In Desperation

28

Phoenix, Arizona

I t didn’t add up.

As night fell, Percy Smoot wet the tips of his nicotine-stained fingers with his tongue and counted the cash at the Sweet Times Motel register.

Worn and torn fives, tens and twenties piled on the front desk. When he finished counting, the total was four hundred and eighty dollars.

Percy pushed aside the long strands of greasy hair that curtained over his face. His bloodshot gaze traveled over his bifocals to the heap of bills as if waiting for the total to change.

It should be five hundred and forty.

He shifted the toothpick clamped in his mouth and scratched his gut, which stretched the mustard stains on his Cardinals T-shirt. He then flipped through his registration cards. Nine units rented at sixty a pop, which meant he should have freakin’ five hundred and forty in cash.

So why did he only have four eighty?

Somebody didn’t pay.

If Percy came up short, that peckerwood owner, Lester, would accuse him of dipping into the till again and take the difference out of his paycheck.

Percy would be damned if he’d let that happen.

Fact was, somebody didn’t pay. Question was, who?

He was certain he’d collected from everybody.

He rubbed the three-day growth on his chin, thinking, then drank from his mug of bourbon-flavored coffee. He looked at the nine empty key pegs on the wall. He definitely had rented nine units. So, let’s take a look at them cards again. One by one, he snapped through the registration cards, trying to recall the face that went with each unit. Names meant nothing; no one ever used their real name here. Percy didn’t give a rat’s A, as long as they paid cash up front.

Every now and then, he’d cut some slack with his regulars.

But this time, someone must’ve got by him. Here we go, the guilty party: Unit 28. It was those two shifty guys. He tapped the card and it started coming back to him in pieces. They’d come in when Percy was half-asleep. They said something about paying later. He wasn’t sure. All he knew was that they freakin’ owed him.

All right. Percy sniffed, took another shot of his “coffee,” reached for the motel phone. Unit 28’s going to cough up sixty bucks fast, before Lester shows up to collect today’s cash.

As he extended his forefinger to dial, he released a volcanic belch and blinked. Whoa, that was a bad one, Percy thought, assuring himself that he had pressed the right buttons for Unit 28.

The line rang twice before it was answered.

“What?”

“This is the front desk, sir.”

“So?”

“It appears your account is open and we request that you settle it now.”

“What?”

“Sir, you have an outstanding payment of sixty dollars cash.”

“I paid you, you drunken asshole.”

“That’s not what our records show, sir.”

“Fuck you.” The line went dead.

Percy cursed and steadied himself on the desk. All right, if that’s the way we’re going to play it. He reached under the desk for his bottle and added more bourbon to his coffee. He took a big gulp, gritted his green teeth, then grabbed his baseball bat from behind the door.

Nobody rips off this old dog, Percy told himself, tapping the bat to his palm, ready to settle matters. Walking by the shit hole pool was a hazy reminder that he was a far cry from his old job at the Biltmore, before his wife died and he hit the juice.

Yeah, well, those days are gone.

His current problem crystallized when he got to Unit 28. He remembered. It was a deluxe suite with adjoining rooms but he’d only charged the two guests sixty bucks. He should’ve charged one-twenty. He hammered the bat on the scarred door. Nothing happened for a long moment until he felt a slight vibration, indicating movement inside.

He pounded again.

“Open up, hotel management!”

The lock and handle clicked. The door opened a crack and a man’s unshaven face appeared behind the security chain. Percy brought the tip of his bat to within inches of it.

“You owe this establishment sixty dollars cash.”

Questions surfaced in the man’s dark eyes as he assessed Percy.

“I think you have made a mistake.”

For a second, Percy thought the man’s voice differed from the guy he’d just called but he dismissed it, hawked, spat and fixed his grip on the bat.

“Pay me now, or I call the cops to kick your ass out.”

Unfazed, the man contemplated Percy as if he were an insect that had crawled under his boot. A moment passed before the man came to a decision.

“It’s possible my friend did forget to pay. Sixty dollars, is it?”

“Damn straight.”

“Wait.”

Remaining at the door, the man shifted his weight as if searching for his jean pockets. Percy’s ears pricked up at the jingle of a long chain coming from the adjoining room.

“Do you have a dog in there?”

The man shook his head.

“Because we have a no-pets policy. I might have to charge you extra for any damage.”

“No dog.”

“I don’t give a rat’s A what you two do to each other in there.” Percy scanned what he could see through the sliver the opened door made. It was very dark but he glimpsed the wall mirror, reflecting the adjoining room. The inside partition door swung open ever so slightly and there was a diffusion of light, as if someone had moved inside.

Then everything became still.

Too still.

What was going on there in the other room?

In that instant Percy sensed something was not right. The man at the door, reading the first stage of alarm rising on Percy’s face, tightened his grip on the Glock he was holding behind his back. The moment was telegraphed to the door man’s partner, sitting on the edge of the bed with one hand over Tilly’s mouth, the other holding a knife to her throat.

“Here, this should cover it.”

The door man gave Percy several crumpled bills before closing and locking the door, leaving Percy to count off one hundred dollars.

He lowered his bat and shrugged.

As he returned to the office in his alcoholic stupor, he threw a parting look over his shoulder.

Something was not right in Unit 28, not right at all.