TONY AND I SAT in my car in total silence. The moment we climbed into the little Renault, the atmosphere between us changed. We were together now, in tight quarters. I wondered if Tony also felt this unbearable tension.
“So … where to?”
I still didn’t know which Tony I was sitting next to. Was it the other Tony, the good man I caught glimpses of at work? Or would I have to deal with the façade that Tony presented to the rest of the world?
“I’ve got to pick up my bike. It’s still at the office.”
“Now?”
Tony checked his watch. “I guess it can wait. Maybe we should just get some sleep.”
Tony stared straight ahead, his expression unreadable. He pointed me toward the freeway, and we headed east.
“How’s your head?” I asked.
“Fine.” He brushed his fingers over the bruise.
“What about the others? When will they get out?”
“They got out about an hour ago.” Tony sighed. “It always takes longer for me. Because of my name.”
“Your name?”
Tony grunted. He seemed to consider saying more, but thought better of it. Instead he muttered, “It’s complicated.”
It was late and the roads were quiet. The only sound was the gentle hum of the engine. I couldn’t stand the silence, so I tried another tack. “Was it rough in there?”
“It wasn’t a picnic.”
That effectively ended our conversation. Twenty painful minutes later, he instructed me to take the next exit. We entered a quiet residential area. My heart started to beat faster. We were heading toward his apartment.
“Here.” He pointed at an empty spot in front of a charming 1920s two-story apartment complex. I pulled in and killed the engine.
Without a word Tony led me through the front entrance. He was always careful to keep details of his private life under wraps. Until now I didn’t even know what neighborhood he lived in. Walking toward his apartment, I felt strange, almost like a voyeur. Tony stopped at a door, unlocked it, and switched on the lights. We stepped inside.
It was a small, minimal studio apartment. The few bits of furniture in the place were all a decade out of date—a sofa, a coffee table, a long, low 1970s-style sideboard. On top of the latter were several paperbacks and a small TV. Apart from these spare details, the place was bare. It looked hardly lived in. The walls were empty—no photographs or pictures. It was almost like I was being shown an apartment for rent.
“This is … nice,” I said, glancing around the small, bare room.
It was certainly different from how I’d imagined Tony’s place. With the money he was earning I was sure that he lived in some ostentatious bachelor pad.
“I don’t spend a lot of time here,” Tony said, as if reading my mind.
“It’s … cozy.” Tony closed the door after us. “Can I get you anything?”
I tried to play the situation to my advantage. “Well … a shower would be nice.”
“Oh. Right, of course.” As he went over to the linen closet, I wondered if I had successfully planted an image of my naked body in his mind. Tony pulled two towels from the top of a neat stack. “It’s at the end of the hallway.” He handed me the towels. “There’s extra toothbrushes in the cabinet.”
The bathroom revealed a little more about Tony than the rest of the apartment had. The medicine cabinet was stocked with top-of-the-line shaving creams and razors, toothpaste, toothbrushes, and mouthwash. He certainly didn’t skimp on toiletries. With the door closed behind me I picked up a bottle, removed the cap and inhaled the familiar scent of Tony. As I brushed my teeth, I found myself staring blankly at the label.
Obsession.
I undressed, making sure to leave the bathroom door unlocked. I wondered if he would try to join me in the shower. As I stood under the powerful jets, the pounding hot water eased the muscles in my neck and shoulders. I soaped myself sensuously, all the while glancing over to the door. It did not open. After a while I realized that he wasn’t coming. With disappointment, I turned off the faucet.
I stepped out of the steamy bathroom with one towel wrapped around my head and the other covering my body. I walked barefoot into the living room. Tony was sitting on the couch, staring blankly at the TV. He seemed a million miles away. On-screen, Janet Jackson was skipping through an alley singing “When I Think of You,” wearing an oversized blazer with huge shoulder pads and even bigger hair.
Tony sensed me behind him and stood up. He looked stiff, uncomfortable in my presence. “I guess I’ll take a shower,” he muttered, walking past me.
While Tony showered I glanced around the rest of the apartment, noticing that he didn’t even have a bed. I went to the sofa, where I presumed he slept, and positioned myself as seductively as I could. When Tony returned he was freshly shaved, with a towel wrapped around his waist. I tried my best to not to stare at his broad shoulders, his muscular arms, or the thin line of hair that started at his chest and ran down his flat stomach. Instead I tried to focus on those clear brown eyes.
He looked more alert now. The exhaustion had left his face and it was as if the water had awoken him to the reality of the situation. We were feet away from each other, naked except for our towels. He looked unsure of what he was doing. This was not the Tony I was used to seeing. His unflappable self-confidence had seemingly deserted him.
“Listen, RB … ” He ran his fingers through his damp hair. “I really don’t think this is a good idea.”
“Marisa,” I said. “My name is Marisa.” I stood up and dropped my towel to the floor. His mouth fell open a little. I stepped toward him. My heart was pounding and I felt light-headed. There was no way back now. I noticed that his eyes did not stray from my face. The perfect gentleman. But that look of uncertainty remained.
I was utterly exposed, in more ways than one. I was standing naked in front of my boss. I had made my feelings clear. I knew that if he were to send me home now, I would never be able to face him again.
“Look … Marisa … ”
I leaned forward and pressed my lips gently against his. He did not resist.
I kissed him again, just as softly. This time he put his arms around me and pulled me closer. Our kisses became more passionate. He reached for the nape of my neck and entwined his fingers in my hair. The months of longing, the evenings I had spent alone aching for him, had all led up to this. I was dizzy with desire. I reached blindly for his towel and tugged at it. It fell away to the floor. My eyes traveled down his taut, muscular body, then returned to his face. He met my gaze with a look of such intensity that it took my breath away.
He stepped away from me and pulled open what I had assumed were a pair of closet doors. Instead, a cast-iron Murphy bed popped out of the wall. Laughter bubbled up inside me; it was absurd, comical, like something you’d see on a sitcom. But when Tony kissed me again and gently pushed me onto the mattress, I forgot about everything … everything except him.
THE INCESSANT RINGING OF a telephone woke me up early the next morning. I felt Tony shifting around, groaning, sitting up to get the phone.
“Yeah?”
I opened my eyes. The sunlight was already creeping around the heavy curtains, bathing the room in dim light. Tony was sitting on the edge of the bed, phone to his ear. I could make out the defined muscles of his back and shoulders in the early morning gloom. I sat up and crawled catlike toward him, pressing my bare breasts against his back.
I could hear Ron on the other end, talking about how the agents had been in touch with the players. Everybody had the new 1–800 number. Today would be business as usual.
I kissed the nape of Tony’s neck and ran my hands across his chest. Tony did his best to end the conversation. Ron wasn’t finished, though. “Carmine’s going to join you guys,” I heard him say. “And RB’s staying.”
“Okay.”
“She doesn’t have the backup address. You’ll need to get in touch with her.”
Tony turned his head slightly and nuzzled my cheek. “I’ll get right on it … ”
After hanging up the phone Tony turned his attention back to me, pushing me playfully back on the bed. As he began to kiss the nape of my neck, his lips slowly traveling down my naked body, I silently thanked every woman Tony had ever made love to. As upset as I’d been to hear about the other women in his life, last night I’d learned that all of those conquests added up to a man who really knew his way around the female body.
An hour later, we were completely spent. Tony was next to me, our limbs entwined, the only sound in the room the steady rhythm of our breathing. He looked at me reluctantly.
“We’d better get ready,” he said. I got up and walked shakily toward the bathroom.
Half an hour later, we were outside the warehouse. Tony needed to pick up his motorcycle. Before he got out of the car, he leaned across and kissed me deeply. “By the way,” he said, “about last night.” I raised an eyebrow. “I don’t think we should mention it to anyone, okay?”
The smile froze on my face. I felt a sudden sick lurch in my guts. With a slam of the door he was gone, heading back to his bike. I watched him jump on, start the engine, and roar away. I followed close behind, my mind whirring. What did he mean, I don’t think we should mention it to anyone? Did he think this was some kind of one-night stand, some little secret he could keep under wraps?
I didn’t do one-night stands. I took a deep breath and tried to get my thoughts under control, to look at the evidence logically and dispassionately. He had taken me to his apartment. Not a hotel, his apartment. That had to count for something. And the sex … I knew it wasn’t just my imagination. I had really felt something, a special connection that only comes when two people care about each other.
Soon we were pulling into the employee parking lot at Olympic Produce and Cold Storage, an enormous warehouse in the middle of the bustling produce district of L.A. Tony went in first, and I followed behind him as nonchalantly as I could.
The warehouse, the size of an aircraft hangar, was bustling with activity. The wailing of a Spanish love ballad on the radio echoed around the cavernous space, punctuated by bangs, yells, and the discordant noises of a loading bay in full swing. Nobody glanced at us as we walked past hundreds of piled wooden crates. A black dwarf with a cigar gripped between his teeth zoomed past us on a forklift, yelling something at a gaggle of workers loading crates of iceberg lettuce into a refrigerated truck.
Tony headed briskly toward the back wall of the warehouse. It was much darker back here, and the concrete floor was sticky with decaying produce. He stopped in front of what appeared to be a dead end: a wall lined with stainless-steel industrial-sized refrigerators. He beckoned me over. I watched in astonishment as he squeezed into the crevice between the wall and the first fridge, until he was completely out of sight.
I peered into the tight, dark space. “Tony?”
“Come on in,” I heard him call back. “The water’s fine.”
I turned and squeezed myself into the gap. I had to shuffle sideways down a long, narrow, pitch-black passageway. My chest was pressed against the wall in front of me, with my back against the cold steel of the fridge. The noise of the warehouse receded. Tony’s hand reached out and took mine, pulling me gently out into a small room. He slid a panel into place, concealing the tiny gap from which we had just emerged. Beyond the door was a brightly lit office, no wider than a corridor.
Danny and Kyle had already claimed their places at the long, crude “desk”—a plank of unvarnished wood balanced on crates spanning the length of the cinder-block wall. “Amigos!” Kyle called. “Como estas?”
They scooted their chairs forward to allow us to pass. I slid into a metal folding chair at the far end of the room. If the last office had reminded me of an underground bunker, this one was like sitting in an oversized coffin. Yet despite the claustrophobic space, I was relieved to see Danny and Kyle seemingly unscathed after last night’s ordeal.
“It’s basic, but functional,” Danny said, waving his hands around the tight space. “If I were an L.A. realtor, I’d say … cozy.”
“It’s a dump,” Kyle grumbled. I surveyed the minimal setup.
There were no TVs, no diverters, and no clever system to hide the tape recorders. They were simply connected to the phones, which were spaced at intervals along the wooden plank.
“Just remember to press the ‘record’ button every time you take a bet,” Kyle said. “Other than that, we’re golden.”
Jay arrived. He slapped palms with the guys and took his place at the table. I looked around the room.
“Where’s Mathew?”
Tony chuckled. “Mathew can’t make it.”
The others smiled knowingly, but I was still missing the obvious. “Oh … is he okay?”
“He’s okay.” Danny gestured over to the tight space we had all just squeezed through. “But he’s about a hundred pounds away from being able to fit his ass through the entrance.”
The door opened again, and someone I didn’t recognize entered the room. He was wearing a dreadful flower-print Hawaiian shirt and thick glasses that comically magnified his brown eyes.
“Carmine!” everyone chorused. As he edged into the room, people jumped up to shake his hand.
“Make way for an old-timer,” he said in a voice like whiskey and razor blades. He slid into the seat next to mine. Turning to me he smiled, revealing a set of gleaming dentures. “Carmine,” he said, offering his hand.
Despite the less-than-ideal office situation, my spirits were high as the day got under way. I was happy to be back at work, and felt safe tucked away in this tiny secret office. Plus, I was just a few feet away from Tony. I stole a sideward glance at him, and my heart soared when he returned my smile.
When the calls tapered off after the opening rush, the conversation turned to the bust. “Tell us about your cellmates, RB,” Danny said. “Any lesbian action?”
“I was only there for about an hour!”
“I dunno, RB. I feel like something happened while you were in that prison. You look different today. You might say … glowing.” Kyle chuckled.
“Really?” The guys were amused by something, but I couldn’t understand what. “Thanks, I guess.”
Kyle popped his feet up on the desk, warming to the theme. “You know”—he winked—“maybe you should go to prison more often.”
Tony cleared his throat. “All right, guys, that’s enough.”
“Hey, Tony,” Danny said, “you remember last year, the all-star break? When we all went down to Magic Mountain?”
Tony smiled. He was happy to steer the conversation away from me. “Sure.”
“You remember how they reversed the trains on one side of the Colossus? And you wanted to ride it backward?” Danny was chuckling at the memory now. “And then we went on the Log Jammer, and you got, like, soaking wet, ’cause you sat up front?”
Now Kyle and Jay were cracking up as well. Tony smiled faintly and said, “Yeah.”
“And you remember how Kyle said he didn’t want to spend the rest of the afternoon looking at your hairy nipples poking through your wet shirt? So he went and bought you a T-shirt?” Danny and Kyle were both convulsing now.
Tony’s expression froze on his face. Realization dawned on me.
I looked down at the T-shirt Tony had lent me that morning. He’d pulled it out from the bottom of a stack, where I imagined it had been sitting for years. Over a silkscreened image of a giant roller coaster was the legend “Six Flags, Magic Mountain.” My cheeks burned red as the guys howled with laughter and high-fived each other.
After the initial embarrassment, I was actually glad that everything was out in the open. The guys teased Tony relentlessly over his biased office policy, but it was all good-natured. I wanted a real relationship with Tony, and I interpreted their friendly ribbing as a sign of approval. Even Tony seemed less uptight about the situation.
Later, when all the games were off the boards and we were busy ripping the tickets, Tony’s cell rang. It was Ron. Normally this would have been a routine call. He’d inquire about the chart and ask for an estimate of how much we’d taken in bets. Ten minutes later, though, Tony was still on the phone. From the look on his face I knew it wasn’t good news. By the time he’d hung up, his expression was bleak.
“Listen up. Ron wants everyone at Dan Tana’s tonight. No excuses.”
My heart sank as the guys started protesting. I’d been hoping to lure Tony to my apartment that evening.
“That’s not all,” he added. “Effective immediately, no one is to call, meet with, or speak to Jim Arnold.”
Although he was addressing the room, Tony’s gaze was fixed on me. Everybody knew that I was the only one who had any contact with Jim outside of the office. My mouth turned bone-dry.
“Why?” I managed to croak.
“Because Jim’s the reason we got arrested.”