Ink Flamingos

Chapter 52

Terri pulled up into the circular drive under the tiny white lights in the ceiling of the entryway. Jeff had pulled the Pontiac over to the side of the driveway, just out of sight, but we could see the front of her car.

“Should we follow her?” I asked Tim.

“Yes. I’ll be right over there.” He hung up.

I wasn’t quite sure how he’d find us; it was a big place. But he was a detective, after all, and it was his job to find people, so I was sure he would, eventually. And then it struck me: He’d given me permission to follow her. Had aliens taken over my brother?

When the valet drove her car past us, Jeff pulled the Pontiac into the driveway.

“Where do you think she went?” I asked. She had at least five minutes on us and could be anywhere by now.

“Keep the faith, Kavanaugh,” he said, but his voice was tight.

I didn’t like it that we were handing over the keys to the valet. What if we needed to get to the car quickly? This was why I liked the self-parking so much better. The only comfort was that she’d also left her car with the valet, so she wasn’t making any sort of quick escape, either.

Jeff was already at the door. I scrambled up to him, and he held the glass door wide. We went up the escalator.

We scooted around the hotel “lobby,” which was really just a long counter, passing a few people waiting in line with their suitcases. We stopped next to the familiar bronze flamingo statue-I didn’t want to see any more flamingos, but it was inevitable here-as we scanned the casino, and I spotted her, over on the far side, near the doors that led out to the aviary and gardens.

“There she is,” I said, pointing.

Jeff grabbed my hand, and we moved through the casino, bypassing the slots and the table games and cocktail waitresses balancing trays of drinks. As we slowed a little, I yanked my hand out of Jeff’s. He glanced back at me with a sly smile. I rolled my eyes at him, because I knew what he was thinking. About that thing again.

She’d pushed the glass door open, stepping outside.

We’d been here before: when we’d seen Harry and Ace meeting before their tattoo party. There had been a girl here then, too. Was it the same one?

“Remember, we couldn’t see her. There were too many people,” Jeff said when I asked the question out loud.

Everything had started to blur into one big memory. It was all happening so fast that I was afraid I wouldn’t be able to make any sense of any of it after all, even though there had been so many times over the last couple days that I’d thought I’d figured it out.

Should’ve known better.

She was walking briskly through the gardens, not even paying attention to the flamingos, ducks, and other birds that wandered freely along the pathways. The waterfall backdrop for wedding pictures was straight ahead, but she didn’t stop there.

She veered around the path and went underneath a fuchsia canopy, some sort of statue or something at the end.

“What’s that?” I asked out loud.

“Bugsy Siegel,” Jeff said. “You do know who that was, right?”

I rolled my eyes at him. Of course I did. Bugsy Siegel was the mobster who built the Flamingo back in the 1940s.

“When they renovated in the early nineties, they tore down Bugsy’s suite and put up this plaque instead,” Jeff said flatly.

We’d stopped just beyond the start of the canopy. Terri was pacing in front of the plaque, like she was waiting for someone. I remembered her on her cell outside the apartment building. Apparently her date was late. She reached into her pocket and pulled out a phone.

I felt like a voyeur. Spying on her like this, hiding behind this silly canopy.

I hadn’t noticed how close Jeff had come toward me until I felt his hand on my arm and I was suddenly facing him, his other hand on the back of my neck, and he was leaning toward me and again he kissed me. This time it wasn’t as tentative as it had been before; from the start it was as though he wanted to consume me. I let him. I couldn’t think. I couldn’t do anything except lose myself in that kiss. I forgot about Terri, about Ann Wainwright, about flamingos. I forgot everything except how I wanted that kiss to go on forever.

When he let me go, I couldn’t catch my breath at first. My face was flush with heat, my heart racing, my lips bruised.

For a second, he smiled, his eyes full of smoky passion; then it was gone. “Let’s go.”

I couldn’t wrap my head around it. Go where? What were we doing? Oh, right, following the girl who’d pretended to be me. Where was she? She was no longer standing by the plaque. No one was there. Except us.

And then I saw her, walking across the grass.

“Stop gawking, Kavanaugh,” Jeff said. “Come on.”

How could he kiss me like that and then act as though it never happened?

He’d gone a few steps before he realized I was still planted right where he’d left me.

“You can analyze it later,” he said. “But for now, we’ve got to see where she’s going.”

Okay, right. My feet seemed detached from my body somehow, but I was moving forward.

“You did that on purpose,” I scolded when we fell into step together, Terri heading toward the pool area.

“That’s right,” he said, grinning. “She almost saw us.”

I felt like he’d hit me in the gut. “It was so she wouldn’t see us?” I asked.

Jeff chuckled. “You really don’t think it’s because we’ve got a thing?” he teased. “Because we don’t. You said so.”

So maybe I was wrong, but I started to seethe. This was totally why we couldn’t have a thing. Because I hated him. Because he drove me crazy.

Right. That kiss had driven me crazy.

He wasn’t my type. And he was too old. He had to be at least ten years older than me. He smoked. Or at least he had smoked. His lungs must be black from all that smoking. His nose was a little off-kilter, as though it had been broken at some point, his smile crooked, his eyes a bright blue. So maybe I’d noticed his eyes. How kind they could be. How they flashed when he was angry. How intense they’d been when I’d given him that tattoo under his bullet scar.

His fingers snapped in front of my face.

“I know I swept you off your feet, Kavanaugh, but you’ve got to stay with the program here.”

I made a face at him and swatted his hand away. “Get over yourself,” I said sharply, surprising myself-and him.

Something akin to hurt flooded those blue eyes, but they quickly cleared and he said, “Look over there.”

I looked where he was pointing, and my heart fell.

Terri was giving Ace a kiss on the cheek.