The Albuquerque Turkey: A Novel (20 page)

“Not there? It’s his phone.”

“Uh-huh. And he and his phone have become separated.”

“Separated how?”

“One of them got hijacked.”

“Oh, shit.”

I read concern in her voice, though not shock, as if Woody being snatched was dismaying but not exactly headline news. That’s what I read, but it wasn’t like I could trust any of my reads anymore. Hell, that could have been Allie in a red wig behind the wheel of the Segue. Anything was possible now.

Allie, meanwhile, had lapsed into the contemplative silence of processing and evaluating new data. After a moment of this, she said, “Radar, I’m going to hang up. Star-69 me. I’ll let the call go to voice mail. Enter my code”—she rattled off some numbers—“and listen to the saved calls.”

The line went dead again. I star-69’d her. When her outgoing message kicked in, I punched in her code, and a mechanical female voice said, “You have
no
unheard messages and
four
saved messages. Press 1 to replay saved messages. Press 2 for other options.”

I pressed 1, and heard Woody’s twice telephone-filtered voice say, “Hey, it’s me. A large problem just pulled up outside my place. I’m gonna try to beat it out the back door, but if I don’t succeed, that’ll
mean Jay’s holding an ace, so be aware.” I heard the distant sound of pounding on a door, then the call ended.

“Second saved message,” said the voice-mail gal.

Against a background of street sounds and wind, I heard Woody say, “Me again. I got halfway away, but they’re following me. Okay, I see some stores up ahead. I’m gonna try to get arrested.” I could hear tension in his voice, but not panic. He seemed, on some level, to be enjoying himself. Well, he would. He’s a grifter. We live for this shit.

“Third saved message.”

“Sir,” I heard a stranger’s muffled voice say, “please take your hands out of your pockets.”

“What?” said Woody, muffled at first, but then suddenly clearer. “It’s not a gun. See? It’s just a cell phone.”

“Now if you’ll just calm down, I’m sure we—”

“I don’t have any concealed weapons. I don’t have any concealed anything!”

“Sir, please don’t remove your—”

I heard a clunk and the line went dead. Apparently he’d dropped his phone along with his pants.

“Fourth saved message.”

There was a preamble of ambient noise, including some indistinct radio chatter. Then I heard Woody, muffled again, saying, “Look, you have to believe me, I was faking back there. I’m not a head case. Really, I’m not.”

A male voice, young, but full of authority, said, “Just relax, sir. We’re gonna take you someplace where they can look after you. Get you the help you need.”

“I don’t need help! I told you, I was faking. Some guys were after me, so I—”

“Got naked in a pizza joint? That seems like a strange response.”

“I had to get away!”

A second voice said, “And I have to get laid, but try telling my wife.”

After a little more fruitless back-and-forth, the line went dead.

“You have
no
unheard messages. Press 1 to replay saved messages. Press 2 for other options.”

Other options. Well, what were my options? Leave a message? Tell Allie how hurt and angry I was? Ask if she’d been off disporting with Real Estate Greg when these calls came in? There didn’t seem to be much point to that. Okay, then maybe I’d take the high road and just tell her I loved her. Again, not much point. Sometimes the truth is just the most useless card in your deck. I tried to imagine a scenario where her and Woody’s alliance wasn’t anything but a betrayal, but if it was out there, it escaped me. It crossed my mind to wonder if Real Estate Greg wasn’t a beard of some kind, and the true object of Allie’s affection was a certain vintage model Hoverlander. Could she and Woody be having an affair? The idea was so dismaying that I had to dismiss it. Otherwise my head would explode.

I ended the call and stared at the black clamshell phone for a long, bleak stretch of time. Eventually I came to myself and realized that I was still sitting in the parking lot of the Blue Hills Treatment Center. People probably sat in their cars here all the time, snorking up their last line or popping their last pill before checking themselves in. I felt like checking myself in. I was sure I could use treatment for something.

But the fact remained that Woody had been glommed. However those two had worked me, it didn’t feel right just to walk away. I’d see this thing through. Save my father’s ass. Then kick it. That was my plan.

It was a long, slow ride back to the Gaia. I felt all alone in the world.

My mind wandered to Martybeth in her underwear. The thought caused me a scrotal tickle, and then a shudder. Though Allie had pretty clearly betrayed me, I wasn’t prepared to betray her back.

Yet, Martybeth and her underwear …

At last I had a useful idea.

I phoned Vic. After several rings, Zoe answered. “Thank you for calling MirploCo,” she said in a scripted voice. “How may I direct your call?”

“Hi, Zoe, it’s Radar. Let me talk to Vic.”

“I’m sorry,” she said, still on script, “there’s no one here named Vic.”

This is crazy
, I thought.
Allie reappears and suddenly Vic goes AWOL? What’s going on?
Then I realized that this problem was purely semantic. “I mean Mirplo,” I said. “Let me speak to Mirplo.”

“If this is regarding a commission,” Zoe continued, on script, “Mirplo is now taking orders for thirty-six-month delivery. If this is about an existing commission—”

“Zoe, it’s me, Radar. Let me talk to Mirplo.”

Zoe processed this for a long, silent second and then said, “One moment, please; I’ll see if he’s available.”

After a pause, Vic came on the line. “This is Mirplo.”

“It’s Radar.” I filled him in on the latest developments and said, “I’m accelerating the timetable. How soon can you get to Vegas?”

“I don’t know, Radar. Right now I’m pimping out the ultralight.”

“Vic, this is important.”

“And the ultralight isn’t? This isn’t just about you, you know. It’s also about me. My statement.”

“Your statement,” I repeated flatly.

“Do you begrudge me, Radar? I don’t see you as a begrudger.”

“I don’t begrudge, Vic. I’m not a”—I stumbled over the word—“a begrudger. I just need your help, that’s all.”

“And don’t worry, buddy, you’ll get it. Plane’s almost done anyhow. It’s a dragonfly.”

“What’s that, the brand?”

“Nah, the motif. It represents—” He cut himself off. “Why spoil it? You’ll see soon enough.”

We hung up. I jammed the phone back in my pocket and rocketed down the highway toward town. I had to make two quick stops, then get back to the Gaia and talk to Martybeth again.

I suddenly saw her underwear in a whole new light.

I
went to a business center in a strip mall and spent a productive hour with a computer, color printer, and sheets of plastic laminate. A nearby pawnshop yielded another necessary hunk of verisimilitude, and I returned with these to the Gaia in high spirits—higher than they’d been in quite some time. Granted, Woody was on ice, Allie was past participle, and Mirplo was a shaky (though increasingly arrogant) platform upon which to build a grift, but I was making moves again—snuke moves—and that was like putting on a comfortable old shirt. I felt within myself the same undercurrent of glee I’d heard in Woody’s voice on the phone: This shit is dangerous and uncertain, but on some level just fun. I wasn’t fooling myself completely, of course. I knew that somewhere deep inside lurked a serious heartache I’d have to address eventually. For the moment, though, I muted it with moves. My imagination was flowing, a cool mental lava that eradicated much in its path.

The perks of a Gaia host’s job included a parking space in the employee garage and a room in the old, unimproved part of the hotel. I landed the Swing and thought about going to my room to change but instead went straight to the casino floor, where I found a house phone and had Martybeth paged. When she came on the line, she reacted to my voice about as you’d expect, with a proud cloud of “busier-than-thou” cushioning her hurt. But I’d figured Martybeth out. She was wired to her sexuality. In her mind, she scored points with her body,
and I figured her likely to give it a second chance. It’s what people do when they’re hooked on validation. So I apologized for running out on her, thereby implicitly erasing the stigma of rejection. Then I asked if we could complete the tour, which I knew she’d interpret as “pick up where we left off.” She surrendered her reproof immediately, confirming my impression of her as a slave to approval, someone who put ego above everything. She said she was in Aurum, the casino’s VIP gaming salon, and told me to come to her there.

Aurum
^*
occupied a giant metal pod mounted on eight steel struts that lifted it high off the gaming floor. Its mirrored surfaces and neon trim gave it the spooky look of a UFO, but the design served its purpose of isolating the salon from the main casino’s noise and hubbub, the constant clang of slots, the periodic hoot or whoop of gamblers scoring big with cards or dice, and the undertow lilt of cocktail waitresses crooning, “House’ll buy you a drink?” You entered Aurum by climbing a set of cut-quartz steps or taking a short-throw glass elevator. Then, under the frosty gaze of face control, you passed through a polished metal ring (and embedded metal detector) and followed a long, corkscrew corridor, so that by the time you reached the heart of the sanctum, you were physically, acoustically, and psychically separated from the penny public and could enjoy your high-roller lifestyle in appropriate privacy and luxury.

The room held just six tables, two blackjack and one each of roulette, craps, baccarat, and pai gow, but these six tables yielded, on average, almost 10 percent of the Gaia’s take. In addition to the gaming tables, there was a conversation pit equipped with marble-top tables and creamy leather couches. Martybeth sat on one of these, chubby legs crossed, showing plenty of thigh and chatting quietly with an ancient Asian millionaire and his young escort. I could read Martybeth’s lips as she said, “Don’t be silly, Dr. Wu. It’s the casino’s pleasure.
My
pleasure.
Enjoy your evening.” Then she handed him what seemed to be tickets to a show; however, she fumbled the pass, so that I caught a glimpse of a tiny glassine bindle. The escort saw it too, and her nostrils flared.

Martybeth noticed me and disengaged herself from her guests. She crossed to meet me, tugging down her skirt and tucking her blouse tighter against her frame. “I’m glad you came back,” she cooed. “I’d hate not to finish my job.”

Within the hour, I’d seen all the confidential card rooms, unmarked restaurants, hidden spas, and private lounges that served the Gaia’s top-tier guests. I’d seen the exclusive cashier’s cage they used, with a safe-deposit room more lavish than five-star hotels. I’d visited the private bell service, concierge desk, and access corridors. And I’d seen Antibes, the Gaia’s award-winning topless swimming pool. Did Martybeth measure her roomy self negatively against the taut bodies of all those professionals and avid amateurs? If so, she didn’t let on. Perhaps she thought the sight of such plastic figurines in G-strings would inflame my desire. They seemed to inflame hers; she stayed close, and breasted me from time to time, signaling like crazy. Clearly she was at the tipping point.

Time for a nudge.

“That suite we visited before,” I said. “Any chance I could get a second look?”

“Not now,” said Martybeth. “They’re shampooing the rugs.”

“Shame,” I said, coloring my voice with disappointment and thwarted intent.

“Don’t worry, honey,” she said, laying her hand on my arm. “This hotel has
lots
of rooms.”

Ten minutes later, we’re making small talk in a room Martybeth has commandeered. It’s no high-roller suite, but plenty adequate for the party we have planned. And there we are, sitting on the edge of a king-size bed. Martybeth fiddles with the buttons of her blouse. As she brazenly pops one open, I reach into my pants …

… and pull out a badge.

By all rights, the fake Jake gag shouldn’t ever work. I mean, it’s so
transparent a play. But if you use it right—a swift strike against a soft target—you can sell the bluff long enough to get what you’re after. Martybeth had established herself as a soft target, short on discretion and long on need. Her proximity to Wolfredian (close enough to drop a dime about Woody) implied that she might be long on information, too, so I blitzed her with Special Agent Dim Ysmygu of the thoroughly fictive Nevada Bureau of Gaming Investigation.

The badge, as badges will, stopped her cold. Though naught but a classic generic that I’d picked up at the pawnshop, it engendered the deer-in-headlights reaction that most people have. I handed her my identification card, fruit of my labor at the business center, pure bafflegab but convincing enough, and laminated, which carries a surprising amount of clout. She stumbled over the name on my paperwork—as she was intended to, for in situations like this, an improbable-to-impossible name rings truer than a common one. John Doe sounds like, well, a John Doe, but who in their right mind settles on Dim Ysmygu as an alias? Its sheer outrageousness lends cred to your credential.

She took a weak stab at pronouncing it. “Dim … Yaz-mig-you?”

“Us-muggy,” I corrected. “It’s Welsh.”
^*

The first thing most people do when confronted with adversarial authority is try to figure out how much trouble they’re in.

Can I cry my way out of this speeding ticket?

Would a blow job unresist my arrest?

Do they know about the Caymans account?

Martybeth, predictably, played the seduction card, the strongest one in her deck. She let the halves of her blouse fall open and looked at me with buttery eyes.

Pocketing my credentials (which had done their job and would now not be seen again), I said, “I’m sorry, Martybeth, we don’t have time for that anymore.”