Chapter 5: Gerald Says Hello
Reyes was in our room within four minutes.
She read the message without touching the phone, then looked up at me.
"When did this come in?"
"Two minutes before I knocked."
"Did you reply?"
"No."
She called it in immediately, stepping to the far corner of the room, voice low.
Noah was watching a film on the small television with the volume up.
I had turned it on deliberately.
I didn't want him to hear.
When Reyes came back, her expression was controlled but her jaw was set differently than before.
"Marsh made a phone call from the station forty minutes ago.
He's entitled to one call.
He used it." She paused.
"We're pulling the number now."
"He called someone who had my number."
"Yes."
"Which means someone in this hotel — or connected to this hotel — knows who I am."
She didn't deny it.
"We're moving you again.
Different floor, different wing.
I want you packed in ten minutes."
Noah looked over from the television.
"Are we moving again?"
"Quick change of scenery," I said.
He studied my face for a moment, the way children do when they know you're managing them.
"Okay," he said.
And turned back to the screen.
The new room was on the sixth floor, interior-facing, no pool view.
Two officers this time, one at each end of the corridor.
Reyes sat with us for another hour, asking me to go back through every interaction I could remember from the entire week.
Every face at breakfast.
Every person who had spoken to Noah.
Every moment that had felt slightly off and that I had dismissed.
There had been one.
"Wednesday morning," I said.
"At the breakfast buffet.
A woman asked Noah what his name was.
I thought she was just being friendly — she had a grandchild with her, a little girl.
But she asked his name before she asked mine."
Reyes wrote it down.
"Describe her."
"Sixty, maybe.
Gray hair, short.
Green cardigan.
She had an accent — not strong, but there.
Eastern European, maybe."
"Did she speak to you again after that?"
"She smiled at me Thursday by the elevator.
That was all."
"Did the little girl seem comfortable with her?"
I stopped.
I thought about it properly for the first time.
"She was quiet," I said slowly.
"Very quiet.
She didn't eat much.
She kept looking at the door."
Reyes set her pen down.
"Ma'am, I need you to look at something."
She opened a folder and laid three photographs on the bed.
Women, all roughly the same age, all with short gray hair.
I looked at each one.
I pointed to the second photograph.
Reyes picked it up without a word and walked to the window.
She made another call.
This one was shorter.
When she turned back, something in her posture had shifted — a tightness across her shoulders that hadn't been there before.
"Her name is Vera Holst," she said.
"She checked out of this hotel this morning."
"Who is she?"
May you like
Reyes looked at me carefully, deciding something.
"She's Gerald Marsh's sister."
