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She crosses the floor, puts her arms around my waist, holds me tight. Then she tilts her chin and kisses me with good intentions. I kiss her back with bad ones. We go at it awhile, good and bad intentions, moving around the room, backing into the desk, her against the wall, me against the wall, neither of us against the wall, all while making breathless moaning sounds. We sound silly, like teenagers imitating movie romance.
But laughing is not an option.
Success in fighting means not coming at your opponent the way he wants to fight you. Success in lovemaking is just the opposite: you’ve got to come at her the way she wants to fuck you. And tomorrow she’ll want you to come at her a different way. I’d give you the whole seminar, but I’m too busy right now. Plus, she’s asking me something.
“You’ve wanted to do this since the day we met,” she says.
“Yes.”
I decide not to remind her we met exactly twenty-eight hours ago.
She breaks the embrace and backs up to the bed, removes her sandals, and sits down. A small cloud passes over her face.
“What’s wrong?”
“I want to say something,” she says. “About this morning.”
I kick off my shoes and sit beside her on the bed. She scoots to the far side and lies down, motions me to join her. When we’re face to face, she gives me a small kiss. I trace my fingertips over her thigh, from the end of her shorts to her knee, and back again.
“What about this morning?” I say.
“I wanted to thank you for what you did.”
“At the restaurant?”
“Uh huh.”
I lean over and kiss her, softly.
“My pleasure,” I say.
She raises up to a sitting position and reaches her hands behind her head to unroll the scrunchie from her ponytail. Then tosses her head a single time, and ah, the joys of youth: every hair falls magically into place. Except for one tiny wisp that’s hanging over her eye. I reach up and smooth it to the side.
We kiss again, a quick peck, and she says, “You haven’t asked why Lucky would allow that man to feel me up at the restaurant.”
“No.”
“How come?”
“I try not to judge people.”
“You just execute them?”
“I’d like to dress it up nicer than that,” I say, “but…”
“It is what it is?”
“It is.”
We kiss again.
“Can I ask you a question?” she says.
“Of course.”
“Promise you won’t try to read too much into it?”
“I’ll try.”
“How much would you charge to kill Lucky?”
27.
“Under normal circumstances what would I charge to kill your husband? Or are you asking what I would charge you?”
“Both.”
“Under normal circumstances, that’s a hundred-thousand dollar hit.”
“And for me?”
“Is that what we’re doing here today? Making a contract?”
She gives me three short, quick kisses.
“God, I love your face!” she says.
I wait for her to answer my question. She finally says, “I don’t want you to kill Lucky.”
“No?”
“Of course not.”
“Then why’d you ask?”
“I’m trying to understand you.”
That surprises me. “In what way?”
“I’m trying to understand how you place a monetary value on other people’s lives.”
The woman lying on the bed with me today is far shrewder than the girl I met yesterday. Today’s woman is probably smarter than me, which is a plus, if we’re in a relationship. But right now we’re on a bed in a hotel room, and there’s fire in my pants. I want yesterday’s girl to put it out. I sigh, realizing today’s woman is waiting for me to answer her question about how I price my hits.
“There are a lot of factors that go into the equation,” I say.
“Such as?”
“His prominence, how hard it would be to kill him, if there was a specific time and place you needed it done, and if you require a specific method.”
“Of killing him?”
“Yes.”
“So it could cost more.”
“Or less.”
“Interesting.”
“How much to kill Carmine?”
“Excuse me?”
“Carmine Porrello, crime boss, western region.”
“I know who he is.”
“Would you take a contract that big?”
I shrug. “It’s what I do.”
“You could kill Carmine?”
She’s looking at me with bright, hopeful eyes.
I meet her gaze. When I speak, my words are clear and precise.
“I can kill anyone.”
The smile that spreads across her face says she likes my answer.
I say, “Anything else you want to ask?”
“Yes. Are you ever going to fuck me?”
28.
We fucked.
It wasn’t love, but it wasn’t bad. Not even close to the best sex either of us has had, but probably the best sex either of us is likely to have today. Unless Gwen decides she’s in the mood tonight when Maddie shows up.
After our breathing gets back to normal, Gwen moves in close to cuddle me. I hadn’t thought about it till now, but I realize we’re still on top of the covers.
“I hope we can do it again in a few minutes,” she says, touching me down there, as if trying to determine how many minutes it might be.
“I’d like that,” I say, trying to avoid thinking I might be on a time table.
“You’re the best I ever had,” she says.
“Really?”
“Swear to God.”
“You, too,” I say. Then add, “Speaking of lies, there’s something I haven’t told you or Lucky. About Phyllis.”
She sits up. I’d love to describe for you how the sheet falls away slowly, revealing her perfect, artificially-enhanced breasts, but I already told you we’re on top of the covers.
Not that it makes her boobs any less attractive.
“What haven’t you told us?” she says, her voice suddenly serious.
“If I tell you a big secret, will you tell me one?”
“Like truth or dare?”
“Except without the dare.”
“Okay. Wait. Who gets to choose the subject?”
“Me.”
“That might be fun,” she says. Then adds, “Do I have to tell the truth?”
“That’s sort of the whole purpose.”
She frowns. “Well, I can try, right? So what’s your big secret about Phyllis?”
“I met her.”
She’s quite surprised. “When?”
“Yesterday.”
“Before Connor Payne killed her?”
“Yes. And I asked her about the device.”
“The one we’ve been looking for?”
I nod.
“How did you know about it?”
“Connor’s been seeking it awhile.”
“He spoke to you about it?”
“We’re getting off track. Let’s just say I was trying to negotiate a deal with Phyllis, to keep Connor from killing her.”
“She paid you off?”
“No. I was just seeking the device.”
“And she didn’t give it to you?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“She didn’t have it.”
She stares at me. “Who does?”
“According to Phyllis, you.”
“What? Me?”
“She told me she gave it to you.”
“For what purpose?”
“To hide?”
“I hardly even knew the bitch! And she hated me, remember?”
“I’ve got your word for that.”
Gwen frowns. “I see. And we’ve already established I’m a liar.”
“Just to level the playing field,” I say.
She gives me a look that’s not quite anger, but awfully close. “You’re totally killing the mood here, you know.”
“I know.”
Gwen’s on the verge of throwing a pout. I’m okay with that. I’m trying to accomplish two things here. First, I want to know if she’s got the device. Second, I want to get laid again, and see if we can improve the experience by coming at her a different way. On the one hand, I don’t want to make her too angry. On the other, I need to secure the device.
I say, “If it makes you feel any better, I believe you.”
She turns both palms up. “You’d have to. Phyllis was fucking my husband. We didn’t like each other. She wouldn’t have given me anything important, and I wouldn’t have accepted it if she had.”
“At the time she told me, it made sense. Now that I understand the relationship, it doesn’t. Are you sure she hated you?”
“Yes. And Lucky didn’t make things any easier by rubbing her nose in it.”
“What do you mean?”
“He made her give me all those spa treatments, plastic surgery, chemical peels…”
“She didn’t charge him?”
“Well, of course she did.”
“Well, isn’t that why she’s in business?”
“Do you know anything about women?”
I take a breath before answering.
“No. I talk a good game…but no. Every time I think I’ve finally got a handle on women, I realize the handle isn’t connected to anything. In the end, I’m just holding a handle, without a clue.”
“It was a rhetorical question.”
“Oh.”
“God, you’re good looking when you do that,” she says.
“Do what?”
“That whole clueless thing. You need to cultivate it. It works for you.”
This is something I already know. And she’s right. It does work. Problem is, it’s not an act.
“Let me give it to you from a woman’s perspective,” she says.
“Okay.”
“I’m young and sexy, Phyllis is a drone. I’m not being cocky or putting her down. These are the facts. Phyllis wanted Lucky. Don’t ask me why, but let’s assume she wanted him.”
“Okay.”
“They probably met around the time Lucky and I got married. They were certainly having sex before Lucky made her start fixing my flaws.”
“You’re saying she didn’t like the idea of making you even more appealing to him?”
“Exactly.”
“Because she considered you her rival?”
“There may be hope for you yet.”
I think about that a moment, and then it hits me.
I know exactly where the device is hidden.
Gwen touches the area between my legs and says, “I think we’re getting close here.”
“I agree.”
“I bet if I lick your lollipop I can make you big and strong. Would you like that?”
Would I like that?
Why not ask if I’d like world peace. An end to hunger. A cure for cancer. Yes, absolutely! But I’m struggling to say something cool. Finally, master of bedroom dialogue that I am, I come up with this pearl: “Sure!”
It ain’t Hemmingway, but it gets her to slide down the bed.
Gwen isn’t as skilled as Miranda, but she’s working hard, and I’m responding in kind. We go from oral to something my former Commander in Chief would be forced to call sex. What Gwen lacks in experience, she makes up for with enthusiasm. I’m not getting every last ounce she’s got to give, but I’m getting plenty. And just when she gets me to the very edge of ecstasy…
My cell phone rings.
It’s a specific ring. I have four caller-specific ring tones, and I haven’t heard this one in months.
“Damn it!” I say.
“Let it go, baby,” Gwen says. “Tune it out. Keep riding the ride.”
“I can’t. It’s my boss.”
“Lucky?”
“It’s my real boss.”
“Make him wait. Call him back.”
“You don’t understand.”
“You’re right, I don’t. I guess you’d better take the fucking call. It’s not like you’re doing anything important.”
I stretch to reach for the phone, an act that disengages me from my lover faster than I’d like to admit.
“Asshole!” she says.
29.
“Creed, it’s Darwin.”
“What’s up?”
“I got a job for you.”
I jump to my feet.
“When?”
“Now.”
“Is it—”
“Important? Very.”
Here’s the thing about Darwin. He lets me do whatever I want, ninety-nine percent of the time. Even helps me by providing resources like body doubles, cleanup crews for people I kill, government airstrips, highest government clearance…you name it, I get it. But when he says something’s important, it means one thing: the country’s in danger.
“What do you need?”
By the time he tells me, Gwen is not only boiling mad, but completely dressed. I’m standing here naked, with the same handsome face she adored a few minutes ago, but I’m getting a vibe that our time here is done.
When I hang up she says, “Maybe I should be fucking him.”
If what I suspect is true, that Gwen gets off on fucking men she perceives as powerful, then Darwin probably is the man for her. Then again, I’ve never laid eyes on him, so he could be totally wrong for her. He could be anyone I run into on the street. Could be a woman, for all I know, since he uses voice altering equipment on the phone. In fact, Gwen is the only person I know who can’t be Darwin, since I was with her just now while talking to him. Then again, you never know with Darwin.
“I need to take you home,” I say, getting dressed.
“No. I’m going to buy an outfit. For tonight. I’ve decided I’ll be in the mood when Maddie comes. And no, you can’t watch. You’ll have to listen from outside the locked door.”
“I won’t be there.”
“What? Why not?”
“I have to leave town. It’s urgent.”
“You’re supposed to be guarding me. I mean, us. What about Connor Payne?”
“That’s what the phone call was about,” I say, lying through my teeth.
“Connor Payne is your boss?”
“No, of course not. But my boss tracked him down. He’s in San Francisco. I’m going there tonight. To kill him.”
Her eyes widen. “No shit?”
I look into those wide, mud brown eyes, and say, “I’m doing it for you, Gwen. I’m going to murder one of the most powerful men on earth. But first I’m going to punish him.”
“Why?”
“Because he frightened you.”
“Oh, Oh, wow!”
“I’m going to reduce him to tears.”
“Oh, Oh, Oh, my God!”
“I’m going to make him shit his pants like a frightened child!”
“Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh my God! Oh, Oh my GOD!”
“And when he’s on his knees, begging for his life, the last words he’s going to hear before I snap his neck like a dead twig is, ‘This is for Gwen.’”
“Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh my God!” she screams. “Oh! Oh! Oh my God! I’m getting wet!”
It’s true. She’s as worked up as anyone I’ve ever seen.
“Fuck me, Donovan! Fuck me! Fuck me right now!”
“There’s no time.”
From somewhere deep in Gwen’s throat a moaning sound is born. By the time it escapes her lips, it is unlike any sound I’ve ever heard. Her eyes are half-closed, her head is lolling back and forth. Her hands are shaking.
“Donovan. Please!” Oh God, I’m not kidding!”
She slaps my face as hard as I’ve ever been slapped.
“Fuck me!”
“I can’t.”
She slaps me again.
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