Читать книгу Full Service Blonde - Megan Edwards - Страница 15

Chapter 7

When I checked my email, I found a message from Heather, Victoria’s business partner, whom I’d met at the Sekhmet Temple. Victoria must have given her my email address, or at least mentioned that I work for The Light. Heather asked if I’d be willing to get together to talk about Victoria, which was exactly what I had in mind. Unfortunately, she was in Reno on business, and she wouldn’t be getting back to Las Vegas until Monday.

Heather ended her message with a sentence that made me even more interested in meeting her: “Unless we do something, those bastards at the Beavertail are going to get away with it.”

I called David on his cell phone, hoping I wouldn’t wake him up or disturb the breakfast phase of an overnight date. He was someplace noisy, though, and I asked him for a copy of the police report about Victoria’s death.

“Are you still playing sleuth?” he asked.

“Somebody should be,” I said, and I told him about Heather’s message.

“The police are investigating, Copper,” he said. “Her death really could have been accidental.”

“Sure.”

“Come on, Copper. Give them a chance. It takes time.”

“She had enemies, and she was a prostitute. Cops don’t care about people like her.”

David ignored me and went on.

“For one thing, they have to work with the Nye County Sheriff. Victoria was supposed to be at the Beavertail when she turned up dead. They have to look into the possibility she died there and then got dumped over here.”

David said he’d copy the police report and leave it on my desk.

“But you already know more than what’s in it,” he added.

As I continued looking through Victoria’s files, I came across an audio tape. I didn’t have a chance to check it, but I wondered if it was the one Julia Saxon wanted. What I did learn was that the madam at the Beavertail Ranch was named Bernice Broyhill. Victoria had written her two letters, one explaining about the beauty contest and another asking for her support in her feud with Kent Freeman, the Beavertail’s owner.

Bernice liked to issue commands on pink Post-It notes: “See me today noon,” and “See me ASAP.” Only one was more revealing: “See me re: Marks this p.m.”

Marks. That was a name I recognized. But then, everybody in Las Vegas knows that name. Charlie Marks has practically been deified for reinventing the Strip and building one blockbuster hotel after another. But why would a guy who owns megaresorts frequent a brothel? Surely he could afford full service blondes direct to his room! It can’t be him, I decided. Must be some other Marks.

On the Beavertail’s website, I found Bernice Broyhill listed as “shift manager” along with the great news that she was happy to give free tours, “Ladies welcome!” I was more than half tempted to drive to Pahrump and take her up on the offer.

I’d been to Pahrump only once before, when Michael and Sierra took me to the Pahrump Valley Winery for dinner when I first arrived in Las Vegas. “Going over the hump,” they called it, because we had to cross the Spring Mountains to get there. They didn’t mention anything about brothels, though, and it wasn’t until two months later that I learned that Pahrump’s X-rated attractions were hidden on the south side of town in their own little unmarked bordello zone. Fortunately, the Beavertail’s website provided directions: “West on Highway 160, south on Gamebird Road, east on Homestead to the end. Our doors are always open.”

They should have added, “And we’ll leave the red light on for you.”

:: :: ::

After thinking things over and realizing that Sierra’s breakfast had done a good job of making me human again, I decided to go to Pahrump. Even if I didn’t find anything out about Victoria, I’d never have a better chance to see the inside of a cathouse. I had Christmas shopping to do, but it would have to wait. As Auntie Melanie would say, the opportunity was too precious to let it get away.

When I opened my apartment door to leave, I almost stepped on the perfectly dissected interior organs of a large rodent. The cat wasn’t gone after all. She’d brought me a gift. Sierra would have called it true love, but all I could say was, “Yuck!” I decided to give the cat a name, though: Sekhmet.

As I headed south on the freeway, I realized I would be driving very near the spot where Victoria’s body was found. I wondered if I’d be able to find it, and that thought was enough to pull me off of Blue Diamond Road when I got to Grand Canyon Drive. David had told me the site was less than a quarter mile south, on the right hand side of the road. The pavement ended a few hundred feet from Blue Diamond, and the ditches on both sides of the road had standing water in them. The sky was clear now, but there had obviously been a cloudburst in the area sometime recently. I bumped on down the gravel, and sure enough, I soon spied festoons of yellow caution tape.

I pulled off the road where several cars were parked and joined a few other gawkers watching three men in jeans, sweatshirts, and baseball caps. One was poking around in a creosote bush, and the other two were squatting over a big black stain on the ground. Their gloves, clipboards, measuring tapes, plastic bags, cameras, and little flags made it obvious they were on official business, even though they weren’t wearing uniforms.

David was right, I thought as I surveyed the scene. There was a lot of blood. At least I assumed it was blood that had created the big black stain.

“Fuckin’ drunk drivers,” the man standing next to me said. He was a bearded guy of about fifty wearing a Harley-Davidson T-shirt. “Las Vegas is a dangerous place to be a pedestrian, even way out here.”

“You think it was an accident?” I said.

“Happens all the time,” the Harley guy said. “Some asshole hit her, realized there were no witnesses, and took off.”

It made sense except for one small problem. Victoria was supposed to be at the Beavertail, not alone on an isolated desert road.

:: :: ::

I hung around a little while longer, watching the investigators take pictures and put dirt samples into little bags. One of them mixed up something I guessed was plaster of paris and poured it into a muddy rut. I was tempted to try to talk to them, but when the Harley guy asked them if they had any leads, the one who seemed to be in charge brushed him off with a well-rehearsed line that went something like, “We don’t have any information at this time.”

I had walked back to the Max before I remembered the digital camera in my backpack. Figuring photos would make a good addition to the article I was planning to write, I walked back and snapped a few pictures of the scene before heading over the Spring Mountains to Pahrump.

:: :: ::

The cloudburst had dropped a picturesque layer of snow on the rocks and juniper trees at the summit, and I enjoyed a brief feeling of Christmas before descending into the wide dry valley on the other side.

I knew I had arrived at my destination when I caught sight of its tall sign, a cutout of a woman’s leg in a fishnet stocking. It had a flashing red light at the top, like the ones at railroad crossings. Under the leg were placards saying “Welcome,” “Sports Bar,” and “Truck Parking.” As I slowed, I saw another sign pounded into the gravel parking lot. “Free Tours. Ladies Welcome.”

Beyond the parking lot stood the Beavertail itself. I have no idea what I expected a bordello to look like, but it wasn’t trailers. Or maybe they were mobile homes. Whatever their official designation, about eight of them had been dragged there, plunked down to form a big square, and painted a dainty shade of lavender. The trailer facing the parking lot had a big silver Christmas wreath hanging on its door. A potted poinsettia stood on each side of the wooden steps leading up to it.

I decided to park across the road. As I did, a truck from a Las Vegas glass company pulled into the Beavertail’s parking lot. A man in white overalls climbed out and disappeared through the door with the Christmas wreath. There was no other activity, just four cars in the parking lot.

God. I wasn’t sure I could do this alone. On the other hand, that was the only way I could do it at all. David wouldn’t have come with me unless the newspaper told him to, and my brother would have had an aneurysm if he had known where I was. Anyway, what was the worst that could happen? In a few days, somebody would report a white Chrysler minivan abandoned out on Homestead Road, and the search for my body would begin.

When I finally got up enough nerve to approach the front door of the Beavertail, it swung open and almost hit me. The man in white overalls brushed past me like I wasn’t there, and I found myself face to face with a woman who reminded me of my college Shakespeare professor. Her graying brown hair was pulled up in a librarian’s bun, and she was wearing a tweedy suit and a high-necked white blouse.

“Kin ah help you?” she asked, and all thoughts of my Shakespeare professor vanished. Her voice was rough from a century or two of smoking, and she had a truck stop waitress drawl. As I stared at her, she gave me a quick head-to-toe once-over.

“I—I’m here for the tour,” I said. Her eyes were still appraising my chest.

“Oh!” the woman said, shifting her gaze to my face. “Sure, hon. Come on in.”

She held the door open, and I walked into the whitest room I’d ever seen. Everything was white: the floor, the ceiling, the sofas, the fireplace, the plaster statue of Venus. Even the Christmas tree next to the fireplace was white, and so was the flower arrangement on the white piano, a big urn of fake lilies. There was a faint smell of chemical lemon in the air, like someone had just mopped the floor. Through the window on the back wall, I could see the courtyard formed by the assembled trailers. A white gazebo with a hot tub stood in the center of it.

“Please, have a seat,” the woman said, motioning toward a pristine brocade sofa. “Ah’ll be back in a jiff.”

I didn’t sit. I’d caught sight of a small framed placard propped up next to the flower arrangement, and I moved closer to the piano so I could read it. “Menu of Services,” it said, and the list began with “Straight Lay.” I was pondering what “Extreme French” might be when the woman in the tweedy suit came back.

“Ah’m Bernice Broyhill,” she said, holding out her right hand.

“Copper Black,” I said, shaking it.

“You want a tour?” she asked, as though she couldn’t quite believe it.

“Yes, I—” And if I’d had the chance, I think I would have said, “I’m a reporter.” But Bernice was already talking again.

“If you’re wonderin’ why there aren’t any prices on our menu,” she said, launching into a sing-songy spiel, “it’s because our ladies are independent contractors. Their rates are in-tar-ly between themselves and the gentlemen. So are the services they provide. How they accommodate their clients is in-tar-ly up to them. Some of our ladies are world famous for their specialties.”

Bernice then explained that if I’d been a “gentleman,” she would have called a “lineup,” and I would have chosen a “lady to party with.”

“And if you weren’t quaht ready to party, you’d be welcome to have a drink in the bar and socialize awhile,” she said. She crossed the room and pushed open a saloon-style door. “We’re proud of our new sports bar,” she continued as she held it open, “and we have a full kitchen and a gen-you-wine Core-don Blue chef. If the gentlemen want to party in one of our bungalows, we serve them steak and lobster—real gore-may meals.”

Bernice kept yakking a mile a minute as she showed me pictures of the bungalows, which were really just more trailers on the other side of the gazebo. Each one had a different theme, like “Psychedelic Sixties” and “Arthur & Guenevere.” Then she led me down a hall that looked exactly like a motel except for some artsy black-and-white photos of nude women on the walls. The smell of disinfectant was a little stronger, reminding me of the rest home where my great-grandmother spent her final decade. Just the smell, though. I’m pretty sure Great Grammie’s place didn’t have a dungeon with shackles attached to the wall or a whirlpool room decorated with Budweiser posters.

“These are our public rooms,” Bernice explained as we moved from one to the next. “All our ladies can use them. Their own rooms are in-tar-ly private, of course.”

I was beginning to wonder if there was anyone else in the building when a door opened and a woman in a skimpy hot-pink tank top and a G-string emerged and walked toward us. Stretched across her obviously augmented breasts was the word “JUICY” spelled out in rhinestones. She was tan and slim and pretty, although I noticed she was missing teeth on both sides of her mouth when she smiled. I couldn’t help turning to watch her when she passed, and from the back, it looked like she had nothing on below the waist.

Bernice had launched into a new line of patter about health and cleanliness standards by this time, explaining how nobody had ever contracted a sexually transmitted disease in a legal Nevada brothel. Opening the door of a large closet, she pulled out a plastic bag.

“We call this a trick pack,” she said. “The ladies pick one up when they have a client. It’s got a sheet, a condom, a towel, and a washrag.” When she closed the closet door, I noticed that next to it was a bookcase full of shoes. At least thirty pairs were all lined up neatly, eight-inch stiletto heels facing out. Slut shoes, we called them in college, and I almost laughed as I realized just how accurate we had been.

As we rounded the corner and headed back into the living room, Bernice’s cell phone rang. She looked at it before she answered, and she wasn’t too happy about what her caller ID revealed.

“I’ve been trying to reach you all morning, Kent,” she said. “The glass man was here.” She turned away from me. “Close to two grand,” I could still hear her say, “and there’s only eight hundred in Victoria’s account—okay, okay, just git your butt over here, and you can decide for yourself.” Bernice snapped her phone shut.

“Sorry,” she said. “Where were we?”

And here’s where I was either very brave, or very stupid, or both.

“Were you talking about Victoria McKimber?” I asked.

Bernice stared at me.

“I knew her,” I said.

“We’re all very sorry about her death,” Bernice said, her surprise quickly hardening into suspicion.

“Do you know what really happened? I mean, she was supposed to be here when—”

“She was hit by a car,” Bernice replied quickly. “A terrible accident.”

“I’m not so sure,” I said. “I know that’s one possibility, but I was hoping you—”

“You’ve got a lot of nerve coming here and conning me into a tour,” Bernice interrupted. “Who are you, anyway?”

“I told you, I—” but Bernice was barking into her cell phone.

“Parlor, Bill,” she said. “Now.”

Almost immediately, the bar door burst open, and a muscled guy in a black leather jacket was practically on top of me.

“I’m gonna need some ah-dee,” Bernice said, and while I was still figuring out that she was talking to me, she barked again. “Yer driver’s license. Hand it over.”

Bill intentionally slid his hand to his hip, pushing his jacket back. Stuck in the waistband of his jeans was a big handgun—the kind hit men use in Mafia movies. Dangling from his belt was a pair of handcuffs.

I didn’t waste any time digging my driver’s license out of my wallet. Bernice snatched it from my hand and disappeared. Bill moved closer, enveloping me in a disgusting miasma of old cigarettes, breath mints, and sweat. I was just envisioning the cops examining my abandoned body when Bernice came back and slapped my license into my palm. She nodded at Bill, and suddenly I was out in the parking lot.

“Where’s your car?” Bill said, his hand gripping my upper arm firmly enough to leave bruises.

“Over there,” I said nodding across the street. He marched me to the edge of the road.

“Get in it,” he said. “Drive away. Don’t ever come back.” Then he leaned closer. What now? I thought, but when he spoke, he was almost kind.

“You look like a nice girl,” he said. “This is a very dangerous place for nice girls.”

If he was trying to scare me, it worked. I got in my minivan and drove down Homestead Road so fast I missed the first stop sign and almost hit an old man on a bike. After that, I pulled into the parking lot at the Pair-a-Dice Casino. I needed to calm down, and I knew there would be a coffee shop inside where I could sit until I stopped shaking. As I walked into the smoky darkness, I couldn’t help thinking that teaching kindergarten in Connecticut wasn’t such a bad idea after all.

An order of fries and a Diet Coke went a long way toward settling my nerves, though I barely touched either of them. I mostly watched legions of blue-haired bingo players mill around while I eavesdropped on a conversation two waitresses were having about their boyfriends. It was all so ordinary that it helped me forget I’d just been evicted from a whorehouse.

When I left the Pair-a-Dice, my plan was to go back to Las Vegas and go Christmas shopping. But as I was driving, I kept thinking about how convenient it was for American Beauty that Victoria was dead. Bernice Broyhill didn’t seem exactly broken up, either, and Bill the bouncer looked like he’d make a capable hit man.

I kept seeing the look on Bill’s face. He wasn’t only trying to scare me. He was trying to warn me.

Warnings. That’s all I was getting from everybody—David, Sierra, Michael, Daniel. Except for Heather, not a single person thought I should pursue the truth about Victoria’s death.

And maybe I was nuts to think I had something to gain from “poking into things,” as Sierra put it. Daniel and my parents would arrive in a few days. It would be Christmas, for God’s sake. What was wrong with me? Shouldn’t I be at the Caesars Forum Shops buying my mom a big bottle of some new fragrance sensation? I hadn’t gotten anything for Daniel yet, either, and I didn’t even have a Christmas dress. I love Christmas, and I had never let the holidays go by without acquiring an appropriately festive dress.

The trouble was, I couldn’t stop thinking about Victoria, and it went way beyond wanting to be a journalist. I didn’t think Victoria was a saint, but she did have a mission. And it was a noble one, I reminded myself. She wanted respect for who and what she was, and she wanted to extend it to all women like her. David might say it was just attention-seeking self-aggrandizement, but I knew he was wrong. I hadn’t gotten much of a chance to know Victoria, but it was enough for me to see the crusader in her. She was a natural leader who might have actually been able to reverse an age-old tide of public condemnation and ridicule. And now she was dead. It was awfully convenient for the brothel and American Beauty, but nobody seemed to find that the least bit suspicious. Nobody but me.

Unless her husband cared. I didn’t know anything about Richard McKimber except that his left arm was a mess and that he wrote a good essay about Forever Young antiwrinkle cream. Did he miss Victoria horribly? Did he want to wreak revenge on her killer? Or was it just the opposite? Maybe he hated being married to one of Bernice’s “ladies.” Maybe he took out a huge life insurance policy a couple of weeks ago. Okay, okay, so I’ve watched too many Law & Order reruns.

Anyway, I made a plan. I knew where Victoria lived because her address was in her files: 1075 Chantilly Court. It wasn’t far from the big truck stop on Blue Diamond Road, according to my Las Vegas road atlas. There was no harm in driving by, right? At the very least, I could see what kind of house she lived in.

And then—I swore—I was going to do my Christmas shopping.