Private India (Private 8)

“But what, Peaches? You don’t like me, but what? You are having a very good time?”

Gozan laughed. He was an educated man, had gone to school in London and Cambridge. He knew six languages and had founded a boutique merchant bank in the City of London while serving on numerous boards. But, as much as he knew, he was still mystified by the way women allowed themselves to be led and tricked.

Peaches was lying at his feet, “spreadeagled” as it was called here, bound by her wrists and ankles to table legs and an ottoman. She was naked except for dots of caviar on her nipples. Well, she had been very eager for wine and caviar a couple of hours ago. No use complaining now.

“I forget,” she sighed.

Khezir had gone into the bedroom just beyond the living room, but had left the double doors open so that the two rooms merged into one. He lounged on the great canopied bed beside the younger woman who was the daughter of the first. This woman was even more sexy than her mother; beautifully fleshy, soft to the touch, with long blond hair.

Khezir ran his hand up her thigh, amazed at the way she quivered even though she could no longer speak.

He said to the young woman, “And I will call you … Mangoes. Yes. Do you like that name? So much better than what your pigs of parents called you. Adri-anne.” He said it again with a high, affected voice. “Aaay-dreee-annnne. Sounds like the cry of a baby goat.”

Khezir had cleansed many towns of people who reminded him of animals. Where he came from, life was short and cheap.

The girl moaned, “Pleease.”

Khezir laughed. “You want more, please. Is that it, Mangoes?”

In the living room, the CD changer slipped a new recording into the player. The music was produced by a wind instrument called the kime. It sounded like an icy gale blowing through the clefts in a rock. The vocalist sang of an ocean he had never seen.

Gozan said, “Peaches, I would prefer that you like me, but as your Clark Gable said to that hysterical bitch in Gone with the Wind, ‘Frankly, I don’t give a shit.’”

He leaned over her, slapped her face, pinched her between her legs. Peaches yelped and tried to get away.

“It’s very good, isn’t it? Tell me how much you like it,” said Gozan.

There was a loud pounding at the door.

“Get lost!” Gozan shouted. “You’ll have to come back for the cart.”

A man’s voice boomed, “LAPD. Open the door. Now.”

SPRINKLERS SHOT BROKEN jets of water over the lush gardens at the back of the Beverly Hills Hotel. Night was coming on. I was armed, waiting behind a clump of shrubbery a hundred feet from Bungalow Six when footsteps came up the path. Captain Luke Warren of the LAPD with a gang of six cops right behind him came toward me.

For once, I was glad to see the LAPD.

I had information that Gozan Remari and Khezir Mazul, two heinous cruds who were suspected of multiple rapes, but hadn’t been charged, were behind door number six. But unless there was evidence of a crime in progress, I had no authority to break in.

I called out to the captain, presented my badge, handed him my card that read, Jack Morgan, CEO, Private Investigations.

Warren looked up at me, said, “I know who you are, Morgan. Friend of the Chief. The go-to guy for the one percent.”

“I get around,” I said.

Cops don’t like private investigators. PIs don’t play by the same rules as city employees and our clients, in particular, hire Private because of our top-gun expertise and our discretion.

Captain Warren was saying, “Okay, since you called this in. What’s the story?”

“A friend of mine in the hotel business called me to say that these two were bounced out of the Constellation for assaulting a chambermaid. They checked in here two hours ago. I’ve got a couple of spider cams on the windows, but the drapes are closed. I’ve made out two male voices and one female over the music and the TV, but no calls for help.”

“And your interest in this?”

I said, “I’m a concerned citizen.”

Warren said, “Okay. Thanks for the tip. Now, I’ve got to ask you to step back and let us do our job.”

I told him, of course, no problem.