Chapter 8 - The Door They Couldn't Open
I kept the office door closed. "Show me your manager's badge through the glass," I called.
No badge appeared. Instead Pike's voice came through the door. "You're trespassing in a hotel where you're no longer employed."
Evelyn drew herself up. "Actually, she's still employed. You're a contractor. And this is my office."
For a heartbeat nobody spoke. Then Pike said, "Don't make this worse, Ms. Sato."
"I've spent twenty-two years explaining to guests why a key didn't work," Evelyn said. "I can spend one night explaining it to you."
I nearly laughed. June almost did. Fear loosened its grip for a second.
Priya stayed on speaker. She told Evelyn to preserve the documents and call the city housing office's emergency number. Evelyn did, reading the file numbers aloud. The clerk couldn't halt a board vote, but he could log the complaint and alert the agency overseeing the property's grant restrictions.
I'd once told a frightened client that reporting trouble didn't cause it. It only gave it a name.
June found a pen. "Let me write my statement while I remember everything."
"Do it," Priya said. "Date, time, what you personally saw. No guesses."
Outside, Pike's radio crackled. "Board members entering the Ash Room now."
I looked at my watch: nine-twenty-one.
"He can't shut us in here forever," Evelyn said.
"He doesn't need forever," I answered. "He needs twenty-four minutes."
We used the adjoining records room, a legitimate staff passage that led to the hotel's loading hallway. Evelyn held the door while June and I slipped through. The passage smelled of floor polish and hot laundry.
Halfway down, June stopped at a wall calendar with a picture pinned to it: a man receiving a donation check from Vanessa.
"That's Colin Marsh," she said. "He chaired the tenants' meeting."
May you like
I studied the caption. Colin Marsh wasn't a tenant. He was Homeward Key's paid finance director.
And the man beside him in the picture was Brennan Pike.
