Pearl listened as their footsteps left together; there was no way Meriwether could resist seeing him to the door to make sure he obeyed. Sagging against the wall, Pearl waited. A few minutes later, Meriwether’s footsteps passed by again, and the corridor light disappeared from the space beneath the restroom door.
She didn’t poke her head out again until she absolutely couldn’t stand it anymore. There was a faint reddish glow spilling over the floor from the lobby exit sign; everything else was dark and silent. Go time.
In the lobby, the little club was an angular shadow outlined by the streetlamp beyond the front windows. After some fumbling, she found the hidden switch behind the house that turned on the lights, wincing at the brightness. Somebody might see from the road—better work fast.
She moved the furniture around, looking under tables and chairs, taking down paintings, tipping over divans. Nothing behind the curtains, or inside the attic storage boxes. Cupboards, drawers, hutches, all matches or near matches to the real thing, placed exactly so—she shook them, knocked them over in her haste.
Finally, Pearl sat back, gripping her knees, barely resisting the desire to trash the inside for the sheer satisfaction of it. She took the sides of the house in her hands—it was heavy, she could barely manage it—and tilted the entire thing back and forth, shaking it, looking for any confirmation of what she’d seen.
The lights flickered. She shook the house again; another flicker. There was a short somewhere. She reached around and followed the electrical wire that fed into the house; it disappeared under the floor of the ballroom. She leaned into the room as far as she could, running her fingertips over the floor and wall, searching for anything.
The seam in the wallpaper at the far-left corner of the room felt deep; she could fit her fingernails into it. The slice went all the way through the board behind the paper. She continued to pull, waiting to hear a crack, destruction that she’d never be able to repair—but the wall panel came away without much resistance.
She pulled it as far away from the outer wall of the house as she dared, providing a space of about three inches. The house had been hooked up using tape wiring, nearly microscopic brads holding it in place. She couldn’t see well enough into the space to tell much, so she wriggled her fingers in, sliding them up and down the walls.
Something small and metallic lay in the space between. She flicked it, watched it skitter out onto the ballroom floor.
A set of keys. Two identical silver keys on a wire ring, the sort that might come with a padlock. Wedged in there for who knew how long, aggravating the junction splice, causing a short.
Breathless, Pearl grabbed them, stuffed them into her pocket, and began the painstaking task of setting things to rights.
Some of it she could do from memory—she knew the layout of the dining room and surrounding areas by heart, but there were two other floors that she never had any reason to go onto. She ended up putting tea tables and bookshelves back in any random place, anxious to get out of the silence and artificial glow of the little club. Maybe the desk staff would think somebody’s kid got into it earlier in the day and moved things around.
She eased out the front exit, heard the lock click behind her, and ran for the staff parking lot. She was digging for her car keys when a set of headlights flashed on across from her, high, then low.
Her breath caught. The car’s engine started, and it crawled into the spot beside her. Thank God. Reese’s old clunker.
She got into the passenger seat, sighed, and rolled her neck, which felt like it had a couple of steel rods jammed up through it. “Who’d you think I was, the po-po?” he said around a mouthful of candy bar. “Looked like you were passing a stone out there.”
“How’d you get around Meriwether?”
“Pssh. As soon as she knew I couldn’t get back inside to steal the silver or whatever, she took off in her Mini Cooper. So? Find anything?”
She held up the keys, glinting in the dashboard light. “Behind one of the walls.”
Reese swore. “You were right.” A pause. “You think Cassidy put them there?”
“Or Joseph. If this is what Tristan was looking for, he missed the flickering lights. You couldn’t even tell that the wall had been cut into. They must’ve used an X-Acto knife or something.”
He took the keys from her. “Okay. Now riddle me this. What do they go to?”
“Good question. A small lock, obviously. A locker padlock? A diary?”
“Diaries come with locks?”
“Must be a girl thing.” Pearl sat back. “This is too strange. It’s like I was meant to find them.” She shot a look at him. “I know how crazy that sounds.”
Reese shook his head slowly. “I’m not laughing. I think this whole thing is freaky as hell.”
From the corner of her eye, Pearl noticed more clutter in the backseat than usual, and she turned to look at cardboard boxes full of Reese’s things. “You’re moving already?” She looked at him. “Why didn’t you say anything? I didn’t even know you’d signed a lease yet.”
“Everything happened kind of fast.” He crumpled the candy bar wrapper and stuck it in the cup holder, wiping his fingers on his work slacks. “Jovia isn’t thrilled, but she’s being cool about it. She’s helping us hunt down some extra furniture and stuff.”
“Us?”
Reese paused. “Indigo and me.” He didn’t hold her gaze long. “Her roommate’s finally going to move in with her boyfriend. Indigo needs help with the rent, and I need a change. Makes sense.”
Maybe she should’ve seen it coming. Hearing it spoken out loud still felt like falling way, way down into a place with no light. Pearl tried to get her bearings, but her voice sounded odd, unfamiliar, as she said, “I didn’t think you guys were that serious.”
He shrugged, half smiling. “We’re going to give it a shot. Never know until you try, right?”
She was supposed to laugh here, to agree and turn the conversation onto lighter things, but she couldn’t. Couldn’t force another word from her mouth as she sat there, feeling sucker punched, tasting a memory of rum eggnog and humiliation, hearing the whisper everything you hoped for, sweetie? as her eyes burned with tears.
He still held the keys. Pearl took them back, grabbed her bag. “I better get home. Dad will be wondering.” And now she’d just told a lie to Reese, who knew better and made a soft sound.
“Pearl, come on. Don’t run off.”
“I’m not. Thanks. For tonight.” Her voice broke at the end, but she was halfway out the door and hoped he hadn’t caught it. She got into her car, keeping her face averted as she started the engine. She was glad when he left first, so she could sit for a minute and let her vision blur, feel some release before making the drive home through the rows of quiet, sleeping houses.
Twenty-One
IT WAS A relief when they weren’t on the next afternoon, Reese and Indigo. Pearl didn’t mind the solitude in a crowd this time, spending most of her shift in her head—so long as she didn’t have to see them together.
She’d lost him. No wonder Indigo had been so willing to help with Marilyn, had even spoken a few words to Pearl in the kitchen the other day. Not hard to be magnanimous when you knew you’d won. Pearl had known frustration and jealousy during this cold war, but never grief like this. It dragged her around by the collar all day, catching her up, jerking her back whenever her mind strayed too far from the nagging ache that was Reese belonging to Indigo, no longer being the person Pearl could call, day or night, no matter what. Because he’d be sharing a bed, making a home.
There were the keys, of course. Pearl had those. She kept expecting Meriwether to call an emergency staff meeting and announce that there’d been a break-in and a case of dollhouse molestation, but nothing happened. Apparently, the little club had become a part of the scenery already, and no one was looking closely at the rooms anymore.