The Art of Deception

Hide and Peep

Nordstrom and the tourist thing had worn Melissa Dunkin’s legs down to a pair of aching calves that would be shinsplints by the following morning. At 7 P.M., practically stumbling into her suite in the Inn, she headed straight for the bath. With dinner scheduled for 8:30, she had no time to waste. A few minutes for a “lie-down” in front of CNBC if she hurried.

Melissa used the brass security hook-and-latch lock to ensure her privacy against a random minibar inspection or turndown service. She started the bathwater and began undressing immediately, the water steaming piping hot and making her think, for no reason at all, of home and her husband and kids, whom she missed. On reconsideration, more honestly, she was happy to have the time alone. Nothing wrong with some self-indulgence once or twice a year.

Her blouse off and hung up, she drew the living room sheers across a large window with a panoramic view of Puget Sound.

Slate-green water, densely forested islands, and the Olympic mountain range served as a backdrop. She drew the curtains in the bedroom as well, mildly annoyed that they wouldn’t close completely, but as they faced a darkened construction site, a skeleton against the slowly fading evening sky, she didn’t worry about it. She undressed fully, off to one side. Nothing mattered much at this point but that bath.

She slipped into the complimentary terry cloth robe, angled the TV to face the bathroom, angled the bathroom door’s full-length mirror, and readjusted her efforts twice so that she could see a reversed image of Market Wrap from the tub. Turned the volume way up. Toe in the water. Heaven.

She shed the robe, slipped into the foaming tub, and nearly squealed with delight it felt so damned good. A moment later, she climbed back out, ignored the robe, and sneaked into and across the suite’s living room where she snatched a beer from the minibar. She returned to the tub a conquering hero.

Twenty hedonistic minutes later, Melissa Dunkin dried herself off with a towel the size of a rug, slipped back into the robe, and headed straight for bed. Do not pass Go. The covers drawn, she shed the robe and lay back into the crisp sheets, naked, glowing, the bath’s heat slowly seeping out of her flushed skin. She zapped the TV’s sound and dozed, as relaxed as she’d been in ages. If that dinner hadn’t been on her Palm Pilot, she’d have let herself sleep until morning.

She would never have accused herself of woman’s intuition.

She left that for the touchy-feelies, the Birkenstock set who fre-quented the whole-food stores and took Chinese supplements they couldn’t pronounce. Melissa Dunkin considered herself pe-dantic but effective and efficient as a businesswoman, adequate as a mother, accomplished as a lover. She pulled the sheet up over her chest as she cooled, luxuriating in the serenity of a self-induced stupor.

It was at that moment she saw the man’s reflection in the bathroom mirror, which, at its present angle was trained with a view out the bedroom window. He glowed red, then suddenly green as a traffic light changed. He held something to his face.

Binoculars.

Aimed into her window.

At her.

Naked, until only seconds before.

Oh, my God!

She coiled into a fetal ball, stretching for the phone while clinging to the sheet that hid her from him. She snagged the handset and ended up dragging the phone by its cord across her oversized pillow. She was dreadfully cold all of a sudden, her skin coursed with gooseflesh, her teeth actually chattering. The talking head on the TV looked out at her, so calm and collected.

The collision of fear and dread inside her left her nauseated.

She wasn’t about to call some minimum-wage hotel receptionist. Not Melissa Dunkin. She dialed 9 for an outside line and punched in 9-1-1.