As the truth is revealed, Gustavo gasps. The luster of what appears to be precious metals and sparkling jewels ricochets the beams from his ceiling light. He immediately thinks of a magic wand—perhaps a Hollywood prop for a flamboyant sorceress or wizard in an epic fantasy movie. The base of the wand is coated with various silver-like metals. A cobra, with her or his head flattened and ready to strike, emerges at the top from neck-band collars of inset stones that mimic diamonds and emeralds. The serpent, scaled with golden coloring, has violet eyes. Onyx-like gemstones are embedded in the faux eye markings enigmatically displayed on the back of the cobra's hood.
"A bejeweled cane," he speculates aloud, twisting it in the light, still careful not to press any part of his fingers or skin on it. "Heavy. Obviously fake, though damn realistic. A big budget production, to be sure. Or is the value sentimental? A family heirloom? An ancestral gift intended for one's descendants?"
Gustavo rewraps the wand, tapes it back inside the layers of bubble wrap, and slides it back into the box and under his bed. Excited, he searches images on his computer until he can barely keep his eyes open. Looking up "cobra de capello," he finds that it is a term of Portuguese origin, translating essentially as "cobra with hood." It is associated primarily with research studies, a few dissertations and articles, and scientific pieces on snakes. A professional mixed martial arts fighting league, based in Las Vegas, bears the name too.
Tumbling into his bed, Gustavo has just enough strength to flick off the lights before his head hits the pillow and he sinks into sleep.
12
Dash
Aleksey pays for his drinks. Instead of leaving the Sky Beacon lounge, he moseys around the room, pretending to be absorbed by the night views of the San Francisco bridges and skyline. Backing up, to frame a picture with his cell phone, he nudges the table with the mystery couple.
"Please forgive me," Aleksey says, making eye contact with both the man and the blond woman.
"You almost spilled our drinks," the man protests.
"I regret my clumsiness and ask your pardon."
"Slow down, young man," the woman says, lifting her eyebrows. "You are excused."
As soon as Aleksey walks out of their sight range, he dashes to the stairwell and phones Zachary as he sprints down the spiraling steps.
"Mayday!" Aleksey declares on the message after Zachary does not answer the rings. "Get out of there!"
Aleksey reaches the ninth floor and bolts down the hallways. He reaches his and Zachary's hotel room and bursts inside with his pistol lifted in his hands.
The room is empty.
DOUGLAS REFASTENS HIS kilt with one hand, not daring to drop his eyes or gun barrel from Zachary's body.
"Finally caught," Zachary says, repeating Douglas's words. "You used the word finally just now. Very odd."
"You thought you were invincible?" Douglas asks. "Who knows how many johns are out there—many, like me, pretending to be gay—trying to snag you and just waiting for you to slip up."
"Lucky you, Douglas. So you have been at this a long time?"
"No, not really, but long enough to hook you."
"You might succeed, but it is too early to claim me as a prize. You have some work to do. Either pull the trigger or figure out how to get me out of this hotel room where every hallway has live security cameras."
Douglas pulls his phone out of a compartment lined inside his kilt.
"I've got him in my talons," Douglas says into his phone. "He is not moving a muscle, but you guys should hurry on up here."
Zachary's phone rings. Instinctively, Douglas's eyes drop to Zachary's front pants pocket. Zachary unleashes a disabling kick to Douglas's groin, followed immediately by a side strike to Douglas's neck using the ulna bone of his forearm. Knocked out cold without firing a shot, Douglas collapses onto a heap on the floor.
Zachary snatches Douglas's gun and tucks it into the waistband of his pants, grabs his own shirt and shoes and bounds out of the hotel room. Guessing that the men Douglas called will be utilizing the stairwell to avoid security cameras, Zachary joins a small group of people stepping into an elevator. While kneeling down to tie the laces on his shoes, he scans the other occupants, focusing on items in their hands and anything they could be hiding under their clothes. A man in a sports jacket is the only person inside the elevator who concerns him. The man is staring rigidly ahead, apparently taking no notice of Zachary or any other passengers.
The elevator stops on the third level, but no one makes an attempt to exit. Just as the doors are about to smash shut, Zachary inserts his hand and steps out of the elevator. The man in the sports jacket leaves the elevator too.
"My ring is missing," Zachary fibs to the occupants of the elevator. "It must have fallen off."
Zachary drops to his knees as if he is searching the carpet. The man in the sports coat watches him and makes no effort to walk away. The elevator doors begin closing again. Zachary crawls back inside the elevator chamber.
He looks back just in time to see the man in the sports jacket glowering as the doors slam shut.
13
Franklin House
As he does every morning, Gustavo wakes gazing across Franklin Avenue at the landmark mansion illuminated by the dawn. His bed faces tall Spanish Colonial windows which precisely frame the Mayan-inspired and historic home designed by Lloyd Wright, son of architectural genius Frank Lloyd Wright, in 1926. A broad row of steps climb the hillside, evoking an ascent to a shrine, leading to a mysterious copper-gated entrance overshadowed above by dramatic jaw-like protrusions of patterned concrete block from a pristine rectangular form. It remains a spectacularly bold structure today and Gustavo imagines the enormous shock it must have elicited from Los Angeles residents and tourists upon its completion almost a century ago.
Gustavo is also fascinated by the Franklin House's interior and fables. The forbidding exterior shelters a charming courtyard, lush with flowers, vines, plants, and trees. This roofless center welcomes fresh air and sunshine while residents swim in the pool, entertain around a fire pit, and listen to the trickling of a fountain. Numerous shows have been filmed in both its indoor and outdoor rooms. Stars from Hollywood's so-called Golden Age reportedly fell in love there, started feuds, settled scores, and agreed to new motion picture deals. At least one writer claims its secret underground room was the brutal, body-severing murder site of a young woman named Elizabeth Short—known as The Black Dahlia—by the home's owner in 1947.
Gustavo remembers dreaming about auras and his self-portrait. He feels hopeful. He is ready to spend hours in his studio exploring and experimenting. As he yawns and stretches, memories of the attack in Griffith Park and his experience at the police station seep back into his thoughts. In denial, Gustavo tries to convince himself that he must have misinterpreted the entire episode. He will contact the observatory this morning and may even get his phone back. He thinks he also has a decent shot at eventually finding the production studio that owns the adorned cane.
Gustavo's old phone successfully charged overnight. It is slow, but functioning. He puts on casual clothes and shoes he won't mind splattering paint on.
Breakfast is a sugar-free protein bar, a large glass of plant-based milk, and chewable gummy vitamins. From Gustavo's living room he watches a formally-dressed group of people enter into Franklin House and wonders if they are planning a charity event or scouting a filming location. Rather than being lived in as a residence, his understanding is the home is now used almost exclusively for benefits, entertainment, and business functions. Gustavo approaches his window and surveys the vehicles parked along Franklin Avenue.
Jolted and stunned, as if he had been electrically shocked, Gustavo drops the protein bar on the hardwood floor. The tip of a white jeep, parked curbside by the entrance to his building's parking area, peeks out from a large fir tree masking it from view.
Gustavo creeps to his front door. The peephole reveals an empty hallway. But he knows the square-jawed man,
and possibly others, could be hiding on the other side. Careful to make no discernible noise, he zooms to his bedroom and packs a duffel bag. Gustavo crawls out of the laundry room window at the back of the building into a narrow alleyway where trash receptacles are stored. He leaps the iron gate, hurtles to his car, and gallops away down Normandie Avenue without ever daring to glance back.
14
Memory
Reuniting in a room at a motor lodge built in the 1950s near the Castro neighborhood of San Francisco, Aleksey and Zachary mull over their options before breakfast.
"I am disappointed with myself," Zachary says. "I really slipped up. I should have texted you his hotel room number. I should have realized I was being set up. Douglas knew enough to lure me with a kilt and then play with my chest. In other words, he knew too much—too much about my desires."
"You survived it," Aleksey responds. "There are more precautions to take from now on. But the silver lining here is we know you are being actively pursued and we have to get ahead of this thing and figure out how to stop it."
"Tell me again about the blond woman in the rooftop lounge."
"There was nothing suspicious about her. I noticed her across the room with a man. It looked like they were on a date. But I knew I had seen her face before. I wracked my brain and could not identify her. I got closer to her and we made eye contact. She registered no sign of recognizing me, but that is maybe because of my hair just being shaved off. Suddenly, in a burst of images, I remembered her though. Her face, not her name."
"How certain are you, Aleksey?" Zachary asks.
"No doubt whatsoever."
"Have you ever noticed her at any fights? Any weigh-ins? Any arenas?"
"Nope, but I was not ever looking for her at any of those places," Aleksey answers. "However, if you ask me if she is the very same person who attended your deposition at that Las Vegas law office a year ago, then the answer is an unqualified yes. She was definitely there at the deposition, seated with some cranky older men associated somehow with the league. That is why I knew there was instant trouble at the hotel. As you and I both completely agree, there are no such things as coincidences."
"Do we now have worries with the hotel?" Zachary asks.
"I don't think so. The identification I used was fake and the credit card cannot be traced back to us. I doubt the man who called himself Douglas will be filing any police or hotel reports."
Zachary reclines on one of the twin beds in the motor lodge room, shuts his eyes, and tries to recall the faces of the people who attended the deposition. Perhaps because it was so distasteful to him, Zachary cannot remember what the lawyers and their assistants looked like. He remembers the cramped, cold conference room and how the air-conditioning vent blew directly on him. An emerging international league had sued Nathaniel, Zachary, and a half dozen other accomplished professional fighters for breach of contract. The case never made it to trial. The plaintiffs—the league's owners—withdrew their lawsuits after research in the discovery phase unveiled some of the league's ruthless tactics giving some fighters unfair advantages, among other misdeeds.
"I cannot picture the clear faces of anyone there," Zachary says. "It is just a blur. An unpleasant episode I only wanted to forget."
"You don't doubt my recollection, do you?" Aleksey asks.
"Not at all. You are uncanny about identifying faces. I am certain she, and perhaps that league too—I cannot remember its weird name either—are behind this effort with Douglas."
"Have you notified Nathaniel?"
"Not yet."
"Nathaniel's lawyers represented all of you," Aleksey says, "I mean, all of the fighters being sued. Nathaniel was their primary target because of his championship status and my memory is that he paid the bulk of the legal fees and the rest of the fighters chipped in what they could afford. Some of the guys and gals did not have wealth yet."
"Yes," Zachary replies. "That is correct."
"I tried finding the blond woman's picture online, without success. The case never made it to the press and my basic searches on most of the fighting leagues, legitimate and underground, came up empty. We need to get the name of that league. Nathaniel, or at least his lawyers, should be able to tell us right away."
Zachary rummages through his luggage for his toiletry kit and again applauds Aleksey for getting their bags out of the Grand Vestige Hotel before fleeing.
"I will call Nate after I get out of the shower," Zachary says. "I know the way he thinks. He will want me to head to his place to obsess about what happened. I would like to know your opinion, Aleksey. Should I go to Sausalito?"
"Well, of course, I will respect whatever choice you make. I think it would be a mistake to remain here in San Francisco, even in a quaint motor lodge, and an even bigger error to possibly lead the people hunting you directly to Nate's door in Sausalito. I believe we should get on the road—or take a flight or ride a train—and get out of here."
"Agreed. Let's go now. I'll skip the shower and call Nate when we know we have escaped the city."
15
Cottage
Gustavo leaves his car in a distant corner of a parking lot shared by a 24-hour pancake restaurant and physical fitness gymnasium on Sunset Boulevard near La Brea Avenue. He swiftly hauls his duffel bag through alleys and parking zones, leaping concrete walls, moving eastward past homes and businesses. His friend is waiting for him at the gated pedestrian entrance to a bungalow court on Formosa Avenue.
"Thank Heaven for you," Gustavo says, racing toward her.
"Are you sure you were not tailed?" Lavonne Tejada asks, unlocking the steel gate and admitting Gustavo.
"No one could have followed me."
They scurry through a cobblestone courtyard shared by four tiny houses. Reportedly created by Charlie Chaplin, the superstar of the silent film era, the shingled-roof cottages are deliberately bowed and true to the fairy tale character of the Storybook architectural movement in 1920s Los Angeles. Historians claim each cottage served as a temporary home for movie stars who filmed at Chaplin's nearby studios. Such a collection of homes, once popular throughout the city, is now one of only three hundred bungalow courts surviving demolishment.
Lavonne's home, only 600 square feet in size, emits few indicators that she is one of the most successful avant-garde painters in southern California. The only artwork inside the spartan interior is displayed on four layers of shelves that span the height and width of the central room. Dominican carnival masks with lustrous colors, many with horns, are arranged so that they harmonize. A smiling mask, pieced together and painted by her mother, when she was a child paying tribute to her culture, proudly fits in the center. Lavonne serves hot mint tea and sits across from Gustavo beside her collection.
"Let's try to get to the heart of the matter," Lavonne says, shifting forward after hearing more details from Gustavo. "No guessing. Don't answer me with any guesses, okay?"
"Agreed," Gustavo replies.
"You are certain that the man who pursued you last night in the parking lot was the very same man who chased you in the Griffith Park terrain?"
"Yes, I am fully certain of this. Besides his clothes and short and stocky physique, he had a prominent eyebrow scar."
"And you are equally positive that the white jeep in front of your apartment building this morning is the exact same one that followed you last night?"
Gustavo folds his arms and puts his fist over his mouth, recalling the images. He leans backward in the chair and his eyes meander around Lavonne's beamed ceiling.
"Your body language answers for you," Lavonne says, wrapping the top of her braided hair in a folded handkerchief and lightly pulling on her stone earrings.
"I believe it is the same jeep," Gustavo states. "But, no, I am not positive about this."
"Will you show me the movie prop? The cane?"
"Of course."
Gustavo removes the box from his duffel bag, peels away the tape and protective layers from the top portion
, and hands the base of the cane covered in plastic wrap to Lavonne.
"No, friend!" she whistles. "This is no movie prop."
Like Gustavo, she takes care not to directly touch it. Lavonne scoots her chair closer to her window to let natural layers of light strike the cut of the gemstones.
"What is it a replica of?" Gustavo asks.
"Honey, it is no replica either."
"What part is real?"
"All of it."
Chills surge up Gustavo's back and arms.
"Real gold?" he asks, referring to the hooded cobra.
"Real gold, real silver, real diamonds. Platinum, emeralds, and rubies. This doesn't belong in a duffel bag. It could be something you would find in the Tower of London alongside the Thames River patrolled by royal bodyguards."
Gustavo, speechless, searches Lavonne's face for any signs of doubt or humor. He agrees to let her photograph it and holds it at various angles to help her capture details.
"I will share these images with you," Lavonne says.
"What is it?" Gustavo asks. "If really priceless, no one would dare use it for walking."
"It was not created for use. Think of it as a staff. A symbol of love. A family treasure. A compilation of wealth stored inside a piece of art."
"I am too shocked to think clearly."
"I know you well enough to trust, without any doubt, that you will do the right thing," Lavonne declares.
"What is the right thing?" Gustavo asks.
"Only you can answer that. You are the finder. It is your burden."
"Lavonne, I did not find it. This was given to me by the man who was collapsing in the park. I did not ask for it."
"But you took it."
"From a dying man!"
"When you calm, I believe you will awaken the strength to handle this situation, Gustavo."
"What would you do if you were in my shoes?"
Guarding His Desires (Passionate Security Book 2) Page 5