Lethal People: A Donovan Creed Crime Novel (15 page)

Joe DeMeo.

“You’ve been busy,” he said.

“Jesus, Joe, where’d you find those guys?”

“Ah, what can I tell you? Short notice and all. Look, sorry about today. Your whole thing caught me o
ff
guard, pissed me o
ff
. You shoulda called me first instead of poking around out there. I’d have cut you in. Now the whole thing’s turning into a mess.”

“You get my message about setting up a meeting?”

“Our phones are secure. We can work this thing out right now.”

“I’d rather meet face-to-face.”

“You got some balls, my friend. I always said so.” He sighed. “Okay, Creed, we’ll meet. You say when, I’ll say where.”

We worked it out for Saturday morning in LA, which gave me plenty of time to do some other things, including having another Maker’s while waiting for my seven o’clock drive to White Plains.

And flying to Cincinnati to meet my good friend, Lauren.

And making plans to meet a certain young model wannabe at a beachside hotel in Santa Monica on Saturday afternoon—assuming I survived my Saturday morning meeting with Joe DeMeo.

CHAPTER 17

L
auren Jeter had been an escort since the early days of the internet. Over time, she’d built a clientele that included a dozen of Cincinnati’s most prominent public figures, most of whom managed to spend quality time with her several times a year. Add the income from these wealthy regulars to her hourly outcalls and Lauren was pulling down more than a hundred grand a year, all cash.

Not a bad business, but not without risk.

This particular morning, around ten o’clock, she knocked on the door of the upscale hotel room in downtown Cincinnati where I was staying. I handed her a quarter-inch stack of hundreds, and she smiled and said, “You’ve always been way too generous with me.”

Lauren loved her Mimosas with fresh-squeezed orange juice, and she enjoyed several as we caught each other up on our families, our problems, our health, and the books we’d read in the months that had passed since my last visit.

At some point she smiled and asked, “So, you wanna …?”

Instead of answering directly, I told her I had a unique proposition for her: we could spend the next few hours in the traditional manner and afterward go our separate ways happy and richer for the experience, or I could pay her an obscene amount of money to let me beat the shit out of her.

For a split second, Lauren’s smile remained frozen on her face, caught in the moment like a deer in the headlights. Then she made a funny noise and bolted for the door. She fumbled a bit, trying to get it open. When she finally did, she flew out of the room and slammed the door behind her. I watched her do all that, and after a minute or so, I topped o
ff
my glass, sipped some more champagne, and moved closer to the phone. A few minutes passed before it rang.

“You didn’t chase me,” she said.

“Why would I do that?”

“I thought maybe you’d snapped or something. No o
ff
ense.”

“I’m sorry.”

“No, it’s just—I don’t know, I guess I’ve always had the feeling you could turn violent on me, though you’ve always been a perfect gentleman in the past. Still, what you said a while ago, well, you sort of threw me for a minute there.”

“And now?”

“Now I feel sort of bad that you paid for an overnight and I bailed.”

“You were scared.”

“I was
really
scared!” she said.

We were quiet awhile.

“You’ve got a good heart,” I said.

“I’d like to be your friend, Donovan,” she said, “but I might be just a little afraid of you right now.”

“I can’t fault you there.”

“Should I be?”

“What’s that?”

“Afraid of you?”

I paused a moment. “No.”

“Well,” she said, “you didn’t grab me or hit me. You didn’t force me to do anything. When I ran you didn’t chase me. And you’re very generous—the money, the champagne.”

“Does all that add up to let’s try again?”

“I don’t know, Donovan. I’d like to save our relationship …”

“But?”

“But I’d have to feel safe.”

“Well,” I said, “I didn’t chase you.”

She thought about that some more. Then she said, “I’m only about a block away, sitting in my car. If I agree to come back, will you promise I’ll be safe? I mean, I’ll treat you real good and all, but can you promise not to hit me?”

“Yes. If you want, you could bring someone with you.”

“Another girl?”

I laughed. “No, I meant a guy. You can bring a guy with you, for protection.”

She pondered that a minute. “Is there anyone I’m likely to bring who could protect me if you wanted to hurt me? Even if he had a gun?”

“No,” I said, “but, Lauren, you have my word. This choice I mentioned, like anything else we’ve ever done or might do, is completely up to you.”

“And you have my answer to your o
ff
er, right?”

I laughed. “You’ve made it abundantly clear. No hitting, no hurting.”

Back in my room a few minutes later, she asked, “Do you get o
ff
on beating up women? Again, no o
ff
ense meant,” she added.

“None taken,” I said, shaking my head. “No, I would never get any pleasure out of hitting a woman, and I don’t understand those who would.”

“Then why?”

I thought about telling her Kathleen Chapman’s story, how she had experienced years of physical abuse at the hands of her ex. I wondered if Lauren could possibly put herself in Kathleen’s place, imagining the heartbreak, the pain and anguish, the humiliation Kathleen had su
ff
ered all those years.

My idea did have one major flaw: when you came right down to it, I’d be beating Lauren up now to protect Janet from getting beaten up someday. Of course, Lauren would have made the conscious decision to be beaten up. I wondered if that type of logic would provide su
ff
cient justification for the way I’d feel later.

In the end, I just waved it o
ff
. “My mistake,” I said. “Water under the bridge.”

Lauren looked me over carefully. When she spoke, her voice was clear and steady. “You don’t appear to be a freak,” she said.

“Thank you.”

“Of course,” she said, “in my experience, most freaks don’t appear to be freaks.”

“I’ve found that to be true in my experience, as well,” I said. She extended her hands in front of her, palms open, as if to say,
Help me out here, will ya
? Then she said, “But if someone were to ask me for an assessment at this stage of our relationship …” she paused a beat. “Can you understand why I might question your sanity?”

“You’d be crazy not to,” I said.

She nodded slowly.

“Would you like me to take o
ff
my clothes now?” she said.

“I’d like that a lot. If it’s your choice.”

“It’s what you’ve paid for,” she said.

“Actually, I don’t look at it that way.”

She flashed me a skeptical look. “You don’t, huh?” There was an edge of sarcasm in her voice.

I said, “Sex isn’t the same as intimacy. Intimacy only works if it’s a choice you’ve made about me.”

She stiffened a bit. “A choice,” she said.

“That’s right.”

“Like letting you beat me up?” I saw the anger flash through her eyes. Now that she trusted me not to hurt her, she was fired up.

“It’s nothing personal,” I said, hoping to di
ff
use the fireworks I could see coming.

“Really? Nothing personal, huh? So your o
ff
er had nothing to do with the fact that I’m just a low-life hooker? Tell me, Scarface, how many teachers, nurses, and housewives have you o
ff
ered to beat up for money?”

I heard her. I don’t mean I listened to her; I mean that what she said and the way she said it made me see it from her point of view. Now what could I say, except that she had a point.

“Lauren, you’re right, of course. That was a big part of it, the fact you do things for money.”

We sat there quietly and looked at each other, neither of us knowing quite what to say.

“There was something else,” I said. “I didn’t give you my reasons, but a big part of it had to do with an uncanny resemblance. But again, I’m sorry I brought it up. I feel terrible for scaring you. I really care about you and always have.”

We were out of orange juice, but she reached for the champagne and poured some into a clean flute. She glanced at her champagne glass and a strange look crossed her face. She picked it up and held it to the light and stared at the amber liquid.
What now
? I wondered. Maybe there weren’t as many bubbles floating to the surface as she thought there should be. Maybe …

“It’s not drugged,” I said.

“Then you drink it.”

I sighed. “I’ve lost your trust, and for that I apologize.” I took the champagne flute from her hand, put it to my lips, and drained it. Then I refilled the glass, handed it back to her. She nodded slowly and took a sip. Then, to her credit, she winked at me.

“Hookers have feelings, you know.”

I smiled. “It’s not because I think you’re unworthy of being treated well. It was never that. If it makes you feel any better, you’re the only person I’ve ever o
ff
ered to pay to beat up.”

Lauren had a light, airy laugh. Now, for the first time since she’d run out, she showed it. “Why the hell would that make me feel better?” she asked.

I laughed, too. “I’m sorry, Lauren. You’re right. I prejudged you. Now I’m making it worse trying to talk about it. Big surprise: I’m not very smooth with women.”

“Hey, ya think?” She smiled.

“Now you know why I have to pay for sex.”

“Intimacy,” she said.

“Yes.”

“A choice,” she said.

“It is,” I said. “Or should be.”

She nodded slightly, as if confirming some private thought. Then she took off her clothes and helped me with mine. Then she did the things Janet used to do to me all those years ago, things she was surely doing to Ken Chapman every night for free.