My watch buzzes. “January, you free?”
I smile at the guy when he realizes the implication, so he hits the tab on the phone and redials. “I need a manager up to my room right now. It’s important. I caught one of your staffers going through my things.” Pause. “Yes, I contacted security. Apparently it’s one of your security people who was doing it.” Another pause. “Fine. Thank you.” He hangs up and turns to me. “The manager is coming up.”
I nod. Look around the room. Relax my shoulders. “So…where ya from?”
He doesn’t answer.
* * *
—
“What were you doing?” Reg asks outside the elevator bank, breathing hard, his face red. He’s still that way after making it to the guy’s room, hearing him out, and comping the rest of his stay. Because the only way to truly satisfy people with money is to give them stuff for free. Frankly I think it’s a con and that’s how they keep their money. They’ve convinced people they’re too good to spend it.
I fill my lungs until they feel overstretched like balloons, and let all the air out. Try to think of something to say. Where do I even start? I don’t know that I can. Telling Ruby is one thing. It’s not going to report me. Reg might. Or he might say the wrong thing to Allyn. Who knows? I settle on: “I’m looking into something.”
Reg waits, tipping his head toward me, showing me his ear. “That it? You’re looking into something.”
“Yes.”
“What something?”
“A thing.”
“A thing,” he says, nodding slowly. He looks at Ruby. “What thing?”
My heartbeat picks up, but then it answers, “Do you honestly think she tells me anything?”
Reg nods, frustrated but accepting this is how it’s going to be, and says, “Follow me.”
He leads me into the elevator and we ride it down. Aside from the heavy breathing he’s silent as a palace guard, not looking at me, trying very hard to not say anything. I can feel the strain of it. And as much as I want to break the silence, I don’t. I’m just exhausted. I need a nap. I need coffee. I need to see Mena right now.
We get to the lobby, where there are a few more TEA agents floating around, plus Nik is standing at the concierge desk talking with Cameo. Reg leads me to the elevator that runs up through the lobby, parallel to the brass pole suspending the clock, the hands of which are still stuttering and jumping.
As the elevator ascends I ask, “Taking me to the roof to murder me? There’s so much snow we won’t be able to get the door open. You might be better off throwing me over the railing of the lobby. The guests won’t like it. I mean, I’m going to hit that floor and splatter open like a tomato. Then again, who knows what half of these weirdos are into…”
“Stop it,” he says.
We make it to the top and he leads me to the Tick Tock, where we proceed to an empty table and sit down. As if he was expecting us, Marc, the waiter with the ear gauges who is always wearing artfully done eyeliner—it’s so good I’ve been meaning to ask him for a lesson—comes over and waits for his command.
“Macallan, the twenty-five, splash of water,” Reg says, then looks at me, like he wants to know if I mind.
“Seltzer, splash of lime,” I tell Marc.
He nods and disappears.
“Isn’t that a hundred bucks a glass?” I ask.
Reg bores a hole in me with his stare. “It’s my hotel. And it’s been a long day.”
“What are we doing here?”
“Getting something to eat.”
“Why?”
He leans back. Looks around the restaurant. MKS is hunkered down with Drucker in a corner. A few members of his entourage are having dinner on the other side of the room. Warwick is sitting at the bar nursing a beer and pecking at a laptop. The place is reasonably crowded, though we have a nice little oasis around us. A few empty tables that make it feel like we’re sitting alone.
“How are you doing?” he asks.
“I’m fine,” I tell him. “I’m always fine.”
“Look, I’m not dumb…”
It zips right into my head—really, coulda fooled me!—but he sees it and puts his finger up.
“Stop actively trying to be a dick for like two seconds,” he says.
“Nothing active about it. It’s a reflex.”
Marc shows up with our drinks. He sets them down and waits for a food order. Reg gets a banh mi on gluten-free bread and I go for the thieboudienne. Been craving that ever since I suggested it to Nik earlier. Marc disappears without writing it down, and Reg says, “You’ve been on edge. More so than normal. Now I get a call from a guest that you’re going through his things?”
“I wasn’t going through anything.”
“Doesn’t matter exactly what you were doing, because the point remains, you were in someone’s room, unsupervised and without permission.”
“I was supervised,” I say, pointing over my shoulder at Ruby.
Reg sighs. Picks up the scotch. Takes a little sip. His body relaxes as soon as it hits his lips and I can smell it from here. It makes me wish, deeply and desperately, that I could have a drink, but that’s not in the cards. Not usually, and especially not now, with where my head is at.
“January, I know you went through a lot of shit,” he says. “We all did. And I know it’s a little frou-frou, but…” He looks around again. “This is a family. It’s a weird little family. I get that. But we’re here for each other. I mean, when we held the memorial for Mena you didn’t even show up.”
I take a big gulp of my seltzer. Too fast and hard, so that it goes down the wrong pipe and sears my lungs. “Someone would have asked me to talk. Not my jam.”
He’s halfway to sipping his scotch but he stops, points a finger at me. “See? That right there. We all know that. You think we don’t know that? No one would have expected that of you. It was you projecting your insecurities on us.”
“Whatever.”
“What can I do?” he asks. “Just tell me, what can I do?”
I don’t know what to say, so I say nothing.
“You think I don’t see what this is?” He looks around, makes sure we’re alone, that Marc isn’t making his way over with the food. He leans forward and drops his voice. “You shouldn’t be here anymore. You should be safe away from this place. Seeking treatment. You stay here, you know what happens.”
“Did Tamworth say anything to you? He’s not supposed to.”
“Tamworth didn’t say shit. We all see it. We all know. It’s not a secret. It’s like you’re running toward the third stage of this thing, full speed. At this point I gotta ask, how’s that different from putting a gun in your mouth, other than the time it takes?”