One Night (27 page)

“I guess that's what saved your life.”

“You didn't answer me before. How did she find you? How did she find us?”

“I told you.”

“Tell me again. This is . . . shocking.”

“Whenever I use my charge card, it sends an alert. E-mail goes out for every transaction, no matter the amount. It's that way for fraud prevention. Had an incident in the past. People can do many small transactions, under the radar. So the moment there is a charge, no matter the amount, an alert is sent to both of our phones. She saw that I had gotten a room, knew where. The card leaves an electronic trail.”

“Your credit card is your snitch and needs stitches. In that case, before all that happened, she knew you had bought gas in Hawaiian Gardens, might have known you had bought condoms at 7-Eleven.”

“And she was alerted again when I paid for the room service.”

“Well, she knew you weren't alone if she saw that bill.”

“She knew I wasn't alone at Denny's.”

“Technology is a beast. Now everyone can pretend they are Big Brother. Everybody can stalk everyone and never be seen. She knew you bought condoms and wine at 7-Eleven.”

“She knew. She cursed and told me she knew.”

“They can do that? Send a message stating everything you bought? Rhetorical question that time.”

“She was alerted again when I left and bought the cheesecake.”

“She knew you had left the hotel.”

“Yeah. That last alert was how she knew I wasn't at the hotel, and maybe that gave her the confidence to go up to the room, see how it had been left, and wait for us to come back.”

“Or see if I was still there. A woman always wants to see what the other woman looks like.”

“I was gone. She knew I had gone in search of the best cheesecake in Los Angeles.”

“She probably assumed I was there with you. Or that we'd be back.”

“Probably.”

“You knew that she would know everything you had done tonight.”

“It didn't matter, not anymore. I told you that at the start. I know what she's done as well. What I did was a drop of water. What she's done has been an ocean. What I did doesn't compare.”

“She went to some place called Houghmagandy.”

“And Decadence.”

“She doesn't look like the type. She looks so wholesome, so Procter and Gamble.”

“The sneakiest whores look like the girl next door.”

“She was a beauty queen?”

“She was Harvest Queen in her hometown.”

“Why didn't she just divorce you?”

“Ten years. She needed to be with me for ten years. After ten years, in the state of California, she would have been entitled to much more than she'd get from a divorce now.”

“She was a well-dressed and educated scavenger in it for the long con. She was playing you for the long con better than any hood rat puts a man in a trick bag and gets him for eighteen years.”

“I guess so. Whatever you just said, I guess so.”

“You said the marriage was bad. Why didn't you divorce her?”

“My parents never divorced. Thought it would get better. Thought I was doing something wrong.”

“She came to kill me.”

It played again in my mind.

I had seen her. When I was in the hallway, naked and at the bank of elevators, she was the woman who had exited on my floor. The elevator doors had opened on my angst and inebriation, and then she had stood there, disarmed. She was behind me, coming to our fornicave, to my romping shop.

I had passed rude people and gone into my room. He told me there had been a gun in her purse. I blinked, numb, still in a state of disbelief. I tried to remember those cloudy moments.

I had passed others in the hallway. She had passed others.

So she had let me return to the room.

She had entered my room after I did.

She had closed the door.

Then security had come on her heels.

She had to make a choice.

I assume she had to make a choice whether to confront me, fight me, and kill me.

If she had killed me, she would have had to kill the security guard as well.

She could have sent me to play in God's sprawling Disneyland with Natalie Rose.

I tried to process what I had missed, what had happened right in front of me.

When the hallway was clear, she had come back, had returned when I was taking a shower.

That's what had happened. What had happened off-camera revealed itself in my mind.

His jealous wife made her choice and left, but she came back when she thought the coast was clear. She had to be ready to take it to the next level, but she pushed the door and couldn't get in.

Then his wife had hurried away, retreated from the battlefield when she realized I was awake.

She had used her electronic key to open the door. She might have heard me in the shower then.

But before, maybe she thought I was so drunk I had gone back to the room and passed out.

Now it was clear to me that I had heard her open the door and try to rush in before she was seen.

I had heard the latch catch the door and create the sound of a big, bold exclamation point, and that exclamation point had been a shock that caused an adrenaline rush inside both of us. Mine had sent me to the door to investigate, hoping he had come back. I guess that had triggered her overwhelming flight-or-fight response, and in that moment, exposed, she had chosen flight, and her adrenaline rush had made her legs move and sent her running away, running fast to the elevators, maybe hoping she hadn't been exposed. I could have been playing with my daughter right now. We could've been together again.

It wasn't my time.

My unseen enemy had been cunning. She was smart. I never would have looked at a woman as put together as her and seen my own death staring back at me. She could've sold me rocks in a box.

She had pulled off the best capitalistic con in the world. She had done well for herself, better than most, had married a man for money, but I guess that hadn't been enough. She had an affair with one man while she was married to another one.

She had come for me. She had been inside my room.

I said, “Your jealous, distraught wife had a gun.”

He nodded to confirm what he had already told me more than twice.

I said, “Damn. I think I know what happened when she got off the elevator.”

“What?”

“She pulled her gun, maybe brandished her gun when the guys were in the hallway.”

“You saw her pull her gun?”

“She was behind me when I was walking back to the room. I passed by a group of prairie dogs in sagging pants, and I wasn't paying attention.”

“Group of prairie dogs?”

“There was a coterie of Lil Wayne wannabes in the hallway acting out and heading for the elevator.”

“Thugs.”

“The kind that rap the N-word, think they're Jay-Z or 50 Cent, and are poor-man rich. Sagging pants and fitted caps tilted to the side. That kind of swarm of ignorance came up on us unexpectedly.”

“They would've scared her. Just their look would've terrified her.”

“They were calling me names because I was naked. I remember that now. She was actually trying to protect me from those guys. I think that's what she was doing, until she realized who I was.”

“Why were you in the hallway naked?”

“Not important. Trying to remember. Was so spaced out. Jesus Christmas, I think she went NRA on them and brandished her gun like she was working a neighborhood watch program down in Florida. She was probably intimidated by them and showed her gun. I would've done the same. Probably. Not a gun person. Anyway. They ran to security and snitched. That's why security came upstairs so fast.”

Despite her wrongs, despite his point of view, be it reliable or not, she had been coming for her man. She had been coming for her husband. She had been coming for whomever he was with.

The most jealous and insecure are the ones who are guilty of betrayal. The ones who are the angriest are those who are pulling cons themselves, only to find out they're being conned as well. A thief hates to be robbed, and a cheater always wants you to be loyal while they are being unfaithful. When suspicions arise and the questions start, they are always defensive, always volatile. A thief takes being robbed personally, the same way a player falls apart when he finds out he is being played.

She had returned, had come back to my door when we should've been in bed sleeping, naked, vulnerable. And she had a key. She could've walked in and done whatever. She had on sweats and trainers. She was cute, but she had come in the clothing of a high-end warrior. The bitch had come back to fight, at the very least. Emotions were high. The man from Orange County had beaten her lover, and then made a mockery of her infidelity by having me. It was as if the gods had their hands in this cruelty.

She wanted revenge on so many levels that it was scary. We fight for what we love, what we feel we own, right or wrong. No matter if I was right or wrong, I still would have kicked her ass.

Or died trying.

I said, “She's not white.”

“You're obsessed with race.”

“Because I'm a true American. I am the mirror and mouthpiece of everything that is going on in this country. I've been programmed. I have been ridiculed and underappreciated. What I am is what America has made me, and it hurts to be this way. Do I like it? Hell no. But this is my reality.”

“You're like a one-woman, Negro Tea Party.”

“You're from Colorado, where the girls put on condoms a little bit too late.”

“I'm a cheater like Jacob, with a temper like Peter.”

“Only when you've been motivated.”

“That's my weakness. I can only take so much. Then I lose it.”

“Irresistible impulse.”

“I'll keep that in mind when I consult with a team of attorneys.”

“Anyway. She's not white. At least not all the way.”

“Portuguese, African, Dutch, Indian, and British.”

“She looks Latina.”

“She's not. Lots of people assume she is when they first meet her, but she isn't.”

“You lied about her ethnicity.”

“Never lied. You assumed and delved into racial profiling.”

“I know who you are.”

“Do you? Based on whom I married, you think you know me better?”

“I'm being serious. I looked you up online. You lost your business.”

“It's not gone. It's being downsized, like the postal service, like Barnes & Noble, like Sears, but I'm holding on like a warrior.”

“What I read online said you will lose it, and three thousand people will end up without jobs.”

“Things will change. I might end up sleeping on Crenshaw.”

“Will you have to come off the hill and live among the colored folk?”

“‘Colored'? Didn't being colored go out with Donkey Kong?”

“Glad you still possess your sense of humor.”

“After this one day in my life, I will need that, and a good team of radical attorneys.”

“This is your wife.”

“This is the one I chose. The one who chose me. Though she is no saint, I'm sure she'll be portrayed that way by the media. You pushed a lot of buttons tonight. You asked me hard questions.”

“You did the same for me. You made me realize a few things.”

“I try not to say too much about the woman I chose. This was the one I chose. Never have chosen a good one. Not since Colorado. I seem to get the same woman over and over. Until you.”

“Damn. Sorry to hear that.”

He nodded. “I'm not sure why she married me in the first place.”

“You're rich.”

“Stop saying that.”

“That's why she rushed you to the altar.”

“She had lovers. I don't see why she made such a big deal out of getting married.”

“Because it's expected. Because it's pushed on women from the moment we're ejected from the womb. That's the way women are taught to hunt. And we do it, follow the programming, and it turns out bad for most. Not saying it's a bad thing, just saying only a few win the lottery.”

“Very few end up like my parents.”

“Most people just skateboard from unhealthy relationship to unhealthy relationship.”

“That has been my journey, without the skateboard.”

“So. Your wife.”

“What about her?”

“She had an old man for a lover, and he has been there from the start.”

“I don't think being monogamous ever occurred to her. She was upset tonight. She'd given me an interesting life, and now she couldn't handle the idea that I was engaged with someone else.”

“But you said all of your credit cards were set to alert both of you to charges.”

“They are. The personal credit cards that we share are set on alert.”

“So you knew she'd know you were at a hotel.”

“I knew.”

“You wanted her to know.”

“I did.”

“You were spitting in her face.”

“I was. Does that make me a bad person?”

I shrugged. “Makes no sense to me.”

“Because you're sane.”

“Glad someone thinks so.”

“You have to be crazy to understand crazy.”

“Or crazier than the crazy you are facing.”

“She drove me crazy. In the end, she drove me crazy.”

“You've had a hell of a day.”

“I have.”

“Guy she was seeing, you went to confront him.”

“That was where it all went to hell. Never should have gone up there.”

“Tell me. Tell me what they're not saying on the news.”

“How much do you want to know?”

“All of it. I want to know all that was going on, and I had no freakin' idea.”

“He made love to my wife countless times, then attacked me with a racquetball racquet.”

“Insult to injury.”

“I was angry, but only wanted to talk. He denied everything. Denied it all until I showed him her iPad. I yelled, began reading the exchanges. I shouted her words. I screamed his words. I yelled how he loved for my wife to suck his dick. I read that to him. He became outraged, yelled, and acted like I was the criminal for invading his privacy. Everything was twisted, and it got out of hand real fast. It happened so fast, the energy was so high, that even now it's blurry and I have to piece it together.”

“I've seen you angry. It's nothing nice, especially when you have something in your hand.”

“He grabbed his racquet and hit me.”

“That explains the head blow.”

“He tried to take me out. I swung at him and missed.”

“You hit the wall.”

“Yeah. I clipped the wall. But I got the best of the old man. I knocked him across a table and he fell down, got up, and charged at me. Then I saw the Dodgers baseball bat, a bat for his grandson that had been personally hand-signed by Yasiel Puig, saw it leaning against the wall, a bow around the middle, one of the kid's Christmas presents.”

“You beat him with an autographed bat? That's blasphemy. Have you no respect for the sport?”

“I didn't care if Babe Ruth had autographed that bat after he had hit his first home run at Yankee Stadium back in '23. The old, arrogant fool had lied, then hit me with a racquet. He was sleeping with my wife more than I was sleeping with my wife, was sleeping with my wife like she was his wife, and he hit me. He attacked me. He drew first blood. There was no remorse. He was taking my wife to swingers' clubs, was doing only God knows what to her in front of other people, probably was sharing her with others, and there was no remorse.”

“You didn't just walk in fighting.”

“No. I was there a few minutes before the fight started. He was surprised to see me, but let me in, asked me if we were supposed to play racquetball, thought he had the days wrong. We walked to his kitchen, and I sat on a bar stool, powered up the iPad, and told him I needed to talk to him about something important. He had coffee on and poured me a cup. I was calm. I was rational. I didn't go there to fight.”

“Okay.”

“Then I presented the evidence. The e-mails, the
I love you
messages from Skype, the messages from Tango, the flirtations on WhatsApp, the sexy photos, and the picture of the dick he put in my wife. She used an app to track her period, and she kept track of her weight, body temperature, and when she was intimate. With that app, she put in the days she had had sex. I stood in front of him and read him the information from the damn Pink Pad app, told him the exact moments he had fucked my wife.”

“What did he say about all that?”

“Asked me why I had broken into my wife's private accounts.”

“What?”

“Then he shook his head like I was pathetic. Told me to get over it. That did it for me.”

“When I met you, you were coming from committing a crime.”

“Revenge shouldn't be called a crime. Revenge is the response to a call; the answering of a bell.”

“It should be an entitlement, but it's a crime.”

“A small crime in the name of love, honor, and ego, and showing an old fool that I was a man.”

“No wonder you were angry.”

“It was like being that high school kid in Colorado again. Same feelings had me again. Opened an old wound. Their affair had been going on from the start. This morning I found out he was with her before I was with her, during his marriage, during my marriage, during his divorce, until now. We took vacations together, to Tel Aviv, Tokyo, and Stockholm. His wife never interacted with my wife. Never. I never understood why his wife didn't like my wife, why she despised her, why she was jealous, but now I get it. She could look at them and see beyond the father-and-daughter facade they put on in front of me and others.”

“Why couldn't you tell?”

“I didn't think twice because I trusted him, like he was my second dad. When I went away on trips, he would go by and check on her. I was in Dubai, in China, in London, in Australia, in Barbados, in Ireland, in Denmark, in San Francisco, in Hong Kong, in Memphis. I was all over, working my ass off, trying to get this company to go international, and when I called home, exhausted, he was there checking on her. I asked him to go by in the evenings to make sure the house was safe. I would be gone two weeks at a time. Once or twice I was gone for a month. He'd stop by every day. We'd talk on the phone while he was in my house. Then I'd hang up, and he'd drink vodka and undress my wife, then take her to my bed or call a car service run by some guy they simply called ‘Driver' and have him chauffeur them both to Houghmagandy.”

“That was in the messages?”

“It was in the messages.”

“You showed him the messages? Is that what you said?”

“I sat in his kitchen, cup of coffee in front of me, and used her iPad to pull up many of their recent exchanges, show him the lingerie photos she had sent to his multiple e-mail addresses. She had sent thousands of erotic photos. And I showed him the photos of his dick. I stood in front of a man showing him a photo of his own dick. He gritted his teeth, sipped coffee, and I showed him indisputable truth.”

“It wasn't password protected? She'd gotten real comfortable.”

“She didn't expect me to come home and had left it unlocked.”

“Lucky you. She left you access to her entire life.”

“She said he made her pussy meow. They discussed buying vibrators. They created a world where I didn't exist. She sent pictures of herself in her underwear and told him her legs were missing having him between them
. He sent pictures of his dick
. They watched porn. Yesterday morning I sat in my kitchen, shocked, looking at pictures of her naked, looking at photos of his damn dick. I was so damn angry, and read it like it was a cheap eBook. I went to the car I had bought for her, was going to drive it back to the dealership and get my money back, but I got in and headed north, went to have a face-to-face with him regarding my wife. I went to see him about the woman he would lovingly refer to as his daughter. I went to his front door, went in to sit down and read every line. I repeated all the vulgar things he had done to her, and read all the things he had promised to do to her before the end of the year. They were going to get together Christmas Eve. He was going to take her to a hotel.”

“Which hotel?”

“The one we were in. The same one we just left.”

“They used that swank hotel for their affair?”

“Would have been their first time there. Based on what I read, that would have been their next fornicave and their next romping shop. She had picked the spot. I beat her to the punch.”

“Jesus. You knew she'd see that on the card. You rubbed it in her face.”

“You led me to that area. It was strange. It was as if you knew. So I pulled up there. Part of me wanted to see where they would've gone. I wanted to see where they would have had room service.”

“Then exchange presents and semen.”

“That was their last exchange. I went to see him. Wanted to verify his intentions. Don't have sex with my wife behind my back for the duration of my marriage and act like I'm the crazy one.”

“She was your Clara Bow, your Pamela Anderson, a woman with a trustworthy face like Nancy Reagan, but behind closed doors, she was someone else. She was his little Lolita.”

“She did a lot more than Lolita ever did with Humbert Humbert.”

“You beat his ass, then you went to a barbershop, got yourself a fresh haircut.”

“I did. Put that on my charge card as well.”

“To look good in your mug shot.”

“No, this is my haircut day.”

“Creature of habit.”

“Not even a little anger, betrayal, or death should steer us away from the important things in life.”

I asked, “Did you do a good job covering it up?”

“No. Not really.”

“Did you clear your prints? Check for cameras?”

“Not as good a job as you would have. Was high on emotion. Rage took over and it got out of hand, fast. He didn't respect me. She didn't respect me. She had used me. He had betrayed me. I had had enough of the disrespect. I barely remember what went down. I just remember him being down on the floor, looking broken. Then, after it happened, I dropped the bat and felt incredibly calm.”

“Like after a man has had an orgasm.”

“I just know that I felt relaxed. He was on the floor, and the house was quiet. I sat down, finished my coffee. Had a second cup. I was unflustered because I understood why my marriage was the way it was. I understood what my marriage was. I knew that it wasn't me. For years, since we married, I'd felt like I wasn't doing something right. Now I know it wasn't because I wasn't a good husband. It was her mind games, her reverse psychology that had me feeling like I wasn't competent in so many ways.”

“Who found him?”

“I finished my coffee, then called nine-one-one and sent the authorities to the home of her soul mate.”

“Why would you do that?”

“He used to be my friend. He was a brilliant businessman who gave me good advice.”

“You had a soft spot for the old guy who had been with your wife behind your back?”

“I didn't want the asshole to die. He never should've attacked me with that racquet. When things happen, it gets to a level where it's no longer about the woman. It was about one man betraying another. I went to see him more about that than about my wife having an affair. I expected more from him than I did my wife. I expected remorse. I expected full disclosure. I expected him to fall on his knees and beg for forgiveness. That is a different kind of pain than a woman betraying a man. Man betraying man, it sparks wars. She should've chosen a stranger. She could've cuckolded me with any man, and most men would have been glad to have her. But she chose my friend. My mentor betrayed me with my wife. How do you process that? Knowing that was in your face and you missed it, how do you? That destroys a man.”

“You got the best of him. Since he went for your head, it could've ended up the other way.”

“But when it was done, when I was winded, when I dropped the bat and looked at him, when I saw what I had done, there was regret, there was instant regret, but it couldn't be undone. I had struck him many, many times in rage. I knew that he was on the next train to that Disneyland in the sky.”

“Jesus. Your wife was your ultimate betrayer. She makes Cleopatra sound like a saint.”

“She didn't act alone. They were complicit. Both betrayed me. He was a Benedict Arnold and she was another Doña Marina. He had my wife and me on his Slipstream yacht, and when he divorced he brought his girlfriends to party on mine. You're looking at me like
that
. You really should leave now.”

“You had a lot of cash. When I met you, you had a lot of cash on you.”

“I took his money and hoped it would look like a robbery.”

“His cash? You gave me his walking-around cash and rushed away with a box of rocks.”

“Now you know why I gave you that wad of money so freely.”

“You gave me blood money.”

“I show up with two grand in my pocket, and you appear out of nowhere, telling me you have something worth two grand. At that moment, I thought you knew. Then I heard all the sirens.”

“I don't know what to say about that. I don't believe in kismet, try not to, and for my own sanity I have to not believe that all things, good and horrible, are already written, but that's weird.”

He said, “He's been on the news all morning.”

“Now I know why you were avoiding the news. That's why you jumped when you heard sirens. That's why you didn't call the police when that guy did the hit-and-run. That's why you were jittery when the police came into Denny's. That's why we rushed from the 7-Eleven. That's why you reacted the way you did when security knocked on the hotel door. You expected the police to come for you.”

“Thought they were coming for me. I knew they'd show up at the hotel.”

“Is he dead?”

He paused, choked with emotion. “His brain isn't responding.”

“Will they be able to do anything?”

He took a few breaths, tears in his eyes. “You should go now.”

“Why?”

“I don't want you to be here when they come for me.”

“I'm not calling the police.”

“This car has GPS. The police are smart. Maybe someone saw me leave. Maybe a camera inside his home recorded it all. I'm sure a fingerprint was left somewhere. I don't think I cleaned the coffee cup. They'll find this damaged car and me. And now they will find her, his mistress, in the trunk.”

“Sirens.”

“I hear them. Leave.”

“No.”

“You have responsibilities. Think about your kid.”

“How do you know about my kid?”

“You're a mother.”

“How do you know I have a child?”

“I know you.”

“How do you know me?”