Saguaro Riptide

SEVEN

Woody sneezed. Shit. It fuckin’ figured that he’d turn out to be allergic to roses.

A card had accompanied the flowers. Woody had read the damn thing at least twenty times, his lips barely moving. Didn’t matter how many times he read it, though. It set his blood to boiling each and every time.

The card said:

LOVE AND KISSES YOU DOG-BEATING BASTARD.

FROM HERE ON OUT IT GETS WORSE.

The card wasn’t signed, but Woody figured it had to be from Jack Baddalach, which meant that Baddalach had learned about the monk’s run-in with his dog and had been waiting for payback when the monk pulled into the parking lot at the Saguaro Riptide.

The Vietnamese kid had practically predicted the whole thing. Shit. Woody couldn’t figure why the monk hadn’t popped a cap on that little motherfucker. Boy had a real mouth on him. Letting him live had been a big mistake.

Just one of many. Woody looked in the mirror. Shit. He looked like something that had been scraped off the highway. His eyes were red as Ripple, and his hair was as scraggly-looking as an Airedale’s butt, and his Sunday-go-to-meetin’ lame-ass monk clothes were dirty, and his left hand was fucked up from a dog bite.

That was the hand he jacked off with, too. Shit. He couldn’t even get the least little bit of a break.

Woody tossed Baddalach’s message into the garbage can. Half this shit wouldn’t have happened if the monk had used the balls God gave him. Not that Woody cared about the monk, but, shit, a man had to look out for himself.

’Cause if the monk got his ass chilled, it meant that Woody would get his ass chilled, too.

That wasn’t going to happen. Now that Woody was in charge again, the monk was going to stay locked up in the Rahway of his mind.

A life-fuckin’-sentence. No possibility of parole, neither.

Woody was the man, now. And there were just a couple of three things he had to deal with.

First off, he had to get himself a weapon.

Second, he had to get himself a car and get the hell out of this town before those crazy bitch cops came after him again. They thought he knew something about some cat named Komoko. Shit. He didn’t know Komoko from Kiss-My-Ass. Probably the whole thing had something to do with the boxer, but at this point he didn’t even care. He just knew he didn’t want to tangle with those bitches again, because they were crazier than any cons he’d ever run up against in the slams.

Third-and most importantly-he had to get himself some pussy. Lack of trim made him real edgy. And he’d been lacking trim for a seriously long time. Locked up in the monk’s head all those years. . shit. The monk-he didn’t jerk off, didn’t even look at no magazines, let alone shoot some beaver.

Woody thought it through. Getting a weapon, now that might be a little hard, especially if he wanted something good. He could probably find himself a pipe or something lying around over by the junkyard, but a knife or a gun might be tough.

And he might need something like that to get hold of a car. Shit. Hard to scare a person with a hunk of pipe. Somehow, folks really didn’t think you’d beat them to death just to rip off their ride. But a gun was different-wave a gun in someone’s face and they’d hand over the keys, like yesterday.

There weren’t many cars here at the motel. An old Subaru wagon was parked by the office-it probably belonged to the lady who ran the joint. A Range Rover with a Budget Rent-a-Car bumper sticker was parked below Woody’s window-he figured that Baddalach was the cat who had rented it. The Rover would be Woody’s preference. Get the pug’s car. Kill him, too, just to be doin’ it.

Woody peeked through the drapes. The only other car- actually, it was a truck-belonged to that sweet little bitch sitting by the pool.

A black bikini that fit her just right. And skin as white as cream.

Shit. Little Woody was getting hard. Woody’s heart started to trip-hammer. Without thinking, he squeezed Little Woody with his wounded left hand, then yelped in pain.

This was going to be tough. Woody bit his lip. Maybe his third priority was going to have to change places with his first.

’Cause his need for trim was seriously bad.

He lay back on the bed and thought about it. Unzipped his fly and tried to get things going with his right hand, but man, it just felt too weird.

Completely fucking unnatural.

But, shit, sometimes a man just had to have hisself some relief.

Damn it was good. Erupting like Krakatoa, East of Java.

Heart pounding. Head thudding like goddamn conga drums-

Shit, no. Someone was knocking at the door.

Woody jumped up, thinking. Hey, maybe the little bitch delivers.

He zipped his pants and opened the door just as the motel lady turned away.

She wasn’t the bitch in the black bikini, but she was damn fine for a woman with some mileage on her.

“Hey,” Woody said. “I was taking a nap. I almost didn’t hear you.”

“Sorry to wake you, but I wanted to make sure that you were okay.”

Woody turned on the charm. “Been better.”

‘The sheriff told me that you were robbed,” she said. “I can’t tell you how sorry I am. This place isn’t much, but I own it. No one’s ever been robbed here, not in twenty-six years.”

“I’m sorry to be the first.”

She smiled, and Woody noticed that she held a plastic bag in her right hand.

“It’s not much.” She handed him the bag. “Some toothpaste and a toothbrush, some shaving stuff But hopefully it’ll get you through until things straighten out.”

“That’s sweet.”

“Don’t worry about it. And don’t worry about your bill. The room’s on me, for as long as you need it. It’s the least I can do.”

“Well all right. Hey, you want to come in?”

“I probably shouldn’t.” She pointed at the roses fanned out across one side of the bed. “Nice flowers.”

The comment brought Woody up short. So did the amused little smile on the woman’s face.

In self-defense, he tried to trap the smile on his own face, but it managed to escape. Shit. He didn’t like this bitch seeing the flowers. A man didn’t get flowers. Bitch was going to think that he was a faggot or something.

“The roses were a mistake,” he said, trying to keep his voice light.

“They weren’t for you?”

“No. They were for me. But they were a mistake.”

Now she was really smiling, like this was the fucking funniest thing she’d ever heard of “You sure about that?”

“Yeah.” A dull throb bloomed behind Woody’s eyes. “I’m sure. You want to come in? I could get us a couple of Cokes or something-”

“Maybe later,” she said, still grinning. “Right now I’ve got some work to do.”

“Sure.”

She walked away. He closed the door.

The stink of the roses burned in his nostrils.

His head pounded. His stomach churned. The bathroom was fifteen feet away. A garbage can was closer.

Woody made neither.

He didn’t bother to clean up the mess. Suddenly, he was tired, and there was too much other shit he needed to do.

He sat on the bed and fumbled through the contents of the bag of toilet articles until he found a razor. Two tiny blades were embedded in the plastic cartridge. Woody twisted the plastic until it broke. The blades dropped to the green bedspread, glinting there like tiny fish in a huge ocean. Woody picked up the one closest to him, then searched the bag for the toothbrush the smiling bitch had mentioned.

His fist closed around the bristles.

He dropped the bag on the floor.

Sighed.

Shit, he was seriously tired. He wanted to lie down.

Instead, he sharpened the end of the toothbrush.

But his thoughts drifted, because he really was tired. First he thought about the woman, and how things might have ended up with her if those goddamn roses hadn’t been in the room. Then he thought about the way the bitch had smiled when she’d seen them, like she was in on some little faggoty secret.

Next he thought about the man who had fucked up the whole thing by sending those roses in the first place.

That man’s name was Baddalach.

Woody smiled. The end of the toothbrush was starting to look pretty wicked.

People said it all the time, but this time it was true- Baddalach didn’t have any idea who he was fucking with.

The barber had more hair on his arms than he had on his head, and his only customer looked like he’d paid for a hair-weave that hadn’t quite taken. As far as Jack was concerned, these were portents both negative and frightening, but he entered the barbershop anyway. He was a man on a mission.

Jack traded nods with the men-Don’t squirm, goddamnit, the barber said-and took a seat in a chrome-backed chair that looked like it had been designed by Torquemada.

Felt like it too. But that didn’t matter to Jack. Because the chair sat next to a table brimming with skin magazines.

Jack fished the computer printout from his back pocket. He glanced over it, pretty sure that the list itself was proof enough that the woman who looked so good in a black bikini wasn’t conning him. The printout certainly proved that there was indeed a person named Kate Benteen who had done some pretty amazing things.

But pretty sure wasn’t going to cut it, not the way things were going. Because while the information Jack had found at the library proved that Kate Benteen existed, it did not prove that she and the woman in the black bikini were one in the same.

Only a picture could do that.

Jack double-checked the date on the printout. Then he started to dig through the magazines.

Four issues of Beaver Hunt on top. Every ’94 issue-it appeared they were on a quarterly schedule. Then he thumbed through a selection of Shaved and Tail End, but neither publication deterred him from the task at hand. He managed to resist the charms of 44 Plus, as well, digging ever deeper, working his way through two years worth of Hustler.

A jackalope head was mounted on the wall above the chrome chair. A buffalo head loomed over the front door, and a coyote head hung eternally vigilant over a door at the back of the shop. A half-dozen glass eyes seemed to study Jack as he finished off one stack and started on another, but the stuffed menagerie made no comment.

The guy with the bad hair-weave did. He fidgeted in the chair, trying to get a look at the barber, and said, “Picky bastard, ain’t he?”

“Don’t squirm, goddamnit!” the barber said.

The guy in the chair giggled. “Hey, buddy-if you’re lookin’ for the magazines with boys in ’em, Rudy keeps those in the back. Those are his favorites.”

The barber jerked and the man in the chair screeched.

“Jesus, Rudy! Watch it!”

“You got another ear, asshole.”

Jack ignored the two combatants. He continued through the Hustler collection. The last couple issues were stuck together. Jack was a novice at the detective business, sure, but he figured that this was a line that even Mike Hammer wouldn’t cross.

Gingerly, he pushed the pile away.

He pulled the next pile toward him.

Halfway through a run of Penthouse, he found it.

Playboy. September 1991.

The “Girls of Desert Storm” issue.

Rorie pulled up a chair and sat down on the right side of the chaise longue. Wyetta took the left side, flipping her chair around backward, straddling it, leaning her elbows on the back.

The occupant of the chaise longue peered over the latest issue of Cosmopolitan. “Let me guess,” she said, pointing at Wyetta, “you’re a little bit country, and she’s a little bit rock ’n’ roll.”

Wyetta glared at her, but the chicklet in the black bikini was wearing real dark sunglasses and the glare didn’t take.

But this girl was an odd one. Wyetta decided that right off. Out here under the sun with that marble skin of hers, a bottle of Coppertone 45 at her side. Trash magazine in her hand and more magazines under the lounge, probably more trash-

Wyetta did a little double take as she checked out those other magazines. She spotted the same issue of Guns amp; Ammo that had arrived in her mailbox just the other day. Bitchin’ article about combat shotguns in there. New Soldier of Fortune, too, with an article about handgun tactics in hostage situations. But along with those the little gringa gatita had a couple issues of Mademoiselle, even a battered Seventeen. Wyetta couldn’t figure the mix.

The gringa followed Wyetta’s gaze. “When it comes to magazines, we get the shit end of the stick, huh. Sheriff?”

“What do you mean?”

“Just check this out.” The chicklet tossed Wyetta the Cosmo she’d been reading, and it was all Wyetta could do not to drop the thing on general principles.

First off, the magazine was stuffed so full of fragrance cards that it smelled like Zsa Zsa Gabor’s underwear drawer. And second, there was some dark-eyed Gina Lollobrigida-looking bitch on the cover-except this bitch was skinny.

Wyetta shook her head. At least the bitch didn’t look like Cindy Crawford. Jesus, today they all looked like Cindy Crawford. Eyebrows like Tyrone Power and tits inflated like the tires on an old Huffy bicycle.

But Cindy only had a lock on it if they wanted to sell you something sexy, like perfume or nightgowns or booze. If they wanted to sell you a product you could trust-like tampons or mouthwash or douche-they’d pick a perky little blond thing who looked like every girl’s best pal, Meg Ryan.

Wyetta glanced at the table of contents. The articles were scarier than Boris Karloff, FROM HATE AT FIRST SIGHT TO FRIENDS TO MARRIED. Or; GIVING HIM A (SEXUAL) NIGHT TO REMEMBER. Or: A TOP MODEL SHARES HER (DROP-DEAD) BEAUTY SECRETS. Or: INVESTING IN LOVE (AND WE DON’T MEAN MONEY, HONEY). Or: MUST YOU DEPEND ON HIM THAT MUCH?

“These rags all look the same to me,” Wyetta said. “But I don’t see-”

“Think about it,” the chicklet said. “A woman goes down to the five-and-dime to buy a magazine and she ends up with one of these. She takes it home and reads it, ends up all depressed because she doesn’t look like any of the models on those slick pages. She doesn’t dress like ’em, either. And her man doesn’t look like any of the men in the advertisements. His name’s Fred or Bob. It sure ain’t Pablo or Antonio or Lucky.

“And if she reads the thing, well, then she’s worse off. Because pretty soon she figures out that she’s bought a magazine aimed at an audience of independently wealthy anorexic New Yorkers who while away the hours designing new ways to delight their billionaire lovers. And that’s not what she does with her life. She’s too busy scraping crusty meatloaf out of a pan that’s been in the sink for a week. She’s not fulfilled. And on top of that, she’s out two bucks and fifty cents, retail.”

The chicklet grinned. “But a man-he goes down to the five-and-dime for a magazine and what does he end up with?” She snatched up the Guns Ammo. “One of these. And he gets home, cracks a brew, settles back. Sees that all the guys in the ads are kind of tubby, just like he is. Sees that they’re all smiling. And happy. And fulfilled. And what have they had to do to get there? Did they have to let some surgeon whittle down their nose or pump up their chest with silicone? Did they have to go on a diet or move to New York City? Hell, no. They didn’t have to do any of that stuff. All they had to do was buy the right gun and the right ammunition, and they were set.”

Kate Benteen dropped the magazine and settled back.

Wyetta glanced at Rorie. The deputy looked like someone had beaned her with a blackjack. Wyetta felt kind of the same way herself.

It was definitely time to put this gatita in her place before she got to feeling that she had any wiggle room.

Wyetta dropped the Cosmo. Patted the butt of the cedar-handled.44 American that filled her holster. “Me, I found the right fit a long time ago,” she said. “I’m happy. Hell. . maybe I’m even fulfilled. But I didn’t come here to talk about me.”

The gatita stuck with the grin.

“I came here to talk about you,” Wyetta continued. “I want to know if you’re still looking for the right fit, or if you’ve already found it.”

The grin wavered, just a millimeter.

Wyetta went for the jugular. “So the real question is: what gets it done for you anyway, little darlin’? Is it a peckerwood thief like Vincent Komoko?”

“Or maybe it isn’t Komoko at all,” Rorie said. “Maybe it’s his money that gets our little friend all slick and sassy.”

“Uh-huh.” Wyetta nodded, smiling. “Or maybe. . just maybe what this little gash needs to ring her chimes is Vincent Komoko’s money. . and the hardest part of the former light-heavyweight champion of the world.”

Staring down at the Playboy magazine, Baddalach swore under his breath.

It was her, all right. Kate Benteen. The woman in the black bikini. One and the same.

There were three columns of text on the first page of the interview. A photograph at the bottom of each column. Three portraits in black and white, each one featuring Kate Benteen and her familiar sunglasses. And beneath each photo, a quotation from the interview.

In the first photo, Benteen was smiling. “As a kid growing up on a horse ranch in Montana, it never seemed like I could fill myself up. I was an only child. Dad was off flying choppers in Vietnam; Mom was busy running the ranch. I grew up around people who got things done. That was how they were built. Fear wasn’t part of the equation. I don’t think I ever even heard the word failure until I was sixteen.”

She wore a pensive expression in the second photo. “Renaissance woman? Spare me. I’ve just got a low boredom threshold. I got tired of barrel racing when I was fifteen. Moved on. Got tired of diving into swimming pools when I was twenty. Dried off and chucked the Olympic medal in a drawer. My uniform. . they took that from me, but I’m not going to cry over spilt milk. Now I’m here in Hollywood, but watch out for my dust. Been there, done that. . those are words to live by.”

In the third picture, her lips were interstate-straight-no expression at all. “People want to make me into some kind of American hero. That’s not for me. I don’t think this country’s always right. But I was proud to do my part in the Saudi. I was a soldier. And being a soldier means you take it the way it comes, you live by the soldier’s code. I didn’t panic when our chopper went down. I never lost hope when the Republican Guard locked us in Saddam’s dungeon. But it wasn’t my country that got me through. It was the people who were with me in that hellhole-and what was important was their faith in me and my faith in them. My fellow Americans. God, that sounds corny. This sounds worse-One fellow American in particular. I’m not talking about love. I’m not talking about romance. In that kind of situation, there’s no room for any of that. That came later. What I’m talking about goes much deeper. It’s a special kind of intimacy you don’t get to any other way. A special kind of trust that you build on. I hope it lasts forever.”

Kate Benteen said, “That’s a good question. Sheriff. Much as I hate all that introspective shit, I gotta admit that I’ve been thinking about it myself. And the only answer I can come up with is Vincent Komoko. He’s what gets it done for me.” One corner of her mouth twitched, but she stuck with the grin. “But ol’ Vince doesn’t seem to be around. Not anywhere. I think maybe his days of getting things done for anyone are long gone.”

“We know that he phoned you,” Wyetta said.

Benteen nodded. “Vince got my answering machine, actually. Not that it mattered. He didn’t have anything important to say.”

Wyetta’s fingers brushed the butt of her pistol, lingering there long enough so that the little gash was sure to notice. “You sure about that?”

Benteen spit a short laugh. “I’m sure. All Vince wanted to talk about was some money. Two million bucks. He hid it somewhere. Wanted me to come and get it. Like giving it to me really made a difference.”

“Where is it?”

Another laugh. And then her words, deadpan: “It’s in a safe place. Like I told you: Vince told me exactly where to find it. Hell, I’ve been here a couple days. It wasn’t like I had to figure out a puzzle or anything.”

Wyetta glanced at Rorie. The deputy rolled her eyes. Benteen shrugged. A rumor of a blush glowed on her cheeks, and she shook her head as if she were terribly embarrassed. “I know it sounds crazy,” she said.

Rorie laughed out loud.

“If you’ve got the money, what the hell are you doing hanging around here?” Wyetta asked, nearly exasperated.

“I don’t quite have that one figured out. Sheriff.” Benteen glanced down at the Cosmopolitan magazine. “Maybe I’m just looking for closure.”

“Bullshit.”

“C’mon now. . Helen Gurley Brown would understand.”

“Fuck Helen Gurley Brown and the horse she rode in on.”

“Why would I lie?”

“Don’t fuck with me,” Wyetta said. “If you so much as try, you’re going to be one sorry little-”

An insistent ringing interrupted her.

“Is that your pocket?” Kate asked.

“It’s my phone, idiot.”

Wyetta flipped open her cellular.

“Kirk to Enterprise,” Kate said. “Two to beam up.”

Baddalach sat in the barber chair, an electric razor buzzing around his ears. He didn’t squirm-didn’t move his head at all. Only his eyes moved as he scanned the pages.

He’d figured out that Kate Benteen talked the talk about two minutes after meeting her. But reading her interview in Playboy convinced Jack that she walked the walk, as well.

Because it was all right there, between the celebrity layout and the centerfold spread. All the stuff she’d talked about. The rodeo titles, and the Olympic silver medal, even the stuff about being in the movies.

And the stuff about the Saudi, too. Kate Benteen had been in the Gulf War as a flight surgeon attached to a chopper battalion. Jack had always thought of Operation Desert Storm as one of those pleasant little wars, a lopsided exercise that could be measured in hours rather than days. To him, the whole thing had seemed like putting a featherweight in with the heavyweight champion of the world. Didn’t matter how good the featherweight was; he was going to get crushed.

But Desert Storm hadn’t been easy for Kate Benteen. She’d been on a rescue mission, looking for a downed pilot. Her Black Hawk helicopter was shot down, and she’d broken both arms and a collarbone in the crash. That was bad enough. Worse was getting captured by Saddam’s troops.

Not just grunts. The Republican Guard got her-Saddam’s true believers. They tossed her in the back of a truck along with the chopper’s other survivor-the pilot. Drove them through the desert and locked them up in a dungeon God knows where.

It was just the two of them for days. With the broken bones, Benteen could barely move. The pilot fed her, took care of her. After it was over, Benteen said she’d never felt so close to another human being. She said you couldn’t buy that kind of closeness. It was something you’d never give up because you’d gone through hell to get it.

Jack wondered if the pilot agreed with that, but he knew he’d never find an answer to that question.

Because the pilot’s name was Vincent Komoko.

Kate watched as the cops drove off.

Judging from the sheriff’s tone and the things she’d said, Kate figured the phone call that had interrupted their little chat wasn’t official business. But that didn’t mean it wasn’t urgent. The sheriff and the deputy had taken off faster than a speeding Bullitt (if you knew your Steve McQueen).

They said they’d be back, of course.

That was fine with Kate.

Because she’d decided exactly what she wanted. Not that it was a conscious decision-it was just that all of a sudden she knew what she had to have before she could leave Pipeline Beach.

Could be a handful of people might give her what she was after.

The sheriff and the deputy were definitely on the list.

“All done,” the barber said, spinning the big chair with such unrestrained enthusiasm that Jack figured the guy had missed his true calling as a Tilt-a-Whirl operator.

Jack came face-to-face with a large mirror.

Decided his Tilt-a-Whirl assessment had been dead on.

Because the guy sitting in the barber chair was a complete stranger.

Jack said, “Shit.”

The stranger in the chair said the same thing.