“We don’t give out—” the clerk, a young man, began.
“This shield says otherwise,” barked Pine. “Do it!”
The intimidated clerk quickly checked the computer. “Yes. An Eloise Cain. She checked in today and is staying for one night only. Paid with a credit card.”
Eloise—the same name she gave Wanda. It has to be her.
“What’s her room number?” she said frantically.
“I can’t—”
Pine grabbed his arm and jerked him toward her. “Tell me the fucking room number or you’re under arrest!”
“Four-oh-four.”
“Now give me a key to that room.”
“I can’t do that. I need to talk to a supervi—”
Pine shouted, “I don’t have time to argue. This is a life-or-death situation.”
The man paled, grabbed a blank key, charged it, and handed it to Pine.
“Do you know what kind of car she was driving?”
“No. We don’t have valets. Just self-park. And I must say this is highly unusual.”
“You’re damn right it is,” snapped Pine as she sprinted toward the elevator.
CHAPTER
43
PINE RAN INTO BLUM IN THE LOBBY.
“I was going to take a walk before bed, what’s happened?” she said, noting her boss’s excited features.
She followed along as Pine quickly filled her in on Mercy’s likely being at the hotel, and also about Special Agent Drew McAllister’s arriving the next morning to question her.
“You really think that was your sister in the gym here? I mean, what a coincidence.”
“The description Wanda gave me fit the woman I saw in the gym to a T. And how many six-foot-tall Eloises are out there?”
They reached room 404. Pine drew a long breath and knocked on the door. Her hand was trembling. They heard nothing from inside. She knocked again.
Pine leaned toward the door. “Mer-Eloise Cain? It’s . . . ” A suddenly stumped Pine thought frantically for something to say.
Blum called out, “It’s your sister, Atlee Pine.”
Pine stared wide-eyed at Blum for a moment before thanking her with a weak smile. But there was still no sound from within.
Pine put the key card in the reader and swung the door open. They moved inside, and Pine turned the lights on.
“Mercy? It’s Atlee. Mercy! It’s your sister, Lee.”
The bed was still made. They could find nothing that wasn’t supposed to be in the room. A dirty towel and washcloth lay on the bathroom floor.
Pine said, “The front desk clerk said she checked in today and was only staying one night.”
“I would say that she might have just gone out, but there’s no suitcase or anything else of hers in here. Do you think she could have already left? But surely if she checked out the clerk would have told you.”
“If she came here looking for Desiree she might have found out she’s been arrested and is in jail. There would be no way for her to see her. She might have just left without bothering to check out.” Pine stood in the middle of the room and put a hand over her face. “Shit, I can’t believe I walked right past my sister and didn’t even know it was her.”
“My God, Agent Pine, you haven’t seen her in thirty years. She wouldn’t recognize you, either.”
“But we’re twins, Carol. Damnit, you’d think I would have—”
“What? Felt a tingling sensation? That’s not how it works, Agent Pine. It was amazing luck she was staying at the same hotel. And it was just bad luck you didn’t recognize her. There was nothing you could have done.”
Pine went to stand over by the window and looked out. She had a sudden thought.
“They don’t have valet service here, only self-park, but they might have a security camera.”
They rushed back to the front desk where the same young man was standing. He started scowling as Pine approached him. He ducked into the room behind the desk and thirty seconds later, an older woman came out also carrying a scowl and a defensive posture.
“Can I help you?” she said stiffly.
Pine pulled out her shield. “I’m with the FBI. I need to know if you have video surveillance of the parking lot.”
“Why do you need to know that?”
“Because I am trying to track down a guest who is staying here. She’s not in her room. She might have recently left the hotel. I need to see if her car or her image is on the film.”
“Do you have a warrant?”
“Why do I need a warrant?” asked Pine. “I’m not asking to search anyone’s room.”
“You’ve apparently already done that, or so my associate told me. Video surveillance is a form of searching. It invades someone’s privacy, not only the person you say you’re looking for, but our other guests as well. So, no warrant, no security tape.”
“You sound like a lawyer,” said Pine, who was impressed with the woman’s argument, despite her frustration with her answer.
“For twenty years I was a paralegal to one of the best criminal defense attorneys in the state.”
“Why are you working here, then?”
“If you must know, he died and I lost my job, and I’m apparently too old and too expensive to be employed as a paralegal anymore,” she said bitterly.
Blum said, “Well, clearly those people are wrong and stupid.”
The supervisor looked at Blum. “Are you with the FBI, too?”
“I am.”
Now the supervisor looked impressed. Pine could almost see the woman’s brain percolating.
“Well, that’s . . . progress.”
Blum smiled knowingly. “Yes, it is. But a lot more progress needs to be done. I think we both know that.”
The woman eyed her for a long moment, before she glanced at Pine. “But I’m still afraid I can’t do what you want without the proper legal process.”
Pine’s features calmed and she rested her elbows on the counter and looked at the woman, her expression one of desperation mingled with mental exhaustion. “Would it make a difference if I told you the woman in question is my twin sister? And that I haven’t seen her since we were six and she was kidnapped from our home in Georgia?”
The woman took a step back and gave each of them a searching glance. “Is that really the case?”
“I would never make something like that up.” Using Blum’s phone because she had left hers in her room, Pine showed the woman the image of Mercy from the FBI PSA. “This is my sister at the exact moment when she broke free from years as a captive in a living hell. Now, I believe she’s in this hotel. I’ve never been this close to her in thirty years.” Pine handed the phone back to Blum and said pleadingly, “Will you please help me? If I have to wait for a warrant, she’ll be long gone. This may be my only shot.”
A significant moment passed while the woman processed all of this. Then she nodded and said, “Would you like a tour of our security room? We sometimes offer that to our guests so they can see how we take ensuring their safety seriously. I can even have my personnel show some actual footage from the parking lot from today, say around the time your sister checked in?”
“Thank you,” said Pine with a relieved smile. “Thank you so much.”
“I’m someone’s sister, too,” the woman said demurely.
CHAPTER
44