By Familiar Means (28 page)

30

To say Old Sean was pleased to see me and his son walking into the Harbor Rest's bar together was something of an understatement. I swear he was ready to break out the champagne and toast the happy couple right there. And this wasn't just me. My Sean saw his dad's grin and turned a truly remarkable shade of red.

No, I did not actually call the younger Mr. McNally “my” Sean. That far gone I am not. Especially not after I saw the broad grin and the broader wink his dad gave him when Sean said he was going to go home to shower and change and he'd meet me at Jake's party.

Despite the fact that Old Sean clearly regarded my request that he take me to Kelly Pierce by the route least likely to be seen by any Hildes as a feeble ruse to hide the depth of my feelings for his son, he did agree. I followed him carefully, carrying two very full take-out cups down into the hotel basement.

I'm used to basements being cold, but as soon as Old Sean pushed open the door at the bottom of the service stairs, it felt like I was walking into a steam tunnel. A very
noisy steam tunnel painted the color of cold oatmeal and full of men and women in gray-and-white uniforms who barely glanced at either of us as we edged past them.

Next to the locker rooms waited an open door (also oatmeal colored) with
MANAGER
painted in black on it. Inside, Kelly Pierce sat at a battered metal desk that was as piled with paper as Martine's. She was typing madly at a laptop keyboard while talking on the phone jammed between her shoulder and her ear.

“
Please
, Luis. We're in a bind. Yes . . . yes . . . you're my hero. We'll see you in an hour.”

Old Sean knocked on the doorframe. Kelly glanced up and waved us in.

“Miss Pierce, this is a friend of my son's, Anna Britton,” Old Sean told her.

“I don't suppose you have any experience waiting tables?” she asked me.

“Not since art school.”

“Damn. I'm three servers down for dinner rush and my substitute chef has just informed me that we only got half the steaks we ordered today, and we might be about to run out of our most popular vodka, and the soda dispenser in the coffee shop's on the fritz,” she announced. “
What
can I do for you?”

“I, um, got your name from Martine Devereaux.” I held up one of the paper take-out cups. “I brought coffee?”

She glared at me, and then at Old Sean, and then at the coffee. We all waited. I might have held my breath.

Kelly gestured with two fingers. “Give it here.”

I did. Sean winked and beat a hasty retreat while Kelly pulled off the to-go cup lid and downed a healthy swallow. “Ah,” she sighed. “Thanks. I needed that.” She took another long swallow. Wow. She could give Frank a run for his money. “All right, you can stay, and you got five minutes. What do you want?”

“I was hoping I could talk to you about Jimmy Upton.”

Kelly grimaced. “What do you want to know about the little grunge-meister?”

“Umm . . . that may have done it right there.”

She shook her head. She also took another gulp of coffee. “I'm new in town,” she said. “I only took this job six months ago. If I'd known what I was walking into . . .” Something came up on her screen. She swore and started typing faster one-handed than I can with both. “No, no, no! We need thirty-six cases, you . . .” There followed some more drastic language and some more frantic key clicking.

“There have been problems?” I asked.

“There are always problems with a restaurant, and it's worse in a hotel, because you're dealing with room service and catering for major events and maybe a coffee shop and all that.”

“I'm guessing Jimmy didn't make things any easier?”

She made a face like she was drinking pure lemon juice. “Jimmy was a hotshot, and he was a hustler. That's okay; you get 'em in a kitchen. A good executive chef can usually put them in their place. But Jimmy was in a league of his own.”

“I heard he was good.”

“That's part of the problem. He really was. His food was amazing. He probably could have been great.” She eyed what coffee remained in her cup. “And he wasn't a complete jerk. I saw him down by the service drive a few times. We get some homeless down there. Jimmy was passing out sandwiches and cards for the shelter. He said he'd been on the streets and nobody ought to be that hungry.”

This was something no one had mentioned yet. “Does anybody know how he wound up on the streets?”

She shrugged. “I never asked and he never offered. But my guess is his temper and his ego got in the way of him working real steady.” She took another sip of coffee, and this time she eyed me over the rim with the kind of thoughtfulness that made me distinctly uncomfortable. “Who did you say you were with, Miss Britton? Aside from the McNallys?”

I'd been expecting this question, or something like it, and I'd even gotten an answer ready. “I'm not really with anybody,” I admitted. “But, well, my family is friends with the Hildes, and, you know, I heard things are tough right now
and I . . . I don't know. I thought maybe I could help, or something.” I smiled at her. Innocent. Sunny. As harmless as Grandma B.B. with a lollipop.

Yeah, right. Kelly wasn't buying it either. At least, not entirely. She set the coffee cup down and she sighed.

“Listen, you want to help? Tell whichever of them you're friends with that they need to get their collective act together. Have a family meeting, hug it out, spank their inner child, what-the-heck-ever. But unless and until the Hildes get it together, this place is going to collapse.” She said it fast, like she was trying to get all the words out before common sense caught up with her.

“Was that what you were telling Christine Hilde at the Friendly Toast last night?”

She tried hard to cover the shock of being seen by taking another long swallow of coffee, but it was too late. “Who told you about that?”

“Nobody. I love pancakes at one a.m.”

Another thing I'd learned from hanging out with Martine is that people in the service industries all have insane schedules. The idea of somebody out getting breakfast in the small hours of the morning did not seem at all strange to Kelly.

I made myself smile the smile I reserve for potential clients. “Or maybe it wasn't about the family? Maybe you were talking about the new hotel Dreame Royale is going to be opening?”

Kelly groaned. “I am going to murder that . . . She promised she would keep the whole thing under wraps until Christine had a chance to present our final proposal.”

“Secrets this big are hard to keep,” I said. “I imagine a lot of Hildes would get upset if they found out you two were talking to Shelly Kinsdale.”

Kelly set her coffee cup down and leaned across the desk. “What do you want, Miss Britton?”

“I want to know if you are helping Christine open a new place, or if you're planning on taking over Harbor's Rest,” I said bluntly. “And whichever it was, did Jimmy Upton know?”

Kelly's jaw dropped. Literally. Unfortunately, before she could collect herself, the door flew open and Dale Hilde strode in, his face as red as his blazer and his hair all but standing on end.

“Ms. Pierce! What is going on here!”

Kelly was on her feet before I could even move. “Mr. Hilde. What's happened?”

“What's happened is you're sitting here gossiping with your girlfriend while you're on the clock.”

Kelly drew herself up and her eyes flashed, but Dale wasn't paying attention. Instead he rounded on me. “Unless maybe you've come to apologize, Miss Britton?”

“Apologize? What . . . ?” I stammered.

“Mr. Hilde,” tried Kelly grimly. Oh no. I'd gone to far. She was going to tell him. I'd blown it.

But right then Kelly's laptop beeped. So did the phone.

“You'd better take care of those, Ms. Pierce,” said Dale coolly. “Ms. Britton, you'll come with me?”

I guessed I would. I picked up my purse and my cup of mostly untouched coffee and followed Dale out the door as Kelly hit the button on her phone.

“Yeah? Go.
What?
No, you . . . Who told you that?”

The door swung shut behind me, and I suppressed a sigh.

*   *   *

Dale's office on the first floor was the polar opposite of Kelly Pierce's loud, hot, crowded space down below. This was a deeply old-fashioned and serious place. The lamps were polished brass; the fireplace was actual wood burning, no gas logs here. The multipaned windows had been pushed open to let in the cool river breeze. The desk was the oldest piece of furniture in the room, plain and scarred and turned dark by long years of use.

As soon as I got inside, Dale shut the door. He also ran a shaking hand through his thick, dark hair.

“You've got a lot of nerve, Ms. Britton.”

“I'm sorry, but . . .”

He cut me off. “Thanks to you and your grandmother,
my
mother is sitting in her room sobbing into a handkerchief!”

“What?”

“I haven't seen her cry since our father walked out. What kind of—”

“Hang on!” I help up both hands. “Look, Mr. Hilde, I'm really sorry your mother's upset, but I've got no idea what the problem is.” Well, except for maybe that thing with Grandpa Charlie, but that was fifty years ago. It couldn't possibly be that. Or Grandma asking if I could see the hotel archives. I mean, why would that be a big deal? Except, it wouldn't take a lot to guess that I might just be looking for the tunnel entrance. But Gretchen Hilde was a tough businesswoman. Nothing like that could make her cry.

Could it?

Dale and I stared at each other, with contempt on his side and confused near panic on mine. Near panic lasted longer. Dale Hilde slowly crumbled and at last sat in the leather wing-backed chair.

“This office was my great-grandfather's,” he said as his gaze wandered about the room. “My mother gave it to me when I took over as financial manager. Rich had wanted it, but she gave it to me.” The ring of pride in his voice was painfully audible. “She said since I was the one keeping the hotel on an even keel, I deserved the captain's cabin.”

“You two must be close.”

I meant it as a compliment, but Dale looked at me like I'd criticized the color of his great-grandfather's drapes (green plaid, in case you're wondering).

“You're going to do it, too, are you?” he said.

“I don't—”

“People make a lot of assumptions when they find out a man my age is working for his mother. If it's his father, nobody's got a problem. But if it's his mother, they start looking at him cross-eyed, like she's got to be a dragon and he's got to be a wimp or terribly, terribly resentful because she's in charge and I'm not.”

“Erm . . .”

“Look, Miss Britton.” Dale Hilde planted both hands on that acre of antique mahogany. “My mother held this place together single-handed after my father left. She fought because it is our home and because she loves it. I'm proud of my whole family and I'm proud of what we've built. That's why I'm still fighting to keep us going.”