Cashed In Page 9

  I’d already grabbed Elva by the elbow and guided her out the door, quizzing her in detail about Rick’s call.

  Ten

  My heart was pounding so hard by the time I found a house phone that I was afraid I wouldn’t hear Rick, even if he was still there to answer. When she’d asked, he’d told Mom that he was praying I could help him with a problem. He’d hung up before she could ask where I could reach him.

  I thought I knew.

  As I played what he’d said over and over in my mind, I realized that the flippant use of the term “pray” might be the way Ingrid or Stella or Ben would use the word but not Rick. When he was praying, I’d bet he was down on his knees.

  The ship’s directory was under the glass on the table, just below the house phone. I found the number for the chapel and dialed. “Hello?” a man’s voice answered tentatively.

  I paused, having not made a plan if I couldn’t recognize Rick’s voice, which of course would be nearly impossible since I had never talked to him over the phone.

  “Rick, it’s Belinda.”

  Sneaky, I know.

  I heard air blow through the lines and nearly hung up. I might have gotten a perverted minister instead of my poker pal. The air blew again, and this time I recognized a sigh. “Bee Cool, can you come help me?”

  “Rick, where have you been? Why do you need help?” I imagined him amidst stained glass, polished oak pews and glowing candles, hands clasped around a Bible, on his knees. “Are you suicidal?”

  “I will be if you don’t get here soon!”

  Click. A buzz signaled the end of the connection. I dialed again and the line was busy.

  Great. I looked back at the directory under glass, my eyes first finding security then the poker tournament office.

  I considered dialing both, pawning this off on Hans or Kinkaid. Then I considered dialing the Santobellas’ room where Delia was surely asleep by now, as emotionally exhausted as she had been hours ago. This was her husband and her problem, after all. Yet, something stopped me. The begging in his tone, maybe. A sense of danger niggling at the base of my spine. Mostly, the fact that I wasn’t sure if this was really Rick, which, of course, was probably the best reason for calling in reinforcements. If someone was pretending to be Rick, it was probably the bad guys who nabbed him.

  Where was Frank when I needed him?

  I called the next best man, who was a far cry from Frank in a crisis, but all I had. “Yo.” he answered. I could hear a pleading voice in the background.

  “Ben, I need you to help me.”

  “No way, no how, sis. You already helped enough with your boyfriends’ head trips. I don’t need any more help tonight except the help Stella’s giving me right now. Excuse me.”

  “But—” Click.

  I could have been in the process of having my arm sawed off and my brother wouldn’t be interrupted from his extracurricular activities. I sighed and wished for Frank again. I could call Ian, I supposed, although I didn’t quite trust him enough. Then I remembered someone aboard I did trust.

  Good old Ringo appeared, sleepy eyed, but with his five long hairs carefully combed over his bald spot, outside the chapel at 3:37 a.m., no questions asked. I’d hated to wake him, especially with the lame excuse of returning his Anarchys in the middle of the night. I didn’t want to get him involved in any danger that might accompany my meeting with mystery-man-maybe-Rick but I thought if I got the chance to scream as he headed down the hall, he could call for my rescue.

  “Now you can use these if you play any cash games tomorrow morning,” I said breezily.

  “Bee Cool, the ring games don’t open until after noon.”

  “Is that right? Well, gosh darn, I didn’t have to get you out of bed then, but I will sleep better knowing they are back with their rightful owner. Now let me pay you for my lucky Gargoyles.”

  He patted me on the shoulder, reviewing me like I was his addled yet favorite great aunt. “It gives me more pleasure to see you wear them than to wear them myself, Bee Cool. I feel part of a success I could never be.”

  “Oh, Ringo, that’s not true, your day will come.”

  “How can you sound so sure?”

  “Dating someone special?” I asked, noting he wore no wedding band.

  Ringo shook his head sadly. “Not for years.”

  “Then it’s your time at the poker tables,” I assured him cheerily, reaching into my purse and pulling out Richard’s card. “Find this guy on board. He’ll give you some hope.”

  Ringo nodded, reviewing the card. “Okay. Can I walk you to your room?”

  “Uh . . .” I glanced at the chapel door and put my hand on the handle. “You go on. I’m going to have some alone time first.”

  “I can wait for you.” Ringo offered eagerly.

  “No, that’s okay,” I paused. “But, if you hear me scream or anything, go ahead and call security.”

  “Why would you scream?” Ringo asked, aghast.

  “Uh, sometimes I have a flashback to a terrible thing that happened to me years ago, and I get uncontrollable. It’s better to just let security get me back to my cabin where I can chill out.”

  “Are you sure?” His eyes twice as big as usual behind his bifocals, imagination working overtime.

  “It’s, y’know, embarrassing. I’d just rather you not see me that way.” I dropped my head.

  Ringo patted my arm. “I understand.”

  Sighing dramatically, I nodded, waved Ringo on and didn’t open the chapel door until he began to reluctantly work his way down the hall.

  I waited a beat, pulled the door open and slipped in. It was half dark inside, with faux stained glass throwing colored shades on plastic pews laminated to look like oak. Electric candles instead of wax and flame lit the altar, reminding me again I was on Vegas on the Gulf. I realized I was holding my breath. I was just getting dizzy as a finger tapped my shoulder. I spun around, nearly fell as the room wavered, sunk into a pew and sucked in a couple of breaths. Rick patted my back. “Are you okay?”

  I put my index finger over my lips to shush him. “You scared me,” I whispered.

  “I’m sorry but I just talked to you, who were you expecting?” He asked as he sat down next to me.

  “I didn’t know that was really you on the phone. You disappeared. I’ve never heard your voice over the phone before. We didn’t know if you’d been kidnapped or killed.”

  Rick’s face reddened. He tore his gaze loose from mine and looked down at hands he clasped and unclasped. “Nothing like that.”

  For the first time I noticed the shiny patch of matted hair on the top of his head. I touched it and he winced. My fingers came away with sticky dark goo—blood. “Rick, what happened?”

  “I left the dinner table to avoid the temptation of those desserts, and decided to take the time to explore the ship. I was on the Trips Deck when a woman came up to me. She recognized me from the Bellagio tournament I won last month and asked me if I couldn’t give her a couple of tips on the game.” He’d started to flush again. I guessed the woman might have been admiring more than Rick’s game.

  “What was her name?”

  “Jane.”

  “Sure.” I said and he flushed redder. “Was Jane coming on to you?”

  He looked away, at a stained glass window unfortunately of the Garden of Eden. Oops. He dropped his gaze to his hands again. Clasp. Unclasp. “Maybe a little. She was very attractive, dressed really provocatively, except for her hat and sunglasses. I thought she was trying to be one of us. You maybe.”

  “So you wouldn’t recognize her again?” Except her bra size, probably. I reserved judgment. He was guilty enough with no help from me.

  He shook his head. “Probably not. She did have Marilyn Monroe hair, though, I remember that.”

  Which might have been a wig. “So what happened?”

  “She had a deck of cards with her. We decided to sit down at the Fourth Street restaurant for a few minutes.”

  �
�Which was a ghost town because it was the first night dinner and nobody misses that.”

  He nodded again sheepishly. No telling what happened there. “We went over some advanced strategy. And then . . .”

  I waited a beat. He watched the pulsing light of the electric candles, searching for something in his mind. “And then?” I prompted.

  “And then I don’t remember. I woke up in the maid’s closet on the fourth deck under a stack of dirty towels. And I came here.”

  “Why the chapel?” I asked Rick.

  “What better place to hide on a boat full of gamblers?”

  “Every official on the ship is looking for you, not to mention your wife. Why do you want to hide?”

  “Because I need to come up with a story.”

  Uh-oh. “Why did you call me instead of Delia?”

  “Because I want you to be my alibi.”

  Eleven

  I didn’t want to be anybody’s alibi. I had enough problems of my own to take on more. I sucked in a fortifying breath before I spoke in my best calm, rational voice. “Rick, why do you think you need an alibi?”

  “I don’t know what went down with this Jane woman. Anything could have happened.”

  “Well, obviously, you had a chat, threw around some cards, you got clocked by a heavy object and dragged into a broom closet, left for dead.” I examined his head again and saw it was worse than I first thought. “You need stitches.” I stared at his pupils. “You have a concussion. We have to see the ship’s doctor.”

  He grabbed my wrist and forced me to sit again. “First we have to get our stories straight.”

  “Your story is the one you just told me. My story is the story I just heard. What’s to get straight?”

  “No, I can’t mention the woman. Delia will kill me.”

  “Some stranger might have just tried to do that. So why don’t we try to find her first and deal with the murderous person you’re married to second?” I suggested, striving for patience.

  “No, you don’t understand, I can’t tell my wife about this other woman. See, I was unfaithful once.”

  Dirty laundry. What a mess.

  “What aren’t you telling me?” I demanded.

  “Maybe I wasn’t dragged into the closet. Maybe it was my idea or her idea and we ended up there. Maybe I slipped and fell while I was doing something I wasn’t supposed to and she panicked and ran away.”

  Men. I sighed, closed my eyes and rubbed my now aching temples. I opened my eyes and drilled him with a look reserved for my troublemaking best friend. “You remember sleeping with her?”

  The shocked widening of his eyes gave me the answer before he opened his mouth. “No! I remember fantasizing about it.” He paused, embarrassed. “I remember us playing cards. I don’t remember anything after that until I woke up in the closet.”

  I have a cruel streak, I have to admit. For that was the time I could have told him about Rawhide disappearing too. That Jane might have had something more nefarious on her mind than poker tips and a quickie. Instead, I let the sweat developing on his forehead come to full bloom and slide down his face in rivulets. Finally I asked, “So what is your plan? How do you want to use me?”

  His face flushed again at my words. “It’s not like that. You have kind eyes and a good heart. It just seemed to me you were—”

  “A sucker?” I snapped.

  “A savior,” he breathed.

  Oh please.

  “Listen, Rick, besides the fact that any lie you will tell will be falsified by the video cameras they have on board, Rawhide is missing too. That complicates any story you might want to tell, except a true one.”

  “What!?” Rick wiped the rolling sweat with a shirt sleeve and paused, thoughtful. “Rawhide is a notorious lady’s man. Jane could’ve moved on to him after she finished with me.”

  Damn, I’d hate it if Ian were right. “But why conk you on the head in the maid’s closet unless you got fresh without her consent? What is her motive? You weren’t robbed, were you?”

  Rick shook his head, reaching around to feel the wallet in his pocket that he obviously had checked already. “No. Maybe she’s just crazy or a psychopath.”

  “A serial black widow who just preys on Texas Hold ’Em champions? Maybe the wunderkind from New Delhi hired her to knock the two of you out of the tournament so he could be poker’s Tiger Woods.” Rick looked way too sold on this random notion so I added reasonably, “Seems a little farfetched.”

  Rick wilted. “Oh.”

  I played out possible scenarios in my mind. I just didn’t think like a criminal very well. Finally I said: “Perhaps she was just bait.”

  “For what?”

  “I wish I knew.” I mused. “But whatever it was, you foiled them.”

  In the end I was forced to equivocate a bit. Rick’s story to security and Kinkaid was that he woke up in the closet, not remembering anything, including who he was (hoping his amnesia was an acceptable excuse for whatever stories the video cameras told), wandered the halls, saw my photo on one of the tournament posters, ended up in the chapel for guidance (right) and called my parents’ room that the operator still had listed as mine. I met him in the chapel, talked him into telling all to the authorities and calling his wife (that part being true and probably the least believed).

  An emotionally drained, sleep deprived and, at least once, scorned Delia was suspicious. “Nice of you to be there when Rick needed someone,” she said, with her woman’s intuition on full alert, even if it was misguidedly pointed straight at me.

  I sighed. It was five a.m. by now and I had been fully grilled by Hans and the silent, perplexing presence of Phil. Rick was at the physician getting his head sewed back together. “I’m just grateful you can relax now that your husband is safe and enjoy your cruise,” I told Delia.

  “Fat chance,” she snapped.

  “What do you mean?” I asked.

  “I mean that I will have my eyes on you. Using my confidence against me to get my husband is disgusting. If you think he is going to forward your poker career, like Phil Laak and Jennifer Tilley, the Unabomber and Unabombshell Two, then think again.”

  “I really don’t think of myself as having a poker career to forward, Delia, it’s more like one lucky break—”

  “Don’t give me that self-deprecating caca,” the sweet-faced little woman said, shocking me speechless with her venom. “That might work with men, but not with me. You are smart and talented and you should use it to win Hold ’Em games not to manipulate men.”

  Wow. “Thanks.” I said, more surprised by her compliments than offended by her insults.

  “Don’t thank me, I could be your worst nightmare,” she spewed. The happy middle-aged couple I’d seen not twelve hours ago had morphed into something else entirely. I hoped there was a life lesson in here for me for all this suffering—appearances are not what they seem? Mind my own business? Beware of poker playing ex-wrestlers and their seemingly mild-mannered wives? She jutted her chin in the air. “How would you like yourself splashed all over the cover of Card Player with a full exposé of your affair with my husband?”

  Actually, as an ad exec, I had to say that if I were trying to further a poker career that would be the best thing for me. The old adage of any publicity is good publicity is often true, unfortunately, definitely more often than it should be. However, since I really wasn’t that organized or mercenary or, face it, brilliantly opportunistic, I shook my head. “Delia, I am not having an affair with anyone, least of all your husband.”

  No good deed goes unpunished. She narrowed her eyes. “Even if I believed that, there is the other reason to suspect you.”

  I raised my eyebrows. “Yes?”

  “Bad things have a habit of happening around you, don’t they? Six months ago, Stan gets killed, now Rick is almost killed. Who is the common denominator? You.”

  She was right, of course. I didn’t think she was in the mood to hear me whine about bad karma and my theory on money
and trouble right now so I just held her righteous gaze.

  Delia narrowed her eyes at me. “I’ll remember that.”

  So would I.

  I awoke at just after noon to the ring of the telephone next to my bed. I was tempted to ignore it except I thought it might be my mother and if I ignored her she would be knocking at the door in a matter of minutes. I assumed Ingrid, who’d been blessedly asleep when I’d come in, was long gone doing what stunning Amazonian model types do on tropical cruises. I reached out of the covers pulled over my head and found the receiver.

  “Ar-oh?” I croaked into it.

  “Belinda?” A pleasant-sounding tenor that rang a familiar bell asked.

  “Ye-oo.” My back seized up as I tried to sit up in bed. I was going to have to start working out regularly or taking Geritol or something. I hadn’t been battered by anything but Delia’s words last night, but my body ached like it had met a truck on the interstate.

  “It’s Ian,” my caller clarified. The image of Mr. Hot sprang into the cabin, kick-starting my brain and my beauty regimen as I bolted up against the pillows and began finger combing my hair. He continued. “Tell me: Is anything wrong? I’ve been looking all over this ship for you. I pegged you for an early riser.”

  So I’d been right. He had been fitting me into one of his psychology holes the whole time he’d been with me. Hmm. I thought of that plastic puzzle game my goddaughter played as a baby, fitting different shaped pieces into the right opening. Was I a hexagon or a pentagon? Nothing too symmetrical, I had a couple of misshapen sides for sure. Maybe those would prevent him from categorizing me. I’m not certain why I wanted to throw him for a loop except that I am a bit perverse that way.

  “I’m fine, just sleeping in a bit. I had a late night.”