I PULLED UP to the front of the hotel, parallel to the valet stand, and revved the engine. The valet, a college-aged kid with curly black hair, came around from his stand and ran over. He took a step back and admired the bike. “What a nice ride. But, I’m sorry, sir, we don’t valet-park bikes.”
I reached into the brown paper bag and peeled off two one-hundred-dollar bills from one of the rolls of Bobby Ray’s money. “I’ve had a long day,” I said. “A bad day. One of those kinds of days that gives you nightmares for weeks. And I need a little break here. Can you help me out?” I handed him the money.
He started to shake his head until he saw the money wasn’t ones or tens, or even twenties. He looked around furtively and said, “Sure, man, no problem.” He snatched the money and made it disappear.
I climbed off and he climbed on.
“Park it someplace where it won’t get messed with or scratched.” I handed him another hundred. It wasn’t my money.
He smiled and nodded. “No problem.” He gunned the throttle, clicked it into gear, and took off. He’d ridden bikes before.
My feet throbbed in the too-small boots. My face still hurt from the fight in the freeway incident, and I had a lump on the back of my head the size of a dodo egg where Monster cold-cocked me. At least the feeling had returned to my fingers.
I limped into the hotel. I needed a hot bath, some hot food, and to snuggle up to my little sweet Marie.
In the elevator I pressed the button for the fourteenth floor. The doors closed, and I realized I’d walked right through the lobby without looking for Drago’s added security, the two cops standing watch. I needed sleep more than anything else.
I reached in my back pocket for the room card key. Not there. I checked the other pockets. Not there. No room key. In all the excitement of the day, I’d either lost it or someone liberated it.
Monster.
If Monster had the room key—
A new dose of adrenaline hit and woke me up. The numbers over the elevator door somehow moved slower now.
Marie.
What if the Visigoths came and snatched up Marie, held her until the deal went down to make sure I didn’t run off with the money? The crumpled bag of money tucked under my arm turned warm.
The doors finally opened. I ran down to the room and pounded on our door. “Marie?”
The door across the hall opposite ours opened. Drago stepped out and took hold of my shoulder with one paw. “You all right, man? Everything all right?”
“Yeah, yeah, how’s Marie? She okay?”
“Yeah, I told ya she’d be fine and not to worry about her. You shouldn’t’a run off like that, you scared the hell outta her. Jesus, man. What the hell happened to you? You look like someone took you through a meat grinder. You better sit down before you fall down.”
“No, I’m good.”
“No, you’re not, man, no you’re not. You shouldn’t’ve of left me like that. I coulda backed your play. You wouldn’t look like—”
The hotel room door opened. Marie rushed out and wrapped her arms around me, buried her face in my chest and wept.
Her love for me made a lump rise in my throat and tears well in my eyes. Somewhere along the way I’d transitioned from a hot-shit violent crimes detective into an overly emotional old man.
I handed Drago the bag of money. “Here, keep this safe for me, okay?”
“You got it, bud.” He gently ushered us both into our room. “You two need some alone time.” He backed out and closed the door. Marie had not let go. We stood there a long time, holding each other, swollen feet be damned.
“Bruno?”
“Yeah, babe?”
“Whose boots are those?”
“It’s a long, ugly story that I might tell you about someday if you’re very nice to me.” I pulled her away enough to kiss her. And I did just like there was no tomorrow, a long, wet kiss we both got lost in.
We came up for air, her face wet with tears. She looked at me. She immediately lost her contented smile. “Bruno Johnson, what in the hell have you been up to?”
“Sweetie, please.” I tried to usher her over to the bed to sit down. “These boots are killin’ my dogs.”
“No, come into the bathroom, let me get a better look at you.” She took hold of my shirtsleeve and dragged me along. “Start talking, mister. Tell me everything that happened.”
The memory I had difficulty locking away instantly brought me back to the freeway, brought me the image of Bosco flying overhead, the Honda snatching him out of midair, the look in his eyes.
His plea for me not to do it.
The image made me sick to my stomach.
I couldn’t talk about it. Not yet. And I didn’t want to lie to Marie.
She stood me in front of the sink in the bathroom and turned on the light. My mouth dropped open. I hadn’t seen myself since it all started. I didn’t recognize the person who looked back at me.
Marie went to work cleaning the abrasions on my face with a warm washcloth and soapy water.
“Start talking, mister.”
“Marie, honey, I really need to get these boots off.”
“Come over here, sit.”
I did, on the edge of the bathtub. She tried to pull the boots off and couldn’t. “Here,” I said, “turn around and put the boot between your legs.” She did. I put my other foot on her bottom and pushed. Nothing, not even an inch. My feet throbbed, my head throbbed, I had a rhythm going.
I leaned to the side and pulled the knife out of my pocket. “My feet swelled up and we’re gonna have to cut ’em off.” I tried to hand her the knife. When she didn’t take it, I looked at her.
Her mouth hung open, her eyes wide. “My God, Bruno.” She started to cry again. With shaking hands, she probed the dodo egg on my head. “We have to get you to the hospital, baby, and I mean right now. You have to have this X-rayed.”
“No, we don’t; no hospitals and you know why.” She knew part of the reason, the warrants, but not the most recent.
She took my head in her arms, pulled my face into her breasts, and hugged me. Her body shook as she cried. She spoke in broken sentences. “Can you see okay . . . you’re not . . . seeing double, are you? Are . . . are you nauseous?” She pulled me away from her chest and looked me in my eyes, checking my pupils, at the same time watching for the truth. “Did you lose consciousness?”
“No.” I spit out the lie quick so she wouldn’t spot it, and I felt like a heel doing it. We couldn’t go to a hospital; they would report the injuries to the police, who’d be looking for the guy on the freeway who’d fled leaving bodies in his wake.
She waited a long moment for my eyes to give me away. When that didn’t happen, she helped me up. “Come on, you’re going to bed.”
“Oh, thank you, babe, but I’m not feeling particularly amorous right now.”
“You’re not funny, Bruno Johnson. And I already told you once I don’t like being lied to.”
She’d seen right through me. I knew better and shouldn’t have even tried it. She eased me down on the bed. She disappeared. The room door opened and closed. I fought to stay awake. The door opened again. She put a wet towel filled with ice on the knot at the side of my head.
Aah.
Someone took hold of my feet. I looked down.
Drago.
He tried to pull the boots off, and I only slid further down the bed. “Ow. Ow, hey!”
“They’re not gonna come off,” he said.
“I know that, Karl,” Marie said. “Go ahead and cut them off.”
“You sure? These are custom. We probably got two grand in boots here.”
“Drago.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Drago cut. The first boot came off. My foot screamed with delight. When the second one came off, the world closed in as my body decided, all on its own, that it was time to rest.