Rex woke the next morning feeling a throb over his left temple. He'd had too much wine the night before. Partially to keep up the facade and partly because Viv made him lose focus.
She looked stunning in that dress. How am I keeping my hands off of her?
He didn't appreciate how silly he felt, or how he'd fallen hopelessly in love with his next-door neighbor. He'd been able to bed many younger women over the years with a quarter of the effort. But Viv, she was a challenge.
It was mostly because he cared. He just didn't want to overstep. I don't want her to run back in her house and never speak to me again. He realized, maybe for the first time in his adult life, that he'd gotten emotionally invested.
And those thoughts alone upset Rex. He'd not been that vulnerable for a long time. Maybe since forever, when he'd first started dating. Mary Lou What's-Her-Name in seventh grade. She'd made him feel this confused. When she dumped him for his best friend, he'd been humiliated and hurt. But not since then.
"Damn," he uttered to the empty bedroom. And then because he knew he had to stop thinking about Vivienne, he reached over for his cell phone. One message from Sutton caught his eye.
Rex was making coffee when he heard a tap at their door. Sutton stood outside wearing her Three Bunch shirt. Her white sneakers looked as clean as the day before. He pointed to her Nikes.
"Are those shoes a part of the uniform they give every employee?"
"Yep, we get two sets of clothes. Even the shoes. Two pairs. Three Bunch is very particular about their footwear."
"Come on in. I have coffee."
Sutton walked through the front room toward the kitchen. She looked around. "No Viv?"
“She's sleeping in," Rex muttered.
"Did you sleep alone last night?" When he shrugged, Sutton's eyes opened wide. "Why you old scoundrel. She's keeping you at arm’s length. The great Rex Redondo."
"That's true," he admitted, pouring coffee in her mug. "I am relegated to making the morning brew and licking my wounds. So what did you find out?" He gestured to a chair at the counter for her to sit.
"First of all, I'm pretty sure Pete and Beverly are a couple. No overt flirting or anything, but they seem very familiar with each other. And then all they could talk about was Viv." She paused and then continued, "How she'd not reported in since they gave her the retainer."
"Were they mad?" He felt his stomach twist. "I mean, are they going to do anything about it, like track her down?"
"There was talk of that. Peter seems to think he can show up on her doorstep at her house and call her out."
"They did give her a whopping check," Rex admitted. "But I'm afraid they'll do more than demand the money back."
"Ten grand. They talked about that too. But mostly how Joey killed Carmine and no one, not even the cops, seemed to care."
"So what's that got to do with Viv?"
"They are depending on her to hand him over. I don't know what they want to do with Joey. That part is uncertain. But just so you know, they aren't happy with you either. In fact, Peter is furious, the way you used Beverly during the act. I believe I heard him use the words, 'phony mentalist with the fake teeth.'"
Rex tapped on his front teeth and grinned at Sutton. "Okay, so I've had some caps and gotten them straightened. And I do bleach. But I'm no more phony than everyone else around here." He nodded at her.
"I'll have you know these are my teeth. The ones my parents paid for," Sutton insisted. "I merely keep them clean and polished."
She put her empty cup on the counter. "I've gotta report in to work. I'm still serving cocktails by the infinity pool. I reserved a cabana for Elvis and Priscilla, so you two can come by any time."
She left Rex in the kitchen, closing the door with a click.
He emptied the rest of the coffee into his mug. From the other room he detected a squeak and then the drag of the front door against the tile.
"Did you forget something?" he called out.
When no one answered, Rex made his way around the corner. To his surprise, a man, facing the front door, was securing the dead bolt in place. He must have heard Rex, because he turned around quickly. "Stand over there," Joey Baker commanded, a revolver raised in the air. Nothing in his tone gave Rex the impression that he had a choice.
Before he could speak, the sight of a woman in a fluffy white bathrobe made his heart stop. He wanted to shout, to tell Viv to run the other way, but the words got caught in his throat. Fortunately Baker's back faced the hallway. Rex wasn't sure if Viv could see the small gun he held waist-high pointed right at him.
Viv stepped closer, her eyes looking past Joey to Rex. He didn't glance her way, hoping she'd realize he was in danger. She stopped in her tracks. Reaching inside her bathrobe, she pulled out a silver meat tenderizer, the kind found in a gourmet kitchen. With one swing, the mallet made a sickening thud against Baker's skull, followed by his body slowly crumpling to the floor.
Hair in disarray, her robe gaping open slightly, Viv held the mallet aloft. She waited for Baker to get up. When he didn't, she explained, "I took it with me last night. From the kitchen." A small drop of blood from the mallet dripped onto the floor.
Rex came closer. He bent down to have a better look at the unconscious man.
"I needed a weapon just in case someone broke in," Viv kept explaining. "In the middle of the night I kept thinking about Carmine. Discovering him between the sheets. I needed something for protection."
Rex put two fingers under Joey's ear. "Still has a pulse." He looked at the back of Joey's head. "Not much blood."
"It was self-defense," Viv explained.
"You protected me," he said, his voice unsteady. "With a meat tenderizer." He stood, taking in her stricken face. Then he pulled on his ear. "But now we'd better call the cops."