Hold ’Em Hostage Page 11

  “I guess we’ll all just have to walk hand in hand with our hearts and minds,” Frank finally said, piercing me with a hot look. “And make our decisions with influence from both.”

  I knew that cost him. He was a total mind man. He was compromising—willing to use his heart on Affie if I’d use mine on him? Or maybe he was just hoping I would use more mind on him than I normally would since heart usually wasn’t in question with me. Hmm. Affie was worth the bargain.

  “I guess we will, then,” I said softly, wrapping my arms around Shana and leading her to the bedroom. “Hearts and minds and the supernatural. Maybe it will combine to find a scared little teenager.”

  Get to the next round. Talk to as many reporters as you can. Dress up!

  You know, if it weren’t made up of letters cut out of a newspaper and slipped under our door, I’d have thought the note was written by she who dubbed herself my fashionista/ imagista—Ingrid—trying to give me some PR pointers. Instead I realized it was Aph’s captors, giving me my orders.

  Your goddaughter is counting on you.

  I’d put on some coffee before the paper on the floor caught my gaze. Now the smell of java brewing made my knees weak. Pouring a cup, I studied the note, remembering belatedly only to handle it at the corners so Frank’s lab could get any possible fingerprints. It sounded like a pep talk not a kidnapper’s demand. I just didn’t get it. Why would they be forcing me to do something I had intended to do all along—except maybe talk to reporters?

  I turned on CNN, kept the volume low since I seemed to be the only one awake and sipped my coffee. I needed to think about Affie and ways to find her, but heaven help me, all I could think about was Frank, and his ex-wife, and the men he killed. I couldn’t wait to get back to the WSOP to quiz Serrano with all the things I’d been too brain-frozen to ask the night before. As I paced behind the wet bar, I glanced at the TV. The news anchor had a WSOP emblem graphic by her head as she introduced the next news story. I hurried over to the set.

  “…a bit of controversy was stirred up at the largest poker tournament in history—the World Series of Poker 2008, being held in Las Vegas this week.” The camera switched to video of the protestors outside the Fortune. “A band of religious followers of the Church of the Believers picketed in front of the hotel hosting the event that has attracted more than eleven thousand entrants to the most popular card game in the world—Texas Hold ’Em.” Up popped Phineas Paul. “Sins and devils who promote them will steal our children away to darkness!”

  Ack. That scared even me, and I was the evildoer he was talking about! Then, as if conjured, up I popped on the screen. “I certainly respect Mr. Paul’s right to free speech.”

  Hmm. Not a bad sound bite but my voice sounded a bit twangy and the fuschia shorts had to go.

  The landline on the coffee table rang. I jumped, then plucked it up quickly. “Keep it up,” the androgynous voice said through the receiver, followed by a dial tone.

  I swallowed hard and slowly replaced the receiver. I changed the channel and saw Fox was showing the same story. I switched again to local news and they were just finishing playing the same sound bite.

  I suddenly felt so alone and vulnerable, I considered waking Frank.

  The anchorwoman had moved on to the next story and I only half listened as I stood, walking toward the opposite bedroom door. “…a middle-aged man found dead in an alley behind the Fortune.”

  I knocked on the door and waited and the anchorwoman chattered on, “…thought to have died of a knife wound or wounds…”

  Ben yanked the door open, glaring. “What?”

  “Wake Frank,” I glared back, savoring a sip of coffee just to irritate him.

  “Frank’s not here,” Ben snapped back. He slammed the door and added behind it, “He never went to bed.”

  Annie Anchor sounded way too chipper as she explained, “…not yet releasing his name, they say that he is a resident of Los Angeles, California, and a former police detective.”

  My heart seized. I gasped.

  A click sounded outside the front door. A second later, in walked Frank. I ran to him and gathered him in a hug. He kissed the top of my head. “Wow, I should go out all night more often.”

  Then I got mad. “Where have you been?”

  Thirteen

  “I knew that had to be coming,” Frank muttered jokingly. He grabbed my coffee cup, nabbed a sip and pulled a face. “Too strong.”

  I always used double the grounds recommended to brew a pot—the more caffeine the better. “Don’t change the subject. I want to know where you were. I thought you were dead.”

  I waved toward the TV, which was showing the sheet-draped corpse being loaded into the medical examiner’s van.

  “Why did you think that was me?”

  “It’s a former LAPD detective.”

  Frank ground his jaw and turned away, pointing to the note on the bar. “What’s this?”

  “Love note.”

  “You didn’t touch it, did you?” Frank demanded, fishing a plastic evidence bag out of his computer case and carefully slipping it in as he read it. “Weird,” he murmured.

  “No kidding.” I said. “He called too, right after the news ran some coverage of Paul’s protestors and me spouting off about the First Amendment. The creep told me to keep up the good work.”

  Frank frowned. The phone rang. I jumped and he grabbed the receiver, barking into it, “Yes?”

  With a brief greeting to Jack, he passed it to me. “I was worried, Jack, when I didn’t hear from you last night.”

  “Bee Cool, stay c-cool. It’s hard to remain b-believably undercover if you’re phoning home every other m-minute, issuing upd-dates.”

  “Okay, okay, point taken.”

  “This is the b-buzz: apparently there is some high-level c-collusion going on in the high-stakes ring games in the major p-poker rooms. Nobody I found knows any names, so I g-guess there aren’t any faces involved—just d-day players. No one’s been caught but everyone’s talking about it. Two b-big-name guys I overheard said even if they found a c-colluder they were going to go protectionist.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “They’ll d-deal with it privately because of that religious n-nut and his p-protestors. They don’t want any bad press for the game right now, especially during the WSOP.”

  “Since when do gamblers care about press?”

  “The m-main answer to that is—since Hold ’Em became the world’s favorite g-game. That means more money but also more s-scrutiny, and possibly more regulations. Most of the pros who really make a l-living at this would just rather have the old days back, I think. P-poker’s a different world than it was even five years ago, Bee.”

  “So I suppose the casinos have extra security in the poker rooms?”

  “They d-did where I was, but that may j-just be because of the higher volume of players in t-town r-right now. Every p-poker room is expecting more offshoot action.”

  “Now, what do you think this means to me?”

  “No clue, b-baby,” Jack said. “Maybe n-nothing. We’ll see. People bound to be talking about you today, what with your f-famous sound bite.”

  I grimaced. “Ugh.”

  “Hey, d-don’t c-complain. Ingrid’s already b-been on your website m-making the most of this. She’s intent on f-finding a way for you to c-capitalize financially.”

  “I don’t want to do that,” I argued.

  “Whatever. Ingrid usually g-gets what she w-wants.”

  Understatement of the year. Ingrid also got ten percent of my poker income but I doubted that was her motivation. Making my life complicated was her juice.

  “S-speaking of which,” Jack continued, “She wants b-brunch. You think you can h-hang with Shana until eleven or so?”

  “No problem, she’s intent on going back to this medium, and I want to be with her for that. Meet you outside the Fortune at eleven thirty, okay?”

  “It’s a p-plan.”

>   As he rang off, Frank came in from the bedroom. “I don’t like the way this feels, but I don’t know why.”

  “Were you listening?” He cocked his head. Great investigator I was. I’d seen him disappear into the bedroom, but never listened for the click on the line. Humph.

  “Are you going to tell me what you found out at the tattoo parlor or not?” Frank asked.

  “Maybe not, unless you tell me about the murders in L.A. and your ex-wife.”

  Frank turned his back to me, striding to the window. “My story won’t help Aphrodite and it will only distract us from the search.”

  “Damn you,” I whispered because, of course, he was right. I gave him the lowdown on the meaning of the gang’s tattoo.

  Frank turned around, his face transformed with tight intensity. “I have an informant who is in jail in Los Angeles. He’ll know about this, but I’ll have to fly to see him in person. I hate to leave you.” I could see in his eyes that he wasn’t going to be missing my company as much as he was afraid I was going to get whacked.

  “I’ll be okay. Ben’s here. Ingrid’s here. Joe’s here. My invisible cop bodyguard is somewhere around.”

  Frank shook his head and pinned me with a hard look. “Remember, consider cops an enemy, although they will save you from bodily harm so they can prosecute you without public sympathy.”

  “Heartwarming, but we will use what we can,” I chirped as I sipped my coffee. The caffeine was making me brave. “Besides, I’ll ask Shana’s psychic if I have anything to worry about.”

  “Don’t you dare.” Frank turned dead serious. “Her kind of vague predictions will only make you second-guess yourself, your judgment and the facts. Promise me you will not listen to anything she says about you, okay?”

  I sighed. “Go on to the airport. Hurry back. I’ll try to be alive when you get here.”

  Frank shot me a warning glance, grabbed his computer and strode out the door.

  Brooding Ben accompanied Shana and me to the psychic, despite my protestations. I hated to say it, but this earnest brother business was getting on my nerves. I wanted my narcissistic twin back. Moon the Medium operated out of an arch-shaped tent in a trailer park. It was already ninety-eight degrees in the shade at ten thirty in the morning and Moon’s office was not air-conditioned.

  We ducked under the edges of the tent, open sided and about the size of a tennis court. The interior—to use the term loosely—reflected a celestial theme, the night sky, planets, stars, moons (duh) painted on the underside of the tent that soared to at least twenty feet in the center.

  “How did you find this goon?” Ben stage-whispered in Shana’s ear.

  She glared and batted him away.

  “It’s Moon, dear, not Goon,” corrected the woman sitting cross-legged on a pillow dead center under Mars.

  Shana threw him a triumphant look. Ben refused to look abashed.

  Moon continued to address only Ben, with a singular focus from her pale blue, almost tintless gray, eyes. It was entirely disconcerting, even for someone on the outside of the range. “It’s good to open your mind to things metaphysical, especially when you have been entirely too physical your whole life.”

  I snorted. I couldn’t help it, because her meaning was clear. Ben was promiscuous. “I like to stay in shape,” Ben said, a little uncertainly.

  I looked at him askance. He was naturally muscle tight with absolutely no effort and no regular exercise. Just another example of me being gypped at birth. “You know very well, Benjamin, Scorpio, that it is not what I was referring to. Your aura is one of a…tomcat.”

  A giggle escaped. Shana almost smiled. Frowning, Ben leaned in to Shana. “Why did you tell her all this stuff about me?”

  Shana shook her head in denial. “Maybe it was a good guess.”

  “Maybe one of your conquests has already been here, those odds are better,” I put in.

  Ben narrowed his eyes at me as Moon said, “Yes, one has.”

  “Really? Who?” I asked.

  Moon just smiled directly at me, serenely and very oddly, then looked up at the tent and closed her eyes.

  “We brought something that was once Affie’s. It was hers for a long time,” Shana said to Moon. “Like you asked.”

  On the drive over, Shana had explained that Moon used psychometry—the use of solid objects—to try to feel her subjects. Impressions can’t be erased over time, according to Moon. Something owned by someone will continue to radiate that person’s aura. It made me think of a dime and how much aura it was exuding. Supposedly metal transmitted “impressions” the best. I considered handing over a dime—think of the headache that would give Moon—instead I passed Shana the talisman Affie had given me when I opened my own business—it was a copper disc that read: “Determination destroys all fear.”

  I held my breath while she fingered the copper.

  “Belinda, you are in crisis,” Moon informed me, still with her eyes closed, neck bent back. No duh. If stars didn’t tell her that one, the line between my eyebrows that rivaled the Grand Canyon sure did.

  “Blood, I see.”

  I gasped. “No! Not Affie?!”

  She shook her head gravely. “No, I have to get through your impressions on the coin before I get to hers. Water. A man.” She paused. I wasn’t impressed. She probably saw the news, although none of the stations had connected me to the body in the Image lagoon that I knew of. Still, maybe she knew someone at the cop shop.

  “No, three men and blood. Maybe even six now. I feel your love there—for which I don’t know. Money? A wheelchair? A Bible?”

  Her eyebrows were drawn together as she dropped her head and pinned me with a look through to my soul. I shivered. Whoa. Nobody around me knew this stuff but Frank himself and Serrano.

  Who were the six men? Maybe the men Frank killed, the man in the lagoon, Frank—that left two unknowns.

  I shook my head. I was buying into this, exactly what Frank warned me against. “I hope not. I hope there’s no more death.” Enough about me, it was freaking me out. “What about Affie?” I asked again.

  Moon moved the copper disc to her forehead. After a minute or so, she spoke. “I see lots of teenage girls. Is she in camp?”

  “No,” Shana said, obviously disappointed. “She’s never been to camp. She’s not the type.”

  “Dormitory atmosphere, the great outdoors. I see her playing volleyball, kayaking. I see a snake?”

  Shana, Ben and I shared a look and shrugged. Frank had warned me not to get our hopes up but I had regardless. Damn.

  “Is that all?” I asked finally when Moon didn’t elaborate.

  “She’s missing you, but not hurting. And…”

  We all leaned forward as if we could draw more out with our bodies. “That’s all.” Moon pivoted her head back forward and slowly opened her bizarre-colored eyes. Suddenly she started pouring with sweat, like a faucet had been opened. Now, I have to admit I’d been sweating too, after all it was a hundred blasted degrees, but while I might’ve felt like I’d just run a marathon, I don’t think I looked like Moon. She held her arms out to her sides and the corners of her wrap dripped.

  “Thank you,” Shana breathed. Ben was watching the sweat pool on the tent floor like it was going to come to life. And then it did, in a way. It began to flow like a tiny river, to form a tiny lake in a divet in the rug-covered sand.

  “Time to settle down, Benjamin.” She smiled at my brother. “Time to become a penguin.”

  “I don’t like tuxes much,” he answered Moon. She smiled benignly and closed her eyes.

  “Hey,” Ben mused a second later as we walked away, “don’t penguin males take care of their young while the females go out on the hunt?”

  “She probably sensed you’d gotten one of your latest dates pregnant. Now you have to go home and figure out who it is. That alone could take nine months.” I laughed and bumped Shana, who normally would enjoy digging Ben. Instead she looked away, tension wracking her body. Slightly
suspicious, then immediately guilty for feeling suspicious, I wrapped my arm around her shoulders. This emotional roller coaster was taking a toll on my best friend. I was going to have to find her daughter soon or she was going to lose her mind.

  Fourteen

  Ringo waited inside the Fortune, in the hallway leading to the WSOP ballroom, holding a big white FedEx box and bouncing on the balls of his feet. Ringo was my sunglass savior, BeeCoolHoldEm.com columnist of Ringo’s Shadey Report. He was an accountant in Nova Scotia when he wasn’t wasting his time trying to keep me properly shaded at poker tournaments. I was forever forgetting my sunglasses and, according to those who knew me, I would never have won a hand at Hold ’Em without hiding my tell-all orbs.

  Ben had dropped us off with Ingrid across the street from the casino. Jack had a hot lead and ran off to follow it before we’d arrived. Since Paul’s protestors were still mobbing the Fortune’s entrance, I made the duo take off from there for a satellite at Poseidon’s, anticipating Shana’s sadness at seeing all the girls near her daughter’s age at the picket line. They were painful reminders of Affie, somewhere out there.

  As I wove my way through to the front door of the casino, I’d asked one of the girls, “Does your mother know you’re here?” I wondered if the church was a family affair.

  “Hell no,” the girl said, waving her sign that read: Poker Sinners: REDEMPTION is the Only Holy Bet. Cute. “And even if she did, she wouldn’t care.”

  Huh, maybe Paul had a really strong youth program. I hoped he didn’t hear her using profanity, though, because I ventured to guess he wouldn’t be too keen on it. A casino security guard who apparently thought I was in trouble reached into the throng and grabbed me out before I could ask her any more questions. Probably good thing, because Paul came around the corner about then and seemed intent on me. I slipped into the casino before he could open his mouth.

  “Ringo.” I bent down to kiss him on the cheek. He blushed and fingered his four hairs over his bald spot. “You didn’t have to come.”