by Becky Clark
Our publisher didn’t foot the bill for our book tour. Viv and I paid for everything out of our minuscule advances, so after every signing event, she talked our way into free meals, drinks, or hotel rooms along our route. After a while, I couldn’t remember what was the truth about us and what was the fictional embellishment she wrapped us in. Regardless, we seemed like the two most interesting women in the world. So what if it wasn’t completely accurate? At least it was entertaining, especially for us.
If I felt uncomfortable when she got too outlandish, Viv convinced me that it was what people came to hear. We were obligated to give them their money’s worth. When I reminded her we spoke for free, she said, “If they only met boring old us, they’d be disappointed. At least now they have awesome stories to tell at parties about the time they got to hang out with those two crazy writers.”
I laughed out loud. Did anyone actually remember any of her tall tales?
A man standing nearby smiled at me, then spoke with a British accent. “I shall go barmy if I have to wait much longer, but it seems you bloody well don’t mind waiting to be picked up.” He gestured toward the terminal. “I heard a bloke inside say there was a tie-up on the motorway.”
“Actually, I’m thinking about turning around and flying right back to Denver. Or at least going back in for a grilled cheese sandwich. With bacon.” I eyed the terminal doors behind us.
“Don’t like Portland?”
“I love Portland. But I’m here to speak at a writers’ conference, and I’m nervous. I’ve been on panels before, and taught workshops, but my friend Viv, who’s the organizer, wants me to give the keynote speech at the banquet on Saturday.”
“Are you an author?”
I nodded and thrust out my hand. “Charlemagne Russo. Charlee. I write mysteries. But I’ll bet you’ve never heard of me.”
He shook my hand and quirked his mouth apologetically. “Sorry. I don’t read mysteries. I’m Sir Richard Headley.”
“Ooh, I’m in the presence of royalty.” I gave a demure little bend of the knee, making him laugh.
“Nah, not really. Just pretending. Call me Ricky.” The posh British accent was gone, replaced by a flat Midwestern one. “I’m from Nebraska. Practicing my accents. I was in the Russian Politburo on the way here.”
I raised my eyebrows at him, hoping there was more explanation coming.
“I travel a lot—I’m a motivational speaker—and believe you me, every single person on this planet pretends to be something they’re not and feels like a fraud. And some of them actually are.”
“Like me.”
“I’m sure you’re not.”
“Are you here to … motivationally speak?”
He shook his head. “Friend’s wedding. Haven’t seen him in years. Not really sure why I agreed. The things we do for friends.”
“Indeed. I’m even using my own hotel points and I flew in early because flights on Wednesday were cheaper.” I peered hopefully at the cars coming down the passenger pick-up lane, but they all stopped for other travelers. “I should have called a cab or taken the MAX, though.”
“Same here. I’m supposed to be taken for a tuxedo fitting, but I don’t know where. Otherwise I’d be in a cab.” Ricky glanced at his phone, then dropped it back in his pocket. “So, tell me. What does one do at a writers’ conference? Surely you don’t sit around and write.”
“Well, sometimes, depending on the workshop you’re in. It’s a group of writers, I think about three hundred this weekend. All different skill levels and all genres, although some conferences focus on just mystery or romance or sci-fi or whatever. It starts Friday afternoon with pitch appointments—”
“Pitch appointments?”
“Writers who are looking for literary agents or publishers can get short meetings with them to see if there’s interest in whatever story they’re working on. The agents ask for a few chapters or the whole manuscript, and then the writer can spend the rest of the conference giddy with relief. Or they might get the brush-off and decide never to write another word as long as they live. Never, ever, ever.”
Ricky smiled and showed his dimples. “You seem to have some experience with that.”
“Yep. If you’ve never wanted to quit writing, you’ve probably never shown your work to anyone.”
“Is that all that happens over the weekend? People either get manic or depressed?”
“Nope. That’s just the fun part.” I smiled, hoping to get him to show those dimples again, and was rewarded. “There are also critiques of pages you submit—”
“More heartbreak—”
“Lots more. But there are also workshops about all kinds of writing-related topics, and you get to meet other writers, some of whom are famous—”
“Like you.”
“No. Famous ones. I’m midlist. Nobody knows me.”
“I think you’re selling yourself short. You were asked to give a keynote speech at the banquet of a weekend conference. I’ve never been to one of these things, but I suspect that’s where they put the most famous of their faculty.”
I wrinkled my nose. “I told you, the organizer of this conference is a friend of mine. She couldn’t get anyone else.”
Ricky sighed at me like my father would have. “Tell me about your speech.”
I made a noise in my throat. “It’s called Seven Things I Know About Writing.”
“And they are …?”
My mind blanked. I squinched my eyes but that didn’t help, so I pulled the notes out of my messenger bag. I flipped and shuffled pages, all strike-throughs and scribbles, trying to identify any of the seven things.
Ricky held out his hand. “Can I see?”
I offered the pages. They shook gently as I held them out, which surprised me a little. My tremor hadn’t bothered me very much in the few weeks since I’d found out what really happened to my dad. I’d had the tremor for years, since his funeral, but maybe I could soon be free of it.
“You may need to Lysol your eyeballs after you read this,” I said.
He was holding the opposite end of the pages. “I’ll take my chances.”
I finally let go, and he pursed his lips while he skimmed the pages. “This is good.” He pulled a pen from his shirt pocket. He cocked his head at me. “May I?”
I had no idea what he wanted to do, but he certainly couldn’t hurt that mess any worse than I already had.
He went back to the first page and circled single words. Then he turned to the blank back of the last page, flipping back and forth through the text as he wrote a list. When he finished, he stepped closer to me and pointed at the list with his pen. “These are the keywords for your seven main points. Now I just need to—”
I reached for the pages, but he held up one hand. He rewrote the list of seven words in a different order, then announced, “Achieve.”
“Well, I’ll do my best, but—”
“No. ACHIEVE is the acronym you need to memorize, and your whole speech will fall into place.”
He saw my confusion and pointed at each letter of the acronym and each of the keywords he’d written. “ACHIEVE. A for ability, to craft a story. C for courage, to put yourself out there. H for hocus-pocus—”
“Sometimes you need magic to make it all work right.”
Ricky nodded. “I for imagination …”
“For your story and for marketing and promotion.”
“E for editor …”
“Writing is rewriting, find an editor you trust.”
“V for voice …”
I thought back to my notes. “Your voice and your character’s voice are what make your writing unique.”
Ricky showed me his dimples again. “And last, E for earnings …”
“The goal of every writer. Professional writers get paid for their writing.” I nodded appreciatively. “You might actually be a genius, Sir Richard.”
“You should write a book about me.” He handed back the pages.
“Absolutel
y. But I’d have to make you a murderer. Would you settle for a sandwich as payment for dropping your knowledge on me?” I gestured with the pages toward the terminal behind us. “It’s way past my lunchtime. I’m starving.”
“Me too.” Ricky glanced toward the terminal, then down the road. “Maybe he forgot about me. Okay, let’s go get a—”
A horn beeped and an SUV rolled up. A harried guy leaned toward the passenger window. When it had rolled all the way down, he said, “Rick, man, so sorry I’m late. Accident on the freeway.”
“It was lovely to pass the time with you, Charlee, but it appears my chariot has arrived. Can we drop you some place?” Ricky picked up his bag and moved toward the SUV.
“No, my ride’s probably stuck in the same accident. I’ll be fine. Thanks anyway. And thanks for your help with my speech. I already feel better about it.”
“If you’re sure.”
“I am. Cheerio, pip, pip and all that.”
“Blimey, you cheeky monkey.” Ricky tossed his bag in the backseat, then settled into the front. After he hooked his seat belt, he gave me a wave and disappeared into rainy Portland.
“That right there was fate,” I muttered to myself. A professional speaker to help me figure out my keynote speech? I must have done a good deed in a past life. Or I owed the Universe one. Either way, I was happy to comply.
I reviewed the ACHIEVE acronym and tried to memorize the corresponding keywords. I could type them into my phone and use that for my notes. The idea of my nerves magnifying my tremor and making the pages quake like an aspen tree in the wind during my speech made me a bit queasy. I’d forgotten to ask Viv if I’d have a podium to rest my papers on. But this would be better anyway; I could use my phone with the acronym and the keywords showing. Uh oh. What if I forgot to charge my phone? When that had happened a few weeks ago, I’d almost gotten myself killed. Since then I’d been trying to keep at least sixty-five percent power, but who knew what would happen this weekend when I was out of my routine.
Curious, I pulled out my phone: forty-eight percent. Darn it. Better to memorize.
I had only reviewed keywords up to the C in ACHIEVE when Viv screamed up to the curb in her Toyota.
“Finally!”
She popped the trunk from her seat but didn’t get out of the car to help or to hug. I lifted my rolling carry-on into it and slammed it shut, hurrying to avoid any more of the misty weather. My bangs were already plastered to my forehead, and I knew that when I shook out my braid later, after it dried, I’d have kinky hair that would make a witch proud.
I slipped into the passenger seat, dropping my messenger bag at my feet. “Hi. Did you get stuck in that accident—”
Viv roared away from the curb before I even got my seat belt buckled.
“Charlee, my daughter’s been kidnapped.”
Two
I clawed at my seat belt, trying to buckle it as I absorbed Viv’s words. “Kidnapped? Hanna? Why? How? When?”
Viv didn’t answer. Her head swiveled at the heavy airport traffic as she tried a breakneck merge. I felt everything rushing too fast—the traffic, the Toyota, the MAX train on the tracks parallel to us, my thoughts. It was too soon after Melinda’s murder for me to be involved in chaos again. First with my agent, and now my friend? I want to write about crimes, not be involved in them.
“Did you call the cops?”
“No, they said they’d kill her if I got the cops involved.”
“You have to let the police handle this, Viv.” It was excellent advice, even though it wasn’t what I did when Melinda was murdered.
“No. I shouldn’t even have told you.”
Viv continued to drive like Mario Andretti, swiveling her head and agitating her blond bob like it was a washing machine. While I wanted answers to so many questions, I didn’t trust her to talk and maintain control of the car at this speed. It wasn’t too long before traffic stalled in front of us and she was forced to slow to a crawl. She beat a fist on the steering wheel and spewed a litany of expletives I’d never heard strung together in quite such a manner.
“Okay. Now talk to me. Tell me exactly what happened.”
Viv turned my way and I saw her dark lip liner but no lipstick. Like she’d gotten interrupted while putting on her face for the day. “I got a phone call this morning and someone said they had Hanna and not to call the cops or they’d kill her.”
“But why?”
Viv inserted her car into the fast lane and earned an angry honk from the car behind us.
“Why Hanna?” I repeated.
“I don’t know.”
“When did you last see her? Did you have a fight?”
“No, nothing like that. We had a game night a couple weeks ago. She beat me at Scrabble. Everything seemed … fine.”
“Why did you pause? What aren’t you saying?”
“Things have been … challenging with Hanna the last few years, but I thought we’d turned a corner. Maybe I was wrong.” Viv changed lanes too fast and with barely enough room.
With my eyes squinched tight, I asked, “Have you called her? Gone by her house?”
“Of course I did. She’s not answering her phone and her car isn’t at her apartment.” Viv took her eyes off the traffic and stared at me. “Charlee, I need your help.”
“I can’t do anything!” My voice pitched up two octaves. It was well documented that my sleuthing skills only worked in fiction, not real life. I’d just asked all the questions I could think of and no answers had clicked in my brain like you see on cop dramas. “I don’t want anything to do with this. I’m way out of my depth here. Take the next exit back to the airport.” I glanced over my right shoulder to see if she could change lanes. Pulling out my phone, I said, “I’ll call my brother Lance. He’s a Denver cop. He’ll know—”
Viv leaned across and knocked the phone to the floor. “No! No cops. I’m sorry I said anything.” She kept one eye on traffic and the other on me groping around for my phone. When I came up with it, she stared fiercely until I shut it off and dropped it back into my bag.
She groaned but calmed the teensiest bit, the fierceness replaced by concern. “You solved your agent’s murder. I need your help. I don’t know what’s happening. I can’t call the cops. Hanna is an adult—twenty-five years old—and she doesn’t even live with me. There’s nothing the cops can do since there’s no evidence of a crime. You should know that. I’m not even sure it’s true—maybe it’s a bad prank. It was a cryptic phone call from a blocked number.” She glanced at traffic beginning to move again, then back to me. “I told you, Hanna and I have a … difficult relationship these days. But I need to find her. I can’t risk anything happening to her. You have to help me. I’m begging you, Charlee.”
I thought back to all the help Viv had given me with my career over the years. She’d taken me under her wing at that conference, introduced me to Melinda, who became my agent soon afterward. I’d always suspected Viv had pulled some strings and went out on a limb to get Melinda to agree to represent me. She was perhaps the spark that had ignited my career all those years ago.
It broke my heart, but I said, “You know I’d do anything for you, but there’s nothing I can do about this.” I couldn’t look at her.
“Yes, there is. The kidnappers don’t know you, so you can skulk around and help me find out what’s going on. They’re probably following me, watching my movements. I just know it.” Viv sped up, passing cars by narrow margins and finally shooting off at an exit into the city.
Prickles formed on the back of my neck. “If they’re following you, they’ve already seen me. Besides, skulking around isn’t a big part of my skill set.” I glanced at the cars around us. Nobody looked kidnapper-ish. I didn’t want to tell her that my investigation into Melinda’s murder hadn’t gone very well and I was likely to get Hanna killed in the process. “I can’t, Viv. Call the cops. That’s their job.”
She didn’t say another word until we’d skidded up under the circula
r portico at the Pacific Portland Hotel ten nerve-wracking minutes later. She popped the trunk but didn’t move from her seat, staring straight ahead. “Fine. If you’re not going to help me find Hanna, at least help me with the conference.”
“The conference? You didn’t cancel the conference? You have to.”
She snapped her head toward me. “I can’t. It’s too late. It starts in two days. I can’t afford to cancel this late.” She fluttered one hand at me, indicating I should get out. “Be there for me, since I can’t.”
I collected my messenger bag from the floor, slid out of my seat, and stepped to the concrete. Holding open the door, I leaned in to try and talk sense into her, but I saw her pleading eyes and that pathetic lip line. “Fine. You concentrate on Hanna and I’ll help with the conference.”
Viv expelled a big breath. “I can’t thank you enough.”
Before I could ask about the specifics of what she needed me to do, she said, “Oh, and all my main volunteers got food poisoning, but I made some calls and think I got some others. And whatever you do, don’t tell anyone about Hanna. Especially not Jack, the concierge. They’re friends.”
She zoomed away, only to back up ten seconds later with her trunk bobbing.
I grabbed my suitcase and slammed the trunk. “Call me as soon as you—” She was gone before I straightened. The things we do for friends, indeed.
I don’t know how long I stood in the middle of the lobby of the Pacific Portland Hotel. I still held the handle of my rolling suitcase, and my messenger bag was wadded up under my arm. My unfocused eyes gazed all the way across the lobby, through the floor-to-ceiling windows and past the patio area where I assumed the pool and hot tub lived. I wished a nice soak in the Jacuzzi could make all this disappear.
Someone touched my elbow. “Ma’am? Ma’am, are you okay?”
I blinked at the twenty-something man studying me with concern. His brown hair tousled with expert care, he looked like he belonged in a boy band. He wore a name tag that read Giacomo, Concierge.
