It All Began in Monte Carlo (15 page)

Men alone, without a companion, were allowed only once a
week, on Friday nights, though women alone were always welcome. For a little more than the entrance fee, dinner could be had while observing the antics, and making a choice, and maybe joining in a little.

Strobe lights licked at the half-naked bodies and every now and then someone sprayed perfume into the air.

Kitty needed the sexual contact of strangers she found at the clubs. It gave her a strange satisfaction to be taken by men who were as emotionally unaffected as she was, though unlike them, she never found it sexually satisfying. Power was what she felt, even though she was often the one being degraded in some sadomasochistic act, handcuffed and collared, men grouped around her, watching her moan and scream in a pretend ecstasy she never felt.
That
was her power. The men thought they owned her with their sex. She knew they did not. It was weird but she was addicted to it, the way others were addicted to cocaine. Though of course, she wouldn't say no to a line or two of that either.

Kitty was well-known at all the clubs, but her “act” and her body were becoming tired. Kitty could no longer undress completely. She had to rely on attracting tourists or businessmen who had not been there before, who had never seen her trolling for customers, one or two or more at a time, unfastening her dress to display herself. Now she was ashamed of her pear-shaped middle-aged body and her pancaked breasts. She always kept on the padded bra and a camisole that covered the folds in her belly, though not her private parts, her
chaton
as she called it in French, making a little pun on her name, “Kitty.”

No panties of course, that would hold matters up. Which phrase meant a great deal to Kitty. “Getting it up” was her job. And the truth was she
was
getting a little old for it. The hair on her head might be dyed red, but her pussy was waxed, and with her plump cellulite thighs, naked she looked like a plucked chicken.

Teenagers with bodies to die for were taking Kitty's place, and what man would not prefer their young flesh. She now had to rely
on flattery, charm, sex talk and acts so outrageous with promises to do whatever the men or women, or both together, wanted.

There were also, of course, her ads on Craigslist and on
Eros.com
, with photos of her in exotic poses, always in the upholstered bra and cami, but looking magically younger, and extolling her sexual expertise. And then there were the adult ads in the local papers:
“Mature foreign woman. Expert in all forms of massage. Natural redhead, willing to experiment any way you like to bring you happiness.”
“Natural” of course was pushing it.

And then there was the escort service from where she was sent to the lesser hotels because she had never been in the category of the expensive “high-class” call girl; she was merely “an escort.” For a modest amount of money she would meet unimportant businessmen at their hotels, slipping in head-down in an attempt to be discreet, though of course there were always security cameras, positioned in every hotel lobby and on every floor, that recorded exactly who came in and out and where they went at any given moment. Those records, of course with Kitty on them, were microchipped and stored by the hotels for easy identification, in the event of any police trouble later.

So far, though, Kitty had avoided that kind of trouble. She never stole from her businessmen and she never cheated on their fees, though she did try to charge for “extra” services, about which she would whisper in their ears, while dangling a pair of handcuffs,
“Come on, everybody does it. It's fun.”
Sliding her hands over her body, rubbing in scented oil, she would ask,
“Does it excite you when I do this?”
And,
“Do you want to hurt me? Anywhere except the face.”
And in the little overnight bag she carried, she would have her special “sex” outfit: the leopard bikini pants, the padded push-up bra, the cheap blue silky camisole. She wore this same outfit on all her sexual encounters, and of course always her precious Louboutin heels with the identifiable red soles that she believed gave her an expensive air of class. Also in her little overnight bag were lotions and lubricants, a vibrator, handcuffs and studded collars in leather with metal spikes;
and sex toys, masks, and a sweet little whip as well as a paddle, for those kinds of services. It didn't matter to Kitty. She never felt anything sexually anyway. Not a thing. Although of course she always moaned a lot so the men would think she did.

Kitty's “partner” was James Franklyn, whom she called Jimmy, a married Englishman with whom she had an ongoing relationship. When Jimmy got mad at her he told her she was a true nymphomaniac.
“Multiple partners,”
he yelled, ticking off the list on the fingers of one hand. “
A constant need for masturbation.
And never,
never
any feeling or satisfaction.”

It was true Kitty never climaxed. In fact she was secretly deeply disinterested in sex though she tried every morning with her vibrator to satisfy herself personally. It never worked. What Kitty liked was the attention. She was a sexual predator who sought out men vulnerable to her brand of flattery. She liked to turn on a man by talking sex, by offering it, but at heart she was a voyeur. Kitty Ratte was as cold as meat in a meat locker, and as manipulative and scheming as any criminal. Kitty still denied being a nympho, but when Jimmy Franklyn, failed accountant husband of Martha Franklyn of suburban Surrey, England, called her a psychopath, she felt like killing him. And she might have. Instead, she went to a therapist.

Only once though, because the woman had looked into her eyes, asked a few pertinent questions about her lifestyle, about what she felt when she was with a man, about who she thought she really was, and then dismissed her. “You lie even to yourself. You need more help than I can offer,” she had said as coldly as her professional manner would allow. It upset Kitty, being despised by a therapist. She'd paid good money only to be insulted.

Getting up to leave, Kitty had stopped at the door. “So?” she asked, in that middle European lilt. “Am I a nymphomaniac?”

The therapist looked at her from behind her desk, hands steepled together, cool. “Absolutely,” she said.

“And a psychopath?”

“Ask yourself that,” the therapist said. “And see what answer you come up with. Meanwhile, there's a place in Switzerland. I suggest you consult the psychiatrists there. Perhaps they can help you.” And she wrote down the name and address on a piece of paper and walked across and handed it to Kitty.

Kitty put it in her Chanel purse, looking hard into the therapist's eyes all the time, her blue pinpoints furious under her lowering brow and the fringe of red hair. “Bitch,” she had said as she departed, slamming the door behind her.

 

 

Jimmy was at Kitty's apartment that night when she returned from the club.

He got up from the sofa where he had been stretched out, tall, emaciated-looking with sunken dark eyes, clean-shaven, thin brown hair and as unremarkable as Kitty. It was his interest in sex that had drawn them together. She had given him the sex chat in a hotel bar, about how much she loved sex; how sexy he was, how attractive, and how much she wanted him. Jimmy had fallen for it like a ton of bricks, because like her, Jimmy was a voyeur. He enjoyed watching Kitty do her “act,” which meant provocative poses in the leopard bikini pants, legs apart, wiggling her plump bottom, using her vibrator while he watched, asking if she was turning him on. The cami never came off though, and certainly not the bra.

“I'm ashamed of my body,” she told Jimmy later in their relationship. “It's getting old. But my other longtime lover says I'm beautiful. And our sex together is great.” Of course there was no other “lover” but Jimmy did not know that then.

Jimmy thought Kitty was far from beautiful but he got off on the show and the stories she told him of her other sexual exploits. Over the past couple of years they had become close, and Jimmy
left his suburban life in England behind more and more often to tend to the new “business” of blackmail he and Kitty had developed together. They had done well, but only in a small way, with small-time targets, married men afraid of being caught by their wives who'd paid up and moved on. Kitty was too afraid to keep up the demands, though, and they soon went through the cash, which anyhow, had not been enough to buy Kitty her jewelry and watches, or her apartment, or the bar in Marbella they longed for.

“You're late,” Jimmy said now, not touching her.

“I went to the club.”

Kitty unhooked her bag from her shoulder and threw it onto a chair. Her ground-floor apartment in a converted old house was smaller than she would have liked, with glass doors leading onto a tiny garden with a gate set in a hedge at the far end. The decor was an attempt at a Mediterranean theme: seashell cushions, blue-and-white cotton-duck curtains, silvery bits and pieces and cheap crystal figurines of fish and seabirds, things like that, that Kitty “collected” on her travels. Not that she traveled anymore. She couldn't afford it.

There was a small living room with a couple of beige couches and matching chairs set around a glass coffee table; a commercial painting or two and a gold sunburst mirror over the fake fireplace, where a red glow emanated from an electric bed of logs. And, unnoticed by her “visitors,” hidden in the ceiling and aimed directly at one of the couches, was a professional video camera, the size of a nail head. Like a nanny-cam but very powerful. No detail escaped it.

The apartment was a month-to-month rental and Kitty had to work to pay that rent. She
hated
not owning it. It drove her nuts, boring into her brain as she struggled to come up with the money each month. She could not even afford another pair of the Louboutin shoes, let alone the Hermès bag she craved. Now, at last she was about to do something about that situation.

She went into the bedroom, kicked off the stilettos that were killing her; threw off her dress, the chemise and the bra, put on a robe and walked back to the living room where Jimmy was pouring himself a vodka soda. Kitty could be naked only with Jimmy, who knew and understood her.

“Come with me,” Kitty said, leading the way into the kitchen where a computer sat on the counter under a bank of cupboards.

Jimmy followed her. “Drink?” He lifted up his glass.

“Red Bull.” Kitty settled herself on a metal chair in front of the computer which was tuned to Skype. When Jimmy was back in England, it kept them in touch sexually, with both of them naked on the screen, as well as keeping her “in touch” sexually with plenty of others. But sex was not on her mind now. She gulped down the Red Bull, waiting for a caffeine rush which, since it was her sixth of the night, she had no problem achieving. Then, “Look,” she said, beckoning Jimmy over.

She had Googled Eduardo Johanssen. Google gave them, or anyone who cared to Google Eddie, a great deal of information on him, more than most would have needed to know. But for Kitty it was important and she was about to tell Jimmy exactly why.

“I was with Eddie tonight,” she said. “I spent a couple of hours with him. He's lonely. A new girl left him for someone else. Her name is Sunny. I know her. Don't worry, she's an easy one; simple or dumb, or maybe both. Anyhow, I became her new best friend and I have her under control. Now I'm also Eddie's friend. I have him bewitched. He told me his wife is divorcing him and it's very messy. She wants to keep the kids. He won't allow that. He's rich and he's a loner.” She turned and beamed her bucktoothed grin at Jimmy. She said, “Any evidence of Eddie's lack of moral standing and he loses those children. Plus most of his fortune. He's ripe for the taking.”

Jimmy nodded, then drained his glass. “I'll find out everything else there is to know about him. By tomorrow, you'll have all the information you need.”

“As well as these.” Kitty took a bottle of pills from the counter and held them up for him to see. “My secret weapon.”

Date-rape drugs and Ecstasy were only two of the secret weapons in Kitty's new blackmail game.

 

 

Sunny woke, heart pounding. A crack of light came from the bathroom door because she couldn't sleep in a room that was totally black. Mac had laughed the first time they had slept together when she'd confessed that she had always been afraid of the dark. “Sunny Alvarez afraid of the dark?” he'd asked, kissing her neck where the pulse fluttered under his lips.

“Hey, a girl can't be brave about everything,” she'd retorted.

“Not this gal, though,” he'd said. “Not the one who rides a Harley like a man and drives a car like a racing pro; who surfs and swims like a porpoise; and who faced danger with me. Not the woman who found a body in a refrigerator in Tuscany, and another under a cactus in the California desert; who walked into a Halloween party that turned out to be not so Halloween and she was the only one in costume.”

Sunny had dressed like a lady vampire for that party, not so ladylike though in fishnets and stilettos and fangs. And Mac had been embarrassed in his own vampire outfit, though it was less revealing than hers. She'd faced down the stares of those country-club ladies in their St. John suits, martinis in hand. She had stuck her chin in the air, given them her best vampire smile and walked right out of there—and into even more danger than she had ever expected. But that was another story.

Right now, in the hotel room in Monte Carlo, Sunny was afraid of the dark.

She switched on the bed light and Tesoro growled, blinking from the pillow, grumpy at being disturbed.

The gap in the curtains showed a gleam of gray light. A glance at the clock showed it was five-thirty. Too soon for the sun, too late for the moon. Night and darkness were being dismissed and Sunny could breathe again.