...and stumbled forward as the door opened with the slight pressure of my body.
It had of course been open the whole time. The deadbolt had been pushed out so that the door wouldn"t automatically lock. If I had been sober I probably would have noticed that before pressing my head against it.
Yet I wasn"t quite so drunk as to miss the fact that I was the only one in the room. Just me and a bed that clearly hadn"t been touched since it had been made up earlier in the day.
But it was Anatoly"s room. That was his jacket draped over the chair by the window.
If this was his room and the bed was still made then he hadn"t slept with her after all! I half skipped, half stumbled over to that jacket and took it up in my arms. He hadn"t even taken her anywhere because if he had he wouldn"t have left his jacket...
Wait a minute.
I sat down on the chair and stared at the door that was still being forced slightly open by that deadbolt. Why had he left the door open when his stuff was in here? That didn"t make sense. I squeezed the jacket closer to my body. It smelled like him and it felt...lumpy. Why did it feel lumpy?
I reached into the inside pocket and pulled out his iPhone. He left the room without his iPhone? That wasn"t like him. I sat there for a moment staring at the device. This would be a confusing situation even if I weren"t intoxicated. As it was I was completely stupefied.
"Okay, think about this," I said aloud. "He left the room. He also purposely left the door open and he left his jacket and iPhone here. Those are the facts."
I was quiet for a moment. Listing off the facts hadn"t been as helpful as I had antic.i.p.ated. Maybe I needed to list even more facts. "I"m in Anatoly"s room and there are no bimbos in it and the bed hasn"t been slept or f.u.c.ked in recently."
These facts weren"t any more helpful but they were much more fun to say. I closed my eyes and enjoyed the mild dizziness. Things didn"t always need to make sense. As long as he wasn"t letting Mr. Happy go spelunking everything was okay. I opened my eyes and let my gaze lazily move around the room.
And then I saw something on the desk. I stood up and went over to it. Carefully, I touched the cool silver metal of the money clip I had given Anatoly last year, his initials clearly engraved on the front of it. Inside the clip were five $10 bills.
He left $50 in the room.
He left the door purposely open He was nowhere to be found.
These were not fun facts.
I was beginning to feel more sober. Now clutching both the money clip and the jacket I checked the bathroom. No one there. The towels were still perfectly folded which meant the shower hadn"t gotten any more use than the bed. There was a travel toothbrush and toothpaste set next to the sink that were still in their original packaging and...a small bottle of Aveeno Positively Radiant Daily Moisturizer cream.
Anatoly didn"t use Positively Radiant Daily Moisturizer. Of course he should use it. I loved that particular product and had tried to get Anatoly to use it as well. I was of the firm belief that everyone should have a strong skincare regiment, regardless of their s.e.x. But Anatoly never listened to me about that kind of stuff and when you considered why I threw him out it seemed unlikely that he would try to win me back with newly radiant skin. And yet someone had to bring the Aveeno here and that someone obviously wasn"t me.
I backed out of the bathroom and then turned to examine the room again. I spotted Anatoly"s duffle bag on the floor. Hesitantly I opened it up. On top were a couple of his t-shirts, some jeans, under that a few pairs of boxer briefs and under that...
Under that were two rounds of ammunition. The ammunition Anatoly used for his snub-nose revolver.
With a new sense of urgency I started rifling through the bag and running my hands along the lining. His gun wasn"t in there. It"s fairly rare that someone packs ammunition without packing their gun. So he had left his iPhone and $50 behind but taken his gun? That suggested he wasn"t out filling an ice bucket.
Why would he have brought his gun to Vegas anyway? And if he had his gun on him now it was undoubtedly loaded; Anatoly never carried an unloaded weapon. So that was at least three rounds of ammunition. For G.o.d"s sake, how many things had he planned on shooting?
My heart was beating a little faster now.
Maybe the gun was in the drawer. I opened the top drawer of the dresser. What I saw there did NOT make me happy.
Women"s underwear! Son of a b.i.t.c.h! He hadn"t just picked up some random, drunk, s.l.u.t. He had actually checked in with her! Less than a week after we broke up! Even Dena would take issue with that! And I knew this chick was a s.l.u.t because of this stupid skimpy thong...actually it wasn"t that skimpy. I had the exact same one at home.
I also had the same pair of bikini panties that were underneath those and I owned those same bras too. My head was spinning as I opened another drawer.
There was the Michael Stars t-shirt that I had left in my dresser at home along with my BCBG knit top and my scarf that I had bought with Anatoly at the North Beach street fair.
In yet another drawer were two pairs of my jeans.
I looked down at my hands. They were shaking and this time it had nothing to do with the cosmos.
That"s when instinct took over. As quickly as possible I took out every item of clothing and stuffed it all in Anatoly"s bag. I ran into the bathroom and s.n.a.t.c.hed up the Aveeno and threw that in his bag as well. I didn"t know what was going on other than that it looked like someone wanted others to think that this was my room and I had a very strong feeling that if that"s what they wanted it was very important that no one ever reach that particular faulty conclusion.
I could barely feel the effects of the alcohol anymore. Adrenaline had taken over. I grabbed a washcloth from the bathroom and wiped down everything that I had touched.
"Anatoly, where are you?" I asked the empty room. I desperately wanted to leave but then what if he came back?
I glanced over at the closet. Would more of my clothes be in there? I rushed over to the closet door and threw it open.
There, underneath a few of my sundresses that were hanging from the rod, and on top of my beat-up overnight bag that I never used anymore, was the blonde bimbo.
She was just lying there...with a bullet hole in her forehead.
"No." I said the word out loud but this time it didn"t feel like I was talking to myself. It was more like a prayer. "No!" I said again and then pressed my fist against my mouth.
She was dead! Dead and draped over my overnight bag! As if I was planning on packing her or something!
And Anatoly was nowhere to be found.
I had to do something right now! But what? I started to reach my hand towards the woman, as if to feel her pulse but quickly withdrew it. People with bullet holes in the middle of their foreheads did not have pluses!
I felt myself gag against my fist. I tore my eyes away from the woman and yanked my dresses out of the closet. I had to get the bag too. I gagged again but forced myself to pull it out from underneath her. She flopped forward and I nearly screamed before I finally resolved to shove her back in the closet with my foot and then slam the door.
Someone wanted it to look like this was my room and now a woman...a woman who was recently hitting on my boyfriend, a woman who I had paid a stranger to follow, was dead in the closet.
Calling the police was simply not an option.
I bit down harder on my fist. What were my options?
Oh yeah, I needed to get the h.e.l.l out of there.
I threw my dresses and Anatoly"s jacket in my bag and with effort managed to scrunch his duffle bag in there too. Using my foot I opened the door, then thought better of it and used the washcloth to wipe down the doork.n.o.bs and undo the deadbolt so the door would actually lock behind me. Swiftly, and keeping my head down, I walked toward the elevator.
And with each step toward the elevator the same thought rang through my head.
What happened to Anatoly?
Chapter 5.
"I"m a very forgiving person...particularly after I"ve made my enemies pay."
--Death of the Party Anatoly was still the only thing on my mind as the elevator doors opened to the main lobby. If he could just be down here, waiting for me...even if he was with another woman I just needed to see him! I stepped out and scanned the room.
"There you are!"
I froze and turned toward my sister"s voice. She was no more than fifteen feet away and by her side was my friend, and Dena"s cousin, Mary Ann Bettencourt. Mary Ann"s chestnut brown curls bounced loosely around her porcelain features complimenting her green hoodie and light grey knit, straight-legged pants while Leah"s chemically straightened hair was pinned up and she was wearing a knee length charcoal grey pencil skirt paired with a bell jacket cinched neatly at the waist.
"Oh yay, we found you!" Mary Ann squealed. "We didn"t know your room number and I was beginning to think we"d have to spend the whole night looking for you! How come you didn"t answer my text?"
"My room number?" I asked blankly. I had fallen through the looking gla.s.s, no doubt about it. First I had been confronted by a dead body in a closet and now I was being faced off by Mary Ann and my sister...who was apparently trying to channel a 1980s version of a b.i.t.c.hy Joan Collins. I wanted to throw up. I wanted to run away screaming, I wanted to cry...what I didn"t want to do was stand here in this lobby having a conversation.
"I don"t know why you"re here," I said as calmly as I could manage, "but we"ve got to leave."
"What do you mean, you don"t know why we"re here?" Mary Ann asked. "Leah said you guys were turning this trip into my bachelorette party!"
A flash of guilt crossed Leah"s face but when she looked at me her expression switched to panic. "What"s wrong?" she asked. "Oh dear Lord, tell me you"re not married!"
"I didn"t get married, " I said, grabbing her arm and pulling her toward the door. Mary Ann fell into step beside us. "Mary Ann, call Dena and tell her you"re here with me and that she and Marcus should meet us back at our room at the Encore right now.
"The Encore?" Leah asked confused. "But isn"t this where you"re staying?"
"Why would you think that?"
"Because I called and the front desk confirmed that you were a guest here...did you book rooms at two hotels?"
I froze, still twenty feet from the main exit. Pivoting toward her I met her brown eyes with my own. "There"s a room booked under my name here?"
"I called five different hotels asking to leave a message for guest, Sophie Katz. This is the one that had a reservation for you. I figured there"d be a good chance that this is the place you"d pick, seeing that they have a movie theater that shows. .h.i.tchc.o.c.k and all that other stuff you"re into-"
"They said they had a room booked under my name," I said again.
"I don"t get it," Mary Ann interjected. "I thought you said this was all arranged with them, Leah. Didn"t they tell you which hotel they were staying at?"
"She didn"t arrange anything with any of us," I snapped as I quickly scanned the lobby for anything or anyone suspicious. Was the green-eyed man around? Did he have anything to do with this? "You really need to call Dena and tell her to get out of this hotel. It"s important."
"Okay," Mary Ann said uncertainly as she reached for her phone "Come on, we"re getting a cab back to Encore."
"Can"t we just walk?" Leah asked.
"Look, you"re crashing my party," I hissed as I resumed my march to the door. "You are not in a position to complain to me about my itinerary and right now I"m telling you that the next thing on the itinerary is getting out of here. Do you understand that or not?"
"But you"re not married," Leah said, as she followed me out into the cold night air.
"f.u.c.king h.e.l.l, Leah, no!" I stepped close enough to whisper into her ear. "I didn"t get married again, but I did find a dead body in a closet."
Leah didn"t react immediately. She seemed to need to take a second to process the information. "Why do you keep doing this?"
"What?"
"What? It"s gotten to the point that when I see the words body discovered in a news article I immediately start scanning for your name, that"s what!"
"Keep your voice down," I hissed and started pulling her toward a cab. I could hear Mary Ann talking to Dena on the phone. I could tell from Mary Ann"s side of the conversation that Dena was p.i.s.sed, most likely at me, but I was just going to have to explain later. Right now the most important thing was to get everybody out.
We all piled into the car and I gave the driver our destination. As we pulled onto the strip Mary Ann hung up and looked over at me and then the overnight bag that was now squeezed between the front-seat and my knees. "Something bad happened, didn"t it?" she asked.
I stared out the window at the overly bright lights of the city. "You have no idea."
"Okay, so help me understand this," Marcus said slowly. It hadn"t taken us long to get back to the Encore and we were now all in his and Dena"s room. I was standing by the window, my arms tightly crossed over my chest and the overnight bag I had removed from that room right by my side. Mary Ann and Leah were sitting on one of the double beds and Dena was sitting at the desk refusing to look at anyone but Marcus who was standing in the middle of the room. Marcus turned to the two newest arrivals.
"Why are you here again?" he asked.
"I thought Sophie might do something stupid," Leah explained, "and I wanted to be here to chaperone. I knew that if I brought Mary Ann with me Sophie wouldn"t be able to just send me home."
"And you thought Sophie would do something stupid?" Dena muttered but Marcus pressed on.
"And Sophie, you went up to Anatoly"s room?"
"It wasn"t his room," I said quickly.
"It was the blonde"s room?" he asked.
"No, not really...I don"t think so."
Dena gave me a withering look. "You barged in there like a first cla.s.s stalker and you don"t even know whose room it is?"
"Go easy on her," Marcus murmured, "drunken heartbreak makes people do crazy things."
Dena didn"t look like she wanted to take it easy on me. "So I take it you went up to his room and found him with the blonde and now you...what? You stole his overnight bag to get revenge?"
"This isn"t his overnight bag, it"s mine." I unzipped it and pulled out the duffle bag. "This is his bag. It was in the room but he wasn"t."
"Maybe this isn"t a good time to say this," Mary Ann hedged, "But I"m so sorry to hear about you and Anatoly. If it makes you feel better, I really don"t think it"s a permanent break. True love always finds a way!"
All of us in the room took a second to stare at Mary Ann like she was an alien from outer s.p.a.ce (a real possibility) before turning back to the subject at hand.
"So the blonde let you in?" Marcus asked.
"No! No! She didn"t let me in! She couldn"t let me in because she was in the closet!"
There was a long pause before Mary Ann clapped her hands happily. "This is great news!" she squealed. "Anatoly couldn"t have been having an affair with a lesbian! He still loves you!"
Leah dropped her head in her hands and sighed.
"You"re not understanding me," I said slowly. "She was literally in the closet!"
Dena c.o.c.ked her head to the side. "Really? That"s a new one for me. Usually when people talk about a closet fetish they don"t mean it literally but..."
"Oh dear Lord, Dena, not everything is about s.e.x!" Leah burst out. "What Sophie"s trying to tell you is that there"s a dead bimbo in Anatoly"s hotel room closet!"