no virgin nor was she terribly experienced, though she did just fine, undulating, surging, our breathing building into a shout from me and a scream from her.
“Oh Mike,” she breathed. Her eyes were rolled back. “Mike… I’m drunk now… I’m drunk now, all right…”
We were under the covers in her bedroom. We were both naked. We had finished round one in the living room in a hurry. Round two had taken its own sweet time, and we were both tired and, speaking for myself anyway, very satisfied. Even if two hours had gone by with no detecting whatsoever, other than me finding out she was a natural blonde.
“Honey,” I said, “when you were out at that casino near Sidon-”
“Not that again,” she said, stealing the smoke, taking a drag on it, handing it back.
“Yes that. That’s the case I’m on. She’s dead, remember? Murdered. You mentioned that local deputy, Dekkert, getting fresh with you out there. You gave him the brush by way of a knee.”
“Sure. What of it?”
“Was he just getting fresh? Or do you think you were in danger?”
“Would he have forced himself on me? Maybe. But I just think he was a big damn lug who thought he was God’s gift. I can handle myself. Nobody gets in my pants without permission.”
“I don’t remember getting permission.”
Her smile was devilish. “It was implied.”
“See, that’s the problem. Is Dekkert a guy who was reading the signals wrong? Or is he a rape-happy slob?”
“Either way,” she said, stealing my smoke again, “I’ll just bet he had to go home and put an ice pack on his balls.”
That made me laugh, and she laughed, too.
“You minx-faking me out like that,” I said to her, and kissed her for a while.
Then we settled back again and I lighted up a fresh Lucky and asked, “Did you ever notice Dekkert hanging around Sharron Wesley?”
“Well, he was her bouncer. So I saw them talking now and then. You know, over to the side of the big casino room. Mike, I was only out there two or three times, remember.”
“Think. Anything odd. Anything that wasn’t employer/employee.”
She was frowning as she mulled it. She stole the cigarette back, dragged on it, stuck it back in my mouth.
“You know,” she said, her expression distant as she recalled, “there was this one time, this one thing… I was walking outside with the guy I went out there with. That was the best thing about Sharron’s set-up, that lovely view of the ocean. Over to one side, there are these trees… that form a kind of protective wall from any neighbors in that direction. You’ve been out there, right?”
“Yeah, I know what you’re talking about.”
“Well, there’s a funny little house. A lot of trellis-type stuff, latticework with ivy, unsubstantial looking.”
“A gazebo.”
“I guess that’s what it’s called. Anyway, it’s mostly just a roof over a little padded bench. Kind of a romantic- looking thing. Lovey dovey, sort of. And I was walking hand-in-hand with my date… jealous yet, Mike?”
“Boiling. Go on.”
“Well, I noticed Dekkert sitting out there with her. With Sharron. They were having a conversation. It was very serious. Serious how, I couldn’t say. But he might… I can’t be sure, Mike, but he might have been holding her hand.”
“ Not employer/employee stuff.”
“No. Not hardly. But listen, I didn’t see him kiss her or anything. And he sure didn’t pull her into the bushes.”
“Maybe you taught him a lesson that other time.”
“Maybe. I’ve been known to teach men lessons.”
“Yeah. I had one of those earlier.”
“Was it so bad?”
“Terrible. Humiliating. I really should spank you.”
“Promise?”
The phone rang on her nightstand and she gave it a crinkle-nosed frown.
“Forget it,” she said. “I’m busy. I don’t want to be reached.”
“No! Get that. It might be Louie.”
She gave me a dirty look, but got it and it was Louie, all right.
“Mike,” Louie said, “that poker game, it’s a still goin’. It’s at the Waldorf-Astoria. Pretty fancy, huh?”
“You got a room number for me, Louie?”
“I sure do,” he said, and gave it to me.
“And are Bill Evans and Miami Bull still in the game?” I asked.
“They sure are,” he said.
Round three would have to wait.
CHAPTER TEN
Thanks to Marion Ruston’s hijinx, my suit was still damp as a dishrag. That meant a stopover at the cave in that modern cliff on the East Side that I called home. My best suit waited in the closet, tweeds custom-made to conceal my shoulder-slung. 45, and perfect for where I’d be heading next-you can’t walk into the Waldorf-Astoria like so much riff-raff.
But this was turning into a long day, and that cute little twist had tired me out. A hot and cold shower gave me a new lease on life, and I climbed into the dry threads feeling refreshed. Before I slipped the rod into its leather womb, I took time to shoot a few drops of oil in the slide mechanism, checked the clip, grabbed an extra one for my side suit coat pocket, then wiped down the weapon and tucked it under my arm.
I felt right at home moving through the mosaic-floored, marble-columned Waldorf-Astoria lobby. I might have been some swell dropping by the Wedgewood Room or a business executive from Philly on his way to an important conference. Instead I was a private eye looking for a poker game.
Maybe the Waldorf seems an unlikely place for such a lowbrow, illegal activity. But the kind of high stakes game involved made the setting just right. I wandered around overstuffed chairs and potted plants till I detected the bank of elevators. I told the attendant where I wanted to go and he took me there, halfway up the hotel’s fifty floors.
Nobody was outside Suite 2525, no watchdogs in or out of coats cut for underarm armory. I didn’t knock-bad form. This was the kind of hotel suite where you rang the bell.
The lug who cracked the door had confidence-he wasn’t bothering with a night-latch. I didn’t know this character but he was bigger than me, and I’m big enough. The half a bashed nose and single cauliflower ear showing said he was an ex-pug, though not on any circuit around this part of the universe.
“It’s closed,” the doorman rumbled.
Whether that meant the table was not open to the uninvited or that the tourney was at a late stage where additional players were not welcome, I had no clue.
I said, “I need a word with Bill Evans and Miami Bull.”
“Both of them?”
“Well, one of them anyway.”
“They’re busy.”
I flashed the badge that comes with a New York State investigator’s license. Do it fast enough, it can fool people.
Not the ex-pug. “That’s a private badge, bud. Shove off.”
He started to close the door but I gave it the kind of straight-arm a lineman gives a blitzing linebacker, and it
