by Jack Bunker
It was too early to tell if the Valtrex was helping. Christ, but that’s a big pill.
Mack awoke when the door to the room clicked closed. Wanda walked toward the beds, wearing a loosely tied terrycloth robe, the top half of her bathing suit visible and her hair swept up in a white towel.
“Hey,” he croaked.
“Well, good morning, sunshine,” Wanda said, smiling. “Doesn’t look like married life’s agreeing with you too much.”
Mack rolled over and propped himself up on his elbow. “Wait. We got married?” His mouth tasted like roadkill. “Where the fuck was I?” He looked around the room. The other king-size bed had clearly been slept in.
“Oh, you were there.” Wanda walked over to the armoire and picked up a pile of documents Mack didn’t remember seeing before. She selected the nine-by-twelve manila envelope Mack did recognize, and she pulled out a certificate from among a thick stack of smaller envelopes and papers. “See?”
“Son of a bitch. How about that?” Mack tried to swallow, but his throat felt like broken glass. “What’s that smell?”
“‘What’s that smell’ like the six gallons of gin seeping through your pores? Or ‘what’s that smell’ like where you threw up behind the curtain?”
“The second one, I reckon.”
“It’s been quite a honeymoon so far.”
He didn’t remember the pain in his shoulder until he rolled over on his side. He needed about a pound of Advil. Shit. The scam. Now he was back on that asshole J.T.’s payroll and under his thumb after all.
He got another whiff of the smell from behind the curtain. “Sorry about that.”
When he saw Sonu Chugh’s number appear, J.T. put the phone back in his pocket. He didn’t have any idea when Mack would be scheduling his appointment, so there was no sense enduring another inane discussion. There was always the chance that Chugh had gotten in trouble and was calling to engage him, but if that was the case, J.T. figured, the good doctor would call back.
J.T.’s first order of business was to go to La Bodega and pick up some cheaper wine. He’d put off buying wine because he was trying to save cash. Once he did the math, however, he realized that it was cheaper paying Frankie Fresh 52 percent interest on thirty-dollar bottles than drinking up his $150 bottles. J.T. figured a few cases ought to hold him until he got his end from the scam.
He was sick of paying for Domino’s with loose change because there was no food in the house. At Whole Foods he loaded up on Manchego, Cheshire, Stilton, Reggiano Parmesan, and Saint-André cheeses. He bought two Wagyu beef filets three inches thick. He threw jar after jar of cornichons, cocktail onions, French mustards, and English marmalades into his first cart; when that filled up, he grabbed a second. He bought $360 worth of acornfed jamón ibérico, sliced thin. A pound of whitefish, a pound of sable, and two pounds of Nova salmon. Two quarts of kalamata olives and a gallon of Pugliese olive oil. He bought five pounds of Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee at sixty dollars a pound.
He felt better already.
Mack, too, was starting to feel better. He and Wanda stopped at the In-N-Out Burger a couple miles from the hotel and Mack sucked down two double-doubles, fries, and a chocolate milkshake. Wanda had to pay, just as she’d had to tip the valet. By the time she filled her car up with gas, they were effectively out of cash. Mack wasn’t worried. If old J.T. wanted this thing done, he’d just have to absorb a few more expenses. Hell, Mack was out almost a hundred grand and nobody heard him bitching.
Wanda drove back to Palm Desert with the top up and the air conditioning on. There wouldn’t be any nipple glimpses this trip. Wanda was covered up in some black knit jersey she’d bought on a Mack-sponsored shopping spree. Not that Mack could keep his eyes open anyway. He leaned against the window’s warm glass and, still drunk from the past two days, dropped off to sleep.
Mack had only been asleep thirty minutes when his cell phone rang. With his eyes still closed and his face still mashed against the glass, he dug the phone out of his pocket. He cracked one eye open enough to see that it wasn’t J.T. but Buddy.
“Whatcha say, Buddy Roe?”
“Tommy told me to call you. Said he couldn’t get ahold of you.”
“What’s his problem? I told him I was gonna be out a few days.”
“We been furloughed, man.”
“Come again?” Mack sat up and wiped the drool from his cheek. “We been what?”
“Furloughed. Means we got time off now.”
“Awesome.”
“It ain’t paid, man. It means you still got a job, you just stay home a coupla days a week without pay.”
Mack stretched his eyes wide and reached for the sweating plastic bottle of Dr Pepper in the cup holder. “Well, that sucks.”
“Yeah, no shit.”
“So when are you off?”
“Tomorrow.”
“Well, shit, c’mon over and hang out with us at El Fuente Dorado.”
“Say what?”
“Fuck it, man. If we ain’t workin’, let’s play a little golf. We can play one a these nice resort courses. Put it on ol’ J.T.’s tab.”
“You sure?”
“Fuck yeah, why not? Hell, I’m supposed to be on my honeymoon. Nobody said I had to be stuck inside watching TV, did they?”
Still leaning against the window, Mack reached down to the console and fumbled with the bottle of Dr Pepper as he tried to find the cup holder with his eyes closed.
“Yeah, all right. You sure it’s free?”
“Absolutely. All part of the honeymoon package, brother.”
Al was standing next to the Coke machine in the employees’ cafeteria when Marino Vargas, his district manager, walked up.
“How’s the due diligence going?” Al asked.
“Moving along. Once you get the fucking lawyers involved, you know how everything’s going to slow down to a crawl,” said Vargas.
“I heard that. They got a time frame on when the merger’s going to go through?”
“Shouldn’t be long now, assuming we figure out this IT shit before they do.”
“What do you mean, IT shit?”
“You know fucking lawyers.” Vargas leaned in and lowered his voice. “One of the IT guys was going through the data room they have set up for SAICO’s attorneys doing the due diligence. He didn’t say anything to them, but it looked like somebody may have hacked in to the central database.”
Al opened his Coke. It fizzed through the top of the can and over his fingers. “Are you serious? Why?”
“Who knows? Maybe it’s the Chinese. Maybe it’s some bored high school kids. Bunch of dumbasses. Go through all that trouble to hack into the computers and do they start wiring money into Cayman accounts? No, these assholes just download a bunch of worthless, encrypted historical settlement data from years ago.” Vargas shook his head. “Douchebags.”
“So they don’t know who hacked in?”
“No, and until this SAICO merger goes through, nobody on our end’s saying shit. It doesn’t create any liability we have to disclose. As far as our lawyers are concerned, it’s a nonissue for the merger. If SAICO’s lawyers haven’t asked any direct questions about it, we’ll just investigate it internally.”
Al could feel a new rash blooming beneath his shirt. “Leave it to the Chinese.”
“I know, right?”
Mack fell back into a road coma.
Wanda cleared her throat. “So you think that’s a good idea?”
“What?”
“Having Buddy come out to play golf. You’re supposed to be on your honeymoon, aren’t you?”
“Yeah, at a fuckin’ golf resort. What’s the problem?”
“It doesn’t matter to me, I just know J.T. has a lot of ideas about how he wants stuff done.”
“Like you said yourself, J.T. wants a lot of stuff. What he needs, though, is to chill out and shut the fuck up. We can walk away from this shit and then where is he?”
“I’d just hate for this
to get screwed up.”
“You mean like I screwed up losing that money in Vegas?”
“I didn’t say that.”
“Listen, don’t worry about nothing. You just go on and get another massage and relax.”
“Whatever you say, Mack. You’re the man of the house.”
“Yeah, I guess you’re right. I never thought of that.”
“I’m sensing a pattern.”
Mack half raised a sleepy eyebrow. “How’s that?”
“Never mind.”
Mack reached down, reclined his seat, and crossed his legs. “Hell, maybe you ought to bring one of them little oriental honeys back to the room and we can get a real party going.”
Wanda shook her head. “How did a prize like you manage to stay single all these years?”
“Hard to believe, ain’t it?”
When they got to El Fuente Dorado, Mack and Wanda checked into one of the poolside casitas. The porter brought in their luggage, which consisted primarily of bags from Wanda’s shopping adventure. Mack opened a Corona from the minibar, flopped on the room’s single king-size bed, and flipped on the TV.
He was still wiped out. The In-N-Out had helped his stomach, but he was completely lethargic. His eyes were starting to close when Wanda’s rustling shopping bags jarred him awake.
“Where you going?”
“Down to the pool. Like you said, I didn’t come to stay inside and watch TV.”
Wanda stepped into the bathroom and came out two minutes later wearing a white tank bathing suit with a maroon sarong wrapped around her waist.
“I’m gonna take me a little nap,” Mack said, yawning. “Maybe I’ll come down and join you in a bit.”
“Suit yourself.” She reached into the minibar and pulled out a can of Amstel. She laid it in a pool bag with a towel and a paperback and shoved her sunglasses from her forehead down onto her nose. “See ya.”
Mack watched her wide shoulders turn slightly as she went through the door. Her already-tan skin looked even darker set off by the white bathing suit. Mack’s swelling member reminded him that they’d yet to consummate this marriage. Tonight would be it for sure.
TWENTY-THREE
J.T. couldn’t wait anymore. He called the cell phone he’d given Wanda. She answered it on the third ring.
“Hey, it’s me,” he said. “Can you talk?”
“Yeah, I’m out by the pool.”
“Where is he?”
“Back in the room taking a nap.”
J.T. paced back and forth in the kitchen. “So what’s the deal? When is he going to have his accident?”
“Jeez, would you relax about that?”
“How can I relax? Do you know how complex this situation is? How much I’ve got invested in this little project?”
“Yeah, about that.”
“What?”
“You’re going to need to invest a little more.”
“What?” J.T. started to hyperventilate. “What are you talking about? I already gave that jagoff two grand for expenses.”
“Yeah, well, that’s not gonna cover it. That disappeared in Vegas.”
J.T. wanted to spike the phone again, but he was running out of them. He took a deep breath and tried to calm himself. “What are you talking about?”
“The money you gave Mack. It’s gone. He lost in Vegas.”
“That little prick.”
“Listen, you need to get over this. Just send a couple thousand more out with Buddy.”
“Buddy?”
“Yeah, he’s coming out tomorrow to play golf with Mack.”
“ARE YOU SHITTING ME?” J.T. was desperate for something to throw, something to smash, something not too valuable. When he couldn’t find anything, he opened the microwave door and slammed it. It pinged when it shut. “That asshole thinks he’s playing golf? I ought to drive over there and drown him right now myself!”
“Hey, get a grip on yourself. Take a deep breath and listen, okay?”
J.T. did as instructed, filling his mouth with the thirty-nine-dollar Cab he’d bought at La Bodega.
“First of all, you promised me an all-expenses-paid honeymoon, remember? Putting aside how absurd this whole thing is, I used my credit card when we checked in. There’s no way there’s enough available credit on there to cover even the minibar tab, so you need to get some money out here.”
J.T. gulped his wine. “But—”
“I wasn’t finished. Now listen, this whole thing is supposed to be set up as a honeymoon. Is it really plausible for him to slip fifteen minutes after we get to the place? If that’s what you were thinking, you should’ve told me that up front. That’s the stupidest thing I ever heard.”
Still breathing hard through his nose, J.T. filled his mouth with more wine and let it sit there.
“I’m not asking questions about the moving parts of this,” Wanda continued, “because I don’t want to know. But I told you I’m not going to get jerked around on this. You said all expenses paid, and that’s what I expect.”
A lawnmower started up next door. J.T. looked out the kitchen window. His own lawn hadn’t been mown in three weeks. His gardener had gotten tired of getting stiffed and finally just quit showing up. Maybe the guy cutting the neighbors’ yard would do it for a quick fifty bucks.
“Furthermore,” she continued, “you seriously need to dial back how you’re talking to Mack. He told me how he already messed up his shoulder on something that wasn’t supposed to hurt. You keep talking to him like he’s your bitch, he’s going to walk away. I’m not kidding.”
“Okay, I hear you.”
“You sure?”
“Yeah. You’re right. Another day does make it a more believable story.”
“Just chill. It’ll be fine.”
J.T. looked in his wallet to see what he had. “Have Mack call Buddy and tell him to meet me tonight at the Home Depot off the Sixty in Moreno Valley at seven o’clock. And Wanda,” J.T. said, exhaling, “I’m telling Buddy to give the cash to you. Do not fuck me on this.”
“Yeah, yeah,” she said, and hung up.
Al was completely unable to focus at work. What if the IT guys figured out the system hadn’t been hacked but accessed by someone inside? What if Vargas telling him had been a trap to see how he’d react? Jesus, J.T. was right about paranoia. There was no such thing as too much.
Should he tell J.T.? No, it’s the other way around. That slippery fuck needs to be telling me some things. Al was still looking for the angle to spring the knowledge about the Chugh mini-scam on J.T. Needed to pin him down, figure how to get something out of this. The return of the five grand, for starters.
He hadn’t heard dick from J.T. since he sent Mack and Wanda off to Vegas. And the whole loss of consortium angle had been his idea! Well, maybe Wanda had planted the seed, but it was Al who’d saved their asses with Frankie Fresh, and this was the gratitude?
But this Weed thing. Vargas hadn’t mentioned anything about it the other day, but it was only a matter of time. Vargas had finagled keeping the job off the HR posting, just because he didn’t want to see Al get shafted altogether. Maybe Al could move up there temporarily and rent out his house until the market turned, or until he could work another transfer back.
That was nuts. He wouldn’t even cover his mortgage with what he could rent his place for. Both the other completed houses in Tangelo Estates sat empty. He was convinced dirtbags were using the house behind his as a meth lab. Yeah, that’d be a great idea. Rent out a house to a bunch of thugs to raise pit bulls, stage cockfights, and rape teenage girls in the backyard.
No, Al needed Mack and J.T. to come through on this deal.
Wanda walked through the door of the casita and a wave of sweet coconut swirled into the room behind her. Mack, reclining in his boxers and watching CNN, sat up and drained the last of his beer.
“You hungry?” Wanda asked.
“I could eat.”
“Let me take a shower and we can go over to
Saguaro at the lodge. I saw the menu while we were checking in. It looks amazing.”
“Sounds good to me.”
Wanda pulled off her sunglasses and laid them on the desk. “By the way, I talked to J.T. You need to tell Buddy to meet him at seven tonight at the Home Depot in Moreno Valley off the Sixty. You know which one I mean?”
“Yeah.”
“J.T.’s going to give him the money to pay for the room.”
“So you told him Buddy’s coming to play golf? Was he pissed?”
“Yeah, at first. Then I reminded him that it made the honeymoon story more plausible if you didn’t have an accident on the first day.”
“Yeah, he likes that word plausible.”
Wanda disappeared into the bathroom. A minute later Mack heard the shower running. Tired as he was, his throbbing erection led him into the bathroom.
Standing in the shower, Wanda turned and looked at him. She didn’t say anything, but lifted her chin under the showerhead and began rinsing the chlorine from her hair. Her head seemed to change shape as her normally puffy heap of curls flattened under steaming jets of water. She squirted a handful of gel into her palm and started lathering up her body. Mack didn’t know why he’d always thought she was fat; seeing it all at once, naked, she had an awesome body.
He stood in the middle of the room slack-jawed, his member pointing at the shower like a divining rod. Wanda looked over at him, then covered her mouth. An indigo splotch the size of a dessert plate now stained Mack’s chambray-colored boxers. He looked down and his erection vanished. Crimson spread from the tips of his ears to his collarbones.
“Hey,” Wanda said, still laughing, “it’s no big deal.”
Mack turned, grabbed a hand towel, and walked out of the bathroom. He stripped off his boxers and pulled on a pair of shorts, commando style. He threw on one of his new Tommy Bahama shirts, snatched a Dos Equis from the minibar, and just before he slammed the casita door behind him, scratched out a note on the desk.