Linda quit laughing and gazed at him with something like contempt. He couldn’t help it; he began to squirm.

Linda said, “Let’s walk.” She stood up, but not before leaning over and giving him a good look at her cleavage. He glimpsed where tan flesh turned pink in a place mysterious. He was surprised by how tall she was. As he stood up from his chair, he glimpsed down to see if she was wearing heels. She wasn’t, but the rubber soles of her sandals were thick. He thought that if they were both barefoot she and he would be almost the same height, which made her tall for a woman.

They left the island of light that was Pike’s and walked side by side south along the shore. Neither spoke, but the waves applauded again and again. When the beach narrowed, Dwayne leaned down and rolled up the cuffs of his pants. Linda removed her sandals so that her legs were bare below her shorts. They walked in the packed wet sand, among tiny broken shells, where every once in a while the surf would reach them and swirl about their feet.

“Tell me you’re not an artist,” she said.

“I can honestly say that. What about you?”

“I dabble.”

“I bet you dabble great.”

“I’ve seen enough paintings of sunsets, leaping marlins, and squinting old men with faces marked by the sea.”

“Me too,” he lied.

“There,” she said suddenly, and pointed.

To their right, beyond the curved beach and a stretch of sandy soil, were the lights from a string of condos and rented beach cottages. Linda was pointing at a rectangle of yellow light that was a large window or sliding-glass door in a two-story hotel, kept low by building ordinance and the slightly taller hotel across the street from it.

“That’s the Tipton Hotel,” he said.

They’d stopped walking. His back was to the ocean. Because of the moon he could see her glowing face as she smiled. “How do you know that?” she asked.

“I’m from around here. I’ve driven back and forth on the beach road.”

She widened her eyes in a way he knew was an act. “You’re old enough to have a driver’s license?”

“You know I am,” he lied. She was making fun of him and he couldn’t keep the anger from his voice. A rage she didn’t yet know.

Or knew all too well.

She surprised him by taking his hand. Her own hand was dry and surprisingly strong. She took a few steps, pulling him along until he began to walk.

“I’ll show you,” she said.

“Show me what?” His heart was banging away.

“Where I’m staying,” she said. “Ever been inside the Tipton?”

“Couple of times,” he said. Once. In the lobby.

She was smiling again, amused by him again.

He realized he was smiling on the inside.

She didn’t know that.

43

There was a wooden deck outside the back of the Tipton Hotel, with a scattering of empty lounge chairs several rooms down. Also farther down were the lights of the hotel swimming pool. A few shrill children’s voices reached Linda and Dwayne. No one seemed to be seated outside in the warm Gulf breeze, watching the kids. Or maybe everyone, including the parents, was in the pool.

Smiles and splashes. Family life. Dwayne didn’t think a lot about it.

Still holding his hand, Linda guided him up the wooden steps and across the narrow deck to the rectangle of light she’d pointed out when they were down on the beach. He saw that it was much larger than a window. Two floor-to-ceiling sliding-glass panels.

Linda reached out with her free hand and slid one of the panels aside. It moved smoothly in its track, making barely a whisper.

“Don’t you lock your room when you leave?” Dwayne heard himself ask.

“Nobody would dare steal from me,” she said. Kidding him again. Making fun. Lies large and small would flow from her, and then, finally, the truth would be revealed.

The room was small and neat, with furniture that was sparse and obviously expensive. The Tipton was definitely one of the better hotels in a string of hotels and condos along the beach road.

The bed was made, with its gray-and-green duvet drawn taut. A single large suitcase sat closed on a folding luggage rack near what must be the door to the bathroom. The suitcase looked like real alligator dyed red, but Dwayne knew it probably wasn’t.

Just like the woman looks real.

A pair of red high-heeled shoes with pointed toes stood precisely side by side before a louvered closet door. Above a small desk, a TV was mounted on the wall. Its large screen was gray. The brass bullet lamp on the desk provided the only light.

Linda finally released Dwayne’s perspiring hand and went to the sliding-glass doors. He couldn’t look away from the smooth play of her hips as she walked.

She pulled a cord, and gray-and-green drapes that matched the bedspread made a ratcheting sound and rushed to meet each other. The room, small to begin with, suddenly seemed half the size it had been when the dark sea and beach were exposed.

The moon no longer contributed any light. In the intimate dimness, Linda unbuttoned and pulled her shirt over her head, leaving her blond hair a tangled mess that Dwayne couldn’t help staring at. Until she bent forward, elbows out, in that curious birdlike motion women have, and deftly removed her bra.

She draped blouse and bra over the back of the desk chair and stood looking at Dwayne. Her eyes went to his erection and immediately it seemed twice as large to him.

“Better take those pants off while you can,” she said.

Neither of them said anything until they were both completely undressed, then they fell together onto the bed. They rolled back and forth, hugging, kissing, wrestling for dominance. She wound up on top, kissing him with her mouth open, using her tongue.

When they drew apart in order to breathe, he said, “Wait a minute! Just a few seconds.” His mind was whirling.

“You okay?” she asked.

“Yeah.” The clothes he’d practically ripped from his body were wadded on the floor beside the bed. “I’ve got a rubber in my wallet.”

She smiled broadly, then laughed. “Really? How long’s it been in there?”

“I replaced it this morning,” he said.

More laughter. “That’s wonderful!”

He rolled onto his side, still half on the mattress, and his groping hand found the rough material of his pants. He felt for the pockets.

Found his knife.

It was past 2:00 A.M. when Linda finally died. Dwayne had been careful not to leave fingerprints.

But after showering and dressing again in his shirt, shorts, and sandals, he stood before the closed drapes and found that he didn’t want to leave.

Not yet.

Careful where he was stepping, he made his way to the bed, where what remained of Linda lay, bound with electrical cord and gagged with one of her bikini bottoms, knotted in her mouth, then knotted again at the nape of her neck. Her wide eyes were fixed and staring at the slowly revolving ceiling fan. Dwayne thought her stare was as empty as her thoughts. He had everything of her now.

Dwayne knew that blood would no longer gush. He drew his knife, leaned over the bed, and deftly carved his initials in Linda’s smooth pale forehead.

Now she was marked. Branded.

Forever.

His.

PART FOUR

The place where optimism most flourishes is the lunatic asylum.

—HAVELOCK ELLIS, The Task

of Social Hygiene

44

New York, the present

Quinn’s desk phone jangled. He liked the sound. Cell phones imitated it but couldn’t get it quite right.