When the Day of Evil Comes (17 page)

The lobby was filled with the scent of stargazer lilies and roses from enormous arrangements set atop inlaid wood tables. Oriental rugs hushed the footsteps of hotel guests. The hotel staff, wearing tailored black uniforms with brass name tags, walked silently, crisply, purposefully.

It didn’t dawn on me until exactly that moment, swept away as I was by all that elegance and that heady floral scent, that I had no plan. True to form, I had arrived on my mission completely unprepared. What was I going to do, walk up to the front desk and request the Zocci suite? Pretend to be a Zocci cousin? A reporter? I wasn’t even sure what I was doing here. What exactly did I hope to accomplish? I kicked myself for sleeping on the plane instead of obsessing properly.

Though I was just standing inside the doorway, dumbly rooted in place, no one seemed to be paying any attention to me. I decided to seize the opportunity to blend and began a slow stroll around the lobby to study the situation and to think.

I made a circuit, limiting myself to one time around the room, lest I convince security that I was a call girl or something. For once, I had dressed conservatively, so at least I looked semi-credible. I tried to look as if I belonged there and perhaps was
waiting for someone. I screwed a puzzled look on my face, looked at my watch, and dug in my bag for my cell phone.

I held the phone to my ear and nodded as though I was listening to a conversation, almost jumping out of my skin when the phone rang loudly in my ear.

“Hello?” I was grateful to engage in a real conversation. I was no good at faking it.

“Dylan, it’s David.”

Pleasant surprise. “Hey, there. How’s the death business?” I asked. In our few conversations, I’d been relentless in teasing him about his occupation, and thus far he had proven to be a thorough sport about it.

“Smelly,” he said, not missing a beat. “We had a real stinker in here today. Want details?”

“Pass,” I said, laughing. I could feel myself settling into the easy sound of his voice.

“I left you a message yesterday,” he said, “hoping you’ll take me up on thick steaks, cold beer, and dancing on Thursday night. My intention is to sweep you directly off your feet.”

What an offer. The man had some charm.

“How about Saturday instead?”

“Keeping me waiting? I like that. Never sound too eager.”

I laughed. “It’s just that I’m not sure I’ll be back by Thursday. I had to leave town suddenly.”

“Okay. Saturday it is. But I may have to warm up your beer a little, just to maintain a little edge here.”

“I don’t like beer,” I said.

“Oh. Date’s off. Sorry. Where’d you jet off to?”

“Chicago.”

“You’re not dumping me for some Yankee boy, are you?”

“How could I dump you? We haven’t been on a date yet.”

“You’re not counting the pharmacy?” He faked incredulity.

“Definitely not,” I said.

“Define ‘date.’”

“You pick me up at my house, tell me I look beautiful and how could you possibly be so lucky, take me to a restaurant with cloth napkins, spend significant amounts of money on me, treat me like a lady, walk me to my door, kiss me on the cheek, and leave. Then you wait two days so you don’t sound needy, then call me and beg me for another date.”

“Wait a minute,” he said. “I’m writing all this down. What comes after picking you up at your house?”

“The beautiful part.”

“Do I have to do it all in order?”

“Order is optional,” I said.

“This is complicated.”

“It’s part of the weeding-out process.”

“So are we on? Saturday?”

“Absolutely.”

“Pick you up at 7:00.”

“Make it 7:30.”

“Nice touch.”

“See you then.”

We hung up. I felt rejuvenated. Never hurts a girl’s confidence to have a funny, good looking guy ask her out. Even if he does own a funeral home in Hillsboro.

I turned my eyes back to the lobby and watched the hotel staff for a minute, looking for an opening. I needed someone amiable to talk to. Someplace to start. My eyes settled on a porter clearing tables in the seating area by the bar.

I watched him for a minute. He was a wiry little man with coal-black skin and hair the color of graphite. He could have been fifty years old or a hundred. It was hard to tell. He bent over his task with the solitary burdened efficiency of someone
who had emptied the same ashtrays and fluffed the same pillows for decades.

He was perfect.

I walked over to an empty grouping of wing chairs and had myself a seat, sinking into the feathery cushion with a surprising sense of relief. I hadn’t realized until that moment just how tired I was.

I reached for a section of the newspaper that was scattered on the table in front of me.

“Let me get that out of your way,” a voice said.

I looked up and saw the man’s face over my shoulder, dark and lined as tree bark. I glanced at his name tag.

“Thank you very much, Earl. But I was just about to read it.”

“That one’s been read,” he scolded. “I’ll get you a new one.”

“The words look the same to me. They don’t evaporate when someone reads them the first time or anything, do they?”

He laughed. “You right about that. Don’t know why everyone so worried about a newspaper’s already been read. But I always like to offer a fresh one.”

He stacked the newspaper and placed it neatly on the table in front of me.

“You enjoying your stay, ma’am?”

I decided I could not lie to this man. He was just way too dignified for that.

“I’m not staying here,” I said. “I’m just stopping in.”

“It’s a good place to stop in, that’s for sure.”

“How long have you worked here?”

“Long time. I can’t even say,” he said, shaking his head. “Long, long time.”

I leaned forward. “Can I ask you something? Earl?”

“Yes ma’am. I may not know an answer, but you can ask all you want.”

“Were you here when that boy committed suicide a couple of weeks ago?”

“The Zocci boy? No, ma’am. I work the night shift.”

“But you knew him.”

“Everyone knows that family. They stay here all the time. Every one of them, and they’s lots of them. Always ask for the same room. Up there on the twelfth floor. They like it up there on twelve.” He straightened.

“Do you happen to know the room number?”

“You a reporter or something, miss?” He didn’t seem at all concerned. Just mildly curious.

“No. Just a friend.”

“Can’t say the number. It’s up there on the corner. Looking back on Delaware. You can see the water from the window.” He picked up the ashtray. “I better get myself busy. They don’t pay me to visit.”

“One more question,” I said. “Do you mind telling me where the gift shop is?”

He pointed. “Right over there, other side of those elevators. You have a nice evening, ma’am.”

I watched him walk away. His stringy little body moved with surprising agility.

I sat there for a few minutes, contemplating my next move and wondering where I could find a McDonald’s or something. I’d just realized I was starving.

The arm of a uniformed hotel employee startled me, reaching out of my peripheral vision and whisking the newspaper off the table in front of me, replacing it with a new one.

I looked up to see a young woman standing over my chair. She tucked the used paper under her arm. “May I offer you a drink from the bar?” she said.

“Club soda?” Surely that would be cheap.

“Certainly.”

She returned in a few minutes with a club soda and lime on ice and a generous bowl of snack mix. What a jackpot.

I tried not to shovel down the snack mix, slowing myself down by perusing the paper. I started with the metro section, thinking there might be something about the Zocci family or about Erik’s suicide. I didn’t find anything, so I finished my drink, fished the last pretzel out of the bowl, and left a few dollars on the table.

The gift shop was closed. I checked my watch. 6:15. It had closed a quarter of an hour ago. The sign said it would reopen at nine the next morning.

I stepped back into the lobby, suddenly feeling the weight of the day. The weight of the week, perhaps. I was tired. And hungry Snack mix wasn’t going to cut it.

I decided I’d done enough sleuthing for one day. I’d figure out a way to see the twelfth-floor suite tomorrow.

I made it back to my parking space before the meter ran out. The purple car was still there, right where I’d left it, greeting me cheerily with its tacky happy-face flag. No one would be even remotely tempted to steal it. I had that going for me.

I checked my map and made a circuitous, inefficient, mazelike route to my motel, which it turned out was only six blocks from the Vendome, though it seemed like a universe away. I checked into my room and unpacked my sparse belongings.

The Downtown Chicago Best Mid-Western shared a parking lot with a Denny’s. I walked next door, slid into a booth, and had a grilled cheese sandwich, a salad, and a slice of chocolate pie.

Then I went back to my room, took a shower, and got myself ready for bed, checking the lock on my door twice before turning my light out for the night.

I
AWOKE TO THE SOUND OF SOMETHING
clattering loudly to the floor in the bathroom. Afraid to move, I cracked an eyelid and looked at the clock, its numbers glowing red beside the bed. 3:30.

Keeping my head still, I rolled my eyes around and looked at the bathroom door. It was closed. I could see a thin strip of light under the door. I was certain I hadn’t left it on. As I watched, the light clicked off.

I shot out of bed and made it to my bag in one leap, keeping my eyes on the bathroom door.

My purse (more of a backpack, really) has the weight and heft of a bowling ball. I don’t know what leads me to believe I need everything I carry around in there—I couldn’t possibly have a daily, urgent need for four different kinds of lip gloss, for instance—but for once I was glad to be so thoroughly disorganized and indecisive.

I hoisted the bag over my shoulder and froze, my eyes fixed on the bathroom door. I leaned in and listened, silently cursing the air conditioner for rattling so loudly over there by the window.

I heard nothing. Whoever was in there wasn’t making a sound.

The room was pitch black, save for the faint red glow of the digital clock. I inched my foot sideways, sliding it across the floor toward the bed. After a few steps, the polyester bedspread scratched against my ankle, and I shifted my direction to ease my way around the bed.

When I reached the night table, I felt for the phone, my hand grasping the receiver just as I realized what a stupid idea this was. Did I really want to let the boogie man hear my voice so that he could come barreling out and kill me before I completed my first sentence? Besides, who was I going to call? 911? The front desk? “Excuse me; There’s a monster in my bathroom. Could you send someone right away please?”

I didn’t have to wait to find out. While I stood there indecisively, I heard the bathroom door click open.

I lunged for the front door, grabbing the doorknob and flipping the deadbolt simultaneously I yanked on the door and heard a huge thwack as the door slammed, six inches open, against the inside latch.

I flipped on the light switch and whirled around, swinging my bag and screaming.

I faced an empty room.

The bathroom door was open.

My heartbeat almost choking me, I stepped forward slowly, bag at the ready, and moved toward the bathroom. I looked to the right as I passed by the bed. No one hiding behind it.

I stopped and listened again when I reached the bathroom door. I heard nothing. Not even breathing.

I leaped into the doorway, slamming the door against the wall with all my weight. No one was back there. I flipped on the light.

The shower curtain was crumpled on the floor, rod and all. I pushed the door flat against the wall.

The room was empty.

Lowering my bag, I stepped back out of the bathroom, went back to the bed, and threw the skirt of the bedspread up onto the mattress. Like most hotel beds, it was built to the ground. There was no space underneath at all.

I was alone in the room.

I sat on the bed and tried to breathe normally and bring my heart rate down to some level that might sustain life.

Had I imagined the entire thing? I didn’t think so. It had seemed so vivid. So real. The shower curtain, surely what had woken me in the first place, was in a tangled heap on the floor. That, at least, was indisputable. As to the rest, I had lain there in bed and seen the closed door. I had watched that light go out. I had heard the door open.

I walked back to the bathroom and examined the crumpled shower curtain and rod. The screws that had held it in place were still in their brackets, drywall clinging to the threads. I dropped the end of the rod back to the floor, hearing the distinct hollow clatter that had woken me.

I reached up and examined the holes in the wall.

The beige vinyl wallpaper had six neat holes in it. Three on each end, in a triangle, at either end of the tub enclosure. The wallpaper was ripped slightly downward at each hole where the screws had scraped against it, coming out of the wall. Something had brought that rod down with force.