Stalk Me

by Richard Parker

  Beth bit her lip and looked instinctively around, as if expecting to find him seated nearby. She didn’t want to remain in the café any longer than she had to.

  I’m meeting Allegro at three o’clock by the concierge desk in the lobby of the Luxor. It’s nice and populated.

  He logged out.

  Chapter 54

  Tired of navigating the human traffic and the groups of guys snapping cards with hookers’ numbers on them at her, Beth hailed a cab but didn’t return to the Golden Nugget. She got the driver to take her up the Strip towards the Luxor, but asked to be dropped at the MGM Grand. She would lose herself in the people there, where she could feel relatively safe, and decide what to do.

  She left the glare of the sun and, for a moment, couldn’t see as she entered the subdued bustle around the rows of jabbering machines. A few dowdy waitresses ferried trays of drinks to gamblers who barely glanced up, and the whole place had a burnt-out feel. There was something unsettling about the people feeding dollar bills into the slots, almost as if it were a joyless, robotic compulsion.

  Feeling dizzy, Beth walked unsteadily and glanced the faces passing by. She recognised a set of features there and stumbled back, walking onto the bare, sandaled toes of a man behind her.

  “Jesus!” He sounded British.

  She turned to look at him and apologised. There was pain on the pockmarked features above her, and his rigid smile said it was OK but not really. Had she seen the gunman watching her? As she scrutinised the crowd there wasn’t any trace of him, no face she could have mistaken for his. Had her drowsy mind inserted him amongst them?

  He could easily have slipped back into the crowd. If it had been him, why wait before pulling the trigger? Perhaps his barrel was trained on her right now.

  Beth spun round, feeling suddenly exposed.

  “Ma’am?” It was the voice of a black, thickset security guard.

  She couldn’t work out if he was concerned for her well-being or considering escorting her off the premises. He’d obviously reacted to the mini disturbance she’d made. “I’m fine.” But even though she knew it made no odds to the gunman, she was glad of his presence at her side. “Just feeling a bit sick.” She wasn’t lying. Oh God, not here, not now. She vomited onto the carpet and several passing pensioners leapt out of the way as if she were a terrorist. Beth braced herself for another wave, her hands gripping her knees. She felt the security guard’s fingers gently skim her back.

  “She’s OK,” he reassured the crowds. “You OK, ma’am? Don’t worry. We’ll have someone right along to clean that up.”

  She threw up again onto the patterned carpet. Through the moisture in her eyes, it actually seemed to blend in.

  Chapter 55

  Beth’s straw rattled in her ice as she sucked the last of the lime and soda out of the frosted glass. She felt dehydrated and wanted to get rid of the acid taste in her mouth. Ordering another, she looked at her wan reflection in the mirror beyond the rows of spirits. She was tucked at the end of the Centrifuge bar in the MGM, and it was twenty-five to three. The gunman was probably already in position.

  How could she even contemplate meeting him? He’d not made any attempt to conceal the fact he wanted to kill her. What did she really expect? That he’d put her mind at rest before he pulled the trigger?

  Beth didn’t have any edge or advantage. She was just a dumb tourist, and it was mainly luck that had kept her alive until now. Perhaps that’s why she’d caught him off guard. Maybe he’d thought she was such an easy target that her reactions had surprised him. Or was he just toying with her?

  She knew she had to stop running and using any reason not to go home, even following a killer. But was she really safe, even if she got on a plane back to the UK? If the gunman failed when he’d lured her to LA and Vegas, would he then come looking for her? Was home any more secure, and did she want to endanger the lives of her family? Beth considered the threat he’d made against Jody’s life. The police, on whichever side of the Atlantic, weren’t going to be able to protect them indefinitely.

  Or was she convincing herself to continue her own death wish? Beth wondered if she would have believed where she was now if she’d told herself only a handful of months ago. How had she arrived here? The only person who could definitively give her an answer was now a pile of ashes.

  What had Luc been mixed up in that could have provoked this outcome? Maybe it was something Jerome had got him embroiled in. He was the more ambitious partner and was always pushing Luc to expand their remit. Perhaps he’d been socialising with some less-than-savoury clients. It all seemed so unlikely.

  But if somebody wanted her dead, she should at least take the opportunity to find out why, rather than wait for a bullet. Was this her only chance to discover who Allegro was? Ramiro Casales?

  The other drink arrived, but she was already off her stool and dumping dollar bills on the bar.

  Beth entered the Luxor via the medieval-themed Excalibur hotel, wearing a mint-green baseball cap she’d bought in a souvenir store. She could at least make it difficult for him to spot her shaved scalp, but knew it was barely a disguise.

  She walked down the ramp into the Luxor and found a floor map. Striding straight on, Beth studiously examined the features of everyone she passed and skirted the long wall of the Liquidity nightclub. The giant Egyptian pyramid interior of the Luxor was cool and welcoming, and the aroma of coconut oil was being piped through the air con. She stopped by the stairs outside the Tender steak restaurant that led down to the “All You Can Eat” buffet area, her knees wobbling.

  The food smells wafting up made her throat spasm. Not again. Beyond her were a security post, the LAX nightclub and escalators up to the next level. She checked her watch – 2.59 – and, again, the faces of the people passing her. If he weren’t going to wait in the lobby, where would he be? She imagined the balconies overlooking the reception were way too obvious.

  Where would he think she’d go to observe from a safe distance? Right where she was? Nowhere in the hotel was going to be safe. Her best recourse was to leave right now. She could attempt to contact him during his meeting via the Facebook page.

  Beth was about to turn on her heel when she noticed the exposed screens of a security booth that was under maintenance. The front of the booth had been removed exposing board and wires but she could see the three screens at the back of the booth as they shifted through different sectors of the Luxor lower floor. A bleary-eyed security guard with a braided ginger beard, grey uniform and peaked hat was seated on a swivel chair below reading his Nook. She looked around for signs of anyone else loitering nearby, but the area was clear.

  Beth walked left until she was parallel with the booth. She couldn’t approach the security guard and try and make idle conversation while watching the images, so she walked to the sidewall of Liquidity and leaned there.

  Beth got out her iPhone and pretended to be busy with it. She was too far away to see the images, so she opened the camera and used her fingers to zoom it on the security booth. Her hand was shaking as she tried to steady it. The lens picked up the deadpan features of the security guard. He hadn’t acknowledged her observation of him.

  Beth turned her iPhone on its side so she was focused on all three screens and their shifting perspectives. She waited, trying to slow her breath so the circulation in her arm didn’t keep wobbling the image. The black-and-white screens shuffled through other sectors on the lower level. There were about eight seconds between each angle change.

  If she got a quick glimpse of reception, however brief, she could at least ascertain if the gunman was actually waiting for her. Beth took the opportunity to glance up and around. The security guard still hadn’t registered her presence, and apart from an old couple hobbling past, there was nobody else in the immediate vicinity.

  She studied her iPhone again. One of the images was of the lobby, and her hand shook as she rapidly tried to assess the people there. Where was the concierge desk? Beth didn�
��t have long. There was a man in a Hawaiian shirt with a small rucksack on his back standing at the desk, about two feet away. It looked like the spiky head of Ramiro Casales.

  Chapter 56

  The shot changed, and Beth bit her lip hard while she waited for the cycle of images to return to the lobby. If this was the perfect way for her to observe the concierge desk without being there, had the same thought occurred to the gunman?

  She glimpsed quickly around her again but couldn’t see anyone in evidence. Maybe he was watching similar screens elsewhere.

  That’s if he wasn’t hidden somewhere near Ramiro. Would he assume his threats were sufficient enough that she wouldn’t call the police and have them arrest him?

  Beth gulped audibly as she waited for the shuffle back, expecting Ramiro to be gone when the angle returned. She checked her watch. It was two minutes past three. How long would he wait there?

  Then she was looking at herself on her iPhone, leaning against the wall of the nightclub.

  She darted her head left and spotted the spherical white camera that was trained on her. As she looked up at her figure isolated on the screen above him, the sudden movement brought her to the attention of the security guard.

  Beth tried not to look as stricken as she felt when she met his gaze. Returning her attention to her iPhone, she tried to hold it solidly by clenching the tendons in her wrist. Her hand was shaking too much. She was still in her viewer. Surely it had been longer than eight seconds. It felt like a minute already – a minute the gunman would have to register and locate her if he was watching on the security screens nearby.

  At last the image changed to people at a bar with their backs to the camera. If he’d been searching for her on monitors, she’d pinpointed herself nicely within the shot. She had to get out of there, trot quickly back the way she came. Not too fast or he’d easily spot her amongst the crowds via the other cameras. But she had to see Ramiro in the lobby again first. Should she warn him now?

  Beth kept the lens of her phone trained on the security screens.

  Another carpeted area and more people playing the slots. How much longer was it going to take to return to the concierge desk? Every second put her in danger. But she remained rooted, gritting her teeth as another eight-second scene and another presented themselves. The lobby perspective finally appeared again.

  Ramiro was still there. But she was looking at the top of his head. He was crouching over. What had happened?

  Beth realised his rucksack was on the floor. Had he dropped it? She held her iPhone steady. Ramiro’s arm pumped.

  He was rifling through it, looked like he was searching for something. He withdrew his hand from the recess. It was holding a revolver. Ramiro placed it into his mouth and immediately pulled the trigger.

  Beth saw the dark cloud erupt through the back of his skull and screamed as the sound of the shot bounced back at her.

  Chapter 57

  Again, Beth’s eyes locked briefly with the security guard’s. Then he turned in the direction of the shot, frowning as if he’d misheard. She tilted her gaze to the screen above him. The image of Ramiro’s collapsed body changed, as if she’d already been shown enough. Then another woman’s scream, coming from beyond the escalators, broke the silence.

  The security guard quickly ditched his reading and jumped off his chair. Another yell quickened his pace as he headed towards the lobby. Beth retreated in the opposite direction.

  The screams swelled and rebounded off the balconies. People emerged from the bars and cafés to investigate, but she trotted dazed and robotically past them and back to the ramp that led to Excalibur. Ramiro’s bursting head played on a loop in hers.

  *

  Mimic remained to one side of the large potted palm tree opposite the concierge desk.

  Ramiro’s body had slammed against the champagne floor about twenty yards away from him. Briefly, confusion allowed him the temporary freedom of the scene so he could examine his handiwork. Besides, a sudden departure would draw attention. He moulded his own features into horror, duplicating those around him. More people screamed.

  He allowed the security cameras to capture his presence as he walked falteringly towards the body. He’d gone for a coffee in the Starbucks opposite and had taken his position minutes before Casales had arrived. Now he stepped out from it so he was centre stage. It didn’t matter. The kid had taken his own life. No suspects.

  “Jesus fucking Christ.” His whispered words vocalised the expressions of the young family of vacationers checking in who had turned to look at the mess behind them.

  Although his legs and arms were in disarray, Ramiro was still alive. But Mimic knew, despite the fact Ramiro was lying on his back with the worst of his head wound against the floor, the fragments of bone and flesh scattered around him meant his scrambled brains were likely to drop out if anyone tried to lift him up.

  Even though his eyes were open, Ramiro wasn’t seeing anything. His nostrils pumped as he breathed erratically. Looked like the kid’s ruined cortex hadn’t had time to tell his lungs what happened. They were operating on their own, but they’d close down soon enough.

  It was his best work. He’d replicated not a local but a globally trending crime and got the kid to do it for him. Was he really ready to retire? It was better than the Kelcie Brooks set-up, and his removal from the process certainly hadn’t robbed him of his inner mellow.

  He turned and ambled back in the direction of Starbucks. “Somebody call the cops. He’s been shot.” People were emerging, rearing up like meerkats to see what the commotion was. “Call them!” he addressed a young black couple clutching their cells and staring dumbly past him. Everyone was momentarily stunned.

  But it would only be fleeting. Soon, those iPhones would be activated as cameras and there would be no blind spots. Mimic’s exit had to be legit. He didn’t have time to be a witness and so had to surf out of there on a wave of natural distress. He moved to a bright orange girl in a turquoise halter neck clutching her phone against her cleavage and craning to see past him.

  “Call the cops!” he reiterated, but she looked at him through ridiculous eyelash extensions as if he were a distraction to the main event. It was his best cover.

  He pushed past her and strode briskly down the side of Starbucks, passing the restrooms, Luxor Essentials and Spirits. He could hear sirens already. More people were coming to investigate, but they didn’t see him. He hung a right and exited the pyramid via the ramp into Excalibur.

  A pyramid, he considered, was the perfect place to leave a body.

  Chapter 58

  Beth reached the moving sidewalk to Excalibur twenty seconds before Mimic. Her whole frame trembled and she had to concentrate on staying upright. Would there be two bodies lying in the lobby if she’d been foolish enough to try and warn Ramiro? She turned right into the hotel. More “All You Can Eat” buffet signs and gift liquor stores. It felt like she was trapped in a maze of the same place.

  She eventually made it out onto the bustling, hot Strip. The sky was clear blue and the desert breeze warm like a hair-dryer. She sidestepped Elvis and the Disney and Pixar characters selling their poses for a gaggle of Japanese tourists. An enterprising man in a wheelchair dressed like Tom Cruise from Born on the Fourth of July was doing equally good business.

  Beth wandered into the first Internet café she found and waited, anaesthetised, for a terminal to become available, finally seating herself on a dank hot leather chair vacated by a huge man in sweaty black lycra.

  There was no question of where Beth was going next. They were already over two hundred and fifty miles nearer to West Glacier Village. It would be much less than a day’s drive now.

  Against agency policy to release details of guests was the response from OutwardlyBoundVacations.com.

  Sorry. Nobody of that name staying in our lodge. Will ask around, Scott and Margaret Gellar apologised.

  They were the only responses she’d had to her email. Maybe the O’Dooles
weren’t staying in rented accommodation. Perhaps it was a private cabin. So it didn’t matter if every company she’d emailed did get back to her – which was unlikely.

  Whatever remained of her logical self told her to call Cabrini. But she’d already fled the protection of the LAPD. What about law enforcement in West Glacier? She’d already been warned about who was really in danger if she involved the police.

  The gunman was relying on her needing the answers he said he had, and seemed happy to string her along in the meantime. But Beth knew it was only because he wanted to keep her close until it was her turn.

  Why?

  She left it on Eileen Froley and Allegro’s walls. Beth guessed he’d get the alert and respond. She sat back, the line of people waiting glaring at her while she remained idle in front of the monitor. A couple of minutes passed. Perhaps he was packing or heading to the airport. It had sounded as if he’d driven to Vegas, though.

  Beth checked the YouTube clips. Dustboy’s had been removed. That only left the one Tyler O’Doole had uploaded.

  Physically looking for the family was her only remaining option. Would the gunman leave immediately or try to locate her in Vegas before he left? That was if he was actually heading to Montana. Beth guessed if she’d found them online so easily, though, he’d know exactly where they were as well.

  She looked up flight details from Vegas to Glacier Park International. Allegiance Airlines operated limited flights out of Vegas to Kalispell. There was one flight that day, but it didn’t leave until five. There was another at 6.15 to Bozeman, but then she would have a four-hour drive to West Glacier Village.

  Looks like dustboy has bitten it.

  Beth shuddered inwardly as she straightened in the clammy chair and typed a response to his in the dialogue box.

  Why did Ramiro kill himself?