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  He frowned at himself for even thinking about it. He wasn’t supposed to be thinking like this. It wasn’t exactly positive thinking, and that was bad for Renée. She needed positive thoughts, lots of them. But still, horny is horny. And he couldn’t deny that Loretta was having an effect on him.

  Sort of. A little bit.

  He glanced over at her. She was staring out the window. He wondered if she was nervous about going undercover. She looked like she could be nervous.

  “If you want to back out of this, Loretta, that’s okay. I understand.”

  “No,” she said, turning to face him. “I said I’d do it.”

  “I’ll just tell Temple the deal’s off.”

  “I said I’ll do it.”

  “You’re not worried? What if something happens?”

  “I can take care of myself. I’m not completely inept.”

  “I never said you were. It’s just that, you know, when people feel cornered, they get desperate, they do crazy things.”

  “Marvelli, we’re talking about embezzlers, not killers. Martha Lee has no history of violence. And Roger Laplante? Come on. Have you ever seen a bigger wuss?”

  “Don’t underestimate them, Loretta? Never underestimate anyone. You’re going in there to take Martha Lee’s life away from her. You realize that, don’t you? Same thing with her boss. You’d fight for your freedom, wouldn’t you? No reason to think they won’t do the same.”

  “Stop worrying, Marvelli. I don’t take unnecessary risks.”

  He looked at her. “You asked to work for the Jump Squad, didn’t you?”

  She didn’t answer him.

  “Here.” He pulled out his wallet and dug out a business card. “See my beeper number on the bottom? Use it if you have to.”

  “Marvelli—”

  “For my peace of mind, okay? If you get in any trouble and you need me, call my beeper and just leave any number that ends in 1111. That way I’ll know it’s you.”

  Marvelli put on his directional and turned left off the highway. The front entrance to Rancho Bonita was down this road about a mile or so. He drove for a while without saying a word. All signs of civilization soon disappeared as the brush along the road grew thicker and took over the shoulders. He looked sideways at Loretta. His card was still in her hand as if she didn’t want to keep it.

  “Take it, Loretta. Just in case.”

  She responded with a testy sigh.

  “Any number with four ones on the end and I’ll be there in a flash.”

  “Will you bring doughnuts?” she asked sarcastically.

  “Just take it,” he said as he pulled up to the guardhouse at the front gates.

  A perky little blonde poked her head out of the guard booth. “Welcome to Rancho Bonita,” she said.

  “Hi,” Marvelli said, forcing himself to look pleasant because he knew Loretta was scowling at the girl.

  “Do you have a reservation, sir?”

  “Yes. For my wife.” He could hear her shifting in her seat.

  The blonde pulled out a clipboard. “And the name, sir?”

  “Mrs. Frank Marvelli.”

  She ran her finger down the clipboard, then looked up and smiled. “Okay,” she said. “Drive right in and go to the front desk. I’ll call ahead and let them know you’re here.” She bent down so she could see Loretta. “Enjoy your stay, Mrs. Marvelli.”

  Marvelli pressed the accelerator and drove through the gates before Loretta gave her the finger.

  “Mrs. Marvelli, huh? When did we get married?” Loretta was doing a slow boil.

  He shrugged helplessly. “I had to make the reservation in my name. We told that guy Lance that we were a couple.”

  “You told him. I didn’t.”

  He pulled into a parking space and shut off the engine. “Is this gonna be a problem?” he asked.

  Loretta was still fuming when she got to her suite, which was on the first floor of a small two-story town house. The entrance to the suite upstairs was on the other side of the building, assuring privacy for both guests. There were dozens of these little town houses in this section of Rancho Bonita, but they were positioned at all angles, buried in palms and ferns, so that despite their proximity, every suite seemed to be all by itself buried in the jungle. She’d stayed in one of these town houses the last time she was here, and she hated the design.

  Why isolate people? she wondered. Or was it that fat people shouldn’t be able to look at each other? You put too many of them together, they might start thinking they’re normal. God forbid.

  The room was nice, but a little too Laura Ashley for Loretta’s tastes. She noticed that there wasn’t a little courtesy refrigerator anywhere in sight, which didn’t surprise her. That had pissed her off the last time she was here. Roger Laplante didn’t trust his guests to control themselves, which she had absolutely no intention of doing anyway.

  The Hispanic bellboy—who was dressed in black shorts and a white polo shirt like everyone else who worked here—set her overnight bag down on the luggage caddy. He was smiling like an idiot, thinking he was going to get a big tip, but she glowered at him the whole time, so he didn’t even bother to hang around. He wasn’t going to get squat from her because she didn’t want to be here.

  But after he left, she felt bad. It occurred to her that maybe a lot of fat people were angry that they’d come here, so they didn’t tip. She thought about calling him back to give him a couple of bucks just so she wouldn’t be like the rest of them, but by the time she poked her head out the door he was already gone. Nothing but gently swaying ferns in his wake.

  Crap, she thought as she started to close the door. She’d catch him later.

  “Hel-lo-o!”

  Loretta cringed when she heard the voice.

  The last person in the world she wanted to see came bounding down the path like a raptor in Reeboks. Lance the aerobics instructor stood at her door, smiling like a dope, running in place. “I just wanted to welcome you to Rancho Bonita and tell you how glad I am that you decided to stay with us . . . again.”

  Loretta’s heart stopped. “Excuse me.”

  He rubbed his index fingers together, shame-shame. “You were here before, weren’t you? I thought you looked familiar this morning. I’m terrible with names, but I never forget a shape.”

  Her vision blurred as an overwhelming urge to punch his lights out came over her. She clenched her fists until it passed.

  “Come on, admit it,” he said. “You stayed with us a few years ago, right? And it didn’t work for you, right?”

  “Well . . . yeah. . . .” She wanted to kill him, hide his body in the bushes.

  “Well, I just want you to know that when people come here and they don’t get the results they want, I take it as a personal failure. I just didn’t work hard enough with you last time, and I apologize. But this time I’m going to make it up to you. Cross my heart and hope to die.”

  That can he arranged, she thought.

  But she suddenly realized that this wasn’t funny. How much did this little creep remember about her? She’d checked in as “Mrs. Frank Marvelli,” and Marvelli had suggested she use her own first name, so she wouldn’t get caught not answering to a fake name. But Lance could be a big problem. He knew her as Loretta Kovacs the last time she was here. She also seemed to remember some sort of touchy-feely get-together that Lance had run the last time where the fatties were supposed to tell the group something about themselves and bare their souls. Problem was, she didn’t remember how much of her soul she’d bared. It had been right after the Brenda Hemingway incident, so she’d been pretty shaky at the time. She wished she could remember how much she’d said about herself. What if this little twerp blew her cover? He could ruin everything.

  But how much could Lance remember? she reasoned, trying to calm herself down. That had been three years ago. As Marvelli said, thousands of guests must have passed through here since then. You’d have to be pretty outstandingly plump for anyone on staff to r
emember you, she told herself. And that, she wasn’t.

  Lance’s eyes were squeezed shut, his hand on his forehead, like a mind reader. “It’s an L name, right?”

  “What?” Her heart was suddenly pounding.

  “Don’t tell me now. I’ll think of it.” He pressed his lips together, thinking hard. “Is it Lori? Laurel? Something like that?”

  The blood drained out of her face.

  “Lorinda maybe?”

  “Rumpelstiltskin,” she said.

  His eyes popped open. “O-ho! You are funny.” He tilted his head to the side and looked up at her with an impish twinkle in his eye. “So are you going to tell me your name? Or are you going to keep me in suspense?”

  She gritted her teeth and forced a smile. “I’m going to hang you up by your toes and tickle you to death.”

  And then eat you, she thought.

  He stopped jogging and clutched his belly, laughing like a real bozo. But suddenly he switched gears and pouted like a mime. “You’re not going to tell me your name, are you?”

  She grinned at him, wishing he would have a stroke. “No. I want you to guess.”

  He brushed away an imaginary tear, still pouting.

  “And I bet you won’t remember by the end of the week,” she said.

  “Okay, you’re on.” He started to jog in place again. “This’ll be fun.”

  “Absolutely.”

  “So how about we go over to the gym and get you started on some toning exercises? Then we can get you into the sauna and maybe fit you in for a Scotch hose before dinner.”

  Loretta shuddered. She remembered the Scotch hose. Some sadistic matron taking target practice on your naked body with a fire hose fitted with a pinprick nozzle. It was amazing the Geneva Conference hadn’t outlawed it.

  “Gee, that sounds great,” she said, “but I promised to meet an old friend at”—she glanced at her wristwatch—“three-fifteen. She works here.”

  “Well, all right,” he said, jogging along, bouncing up and down, going nowhere. “But I’m going to make you my personal mission while you’re here. I guarantee I’ll get you down to a size twelve in no time.”

  “I am a size twelve.” You fucking little shit!

  “Really?”

  “Yes.”

  Most of the time, she thought.

  He shrugged and started to jog off. “I’ll see you later then.”

  “Oh, before you go,” she called after him. “My friend told me to meet her at her apartment, but she didn’t tell me where the staff lives around here.”

  Lance pointed down another path. “Follow this past the building where the restaurant is. Then go past the tennis courts and turn left. Staff housing is on the other side of the parking lot. Do you want me to take you there?”

  “No, that’s all right.”

  Just get lost, dweeb!

  “Okay, bye-ee,” he said as he jogged backward down the path.

  “Later,” she said, heading back into her room.

  But then she heard him yelling from twenty yards away. “I’ve got it! It’s Loretta, right? Loretta. And you do something in law enforcement? Am I right?”

  Loretta’s stomach bottomed out. Oh, shit!

  13

  Martha Lee kept thinking about the Browning automatic in the night table drawer, buried all the way in the back behind the nail polish bottles, nail polish remover, emery boards, scissors, barrettes, the earrings that didn’t have a match anymore, all that stuff. Naked, lying on her back in bed and staring at the ceiling, Martha was thinking about getting the gun out. But there was a problem. Torpedo Joe had his big leg draped over her legs and his big paw on her tit. She could barely move. The gun was stuck in her mind, though. She couldn’t think of any other way to get rid of him.

  She glanced at his face. He seemed to be sleeping, but she couldn’t tell for sure. He ought to be sleeping, goddammit, she thought. After one go-round, most men just conk right out, and she and Joe had already done it twice. He wasn’t half-bad, all things considered. Pretty gentle for a guy his size. And he had waited for her to come first both times. It wasn’t exactly her idea of romance, but she didn’t realize how much she’d missed sex until Joe had shown up.

  Of course, the fact that having sex with him had saved her life for the time being probably had a lot to do with the way she felt. He hadn’t actually threatened her yet, or even said what he was here for, but she knew. When Torpedo Joe Pickett showed up at your door, you didn’t have to ask why.

  Something suddenly occurred to her. Maybe this was something new for him. Instead of coming to shoot her, he was planning on fucking her to death. He had a dick like a Louisville Slugger, and she swore to God she’d never come so many times in a row in her life. Maybe his plan was to keep doing it until she had a heart attack and died.

  She thought about the .22 again and frowned. Even if she could get to it, it wouldn’t do her any good. She didn’t know how to use it really, and Joe probably got into fights every day. He’d take it away from her in no time flat. Or else she’d get a shot off and then find out that a little .22 couldn’t pierce his thick rhino hide.

  She wiggled her toes and tried to bend her knees, but his leg was a deadweight on top of her, cutting off the circulation. Maybe that’s how he planned to kill her. Fuck her a few more times, then just lie down on top of her. Death by weight.

  But even if she could get away from Joe, the goddamn IRS guys were gonna screw everything up. Once they got into the books, they’d figure out that the Alvarez Cocoa Company was a scam. They probably already knew that if, as she suspected, they had a spy here at the spa. That’s how they operated, those bastards. Undercover agents snooping around, getting in your underwear, finding out everything. Low-down sons of bitches, that’s all they were.

  She glanced at Joe’s closed eyes. At least he was out in the open about it, she thought. He didn’t sneak around pretending to be somebody else. He was what he was. Ding-dong! Hit man! Here to kill you.

  Ding-dong, she thought glumly.

  Hmmm . . . maybe.

  “Joe,” she said. “You awake, Joe?”

  “Yup,” he said right away. He didn’t open his eyes, but he’d apparently been awake the whole time.

  “I got a proposition for you, Joe. You wanna hear it?”

  He scratched that little braid under his lip but didn’t open his eyes. “I’m listening.”

  “I know you didn’t come here to see me because I look like Cindy Crawford or anything. You’re here to kill me, right?”

  “Yup.” He rubbed his nose with the back of his finger.

  “How much they paying you to do me?”

  “Can’t tell you that, Martha Lee.”

  “Why not?”

  “It’s unethical.”

  “Whatever it is, I’ll double it.”

  “For just going away?”

  “Nope. I got somebody you have to do for me.”

  He opened one eye a slit. “You couldn’t afford it.”

  “Oh, no? Name your price.”

  “I’m getting fifteen to do you, honey bun.”

  “Then I’ll give you thirty. Fifteen for the hit, fifteen to leave me be.”

  Joe grinned at her. “You’re full of it, sweetness. You ain’t got that kind of money,”

  “You don’t think so? What do you think I’m doing here then? Working on my tan? Moving money around is my specialty, in case they didn’t tell you that up north. I move it places where no one else can get to it but me.” She didn’t have squat on hand, but that didn’t bother her. If she knew anything, she knew that she could be damn convincing when it came to bullshitting people about money.

  Joe opened his eyes all the way and stared into her face as he circled her nipple with his index finger. It was as big and blunt as a Havana cigar but very gentle to the touch. “Who is this person you want done?”

  “We talking hypothetical, or we talking deal?”

  “Tell me who it is and I’ll let you
know.”

  “I’ve got a bad feeling the government’s got an undercover agent here snooping on me. You find out who that person is and get rid of him, and you got yourself thirty grand.”

  Joe laughed his husky laugh. “You mean to tell me you don’t even know who this person is? You want me to play detective and do the deed? Get real, darling.”

  “Thirty grand. Cash. No bullshit.” She looked him right in the eye and didn’t flinch. It was her bear-trap face. If she could get him to buy the hard sincerity of the bear-trap face, she had him caught.

  “I’m talking cash, Joe. I got it in a safety-deposit box not too far from here. Find the rat and eliminate my problem. That’s all you have to do.”

  Joe grunted. His eyes were slits.

  “What do you think, Joe?”

  Joe tugged on his braid and seriously considered it. Thirty grand was hard to turn down. It would get him another Harley, a nice one. It would also bankroll him for a while, give him a nice little break from all the bullshit. He was getting tired of all this killing shit.

  “Hello, Joe? I want you to go up to Maine and do this guy who screwed me.”

  “Hello, Joe? You got time to go down to Oklahoma and show my old lady she fucked with me for the last time?”

  “Hello, Joe? I gotta little job for you if you wanna go out to Vegas.”

  All those miles were wearing him down. He wouldn’t mind sitting tight for a couple of months. Maybe renting a room and getting himself a coffeemaker. Get up every morning and make himself a good cup of coffee. Just stare out the window and take his time drinking it, enjoying every drop. He thought about that a lot. It was one of those simple pleasures he never got to have because he was always on the road, at the mercy of every stinking greasy spoon between here and there, always having to rush off to kill somebody new. Yeah, thirty grand would be real nice.