“Hey, yourself,” Grandma said. “I hope you’re not missing all the action at that hotel that looks like a birthday cake. First off, the fire alarm sent everybody out. And then some guy went splat on the road. Nobody knows if it was a suicide or what. Lula and I were at the Monkey Pod when it all happened, and I got out in time to see the guy before the police roped it all off. He was flat as a fried egg, and his head was burst open like a ripe melon. It was terrible … in a fascinating kind of way.”
“Poor man.”
“Yeah. One of the people there said the smushed dead guy just broke up with his girlfriend and they had a big fight in the casino. Where are you, anyway? Did you get a chance to see all the commotion?”
“I’m at the Monkey Pod. Just checked in.”
“We’re out on the boardwalk. Boy, I’d kill to see one of those rooms. Do they have the monkey theme like the casino?”
“Yep. There are monkeys everywhere.”
“I don’t suppose we could come up just to take a peek?” Grandma asked.
“Sure. Just to take a peek, but this is actually Ranger’s room and he’s working, so you can’t stay long.”
“We’ll be in and out.”
I gave her the room number and hung up.
“Grandma and Lula want to see the room,” I said to Ranger.
Ranger’s shirt was soaked with blood. “I’m going to rinse off in the shower,” he said. “I can’t tell how deep this slash is on my arm. You’re welcome to join me.”
“Tempting, but I’ll wait here for Grandma and Lula. They said they’d be right up.”
I went to the powder room, switched the light on, looked in the mirror, and had to steady myself with my hands on the vanity. I looked like something from a horror movie. I washed my face, neck, and chest as best I could. I scrubbed my arms to above the elbow. I couldn’t do anything about the blood on my shirt and jeans, but at least the shirt was red from the start.
The suite had a doorbell that sounded like a monkey screaming. I opened the door to Lula and Grandma.
“Look at this,” Lula said, pushing past me. “This is the shit. This is the bomb. It’s got a dining room table. I bet the Queen of England lives like this. Like when she goes on vacation, I bet she stays in places like this.”
“There’s a separate bedroom,” Grandma said, rushing into the bedroom. “And it’s got its own television. And it’s got monkey lamps and a monkey bedspread with a bunch of monkey pillows.”
“Yeah, but that’s nothing,” Lula said. “It got a kitchen area with bottles of wine and packages of crackers. And there’s a basket with Snickers in it, and all kinds of shit.”
I understood their excitement. This was a high roller suite, and we weren’t high roller people. Unfortunately, I’d just gotten punched in the face and thought I was going to swan dive off a ledge, so I was having a hard time getting excited about the Snickers and the monkey pillows. The adrenaline rush had burned off, and I was exhausted.
“They even got two bathrooms here,” Grandma said. “There’s a powder room, and then there’s this bathroom here off the bedroom.”
“Do you want this Snickers?” Lula asked me. “Because if you don’t want it, I might want it for the ride home. And what about Granny? Does she want anything here?”
I looked around. I didn’t see Grandma. She was in the bedroom, and she’d mentioned the bathroom, and Oh my God!
“Babe!” Ranger shouted from the bathroom. “Come get your grandmother.”
Ranger was standing in the glass-enclosed shower with the door open, looking out at Grandma. He was dripping wet and seemed not especially concerned that he was naked.
“It’s like she’s paralyzed,” he said.
“Amazing,” Grandma said, eyes wide, staring in unblinking stupefaction.
I yanked Grandma out and closed the bathroom door.
“It was mesmerizing,” Grandma said. “It was like staring into the eye of a cobra. I don’t care if I do anything else on the bucket list. This was awesome. It was like a biblical experience.”
Lula stared at my shirt and my face. “What the heck happened to you?”
“There was a little skirmish,” I said. “It’s all okay.”
“You got a nasty bruise shaping up on your face. You didn’t get that from anybody I know, did you?”
“Nope. We took down a bad guy. Where are you going now? More slots?”
“We didn’t get to Caesars yet,” Grandma said. “That’s our next stop. And we’re going home after the dinner buffet. Call if you need a ride.”
I walked them to the door and locked up after them. Ranger was out of the shower when I went into the bedroom. His hair was damp, and he was wearing a hotel robe.
“Sorry about Grandma,” I said. “She got away from me.”
“She just stood there staring. It was eerie. I was afraid she’d had a stroke.”
A stroke of good fortune, I thought. Not everyone was lucky enough to see Ranger naked.
“I heard a text come in while you were in the shower,” I said.
Ranger looked at his phone. “It’s from Mac. This was a more sophisticated delivery system than the one they were going to use on Rangeman. The timer actually showed the start time, and they calculate that the ballroom emptied well before the gas reached it. Plus Mac immediately shut the ventilation system down, so much of the polonium was trapped in the duct.”
Rafael came to the door with a couple bags of clothes. “I did the best I could,” he said, “but everything downstairs has monkeys on it.”
“Thanks,” I said. “I’m sure they’re great.”