But Nobody Wants To Die

by David M George

  “That’s great. If you could tell him Carlos will be by just after 11:00PM tonight?” I said, looking at Carlos for confirmation.

  He nodded, “You said he works for the Las Vegas Ambulance Service. They’re just north of Eastern Avenue and Tropicana, right?” Carlos said.

  “Yes, on Renaissance Drive,” Fay said. “And I’ll tell Kevin to expect you around 11:00.”

  “That’s perfect, thanks,” Carlos said.

  “I am going to have a housekeeping cart all set up for you,” Fay said. “I’m going to follow you at a safe distance up to the twelfth floor, just to make sure things go smoothly.”

  “I’ve got a ‘borrowed’ master but it’s been over three weeks since I used it,” I said. “Is there any chance you could leave an updated master in the bottom of the housekeeping cart, just in case?”

  “I think so,” Fay said. “I’ll put it in with the bars of soap, so it will be easy to hide.”

  “Super,” I said. “Thanks Fay. We really appreciate everything you’re doing for us. If we pull this off I know my Dad will want to thank you personally. Would it be alright if we came by tomorrow afternoon? Is 4:00PM a good time for you?”

  Fay looked at me, “I’m sure you and your Dad will want to spend some quality time together, get caught up,” she said.

  “My Dad and I can get along for ten, maybe twenty minutes at a time. A whole day is really pushing the edge of the envelope,” I said

  “Well, thank you,” Fay said. “If you’re sure. It would be nice to see him again. And, speaking of your Dad, I want you to know that a friend of mine spoke with him and he’s okay.”

  “Really? You did that for me? I’m so touched,” I said, reaching for her hand across the table. “Thank you so much. I’ve been so worried about him,” I said.

  “My friend told him, in a roundabout way, that you were coming for him,” Fay said. “And, obviously, from his reaction, he misses you and seemed very moved to hear that.”

  “Great news, thank you again, all we need to do now is make it happen,” I said, relieved beyond measure to hear that Dad was alive and well. “We will see you tonight and Dad will see you tomorrow.”

  “Sounds good,” said Fay, pushing back her chair. “I’ve missed him too.”

  “Before we go,” Carlos said, “Can I ask how you knew Katrina and I were together?”

  “It was easy, you spent far too much time looking at Katrina and not nearly enough time looking at the records,” Fay said.

  “Roy Orbison? The Dave Clark Five, I mean, c’mon, who has even heard of those guys?” Carlos said.

  “Is that the best you can do, Boris?” I said. We walked out and turned to wave good bye to Fay. We held hands on the way to the car.

  “Great news about your Dad, I’m sure that makes you feel better,” Carlos said.

  “Absolutely,” I said. “But I’ll feel even better when we’re all in the car on the way home and Las Vegas is just a speck in the rear view mirror.”

  “Roger that,” Carlos said, squeezing my hand. “And by the way, you’re quite the little matchmaker aren’t you? That whole thing about meeting at 4:00PM?”

  “Oh that, they go way back; they have a history,” I said. “And, like most men, they seem to do better when they have a woman to take care of them.”

  Carlos did the smartest thing possible, he said nothing. When we got back to the apartment we decided that since we had a long night ahead, we should take a nap. We managed to sleep until almost 7:00PM. We got up, ate dinner, and even had mango sorbet for dessert. I cleaned up the kitchen while Carlos shaved Alphonso. Since Melinda was so good at make-up I asked her to make Alphonso presentable. It didn’t take long for the fertilizer to hit the Mixmaster.

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-SIX

  STONE COLD

  Y

  ou’re on,” Carlos said, coming out on the front porch.

  “What do you mean?” I said.

  “Alphonso refuses to put on the dress. Says he’s not wearing it. Think of this as your opportunity to make him think you’re a stone cold killer.”

  “And if I can’t do that?” I said

  “Just convince him you’re one crazy ass bitch,” Carlos said.

  “That might be easier,” I said. “Give me your gun.”

  Carlos handed it to me. “Be careful,” he said, “it’s loaded.”

  “Oh good,” I said. “I’ve heard it’s much harder to scare the hell out of someone with an unloaded gun.”

  I took a deep breath and marched past him, opened the front door and went into the dining room where Big Ears was tied to the chair.

  “Here’s a line you’ll recognize asshole,” I said. “I’m gonna make you an offer you can’t refuse. Either you agree to put this on, do exactly as we say, or I will kill you this very minute.” I pressed the pistol into his neck and looked him in the face with all the venom I could muster, which given what he had done to me and my Dad, was plenty.

  “You’re bluffing,” he said. “You need me alive to make the trade.”

  “Maybe, maybe not,” I said. “There’s always another way. But you won’t be around to find out, because you’ll be dead,” I said, jamming the pistol against his flesh. I felt my eyes narrow into slits, seeing only the end of the barrel pressed into his neck.

  “I know you’re the one that sent Mikey,” I hissed in his ear, “and then he took me out in the freaking desert and tried to kill me because of you. Do you believe even for a minute that I don’t think about that every day of my life; how badly I want to get even?” I clicked the safety off, letting the sound carry past his ear and into his brain so he had the chance to realize what it meant, as I increased the pressure of the gun barrel against his neck. And in that moment I knew I was capable of cold blooded murder. I was no longer pretending. I knew it, but more importantly, he knew it too.

  “Okay, okay,” he said, his eyes as wide as dinner plates, “please ... don’t shoot me. I’ll do whatever you say.”

  He caved. Almost like when Paul Newman finally falls apart in the movie, Cool Hand Luke. I broke him. But this was not a case of moral superiority in any sense of the word. In fact, it was just the opposite. All I’d proven was that I was no better than he was. The only difference between us was that this time, I was the one with the gun.

  I took the pistol out of his neck and handed it to Carlos as I walked away, my hands shaking. I felt sick to my stomach. I said, “Get him dressed,” over my shoulder to Carlos as I walked out. I went into the bathroom and closed the door, hoping that flushing the toilet would cover the sound of me throwing up.

  Twenty minutes later Carlos came into the bedroom just as I was putting on the finishing touches to my Global Entertainment housekeeping uniform.

  “He’s dressed,” he said.

  “Thanks,” I said. “Did he say anything?” I added my name tag, KAREN, and checked the mirror to make sure it was straight.

  “Do you mean, did he say anything except please keep me away from that psycho bitch?”

  “Yeah, besides that.” I said

  “No,” said Carlos, “that was it.”

  “My God Carlos,” I said, “I almost killed him. “It would have been the worst mistake of my life, it would have ruined everything. I’m so, so thankful I didn’t. But I just have one question, What if he does try and run away, what do I do then, I know now that I’m not going to shoot him?”

  “That’s not what he thinks. The difference is that now he believes you will shoot him if you have to,” Carlos said. “He won’t try and run away.”

  “Here’s an idea,” Carlos said. You’ve convinced Fagamo and everyone else the trade is going to be made at noon tomorrow, right? You need to share that information with Alphonso. If he thinks this is just a dress rehearsal, a practice run, he may think when the real trade takes place tomorrow he will have a better opportunity to escape. He’ll believe the odds will be more in his favor then, lessening the chance he’ll try and get away tonight.”
/>
  “No matter what he believes,” I said, trying to find space in my purse, “by the time I could even pull the gun out of the purse, he could be halfway across the casino. I’ve got so much crap in here now, I don’t even have room for the gun.”

  “Here’s another idea. Why don’t you take out all the crap you don’t need to make room for the one thing you do?” Carlos said.

  “With women the key word is contingencies. They put things in their purse they think they may need, like lipstick, for example. What if you want to kiss me later when we want to celebrate our success and I don’t have any lipstick?” I said.

  “So how about if I kiss you now and that will be one less thing you have to worry about?” Carlos said.

  “Well, okay but don’t think this means that you can kiss me now and kiss me again later,” I said.

  “The thought never entered my head,” Carlos said, kissing me.

  “You better be lying,” I said, kissing him back.

  “Navy SEALS never lie,” Carlos said. “They may enhance, they may embellish, and they may even exaggerate, but they never, ever lie.”

  “So which is it?” I said, kissing him again.

  “I lied,” Carlos said.

  “I thought so. I also like your idea that we tell Alphonso that this is just the dry run, and I’m going to use it. And I want you to know that I’d very much like to stay,” I said, squeezing his hand, “but I need to check on the troops.”

  “Sure LT,” Carlos said, “I understand.”

  I found Mikey and Melinda out on the front porch. “Mikey, you got a minute?” I said.

  “Sure thing,” he said.

  “I somehow get the feeling that Fagamo is secretly rooting for us to pull off this trade, and that since it’s Alphonso who is going to come out of this with egg on his face, Fagamo won’t try to rain on our parade, what do you think?” I said.

  “You may have something,” Mikey said. “I think Fagamo’s loyalty lies with my Dad, not Alphonso, and supporting him while my Dad is in prison was just the politically smart move.”

  “I’m hoping that unless we kill Alphonso,” I said, “shoot up the casino, or worse, scare the paying customers, that he won’t go out of his way to stop us. Mind you that this is just conjecture based on a forty-five second phone conversation we had about the movie, High Noon.” I decided not to say anything about the second, much longer conversation we had about the midnight e-mail. No sense muddying the water.

  “Fagamo is a funny guy, but he has a sense of fair play, believes in a Wild West code of justice, which is maybe why he likes old movies, but that doesn’t mean he’s not dangerous, if you cross him, he can be ruthless,” Mikey said.

  “Which is why I want to pull this off without anybody getting hurt, make the trade and ride off into the sunset,” I said.

  “Yeah,” Mikey said, “except it will be dark.”

  “Well, yeah, I meant metaphorically speaking. Anyway, I wanted to thank you for all your help.” I said Mikey nodded, “You’re welcome,” he said. “I wanted to ask about that outstanding Maricopa County warrant?”

  “You must mean the time I fell off the barstool,” I said.

  “Oh my God, are you serious? Thank you,” he said, surprised. “I feel real bad about that. I’m really, really sorry.”

  “I know you are,” I said.

  Melinda must have overheard. It was a small porch. “I can’t believe it,” she said, coming up and hugging me, “that is such great news. Thank you so much.”

  “You’re welcome. Think of it as an early wedding present, okay?” I said.

  I could have sworn they both blushed as I excused myself and went to find Jamie. She was inside on the sofa with Rick. She had her Global Entertainment housekeeping uniform on.

  “You’re looking good girl,” I said.

  “Same back at you,” she said.

  “You ready to do this?”

  “Been ready,” she said, with a wink.

  I winked in return, time for my big speech, I thought. I turned to Alphonso. “We’re trading you for my Dad tomorrow at noon at the casino,” I said. “Tonight is our dress rehearsal, a dry run, a chance for us to work out the logistics, to make sure we’re prepared. Don’t think that just because you put the dress on it all of a sudden means we’re buddies. I used to like Italian food, Italian art, even Italian architecture, now I can’t stand the sight of it, just the smell of garlic makes me want to puke. You know why asshole? Because of you. It’s scumbags like you that have given me a hard on for all things Italian.”

  I pulled the M-11 Sig Sauer P228 pistol out of my purse, let him get a good look at it, nodding at Jamie. “We’re both armed,” I said, “and if you give us an excuse, any excuse at all, to shoot you, we will. I figure I can still trade you as long as you’re alive. I could care less if you have to eat lasagna through a straw the rest of your life. If I happen to get excited, maybe pull the trigger once too often and you bleed to death on the floor of your own casino, oh well, maybe Fagamo will figure it’s poetic justice and we’ll go on to Plan B. Capiche?”

  He stared at me with hard, cold eyes. Eventually he said, “Yeah, I got it.”

  What was it that Machiavelli said, ‘It’s better to be feared than loved?’ I needed Alphonso to believe I was more than willing to do whatever it took to pull this off and the more he feared me, the more he believed I was willing to kill him if necessary, the better our chances of success.

  Rick and Carlos both looked at their watches and got up and walked by, heading for the door. I reminded myself that we needed to keep this low key, it was, after all, just a rehearsal. At least, that’s what Alphonso was supposed to think. All right guys, see you there, was all I said. No hugs, no kisses, not emotional good byes, just a couple of high fives like we were seconds away from tip off for a pick-up basketball game at the local YMCA.

  We gave them a fifteen minute head start and then we left right on time, keeping Alphonso just ahead of us as we walked him towards the car, another rental from Enterprise. We put him in the middle of the backseat and strapped him in, with Jamie on one side and me on the other. Mikey drove and Melinda sat next to him in the passenger seat. I kept the barrel of the Sig Sauer Carlos had given me pressed against his ribs just to let him know I hadn’t forgotten about him. Even with heavy traffic, we arrived ahead of schedule, and sat at the outer edge of the parking lot until it was time to go.

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-SEVEN

  THE CHINESE ARRIVE

  I t had been a long trip, and despite his constantly reminding his men to stay hydrated, to sleep as much as they could and take the packets of Chinese Ginseng and Wu Wei Zi they brought with them before they touched down at LAX, they were all clearly jet lagged.

  Jian Lung was probably worse off in that he had spent the time he could have been sleeping looking after his men and worrying about the mission. It was one thing to kill an enemy soldier in combat, but quite another to kill an unarmed blindfolded civilian with her hands tied behind her back. Did the fact that Katrina Johnson was Alphonso Vietri’s enemy make her an enemy of the Chinese? Would he actually allow Lt. Shen to kill her? And finally the last question, the most difficult one of all, if Lt. Shen couldn’t do it, could he?

  He finally fell asleep, but only dozed on and off before they finally landed at LAX. The layover and even the much shorter flight from LAX to Las Vegas seemed to take forever.

  But eventually they arrived in Las Vegas, cleared customs and collected their baggage. They were able to pick up the GMC Cargo Vans at the airport and load them without a hitch but they were not even halfway to the apartment complex when things started to fall apart.

  Sgt. Wu, who had started work setting up the monitoring equipment as soon as they got in the van, broke the news, “Sir, the phone I’m tracking is on the move, it is no longer at the apartment complex.”

  “Let’s hope they just got hungry and decided to go to the grocery store,” Jian said. “Maybe they will be right back
.” But by the time they arrived at the apartment complex it was clear this was no midnight run for frozen pizza. The phone kept getting farther and farther away.

  “Alright Lieutenant,” he said, “take Sergeant Wu with you to the apartment. Let’s make sure it’s not just the phone that’s taking a trip. See if anybody is there, then use the glass cutter and the masking tape to gain entry through the sliding door just to make certain.”

  It was a long ten minutes before they re-appeared. “Sir, the apartment is empty, no one is there,” Sgt. Wu said.

  “Did you find anything?” Captain Lung said.

  “Nothing besides a rope on the floor. It looks like somebody was tied to the dining room chair,” Lt. Shen said.

  “Alphonso,” Jian said.

  Jian was not sure what it all meant, but he understood it to mean that their initial plan was out the window. Things were suddenly much more complicated. “It appears our only option now is to follow them wherever they go,” Jian said, as he turned the key, “Let’s go get them.”

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-EIGHT

  INTO THE DEVIL’S DEN

  I looked at my watch. “It’s time,” I said.

  The three of us got out of the car. We put Alphonso in the middle and marched across the parking lot towards the employee entrance. Mikey and Melinda were to wait for us in the parking lot. It was a long walk, which gave me plenty of time to think about my Dad and why we were here, we weren’t here to steal anything, just to get back what was rightfully ours.

  We went through the doors and down the hallway to the employee lounge. We got quite a few stares, as none of the other girls recognized us. There was a short, fat blonde who tried to catch my eye. It looked like she was dying of curiosity and wanted to find out all about us. She seemed especially interested in the tall, ugly one in the middle with the expensive blonde wig and blue eye shadow.