DOUBLE KNOT Read online

  “Don’t worry about your shoes, Mother. Just don’t slip and fall.”

  “I’m scooting up on my backside,” she said. “There’s nowhere to fall. Boy, I’ll tell you, it’s tight in here. Davis, you keep your seat. It’d take the Jaws of Life to get you out of here. Or in, for that matter.”

  Five excruciatingly long minutes later, and from much farther up the tunnel, she shouted, “I’m almost there.”

  “Can you see anything, Mrs. Way?”

  “So? Can you?”

  “Mother, be careful.”

  Fantasy, Jess, Anderson Cooper, and I had our heads stuffed into the hole in the wall. It was close quarters. Considering how much of me there was. Jaws of Life and all.

  “I can see where Davis’s cat is getting in and out.” From the top, by the time her voice traveled to us, it bounced off the bulkhead and amplified. “It’s a—” we waited impatiently to hear what it was, “—a little closet of some sort.”

  A closet?

  “There’s something stuck up here. HOLD ON.”

  “Oh, Lord.” I had to back out of the hole in the wall. “I can’t stand it.”

  “I’M GOING TO PUSH IT!”

  “We can hear you just fine, Mrs. Way,” Fantasy said. “Maybe not so loud.”

  Next we heard a grunt, then the most godawful noise, most likely Mother’s detached head bouncing down the wall. Fantasy and Jess scrambled out of the way, and I had to clap my hand over my mouth to keep the scream in. The noise got louder and louder until it stopped.

  “I can’t look,” I said. “I can’t. Is she alive?”

  “It’s a piece of wood, Davis.”

  I peeked through two fingers. It was a three-foot by three-foot square of plywood covered on one side with industrial blue carpet. A smooth chunk of the wood had broken away, the edge of the carpet dangling, which was surely Anderson’s in and out. The next thing we heard was Mother, from above. “Well, hello there!” Then a blood-curdling scream.

  * * *

  Her name was Arlinda Smith. She was a Probability casino server and her locker in the casino employee service area behind the main casino bar was directly above the middle mirrors of my dressing room.

  “No way.”

  “Arlinda,” I said. “I have your V2. I’m not going to send it up. You need to come get it.”

  Ten minutes earlier, Mother had introduced herself to poor unsuspecting Arlinda, who happened upon a floating head in the floor of her locker as she searched for her missing V2. Mother invited her to join us in 704, Arlinda vehemently declined, then, at my insistence, Mother slid back down the bulkhead so I could conduct negotiations with (our only hope) Arlinda Smith.

  Mother squealed “Whee!” twice on the way down and “I hope I’m not picking my pants” three times. Fantasy and I pulled her out. She stood, brushed herself off, then announced, “That was the most fun I’ve had in a long time.” She looked past us and pointed.

  We turned to see Sleeping Beauty Jess spread-eagle passed out across the ottoman, her hair hanging off and spilling onto the carpet, Anderson Cooper having her way with Jess’s dark locks. “Davis, your cat is going to snatch her bald.” I caught Anderson’s eye and signed for her to stop. She sat down and pouted.

  I got on my back behind the mirror, my head in the hole, babies playing leap frog, looked up the wall, and tried to talk Arlinda down. Now that more light spilled from above, I could see that the path between us was relatively smooth, but it sloped and slanted right and left like a primitive prototype of a waterslide. I really couldn’t believe my mother had traveled up and down this wall. I knew for a fact my father wouldn’t believe it.

  “Please come down and talk to us,” I called up.

  “I’m getting security,” Arlinda called down.

  Fantasy and I yelled, “NO!”

  “Who are you?” She cast a long shadow down the wall. “Tell me who you are and I might come down there. Maybe.”

  “I’m Mrs. Sanders.”

  “Bellissimo Mrs. Sanders? You’re her?”

  “Yes!” No. “We’re locked in our room, Arlinda, and we really need your help.”

  “Your V2 opens the door,” she said.

  “Our V2s don’t work. We need your help.”

  “What do you mean your V2s don’t work?”

  “I don’t know how to explain it any other way,” I said. “They don’t work.”

  “Well, my V2 works,” Arlinda said. “And I need it. Really, Mrs. Sanders, or whoever you are, give me my V2 or I’m going to get security. Right now.”

  “Arlinda.” I had to get through to this girl. “We are trapped in our suite. Four of us. We’ve been locked up since we walked in. We truly need your help.” I let my plea sit there until things were very still between decks seven and eight.

  “How do I know you’re not lying to me?”

  “Why in the world would I lie about something like this?” I asked. “Please, Arlinda. Please come down here.” And turn on your phone.

  Nothing.

  I pulled out the last trick I had up my sleeve. “I have your tips.”

  I waited. And waited.

  “How’d you get my tips?” she asked. “And how’d you get my V2?”

  “Your V2 fell and I have your tips because my cat has been climbing the wall.”

  “You have a cat on this ship?”

  Well.

  “Okay, move,” she finally said. “I’m coming down.”

  It took Fantasy and Mother to haul me up from the floor and out of Arlinda’s way. We listened intently as she slid down. A shoe knocked its way down. It was an Alexander Wang bone pump. Four-inch heel. Then the other shoe dropped. Fantasy showed them to Mother. “Now, these are high heels.” Finally, we saw one bare foot appear in the hole in the gauntlet gray, then another. Then one long brown leg, then its mate.

  “Now what?” Arlinda’s voice was much closer. “I’m stuck.”

  “That last curve is a booger bear,” Mother said.

  It took ten minutes to figure out how to get Arlinda, several inches taller than Mother, out of the wall she was wedged in. Fantasy pulled her by the ankles until she had room to flip over, then pulled again, Mother directing traffic the whole time, which wasn’t helping a bit, and finally Arlinda Smith appeared. The three of us crowded around and got our first good look at her as she dusted herself off. Then she took inventory of our motley crew. She took a step back and bumped into the gauntlet gray wall. Her eyes were darting and wild.

  I believe we frightened her.

  “Give her some space,” I said.

  Mother and Fantasy moved in closer.

  Arlinda squared her shoulders, took a deep breath, and bravely asked, “Where’s my V2?”

  I held up a finger to my crew—I got this. “What’s directly above us?”

  “My changing room and my locker,” she said. “Where’s my phone? Where are my tips?”

  “Why is the ship stopped?”

  “Engine trouble. Where’s my phone? Where are my tips?” She was considerably taller than me and a lot less, or let’s say not at all, pregnant, with china-doll skin, short dark shiny hair, and bright chocolate-brown eyes. She was wearing two ounces of a navy blue sailor suit. It was barely past a bikini. “I’m really confused,” she said. “I don’t understand what’s going on.”

  Get. In. Line.

  “Can I have my V2?” Arlinda’s shiny hair bounced as her head jerked around the room. She rocked back and forth on her bare feet. Her voice shook when she said, “I really don’t think I should be here.”

  “It’ll be okay, Arlinda,” I tried to reassure her.

  “Can I have my V2? And my tips? Please?”

  “Yes,” I said. “You can have them. I’ll give everything
to you if you’ll give us fifteen minutes. Just fifteen minutes.”

  Her chin trembled.

  “Arlinda, I promise you no one here will hurt you. I promise.”

  Her eyes swept the room again—the remnants of our chicken sandwich picnic; snoring Jess, sprawled out like a drunk prom date in her red undies; Anderson Cooper, ho-hum, grooming her little paws like these were the kinds of escapades she witnessed daily; Mother in her Party Suit and Traveltime Cloggers, animated and energized by her adventure; six feet of Fantasy plus two feet of hair, tapping an impatient foot, hands on hips; and, well, me. Arlinda’s eyes stopped at the remnants of Bianca’s Monique Lhuillier gown in a pile of silk streamers on the gray shag carpet at her feet. She kept her eyes on it as she asked, her voice hollow and thin, “Who are you people?”

  Just then, behind us, Jess woke like we’d dumped a load of ice on her, long bare legs flying through the air, one enormous breast escaping the confines of her red demi bra. She sat straight up on the ottoman. “SO? SO? SO? SO? SO? SO?”

  Arlinda didn’t take her eyes off mine as she stooped and batted blindly for her Alexander Wangs. “I’m sorry,” she said, “but I can’t help you.” She tucked her shoes under an arm and held out her hand for her V2 and tips. “I promise I’ll send help. I promise I will send help in five minutes. But I can’t help you.”

  Fantasy shifted her weight and sighed, then spoke to the chandelier. “Arlinda. That’s not an option. You’re here and we need you.”

  “No.” Arlinda was on her way through the rabbit hole in the wall. “You can keep my things. I’m sorry.”

  She was making a run for it.

  Fantasy looked at me. “Why is she doing this to me?”

  I shrugged.

  The top half of Arlinda had disappeared, but the back half of her froze when she heard the unmistakable sound of a 9mm round being racked into the chamber of a handgun. “Arlinda,” Fantasy said it on a huge sigh. “Get back here.”

  And then the hostages in 704 had a hostage of their own.

  SEVENTEEN

  A door off the foyer led to the dining room, a long skinny room that connected to the kitchen by a large pass-through serving window. I’d poked my head in the dining room last night when I was looking for a way out, but hadn’t spent any time there until now. I thought it best to get Arlinda out of my dressing room. Change of scenery and all.

  We filed in through the foyer, Fantasy wagging the Hi-Point C-9 behind 704’s newest and most petrified guest, and made the dining room Mission Control. Maybe, with the laptop and Arlinda’s help, I could assess the danger level outside of 704.

  Jess tried to comfort Arlinda. “They’re really nice,” she told her. “They haven’t killed me.”

  “Really?” Arlinda was barefoot and wearing a scuba blue Givenchy cashmere blazer of Bianca’s over her bikini sailor suit. “Good to know.”

  Mother said, “That ugly statue is gone.” A directional light pointed at nothing on a marble display stand in the foyer.

  “How about that,” said dumbstruck Fantasy. “Wonder what happened to it?”

  In keeping with the simple décor throughout 704, the dining room was tastefully underdone, with a long white-oak parson table surrounded by eight white linen armless chairs on wheels. Under all that, a wheat sisal rug. Above all that, two birdcage chandeliers on a dimmer switch. I cranked them up.

  We spread our goodies across the table, everything, including Fantasy’s gun, with the exception of Arlinda’s V2 and tips, which I wasn’t about to hand over. Yet. I sat at the head of the table and indicated I’d like Arlinda to sit beside me. She fully complied.

  We settled in.

  “Would anyone like a cup of coffee?” Mother asked.

  “I’d love some coffee,” Jess said.

  Fantasy seconded that motion.

  I looked at Arlinda, who nodded, because she was too afraid not to. I think I could have offered her a cup of battery acid and she’d have gone along with it.

  My hands clasped on the table, the laptop and The Compass in front of me, I turned to our guest. “I’m not Bianca Sanders.”

  She whimpered, a short desperate little noise.

  “My name is Davis Way Cole and I work for the Bellissimo.”

  “You’re Mr. Cole’s wife?”

  My head dropped. My eyes landed on my babies. I spoke to them. “Yes.” Mr. Cole, my husband, the father of my twins, whom I hadn’t spoken to in almost thirty hours.

  “I’m her mother.” Mother waved.

  “I’m her partner.” Fantasy waved.

  Jess sat there, lounging across the dining room table with her stack of dead V2s, trying to figure out who she was in relation to me. I finally said, “That’s Jessica.”

  Arlinda passed around an unsteady smile.

  Mother went to push back from the table without remembering the chair was on wheels. She let out a roller-coaster whoop, laughed at herself, and for a split second the thick tension in the room dissipated. “I’ll go see about that coffee.”

  To our guest, I said, “You are our first contact with anyone outside of this suite since before we left Biloxi. And we need your help.”

  “You look just like Mrs. Sanders.”

  She knew who Bradley and Bianca were. “Do you work for the Bellissimo, Arlinda?”

  She nodded yes. Then she shook her head no. Which was to say she did, but she didn’t plan on ever setting foot in the Bellissimo again. “I’m a server in high stakes. I’m one of several Bellissimo high-stakes servers on Probability.”

  “Well, you just got a big fat raise, Arlinda.”

  She wasn’t impressed.

  “Yes, I look like Mrs. Sanders. I’m who you see at the Bellissimo and in media when you think you’re seeing her. I’m her body double.”

  She was a little impressed.

  “Are you?” Her eyes were fixed on my middle. “Are you really expecting or are you being her body double?”

  I patted my babies. “All me.”

  “Do you need a doctor?” Arlinda asked. “Are you having your baby now?” She inched away from me as Mother appeared in the doorway with a pot of coffee and four martini glasses.

  “She’s not ready yet,” Mother said. “She looks like she’s about to go, but she’s carrying twins. They don’t know what kind of twins because they’re waiting to be surprised. She’s carrying low, has been since she started showing, so I think she’s having boys.” She stopped at Fantasy. “Move that thing.” Fantasy picked up the gun and tucked it at her hip. Arlinda let out a barely audible sigh of relief. Mother stopped at Jess. “Get your elbows off the table.” Jess’s hands slid into her lap. “These will be my first grandsons.” Mother poured steaming hot coffee into Arlinda’s martini glasses. “She’s got another sixteen weeks or so, but you know doubles come early.”

  Well, look who could write a book.

  Arlinda considered the martini glasses curiously and she was the last to pick one up by the stem to take a sip. When she did, she waited to drop dead. When she didn’t, she took another sip. She opened her mouth to say something, changed her mind, then tried again.

  “Go ahead, Arlinda.”

  “My V2,” she said. “Let me have it. I’ll turn it on and you can call the police.”

  “It’s not that simple,” I said.

  “Why not?”

  “The ship is smart,” I said. “Very smart.”

  “Oh, I know.” Arlinda nodded.

  “If I were holding an entire suite hostage,” I said, “the first thing I’d do would be to monitor the electronic activity in it.” I didn’t bother her with the deadly consequences details in the letter that were directly connected to attempts at communication. “I can see where making a call on your V2 would look like the easiest way out. Bu
t we’re sitting dead still in the middle of the sea. I can’t call the police, the Coast Guard, or anyone else who could get here faster than someone on this ship could get here and do us harm. Not to mention it would jeopardize you. The person or people who locked us in here would know the call came from inside this suite and from your V2.”

  Mother said, “Davis is a thinker like that. Always has been. She gets that from her daddy.”

  Arlinda was so pasty pale.

  “We need to approach it from a different angle,” I said. “Or at least be on the other side of the door before we make a phone call. And if we can get on the other side of the door to call for help, we need to make the call on our way to this man, who’s also being held.” From my stash, I pushed a picture of No Hair in front of her. She bent over it. “His name is Jeremy Covey. He’s our boss.” I toggled a finger between myself and Fantasy. “And he’s the head of security on Probability.”

  She looked at No Hair’s picture at length. “The head of security is locked up?”

  “Yes,” I said.

  Arlinda began to see the gravity of our situation, that the problem might be bigger than four women, a gun, martini glasses, and a cat stealing her tips. “Why is he in the submarine?”

  There it was again. “This is why we need you, Arlinda. You’re helping already. How do you know he’s in the submarine?”

  “The round porthole windows,” Jess said. “You can see them in the picture. They’re only in the submarine.”

  Well, there you go.

  “We need your help getting him out of the submarine, Arlinda,” I said.

  “You’re locked in here.” Arlinda tapped the table. “How are you going to get your boss out of the submarine if you can’t leave your suite?”

  “That’s where you come in,” I said.

  She surrendered. Her chair rolled back. She was poised for flight.

  “Seriously,” she said, “I can’t begin to help you. I’m in my last semester of law school at Loyola, I serve cocktails, and I do not know why your boss is in the submarine. I have no idea how to get him out. Please just give me my V2, let me go, and I’ll send someone who can help.”