Chapter 11
Ace
I know for a fact that if I weren't as mentally stable as required to be a member of ICE, I'd be in the middle of a PTSD flashback when I open my eyes to the room filled with a flashing red light.
"What the fuck," I mutter, pulling my arm from the woman's torso and using the back of my hand to swipe at my eyes.
"Shit," she snaps as she sits up. "I fell asleep."
"Makes two of us," I mutter, sitting up as well.
I legit fell asleep, holding a woman I don't even know. How does that shit even happen? I'm supposed to be fucking working, not cuddling in a brothel bed.
"Fuck my life, I'm getting old," I growl as I bend over to grab my shoes.
The woman whose name I still don't know and probably never will grabs her robe from the floor, her eyes locked on me as she dresses.
If I had any doubt that they have cameras in the rooms, I don't now. Once we were awake, the flashing stopped and the light in the room is a little brighter now that my time must be up.
"I'm so sorry," she whispers.
"I had the best time," I tell her, wondering how there are days I feel so young but also so damned old. "That was the best nap I ever had."
"You don' t have to leave just yet," she says, a sultriness to her tone, but she doesn't close the distance between the two of us.
I can already tell this is the upsell part of the night, where she's going to try to convince me to spend a little more money before I leave tonight or get me to make another appointment with her before I do.
"I have a meeting," I lie.
She holds on to her composure.
"I'd like to see you again," she says as she bites her lower lip, and I swear my age is even more glaringly obvious right now than it ever has been.
Forty years ago, hell, probably even thirty years ago, I would've been all over this woman. My hormones would have me taking out a fucking loan to spend a few more hours with her, but I'm no longer a horny guy in my thirties. It probably has less to do with my maturity and more to do with the fact that there must've come a time in my life where women who are young enough to be my granddaughter, if I would've had kids , just don't appeal to me. She's completely legal but doesn't interest me at all.
What a fucking shame, honestly.
"I'll make sure they know to add you to my list at the front," I assure her, wondering all the while if Cora got into more trouble than she was able to handle while I went to fucking sleep.
Maybe retirement isn't such a bad idea after all.
"Have a good night, Mr. Wiedman," she says, her hands on my forearm as she leans in and brushes a quick kiss on my cheek.
She looks back at me one more time before leaving the room, and I swear I see more pain than a girl her age should have in her pretty blue eyes. I can tell with just that one look that she's here of her own free will but it doesn't come without a laundry list of regrets for the things she has had to do to make money .
As soon as the door on the far side of the room closes, the one I was escorted through opens, the woman who brought me here standing in the doorway.
"Anything else we can do for you this evening, Mr. Wiedman?"
"I think I'm all set," I tell her as I leave the room.
I'm not a fool. I know there's a reason some of the money is given back to me when I leave. Just as well as I know that the girl who napped with me will be in some sort of trouble because of it.
My car is waiting right outside when I exit, and I don't hesitate to climb inside. I don't drive it back to the studio apartment even though that nap made me even more exhausted than I was earlier.
I head straight to the hotel where I parked my bike earlier. I leave everything I took with me to the Daydreamer's Spa in the car, including the watch and car keys. The vehicle will have to be swept for bugs before I can use it again, and the phone I'd left in the console was a decoy. It would be insane for anyone not to have a cell phone in this day and age.
I ride halfway back to the apartment before stopping in the empty parking lot of a strip center and calling in the location of the car to have it looked over. There's a lot that can be said about technology left behind, and there's always a chance that Cerberus can learn even more about the devices they may have left in or on the car, as well as the cell phone I'd left in the console.
I wait until I'm in the privacy of the studio apartment before I make the second call.
Kincaid is already laughing when he answers the phone.
"Will you ever grow up?" I ask, trying to sound bored, but there's a smile threatening to take over my face.
"Nah, man. That'll mean I'm getting old."
I don't remind him of our age because that shit is depressing, and there are days I feel much older than I actually am. Then there are days I wonder why my body wants to betray me when my head tells me I can do something.
"Fucking cuddling?"
"Would you have preferred I listed orgies or something? It's the most innocuous thing I could find on their list," he explains.
"I guess I should say thank you for having all that shit in place. So you knew about the database?"
This information, more than anything else, surprised me the most.
"We've gotten wind about it, but we haven't been able to gain access."
"Do you think they have a link to access Hale-ish's files?"
"Worried your time there will come up?"
"More like worried they'll do facial recognition and my cover will be blown," I mutter.
"Your cover is safe. Unless you've been back to Hale-ish in the last ten years."
"I haven't been back since the grand opening. I still think you missed a great party."
He laughs. "Have you seen my wife? I'd never take her to a place like that."
"Afraid she might trade up?" I ask jokingly.
He laughs again. "Did you happen to run into our rogue older sister?"
"Didn't see a soul other than the people they wanted me to see. You know how it goes. What are the chances she's staying in town?"
"A hundred percent," he says, my phone buzzing at the same time he continues to speak. "I sent you her hotel information."
"She used a personal card, didn't she?"
"Of course she did."
"She has no damn sense of self-preservation," I mutter.
"She's a civilian. What do you expect?"
"I expect her not to get into the middle of an investigation."
"I imagine she feels helpless, and as someone from a powerful family, she isn't accustomed to being told she has to wait for something."
I don't argue with him, but I didn't get a spoiled brat sort of vibe from her. If anything, that classification would be reserved for her younger sister, Sadie.
"Are you going to go over there tonight?"
"Probably," I mutter, knowing I'll never be able to sleep without making sure she's okay first.
"Let me know if you need anything," he says before ending the call.
I grab a quick shower, opting for jeans and a T-shirt because house calls at fucking two in the morning don't get the button-down and slacks look. Plus, I'll be on my bike until the damn car gets swept for bugs.
Traffic is less chaotic, but this town is a lot like Vegas, or really any large city; it never sleeps. There's always a café open, coffee hot and waiting to be drunk, no matter the time of day or night. People work two or three jobs to keep up with their lives. Plus, the economy has gone to shit in recent years and there's no upturn on the horizon. People are less likely to vacation and do fun things when they're struggling just to live.
The people on the hill aren't struggling. They still have their jobs and, honestly, if those are the types of people who are supposed to be protecting others, it makes them nothing more than slumlords with the way a lot of Americans are having to live these days.
I guess I sort of have to include myself in that equation, but my job has prevented me from having to choose between food or electricity the way I know some people have to.
I used to be the type of person who would say those people who can't make it need to render better life decisions. If they can't afford kids, they shouldn't have had them in the first place, but people fall on hard times. Stable jobs become less so when the economy falls to pieces.
People who work in the entertainment industry no longer have jobs, and I'm not talking about movie stars. They always have a Plan B, a way to fall back on, a nest egg, or something. The people who really take the hit are the craft food service people, or the hairstylist, the costume designers, and the people who build the sets. Those poor fuckers are the ones not working.
It goes the same way when people can no longer afford their lives. They make bad decisions. It's why check cashing and loan places tend to pop up in the most impoverished communities.
As successful as I've been in life, I know a lot of it rests in the hands of luck and connections. I can't get lost in my head right now, worrying about all the millions of things that are wrong with the world. I have a rich girl I have to chastise for sticking her nose where it doesn't belong.