Eighteen

Fortune cookie baking changed dramatically in the 1960s with the invention of a machine to insert the fortune and fold the cookie, eliminating the need to quickly place the paper fortune in a hot cookie and fold it with chopsticks before it cooled.

CAYENNE’S BABY QUICHES HAD NOT LASTED THE MORNING, so Sandra ordered a sandwich platter for staff lunch. In the before times, I bought pastries for our Wednesday morning meeting and lunch on Saturdays, when the Market was so busy that I couldn’t expect my employees to compete with shoppers for a table or takeout and manage to eat comfortably in the time allotted. But that had changed while we’d all been acting as a pod, spending most of our working time in the warehouse prep-ping mail orders and curbside delivery. Sure, the paid-lunch perk cost me, but ultimately, the cost-benefit analysis worked in my favor.

As it did right now. I sat in the nook with a turkey and Swiss on a ciabatta roll.

I’d already suspected the letters were connected to the murder, and the theft convinced me. Or at least, they were connected to the building, which might mean the same thing. But how? Who had taken them, and why?

Unlike Dave’s comic book shop and my own place, the Gold Rush had no security cameras. No motion sensor lights, no touch pad entry to record the user’s code. Nothing but keys.

And keys could be copied, no questions asked.

I wondered why Bobby needed cash. Keith Chang had said Bobby refused to cut the rent during the shutdown. The Changs had paid for the recent upgrades to the café themselves. I assumed the other ground floor tenants had a similar arrangement. Clearly the Wus weren’t investing the rent money back into the building, with its creaky plumbing and the pile of crumbled bricks in the basement.

If Abigail owned it, did Bobby have access to the revenue it brought in? Keith had linked his increased presence to the sighting of the men taking pictures and measurements, but Yolande thought the offer had been rejected. Who in the family wanted to sell and who didn’t?

There are any number of reasons why a spouse needs money they can’t get from the other. And most of them are bad news.

I had some year-end paperwork to drop off at our accountant’s office, in the building where I’d worked for years at Fourth and Madison. Could I help it if my feet took me by Oliver Wu’s workplace?

There’s a trend in the hospitality industry to repurpose older buildings into boutique hotels, and this was a prime example. Another option for the Gold Rush. If you looked up, the rows of windows might hint that this place had once been an office building. At street level, though, it was polished to a shine, the American and Canadian flags flying above the brightly colored awning. I’d been here once for a wedding and reception, and both food and decor were hip and tasty. Seetha said the massage rooms were the most luxurious she’d ever worked in.

The lobby was equally trendy, the patterns on the upholstery and plentiful pillows perfectly mismatched. No one sat there at the moment. I was tempted.

Behind the front desk stood Oliver Wu, in a charcoal gray suit, his tie and pocket square the same soft yellow as the wallpaper behind him.

“So this is where you work,” I said. “No wonder Seetha raves about the place. Pepper Reece. We met last weekend.” I held out my hand.

“I remember.” His grip was not very gripping. And his eyes— wary or worried?

“I was walking by and couldn’t resist stopping in. You’d never imagine this hasn’t always been a hotel. What a great place to work.”

“It’s an honor,” he said, “to be able to help people create special moments and memories.”

“And the Gold Rush. Oh my gosh. Despite the tragedy, I’ve loved getting to peek inside. What a gem. Your parents must be proud to have you take on the responsibility for keeping it going. And relieved.”

He gave a noncommittal grunt that reminded me of Detective Tracy.

Might as well be bold. I wanted info about the building, and I wanted to know more about this man Seetha was so interested in. “How did it come to be in your family?”

“My grandfather bought the hotel in the 1930s, though it’s older than that. He acquired the rest of the block piece by piece.” The phone rang. Someone in the back office answered, the voice drifting through the half-closed doorway behind him.

“The Gold Rush would make a beautiful hotel like this,” I said. “All that historic charm. Nothing like it in the CID, is there?”

“We—we haven’t decided what to do with it.”

When it came to plans, old buildings were expensive. Were those men in suits would-be buyers or potential financial backers? A modern hotel would require massive loans. On the other hand, subsidized housing would come with grants, low interest rates, and other assistance.

“Seetha might have mentioned that I run the Spice Shop in the Market. The old SROs have been rehabbed into modern apartments, and I can’t tell you how much they’ve helped maintain the sense of community. Keeping it real. I imagine you’re getting more of a feel for what the community needs and what it would support, now that you’re living in the building.” Where a man had been killed. Oliver’s placid exterior reflected none of the inner turmoil I’d felt when a man died on my doorstep.

“Oh, yes,” he said. “No shortage of opinions.”

Was that why we’d been warned off? Though why attack Roxanne? I didn’t know if Oliver knew about that, or the theft, though no doubt the detectives would quiz him about both. The front door swooshed open and I heard the chatter of guests arriving. I was running out of time.

“Tough decision,” I said. “Lots of time and money either way. You could sell. But that would be hard, when it’s meant so much to your family.”

He gave me a sharp look, then greeted the new arrivals, a bellman pushing a wheeled luggage rack. I waved goodbye.

Back outside, I crossed the street to Ripe, Laurel’s café, and popped in to see if she could take a break in five minutes. Then I rode the elevator to the accountant’s office. Left my papers at the front desk and headed back down.

She was waiting with a cappuccino, a chocolate cherry biscotti on the saucer. About half the tables were full, and we took seats at the counter overlooking the street.

“Seetha stopped in during our lunch rush. I didn’t have much time to talk.” Laurel cradled her mug of dark roast, black, as always. “She’d just come from the hotel—they do a lot of weddings and she was part of a spa day team. She’s all gushy-gushy about Oliver. I think she should back off until the police have a suspect.”

“Tell me you didn’t tell her that.” I bit into the cookie and a dried cherry exploded on my tongue.

“I did.” She raised the mug. “I know, I shouldn’t have. It’s the mother in me. I can’t help remembering what a wreck she was when, well, you know.”

“She swears, no bhuts. She said helping me solve the murder in the vintage shop banished them. Not that she helped much. But she stood up to her mother and confronted the racist creep on the street corner. Maybe bhuts cower at the sight of a strong woman.”

“Like vampires vanquished by the sight of a crucifix?” Laurel was skeptical. “I may not have dated in the current century, but would it hurt her to be too busy to see him until all this is over?”

“Not that I disagree, but no way would she cancel their big date tomorrow night.” I told her about the attack on Roxanne and the theft in the hotel.

“I don’t like the sound of that,” she said.

“Change the subject? I had the weirdest conversation with Daria last night, the woman Bron is dating, when I stopped to pick up pizza.” I filled her in.

“So you’re wondering what Nate knows, and if he knows, why he hasn’t said anything to you, and what do you say without letting on that his brother might be making plans without telling him and without sounding like an insecure idiot.”

“Nailed it.”

“Pepper, listen. One of the things I admire about the two of you is, your relationship isn’t that old, but it’s so mature. Nate’s an actual adult.”

Unlike Tag. Or some of the men I’d dated since I left him.

“I know you,” she continued. “You want to dive in and work stuff out. Hash it over. Talk talk talk.”

“You sound like Tag.”

She made a face. “But guys aren’t like that.”

“I want us to work together to plan our future.”

“Pep, remember. Nate’s been working on a boat in the middle of the ocean for the better part of twenty years. He’s learned to work things out himself, as much as he can, at least until he knows his own mind. Not about you, that’s clear. I mean, about himself.” She picked up her coffee and swiveled her stool a few degrees. “Speaking of work. Gotta get back to it. Give him space to work this out. That’s the way to show him you love him.”

She gave me a quick hug and sped back to the kitchen, apron strings flying. I sipped my cappuccino and stared out the window. I wasn’t good at giving people space. Space meant distance, and distance made time for the mind to spin scary thoughts. As Laurel said, I’m talk talk talk. Cards on the table. Everything in the open.

But she was right. This time was different. And if you want things to be different, you can’t keep acting the same old way.

OLIVER Wu hadn’t wanted to tell me his family’s thinking about the future of the Gold Rush, and I couldn’t blame him. But if Keith Chang was right, someone had been casing the place. And I couldn’t discount Yolande’s grapevine gossip.

I knew nothing about the ins and outs of this stuff. But it was a short walk to city hall, full of experts.

Seattle City Hall is a modern building, a blend of materials meant, I imagine, to reflect the vibrance and variety of the community. That variety was on full display as I aimed for the wide steps, passing clusters of people in all manner of dress conversing in half a dozen languages or more, some happily, some with the intensity that dealing with bureaucracy can trigger.

I stepped off the elevator on the fourth floor and almost ran into the coordinator of the Market Historical District.

“Pepper, hey! Don’t see you in months, then twice in one week.”

“Funny how that goes, isn’t it?” The theme of my day. “Do you have a minute? I have questions. I promise they’ll be easier than solving the traffic issues in the Market.”

“Sorry—I’m running late.” She held the elevator door open. “Talk to my assistant, Cathy. She’s smarter than I am anyway.” Then she got in the elevator and zipped away.

Moments later, Cathy and I were catching up across the counter. We’d always gotten along. I gave her the address of the Gold Rush.

“How do I find out if there have been any applications or inquiries for redevelopment? Or for historic status? That’s all public information, isn’t it?”

“Everything we do is public. Not my district, but I can check.” A keyboard sat on a shelf below the counter and she clicked away. “I don’t see any applications related to that building. Hold on.”

She called to another woman and explained what I was after. “Nothing on file that I can see. Are you aware of any proposals in the works?”

“Any scuttle?” I asked. “Any info at all?”

The woman fixed me with a glare that would have withered a prison guard. “We don’t deal in scuttle.”

I felt a flush rise up my cheeks. “Poor choice of words. Sorry. I’m trying to help a friend make some decisions”—if you keep the excuses vague, they aren’t lies—“and wanted to see what we could find out. But if there’s nothing you can tell me . . .”

“Hold on,” Cathy said. “That’s the building the man asked about, isn’t it?”

The stickler lowered her chin, looking over the tops of her glasses. “Men, and women, literally ask us about buildings dozens of times a day. That is what we do.”

“I know, I know. You were on vacation, right around Christmas, and I had desk duty.” Cathy shifted her focus from her coworker to me, and the other woman shook her head and turned away. “A man came in asking about an old hotel in the CID. Not a hotel in the modern sense—one of the semiresidential hotels from way back. If this wasn’t the address, it was close. I specifically remember, he wanted the deeds and the architectural plans.”

“Do you have records like that?” Might be interesting to see the plans for my loft—maybe unearth a clue why a warehouse built more than a century ago had twelve-foot high windows.

“People think the historic preservation office is the repository for all historic info, but it’s not. The records are scattered all over the place, and most records that old are not online. It’s frustrating. I sent him to the King County Archives, to the General Recordings Index for the deeds, and to the Department of Construction and Inspections for the plans. But I warned him not to get his hopes up. It’s hit and miss, and it takes time.”

“How can you remember all that?” I asked. “I barely remember what I had for breakfast. Or if I had breakfast.”

“You remember what spices I buy every time I come in.”

True enough.

She carried on. “Part of why it sticks in my mind is he said the building was built in 1890. That raises possibilities for historic designation and funding. I gave him our checklist.”

That was the right date. “That limits what an owner can do, doesn’t it?”

“Yes, but it’s in a special review district, so we have to sign off on any major changes anyway. You remember.”

My battles had been over exterior signage, which we’d solved by hanging our mock-neon saltshaker sign inside the front window rather than outside. Heaven help a business owner who wanted to put up an awning when historic photographs didn’t show one.

“Did he say why he was asking? Do you remember anything about him?”

“No. He was pretty closed-mouthed. I’m good at details, but not so great with faces. I did tell him some requests trigger public hearings and input, and he didn’t like the sound of that.”

Afraid to tangle with Aki Ohno and her friends?

“Thanks. You’ve been a big help. I hope I didn’t cause you any trouble with your coworker.”

“Pooh.” Cathy dismissed my concern with a wave of her hand.

“Let’s say she and I have different views of what serving the public means.”

I thanked her again and took my leave. Who was this mystery man? The more I thought about it, the more convinced I became that the Wu family had a secret they didn’t want anyone to know. Bobby needed cash. And Abigail? Why had her father-in-law left the building to her? Good estate planning, or an indication that the old man had not trusted his only son?

And what about their only son? What did Oliver want? For Seetha’s sake, for Roxanne, and Terence Leong, I desperately wanted to know.