Love Match, page 17
question Parker. Logan had watched the match on television and couldn't blame
Parker for shutting down for a while. As he stepped back into the heat, Logan
Sully never saw the figure leaning against a tree further up the street.
Had he bothered to look, Logan might have questioned the rosary hanging down
from clenched fingers. The soldier of God had methodically moved from bead to
bead as he prayed for the opportunity to rid the world of Parker King. She
would be the first of the King sisters to receive salvation through death.
"The lord will cleanse the evil that runs through you, Parker.
I'll see to
it myself." With the rosary finished, the slightly bent figure turned and
headed in the direction of the lower end hotel where the tools for the job at
hand were housed. It was time to do some cleansing of his own soul, so that
when the time came his hand would be true and holy.
The man behind the desk never looked in as the renter passed him on the way to
the slow elevator toward the back of the entrance hall.
There had been no
complaints about the lodger that had arrived two weeks before the big tennis
tournament, and the maid hadn't been in the room in that long, turned away
every day by the do not disturb sign on the door. Had she ventured past it, the
police would have been alerted from just the screaming alone.
The man looked at no one as he moved down the hall. The hotel still used keys
and he had to jiggle it in the lock to get the mechanism to work before it
allowed him to enter. On one bed there was a collection of knives that could
have been used as mirrors the shine was so great. Only one of them was wrapped
in a piece of heavy linen material, which could've easily been the nicest thing
found in the room. This one was special because it had the blood of the beast
on it from his first attempt outside the restaurant.
He fell to his knees in front of a small children's inflatable pool with a wire
mesh over it and started his purification ritual. "I am the alpha and the
omega, the beginning and end. He who believes in me shall know the kingdom of
heaven." The lord didn't care if he remembered the words exactly as the
nuns had taught him years ago, what mattered was he believed.
"Lord, I need your help in defeating the beast. She is loved by the crowds
who know no better." He lifted the mesh from the pool slowly and reached
inside. The movement of his hand caused the warning rattles to sound, but it
didn't stop him from continuing. God was on his side and would protect him from
the serpents.
"Show me a sign, Lord." The thick strong body of the rattler coiled
around his right arm leaving itself enough room to still be able to sound his
death rattle. Instead of instilling fear, he reached for another one and it too
wrapped around his other arm. He lifted both agitated snakes into the air and
looked at the viper's eyes. They were unblinking as both heads were poised for
a strike. Their handler had given them enough room to do that if that was their
choice.
His life had been spent on trying to serve the god he believed existed. A god
that struck down those who went against his word by using holy soldiers
carefully chosen to do his bidding, this god had no compassion for those who
lived their lives outside of the norm. The faithful servant holding the snakes
had spun off from his church and formed his own religion along with the type of
Supreme Being he followed. There was no room for decent.
He watched in amazement as a drop of venom dripped from the larger one's mouth
but he didn't strike. "I shall do your bidding, Lord God." His arm
still tingled where the venom had come to rest as he put his tests of faith
back in their lair. The time was at hand.
*************************************************************
***********
"Why does your hair always smell so good?"
"I saw the brand of shampoo you wear on your right sleeve and decided to
try it out," answered Emily. She was curled up on the bed with Parker
pressed against her running her fingers through the blonde hair.
"Keep this up and I may have to spank you."
"As lovely as that thought might be, Logan's due back any minute and I
want to be dressed when he arrives."
"Where's your sense of adventure, baby? Wouldn't Mother Parish love to
read about her little girl's wild and sexy ways?"
"Keep it up and my mother will have a field day with you.
She already
thinks you're a bad influence on me."
"I can't be that bad since I can't talk you out of these shorts."
Emily turned around at the tease and ran her finger along Parker's lips.
"Would you come with me to meet my mother?" The question sounded
almost tentative to Parker who put two fingers under Emily's chin and lifted
her head.
"I'd go anywhere with you, baby, never fear that."
The knock on the door was what ended the kiss they were sharing. Parker was
starting to think it was some conspiracy to keep her from touching Emily. She
looked at the front door of the apartment with the same sentiment she held for
the phone next to Emily's bed.
"Logan, how goes the manhunt?" asked Parker.
"Interesting."
"I'd offer you a place to sit but Emily hasn't gone furniture shopping
yet. How about the three of us go and grab an early dinner?
When you're
finished telling me about the psycho chasing after me, I'll give you some
tennis pointers."
They took Logan's police sedan to a small family owned Italian restaurant the
detective was partial to before the talk of stalkers began.
The results the FBI
crime lab had come up with were still baffling not only them but the New York
police staff as well. The Fed boys had run an analysis on the ink that proved
to shed some more light on the perpetrator, but exactly what the spotlight
showed was unknown.
"We gave them all the letters that have been sent so far, and they all
came back with no prints but with one thing in common,"
explained Logan.
"What's that?" asked Emily. She reached over and took the fifth bread
stick headed toward Parker's mouth away from her.
"What? I'm hungry."
"It's going to spoil your appetite for the tremendous amount of food you
ordered so be quiet and pay attention." Emily turned her head back to
Logan and nodded for him to continue.
"The ink this guy used is mixed with a toxin. My contacts at the FBI
thought that if he was using some sort of different ink we could trace it to
were he or she bought it and get a bead on them that way.
Turns out the ink is
fairly common, but what makes it unique is that the prep mixes it with rattle
snake venom."
Emily sat and stared at the salad the waiter had put down while Logan was
talking. Next to her Parker picked up her fork and started to twirl the
fettuccini she had ordered as an appetizer getting ready to take a bite. It was
as if Logan had complimented her on her shoe selection Emily thought, the
tennis player acted so unaffected.
"Where does one buy rattle snake venom?" asked Parker. "I mean,
I've never been to the grocery when an announcement was made for a price check
on register two for rattle snake venom." The joke made Emily get up and
run toward the bathroom. "Excuse me a minute, will you?"
Parker put
her fork down and followed the upset woman.
The last stall in the tiny restroom was closed and Parker could hear sniffling
coming from the other side. "Can I come in?" asked Parker.
When she
didn't get an answer, Parker stepped into the middle stall and stepped up on
the toilet. "Please don't shut me out, Em."
"I don't know what it's going to take for you to start treating this like
a threat? It doesn't seem fair that I just found you and someone's trying their
damnedest to kill you, and you treat it like it's fan mail."
"Open the door for me a second, please?"
Emily reached over and unlatched the door. The size of Parker's body seemed to
fill the opening when the door swung back and hit the wall.
Not caring for how
clean the floor was, Parker kneeled in front of the upset woman and cradled her
face in her hands.
"I can't live in fear, Em, it's not who I am. While nothing of this
magnitude has happened before, I won't let it change the person I am inside. To
do that would mean that I'd have to walk away from you, and no one can ask me
to do that. As long as they're intent is set on me, I don't have to worry about
you, and I want to keep it that way. I love you, and I know you worry, but this
is not going to beat us or me."
"You can't promise that." Emily looked at her like she wanted to
believe what Parker was saying, but the tears won out.
"I can and I will. I promise you, baby, this creep with the snake ink is
not going to get near me. The right to get in and stay in my personal space is
reserved only for you."
"Is it wrong to want you to be careful?" asked Emily.
"No, and I promise I'll start to check our my surroundings more carefully.
If this idiot went through all the trouble of milking some deadly snake to pen
me a letter, I'm thinking they bare a little more caution on my end. Come on
before your salad gets cold."
"It's a salad, Parker, it's supposed to be cold." Emily accepted the
hand up, but appreciated the hug she got more when she was on her feet.
"Yeah, but I'm thinking Alfredo's turning over in his grave when he sees
what a congealed mess my fettuccini has turned into."
"Sorry, Logan," said Emily when she made it back to the table.
"I understand what you're going through, Emily, don't worry about it. This
case is confusing in that there are plenty of gay athletes out there, I don't
understand why this guy is so fixated on Parker. The only explanation is that
she maybe makes the papers a little more than the others with her life off the
court."
Emily stabbed into her salad and looked up at Parker with an arched blonde
brow. "Those days are over, detective, I can promise you that. Otherwise
she'll be making the papers for another set of reasons."
"It was bound to happen," said Parker.
"What's that, honey?" Emily asked reaching over for Parker's hand.
"I've gone from being the Hugh Hefner of the courts, to henpecked so fast
I'm having a case of whiplash."
Logan laughed at the confession, but the lovesick look on Parker's face let him
know she wasn't too torn up over the development. "To bring you two up to
date on our investigation, besides the venom laced ink, the letters contained
no fingerprints and the stationary can be found in thousands of stores across
the country. The guys over at the FBI did agree to work up a profile on our
stalker and see where exactly we should be concentrating our efforts. I keep
saying he, but in reality this could be a woman."
"Well if part of the profile turns out to be throwing drinks on Parker for
any reason, you may have your work cut out for you," said Emily. Logan
looked at her like he didn't understand and Parker was looking at her through
blue slits.
"Happens that often, does it?" asked Logan with the same teasing tone
Emily had used.
"You can count me out now since I'll let you know my whereabouts when the
notes where sent since I'm guilty of doing it myself once.
There's that and the
fact I'm terrified of snakes." Emily leaned over and kissed Parker's cheek
trying to get of the pout that she had helped put there.
The group spent the rest of the meal talking about Logan's tennis game. Emily
decided to go out and buy a racket and try to learn the basics. With any luck
she would be able to talk Parker into playing a slow game with her on that
great court she had at home. Their new friend gave them a ride home with a
promise to keep them informed on what both the NYPD and FBI discovered in the
investigation.
One of Emily's neighbors shook her head at the pilot who was teasing Parker
unmercifully as she tried to unlock the front door. The fear that had prevailed
earlier in the evening had vanished as Parker had done everything she could to
clear Emily's mind of the current threat.
"Hurry up, honey, I have a promise to keep," said Emily as her hands
went under Parker's shirt.
Parker jumped a little when the small hands hit a ticklish spot causing her to
drop the keys again. "If you don't behave you're going to have to get
naked out here in the hall."
The lock finally relented and Parker picked Emily up and felt the strong legs
wrap around her waist as Emily hung on for the ride to the bedroom. Emily was
biting Parker's bottom lip softly trying to rile her up for what was to come.
It felt good to feel the bed under her and Parker on top of her when they
reached the end of their walk through the apartment. Then one little sound
stopped them both cold.
"Emily, don't move, honey." Parker looked up slowly and saw the lump
right next to Emily's head under the sheet. Neither of them had noticed it when
they walked in so caught up in each other, and even if they had studied the bed
the spot that was now moving looked like a fold in the sheet.
"Parker, what is that?" The rattling got louder and Emily felt like
if her heart beat any faster it was going to start shaking the bed.
"It's either a really big vibrator that's motion controlled,"
started
Parker.
"I don't own a vibrator," whispered Emily trying to control her
laughter at Parker's pitiful attempt to cheer her up right then.
"Then my second guess is it's a rattle snake."
"What're we going to do?"
"Lock your legs around my waist and slowly bring your arms around my
neck," instructed Parker.
"Why?"
"Baby, I love talking to you, you know that, but having long conversations
in a bed with a pit viper is not my idea of a hot time." Parker watched as
the snake uncoiled and slithered closer and the rattling got louder.
They moved as a unit off the bed and toward the door with Emily hanging on for
dear life. The last thing Parker saw was the fangs that had broken through the
sheet inches from where Emily's head had been. Whoever had done this had gone
too far now, and she hoped she was armed with her tennis rackets when the bozo
finally did decide to come out of hiding.
"Wait here," ordered Parker when they had reached the living room.
She had to get rid of the snake before the damn thing crawled off somewhere in
the apartment and laid eggs or something. It was a long shot, but she had seen
too many movies in hotel rooms around the world not to want to take the chance.
Parker unzipped her bag and pulled out one of her practice rackets.
"You can't leave me here all by myself, I'm coming with you.
Can I borrow
a racket?" asked Emily. Parker pulled another one out of the bag and
handed it to her shadow. "This is the first time you've let me touch these
things," said Emily grasping it with two hands.
"Make a mental note for the future. If there's any type of dangerous
critter in the room, please don't hesitate to come out swinging."
The rattle was visible when they got back into the room, but thankfully the
dangerous end was still caught up in the bedding. Parker didn't have a lot of
experience with reptiles, but whoever this one belonged to must have fed it
well it was so thick. The first swing Parker took made the rattle stand almost
ridged before it started in over time again. She kept at it until there was a
visible bloodstain and the damn thing wasn't moving any more.
"I bet that guy Steve Irwin would have me beaten if he had witnessed
this," said Parker.
Emily shivered thinking about the whole thing as she clutched Parker's racket
to her chest. "How do you think it got in here?"
"Aren't rattle snakes indigenous to New York City?" asked Parker.
"Only on Wall Street, honey."
"Touché, pretty lady. Are you ok?"
"I have to admit that I should be more freaked out with the fact there was
a snake in my bed, but having you here made it all right.
You make me feel
safe, Parker." Emily dropped her racket and ran to Parker for a hug.
"It's kinda creepy that someone we don't know was in here though."
"Yeah, cause that puppy was too chunky to slither under the door. Let's
call Logan to come and do whatever needs to be done and then check ourselves
into the Plaza. Maybe I can have the thing skinned and made into a headband for
