The valets have seen it all before. Despite the refined clientele, it’s not uncommon to see stragglers pulling into the Gstaad Palace in the early morning hours after a long night of hard partying. This couple fits the bill.
Robert is unshaven, and his Tom Ford jacket has a rip under the arm where it caught on the skylight while he was crawling back into Eugenio’s apartment. But at least it helps to hide the large bulge under his shirt at the waistline, where he hides the Korean’s gun.
Beneath Carola’s short rabbit jacket, the gold gleams in her pierced belly button. Her skirt is too high, her Moon Boots too big, and her golden metallic tights sparkle a little too much. An older man waiting outside the hotel, dressed in his one-piece ski outfit with a giant embroidered eagle on the back, grabs Robert by the shoulder and asks in a low voice, “Where’d ya get her?”
“What?” Robert says.
“Is she one of the madam’s girls?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Haha! Sure you don’t. I’m like you—I like ’em wild,” says the old man.
“No you don’t, Carl!” says the tan woman beside him, probably in her fifties, with bright coral lipstick. She turns to Robert. “He’s all talk. A threesome for us is a dinner date. He’ll drop a little extra drool in his soup and call it a night.”
“She lies. I’m a tiger. Grrrrrrowl!” The old man paws the air at Carola. “Tomorrow night, you’re mine!”
Robert pulls her under his arm and moves for the elevator.
At the door to his room, he pauses. Carola looks up at him with her big almond-shaped eyes. “What?” she asks.
“Seriously, if you take the USB thing and run, I’ll hunt you across the globe and I’ll fucking kill you.”
“I’ve changed. I promise,” she says with a wink.
“So have I.” Robert slides the card in the door and opens it slowly—to find Hervé sitting in a wingback chair.
“Bonjour. I arrived, waiting to meet my grieving widower, yet instead I find you pulling into port in the early morning hours with a—”
“Watch it, asshole,” says Carola.
“With a charming young lady,” says Hervé.
“Hello, Hervé. What are you doing in my room?”
“What are you doing NOT in your room? That is the question.”
“That’s none of your business.”
“Everything is my business,” says Hervé.
“We met in a bar. He was lonely. He gave me three hundred euros. We drank and fucked all night,” says Carola. “We were going to fuck some more. You mind?”
Hervé lets out a short burst of air. “Every time I meet someone in this town that I think is not motivated by power, prestige, sex, or money—shortly thereafter I’m proven wrong.” He extends his arm toward the bed. “Please, don’t let me slow you down.”
“Why are you here?” Robert asks.
“A man showed up at a high-end whorehouse in town with a picture of a woman that the madam thought with some certainty was your wife. He asked for a girl that resembled her.”
“What?” Robert is aghast. “Is Ali okay? Who was this guy?”
“All I know is that he was disfigured. An American. And disguised.”
“Hervé, you’ve got to find out!”
“That is not all. Someone broke into the tow yard and disassembled Eugenio’s Porsche last night. They even killed an innocent dog. I am French; I love dogs. This is an outrage.
“But back to the Porsche: I did not know you had the key?” Hervé holds out the keys to the Porsche and dangles them from his stumpy index finger.
“That’s mine!” says Robert, a little too forcefully.
“No. It is evidence.” Hervé slips it in his pocket. “I’m going to my office. We have some video from last night. I’m getting closer to cracking the case. Maybe it was our disfigured man at the lot. I will save your wife—if she is alive.”
“Listen, Eugenio gave me those keys. It’s from the last night I saw Ali. They’re mine.” Beads of sweat form on Robert’s brow.
“When the case is closed, I will give them back to you. As a keepsake of your trip to Gstaad. For now, first things first—we must find your wife.”
Carola exchanges a nervous look with Robert and then stretches her hands over her head and says, “I really need a shower. You mind?”
Robert shakes his head no.
She drops her jacket to the floor, lifts her sweater over her head, and undoes her bra. She fondles her breasts and smiles at the salacious Hervé.
She moves closer. So close he can smell her perfume.
He cannot help but lick his lips and nod as if in agreement to something her breasts are saying.
Robert pulls out the gun and holds it at Hervé’s temple. He cocks the trigger.
“This was unexpected,” says Hervé.