"Really?" asked Parker.



"Yes, and I'll even take the phone off the hook but only if I get to come back here Sunday for the finals to watch you play."



"You should give motivational classes," said Parker, as she and Della watched Emily unbutton the shirt she had on, take it off and hand it to Parker.



"For luck." Emily tucked it into Parker's bag and put on the t-shirt Parker had just taken off. "I have to admit these look a lot better on you." Emily looked down to the loose fitting garment that smelled like Parker.



"I think you look good in my clothes, baby, and as soon as I'm finished kicking Della's ass, you'll look even better out of them."



The opponents had already been introduced and had taken their places by the time Gary and Emily made it back to their seats. Della was serving first and while Parker jumped on every one that came over the net, the level of Della's play held on and she won the game. The first photograph that most of the paparazzi shot of Emily was of her biting her thumbnail when Della broke Parker's serve and went up two games to none.



It was amazing to Parker less than an hour later as she sat toweling off her face that she had lost the first set winning not one game. She looked toward Della watching the last of the water in the bottle she was drinking slide down her throat. The idiot didn't even look all that winded.



"Do you think she'll deliver all the stuff she promised you if I win? Tell her I'm staying at the Hilton if she's only interested in sleeping with the winner. All that delicious looking skin looked mighty inviting." Della was starting the next part of her game plan, which was to mess with Parker's mind destroying what was left of her concentration.



"She's not your type, Della." Parker sounded calm despite the fact all she wanted to do was get up and smash every racquet in her bag over the woman's head.



"Blonde, beautiful and sexy. What about all that isn't my type?"



"She's all that, but she's human, I only thought you were into dogs. Or is that the only kind of bitch you can get to go out with you? You know, you should really be careful about how much you drink when going out for the evening. At closing time everyone seems to look like my girl, but I'm convinced it's the lighting in those places."



"Laugh it up, King. Forty minutes to go before you get to go home to the bitch so she can lick your wounds."



"What Emily licks on me, asshole, is really not any of your business."



"Quiet please." Parker waited for the crowd to follow the man's instructions before she turned around and asked for some balls. It was time to give Della Sanchez a taste of what she loved to dish out.



"Fifteen, love." The score got the crowd into the game and the announcer to scream into every radio headphones in the stadium. Parker King had woken up from the nap she had been taking during the first set.



"I don't know where that came from, but hopefully Parker can keep it up," said the excited radio announcer about the ace Parker had just served up.



Parker was feeling good and looking forward to the next to sets of tennis, because hell if she was losing this. To get Della even madder than she was from swinging and missing the serve, Parker moon walked to the other side of the court to serve again. This time the ball came over the net with the same intensity but Della got a piece of it only to have it skitter off into the stands. The crowd when wild when Parker twirled her racquet and pretended to holster it after the, "Thirty, love," came over the loud speakers.



"She's smoking now, tennis fans, and isn't Della surprised. And Ms. Sanchez should be grateful that the crowd came alive with Parker during those last couple of serves, because her language would have gotten her thrown out had the chair heard that last outburst." The announcer and everyone else watching could read the woman's lips though and he had been right.



The next hour was pinpointed by long blistering volleys that started to show wear on Della's face. The power player wasn't used to the amount of running Parker was making her do, and with each short run from one end of the court to the other, her face was starting to turn red.



In the middle of the third set, Della stopped play for at least five minutes to have an argument with the line judge over what she deemed to be a questionable call. Parker just bounced the ball on her side and looked up into the stands waving back to Emily who had stood and blown her a kiss for the tennis she had seen so far. Most of the reporters in the stands had not missed the change in attire when Emily and Gary got back to the stands. The new couple was making women's tennis even more exciting than it already was.



"Game, set and match, Miss King." The announcement came after Parker had broken Della's serve for the third time in the third match. Parker shook hands with her at the net and tried to ignore the quick 'fuck you' Della said when Parker turned and waved toward the crowd. The win put her that much closer to the only title she didn't have.



Like in all her other matches, Parker stopped at the entrance to the tunnel and took the time to sign autographs. She picked randomly from the pieces of paper that were being held over the side along with pens. In an automatic move she grabbed the one closest to her hand when the item she had just finished signing was handed back to its owner. It wasn't until she had it in her hand that Parker noticed it was an envelope and it had her name on it. There was no way to tell in the sea of faces who it belonged to when she looked back into the crowd. With a quick wave she turned and walked back into the tunnel leaving a hoard of disappointed fans clutching unsigned programs.



"Honey, that was brilliant," yelled Emily when they made it down to the locker room after the match. Parker looked pumped by the win but tired. The heat in New York was starting to become a drain, the clay of the courts only intensifying the heat.



"I aim to please." Parker bent down to kiss her lover before picking up her bag.



"What you did was aim for the baselines and kicked the shit out of Della," said Gary.



"You I'm not talking to, and if you put your fingers anywhere near a phone to call Emily's apartment you will find New York City not big enough for you to hide, you putz."



"Parker, apologize to Gary," chastised Emily.



"I help you win and this's the thanks I get?" Gary tried to sound wounded.



"It's nice to know that you attribute all my skill to sexual frustration, coach."



"If that's the case, you ain't getting any until after next Sunday," teased Emily. She started squealing when Parker picked her up and threw her over a broad shoulder and started walking toward the door. "Parker, my mother has seen me on the cover of the Enquirer once this week, you make it two and there will be hell to pay."



Parker put her down and tried to maintain her good mood. It was hard considering the love note she had been handed before coming down the tunnel. She was kicking herself now for not paying attention to who had handed her the envelope. Whoever it was, was the stalker that had been sending the notes all along. Parker recognized the fanciful handwriting the moment the paper slid open in her hand. The decision not to tell Emily, Parker convinced herself was to protect the pilot from worry.



Later when they got to the apartment, Emily showed her what seemed to be the three hundredth lesson in relationships, centering on an open dialog lecture when Parker let her read the note. It was just one of the many ways Parker figured Emily would change the way she lived her life, but getting to share her days with the pilot made a lecture on anything worthwhile.



************************************************************************



"Call him right now."



"Let's go take a shower then I'll call. Come on, Em, it's not like the stalker is going to burst in here and kill us both," Parker tried to reason. The argument had started in the car when she had made the mistake of showing Emily the letter she had gotten.



The nut that was sending them had attached the picture of Emily that had been in the paper with a promise to the blonde to save her from Parker's evil influence. The more Parker looked at it, the more it niggled the back of her mind that she should recognize something about the letters and the way they were written. The old fashioned calligraphy was an odd way for someone who wanted to kill you to pen the death notice. It was almost like an invitation to die at the time they decided.



Emily picked up the phone and handed it to Parker along with the card Detective Sully had given her when he had dropped by her practice. The police officer had left an extra in case Parker needed to call him since Gary had taken the first one he handed out.



"This is serious, Parker. There's some nut case out there that wants to send you to the big tennis court in the sky, and I think that it's time for you to start taking that with some degree of respect." She put the phone down for a moment and walked to where Parker was sitting on the bed and stood in between her legs. "I love you, Kong, and I want you around for years to come. Please do it for me?"



"Ah, come on not that look." Parker got up, picked up the phone and dialed the number. It didn't take a lot of arm-twisting to get Logan to agree to meet them at Emily's apartment.



Emily got Parker to lie down until Logan arrived hoping a short nap would ease the exhaustion from Parker's face. She never heard the knock or the conversation Emily had with the detective when he arrived. He took the letter and envelope with him to be dusted for prints, promising to come back later to question Parker. Logan had watched the match on television and couldn't blame Parker for shutting down for a while. As he stepped back into the heat, Logan Sully never saw the figure leaning against a tree further up the street.



Had he bothered to look, Logan might have questioned the rosary hanging down from clenched fingers. The soldier of God had methodically moved from bead to bead as he prayed for the opportunity to rid the world of Parker King. She would be the first of the King sisters to receive salvation through death.



"The lord will cleanse the evil that runs through you, Parker. I'll see to it myself." With the rosary finished, the slightly bent figure turned and headed in the direction of the lower end hotel where the tools for the job at hand were housed. It was time to do some cleansing of his own soul, so that when the time came his hand would be true and holy.



The man behind the desk never looked in as the renter passed him on the way to the slow elevator toward the back of the entrance hall. There had been no complaints about the lodger that had arrived two weeks before the big tennis tournament, and the maid hadn't been in the room in that long, turned away every day by the do not disturb sign on the door. Had she ventured past it, the police would have been alerted from just the screaming alone.



The man looked at no one as he moved down the hall. The hotel still used keys and he had to jiggle it in the lock to get the mechanism to work before it allowed him to enter. On one bed there was a collection of knives that could have been used as mirrors the shine was so great. Only one of them was wrapped in a piece of heavy linen material, which could've easily been the nicest thing found in the room. This one was special because it had the blood of the beast on it from his first attempt outside the restaurant.



He fell to his knees in front of a small children's inflatable pool with a wire mesh over it and started his purification ritual. "I am the alpha and the omega, the beginning and end. He who believes in me shall know the kingdom of heaven." The lord didn't care if he remembered the words exactly as the nuns had taught him years ago, what mattered was he believed.