Who was still giving her the freeze. As if Miss Beauty Queen herself hadn’t been the one who’d chunked the first Coke.
“Okay,” said Sam. “I’ll bite. He loaned you a million dollars on your signature alone, with your virginity as collateral.”
Jinx took a miniscule nibble of her grilled cheese and chewed it with rapt concentration, as if Sam weren’t in the room.
“But wait a minute,” Sam said, “I’m being so stupid. You have a million dollars you won in that lottery. Tax-free. So what were you doing at the bank?”
The silence was broken only by the waitress who arrived with Sam’s order. “Anything else I can get y’all, y’all just holler.”
Sam wasn’t letting any kidnapping or any ransom negotiations or any beauty queen stand in the way of food that smelled this good. She dug in. The white bun was warm, the meat was beautifully smoked tender white pork shoulder, the sauce an absolutely perfect blending of spicy sweet and piquant with a big hit of hot.
“Listen,” she said when she’d eaten enough to be sure she was going to live, “this Q was worth the trip, so if neither of you wants to talk with me, that’s okay. I’ll finish this, and then maybe another one, or maybe two, and then I’ll be on my way. Olive still hasn’t turned up, and I’ve got plenty to do looking for her.”
“Oh, hell,” Jinx said finally. “What difference does it make? You might as well know.”
Kitty gave Sam a look: Wait until you get a load of this.
But while Sam was curious, she remembered she really didn’t want to know too much. She certainly didn’t intend to get snookered into this kidnapping problem of Jinx’s. “Look, don’t do me any favors. It’s none of my business. You’re right. You should handle this the way you want to. Tell you what, I’ll get another couple of sandwiches to go, and I’m out of here. You carry on.”
“Oh, shut up,” said Jinx. “You’re dying to hear about how screwed up this whole thing is, and you know it. I swear to God, I wish I’d never come back to Hot Springs. I am so mad at Speed.”
An interesting attitude, thought Sam. Blame the victim. But she didn’t say it.
“He encouraged me, you know, to do this whole thing up right. I said I wanted to have this big blowout of an engagement party. He said, Go right on ahead. So I did. I already paid the caterer and the country club and the wedding planner and ordered my gown from Vera Wang, who does those to-die-for dresses up in New York. I flew up there to pick it out and for my fitting, and they’re doing a super rush-rush, which is twice as expensive, but Speed said, So what, sugar pie, you want it, go on ahead. No problemo. Speed says that all the time, no problemo.” Jinx wadded up a little piece of white bread and popped it in her mouth. “I used to think it was real cute, his saying that, No problemo, back when we met.”
“Which was how long ago?” asked Sam.
“A month. Thirty-two days, to be exact.”
“And what exactly is it that you’re mad at him about?”
Kitty’s look told her they were about to get to the good part.
“Well! He said, Go on ahead, do this, do that, and I did, writing checks left and right—”
The light dawned. “So you were paying for all this.”
“Speed had a little temporary liquidity problem. Something about the yen and German marks and the float. You know what I mean?”
What Sam knew was that she could smell fish in the air, and there was none on the menu.
“So I went ahead doing what I wanted to do, knowing that Speed was going to make it all good. After all, the man is rolling in it.”
“Was rolling in it. Maybe,” said Kitty. “Perhaps. We’re not sure.”
Sam said, “You ladies want to spell this out for me? I’m a little slow.”
“Oh, hell!” Jinx was exasperated, and more than a little embarrassed, Sam could tell, airing her dirty linen in front of Sam. “We went over to the Hot Springs Amalgamated because that’s the bank Speed said handled all his big-deal international financial transactions.”
“Let me guess. He’s bust.”
“Not only that, he never had it, never was,” said Jinx. “Bucks up, that is. And only because I am a close personal friend of Bo do I know this, otherwise I would still be in the dark, and I’ll tell you what, I’m glad I found this out before I married the man. This kidnapping has its up side, I’ll tell you that. It sure saved me a lot of grief.”
Sam hit herself on the ear. Could she be hearing this right?
Jinx said, “Don’t give me that look, like I’m an ax murderer or something. I meant what I said. If he hadn’t gotten kidnapped, I never would have gone to the bank to see about taking the ransom money out of his account. Though why I wouldn’t have checked up on him anyway is beyond me. I ought to know better. You can’t trust anybody anymore. The world is absolutely full of people pretending to be something they’re not.”
Sam decided to let that one go, though it was awfully tempting.
However, Jinx was only getting warmed up. “He never had a pot to piss in, or at least not in recent memory. Bo, that’s my close personal friend down at the bank, he said Speed had had about five thousand when he blew into town. It went up and down, depending on his luck at the track, but the man was a fake. He’s a common gambler. I asked Bo, and he looked it up, and said none of that stuff he told me about was in his portfolio. He didn’t even have a portfolio.”
“Oh, dear,” said Sam, making only a minimal effort to keep the sarcasm out of her voice.
“No portfolio. No house in Carmel. No condo in the hills above Monte Carlo. No cabin cruiser. No polo ponies. No apartment in Manhattan.”
“Wait a minute. Didn’t you say you were in New York buying your wedding gown?”
Jinx’s eyes narrowed, and her mouth drew tight as a rubber band. “Yes, I did, and yes, we were. And we stayed at the Plaza because he said he was redoing the apartment, it was too tacky for me to see.”
Sam didn’t have to ask whose American Express card the hotel bill had gone on. “So he’s bust.”
“That’s right. The man has nada. Nothing. Zilch. Zero. He’s a fraud and a fake and a liar and a cheat.” Then her blond head fell into her carefully manicured hands. “Oh, God. I don’t know what I’m going to do.”
“Well, gee, I think that’s terrible,” said Sam. “That he misled you to think he was rich when he wasn’t, but I guess the part I don’t understand is why you were dealing with his finances in the first place. I thought you were going to the bank to withdraw the ransom money from your account. From that million you won in the lottery.”
At that, Jinx burst into tears. She sobbed so hard the man in the Peterbilt hat got up and came over and handed her his red bandana handkerchief. “You let me know if there’s anyone you need beat up,” he said with a grin that was missing a couple of teeth.
Jinx blew her nose on the bandana without even saying thank you to the man, then handed it back to him, wet. “I can’t take the money from my account because I don’t have any money,” she wailed.
Sam found that difficult to believe. “You mean you already spent a big chunk of your lottery winnings?” It hadn’t been that long ago that Kitty had pissed her off, calling her on the phone and waking her out of a sound sleep at the crack of dawn to see Jinx and her damned altar and her damned million dollars on one of those early morning TV shows.
“I mean it’s all gone,” Jinx sobbed. “Practically every last cent. I spent the last of it on this wedding—that’s not even going to come off.” A fresh torrent coursed down her cheeks.
“Sugar, you want to get married, I’ll be more than happy to hitch up with you.” That was the Peterbilt man again, who was still standing there with his damp handkerchief in his hand.
Jinx whirled, facing the man nose to nose. “Would you please mind your own business and buzz off!”
He said to no one in particular, “I’ll tell you what, some women, the only way to treat ’em is you snatch ’em bald-headed.” And
then he stomped off.
Sam said, “You really spent a million dollars in six months?”
Then Jinx sniffed and went wide on defense. “Well, I still owed a lot to begin with, from when Harlan went bankrupt and then got hauled off to the pokey, leaving me without a red cent. You can’t imagine how quick the bills pile up.”
Sam said, “Were you making anything off your altar business?”
Jinx sniffed, “Yes, I was beginning to. But I was trying to get connected in higher circles in Dallas, and with those people, you have to keep up, or they don’t want to do business with you. You have to have a house in Turtle Creek, and you have to have it done by the right decorator, and drive the right car, and go to the right exercise trainer, and wear the right designers, and there are all those dinner parties, well, I’ll tell you, it made me tired, which is one of the reasons I gave up and bought a new house in San Antonio, where I still had a life.…”
Sam got the drift. Jinx had blown it, the whole ball of wax. Little of which was in retrievable assets, except maybe the houses, and real estate had taken a nosedive in Texas like everyplace else.
“So you came to Hot Springs for the races, ran into Speed—who looked like the real thing, bank account-wise, the answer to your prayers.”
“He did! He couldn’t do enough for me. Long-stemmed roses every day, a dozen, two dozen, sometimes three. We flew down to the Bahamas one weekend. We’d go to dinner, no matter which place I picked, there’d be a bottle of my favorite champagne, roses on the table, a little note already waiting. It was like I’d think of something, and there it was. He was like a magician.”
Right. Doing tricks. Dazzling the lady. Making her think what wasn’t was. Just like she was doing. It looked to Sam like both of them got scammed.
“So you were marrying him for his money, which he didn’t have?”
“Well, I loved him.”
Both Kitty and Sam laughed at that one.
“I did! I did, too!”
“I’m hearing an awful lot of past tense, as in not anymore,” said Kitty. “Ever since our little trip this morning down to your friend Bo’s bank when you discovered he was bust.”
Jinx stuck out her bottom lip. She’d had an awfully cute pout back in school. All she had to do was look like she was going to tune up for a good cry, boys would be falling all over themselves running to get whatever it was she wanted. But now? There were faint little lines when she pursed her mouth like that. A couple of years more, she’d want to avoid that maneuver at all costs.
Jinx said, “It does make him less attractive. And he was fooling me all the time, pretending to be something he wasn’t. Why would I marry somebody like that?” She paused, reached over, and took a sip of Sam’s Dr Pepper.
“Besides which, if I’m bust, and he’s bust, well, what’s the point?”
Indeed.
“So, I guess that’s that,” said Sam. “You’re calling off your engagement.”
“That’s right.” Jinx tapped her golden fingernails on the Formica twice for emphasis.
“In absentia,” said Sam.
“What do you mean?” said Jinx, narrowing her eyes again, as if Sam were trying to pull a fast one.
“I mean you’re giving Speed the boot even though he’s not around. Of course, when the kidnappers get in touch, I guess you could tell them that the engagement’s off, let them pass the word along to Speed.”
Jinx was mulling that over. She looked like she thought that was a pretty good idea.
Kitty couldn’t stand it any longer. “Good Lord, Jinx!” she exploded. “Don’t you think that’s kind of cold, his kidnappers giving him the Dear John news? The man’s life is in jeopardy.”
“Now, we don’t know that.” Jinx held out her left hand, the one sporting the huge rock. “Most of the time, these kidnappers are bluffing.”
“Bluffing! What the hell are you talking about?” Kitty was getting loud. People were staring. Sam was pleased as punch.
“Oh,” Jinx said, “I bet when they see they’re not getting any money, they’ll let him go.”
Sam said, “So you’ve definitely decided you’re stonewalling on the ransom?”
“Well, I’m not giving them any money, if that’s what you mean. I was going to buy them off with Speed’s, but seeing as he doesn’t have any…” Jinx toyed with a straw wrapper, trailed off.
Sam said, “Then you might as well call the cops. Let them take it from here.”
“Well,” Jinx said slowly, “I guess I could have. But I didn’t.”
“What do you mean you didn’t?” said Sam, realizing Jinx hadn’t finished the story.
“What are you talking about?” said Kitty.
Jinx turned to her. “I guess I didn’t tell you this part, but after we went to the bank, I went back to our suite at the hotel to freshen up, and one of those kidnappers called and got real pushy on the phone, and I said they could take Speed and shove him. Whatever they wanted to do, I said, they weren’t getting a penny from me, he was their problem.”
15
WELL, IF JINX didn’t take the cake. Sam was walking out to her car in the parking lot around to the back of McClard’s. Telling the kidnappers Speed was their problem, good God!
She was talking to herself, Jinx and Kitty having gone on ahead while Sam stayed behind to sample the lemon meringue pie.
Lady, she said, struggling to wedge her hand into her jeans pocket for her keys, you’re going to weigh two hundred pounds by next week, if you keep this up. But better fat than drunk.
Would Jinx ever get fat? Nawh. She was much too vain. Wasn’t that woman something? Crimminee, Sam couldn’t get over her brushing Speed off like that. It would serve her right if they made him into mincemeat. Then she’d feel guilty.
Except she wouldn’t.
Sam was about to unlock her car door when a tobacco brown Rolls-Royce pulled right up behind her blocking her exit.
“Excuse me, ma’am,” the silver-haired driver said, powering down his window, “but is this your pretty little BMW?”
Sam smiled at the handsome man with the lovely baritone, hoping he hadn’t noticed her talking to herself. “Why, yes, it is.” Then she had second thoughts, but, hey, this wasn’t New Orleans, where they held you up on your doorstep. This was Hot Springs, and the man was driving a Rolls-Royce.
He was saying, “I’ve been looking all over for one that model and color. I’m sort of a collector, and they didn’t make very many of those.” Now he was opening his door. “I know I’m keeping you, but if you have a minute.…” He was out of the car.
“That’s fine.”
“Mind if I take a look?”
“Go ahead.” She kept smiling, hoping she didn’t have barbecue in her teeth. “But I warn you, it’s not for sale. I love this little baby. My car and my dog, they’re not negotiable.”
The man laughed and walked away from her around toward the front of the car. He had a great rich laugh. He really was quite handsome in his beige gabardine slacks and well-cut navy blazer. White shirt and striped silk tie. And he was tall. A lot taller than Harry, who wore torn jeans half the time. Like the child he was. Spoiled rotten child, never knew when he had enough.
“What kind of dog do you have?”
“A spoiled rotten Shih Tzu.” Then she laughed. “I guess that’s redundant. I’m Sam Adams.” She offered her hand as the big broad-shouldered smiling man stepped right up to her.
He took her hand and held it tight. “Sam Adams, huh? Then I’m Kris Kringle.”
That was the last thing she heard before he threw his left arm around her neck in a choke hold, compressing her carotid artery. Her world faded to black in a count of five. Fifteen seconds more, she was buckled down, limp and prone in the backseat of the big car, and they were rolling.
*
When Sam came to, she was sitting on a low stool. Her back was propped against a post, one of four of what she slowly realized was a boxing ring. She was lashed to the post wit
h a soft cotton rope looped several times around her waist.
The large square room was mostly in gloom. She couldn’t see into its edges, but the overhead lamps lit the ring like a stage.
The light cut into her head like a knife. She closed her eyes. From somewhere out in the dark, she could hear the rat-a-tat-tat of someone punching a speed bag. Rat-a-tat-tat. The rhythm was smooth. Otherwise, the room was silent, except for the booming of her heart.
Panic rose in her throat like bile. For this was an old nightmare recast. The year before she’d been abducted by an escaped con, someone she’d helped put away. With the help of an elderly hunter, she’d lived to tell the tale of that one, not that she talked about it a lot. However, the chances of a savior traipsing into this boxing gym seemed slim to none.
She struggled, tried to stand against the rope. It had a little play to it, but she wasn’t going anywhere.
Rat-a-tat-tat. Rat-a-tat-tat. The bag didn’t stop, didn’t miss a beat as, out of the dusk, a voice said, “It’s not nice to lie, Miss Steele.”
She thought it was the voice of the silver-haired man, though she wasn’t positive. But the words he spoke gave her hope. This was a case of mistaken identity. She’d tell him who she was. He’d let her go. Plain and simple.
“Hey,” she called. “Kris Kringle, is that you? Listen, we’ve got a little problem here. My name’s not Steele. You’ve nabbed the wrong woman. I told you my name. I’m Sam Adams. Samantha Adams? Tourist? Just here for the weekend, up from Louisiana?” She raised her inflection at the end of each fact the way Southern women often did, looking for agreement.
Rat-a-tat-tat. Rat-a-tat. “So you said. But we both know that’s wrong, Mickey.”
Mickey? Who the hell was Mickey? She didn’t know any Mickey. And then it dawned on her. Yes, she did. Mickey was the name of the red-haired con woman she’d watched in the Palace lobby last night. The one she’d seen earlier today out by Lake Ouachita.
“Is the Mickey you’re looking for a redhead? A pretty redhead about five-four?”
He Was Her Man Page 12