“She had to. She was there enough times when Brendan or Javi bugged Erin about a new card.” She smiled. “At least she didn’t use yours.”
I rolled my eyes. “Erin’s a fraud. Desiree found out.”
“And?”
I’d always appreciated Sherry’s bluntness. So I gave her some of my own. “And I think she might have helped Desiree ‘accidentally’ overdose.”
If I was hoping for shock and awe, I didn’t get it. Sherry just stubbed out her cigarette on a wall. “I don’t know. Even if she is a fraud, I can’t see her hurting anyone.”
“Because she’s pretty and blond and white? Society loves to have us believe pretty, blond white women are always victims. Never the threat. Erin has clearly taken advantage of that.”
“Touché,” Sherry said. “That would definitely explain the argument.”
I stopped, wondering why it’d taken her so long to share that tidbit. “When?”
“Night Desiree died. Javi saw it on the security cam.”
“You didn’t tell me.”
“I thought you knew. Your dad sent someone to get all the footage from that night.”
It was the first I’d heard of it, but getting rid of evidence was part of Mel’s MO. It was why no one knew if the window incident was just an urban legend. But it also made me hopeful. Maybe that was why Mel had been acting so strange. He actually did believe there was more to the story. It would explain why no one had told me. They didn’t want me to know I was right. And if Mel knew, Tam and Veronika knew too.
“Can I see it?”
“It’s long gone. Your dad made sure of that. Only people even saw it were my managers.”
“Javi and Brendan.” Brendan wouldn’t even give me a name. I held out no hope of him giving me a video. “You think Javi would talk to me?”
Sherry smiled. “Give me thirty minutes. Brendan’ll be off work.”
I waited Brendan out at the Dunkin’ Donuts, picking at a Boston cream until I felt mentally prepared enough to call Erin back. It was looking more and more like my surprise confrontation was a no-go. When she didn’t answer, I sent her a quick WYA text, then stared at my phone for eons while envisioning her on the run in sunglasses and a headscarf, checking into a flight to Cuba on a fake passport. But this wasn’t Mission: Impossible. She was probably getting a facial.
Exactly thirty minutes later, I again walked through the Omni hotel entrance. This time I noticed the cameras. There were more in the lobby than people. Small black lenses protected behind rounded glass.
Sherry stood at the front desk. “How are you with lying?” she said when I got to her.
That did not sound good. “What’s the scale? Out of ten?”
She just stared.
“Maybe a seven,” I finally said. “Nine if I’m really motivated.”
“Great. Javi said he’d talk to you only after I told him your dad had sent you.”
“Great.” My inflection was nowhere near as excited as hers.
“They require one of us to be at the front desk so I’m stuck here. But he’s in the office.”
She gestured to a door less than ten feet behind her. It was half open, and I could barely make out legs, both desk and human. I prided myself on being a quick thinker, someone who could tell you what fifteen times fifteen is in a split second. But that didn’t extend to lying, and I had ten feet to come up with a reason why Mel would send me back down here.
I knocked when I got there, and a voice told me to come in. They didn’t spend any of their interior design budget on the manager’s office. It was clearly meant for one person, though they’d stuffed two desks in there anyway. These were pushed up against opposite walls and looked straight out of an IKEA catalog. The one farthest from me was spotless, nothing but a desktop computer and a pen in a pen holder. The other one was a hot mess—Javi’s.
He looked over when I came in, then popped up when he realized I wasn’t Sherry. Surprisingly, he was about my age. Brown eyes. Tightly coiled black hair. Light brown skin. And either he’d lost weight recently or had never had much to begin with because his suit made him look like a kid playing in his dad’s clothes. He shook my hand.
“Let me apologize if there were any further issues regarding your sister’s stay.” He sounded nervous. Mel must’ve laid into him about the video. “I hope you convey that to your father, Ms. Pierce.”
“Scott,” I said, then continued on before he could do the obligatory What? “Lena Scott. I legally took my mother’s maiden name when I graduated high school. Mel didn’t come to my graduation. The name change was eighteen-year-old me’s way of saying I wanted nothing to do with him. Still don’t think he’s noticed.”
Javi was too good at his job to smile. He just nodded. “Scott is a cool last name.”
“I certainly think so,” I said. Then, “Mel didn’t send me here. He didn’t even bother to tell me about the security footage. So I can go to him and ask to see it. Or you can tell me what happened.”
He said nothing at first, then walked over to Brendan’s desk and started rummaging through a drawer. “The other manager takes all the notes. He has better handwriting.”
He found what he was looking for, then came back with the file and Brendan’s chair. “Have a seat.”
Javi sat back down too. “I remember most of it but just want to be sure.” He glanced through the file and spoke without looking up. “It was in the hallway on fourteen. Time stamp was 8:04 p.m. Ms. Pierce and Ms. Ambrose appeared intoxicated. Ms. Pierce was trying to open the door to her room, but it was a struggle. Ms. Ambrose was on her phone. She said something to Ms. Pierce. We don’t have audio so can’t say what. Ms. Pierce snatched the phone from her. Ms. Ambrose attempted to get it back. Your sister pushed her. Someone must have been in the room because the door opened, and Ms. Pierce ran inside. Ms. Ambrose ran in after her. And that was it.”
Sans water-glass throwing, it sounded like some drunken girl fight you’d find right before the commercial break of a reality TV show. “And you have no clue what it was about?” I said. Was this when Desiree had first confronted Erin?
He shook his head. “We didn’t see them again until close to midnight. Things still appeared frosty. They walked side by side but didn’t seem to be speaking.”
“They were alone?” I said since he’d mentioned someone had been inside the room.
“No, Zarah was with them.” He smiled. Sheepish. He’d used her first name. No “Ms.” It meant one thing: he watched her show.
“Sherry said you were having problems with Erin. That you banned her from the hotel?”
“Sherry has been spoken to about being so talkative,” he said. “Look. I have friends at other hotels. Ms. Ambrose has developed a rep for forgetting to pay her bill. There’s always an issue with a credit card, promises her accountant is wiring over money, mock surprise when it doesn’t show up. Just when we’re about to call the police, she appears with a cashier’s check. Or a friend bails her out. So no, she wasn’t banned, but we were going to suggest she not come back. But we haven’t seen her since Ms. Pierce’s things were picked up. She called us that same day to say someone was coming to pick up all her stuff. I didn’t ask where they were taking it.”