Dylan has to appease his adoring crowd, but first he tells us that a week from tonight, next Friday, most of the Chateau’s occupants will be at a fundraiser in Laurel Canyon. Dylan believes that will be the ideal time for us to enter. We’ll have to scope out the building, just as Diego and the others have been doing every other night; we’ll have to familiarize ourselves with the entrances and the Peacemaker presence there. Dylan tells us to meet him at midnight tonight, on a back road behind the Chateau; he’ll help us case it to the best of his ability. He gives us hugs—mine a little stiffer than Harp’s—and returns to his place under the tent. Harp and I wait a few minutes, then make our way back through the Grove.
“Have you ever noticed,” Harp mutters as we start the long trudge back to Silver Lake, not wanting to test our luck again with Sacrificial RidesTM, “that you have a weird habit of escalating situations to their most dangerous possible outcomes? It’s sort of pathological, Viv. I say, ‘Let’s see if we can dig up dirt on the Church of America’; you say, ‘Let’s drive across the country and break into their secret compound.’ I say, ‘Let’s go see our old pal Dylan; you say, ‘Let’s sneak into Church headquarters in the middle of the night so I can yell at my ex.’ Peter isn’t just some guy from school you hooked up with who never called—believe me, if he was, I’d be all about the dramatic cafeteria confrontation. I’d help you slash his tires in the parking lot. But he isn’t. He’s the sort of person who could have us killed, if he wanted to. I mean, has it ever occurred to you, Viv, that you might have a problem of some kind?”
“They’re going to kill him,” I say quietly. “Amanda’s militia—they’re going to kill Dylan, and Peter, too. They’re the faces of the Church, and that’s where they’ll start: the top.”
Harp doesn’t say anything for a long time. When she finally speaks, I can barely hear her over the traffic whizzing by.
“If you do manage to warn him, they’re going to see it as a betrayal.”
She doesn’t have to tell me who “they” are—I know. Amanda, Diego, Julian, Kimberly, Robbie. Winnie. The people who have protected us, who have worked hard to keep the Church at bay. Not to mention Suzy. Not to mention Karen. I feel sick.
“But Dylan’s right,” I tell her. “None of it’s black and white; the whole thing is in-between space. It’s like Wambaugh told us: don’t see groups instead of people. Granted, a lot of Believers are terrible people—but still! Maybe it’s absurd that it took Peter turning Believer for me to get that, but I do, and we just—” I take a breath, overwhelmed with the weight of what we’re discussing for the first time. I picture him in a room somewhere, the moment before detonation, just as Winnie imagined. Brushing his teeth, drinking a glass of water, staring out of a window, not knowing. This is the part that kills me: that for him it will simply be a blink into oblivion. One second he’s here, the next he isn’t—his giddy, surprised laugh and his blue eyes and the beating heart of him, gone, because of something done by my friends, my sister. Gone. “We can’t let it happen, Harp.”
She watches me catch my breath, and though we’re exposed—all these cars speeding past, with who know how many pairs of eyes—she takes my hand. “Okay, Viv. We’ll warn him. And if through some miraculous turn of events we don’t die in the process, just know I’ll always be here, coming up with cockamamie schemes for you to turn into full-blown suicide missions. For the rest of our lives. That’s just the kind of friend I am.”
The walk back to Silver Lake is hot and endless. Harp’s pigtails loosen and frizz; I feel a sunburn flare on the back of my neck. Both of us are tired and hungry, painfully thirsty. Harp navigates with uncertainty a circuitous route off the busy highway, cutting between houses and behind shops and restaurants. It takes nearly an hour, and by the end of it I’m exhausted and dizzy. She reaches the bookstore before I do, and I feel an ache of longing watching her slip through the front door, imagining the air-conditioning now on her skin. By the time I enter, she rests against the counter, guzzling from Robbie’s water bottle. He nods as I approach, bemusement in his eyes. As always, the shop is empty. Harp takes her mouth off the bottle, passes it to me.
“So they’re still not back? Huh,” Harp says. “Long day for them.”
“Yeah,” Robbie replies. “We got word from Amanda last night that we’re doing the thing at the hotel place in exactly one month, I guess. Diego’s ramping up training.”
I try to catch Harp’s eye but she pushes herself back from the counter and heads for the red door, before turning abruptly on her heel, like she’s just remembered something.
“Robbie,” she says, “you have a set of keys to the cars, right?”
He nods. “Yeah. We all do.”
“Amanda said you need to lend me yours—Viv and I need a car, see, for the mission she’s sending us on, and she figured you didn’t need yours, since you can’t legally drive.”
His expression goes sour; he digs into his pocket and pulls out the jingling keys, but doesn’t hand them over yet. When he speaks, he sounds defensive. “I’m a good driver—Diego taught me how. And anyway, it’s not like traffic cops are even a thing anymore.”
“I know.” Harp rolls her eyes in commiseration. “But—Amanda’s orders.”
I watch Robbie’s arm cross the distance between himself and Harp. In the moment before he drops the keys into her open hand, he turns to look into my eyes. I’m too self-conscious about how sloppily I lie to attempt it, so I just smile. This seems to appease him, and he lets them go. I watch Harp catch the keys and put them in her pocket.
That evening is like every other evening—we gather on the second floor, eat a simple meal, and watch the Church of America News in silence. There’s a brief consultation with Masterson about Harp’s and my possible motives (“It’s clear these girls are doing Satan’s bidding—the question is simply, what has he promised them in return?”); a long segment on Peter’s immense popularity among Believers, with footage of him visiting a tent city, offering a paltry loaf of bread; and a weather report on the arid, howling winds that currently batter the windows in their frames. They’re called the Santa Ana winds, the meteorologist explains, and are noteworthy for their power, heat, and dryness; they increase the risk of wildfires and legend has it they cause aggressive changes in people’s moods. “In a city already poised on the brink of apocalypse,” he muses, “one bad temper could have a catastrophic chain reaction.”
Kimberly hits mute. “Well, that’s a cheery thought.”
About a half-hour until midnight, after the tense soldiers have all headed up to bed, Harp and I sneak down the stairs and through the bookshop, out to the street where the cars are parked. Harp hands me Robbie’s keys and I drive; in the passenger seat, Harp focuses on her laptop. I’m nervous about every aspect of what we’re currently doing—I scope the streets we cruise down for any sign of cops or Peacemakers or random mobs of citizens driven mad by the Santa Ana winds. A few nights ago, the President issued an emergency nationwide curfew of eleven p.m., an attempt to cut down on the spikes in violent crime from coast to coast, but if the news is any indication, it’s had no effect—perhaps, as the Church newscasters intimate, because he did not authorize the Peacemakers to enforce it.
“What are you doing over there?” I ask Harp, to distract myself from my nerves.
“Trying to keep up with comments. I’m getting a thousand a day now.”
“Oh yeah? How many have compared you to Hitler at this point?”
“A little under two-fifty, but I’m not really keeping a tally.” Harp frowns at the screen. “People are starting to talk about where they think their Raptured relatives went. ‘Hi Harp, thank u for revealing the TRUTH! I want to tell u about my mom, Mona Patterson, 85, MISSING SINCE MARCH’—blah blah, this woman’s whole life story, and then—‘I checked credit card statements, like u said to, and guess what? She bought a one-way ticket to Cleveland the week before the Rapture. I SAY IT’S SOMETHING SINISTER.’ And here’s another: ‘If what you say is true that explains a lot. My husband Believed and our marriage was really in trouble, but about three weeks before the Rapture he planned us a romantic weekend in Nashville. We had one beautiful night together, and when I woke up he was gone. Haven’t heard from him since.’ Damn,” Harp says. “How many different cities were the missing Raptured summoned to?”
Shortly before midnight, we turn off Sunset onto a steep, twisting road. The entrance to the Chateau is close to the highway—a long iron-gated driveway leading up to the stark white building, ivy crawling up its walls. Under two glowing torches a couple of sleepy Peacemakers are stationed. Harp shrinks into the shadows as we pass, but they glance at our car without flinching. I can’t let my gaze linger, but I’m struck by how weird the Chateau looks, so ornate and old-fashioned in the middle of this weird city. It isn’t particularly tall but it’s imposing, overlooking the twinkling lights of Hollywood. I turn the corner and continue up the curved lane past extravagant, abandoned houses. At the top of the hill, I turn onto the twisty street Dylan told us about, and park in an empty house’s driveway. We wait. After about fifteen minutes, I see blond curls bouncing beneath a sweatband as Dylan comes jogging up the sidewalk. He wears a white tank top and short red shorts. Harp unlocks the back door for him.
“Dude.” I turn in my seat to study him. “Have you ever seen, like, a single movie before? This is your stakeout attire?”
“You didn’t say anything about what to wear,” Dylan exclaims. “And anyway, I told Derrick—the Peacemaker at the kitchen entrance—that I was going for a run. I wouldn’t go for a run in a black ski mask, would I?”
He advises me to do a loop. We approach the Chateau from the back this time, and I slow to study its white stone facade. At the corner leading back to Sunset Boulevard, Dylan points out the entrance to the kitchens, partially hidden behind a gate, which he thinks will be our best bet. There’s an imposing young Peacemaker stationed there—this is Derrick, and he’s built like a professional wrestler. The roads surrounding the Chateau are narrow and I feel exposed by the lamps hanging from the walls. From Sunset, Dylan points out a dense collection of trees above a white stone wall, a few shiny palms peeking through—this is where the Chateau has a small collection of bungalows, where quite a few distinguished employees, Dylan included, reside.
“I don’t think Taggart’s in a bungalow,” Dylan says thoughtfully. “I never see him by the pool. If I’d have to guess, I’d say he’s on the sixth floor—that’s where Blackmore stays.”
We circle the hotel for over an hour this way. Beside me Harp types notes about everything we see, every possible entrance and sign of movement, no matter how slight. But I can’t stop watching the lit windows of the sixth floor. I imagine Peter behind one of them. I wonder if he can feel me lurking out here. I wonder if he knows I’m coming.
In the week that follows, we stick to this routine: on the four nights Diego himself isn’t doing surveillance at the Chateau, we wait for Amanda’s army to head to bed, sneak out, and drive to the hotel, which we observe from all angles until shortly before dawn. We watch the guards at the front gate end their shifts at two-thirty a.m.; we watch their impossibly prompt substitutes appear. We note that Derrick, the Peacemaker at the kitchen exit, ends his shift approximately an hour before—no one comes to replace him, but a security camera hangs over the door. Late on Monday, we watch a black car pull up the drive, and a man with the general shape of Ted Blackmore steps into the moonlight before entering the hotel. Twice Dylan joins us, showing us pictures on his phone of Molly in her school uniform (navy jacket, starchy white bonnet), laughing with Harp about bad habits of Raj’s they’re trying not to forget. The other nights it’s just Harp and me, increasingly tired and spooked about our plan. On Thursday, twenty-four hours before we plan to break in, a breathless Dylan scampers up to the car and dives in, his expression anxious. He lies flat across the backseat.
“Don’t drive,” he hisses before I can start the engine. “I may have been followed.”
“Fuck!” Harp slips below the line of the windshield.
“I was down in the lobby with Marnie, and I saw Peter Taggart walk past, with Blackmore. They got on an elevator so I decided to trail them. I ran up the steps as fast as I could and I caught up with them on the sixth floor. Peter went into a room—619. So there’s that. But then Derrick came up behind me, all ‘What are you doing?’ and I said I was going for a run but I could tell he didn’t believe me and now I’m going to die here because of you two; I’m going to die cowering in the backseat of a tacky mid-size sedan!”
We wait a long time, but the ominous knock of a Peacemaker at the window never comes. After about twenty minutes, I take a tentative peek outside. Nothing.
“We’re okay,” I say, and Harp and Dylan reluctantly lift their heads. “But, Dylan, you shouldn’t linger, just in case. We’ve got it from here.”
He frowns. “You do? What, exactly, is your plan?”
Harp looks to me—we haven’t discussed it in detail yet; we have only the barest sketch. I’ve been counting on something foolproof hitting us over the course of the week, as we’ve sat here watching and worrying. But nothing has.
“We’re coming back tomorrow, at one-thirty in the morning. We’re going in through the kitchens, after Derrick goes off duty.”
“What about the security camera?” Dylan sounds dubious.
“We’ll—” I glance around, as if the answer is here in the car with us. “We’ll throw, like, a hoodie over it, or something.”
Dylan groans. “Have you ever seen a single movie before? I can unplug the camera from the inside just before you arrive. You’ll have a window of about five minutes before the Peacemakers watching the feed realize something’s up. How are you going to get through the door?” He waits a beat, but we have no answer. He shakes his head, but I can tell he’s secretly a little pleased. “I can make sure it’s unlocked during that window.”
“If I didn’t know you better,” Harp muses, “I’d think we weren’t the first people you’ve covertly snuck into a heavily guarded hotel.”
“Maybe you shouldn’t assume you’re the only people who’ve ever covertly snuck in.” He raises an eyebrow at our blank looks. “This is the Church of America we’re talking about, ladies. They talk a virtuous game, but surely you realize not all Believers are angels? I’ve picked up on a few tricks along the way. How do you plan to get up to the sixth floor?”
Another snag I hadn’t anticipated. “Quietly?”
“Pathetic.” Dylan’s laughing now. He reaches into a pocket and pulls out a thin plastic card on a lanyard, reading: BELLA—STAFF. He hands it to me. “An employee pass. It’ll get you into the service elevator at the back of the kitchens.”
“Dylan!”
“I’ve been cozying up to a housekeeper.” Dylan grins. “She thinks I’m cute. I told her I lost my pass, and could I just borrow hers; it’ll only take me two days to get a new one.”
Harp reaches back to swat him playfully on the arm. “Look at this! This is the rascally Dylan Marx I know and love! You incorrigible scamp! Where have you been hiding?”
But Dylan doesn’t answer. Even in the dim light of the car, I can see a weird tension in his eyes. His grin stays in place, but it seems forced now. “Listen, if you get caught—”
“We would never tell them how we got in, Dylan,” I assure him. “I swear.”
He shakes his head. “If you get caught, or even if you make it but I don’t see you before September … ”
“We’ll see you before September, dummy,” says Harp, “and after September, too. The world’s not really ending, remember? You’re gonna be stuck with us a long time.”
“Right.” Dylan doesn’t sound convinced. “Well, look—be safe. Okay?” He leans forward and kisses us on our cheeks, and then without saying another word, slips out of the car and into the dark, hot night. We watch him jog away into the shadows.