Salty (18 page)

Turk lay in his bed like a shit-battered, deep-fried lump of jetsam. Booze sweat dripped off him, his head feeling like a churning cesspool of pain, guilt, fear, and frustration. He was backsliding, he realized that. It had started with the happy finish and it had picked up steam in that moist little
room with Wendy and Marybeth. The excuses came to him, popping into his brain rapid-fire, one after another—the stress of Sheila's abduction, the strange sense of disconnectedness that had overwhelmed him since the band broke up, his
cycles of addiction
, the
catalytic environment
—but Turk didn't want to blame anyone or anything, didn't want to make excuses.

Maybe this is just who I am
.

The hangover was more or less what he expected. It felt like an ice pick had been driven through his left eye to the exact center of his brain. It was nothing he couldn't deal with.

Turk sat up, feeling his blood pressure readjust, and hoisted himself into the bathroom. He patted his gut, and was surprised to feel it somewhat smaller than before. It was baffling.

With all the booze I've guzzled? How is that possible?

Maybe it had something to do with the food in Thailand. He'd eaten more rice and vegetables in the last week than he had in his entire life.

Turk took three Advil and drank an entire bottle of Evian before staggering back into bed. He was drifting off again when he remembered something from last night. Something wonderful had come out of all that debauchery. It was the song: raw and magnificent, with a bass line like a volcanic blues riff. The song was heavy. Like the songs of his youth, the music that got him excited about playing. Songs like Black Sabbath's “Ironman,” Deep Purple's “Smoke on the Water,” and Led Zeppelin's “Kashmir.” Classic riffs that every teenage boy was desperate to master. Riffs that revealed the roots of rock, the core, the backbone. This was one of those.

An hour later the phone rang. It was Clive Muggleton of Lampard International Consulting. He needed to talk to Turk.

…

Ben sat in the lobby and watched as Turk ambled out of the elevator.
How could such a lumpy lard-ass be an international sex symbol?
Turk was greeted by Clive like they were old friends, lifelong conspirators. Ben watched as they walked out onto the terrace. He didn't need to follow them. He didn't have to get that close. He knew what Muggleton would say.

…

Dense, humid air rose off the Chao Phraya. Turk followed Clive outside and immediately began to breathe easier. It struck him as unusual. Normally he wouldn't venture outside on a hot day; he'd stay in his studio, with its cooled and filtered air. But there was something about the air in Bangkok. It surprised him, like the air was filled with soulful nutrients. It was as polluted as any air in the world, but there was something else to it, a life and vitality to the stench that was missing in the smoggy air of Los Angeles.

Clive turned to Turk. He smiled and began to act like they were having the most banal conversation in the world.

“Where's your lovely assistant?”

“What?”

Clive spoke in a ragged whisper. “Just play along.”

Turk nodded and spoke louder than he normally would have, like he was doing a commercial for something. “We had a late night.”

Clive nodded. “Occupational hazard in your line of work.”

Turk ordered a coffee from the waitress. “Anything for you?”

Clive shook his head. Then spoke quietly. “I'm afraid I don't have good news.”

Turk looked at him, alarmed. “Sheila?”

“No. I don't know anything about her. It's your government. They won't let me take your case.”

“It's none of their business.”

“They've made it their business.”

“But you're Australian.”

Clive nodded. He was Australian, and proud of it.

“My company does a lot of business with the U.S. military. Security and whatnot. They'll pull our contracts if we don't play by their rules.”

Turk put his face in his hands and sighed. This was not making his hangover any better.

“What the fuck am I supposed to do? Leave my wife to rot in some godforsaken swamp?”

The coffee arrived. Clive looked around, professionally scanning the room. “Look, Mr. Henry. I think I can help.”

“But you just said …”

“Ssshhh.”

Clive lowered his voice. “Privately. Between you and me.”

Turk suddenly felt better. “I see.”

“Off the books.”

“I thought you needed a tactical assault squad or something.”

“This isn't about a rescue. You just need to pay the ransom.”

“They won't let me.”

Clive lowered his head. “We'll just have to work around that.”

“What are you talking about?”

“You deliver the money and free your wife and I'll watch your back.”

Turk thought about it. “I don't know if I can do it.”

“Of course you can. Have a little confidence.”

Clive flashed his white teeth and smiled; confidence practically oozed out of him. Turk stared at him. It occurred to him that he felt like throwing up. But it wasn't the coffee or the hangover; it was nerves. Deep down in his heart of hearts, Turk didn't think he was up to it.

“Isn't there someone we can call?”

“Sure, we can call other people. But your government will jump on them just as fast. Meanwhile your wife is out there.”

Clive waved his hand to indicate the vast unknown world surrounding them. Turk sighed. A man can have fame, fortune, and a fashion model for a wife, and still life's not perfect.

“Shit.”

Clive smiled, reached over, and patted Turk on the shoulder. “I'll be right behind you every step of the way.”

Turk took a sip of coffee. He felt it burn its way down into his septic tank of a stomach.

“It's not like I have a fucking choice.”

Aforensic entomologist can tell how long a body's been rotting in a swamp by collecting the bugs—the insect eggs and larvae—living on the corpse, taking them back to the lab, and watching them hatch and develop. Insect lives are set on precise time lines, and trained scientists will recognize the difference between a teenage maggot and the newly hatched, thus enabling them to calculate a precise date of death.

The Thai policeman standing waist-deep in the muck of the mangrove swamp didn't bother to collect any bug larvae, he didn't worry about disturbing the evidence, he didn't wait for the crime scene investigators to come crawling around the swamp looking for forensic evidence the size of a mosquito penis. The body had been gnawed, nipped, sucked, and munched beyond recognition. It had turned into a bobbing luncheonette for all varieties of fish, crabs, and scavenging seagulls. It was host to a convention of bone-white maggots, skin-eating beetles, leeches, carnivorous wasps, and whatever else happened to be passing by looking for some kind of rotting carrion to do its thing on.

In fact the Thai policeman and his partner had considered just leaving the body to float where it was—who wanted to bag that thing?—until they found a U.S. passport in the floater's clothing. Now they'd have to do everything by the book; they'd be spending their afternoon doing paperwork, filing forms, and waiting for someone from the U.S. consulate to arrive.

Ben took the call on his cell phone. Roy, his assistant, had spoken to the Thai authorities in Phuket. Responding to an anonymous phone call, they'd found the body of the woman from Seattle floating in a mangrove swamp a few meters from a fancy resort. According to police on the scene, the body had been in the water for at least twenty-four hours. Ben thanked Roy and told him to book him a seat on the next available flight to Phuket. Then he hung up the phone and ground his teeth.

Too bad it wasn't Sheila
.

He wished he'd been down there to manage the scene, control the flow of information, maybe fix things in his favor. He was encouraged by the fact that the kidnappers had killed the American woman. That meant they'd probably kill Sheila sooner or later. Too bad they didn't decapitate her, then it'd really look like terrorists were behind it.

Those extremists love to lop off the heads
.

He thought about what to do next. Ben realized he needed to separate Turk from the Lampard security consultant as soon as possible. The last thing he wanted was for Turk to get a clue, gain competence, or take any useful advice. A blundering, clueless Turk was dangerous enough, but with a little coaching Turk might actually throw a wrench in Ben's plan.

Ben looked around the lobby of the Oriental Hotel. It was considered one of the best hotels in the world, first-class all the way. He'd never stayed in a hotel like this. It was a luxury that he couldn't afford on his salary. But a million dollars could fix that. With a million dollars in the bank he could stay anywhere he wanted. He could live in the Oriental Hotel. Move in and set himself up like a grand poobah.

Ben couldn't help himself—he smiled as he punched Turk's number into his cell phone.

…

Turk pounded on Marybeth's door. Why wasn't she answering? She was supposed to call him when she woke up, and it was almost noon. Turk pounded again—this time harder, with a little more urgency, suddenly feeling a sick sensation in his stomach as he flashed to the time Klaus Van Persie, his friend and the drummer in The Mountebank Conspiracy—they dressed up as seventeenth-century aristocracy and played a kind of orchestral arena rock with a flamboyant harpsichordist as their leader—hadn't answered his hotel room door. Hotel security was called, and Klaus was found dead, overdosed in the bathtub. Turk could still see Klaus's body, pale and pruney, withered by drugs, wrinkled by the water; it was not something he wanted to remember.

Turk sighed with relief when he heard muffled footsteps in the room. He hit the door again.

“C'mon. It's me. Turk.”

The door opened, and Wendy stuck her head out and smiled.

“Sawadee krab.”

Turk was momentarily thrown.

“Where's Marybeth?”

“In the shower.”

“I need to talk to her. Now.”

Wendy opened the door and Turk entered the room.

The room was murky—the curtains were still drawn—and Turk nearly fell on his face when he stumbled on an empty champagne bottle. Half-eaten plates of food, empty glasses, scattered clothing, an upturned chair … the room reminded Turk of the good old days, when Metal Assassin used to sweep through a hotel like a cross between the James gang and a plague of locusts. He turned to Wendy.

“You girls have a party?”

Wendy smiled. “A late breakfast.”

Turk opened the bathroom door and saw Marybeth in the shower. She peeked out and blinked with surprise when she saw Turk.

“Turkey. Jump in and scrub my back.”

Turk couldn't help himself—he blushed. Not that he wanted to get in the shower with Marybeth, but he felt embarrassed about last night's escapade in the brothel. Even though he hadn't had sex with either woman, his witnessing their sex, allowing her to suck his thumb, masturbating in front of them, it had been a kind of intimacy—a strange kind of intimacy—and now it was something they shared.

Turk looked at Marybeth. He didn't want to snap at her. He needed her support for the coming campaign.

“We've got to go. They found a body in Phuket.”

…

Sheila slammed her shoulder against her ear. The buzzing stopped.
I'm getting good at this
, she realized.
How many people can kill mosquitoes while handcuffed?

She leaned back against the wall, adjusted her legs to try and bring some circulation to her numb ass, and sighed. Sheila had missed her book group. Although she wasn't sure what day it was, or even what time it was halfway around the world in Los Angeles, she felt that tonight was probably her book group night and that right now they were all sitting around a table at Panzanella, drinking wine and eating ravioli while they discussed the latest book and shared their anxieties about their children's upcoming bar mitzvahs or SAT tests.

Sheila was surprised at how intensely she missed them. It's not like she socialized with them; they weren't part of the fashion business, they were just a group of women who met once a month to talk about books. They were all attractive and successful—publicists, lawyers, and agents; they were intelligent and self-assured women whom Sheila admired and looked up to. Fashion models aren't known for their brains, yet Sheila never felt intimidated or stupid around them. They accepted her. Even when she argued against reading another novel by Tolstoy, Balzac, or—God forbid—Amy Tan, even when she pleaded with them not to choose some massive nonfiction doorstop-of-a-book (really, did anybody care about Alexander Hamilton?), they didn't mind. Sheila would try to bring in some contemporary fiction, or new age stuff by Deepak Chopra, even a little chick lit. Why not? Shouldn't they have some fun? What's wrong with a little fluff?

Sheila wished she had a book to read now. Sitting, sweating, and swatting mosquitoes with her shoulders got old fast.
Where the hell was the Captain? And what had happened to Turk?

…

Something was wrong; Somporn could feel it. He sat in a bar nursing an orange soda—Green Spot—and watching BBC as the British couple described their harrowing experience in the jungle.

Somporn wondered how releasing the couple next to a girl bar on a tourist-filled street near Patong Beach in Phuket could suddenly become an inspirational story of survival and a triumph of the human spirit. Why didn't they say they were kidnapped? Why lie?

Obviously, someone in a position of authority wanted to keep the kidnapping quiet. But why? Had his kidnapping scheme been hijacked for some kind of political agenda? Was the Thai government worried news of kidnappings would scare away the tourists? Or was the U.S. somehow behind this? It wouldn't surprise him; Uncle Sam was always sticking his nose in places where it didn't belong. As far as Somporn was concerned, the whole war on terror was just an excuse for America to take over the world. He could see them using the tourist kidnapping as some kind of excuse for military or political intervention. Somporn felt insulted. He had no sympathy for terrorism of any kind; he was a criminal, and had no agenda beyond earning some quick cash. There was no profit in terror. He wouldn't waste his time building bombs, not when there was Pai Gow to be played, whiskey to be sipped, and pure alabaster skin to be stroked.