I thought maybe I could help. “What do you intend to do about Gracie?”
“I don’t know what to do, Eighty-Eight. I gotta go to the airport in an hour to ride into town on the team buses, then we got a team meeting after that. I can’t look for her any more this morning.”
“Would you like me to find her for you?”
“Hey, that’s right. You’re a private detective.” Bob’s mood brightened. “Can I hire you to find Gracie for me?”
“Bob, you only make fifteen million dollars a year. You sure you can afford me?”
“Don’t forget the endorsement deals, Eighty-Eight. They’re good for another thirty million. Where do you want to start?”
I pushed the plate aside and pulled a notepad from my pocket. “Where was the party?”
Chapter 3
I pressed my way through the hotel lobby, dodging dozens of people wearing New York green and white or Dallas blue and silver.
The concierge desk took up a large chunk of one wall. Banners for both teams hung on the wall behind the desk, the Super Bowl logo between them. Two men and a woman in hotel uniforms stood behind the marble desk.
I read the nametag of the nearest concierge. “David, is Ronald here?”
“That’s him.” He turned to the other man. “Hey, Ron, this guy wants to talk to you.”
Ronald walked over. “How may I help you, sir?”
“I’m trying to locate Graciela Perez, Bob Martinez’s fiancée. Have you heard anything from her since Bob was here earlier?”
“Are you a guest in the hotel?”
“Why do you ask?”
“I know Mr. Martinez and Ms. Perez by sight, but I don’t know you. I’m sure you understand.”
“I’m Chuck McCrary.” I showed him my private investigator’s license. “Bob’s a friend. I’m doing this as a favor—not professionally. You keep guest confidences, right?”
“Of course, sir.”
“Graciela was a no-show at breakfast. Bob’s concerned about her. I offered to see if she’s all right. They may have gotten their signals crossed. Can you help me out?”
“I saw Ms. Perez and Mr. Martinez yesterday when I handed them their dinner reservations, but I haven’t seen Ms. Perez since. Sorry. Did you try their suite?”
###
I knocked and waited. I didn’t expect Graciela to answer; she hadn’t answered when I’d called from the concierge desk. I knocked again, then opened the door with Bob’s keycard.
“Gracie. Are you here? It’s Chuck McCrary. Hello?”
Silence.
I stuck the Do Not Disturb card in the key slot and closed the door. The maid had not serviced the room. Two soft drink cans were half-crumpled on the coffee table. Yesterday’s newspaper was scattered on the floor. A laptop on the desk was plugged into an outlet in the base of the desk lamp.
When I crossed the bedroom, I noticed the bed sheets mussed on one side only. I opened the walk-in closet and studied the clothes hanging there. Bob’s clothes used about three feet of the left closet rod; Gracie’s took the rest.
The shelf above the rod held two pink suitcases with the initials GP. One pink suitcase was empty except for the normal travel refuse of a packet of instant decaffeinated coffee and a few wrinkled packets of coffee creamer and sugar-free sweetener. The other suitcase had a highway map of New Jersey in a zipper compartment.
On the right, a variety of women’s clothing in various lengths, styles, and colors was wedged into the eight-foot length of the closet rod. Just what I would expect from a fashion model. Four boxes sat on the shelf above the rod, and a dozen or more pairs of shoes lay haphazardly on the floor. I picked two shoes at random—one was size seven, the other a seven-and-a-half. Two negligees hung inside the closet door. A faint hint of perfume filled the air.
I took the boxes off the shelf. Two contained purses. Each purse was empty except for a small pill box with two kinds of colored pills. The third box held a larger purse with a similar pill box and an envelope folded into a zipped inner compartment. Inside the envelope, I found a baggie containing white powder. This can’t be good, I thought.
Sticking my fingertip into the powder, I touched a little to my tongue. Almost instantly my tongue was numb. Cocaine. The fourth box was empty. I replaced the boxes.
Under Bob’s side of the bed were two brown leather suitcases. Three more pink suitcases lay beneath the other side.
The bathroom shelf held the usual toiletries, but shoved to the back of a cabinet drawer, I found two prescription bottles in Graciela’s name: methamphetamine and an anti-anxiety drug advertised on television. The pills looked like the same pills I’d found in the purses. She keeps a supply of diet pills and tranquilizers in all her purses, I thought. “Don’t leave home without it.”
I opened the first of three louvered doors—the toilet compartment. The seat was up. That figured. Bob would have been the last one to use the toilet.
Another door led to the bathtub. Beauty-salon brand shampoo and conditioner sat on the edge of the bathtub. The used soap in the dish was damp. So was the towel crumpled in the tub. The bathmat showed small footprints pressed in the plush nap. They looked like size seven.
A third door opened to the shower room. Bob’s shampoo and a plastic hair scrubber sat on the marble shelf. Bob’s soap was wetter than the soap on the bathtub. A towel lay across another plush bathmat, this one with Bob’s large footprints in the nap.
I went into the kitchen. The only thing of note was a pink tablet computer plugged into an outlet. I stuck it in my briefcase.
Chapter 4
I waited outside the locker room at the Jets practice stadium for the team meeting to conclude. Bob walked out the door with a group of football players and waved at me.
I walked him out to the field and we sat on a sideline bench. “Here’s your keycard back.”
Bob slipped the card into his pocket. “What did you find in my room?”
“Is that pink tablet computer Gracie’s?”
“Yeah.”
“I took it in case we need to examine it later. That okay with you?”
“Sure. Long as you bring it back.”
“Good. Does Gracie take birth control pills?”
“Yeah, sure. Why?”
“There weren’t any in the bathroom cabinet or drawers. How many bags did she bring to Port City?”
“Oh, geez, let me think… She had five suitcases and an overnight bag.”
“The overnight bag wasn’t in your room.”
Bob frowned and started to say something, then stopped. “I don’t know what to say.”
“That’s all right. One more thing, when you got up this morning, was the toilet seat up or down?”
“I didn’t notice.”
“It’s important, Bob. Close your eyes and think back to this morning.”
Bob closed his eyes. Then he opened them so wide that the whites showed all around. “The seat was down, and I left it up when I went to bed last night.”
“Gracie returned to your room while you were asleep. She took a bath, packed an overnight bag, and left before you woke up.”
“Jesus, now I’m really freaking out.” Bob turned as another player approached. “Just a sec, Bomber. I’m talking with an old high school buddy here. Be with you in a few.” He lowered his voice. “How do you know she took a bath?”
“I have magical powers. Also, I found damp soap and a damp towel in the tub, and woman-sized footprints on the bathmat.”
“I should have noticed that stuff.”
“Nah. You couldn’t see the tub from the shower. And raising a toilet seat is second nature to any man.”
Bob shrugged. “I understand Gracie being quiet when she come back to the room so as not to wake me; she’s real considerate like that. And I understand her taking a bath before bed. But why would she pack a bag and leave again in the middle of the night?”
“It looks like she planned to skip out on you.”
“Why?”
“I intend to find out.”
Chapter 5
The time index on the computer monitor read 02:21:24. The surveillance video showed Graciela exiting the elevator on the thirty-seventh floor. She walked unsteadily down the corridor in a gold lamé dress, carrying matching gold sling-back stiletto shoes in her left hand. A gold-sequined evening purse with a long gold chain hung near her waist. She clutched the purse in her right hand like she was afraid it was planning an escape.
I remembered that same dress hanging in the closet of Bob’s hotel suite. I had seen the matching purse in a box on the shelf above. The shoes had been dropped on the closet floor. Wherever she’d gone, she’d changed clothes.
“Is that who you’re looking for?” Wally, the hotel security guard glanced at his watch.
“Yes, thanks.” I wrote down the time the video was taken. “Can we access the elevator video to see where she got on?”
“You do know I have other duties, right?” He stared into his empty coffee cup as if he could will it to refill itself.
“Wally, that woman is a guest in your hotel. She is missing and maybe in danger. Finding her trumps your duty to refill your coffee.”
The guard scowled, but he punched a few keys. The picture switched to split screen, high-angle shots from the elevator car’s top corners. “I’ll run this back one minute earlier.”
Two men were in the elevator, one in a black tuxedo and one stuffed into an ill-fitting business suit. The second man had a shaved head and a crooked nose. He tugged at his collar, loosened his poorly knotted tie. Part of a neck tattoo peeked above the shirt. The men stood side by side against the back wall.
“Zoom in on the tattoo. Let’s see if we can tell what it is. Hmm. Can’t tell, but it looks familiar.” I gestured at the screen. “Keep going.”
A few seconds later, the doors slid apart and Graciela entered the elevator unsteadily. Her purse swung from the shoulder chain. A couple followed, arm-in-arm. The man wore a blue tuxedo that matched his date’s long, blue cocktail dress.
“Must be Cowboys fans,” I said.
Graciela raised a champagne flute to her lips, emptied it, and placed it on the elevator floor in the corner. She steadied herself with a hand on the wall as she straightened up. Her face came into sharp focus on the monitor.
Wally froze the picture. “Is that who I think it is?”
I shrugged. “Who do you think she is?”
“The Latin Angel… what’s-her-name. The super model…” He snapped his fingers. “Graciela! That’s it—she’s Graciela, ain’t she?”
“Right on.”
“I saw on the television where she’s the Jets quarterback’s fiancée.”
“That’s right.”
The guard seemed more engaged in helping me now. “See this indicator?” He pointed to the lower left corner of the screen. “She got on at the third floor, where the Palm Paradise Pavilion is. That’s where the network threw the party.” He punched the keyboard and the video played again.
Blue Tuxedo put his arm around the woman in the blue dress and copped a feel. She put her left hand down and stroked his crotch discreetly, if you can stroke a crotch discreetly in a crowded elevator. She looked at him and winked. His jacket gapped open to reveal a silver cummerbund. Their mouths moved as they smiled at each other and talked.
“I don’t suppose you have audio, do you, Wally?”
“Too many privacy issues, man. Just the video.”
“Just as well—that conversation’s gotta be X-rated.”
The woman leaned her head on Blue Tuxedo’s shoulder, blew in his ear, then kissed him with her mouth open. The other two men stood in the back, oblivious to the enthusiastic display of young love. Some people have no romance in their souls. Graciela leaned her head against the side wall, oblivious to the other people in the car. In a few seconds, the door opened on the eighteenth floor and the two Cowboys fans strolled off, groping each other as they went.
After the door closed, Graciela straightened up and spoke over her shoulder to Black Tuxedo. He took an envelope from inside his jacket and leaned close to the woman. Crooked Nose watched from the back. Black Tuxedo and Graciela exchanged a few words as she opened her purse and stuck the envelope in it. She wrapped her hand around the top of the purse, covering the clasp.
Graciela flashed a plastic smile at Black Tuxedo as the elevator door opened. Crooked Nose exited first. His jacket bulged under his left arm.
“Freeze that, Wally. I want a printout of that frame.”
“Yeah, yeah, anything you say.” Wally tapped the keyboard. “Is that bulge a gun?”
“Yes.”
“And that tattoo on his neck?”
“It’s a prison tattoo.”
Wally shivered. “Geez, maybe Graciela is in danger after all.” He started the video again. Graciela said something to Black Tuxedo as he waved and followed Crooked Nose from the elevator car.
Wally pointed at the screen. “That’s the thirty-fourth floor.”
“Let’s come back to that floor in a minute, Wally. I want to see which rooms they went into.”
On the screen, Graciela leaned against the wall and took off her shoes. This time she grabbed the purse in a death grip. Whatever she had in that purse was valuable.
“What do you think was in the envelope?”
“His Grandma’s family recipe for cornbread.”
We watched the video until Graciela exited the elevator. No one else entered or left the car.
Wally punched the keyboard again. “Okay, hall camera on thirty-four coming up.”
Crooked Nose looked both ways and nodded his shiny, bald head to Black Tuxedo before he exited.
“Freeze that too, Wally. I need several blow-ups of those guys.”
The two men stopped at a door. Black Tuxedo pointed back toward the elevator, said something to Crooked Nose, then entered a room on the right.
“All the units on that side are suites, Chuck. They overlook Seeti Bay. The rooms on the left have a city view and they’re smaller.”
Crooked Nose entered a door on the left.
“What suite number did that guy in the tuxedo enter?”
“I can’t tell from the video; it’s too far down the corridor to see.”
“Can you access the keycard files and tell which rooms on that floor were entered at—“ I glanced at the screen, “2:20 a.m.?”
“I didn’t think of that. Hold on.” The guard swiveled to another computer and pulled the keyboard over. “Suite 3406. The ex-con is in 3405.”
“Thanks, Wally.” I wrote that down. “Now let’s look at the elevator video again and see where those two guys got on.”
Wally ran the elevator video back three minutes. “They’re already on the elevator.”
So I noticed. “Run it back another three minutes.”
The elevator held another couple. They got off on twenty-six. The empty elevator rose and stopped at thirty-four. Black Tuxedo and Crooked Nose got on and took their positions at the rear of the car. For the next six minutes the two men stood motionless as the elevator went down to the lobby, up to the thirty-ninth floor, and back down to the lobby. Other people got on and off the elevator, but the two men never moved. Finally, the video showed Graciela and the Cowboy fans getting on.
“You think they were waiting for Graciela to get on that elevator?”
I nodded. “Now let’s go back to the thirty-seventh floor camera and watch for Graciela when she came out of the suite.”
Chapter 6
Brian Wallenda, manager of the Super Bowl headquarters hotel, spread the stack of pictures on his desk. “What you’re asking is highly irregular, Mr. McCrary.” Even on a Sunday, he wore a suit and tie.
“Call me Chuck. This may involve a guest’s safety. The guest is Graciela Perez, the fiancée of the Jets starting quarterback. That’s why I asked you to meet me here on a Sunday.”
“I’m well aware who Graciela is. I don’t l
ive in a cave.” Wallenda pursed his lips. “Frankly, if not for the potential danger to a guest, I wouldn’t entertain your request—not without a search warrant.”
“The bald man with the prison tattoo carried a gun. He and the man in the black tuxedo rode the elevator up and down twice, waiting for Graciela to get on. All I want you to do is help me identify the men in the elevator with her.”
“That would require accessing the hotel’s reservation system and our guests’ personal information.” He slipped a finger inside his collar and tugged. “That goes against my hotel training.”
“How about having a guest kidnaped from your hotel? Does that go against your training?”
Wallenda’s face blanched. “I… I, uh, I don’t know what to say. We’ve never had anything like this happen before.” He straightened up. “You don’t know she was kidnaped.”
“I don’t know that she wasn’t, either. I do know she was with two suspicious men and now she’s disappeared.” I’d had enough of this guy tiptoeing around the issue. “Let’s cut to the chase. Can we go off the record, Mr. Wallenda?”
Wallenda raised an eyebrow. “About what?”
“Times being what they are, we both know that it wouldn’t damage the reputation of the Port City Palace if Graciela were discovered to have a controlled substance in her hotel suite.”
“The Palace is a big hotel.” Wallenda shrugged. “No one expects us to control what goes on in our rooms or what guests bring in with them. And everyone knows what celebrities are like.”
“Right. But if she obtained the controlled substance from another hotel guest in your elevator, and that guest was accompanied by an armed bodyguard who is an ex-convict, and your surveillance cameras captured the exchange…” I gestured to the photos on the desk. “And that guest disappeared from your hotel in the middle of the night. It wouldn’t look good if it came out that you ignored the potential danger to a guest—especially a high-profile guest like Graciela.”
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