla’s account in which she confided quite a lot, much of it involving her considering a stint as a high-class call girl to help pay for college. According to the email documentation, and what Danielle had told the private detective, Carla had not gone through with it.

  “I wish I knew more, but I don’t,” Danielle continued. “We only spoke once every few months anyway. School has been crazy, and with her situation it’s just...it’s been crazy.”

  “I understand,” he said. In the four weeks Dean Campbell had been on the case, he had not been able to turn up any new evidence. Carla’s trail ended in Casper, Wyoming and went dead cold. Much like the Casper Police Department, who’d done a cursory investigation, Dean had been able to go no further than verify she’d lived in a few motels in the area after her job layoff and eviction from her apartment. There were no arrest records, no hospital records, no record from the airports, train or bus stations that she’d left the city or the state. The last job she’d held was through a temporary agency, who reported sending her out for a short stint as a receptionist at a manufacturing firm four weeks before she disappeared.

  “You did talk to her when she lived in Casper, though, right?” he asked Danielle.

  “Yes, I did.”

  “And you talked to her after her layoff from Braun & Meyers?”

  “Uh huh.”

  “Did you send her money?”

  Danielle sighed. He knew her parents were well-to-do, that Danielle was attending Harvard on their dime. “I offered to send her money but she wouldn’t let me. In fact, she refused. Said if I sent her anything that it would be testing our friendship.”

  He sighed, closed his eyes. That would be just like Carla to decline help when it was offered, even if she desperately needed it. “You still maintained the friendship, though.”

  “Of course! Carla’s my best friend.”

  He and Danielle had already danced around the subject of his and Carla’s estrangement. It had been the first thing they’d talked about when they spoke six weeks ago. Back then, Danielle had been hesitant to speak to him, was distant, but he’d bridged the gap with her quickly when he learned that Carla hadn’t been entirely revealing to her childhood friend on the specifics regarding what led to the fractured relationship with her father. Carla had told Danielle that her Dad was too controlling, was using his influence to steer her toward a job for one of the companies he had a controlling interest in, and that he’d sabotaged a lucrative job offer for an oil company. What she hadn’t told Danielle was that her father had been largely hands-off on her job search, that he’d simply made the offer that he could help her get a foot in the door with one of his companies. Carla also hadn’t told Danielle that the oil company who’d made the job offer was Al Azif, that the job location was at their international headquarters in Saudi Arabia, and that she was required to live there. He’d explained to Danielle his concerns for Carla living in a Muslim country that operated under Sharia Law, that American women were held to those same standards. When Danielle learned that, she’d said, “Carla didn’t tell me that.” In the weeks that followed after learning this, Danielle had been a fount of information. Unfortunately, that information hadn’t been very helpful.

  “You told the detective that the last time you talked to Carla, she’d just been let go from the receptionist job and was living in a motel. Do you remember which one?”

  “No. They all blur together now.”

  “There was a Roadside Inn, a No-Tell motel, a Motel 6...”

  “Yeah, there was a Budget Inn, too.”

  “Okay.” He jotted this information down. “But you don’t remember which one she was staying at the last time you spoke to her?”

  Danielle sighed. “Sorry. I don’t.”

  “But she was still in Casper?”

  “Yeah, she was. We’d talked a few weeks before.”

  “What did you talk about?”

  “Carla wanted to get another job that would get her enough money to leave Casper,” Danielle said. “I told her if she left at the end of the semester, I was taking a job in Connecticut and she could live with me.”

  “What’d she say to that?”

  “She declined.”

  He sighed. That was Carla, all right. Tenacious as hell. She was not going to run back home with her tail tucked between her legs. He wished she had, though.

  “Anything else?”

  Danielle paused. “The last time I talked to her she said she was going to look into one more job.”

  “What kind of job was it?”

  “It sounded kinda good. A financial thing. She wasn’t really making a big deal about it. In fact, she mentioned it to me in passing. I completely forgot about it until just now.”

  He decided to take advantage of this reawakening of Danielle’s memory. “When did you last talk to her?”

  “August 7th,” Danielle said, pausing again briefly. She’d told Dean Cam
pbell the same thing. “Yeah, it was August 7th. I’m pretty sure of it. That was a Sunday. Carla said she was going to look into this job on Monday. I distinctly remember that.”

  “Did she tell you how she found out about the job?”

  “The employment section of the Sunday paper.”

  “Was that the only job she was applying for?”

  “There were other ones, too. She bitched that there wasn’t much out there to apply for. Bullshit secretary jobs, mostly, and then this one, which kinda leaped out at her. She didn’t have much hope for it, but she was going to apply anyway.”

  “And it was a financial job?”

  Danielle paused again, as if she were thinking. “Actually, I think it was a business analyst position. I don’t remember the name of the company.”

  “What paper was the ad in?”

  “I have no idea.”

  “Okay.” He wrote down Sunday newspaper, August 7th, employment section, business analyst, and circled it. “This helps me quite a bit, Danielle. I can’t thank you enough.”

  “I hope I was able to help.” Danielle’s voice took on a nervous tone. “I’m really worried about her. This just isn’t like her.”

  “I know.” Carla may have severed ties with her father, but she was a loyal friend and had kept in touch with Danielle throughout her troubled times.

  “Please keep me in the loop,” Danielle asked. “If there’s anything I can do—”

  “I will call you.”

  “And if I can think of anything else, I’ll call you.”

  “Please do. And thank you.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Taylor.”

  They hung up.

  Joe looked at his notes, deep in thought. He flipped through the desk calendar he had for last year, found August 7th and traced his finger to August 24, the day the Casper detective and his own private detective claimed Carla had skipped out on her motel room bill, leaving a week’s back rent. Seventeen days, from the last time Danielle, or anybody else for that matter, had seen or spoken to Carla. August 24th, the last day on record that she was in Casper.