The ride back to the motel was deadly quiet. My mind was spun with how to make this all come out okay. Jack was…well, I didn’t really know what Jack was thinking.
He pulled the car into a parking lot in front of a liquor store, jammed the car into park, and took the keys with him as he left, slamming the car door in the process.
Jack was apparently thinking about bourbon.
He took just a few steps then turned around, came around to my side of the car and opened my door. “Just some Diet Coke,” I said, but he wasn’t interested in my order.
He had his hand outstretched, palm up. “Give me your phone.”
“What?”
“Your phone. Give it to me.”
He was wearing his most stern cop face, and I knew better than to argue with him. I pulled my phone out of my jacket pocket and gave it to Jack. He started to rise, but then hunkered back down into my space. “This is it? No other disposable phones in those pockets?”
“That’s it.” He raised a brow at me. “You want to search me?” I said, holding my hands up from my sides.
He snorted. “Later.” He shut my door and headed into the liquor store. His Mecca. His sports book.
I didn’t blame him. I would have loved being taken over by the rush of The Hummer. But my addiction – compulsion, whatever – wasn’t as easily assuaged.
Day Eleven without placing a bet was coming to a close. A bourbon sounded good.
Jack came out a few minutes later, putting the bag with his purchases on the back seat of the rental car. “Can I have my phone back now?” I said, holding out my hand.
“Not yet.” We drove in silence the rest of the way to the hotel and stayed that way up to our rooms. Room – singular – for all intents and purposes, with Jack demanding the adjoining door be left open. Let’s face it, I didn’t really mind that.
After entering the room, Jack took an ice bucket and disappeared. I unpacked his booty – a bottle of bourbon, a six pack of Diet Coke and a can of nuts, which I opened right away. He came back in, flipping the key card on the bureau where I’d set up our make-shift cocktail bar. We were in what was ostensibly my room, though both had two queen beds and neither of us had settled in, our bags still by the doors where we’d dropped them earlier.
I put a couple of cubes in one of the hotel’s glasses then filled half of it with Diet Coke before topping it off with bourbon. I motioned the bottle to him. “Not yet,” he said, so I put the bottle down and, taking my drink and the can of nuts, settled into the upholstered side chair, placing my things on the round table next to it. I looked to my side, out the window. It was an amazing view of the Chicago skyline with Lake Michigan in the background. It would be spectacular in the morning, but the lights with the black lake beyond held a different type of beauty.
“Who do you think I’m going to call?” I asked, taking a sip of my drink.
“Somebody who can ‘take care of’,” he did his hands in air quotes, which was so not Jack’s style, “Bubba Kinney.”
“Oh, come on. Who do I even know who could…” I stopped and took a sip of my drink.
He didn’t say anything, just came over and set his untouched glass on the table next to mine. He stood behind me, looked out the window. “Great view. Tell Lor she picked well.”
I nodded, taking another sip. I turned fully facing the window now, with the hallway light on behind us, it was like looking into a dull mirror, seeing our outlines, but not being able to see each other’s faces clearly. Maybe that was just as well.
I held the can of nuts up to Jack, but he shook his head. “I figured we could order room service, but thought I’d get something to hold us over.”
“Good thinking, I’m starving.”
He went in search of a menu, brought it back and gave it to me. I gave it a quick look, but it was too dark on this side of the room. “Need more light?” Jack asked.
“Yes, but I like this, it’s so pretty looking out.” I handed the menu back to him. “Just get me a cheeseburger and fries.”
He went back to the phone, placed the order then came back to stand behind me again. I held his glass up to him. “Not yet.”
“You back on duty? Standing guard?”
He chuckled. “Hardly. But I do need to call Frank and check in.”
“I need to call Lor and do the same,” I said holding my hand up for my phone.
Jack took it out of his pants pocket, opened it up, dialed for me, then handed me the phone as it was ringing. “Unbelievable,” I muttered just as Lor picked up. It was just past midnight here, ten Vegas time.
“Hey, it’s me. Just checking in to make sure everything was okay there.”
“Everything’s fine. We’re just watching TV. How’s everything there?”
“Good, I guess.” I wasn’t in jail. Or dead. “Yeah, good.”
“Do you still think you’ll come home tomorrow?”
“I hope so.”
She told me what mail had come that day, a couple of other mundane things, then handed the phone to Ben. He and I chatted for a little, he carefully asking me nothing that I couldn’t – or wouldn’t – answer, then I hung up. At least the household was fine and not something I needed to worry about.
Jack held his hand open, and I put my phone in it. “Jack, you don’t really think I’d have a hit put out on Bubba Kinney, do you?”
He put his phone in his pants pocket, stroked his face with his hand. “No.”
“And even if I would, I wouldn’t call Vince for it. I have no idea who I’d call, but certainly not Vince.”
“Why not? ‘Fraid it’d make for awkward pillow talk?”
I ignored his comment. “First of all, Vince isn’t into murder for hire.”
Jack snorted. “Don’t be so sure.”
“Oh come on, there’s a huge leap between…” I chose to just let it all lie.
“He’s ruthless,” Jack said quietly after a moment.
“He’s a businessman.”
“He preys on the weak.”
“Am I included in that category?”
“You’re not who I picture when I think of Vince’s usual clients.”
“That’s why I’m so good at what I do. Did. How JoJo was able to get away with it all. Nobody would ever picture Anna Dawson doing what JoJo did.”
“Again with the third person?”
I waved that away. “Whatever. You’re right. She’s dead and buried anyway. But back to my calling in a hit.”
He held up a hand, halting me, “I’ve looked the other way a lot today. A lot, Johanna.”
“I know.”
“There’s no way I could do that if Bubba Kinney suddenly disappeared.”
“I know that, too. I wouldn’t want you to.”
“If this shit hits the fan – and there’s a good chance it might – I need to be able to protect you the best way I can. I need to be able to say I was with you all the time and there was no way you could have contacted anybody.”
Well, when he put it that way. “What about the hotel phone when you’re in the john?”
“They’d have a record of a call made. You wouldn’t be that stupid.”
I snorted. “Sure about that?”
“Not really. That’s why I just mentioned they’d have records.”
We both chuckled. He put his hand on my shoulder and gently squeezed. “I’m going to go next door and call Frank.”
“I’m going to take a quick shower before the food gets here.”
He went into the next room, leaving the doors open wide. I grabbed my bag and put it on one of the beds, unzipped it and found my toiletries, clean panties and a tee that hung to my knees that I used for pajamas.
The shower felt amazing. I stood with my head directly under the powerful stream for a very long time. Apparently, I’d been waterlogged in my ears too, because I’d never heard Jack enter the bathroom. But JoJo’s red, sequined tube top sat front and center on the vanity. I mentally snorted. Yeah. Right.
And then I realized he’d probably just used it as an excuse to go through my stuff.
When I came out of the bathroom a while later, wet hair slicked back, long tee on, Jack took one look at me, shrugged and said, “Can’t blame a guy for trying.”
He was at the table in front of the window, a tray of food in front of him, eating a burger. His glass was half empty. “You talked to Frank?” He nodded, taking a bite of his burger. “Everything okay?” Another nod. “Anything new in Paulie’s case?”
By now he’d swallowed, wiped his mouth with his napkin, and taken a drink from his glass. “Nope.”
”You’ll probably never solve this one,” I said. “There’s just too many suspects. And you’ll never know all the fires Paulie had irons in. Men like him dabble.”
“Yeah, you’re probably right,” he admitted.
“And you’re okay with that?” I knew Vince wouldn’t be. I couldn’t really see Jack letting it go, either.
“Hell no, I’m not okay with that. Do you have any idea how many murders go unsolved? This isn’t fucking CSI. It’s not going to be neatly wrapped up by the end of the episode.”
“That’s what I’m saying.” I sat in the chair opposite him and started in on my dinner. The fries were kind of mushy and only slightly warm by now, but I still scarfed them down.
“Maybe I should switch to Vice. Seems like I could bring in some heavy hitters in that department.”
“Very funny.” I took another bite of burger, savored, chewed, swallowed. “Why are you homicide, anyway?”
He leaned forward, his arms on the table. “I speak for the dead that are no longer able to.”
My mind reached for something. “Wait a minute. That was from the opening of some cop show.”
He leaned back, smiled. “Yeah. Good line. Wish I’d thought of it.”
We ate in silence for awhile longer. “No, really,” I finally said. “Why homicide? There’s justice to be had in other departments. And you wouldn’t have to see the things you must see on a daily basis.”
I sat my plate back onto the room service tray. Jack had brought the ice, bourbon and pop over to the table, and I cracked myself a new Diet Coke, pouring it into my glass. He picked up the bottle, but I shook my head. “I’m good.”
He put his dishes on the tray also, covering it. He poured another splash of booze into his glass. I leaned back in my chair, glass in hand, stretching out my legs under the table.
He leaned forward, put his hand under the table, took one of my legs in his hand and lifted it so my foot lay across his thigh. He absently cupped the underside of my calf, his fingers a feather-light stroke. He used his other to hold his glass, but he didn’t drink. He looked out the windows while I watched him in silence.
And waited.
“Homicide is the best. But besides that, it’s the ultimate puzzle. I like puzzles.” He looked at me when he said that. I would have expected his cop face, but no, it was the soft Jack that watched me. Well, as soft as Jack can get.
I didn’t say anything, and after a moment he looked back at the dark night in front of us. “But it’s more than that. It’s trying to understand why somebody would hurt someone else.”
“You told me when Danny was killed. Revenge or money.”
He nodded. “Yeah, most of the time it is. Those are the easy ones. The ones I can understand.”
“You understand murder?”
He shrugged, took a small sip of his drink. “I can understand it for those reasons. I don’t like it, and I’ll still try like hell to get ‘em behind bars. But I understand it.” He put his glass down, reached under the table and took my other leg. His hand was cold from the cool glass, and my leg jumped a tiny bit.
“Easy,” he whispered like he was gentling a skittish colt.
I wasn’t skittish. I probably should have been, but I wasn’t. I knew exactly what I wanted. What I’d always wanted since meeting Jack Schiller on the steps of a twelve-steps program.
“It’s those fuckers who beat their kids to death. Or psychos who kill for the thrill of it. That I don’t get. I want to. I try to. I figure it’d be that much easier to catch them. But I don’t. I don’t understand.” His voice was soft. I wasn’t sure he was even talking to me anymore.
“Nobody can understand that,” I said, drawing his gaze back to me. He looked at me like I’d just come into the room, surprising him. There were ghosts in his eyes that took a moment to clear. I came back into focus for him, and his face softened all the more.
His hands ran up and down the back of my calves. His eyes dipped to my neck. To my horseshoe necklace, and stayed there. “When I dream…sometimes…”
“Jack?” I whispered.
His brown, sad eyes moved up my neck to meet my gaze. “When I dream of naked women, I – ”
“You dream of naked women a lot?”
He shrugged. “I’m a guy.”
“Go on.”
“Whenever there’s a naked woman in my dreams, no matter who she is…”
I nudged his thigh with my foot for him to go on.
“They’re wearing that necklace.”
I looked at him for a long time, then slid my legs through his hands and off his lap. I stood up, pushed my chair in, and turned away from him and the table.
“Hey, I’m sorry, I – ”
His next words died in his mouth, and I peeled my T-shirt over my head, revealing the red top underneath. I peeked at him over my shoulder. He was already out of his chair and headed toward me. He stopped, and for a second I thought he’d start spouting all the reasons why he and I wouldn’t work. That nothing had really changed since he’d dumped me. And that he’d spent most of the day looking the other way as I’d tried to cover up my crimes. That I was sort of seeing Vince Santini.
All true (although I wasn’t really sure of my status with Vince since that night on the cliff, and I certainly wasn’t thinking about him right now). All valid. All things for which I had no comeback.
But instead of saying any of those things, Jack reached behind him, grabbed a few cubes out of the ice bucket and started toward me, a huge grin covering his rugged face.
And one brow raised.