The walk isn’t far. Riley goes four blocks, two north and two east, and turns in to the Dunstworth Hotel, one of the ornate, old city hotels. Leo stops short, careful not to walk in immediately.
Where’s he going?
Leo doesn’t know. No point in following Riley while he’s inside, anyway, nothing Leo can do, should be safe, no reason to worry, wait it out, won’t be long.
The pain hits his stomach hard. He brings a hand to his belly. It’s all he can do not to double over with the pain. The hot dog didn’t help, but when he’s tired he has to eat more and he’s plenty tired. Electrified but exhausted.
A minute later, a cab pulls up to the hotel. Leo does a double take, but, yes, it’s her. The same one in the photos he has.
Her name is Shelly Trotter.
20
SHELLY STANDS across from me in the elevator, our backs against opposite walls. Between us is an elderly, well-dressed couple, just two more of the Dunstworth Hotel’s wealthy clientele. I catch her eye but we play it cool, like we don’t even know each other. My body is in chaos, my spirit motoring on adrenaline. Suddenly, my headache is history.
She goes first, walks to the suite, and inserts the key card. She holds the door, but I stand there as she walks in and turns to face me. The clench of her jaw could be mistaken for hunger, a primal urge, but I sense ambivalence as well, even conflict.
She begins to unbutton her blouse. I step forward, but suddenly my wingtips are frozen to the carpet. I look over the posh surroundings, take in the smell of her along with the antiseptic scent of a freshly cleaned suite.
“What are we doing here?” I ask.
She shakes her head slowly, continuing to undress, her blouse parting, revealing her pale, freckly skin, a lavender silk bra. She doesn’t know, either.
Maybe that’s all I wanted to see, even the slightest crack in the armor. I move toward her as she backs up, kicking off her heels. Her pants drop to the carpet. She lets me finish the job, unclasping her bra, lowering my mouth below her neckline, as I lay her on the bed. Her skin tastes like salt and smells like fruit. I run my tongue over her rib cage, stick it in her belly button, provoking a reaction from her. I work through the anguish strangling my heart, knowing I want this more than she.
We are tentative, each of us, feeling around the boundaries of something intimate. It’s a bumpy roller-coast ride until she feels me inside her, reacting with a small moan. I look into her eyes and she looks away. Her body goes motionless, letting me take the lead. I run a finger down her face. She closes her eyes, but I can’t read the expression. I bring my mouth to hers, tasting her lip gloss, but her lips don’t part.
This, I know, is wrong, I’m offering but she’s not accepting, but I don’t stop. I grip her hair tightly and increase the pace, closing my eyes like her, escaping into something distant and angry, and holding my breath at the end.
I withdraw immediately and hike up my pants, walking past Shelly toward the window overlooking the street. The sidewalks are filled with people, escaping for lunch to enjoy the weather.
“That was nice,” she says. “I…”
I button my shirt and stare at the faint reflection of my face on the window. I sense her coming up behind me, then her hand on my shoulder, her chin nestling between my shoulder blades.
She doesn’t finish the thought and I don’t help her. The uncompleted sentence basically sums up our relationship.
“It wasn’t nice,” I say. “It felt like a gift.”
Her fingers draw over my back slowly. “I want this to work.”
I close my eyes and tip my head against the window. My heart is ricocheting against my chest and my knees threaten to give out. “But?” I say.
“But it has to be slow.”
“I always said slow is fine.”
“No, Paul.” She laughs quietly. “You moved out of your condo into a single-family home. And that casual walk in front of the jewelry store? Remember that?”
I laugh, too, releasing two months’ worth of tension. She fits in my arms like she never left. I take in the familiar smell of her hair and the shape of her head, knowing that I’m back out on the limb, raw and exposed and thrilled and overwhelmed.
PAUL RILEY AND SHELLY TROTTER say good-bye outside of the Dunstworth Hotel with a release of their held hands, no kiss. Shelly Trotter ducks into a cab while Riley watches her, a gleam in his eye. Yes, he can see it, Riley’s feelings for this woman.
Yes, that could be helpful.
Leo pulls his baseball cap lower on his face and begins walking. It’s time to get ready for tonight.
21
I MAKE IT TO GALA, a new place that opened up a month ago, at half past seven. There’s already a line out the door, but I walk up to the doorman, a foreigner who is roughly the size of two men put together, and give him my name. To the bemusement of the twenty fashionably attired people standing along the sidewalk, I walk right in.
All because I said the two magic words: “Harland Bentley.”
I’m in a suit and tie, which makes me either over- or underdressed, somehow not fitting in. The downstairs is a restaurant at full occupancy. The place sports “Asian fusion” cuisine, whatever the hell that means. The waitstaff is in all black, T-shirts and jeans. The music is some kind of combination pop and dance-pop-disco fusion?-except I don’t think anyone has called it “disco” for the last decade or two. In my book there are two kinds of music, jazz and everything else. Nowadays, it’s more important how you look on a video than how well you sing. Nobody invents new music anymore, anyway, they just create a not-so-subtle variation on an old style and give it a new name.
I give my name to another guy, bigger than the first one, at the staircase that leads up to the bar. I pass a sign on the way up that indicates that this is a coming-out party for some great new artist on the scene. I decide I will not inquire what they mean by “coming out.” I pass two men in turtlenecks, one with a ponytail and one with a shaved head, both of whom wear painfully bored expressions as they bound down the stairs. The music upstairs is, well, like disco used to be. All sorts of computerized sounds, an urgent beat and thumping bass. I can’t believe people listen to this shit. The lighting is almost nonexistent, but the majority of the people are gathered near the center of the room, encircling a man who is, yes, wearing a turtleneck. This is the artist, I dare guess. I should tell him it’s seventy degrees outside.
I take a look over at the bar, briefly considering a martini, when I hear my name. Harland, with an Asian woman on his arm who is almost as tall as he and skinny as a pole. I’m putting her at twenty-three, tops. “Lisa, this is Paul Riley.”
I take her manicured hand and admire her slinky dress a moment. Jeez, this guy goes through women like I go through vodka.
“You really should meet Raven,” he says to me.
“I can’t wait,” I say, though I have no idea what he means. As he waves his hand to someone, I realize that “Raven” is the artist. A wave from Harland seems to count for a lot around here, because before I know it, Raven is standing before Harland, putting his hands together and bowing. His hair is sharply parted and standing on end. His face is pointy and delicate. If this guy didn’t get his ass kicked every day growing up, my mother didn’t raise me Irish Catholic.
“Raven,” Harland shouts over the music, “this is a friend of mine, Paul. Paul, Raven here is one of the most relevant postmodern artists to come along in years.”