Page 122 of Sunset Beach
She hardly had to twist the girl’s arm. Vera ordered the club sandwich and Colleen had the chicken salad plate, and at Colleen’s insistence, they each had a glass of Chablis.
“This has been so much fun,” Vera said, giggling as she gathered her things to leave. “But I really have to scoot now. We should do this more often. Especially the wine part!” She took a five-dollar bill from her billfold, but Colleen waved the money away. “My treat, remember?”
“Okay,” Vera said, rising. “Have a great weekend. See you Monday.”
Her bus to Atlanta wasn’t leaving until seven-thirty. Colleen ordered another glass of Chablis, gulped it down and paid again with her credit card. Then she went into the ladies’ room and changed into the tight-fitting new designer jeans and platform heels. She pulled a floppy-brimmed straw hat from her pocketbook and tucked her long hair beneath it. At the last minute, she took off her bra and put it in her pocketbook, enjoying the sensation of the silky fabric against her bare breasts, as well as the thought that Allen would have been apoplectic about her walking around braless in public.
When she got to the orange Camaro she unlocked the trunk and removed the train case, flipping the lid just to make sure her runaway money, as she’d come to think of it, was intact. All was well. She folded the new dress, stillin the shopping bag, on top of the cash. She opened the driver’s-side door and placed the clothes she’d been wearing, including her bra and pantyhose, carefully folded, on the bucket seat. She tossed the shoes she’d worn onto the floor and thought for a moment. And then she had a flash of genius.
Allen enjoyed inflicting pain, so maybe she’d hurt him a little, as a parting gesture. She took the nail scissors she always carried and carefully punctured the tip of her right index finger, squeezing with her left hand, spattering droplets of blood onto her clothes and the seat, even smearing some on the steering wheel. For good measure, she slashed the pantyhose and bra, smearing blood on them too. All in all, it made for a ghastly little crime scene. It also made her a little light-headed, so she sat in the Camaro for a good ten minutes, waiting to regain her equilibrium.
When she emerged from the parking deck onto Second Avenue, she donned a pair of oversize Jackie O sunglasses and set off down the street, swinging the train case. With each swaggering step she took her mood lightened.
Colleen was standing at the corner, waiting for the light to turn, when a car pulled up to the curb. She heard a voice call her name, and when she glanced over, found she was staring down the barrel of a gun. “Get in,” the voice said.
49
The Gulf Vista security guard, who was so young it appeared he might have bought his uniform and badge at Toys “R” Us, had difficulty opening the sliding-glass door in Room 133, outside of which Drue was gloomily perched on a cheap plastic chair.
But after much grunting and sweating, he managed to inch the door open far enough to sternly command her, “Come inside, ma’am.”
Drue obliged, stepping into the room. To her delight, the kiddie cop had switched on the overhead light. There wasn’t much to see. The room was small, furnished with a queen-size bed, dresser, nightstands and bad art. The carpet was worn and faded and, though it was clean enough, the room smelled faintly of mildew. Any clues to the criminal acts that had led to Jazmin Mayes’s death were long gone, she knew.
The door from the hallway swung open and a middle-aged white guy entered. He had wire-rimmed glasses perched atop a beakish nose and was dressed in a white polo shirt, black dress slacks and a black baseball cap with the wordSECURITYstitched across the bill.
“Here she is, Mr. Shelnutt,” the guard said, gesturing to Drue, who was still trying to take in every detail of the room.
“What do you think you’re doing here?” Shelnutt asked, his deep bass voice meant to intimidate.
“Just looking around,” Drue said, trying to sound nonchalant.
“Attempted breaking and entering,” Shelnutt said. He unclipped a radio from the holster on his belt and spoke into it. “Security one to front gate. A TI police unit should be arriving any minute. Let them in and direct them to Room 133.”
The radio crackled but the guard’s response was unintelligible.
“Say again?” Shelnutt said.
“Just passed them through,” the guard repeated.
Drue slumped down onto the desk chair.
“Who told you to sit down?” Shelnutt barked. “That’s hotel property.”
She was tired and her knee hurt too much to argue.
“So shoot me.”
They heard the softdingfrom an elevator down the hall and a moment later a uniformed Treasure Island patrol officer entered the room. He was approximately the same age and build as the security guard, although his uniform badge and the service revolver holstered on his hip gave him an air of authority the two rent-a-cops accompanying him lacked, in Drue’s opinion.
He looked from Drue to the glowering security chief. “What have we got here?”
“Our security cameras caught her sneaking onto the property from the beach and attempting to break into the north tower,” Shelnutt said. “When she couldn’t gain access that way, she broke the lock on the back gate here, then climbed onto the balcony outside this room.”
“That true?” The cop, whose name badge she couldn’t read, didn’t seem too worked up about her one-woman crime spree.
“I just wanted to get a look at the rooms here,” she protested, extending her arms from her sides. “Look, you can see I didn’t take anything, and Icertainly didn’t damage anything either, except my own knee and my favorite beach cover-up.”
“Got some ID?” the cop asked.
