Page 88 of Dirty Love

Chicago

March

It’s almost one in the morning by the time I get to the hotel. All I want to do is crawl into bed with Tabitha and crash—hard—but there’s still a gauntlet of people to get through in the lobby, and nobody is being allowed up the elevators without a room key. Tabitha’s last concert is happening the night before the Democratic primary in Illinois, and Victor Best’s campaign has taken over the hotel she’s staying at.

I fight through the unexpected crowd to the counter and hand over my identification.

“Wilson Carter,” I say. “There’s a room key waiting for me.”

“Right, yes, there you are, Mr. Carter. Up on the…fifteenth floor. Room 1562. You can take the elevators here to my left.”

“Great. Thanks.”

I get in the elevator and punch the button for the fifteenth floor, but nothing happens. I push it again, and still nothing. So I try the doors open button, and they do, but then a big, ugly guy wearing an ear piece gets on, and that’s like catnip for me. So I don’t say anything when he slides his card into the slot at the top of the number panel and pushes the penthouse floor button.

Where Tabitha had been, and was booted from. Which means it’s Victor Best’s campaign on the top floor. This guy is clearly security, but he doesn’t look like Secret Service.

Interesting.

“Floor?” he asks me gruffly.

“I’ll go up with you,” I say smoothly.

“Not an option.”

“Then I’ll take fifteen.” Can’t blame a guy for trying.

“You a reporter?”

“No.”

“Why’d you want to come upstairs?”

“To the fifteenth floor?” I play dumb. “That’s where I’m staying.”

“Are you a registered guest at this hotel?”

“You don’t have any right to ask me that.”

“You sound like a reporter.”

“I’m not.” I notice he hasn’t pushed the button for my floor, so I lean past him and push all of the buttons. The car jerks to a stop and the doors open. I catch a quick glance that we’re on the sixteenth floor before Rambo grabs my arm and pushes me out of the car and up against the opposite wall. “Hey! Watch the face. My girlfriend likes me pretty.”

He says something into his radio, and I try to figure out where his feet are. Can I swing a low, sweeping kick and make him fall like a big, ugly oak tree? Bet I can.

Before I get a full chance to weigh the pros and cons of going a few rounds with a presidential candidate’s private security guy, a familiar voice tells him to back off.

“Clearly there’s been a misunderstanding, right Carter?”

I turn and give Deacon Webb my most innocent smile. “Definitely.”

He jerks his head. “Follow me.”

“Do you give me orders now?”

He doesn’t say anything, and since I’m tiring of being a prick, I do as he asks. He lets us into a room at the end of the hall, next to the stairwell. He leans back against the door.

I start on the offensive. “Who was that guy?”

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