Innocent Blood

Fifteen

He pulled open the shower door without warning. Astrid tried to cover herself, but it was no use. She couldn’t hide the bruises on her shoulders and her thighs, or the bite-marks on her breasts. She stood there with water coursing down her face, half ashamed and half defiant.

Frank took a long, long look at her, and then he closed the door. He was sitting on the end of the bed waiting for her when she came out of the shower, wrapped in a thick white hotel robe.

‘I don’t know what to think about this,’ Frank told her, and he didn’t.

Astrid stood in front of the mirror and toweled her hair. ‘What you don’t know can’t hurt you, can it?’

‘That’s bullshit. Anything that hurts you hurts me.’

‘Frank, we’ve spent two nights together. It’s not as if we’re married.’

‘Danny said that you were my future. Don’t you think that counts for something? It does to me.’

‘For God’s sake, Frank, Danny didn’t tell you anything. It was Nevile Strange and Nevile Strange is a fake.’

‘Well, I don’t agree. I heard what I heard and I saw what I saw. And if you’re not my future, why do you keep calling me and coming around to see me and sharing my bed?’

Astrid came up to him and gently tilted his chin up so that they were looking at each other eye to eye. ‘I thought you needed somebody. Somebody who understood how much you’re hurting. I also thought that you needed to forget about Danny for a few hours, and think about yourself.’

‘Right now I’m thinking about you. I don’t see how we can sustain any kind of relationship unless I know who you are.’

Astrid smiled and kissed him on the forehead. ‘I’m just me, Frank. I’m not worth losing any sleep over.’

‘I need to know who hurt you. I also need to know why they hurt you.’

She kissed him again. She smelled of summers gone by. ‘No, you don’t.’

They both drank too much Jack Daniel’s that evening, and when they went to bed they fell asleep almost at once. But Frank was woken in the middle of the night by Astrid tugging his penis. He mumbled, ‘No,’ but she pressed her hand over his mouth, and continued to rub him, harder and harder. When he grew stiff, she climbed on top of him and guided him inside her, gasping with pain.

‘Astrid!’ he cried, and tried to push her off him, but she gripped his wrists and held him flat on the bed.

As she approached orgasm, she began to sob and snuffle. Again he tried to roll over, but she screamed at him, ‘Don’t! Don’t!’ and she jumped up and down on him faster and faster until she finally went into spasm, her thighs gripping him tight, her perspiration dropping on his face and scalding his eyes.

Afterward she lay with her back to him, quivering, and when he touched her face with his fingertips her cheeks were wet with tears.

‘Astrid,’ he said, ‘you have to tell me who did this to you.’

‘I can’t.’

‘You have to. Whoever he is, he deserves to be in prison.’

‘I’m not worth it, Frank. I’ve never been worth it.’

He sat up and switched on the bedside light. ‘How can you say that? You’re beautiful.’

‘No, I’m not. I’m nothing.’

He didn’t know what to say to that. He was too tired and his head was banging and his mouth was all furred up. But he knew one thing for certain. He would find out who had beat up on Astrid, and he would make sure that the bastard got what he deserved, in spades.

The next morning Astrid slept until almost eleven o’clock. The red bruises on her cheekbones had already turned purple and her eyes were almost closed. The first thing Frank did was sit on the bed beside her and hold up his shaving mirror.

‘Oh, God,’ she said.

‘You’re still not going to tell me who did it?’

She shook her head.

‘All right. If you won’t tell me, you won’t tell me. That’s your privilege. What are you doing today? How about lunch at Captain Hooker’s, up the coast? Come on, you can always wear dark glasses.’

‘No, I’m busy today.’

‘How about this evening?’

‘This evening? Well . . . OK.’

‘I’ll see you round seven, then? That’s if you don’t change your mind and go off to get another beating.’

‘Frank . . .’

‘Yes, I know. Not funny. You’d think that I’d be able to come up with a really good gag about it, wouldn’t you, a professional humorist like me? “Does your boyfriend beat you up?” – pause – “No, I’m always out of bed first.”’

‘Frank . . .’

‘I care about you, Astrid, even if you don’t care about yourself. I can’t understand why you don’t want to tell me anything about yourself, but if that’s the way you want it, I’m prepared to accept it. I’d rather go on seeing you, even if you keep me in the dark. Even if you come back with bruises and bites and you won’t say who did them.’

Astrid kissed him. ‘You’re a rare man, Frank.’

No I’m not, he thought. I’m a liar.

He made two mugs of strong coffee and they drank it together in the living room. He didn’t really know what to say to her, because he felt so angry and jealous and he didn’t want her to know.

‘So, what are you doing today?’ he asked her, trying to sound offhand. ‘Anything interesting?’

‘Running a few errands, that’s all. Meeting some friends.’

‘Well . . . if you’re finished before seven, you can call me any time.’

She didn’t answer, but put down her half-empty coffee mug, stood up, and came over to kiss him. ‘I’ll see you this evening, OK?’

‘Sure.’

He waited until she had closed the door behind her. He counted to five, slowly. Then he reached under the couch and pulled out his light tan deck shoes. He picked up his blue linen coat, grabbed his cellphone, and went to the door. He opened it quickly but very quietly, and listened. No footsteps on the stairs; no elevator whining. She must have left the hotel by now.

He hurried down the staircase to the lobby. He was just in time to see Astrid outside in the street, climbing into a red and green taxi. He leaned back against the wall, half-concealed by a bushy fig plant, until the taxi had pulled away. The receptionist raised an eyebrow at him but didn’t say anything. As soon as the taxi had disappeared, he pushed his way out through the revolving doors. His own car was parked only fifty feet up the hill, its front wheels cramped against the curb. He climbed into it, started the engine, and backed it into the front bumper of the Jeep parked behind him.

Astrid’s taxi took a left on Holloway Drive, and then a tight right on to Santa Monica. Frank had to wait at the intersection with Santa Monica, drumming his fingers on the steering wheel, while a long, dawdling procession of traffic crawled past. But by weaving in and out of the west-bound traffic he caught up with the taxi by the time it reached Rodeo Drive. He could see Astrid’s head in the rear window, and he prayed that she wouldn’t turn around.

Eventually the taxi took a left into the Avenue of the Stars, and then another right, and pulled into the semicircular parking space in front of the Star-TV building, which was new and gleaming-white, built in an S-shaped wave, with a huge revolving star on the roof, made of dazzling steel. Its windows were all tinted black, and its staff called it the ‘Limo.’

Frank drew into the curb behind a UPS delivery truck and watched as Astrid climbed out of the taxi. She crossed the white marble sidewalk and disappeared into the Limo’s black-tinted revolving doors.

Frank hesitated for a moment, then got out of his car and followed her. There was a chance that she was still in the lobby, waiting for somebody to meet her, or waiting for an elevator, but he would just have to risk it. He pushed his way inside and was instantly met by a penetrating air-conditioned chill. The lobby was clad in white polished marble, three stories high, with water cascading down one wall and a galaxy of stars suspended from the ceiling.

There were black leather couches for visitors, but there was nobody sitting on them except for two scruffy-looking designers with large art portfolios. The elevator bank was off to the left, but the only people waiting to go up were a UPS messenger and a plump secretary with a bag of doughnuts and a cup of Starbucks coffee.

Frank was immediately approached by two security guards in sky-blue uniforms. One was black and looked like Yaphet Kotto’s fatter brother. The other was white and thin and blue-chinned, with close-together eyes.

‘Do you have an appointment, sir?’

‘Uh, yes, as a matter of fact. A friend of mine said that I was to meet her here.’

‘Would you like to give me your friend’s name, sir?’ said one of the guards, lifting up a clipboard.

‘Um, Polaski. Libby Polaski.’

The security guard ran his pen down the list. ‘Sorry, sir. No Polaski listed here. Can you tell which department she works in?’

‘News. She’s an editorial assistant. She’s only been working here a few weeks. That’s what she told me, anyhow.’

The guard flipped over to another page and glared at it as if he were trying to set it on fire with X-ray vision. Eventually he announced, ‘No Polaski in the news department, sir.’

‘Oh. Well, it looks like I’ve been taken for a chump, doesn’t it? She gave me this whole spiel about her glamorous new career in television news.’

The security guards were not amused. ‘I’m sorry, sir, we’re going to have to ask you to leave the premises immediately.’

‘Sure. I understand. What with all these bombs going off.’

‘We’d appreciate if you didn’t mention anything like that, sir.’

‘OK, sure. Sorry. Sorry to have caused you any trouble.’

Frank left the building and walked back to his car. A motorcycle cop was standing beside it, writing in his notebook.

‘This your vehicle, sir?’

‘Yes, it is. I’m sorry. I had to pick something up from Star-TV.’

‘You had to pick what up?’

‘Well, nothing, as it turns out. The person I was supposed to meet there didn’t show.’

‘What was the name of this person?’

‘Polaski. Libby Polaski.’

‘And what were you supposed to pick up?’

‘A DVD. I met her at a bar yesterday evening and she promised to lend me a DVD of Black Wednesday, the director’s cut. But she’s not listed as working at Star-TV, so it looks like I’ve been taken for a mug.’

The cop tucked his notebook into his pocket. ‘I’m going to have to agree with you, sir.’

‘Oh, yes?’

‘’Fraid so. You never heard the name Libby Polaski before? Libby Polaski is that little blonde girl in If Pigs Could Sing.’

Frank smacked the heel of his hand against his forehead. ‘Jesus! You’re right! Do I feel stupid or do I feel stupid?’