2004-11-18
Las Vegas: Seduction (Ch. 1?)
The knock at the door startled me, rousing me from my reverie. My heart skipped a beat as I wondered if she had been thinking of me. My excitement began to build as I walked across the plush hotel carpeting toward the light rapping at the door. I hesitated before I opened the door, but could not bring myself to spoil the magic by looking through the peephole. Willing to accept any and all consequences if it were she, I reached to open the door….
I had not originally been scheduled to attend the client meeting, but my partner was sick and I am never one to turn down a trip to Vegas, especially on an expense account. To me, there are few things in life better than soaking in the marble tub, grabbing the plush robe off the bathroom hook, pouring a scotch from the mini-bar and watching the Fountains of Bellagio dance. I am not really a snooty or uppity guy, but to truly appreciate the Fountains, you have to see them from a room at the resort. Thanks to the mastery of Mr. Wynn, the lights, the music and the water choreography are all at their zenith when viewed from the resort-side (North and West) rather than the more often viewed Strip-side (South and East).
Ol’ Blue Eyes had just started signing, Luck Be a Lady. The Fountains were tilting, spraying, and dancing in their nearly hypnotic gyrations. All I could think of was She. And what a she She was! I could vividly remember first seeing her across the room. She was drifting by herself in a sea of clustered groups. She did not seem exactly aloof, rather in her smoky grey gown, matching shoes and pearls; she looked more like Cinderella waiting for a clock to strike midnight and her regal facade to crumble. Beyond the small talk and rubber chicken the rest of us were expecting, she looked like she had come for a deeper purpose; looking for something or someone. I could not take my eyes off of this doe-eyed beauty. Like Natty Bumpo, I stalked my prey across the room. Her posture, gestures and bearing, belied her placid countenance. With each moment, she seemed that much more the mysterious beauty I wanted to explore, if not tame.
As she obviously had not found who or what she was after by the time dinner was served, I coolly maneuvered myself next to her at the table. The tables were large and sat about a dozen people. As we all were seated, we collectively started a round of introductions. When she spoke, her voice resonated with a touch of huskiness, almost like a woodwind instrument. She spoke with an accent, it seemed not quite Russian, maybe something Slavic, but it seemed to fit her mysterious air. She called herself Kit, later admitting to me that it was short for Katrina. Most of us included in our introduction what our relationship was with our common client. Kit did not, further adding to her mystery. She seemed like she had stepped into the wrong room, maybe mistaking our client meeting for some sort of grand ball.
Neither of us really warmed to the conversation at the table; I nodded and smiled but was much more interested in studying Kit. I suppose the best way to describe her is Audrey Hepburn-esque. Obviously she was beautiful, but it was the refinement of her details that were intoxicating; the curve of her cheekbone and jaw-line, the way her earrings dangled and swayed from her ear, the flush of the thin skin around her neck accentuating the whiteness of the pearls, her firm arms, delicate hands, and manicured nails. The men in the room were in suits while most of the women were wearing dresses. Kit stood out in her gown. I am not an expert on women’s clothing and do have the vocabulary to accurately describe it, but it layman’s terms, it had a high WOW factor. Her hair was pulled up high and she seemed to have somehow tucked it over on itself so that there was a crease of hair running diagonally from about the middle of her forehead to just over her left ear. I love the shape of the female ear; I know it is funny, but ears are sexy and I love seeing women reveal their ears by wearing their hair up and back. Each time the pulse of conversation took my attention in Kit’s direction, I could not help but surreptitiously study her features. On the other hand, she seemed oblivious to the events occurring around her and continued to furtively glace around the room with a furrowed brow.
As the meal wore on, the cross table chitchat declined and people began to focus discussion on their immediate neighbors. Between the cacophonous din of clanking plates, glasses and silverware and the banquet hall of conversation, Kit and I were strangely in a private world. Suddenly she once again veiled her troubled features and her expression instantly warmed, as though the light of peace had suddenly shown on her. She again asked my name and asked the common Vegas question, “Where are you staying”. We talked about the Bellagio, the Fountains, the Chihuly glass in the lobby and the Botanical Gardens. We explored our common interests in classical music, art, and nature. Despite the depth of our conversation on subjects of obvious passion to us both, she still revealed little about herself.
Emboldened by a few flutes of Champagne, I finally asked her why she was attending the meeting. I nearly choked as she told me that she had nothing to do with my client, but that she was looking for her lover; a lover that she had never met. He had asked her to meet him in Las Vegas to attend this banquet. Apparently she was on the guest list, had been admitted, and had been looking for him ever since her arrival. She did not know what he looked like, but he had told her that he would find her when she was least expecting it. We talked on and as she talked about him her gestures became more animated, her neck more flushed and, if possible, her eyes more alive. He had smitten her with his writing, first via chat and later by email. She claimed his writing touched her to the very core of her soul.
Her devotion to a man she had never met made me feel a bit uneasy. She was beautiful, obviously bright, and articulate; but her story reminded me of two contrary movies, “You’ve Got Mail” and “Silence of the Lambs”. Smitten with Kit as I was, I hoped for former, but could not shake the feeling that her heart might be clouding her better judgment. As the lights began to dim and a spotlight shown on a modular stage in anticipation of the opening remarks from the CEO of my client, I handed Kit a business card with cell phone number and my room number at the Bellagio. I told her that if she needed anything to call me or to come by my room.
She took my card and gave me a kiss on the cheek. She told me that I was a beautiful person and a handsome man. She said she had come to Vegas looking for love and laughed saying that she would either get it from the man she came to see or seduce me, a married man, into a fling if that was all that was offered. I could feel my ears blush crimson as I turned my chair to face the stage.
I could not have had my back turned for more than a minute or two when I turned my head back to glance at Kit and noticed that she had disappeared. She did not say goodbye and I never heard her leave. I had assumed that she had left to visit the powder room, as she probably did not care about the musings of the CEO of a Fortune 500 company, but she did not return. I looked around the room for her, but if she was still there, which I doubt, the darkness had swallowed her features.
After the dinner had ended, I had a haunted feeling. I could not get Kit, the still mysterious beauty, out of my head. My cheek burned where she had kissed me and suggested that I could be her plan B. I did not feel like gambling (or at least gambling with money), so I walked the Strip back to the resort, looking at faces in the crowd for some sign of her. Of course I did not see her and eventually rode the elevator back to my room. I took a bath, grabbed a robe and a scotch and settled into a chair near my open balcony door to reflect on the events of the night.
The knock at the door startled me, rousing me from my reverie. My heart skipped a beat as I wondered if she had been thinking of me. My excitement began to build as I walked across the plush hotel carpeting toward the light rapping at the door. I hesitated before I opened the door, but could not bring myself to spoil the magic by looking through the peephole. Willing to accept any and all consequences if it were she, I reached to open the door….
To be continued…(Maybe)…
-- rockabillie at 1:36 p.m.