A Winter Wonderland

by Fern Michaels

  “No way, babe,” said Merton. “It’s out of my control. I’m hooked. It’s gotta be Lama’s Tears.”

  Nordstrom had never heard of Lama’s Tears, neither had Saks or Sephora or Neiman Marcus. Elizabeth tried all the drugstores and every bath and body boutique in the Palm Beach area. Batting zero, she finally tried asking Toni, thinking that since she was such a big Merton Paul fan she might have heard of the rocker’s favorite bubble bath.

  “You haven’t heard of Lama’s Tears?” Toni was amazed.

  “No, and nobody else I’ve called has either.”

  “Well, you’ve been calling the wrong places.”

  “Obviously,” Elizabeth admitted, growing impatient.

  “Well, I’ll tell you but you’re going to have to do something for me.”

  “What?”

  “If I tell you where you can get Lama’s Tears, you have to let me take them up to Merton Paul, okay?”

  “Okay, okay,” Elizabeth promised. “Where do I get it?”

  “There’s this cool place where all the hip people go. It’s kind of a head shop, but they’ve got some clothes, some vintage. It’s called Metaphor.”

  Elizabeth was on the computer, looking it up, jotting down the phone number. “You’re a lifesaver!” she exclaimed, dialing the number.

  “Just remember your promise. I get to take it up to Merton’s suite.”

  “I won’t forget, I promise,” Elizabeth said, placing the order.

  When she finished she realized she needed to use a bathroom and decided to break the rules just this once and use the facilities off the lobby, which were a lot closer than those provided for staff. She didn’t want to be away from her desk for long, especially since there were so many people milling about in the lobby. The security guards had managed to remove a few paparazzi but others had drifted in, along with dedicated fans of the celebrity guests.

  She’d taken a few steps when she encountered Wrayburn, who was looking extremely harried. “I’ve got to use the ladies’ room,” she told him. “Can you have somebody keep an eye on my desk?”

  “I’ll do it myself,” he said, seating himself in her chair.

  When she returned she saw he had propped both elbows on the desk and was rubbing his forehead. “Thanks,” she said.

  “No problem,” he replied, standing up. Then he gave an abrupt laugh. “No problem. That was wishful thinking.”

  Elizabeth watched as Enola Stitch was accosted by three very thin women dressed entirely in black, obviously members of the fashion press. Enola greeted them warmly, then shepherded them into the coffee shop. “There isn’t much you can do when the guests are the ones breaking the rules,” she said.

  “You said it,” Wrayburn agreed. “I wish I was back in Washington. They take security seriously there.”

  Elizabeth was about to reply when four very serious-looking men in suits and wearing earpieces entered the lobby and took up positions; their presence was both imposing and forbidding. Conversation stopped as people became aware of them, everyone suddenly watchful.

  “Secret Service,” Wrayburn said, using his phone to alert Mr. Dimitri. “The First Lady is arriving.”

  The atmosphere in the lobby was hushed and expectant, everyone waiting and hoping for a glimpse of the president’s wife, and perhaps even a chance to greet her and shake her hand. She was far more popular than her beleaguered husband, who had to cope with the woes of the world, and thanks to her support for disabled veterans, she enjoyed record-high approval ratings from both Democrats and Republicans.

  Mr. Dimitri was hurrying into the lobby, straightening his cuffs as he walked to the front entrance. He had taken his place when the door flew open and a uniformed courier barreled in. The Secret Service officers, moving in unison, all reached for their guns.

  The courier’s hands flew up. “I’m making a delivery,” he said. “From Metaphor, attention concierge.”

  “That’s right,” Elizabeth said as the agents patted the courier down. “I’m expecting a delivery for a guest.”

  One of the agents was examining the package closely, finally concluding it was harmless and giving it to Elizabeth. The courier was sent on his way and Elizabeth, rattled by the incident, forgot her promise to Toni and summoned a bellboy to take the package to Merton Paul in the Majestic penthouse suite.

  Then the motorcade arrived and Mr. Dimitri rushed out and greeted the First Lady, who was smiling and gracious and insisted on greeting everyone, staff and guests and paparazzi alike. It was a full half hour later that she finally stepped into the penthouse level elevator and the crowd began to disperse.

  Elizabeth, wondering why a smile and a handshake from the First Lady could possibly make her feel so good, noticed Chris Kennedy coming through the door. He wasn’t out of town at all, she realized. He’d just said that as an excuse for canceling their date. Suddenly, all that warm, good feeling was gone and Elizabeth wished she could disappear, just sink through the floor. At the same time she couldn’t take her eyes off him. When he looked at her, straight on, she had to do something so she gave him a little wave. Darn it, she thought, she wasn’t going to let him know how upset she was.

  By way of response Chris nodded and continued on his way down the hallway that led to the bar and coffee shop. Elizabeth was tempted to follow but knew it was a bad idea. Besides, Toni was at her elbow.

  “What a creep,” she said. “Coming here like that.”

  “It’s a free country,” said Elizabeth, feeling her knees go weak under her and sitting down.

  “I wonder what he’s doing here.”

  “I haven’t the faintest idea,” said Elizabeth. Her phone was ringing and her computer was informing her she had fourteen instant messages.

  “Are you going to answer that?” Toni asked.

  Elizabeth picked up the receiver and heard Merton Paul’s voice, thanking her for the Lama’s Tears. That distinctive voice of his carried, and Toni could hear him, too.

  “You got the Lama’s Tears?” she demanded, when Elizabeth hung up. “And you didn’t tell me?”

  “I meant to,” Elizabeth said lamely.

  “You promised!”

  “I’m sorry. It was so crazy here. You know how it’s been this morning.”

  Toni’s face was tight. “If it wasn’t for me, you’d never have known even where to get the bubble bath!”

  “That’s true,” Elizabeth said, miserably. “I just forgot.”

  “I thought we were friends.” Toni narrowed her eyes. “I’ll get you for this, Elizabeth. Don’t think I won’t.”

  Chapter 5

  Toni was as good as her word, giving Elizabeth the silent treatment whenever they met, which wasn’t actually that often because they were both insanely busy. At the front desk, Toni’s phone rang constantly with demands from the guests for everything from fresh towels to the weather report. When she wasn’t answering the phone, Mr. Kronenberg gave her the task of hand-addressing the Christmas cards Cavendish sent to every guest who had stayed at the hotel in the past year. “It’s these little personal touches that count,” he told her, giving her a box containing one hundred envelopes and telling her there were more in his office when she finished those. “I simply can’t manage to do it all myself this year, not with all that’s going on.”

  “I’m happy to help,” said Toni, giving the head concierge a big smile. “If there’s anything else I can do, just let me know.” She lowered her voice. “I think Elizabeth is in a bit over her head. She was complaining to me, saying some of the guests are terribly demanding.”

  Kronenberg glanced across the lobby, where Elizabeth had the phone tucked on her shoulder and was scribbling frantically on a notepad. Her hair was mussed and her harassed attitude was a stark contrast to the confident, professional demeanor that Annemarie had always projected. “I’m sure she’s doing her best,” he said. “It’s unfortunate timing that Annemarie got sick just now.”

  “Epstein-Barr can last for weeks, too,
” Toni said in a sympathetic voice. Then her tone brightened. “I’ll get right to work on those cards—don’t give it another thought.”

  Kronenberg’s anxious expression softened. “You’re a trooper, Toni.”

  In truth, Elizabeth was frantically scrambling, without a moment to catch her breath, trying to fulfill guests’ special requests while also assisting Layla with the schedule of activities they had planned. Luxury coaches came and went, taking guests on tours of art galleries and museums, shopping expeditions, nature hikes, and golf matches. The golf tournament, in which every foursome included a member of the PGA tour, was a big success. The boy versus girl tennis tournament pitting Simpson against Sharapova became an instant sports legend, and Gruber’s guests would be able to fascinate friends and acquaintances with play-by-play accounts for years.

  But the main event, the Blingle Bells Ball, was still to come. Every employee was working overtime, preparing for the gala. There were decorations to put up, tables to set, and food to prepare, and the pace grew more frantic as the time drew closer. The doors to the Grand Ballroom would open at nine Sunday evening, and at eight o’clock Layla invited interested staff members in for a sneak peek.

  “You’ve all been working so hard,” she told the hundred or so staff members who had accepted the invitation and gathered in the Grand Ballroom’s service hallway. “This is what you’ve done!” She opened the door and they entered reverently, awestruck, almost as if they were visiting a great cathedral, and paraded single file around the perimeter of the room. Even though they had all been involved in the preparations, only a few workers had seen the room in its final glory, complete with dramatic lighting designed for the event by theatrical lighting expert Stefan Ludwig.

  Elizabeth found herself awed by the banks of orchids on every table, the swags of silk suspended from the ceiling, and the hand-painted wallpaper panels that had been installed for the occasion. Every table was covered with sparkling crystal and silver, the specially monogrammed porcelain plates sat on silver chargers, and two gilt thrones would be occupied by Noelle and Jonah.

  “Every guest will receive a diamond gift,” Layla said. “The gentlemen will receive gold and diamond money clips and the ladies will all get one-carat pendants.”

  “How much are those worth, do you think?” one of the housekeepers, Marketa, whispered, speaking in her lightly accented voice. Elizabeth knew she worked extremely hard, often taking double shifts so she could send money home to her family in Serbia.

  “I don’t think you can get a one-carat diamond for less than a couple thousand dollars,” Angela replied. A bookkeeper for the hotel, she had just gotten engaged. “And that doesn’t include the setting. Gold is really high right now.”

  “You mean, in addition to a ball for four hundred guests, Gruber is giving each a gift worth two thousand dollars? What does that come out to?” Elizabeth asked. “I can’t do the math—it’s too many zeroes.”

  “Eight hundred thousand dollars,” said Angela, who was a whiz with numbers. “Almost a million.”

  Elizabeth suddenly felt sick to her stomach. “A million dollars on gifts for people who already have everything they could possibly want.”

  “I bet some of these women won’t even appreciate a single-carat diamond,” Marketa sniffed. “It’s nothing to them.”

  “You’re right,” Elizabeth said, remembering the way Noelle had tossed forty-seven million dollars worth of jewels on the bed, as if they were little more than a ripped pair of panty hose. “So, Angela, what do you think the total bill for this do is going to be?” she asked.

  “Millions and millions,” Angela said. “But Gruber’s got it. I read in the paper that he’s worth something like a billion dollars.”

  “You know,” Elizabeth said, “back home in Maine, my mom and her friends have this little charity they call the Hat and Mitten Fund. They have bake sales and beg for contributions so they can give poor kids in our town warm clothes and school supplies. I think their entire budget is maybe a thousand dollars.”

  “Imagine what they could do with one of these trinkets,” Marketa said.

  “Yeah, I know what you’re thinking,” Angela said. “But look at it this way. Gruber’s money creates a lot of jobs for folks like us. I heard that Dimitri was considering layoffs because holiday reservations were down. If it wasn’t for Gruber some of us would be having a pretty miserable Christmas.”

  “Ho-ho-ho,” said Elizabeth, causing the others to chuckle as they completed their circuit of the glittering ballroom and exited into the dank, fluorescent-lit chill of the concrete-walled service hall.

  An hour later, just before nine, Elizabeth was back at her desk. A few early arrivals were drifting about in the lobby, waiting for the doors to the Grand Ballroom to open. Elizabeth recognized several of them, people she’d dealt with in the past few days. There was Katrina Muldaur, a sweet middle-aged woman whose novel about the Spanish-American War was a surprise best seller; she was clearly thrilled to have been invited and was wearing a black lace dress Elizabeth had seen at Macy’s for a hundred and forty-nine dollars. The lady author was accompanied by a middle-aged man in a badly fitting tux who tugged on his cummerbund from time to time as he paced about impatiently. Elizabeth suspected he was probably wondering why they couldn’t have served dinner at six, which was exactly what her own father would be wondering, if he were here.

  Matt Milkweed, the financier, also caught Elizabeth’s eye. He was tapping his foot by the elevator, waiting for someone. That someone turned out to be a tiny Asian woman, whose ruffled red evening gown seemed to swallow her up. She had to hold the ruffle encircling her neck down with one hand just so Milkweed could give her a kiss, then she took his arm and they drifted off in the direction of the bar.

  Elizabeth was glancing at the clock over the desk and saw it was just five minutes to nine when the office door opened and Mr. Dimitri appeared carrying the metal-clad jewel case. He gave her a nod as he traversed the distance to the penthouse elevator. Then it was nine o’clock and two hotel waiters dressed as footmen complete with white powdered wigs and knee breeches opened the doors to the ballroom and the rush was on.

  The band was playing a familiar tune, light and nice for dancing, and the elevator was arriving regularly and discharging guests. Elizabeth found she was enjoying the show, despite her uneasiness with Gruber’s display of conspicuous consumption. It was better than a fashion show, she decided, watching Howie Storch’s twin dates hobble past in very tight, very low-cut dresses that seemed ready to pop, revealing all. Merton Paul was flamboyant as ever, in a ruby red silk tux that contrasted nicely with the emerald green wig he’d chosen for the occasion. Norah, however, was the very picture of elegance, in white satin and silver sequins. Her insistence on a hairdresser with a compatible astrological sign had resulted in a smooth updo that perfectly framed her heart-shaped face.

  Elizabeth was wondering what the First Lady would be wearing when she noticed Dan Wrayburn hurrying across the lobby to the elevators with the look of a man who was very worried about something but trying not to show it. He disappeared behind the elevator doors only to return a few minutes later, deep in conversation with Mr. Dimitri and Mr. Kronenberg. After a brief conference, he left to make an announcement on the hotel’s emergency PA system.

  “Attention please,” Wrayburn began. “This is an official announcement from the hotel management. The Imperial Parure is missing and the hotel is on lockdown, awaiting the arrival of the police. Mr. and Mrs. Gruber hope that everyone will continue to enjoy the evening, but no one will be able to leave until further notice.”

  That set off a shocked buzz, with everyone frantically talking, wondering how such a thing could happen. The band, which had stopped playing for the announcement, resumed, but nobody was dancing. Everyone was uneasy, almost as if they were expecting a mob armed with pitchforks to storm the building.

  Then, appearing almost magically, as if she’d simply materialized in the ballroom,
Noelle was standing on the bandstand. Leaving her desk and standing by the door, Elizabeth had a clear view of the gorgeous woman. Enola Stitch’s design more than lived up to the anticipatory hype. She had created a long, strapless sheath of hot pink satin that clung to every curve of Noelle’s amazing body, and then gilded the lily by adding a fabulous puffy bustle and train. Every eye in the room was on Noelle, but she unnecessarily tapped the microphone, as if she needed to call the guests to attention.

  “I just want to say,” she began, in a whispery, little girl voice, “that I hope you will all cooperate with the police and tell them anything you might have seen or consider suspicious. With your help I’m sure we will get the jewels back, and in the meantime, I hope you’ll all have a wonderful time. So take your seats because dinner will be served in a few minutes and afterward Merton Paul will entertain with his biggest hits.”

  She then left the room, clutching Layla Fine’s hand, leaving the two extravagant gilt thrones unoccupied.

  “You know what this means, don’t you?” Toni asked after joining Elizabeth in the doorway.

  “It means the party’s over,” Elizabeth said. The waiters were serving grilled foie gras appetizers but few of the guests appeared to have any appetite. News of the theft had definitely cast a pall over the gala. “They’re all going to be scrutinized by the police and they’ve probably all got something to hide.”

  “Not just them,” said Toni. “The police will start with the staff and I bet quite a few of us have something to hide, too. Mark my words, it’s going to be a lot worse for us than it is for them.”

  Elizabeth knew she was right. The staff members were good, hardworking people but she knew that many of the lowest-paying jobs were filled by illegal immigrants, who feared deportation if their status was discovered. There were also undoubtedly some who had drug or alcohol problems, or a gambling addiction, and they would automatically be suspected of stealing the jewels to feed their habits. Elizabeth was most worried about the handful of employees who had come to the hotel through a program that found jobs for prisoners upon their release. She expected those workers would also face close scrutiny from investigators, so it was quite a shock when she was one of the first called to Wrayburn’s office