Leave Her Hanging: A Noir Thriller

Chapter Thirty-Two

Cassandra unlocked the door to Deepest Desires and led me inside. The main lights were off, but a few security lights gave enough light to move around by. There was no bald man behind the counter this time, no music playing on the radio. I kept my face pointed at the floor to hide myself from the security cameras and followed the woman as we threaded our way among the fetish costumes and DVD racks to the shelves of penis pumps at the back of the store. She smiled at me, winked, and pulled something out of her pocket that looked like a fob for unlocking a car door. She pressed the button. A moment passed, then something clicked. Cassandra hooked her fingers around one side of the wall of shelves and pulled. The wall swung open easily, revealing a narrow, well-lit stairway.

“Down we go,” she said. I swallowed and followed her down.

I was expecting some sort of cramped concrete dungeon at the bottom, so I was surprised when it looked more like a rich person’s house with the interior walls knocked out. The main set was obvious. It was huge, with a queen-sized bed, carpet, high-class wooden furniture. Two big lights, the sorts of things you see on behind-the-scenes documentaries for movies, were poised to light the set. A pair of large cameras on stands were stored against one wall. On the side of the room closest to us, next to where the bedroom set had a missing wall, was a table with a bank of three flatscreen computer monitors. An external hard drive was plugged into the computer tower. Other doors led off the main set. One of them opened, and a skinny guy in glasses came out, fiddling with his smartphone. Dennis Tillman.

He pressed something, slipped the phone into his pocket. Only then did he appear to notice us. His smile was as warm and inviting and fake as Cassandra’s. “Ah, this must be the new boy.”

Cassandra put her hand on my arm. Her touch made my skin crawl.

“Dennis,” she said, “this is Peter. Peter, this is Dennis. He’ll be handling the camera and some of the technical aspects. Is that okay?”

I stared at Dennis’s face. His glasses caught the light, hiding his eyes.

“Yeah, that’s fine,” I said. It wasn’t too much of a stretch to sound young and meek. I glanced around the room. If there was information I needed, where would it be? Computers, maybe. Did they have paper files lying around somewhere as well? A filing cabinet? There had to be an office. “Are we getting started straight away?”

“There’s no rush,” Dennis said. “Cassie, why don’t you show him the bathrooms so you two can get ready.”

“Sure.” She took my hand again. “This way, sweetie.”

While Dennis started setting up the lights, Cassandra led me out of the room, into a narrow hallway. We had to be somewhere under Deepest Desires now, maybe even under the adjacent stores, but I’d lost my sense of direction down here. She opened the door to a simple but clean bathroom with a toilet and a large shower.

“We usually ask everyone to shower before we start. Take as long as you need. There’s a clean towel on the rack, a robe on the back of the door, and some disposable razors and shaving cream in the cabinet.”

“A razor?” I touched my face. I never had much facial hair at the best of times.

She smiled. “Not for your face, sweetie.”

“Oh.” I worked it out. I could feel my face getting hot.

“I’ll be showering just down the hall,” she said, pointing. “Come find me if you need anything.”

I nodded, and she left me to my embarrassment. I closed the bathroom door, had a look in the cupboards. Everything was there. I needed to snoop around the place, and I wasn’t going to get a better chance than now. I put my ear to the door, waited. A few seconds later I caught the sound of a shower running. I went into my own shower, twisted the knob, let the water run. Then I pulled the curtain across and went back to the bathroom door. Eased it open, stuck my head out. The hallway was empty. I slipped out of the bathroom, carefully pulled the door closed behind me, and crept down the hall.