Alexis fingered the skirt doubtfully. “I’ll look like a peacock in this, and it’s just not my style, LJ.”
“I insist,” LJ said, propelling her toward the fitting room. “Try it out at least; it’ll match your nail polish beautifully. And”—he pulled out a pair of silver knee-high boots from another rack—“these will match the outfit perfectly.”
The skirt wasn’t as long as Alexis had feared it would be—just above her knee. If she’d had the time, she would have taken the hem up a few more inches, but she had to leave from the shop to make it on time to the Sorrento Hotel for the dinner with her uncle.
She wore the clothes to the cash register and waited patiently as the lady snipped off the price tags, the metal of the scissors cold against her skin.
“You’re a lucky girl,” the lady said, nodding toward a beaming LJ. “To have a father like this.”
“He’s not—,” Alexis began to say, but stopped, her heart thumping painfully in her chest. And why not, she thought? He was the only father she had ever known.
She tried on a pair of old-fashioned glasses at the counter. They made her look older—wise and sophisticated. Perfect for making Uncle Burr take her more seriously, particularly when she drew her hair back into a sensible low ponytail. She added them to the pile.
The bill came to an astounding $352.23. LJ dug the money out of all the pockets of his jeans and laid it out on the counter as if it were an offering. Alexis reached up and kissed him gently on his cheek and he instinctively brushed it off, his face crimson.
“Here, something else,” he said, opening her hand clumsily and putting a bottle in it. It was the corked purple bottle from his windowsill.
“What is it?” she asked in wonder, turning the little bottle around in her hand, the liquid inside swirling around the glass.
“The first perfume I ever made. Bergamot, sandalwood, cassis, all dissolved in hundred-proof vodka.”
“I’m supposed to drink it?” she asked, laughing.
“Wear it, kiddo.”
“What did you name it?”
“In Seattle, what else?” His smile was wide. “Rain Water.”
When they stepped outside, LJ took three photographs of Alexis near a newspaper stand, the sunlight setting her newly colored head to a red blaze, glittering off the silver of her top and her shoes, the blue feathers of her skirt iridescent against the newsprint. Alexis would find these photographs one day and treasure them as a happy, innocent memory.
She held her hand up in a tiny wave and, to her surprise, LJ came bounding up to ruffle her hair. He bent close to her ear and said, “Love ya, too, kiddo. Be brave.”
And then he was gone, loping toward the Angeline through the crowds, his white hair streaming behind him.
Alexis pushed her shoulders back, took a deep breath, and started the walk toward the Sorrento and her meeting with her uncle. She patted the papers in her bag, to gain some confidence from them and to reassure herself that they were still there. Later that night, when the dinner was done, she thought, she would go to LJ’s factory to find out what he was really up to.
CHAPTER 8
CRAIG WELCH
ALEXIS FOUND HERSELF ALONE, COMPLETELY alone, for the first time in days.
She moved along Broadway, an occasional gust whipping the skirt around her hips. The denizens of Capitol Hill busied themselves along the sidewalk, basking beneath the glittering sun. No one paid her any attention, but she still felt awkward, a child in her new-old clothes, walking alone on a street that suddenly seemed unfamiliar. She remembered clearly the last time she’d felt this strange and out of place in her own neighborhood. It had been Christmas, and her Uncle Burr had come without warning. He’d insisted on taking Alexis and Edith to dinner, urging them to dress as he did, talk as he did. Alexis had felt like an impostor then in her egg-colored skirt. The whole night had been uncomfortable, her uncle trying to learn how she was “faring” at school, about her friends, whether she “enjoyed” the Angeline’s residents. She’d been just ten years old, but she’d sensed something between the two adults, an old argument just below the surface.
She remembered the drive home, her face plastered against the rain-splattered window in the back of the BMW, her eyes scanning the red brick of a Capitol Hill still lined with construction cranes. The bits of old Seattle were more visible then—the cracking plastic video store marquees, the remnants of car dealerships, the litter. The big boxes were going up, yes, but they hadn’t yet taken over. The night had ended with her walking up the stairs and hearing fierce whispers between her two family members.
Alexis moved toward Elliott Bay and the Sorrento, her eyes on the people she’d lived around her entire life. She’d been so preoccupied for so long, she hadn’t noticed them lately, but the events of the past week had settled in her heavily and she found herself happy for the distraction.
At the 7-Eleven she saw the corner boys—the white kids not much older than her who sold dope to the drive-bys, the outsiders who cruised in from the big homes on the plateau. The dealers all thought they were Eminem, with their finger snaps and their yo-yo-yos. She spied one just then, holding court, shooting spittle at a middle-aged guy in cream khakis. The dealer pointed at the guy’s shoes and elbowed his buddies—“Dude’s wearing slippers, man.” The man stared off, beaten down and oblivious.
Alexis had overheard LJ telling people that marijuana was getting tougher to find, something about how the border patrol’s crackdown on terrorists seemed to bring down mostly dope runners instead. Alexis didn’t know anything about that, but it sure didn’t look like there was any kind of drug shortage.
LJ . . . LJ liked his secrets, no doubt, but Alexis couldn’t recall him ever being quite so mysterious. She wondered, not for the first time, if she should be worried—not just about what he might be doing but about him, about his stability. What was he up to? She quickly let it go. LJ was LJ. He’d be OK. She’d never been able to figure him out anyway. She had to trust that he could take care of himself.
She’d trust, all right, but she’d verify, too. Tonight.
Alexis hugged her bag closer and moved past Rudy’s Barbershop and the poster-strewn poles outside the Comet Tavern. She watched a father grab his toddler by the hoodie just before the child darted into an intersection. Would her father have done that for her? Her father. He’d been on her mind a lot lately, thanks to Mr. K’s gift of the violin. Then again, what hadn’t been on her mind?
She could see the hospital up ahead, which meant she was just a few blocks from the Sorrento. She could already feel the mahogany beams beneath her fingers. The hotel was nothing like the Angeline, and its clients were another species altogether. The men wore sweaters tied around their necks. They ironed their jeans—or, more likely, had someone ironing the denim for them.
Thinking about the Sorrento now brought back memories of Mia. It had been Mia who suggested, back when Alexis was in sixth grade, that they wander the halls and try to hunt down the ghosts. The kids in their neighborhood knew the stories about the hotel, about the couple that had been gunned down on the third floor by a burglar in the ’20s, about the bride who’d fallen to her death on her wedding night. They’d all heard about the rooms with doors that slammed shut by themselves. Mia had insisted Alexis come with her to investigate.
They’d made quite a little team back then—Alexis so young that the cleaning women barely noticed her, especially when she was with Mia. No one missed Mia. Tall, thin-nosed, with a dancer’s grace, Mia was fearless and breathtaking. She lied with such ease that the girls always managed to gain access to a room and they would spend hours rifling through drawers, the thrill of the illicit making Alexis’s skin tingle.
They mostly found other people’s secrets—receipts from Nordstrom, dog-eared scraps of paper with scribbled directions. But in a drawer by the bed in every room, the Sorrento kept a book of hotel history. Mia didn’t care much for reading—she didn’t have the patience—but Alexis liked flipp
ing the pages, taking in tales of President Taft’s first visit or the stories behind the carvings etched into the woodwork. The last time they’d been there together Mia had found a gold hoop earring beneath the bed. Alexis had found herself suddenly wanting it. She reached out and Mia, an odd smile curling her lips, had held it aloft.
“It’s gonna cost you,” Mia said, teasing.
“What do I have to do?” Alexis asked. But even then, she had an idea.
Mia, without warning, leaned in and kissed her. Alexis, startled, pulled away. She’d never been kissed by anyone who wasn’t her mother or LJ. She flushed and looked at Mia, but Mia just smiled and stared back, one eyebrow slightly raised. Alexis felt the redness in her face deepen. Her mind was a blur. She grabbed the earring from Mia’s hand and, without another word, bolted from the room and the hotel.
Walking now, toward the iron gates of the hotel’s entrance, Alexis thought about how many times she’d come back to the Sorrento alone. She wasn’t sure she could explain what drove her. Mia’s kiss, of course, was always on her mind. But something else, too, drew her to the hotel. She’d wander the halls, trying desperately to carry herself as if she belonged, trying to mimic Mia’s confidence, pretending she was a guest’s child. Alexis would search until she found an open room and another copy of the hotel’s history. For hours she would sit below a window in that room, studying the stories of former guests, as if their stories somehow held a key to her own.
There was the alcoholic who’d had his last drink near the fireside lounge, who’d returned thirty years later clean and sober. She read about the Air Force pilot who’d broken his back in a fall. He’d spent sixteen months in a hospital in Seattle and recuperating at the hotel—away from friends and family and everything he knew—before he eventually returned to active duty. There were weddings and funerals and Thanksgivings and vacations, and even the sad stories gave Alexis a little lift. These were rich people, sure, and she detested this world. (What would LJ think if he knew she came here? Oh, God, what would her mother think?) But these were families doing what families do, living the kind of lives Alexis only knew through TV. She hated them for that. But she loved them a little, too.
Inside the lobby, Alexis tried to shrink. Men wandered about in the same black vests she remembered. The women still wore those dark, somber suits. She was supposed to meet her uncle in the lounge, and she wanted desperately to get there without having to speak with anyone. She feared what might tumble out of her—about her uncle, about LJ, about her mother still tucked neatly inside her coffin, about their silly plan to raise all that money. (Had she really thought they could do it with a concert?)
Alexis slipped into the lounge without opening her mouth and moved quickly to a chair by the fire. She turned it to face the door. She was early, but she knew her uncle would be, too, and she was there less than a minute before she saw him.
Uncle Burr’s hair and beard had gone white, and he looked like he’d lost weight. He saw her and tried to smile, but he looked like he’d bitten down on a pickle. Alexis had always hated the weakness in his features, the way he seemed filled with worries bigger than her world. Seeing him, she felt all the old anxieties returning. She recalled the overheard arguments with her mother, the formal way he always spoke to them both, and she knew right then that she needed to trust her instincts. Alexis knew she was right to hate him.
CHAPTER 9
MATTHEW AMSTER-BURTON
“SHALL WE SIT?” ASKED UNCLE BURR.
Alexis nodded and turned up the corners of her mouth, a fake smile to match the old man’s. A waiter led them to a table in the dining room and left them with menus.
Burr patted his jacket pocket, looked upward as if remembering something, and picked up his menu. “It’s good to see you, Alexis,” he said stiffly.
Alexis sniffed. “Mmm-hmm.” She made a show of studying her menu, which did, in fact, resemble a final exam on the twin subjects of Northwest agriculture and French culinary terms. It was nearly indecipherable from top to bottom, and Alexis wondered whether she would want to eat any of it even if she could crack the code.
“When will your mother be joining us?” Burr inquired smoothly.
“She can’t make it. She’s not feeling well, so she sent me as her representative.”
“Oh, really?”
“Really. I’m fourteen, you know—plenty old enough to help run things,” Alexis said a little defensively.
“Hmmm. I really have business I need to discuss with your mother. I came to town just for this meeting.”
“Well, you’ll have to deal with me.” Alexis said firmly.
“We’ll see. I suppose we may as well enjoy our dinner,” Burr said grouchily.
Alexis went back to studying the menu, but the type swam before her eyes.
“If I may,” said Burr, “the crab salad is perfection.”
“Thank you.” Alexis had been practicing the art of saying “screw you” in the guise of “thank you” for years, and this was one of her finest performances. OK, then, she would have the crab salad, for twenty-three dollars. She thought about slinking back to the kitchen and cutting a deal with the cook: He could have the crab salad and half the money, and she’d take the rest and get the hell out of there.
But no. For one thing, she was no criminal mastermind. She’d long noticed that the criminals in her favorite detective novels were suave intellectuals, unlike the real criminals in her neighborhood, who wore ripped jeans and smelled funny. They were idiots.
Who was the idiot here, though? Burr knew what this meeting was about. Alexis didn’t. She’d read once that people fear public speaking more than death. Well, her fear of death was long gone, but here, facing off with this tired-looking rich man, she felt like she was expected to give a speech, and she had lost her note cards, and the speech was about the mating habits of ocelots, and she’d missed that day in health class.
“For you, miss?” asked the waiter.
“I’ll have the crab salad, please,” she said, grateful for the interruption.
“And for your entree?”
“Huh?”
“Your main course, miss?”
He couldn’t possibly mean the twenty-three-dollar salad was an appetizer. Alexis knew that rich people ate expensive food, but did they always do it in massive quantities? She looked around the room and saw a disappointing lack of gorging, vomiting, and slugging directly from wine bottles. She couldn’t help it. She imagined the woman on the far side of the room, the one stuffed into a black dress that might have fit her in a past life, guzzling red wine and puking. She laughed.
The waiter, unperturbed, waited patiently.
“Just the salad for me. I’m not very hungry,” she said.
“I’ll have the langoustines, and the filet,” said Burr, “and do you have a bottle of the Haut-Brion open, by any chance?” The waiter shook his head. “Then sell me a bottle, pour me a glass, and give the rest to the kitchen.”
This act of charity made Alexis hate her uncle three times as much. There’s nothing worse than watching someone you dislike do something unequivocally nice. The mind casts around for a way to transform an act of kindness into something else, and Alexis told herself that Burr would be abetting some poor cook’s slide into alcoholism.
“Care to let me in on the joke?” Burr asked.
“What joke?”
“You were laughing.”
“I was coughing. So why are we here?”
“You always did get right to the point. I admire your philosophy, but mine is: dinner first, business later.”
A hardwood chair with no padding is uncomfortable. A mattress with a defective spring is uncomfortable. The silence while Alexis and Burr waited for their food was more like an iron maiden. Alexis let an ice cube melt in her mouth and avoided eye contact. She listened to the elevator music they had piped into the dining room, and found to her surprise that she recognized some of the songs, and felt an inexplicable indignation at the
fact that Led Zeppelin’s “Thank You” made good elevator music.
“The crab salad, miss,” said the waiter, setting down a plate that, to Alexis’s relief, had no claws on it. She couldn’t identify anything that was on the plate, but she took a bite.
Wow. Oh, wow. This was not right. This salad was going to melt her steely facade. Salad! Roberta liked to watch this show where, as far as Alexis could tell, people competed to make the most weird, complicated, and improbable food. As she chewed, she felt her world rearranging itself and coming back together in a new form. It was as if she’d learned that monsters were real—this wouldn’t have surprised her—but were also cuddly.
The salad tasted like a ferry ride, like a rainy day that washes the roads clean. It was going to be very hard to go on hating anyone while eating this salad. Was this part of Burr’s plan? Maybe this concert idea was all wrong. Instead, they should set up a tent and sell this salad.
“You like it,” said Burr, and it wasn’t a question.
Alexis nodded. Burr, she noticed, was eating something that looked like a plate of crickets. Say nothing, she told herself.
Fat chance. “Are you eating a plate of crickets?” she asked. It was the salad talking.
“They’re crayfish,” said Burr, laughing. “Would you like to try one?”
“No.”
“More for me, then.” Why did adults always say stupid things like that?
Alexis did her best to make the salad last while Burr consumed a steak the approximate size and shape, though not the color, of a blueberry muffin. He ate dutifully, like he had eaten this same muffin-shaped steak dozens of times before and had maybe enjoyed it long ago. He patted his jacket again and sighed. Alexis kept herself busy trying to blot the last molecules of dressing from her plate with a piece of bread. Then, just as she resigned herself to the fact that she’d eaten it all, she looked down and the plate was gone. Petty thieves, she thought, could learn a lot from waiters. Or maybe fancy waiters were all former petty thieves.
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