“Master key,” he said.
“Mick, no. I could get fired.”
“Then wait downstairs.”
But she didn’t. She watched him pick the lock on Maggie’s door, then slipped into the room behind him. She said nothing and scarcely moved while he checked the bathroom and the closets to see if they were alone.
“Mick, come here.”
On the bedstand were two prescription bottles, a plastic bedpan, and a pink-splotched surgical compress. Stranahan glanced at the pills: Tylenol No. 3 and Darvocet. The bottle of Darvocets had not yet been opened. A professional business card lay next to the telephone on Maggie’s nightstand. Stranahan chuckled drily when he read what was on the card:
Leonard R. Leaper, M.D.
Certified by the American Board of Plastic Surgery
Office: 555-6600 Nights and Emergencies: 555-6677
“How nice,” Christina remarked. “She took our money and got a face-lift.”
Stranahan said, “Something’s not right. She ought to be in bed.”
“Maybe she went for brunch at the Four Seasons.”
He shook his head. “These scrips are only two days old, so that’s when she had the surgery. She’s still got to be swollen up like a mango. Would you go out in public looking like that?”
“Depends on how much dope I ate.”
“No,” Stranahan said, scanning the room, “Something’s not right. She ought to be here.”
“What do you want to do?”
Stranahan said they should go downstairs and wait in the lobby; in her condition, Maggie shouldn’t be hard to spot. “But first,” he said, “let’s really go through this place.”
Christina went to the dresser. Under a pile of Maggie’s bras and panties she found three new flowered bikinis, the price tags from the Plaza Shops still attached. Maggie was definitely getting ready for Maui.
“Oh, Miss Marks,” Stranahan sang out. “Lookie here.”
It was a video cassette in a brown plastic sleeve. The sleeve was marked with a sticker from Midtown Studio Productions.
Stranahan tossed Christina the tape. She tossed it back.
“We can’t take that, it’s larceny.”
He said, “It’s not larceny to take something you already own.”
“What do you mean?”
“If this is what I think it is, you’ve paid for it already. The Barletta story, remember?”
“We don’t know that. Could be anything—home movies, maybe.”
Stranahan smiled and stuffed the cassette into his coat. “Only one way to find out.”
“No,” Christina said.
“Look, you got a VCR at your place. Let’s go watch the tape. If I’m wrong, then I’ll bring it back myself.”
“Oh, I see. Just sneak in, put it back where you got it, tidy up the place.”
“Yeah, if I’m wrong. If it turns out to be Jane Fonda or something. But I don’t think so.”
Christina Marks knew better; it was madness, of course. She could lose her job, blow a perfectly good career if they were caught. But, then again, this hadn’t turned out to be the typical Reynaldo Flemm expose. She had damn near gotten machine-gunned over this one, so what the hell.
Grudgingly she said, “Is it Beta or VHS?”
Stranahan gave her a hug.
Then they heard the key in the door.
The two couples said nothing for the first few seconds, just stared. Mick Stranahan and Christina Marks had the most to contemplate: a woman wrapped in tape, and a beanpole assassin with one arm down to his knees.
Maggie Gonzalez was the first to speak: “It’s him.”
“Who?” Chemo asked. He had never seen Stranahan up close, not even at the stilt house.
“Him,” Maggie repeated through the bandages. “What’re you doing in my room?”
“Hello, Maggie,” Stranahan said, “assuming it’s you under there. It’s sure been a long time.”
“And you!” Maggie grunted, pointing at Christina Marks.
“Hi, again,” said Christina. “I thought you’d be in Hawaii by now.”
Chemo said, “I guess everybody’s old pals except me.” He pulled the .38 out of his overcoat. “Nobody move.”
“Another one who watches too much TV,” Stranahan whispered to Christina.
Chemo blinked angrily. “I don’t like you one bit.”
“I assumed as much from the fact you keep trying to kill me.” Stranahan had seen some bizarros in his day, but this one took the cake. He looked like Fred Munster with bulimia. One eye on the gun, Stranahan asked, “Do you have a name?”