"You got a point there."
She laughed, started toward his bathroom.
"Where're you going?"
"To the powder room. I'll be right back. I just have to make a few"-she giggled-"preparations." She shut the bathroom door, her back against it. Jesus! She'd been worried when he sniffed the glass, as if he'd actually suspected something. But in the end he was an oaf like the rest of them, unaware of anything except that he was alone with an attractive woman and that he ought to get busy bedding her down, because, of course, that's what she wanted even if the sultry little bitch didn't know it yet.
When she felt enough time had passed, she opened the bathroom door and peered across the room. He must have heard her because he turned his head. His face was pale. He didn't look well at all.
"You okay?"
"A little wheezy." He tried to hold up his empty glass. He didn't have the strength. "What'd you give me?"
"Nothing." "Something… know it… "Love drops," she said. "I gave you love drops."
"Love drops?" He rubbed his eyes. His voice had lost its edge.
"Umm-hmmmm."
"You mean like a… aphrodisiac?" he asked.
"Uh-huh… "
She watched him silently, curiously, as he let go of the glass. It rolled across the bed and fell with a gentle thud onto the carpet.
You're dead meat, she thought.
"My eyelids… heavy… "
"Let yourself go, Phil. Try and sleep."
A mild glare of anger in his eyes. "You spiked it, didn't you?"
"A nice girl like me?"
She waited for the flash of terror, but he was too far gone. He closed his eyes and began to snore. She smiled, shook her head, then slipped on a fresh pair of surgical gloves and set to work cleaning up the room..
In the end she decided not to freak him out. No scissors work tonight-just pick the guy clean and split. She put his cash (three hundred dollars plus change), Rolex and wedding band into her purse.
He'll really sputter when he tries to explain that missing ring! She pulled off his already loosened tie, unbuttoned then spread open his shirt, sat astride him with her marker poised just above his skin. Think of a good message, one that'll really get to him. It didn't take her long to come up with an appropriate slogan. She wrote across his chest in mirror-reverse:
As she was dismounting his prostrate form, she noticed somethings little edge of khaki fabric peeking out of the top of his pants. Aha! What have we here? She unclasped his belt, unzipped his fly and pulled down his trousers to his knees. There it was, a money belt, and she'd almost missed it, too. Okay, let's see what you're hiding. Let's see if you're Mr. Bucks.
She pulled the belt off him. It had been strapped on so tight it left a pink imprint on his skin. She opened the flaps, explored the pockets, came up with a thousand dollars in hundred-dollar bills and a small object carefully wrapped in plastic foam.
Expecting a diamond, or at least a ruby, she was disappointed to find a piece of hard, transparent material covered with tiny lines. She held the object up to the light. What the hell was it? Some sort of computer chip? Dietz, she remembered, had spoken of a deal that would make him very rich."
Well, good-bye deal! She popped the chip into her purse with the other loot, then went back into the bathroom, checked herself in the mirror, returned to the bedroom, looked around, saw everything was clean, moved over to the room door, looked back at Dietz and blew him a kiss.
"Sweet dreams, lover boy," she whispered.
She switched off the lights, cautiously opened the door, checked out the corridor. It was empty. She hung the DO NOT DISTURB sign on the handle of "old 1664," closed the door softly and strode swiftly to the elevators.
Descending to the lobby, she was nearly overcome by nausea. It was hunger, knotting up her stomach. She retrieved her things from the checkroom, walked inconspicuously through the lobby to the street, walked faster until she reached the corner, then broke into a run.
Rain was still falling and there were puddles everywhere. She splashed through several, drenching her shoes and feet. ke cream! She drove to an all-night truckers' diner near the entrance to the tunnel. A few minutes later, sitting at the counter in the midst of pigging out on a huge chocolate sundae topped by a swirl of whipped cream mounted with a cherry, she paused to observe herself in a decorative strip of mirror on the opposing wall.
The sight offended her. She was filled with revulsion for what she was, for what she had done, for what she feared she might one day do.
She knew then that in her next session she would have to tell Dr. Z about the marks. And about a lot of other things, such as Leering Man and "playtime" and the compulsion that came upon her when it rained.
Most of all, she thought, she'd tell him about the secrets of the maze.
Mirror-Reverser.
When Janek emerged from customs at Kennedy Airport, he found Aaron Greenberg waiting at the gate. It was just after midnight, Janek was happy to see him, but he was startled. No one except Kit knew where he'd gone and when he was flying back.
"What is this-VIP treatment?"
"Kit's orders, Frank. She told me to pick you up."
Janek cuffed Aaron on the shoulder. They'd been partners since Timmy Sheehan retired. Aaron was a short, taut, wiry man with weather-beaten skin, sad eyes and a sweet, sometimes heartbreaking smile. He was wearing his usual short-sleeved Hawaiian shirt. Tonight the colors were green and black.
"Some guy's been assassinated downtown at the Savoy," Aaron explained.
"Kit slotted it to us."
"I've been in planes and airports for fifteen hours. Don't suppose there's time to go home and change?"
"Probably be better if you didn't."
Janek wasn't surprised to be assigned a case. Kit had told him she was going to put him on something when he'd called her between planes from Mexico City: "I want you busy, Frank. I don't want everyone talking about how I've got you reopening Mendoza." But he'd expected she would want to debrief him on Cuba first.
"When did this come up?"
"Hour and a half ago." Aaron glanced at his watch.
"Crime Scene team's due now."
They walked through the International Arrivals building. There were fewer than fifty people in the lobby, a sharp contrast to the hordes that had thronged the terminal in Mexico. Actually, he thought, it was good to have something that would take his mind off Cuba-the scorn he'd seen in Violetta's eyes, the degradation of the beating, the stink and boredom of the closet cell.
Aaron led him to his car, a beaten-up green Chevrolet parked illegally in front. There was a ticket on the wind shield.
"Port Authority cops!" Aaron snatched it off the glass, then laughed.
They sped along the Van Wyck, empty of traffic. Janek looked up when they passed the safe house in which he'd met Angel Figueras two and a half weeks before. They were going too fast for him to make out anything more than a blacked-out ordinary little house on an ordinary little street. :'She's not fooling anybody. You know that, Frank?"