Promise Me (Myron Bolitar 8)

Myron looked at Win. Win shrugged.

Big Cyndi continued in her tour guide voice: “Those with an Asian fetish will enjoy the Joy Suck Club—”

“Yeah,” Myron said, “I think I get the picture. So how do I get in and find Katie Rochester?”

Big Cyndi thought about that for a moment. “I can pose as a job applicant.”

“Excuse me?”

Big Cyndi put her enormous fists on her hips. This meant that they were about two yards apart. “Not all men, Mr. Bolitar, have petite fetishes.”

Myron closed his eyes and rubbed the bridge of his nose. “Right, okay, maybe. Any other thoughts?”

Win waited patiently. Myron had always thought that Win would be intolerant of Big Cyndi, but years ago, Win surprised him by pointing out what should have been obvious: “One of our worst and most accepted prejudices is against large women. We never, ever, see past it.” And it was true. Myron had been deeply ashamed when Win pointed that out. So he started treating Big Cyndi as he should—like everyone else. That pissed Big Cyndi off. Once, when Myron smiled at her, she hit him hard on the shoulder—so hard he couldn’t lift his arm for two days—and shouted, “Cut that out!”

“Perhaps you should try a more direct route,” Win said. “I will stay out here. Keep your cell phone on. You and Big Cyndi try and talk your way in.”

Big Cyndi nodded. “We can pretend we’re a couple looking to try a threesome.”

Myron was about to say something when Big Cyndi said, “Kidding.”

“I knew that.”

She arched a shiny eyebrow and leaned toward him. The mountain coming to Muhammad. “But now that I planted that most erotic seed, Mr. Bolitar, you may find performing with a petite difficult.”

“I’ll muddle through. Come on.”

Myron stepped through the door first. A black man at the door sporting designer sunglasses told him to halt. He wore an earplug like someone in the Secret Service. He patted Myron down.

“Man,” Myron said, “all this for a manicure?”

The man took away Myron’s cell phone. “We don’t allow pictures,” he said.

“It’s not a camera phone.”

The black man grinned. “You’ll get it back on the way out.”

He held the grin until Big Cyndi filled the doorway. Then the grin fled, replaced with something akin to terror. Big Cyndi ducked inside like a giant entering a kid’s clubhouse. She stood upright, stretched her arms over her head, and spread her legs apart. The white spandex cried out in agony. Big Cyndi winked at the black man.

“Frisk me, big boy,” she said. “I’m packing.”

The outfit was tight enough to double as skin. If Big Cyndi was indeed packing, the man didn’t want to know where.

“You’re okay, miss. Step through.”

Myron thought again about what Win had said, about accepted prejudice. There was something personal in the words, but when Myron had tried to follow up, Win closed down on the subject. Still, about four years ago, Esperanza had wanted Big Cyndi to take on some clients. Outside of Myron and Esperanza, she had been with MB Reps the longest. It sort of made sense. But Myron knew it would be a disaster. And it was. No one felt comfortable with Big Cyndi repping them. They blamed her outlandish clothes, her makeup, her manner of speech (she liked to growl), but even if she got rid of all that, would it have changed anything?

The black man cupped his ear. Someone was talking to him through the earpiece. He suddenly put an arm on Myron’s shoulder.

“What can I do for you, sir?”

Myron decided to stick with the direct route. “I’m looking for a woman named Katie Rochester.”

“There’s no one here by that name.”

“No, she’s here,” Myron said. “She walked in that very door twenty minutes ago.”

The black man took a step closer to Myron. “Are you calling me a liar?”

Myron was tempted to snap his knee into the man’s groin, but that wouldn’t help. “Look, we can go through all the macho posturing, but really, what’s the point? I know she came in. I know why she’s hiding. I mean her no harm. We can play this one of two ways. One, she can talk to me quickly and that’s the end of it. I say nothing about her whereabouts. Two, well, I have several men positioned outside. You throw me out the door and I call her father. He brings several more. It all gets ugly. None of us need that. I just want to talk.”

The black man kept still.

“Another thing,” Myron said. “If she’s afraid I work for her father, ask her this: If her father knew she was here, would he be this subtle?”

More hesitation.

Myron spread his arms. “I’m in your place. I’m unarmed. What damage could I do?”

The man waited another second. Then he said, “You finished?”

“We might also be interested in a threesome,” Big Cyndi said.

Myron hushed her with a look. She shrugged and kept quiet.

“Wait here.”

The man headed to a steel door. It buzzed. The man opened it and went inside. It took about five minutes. A bald guy with spectacles entered the room. He was nervous. Big Cyndi started giving him the eye. She licked her lips. She cupped what might have been her breasts. Myron shook his head, afraid she’d drop to her knees and pantomime lord-knew-what when the door mercifully opened. The man with the sunglasses poked his head out.

“Come with me,” he said, pointing to Myron. He turned toward Big Cyndi. “Alone.”

Big Cyndi didn’t like it. Myron calmed her with a look and stepped into the other room. The steel door closed behind him. Myron looked around and said, “Uh-oh.”

There were four of them. Various sizes. Lots of tattoos. Some grinned. Some grimaced. All wore jeans and black T-shirts. None were clean-shaven. Myron tried to figure out who the leader was. In a group fight, most people mistakenly believe you look for the weakest link. Always the wrong move. Besides, if the guys were any good, it didn’t matter what you did.

Four against one in a tight space. You were done.

Myron found a man who stood a little in front of the others. He had dark hair and more or less fit the description of Katie Rochester’s beau given to him by both Win and Edna Skylar. Myron met his eye and held it.

Then Myron said, “Are you stupid?”

The dark-haired man frowned, surprised and insulted. “You talking to me?”

“If I say, ‘Yeah, I’m talking to you,’ will that be the end of it or will you come back with ‘You talking to me’ again or ‘You better not be talking to me’? Because, really, neither one of us has the time.”