The Fading Read online

  Once again he was forced to return to the only other environment that afforded him the advantage of familiarity – Caesars Palace. That it was the one and same place where Dalton had found him to begin with only seemed to confirm the crazy logic of the choice. It was a move the killer might very well least expect.

  Only when he strolled through the revolving doors and spotted the front desk did he remember that stealing a key and checking himself into a stolen room would not prove so easy now that he was just like everybody else. Dalton knew how to control it. In time Noel might learn to, but it wasn’t working now. He’d tried a hundred times today, concentrating, wishing it so, trying to bounce it off random strangers, but his Goddess of Light was on hiatus. He needed a room, the phone, a tab he could run up for as long as it took to reach Julie. To hell with it, I’ll follow a maid on her rounds and slip in when she’s not looking. But when he was only a few paces from the casino parlor, a woman called his name.

  ‘Noel Shaker! Hey, hey you!’

  He cringed, but the voice was friendly enough. He turned to see Tilly, his former cocktail waitress milf crush, standing behind the front desk. Gone were the ruffle skirt and stockings and push-up bra. At some point in the past ten weeks the woman had gone corporate, with a new fashionably chopped hairdo, the blazer, white blouse and tie. She’d even ditched the clown paint in favor of clean make-up that showed her true age but made her look more beautiful than ever.

  Noel approached the front desk sheepishly. ‘Tilly? Wow, I love what you’ve done with your …’

  ‘Career. I’m an assistant manager,’ Tilly beamed. ‘I have a 401K.’

  ‘You look amazing.’

  ‘Thanks. You don’t. What are you doing here? I thought you got smart and moved away.’

  ‘I’m leaving soon. Just have one or two more things to take care of.’

  Tilly cocked her head with condescending sympathy. ‘How is Julie?’

  ‘Back to California. Staying with her parents. But I’m going after her. In fact, I need to call her. Something important came up and I lost my cell.’

  ‘Do you want to use one of our phones?’ Tilly gestured to her right.

  ‘I do, but a little privacy would go a long way. We need to have one of those talks, you know?’

  ‘Okay. Sure. Want me to check you in?’

  Dalton couldn’t return to the condo now. He’d stayed at Caesars before.

  Noel inhaled, glanced around. ‘Tilly. I need a favor. Two, actually. One is small, the other, well, I don’t want to get you in trouble.’

  ‘I don’t want you to get me in trouble either.’

  ‘I won’t. But I need to know about a guest. He’s a creep. He’s been following her, and me, and he’s dangerous. Extremely.’

  ‘Oh, shit. Not again. Is his name Randall?’

  ‘No. Why?’

  ‘We get a lot of stalkers here. Complaints you wouldn’t believe. Last week it was Randall from Missouri, shooting upskirt footage. They raided his room and found, like, hundreds of hours’ worth.’

  ‘Awful,’ Noel said.

  ‘Yeah, he’s going to get something worse than a camera up his skirt in prison.’

  ‘My guy’s worse,’ Noel said. ‘Way worse. Can you poke around in your system, see if he’s checked in or out recently?’

  Tilly bit her lip. ‘I’m really not supposed to.’

  But in the end she did. Because Tilly had been a cocktail waitress for nine years and she had been forced to rebuff her share of creeps.

  ‘Nothing under Theodore,’ Tilly said, and Noel didn’t know whether to be disappointed or relieved. ‘But we’ve had two Daltons in the past week.’

  Noel perked up.

  ‘One is a woman, so I’m not giving her your name. No offense.’

  ‘None taken.’

  Tilly drummed her nails on the keyboard. ‘Hmmm.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘The other is just an initial. T.’

  It seemed crazy the professor would use his real name, even an initial. But, then, Dalton would be that smug, cocky in his abilities.

  ‘That’s him. His room number?’

  Tilly stared at him.

  ‘I’m not going to cause trouble, I swear.’

  ‘That’s what everyone says.’

  ‘Tell me this. Is he still here?’

  ‘He’s listed as checked in since the first of May, checking out … let’s see … well, he was booked for another week, but his reservation was changed this afternoon. He’s checking out tomorrow.’

  ‘Tilly, it’s for Julie.’

  ‘But you said Julie’s gone, right? If he’s here and she’s not … maybe you should leave whatever this is alone?’

  ‘He threatened to kill her. He’s broke into our place. He’s got a track record.’

  Tilly’s eyes widened. ‘Well, Jesus, Noel. Call the cops.’

  ‘I can’t.’

  ‘Why not – oh, Noel. What did you do?’

  ‘Nothing.’ Tilly crossed her arms. ‘Okay, I shoved him. I knocked him down after he threatened her, and me. That’s it, I swear to God.’

  ‘You swear to Julie? Swear on her life?’

  Noel crossed his heart and pleaded with his eyes.

  ‘If shit goes down,’ Tilly said. ‘You didn’t get this from me.’

  ‘Absolutely, I promise.’

  She gave him the room number. ‘Go away now.’

  ‘Wait. The other favor.’

  Tilly rolled her eyes.

  ‘I have to call her,’ Noel said. ‘I need a room. For thirty minutes. In and out.’

  Tilly sighed. Noel begged. She slipped him a key in an envelope, jotting the number at the top.

  ‘If you make me regret this, Noel. If I lose my job? I’ll hunt you down and kill you myself.’

  ‘You just saved a life, Tilly.’

  She shooed him away. He restrained himself from sprinting to the elevators. This was good, this was better. After burning Noel at the guest house, Dalton would expect him to be on the run by now. If Noel could stop him from leaving Las Vegas, Julie would be safe.

  But even though Dalton was still here, the smart thing to do would be to call Julie first, prepare her in the event Noel did not make it out of here alive. He meant to go to his room first, to make the call. But the one Tilly had left open for him was on the fourteenth floor and the number she had given for Dalton’s was on six. Riding in the elevator, watching the numbers light up, the temptation was too strong.

  Dalton first.

  Confirm he’s here, then you’ll know Julie’s in a different state, safe.

  Noel got off on six and walked quietly to room 622, which was just around the first corner, almost within view of the elevator bank. He leaned his ear to the door. The television was on. He idled a few minutes, acting like he was waiting on a friend. A couple who appeared to have retired while still in platinum health, decked out in their in tennis-club whites, exited the room across the hall. Noel nodded hello and they smiled, trailing Mentholatum fumes. Noel wandered to the end of the wing, dallied around the soda machine, came back when the coast was clear.

  When he pressed his ear to the door a second time, the TV volume was lower and a man was speaking. To someone on the phone, most likely, because there were no responses during the pauses. He couldn’t make out the words but he knew the obsequious tone. Theodore Dalton.

  Noel had the killer cornered.

  34

  Shall we knock? Play room service?

  No, Dalton would sniff out the ruse, check the peephole, drop out if he hadn’t already, and the advantage would be lost. Better to wait for the door to open, then pounce. All that money, gone. Noel could taste it now. He wanted to deliver Dalton an equally shocking blow. One hard shot to the throat, subdue, overcome before the fucker knew what hit him. Hell, maybe disable both knees, poke an eye out, blind him for life, canceling the threat for good and leave him bleeding on the ground for the police.

  For Julie. To ke
ep her safe.

  Forty minutes passed, then an hour, and Dalton did not exit his room. People came and went, and Noel kept up his charade of whistling along like any other dumb tourist, fumbling for his key in the little envelope Tilly had provided, hovering near the elevators. Ducking under the peephole every time he passed the door.

  Patience, patience.

  Another half-hour later a maintenance man lumbered in, making his rounds with an extended dustpan and sweeper, a canvas trash dolly. He was taller than Noel and twice as heavy, bald with a pencil mustache, three neck rolls and the largest pair of green Doc Martens Noel had ever seen. Knuckle tatts, an eagle with a snake in its beak on one forearm. Military or a skinhead, but in either case a friendly one, giving Noel a smile and a knowing nod. Noel had never seen the guy before today and prayed the reverse was also true.

  ‘How the tables treatin’ you, boss?’ the bald hulk asked as he smoothed the sand with a tiny rake.

  ‘Hm? Oh, my gambling days are over,’ Noel said. ‘Luck went bad years ago.’

  ‘I hear ya. Man’s gotta have some kinda game, though. Especially in this town.’

  Okay, I’ll play along. Act normal, nothing to hide. ‘I might throw a few bucks down on a ballgame, but park me down by the pool with a few drinks, that’s about enough excitement for me.’

  Big dude was also a lonely dude, or a bored dude. ‘Pool here’s okay. But the really nice ass doesn’t show up till the therms go above ninety, know what I’m sayin’?’

  ‘Yeah?’ Noel pretended to look at his watch again. ‘Shit, my girlfriend’s late.’

  ‘You wanna see some real talent, try the pools at the Hard Rock, Palms. Most of the chicks here are broken.’

  Noel forced a smile. ‘Good to know.’

  Apparently, ensuring that all of the ashtrays in Caesars Palace were as pristinely groomed as a trap on Pebble Beach was not high on the man’s list of priorities, only this one. He finished and stood about fifteen feet from Dalton’s door, using his dustbin as a cane. A gleam in his eye, a big dumb grin.

  ‘Women,’ Noel said.

  ‘You’re telling me. Had myself a game-changer a couple weeks ago, though. Buddy of mine was out for his bachelor party. I hooked him up with a room, he hooked me up with something else.’ The giant made a bored, jerk-off motion with his right hand, then mimed the act of snorting cocaine from a straw. ‘After about three days of yee-haw, we’re sitting down by the pool bar, just sucking eggs, hungover as fuck. Couldn’t been more than seventy-five out, no pussy within a hundred yards. We’re talking major drought.’

  ‘Uh-huh,’ Noel chipped in. He glanced at Dalton’s door, leaned against the wall, rubbed his eyes. Leave, please leave.

  But the maintenance man continued, ‘We’re just about to get out of the water, ’cause our fingers are starting to look like fuckin’ prunes, and all the sudden this real piece of work comes out – Indian or Iraqish or one of those from those places where they’re supposed to be covered up from their eyes to ankles, you know? Habib or some shit? She’s wearing a white Caesars robe, the ones they sell in the gift shop. She’s alone. Long black hair, with those giant movie star bitch sunglasses. So, okay, there’s like two hundred empty chairs, but she takes one right across the pool from us, facing right at us, less than twenty feet away. We’re like, helloooo. She drops the robe.’

  ‘Let me guess,’ Noel cut in, wanting to get to the punchline. ‘She’s naked.’

  ‘Not even, bro. This is an order of magnitude beyond naked. She’s wearing a swimsuit, just a perfect white bikini. Bang, like snow against all that dark skin and I actually caught myself reaching for my goddamn sunglasses only to realize they’re still sitting on my face just like I wish she was.’

  Noel glanced at Dalton’s door. Still closed. TV murmuring. The bald white Scheherazade of the maintenance staff was inching closer and closer to it as he attempted to keep his audience rapt.

  ‘Her shit was tight. Off the charts, okay? Perfect body, big ol’ naturals, but we can’t even begin to lift our eyes above her waist because – are you ready for this? I shit you not – she’s got the hugest blackest squirreliest goddamn bush you have ever seen. Crawling out of her bikini like wild vines, man. Up to her navel, down the legs. You could have put this one in front of the fireplace and sipped Moët on it.’

  ‘That’s terrif—’

  ‘Your first thought is, okay, she doesn’t get it. She maybe was in a hurry and didn’t check the mirror, because how does she not know, right? But this wasn’t a case of “oopsey, I missed a spot shaving”. This gal might as well have strapped a couple of black sheep to her hips. She knew. This was on-purpose bush. And then it finally dawns on me, damned if she wasn’t proud. She was! Think about it. Some girls, it’s the tramp stamp above the ass, the smokin’ cleavage, one of those lil’ ankle bracelets from Tiffany, whatever. For her, it was the natural splendor of God’s untamed mammal. And you know something?’

  ‘No, I really don’t,’ Noel said.

  ‘All my life, or at least since I saw my first porno mag in the fourth fucking grade, I thought there was something shameful about that. I thought bald was, like, the standard. ’Cause who needs it? What’s its purpose? But this broad, I don’t know if she was Arab or whatnot, but she changed all that. Converted me in a blink. I ran straight home that night and told my gal, I said, yo, Leslie, no more trips to Brazil. No more spa wax. I want the Black Forest. You start growing that shit out right now or we’re through. And you better believe I meant it.’

  Noel blinked at the man. Why was this stranger telling him this? What was the response here?

  ‘So push comes to shove, and Leslie, well, she fucking split,’ the huge man said. ‘Do you believe that shit? Here I am ready to accept her as God made her, and she tells me I’m the creep! I guess she just wasn’t up to the task, huh?’

  Around the corner, the elevators dinged. A door opened. Noel couldn’t see it, but he knew the sound by now.

  ‘No, really, can you believe that?’

  Noel glared at the janitor. ‘Yeah, okay, I guess I can. I’m happy for you, all right?’

  ‘Happy?’ The guy laughed. ‘You don’t look so happy. What’s wrong, bro? You think maybe your gal left you? What do you think’s taking her so long?’

  What in the name of God was going on here? Enough. Noel put his hands up. ‘Look, I’m in the middle of something, so no offense, but can you give me a little space here? I don’t want to hear your stories, okay? Jesus.’

  If anyone had exited the elevator, they would have taken one of the halls by now. Noel was sweating. Something was wrong here.

  The bald man made a clicking sound of disapproval. ‘No problem, guy. So, what’s the deal, is this a stakeout?’

  ‘Excuse me?’

  The janitor shrugged. ‘Guy paid me a hundred bucks to keep you on your post. I figured—’

  ‘What?’ Noel’s sweat ran cold. ‘Who? When was this?’

  The elevator door swished closed. Noel headed toward it, bracing himself, and from behind him, on the other side of the hall, there came a delicate click.

  Noel stopped, turned back and looked at Dalton’s door. It was ajar. Just about one inch, but rebounding …

  Noel’s eyes darted from the door to the maintenance man and back. ‘Get away. Get out of here right now, you stupid fuck.’

  The maintenance man took a step toward him. ‘Sure, soon as we’re through. Guy said there’d be another hundred if I kept you here for—’

  But he didn’t finish that sentence. For a moment his mouth froze half open, then he took another step and then he gagged. A bright line of red appeared under his chin, widening from ear to ear, and then he fell to his knees and the blood came out of him in a pressurized fan. He hovered upright, and another line opened vertically from his throat down to his belt. His shirt split open and fatty tissue and another torrent of blood slopped out.

  Noel stared in mute shock and he might have heard two soft steps on the carp
et before he felt the air before him stir.

  He backed down the hall, eyes wide, arms out and patting in a shield to defend against what he could not see.

  The giant fell on his face and his blood pumped onto the carpet, pooling over the dense fibers. The heavy green boots drummed the floor and one hand reached out for someone – maybe Leslie, maybe the hirsute princess from the pool – to take it.

  Noel could not remember if he was backing into a dead end. He decided to break a sharp left for the elevators, made three steps and froze.

  What happened next was as detailed as high-definition video run in slow motion, but spliced in and out of Noel’s reality in less than two seconds.

  Theodore Dalton manifested from thin air, blocking the path to the elevators. What little hair he had was mussed, and his mouth and beard were running red as if he’d drunk from the fountain he’d just opened. The professor’s outfit had been replaced by a blue jogging suit, the crotch tented with a violence erection, and in his stocking feet he moved in total silence. His eyes were glossy and wild blue, rolling in his skull as he made a wiping motion against his pant leg and two big strides later raised his right arm above his head. A sickle of hotel light gleamed from the stout serrated blade, and in a less-than-blink he exited the spectrum.

  After that, the swoosh of the knife arcing past Noel’s ear was the only evidence Dalton was real and this was happening.

  35

  Dalton’s blade passed Noel’s ear close enough to leave a feather-tickle of air and the fabric of Noel’s t-shirt ripped from chest to navel. Leaping away just in time, Noel fell, rolled in a panic, and scrambled to his feet before feeling the first of the stinging. Then he felt the warm wetness and knew Dalton’s blade had got him.

  ‘Oh, good boy,’ Dalton’s seemingly disembodied voice announced, and in those few words Noel heard all the bloodlust of a man who has had decades to refine his tastes. ‘I love this part. I call it the three blind mice.’