“Danger, like a third man, was standing in the room.”
—Ian Fleming, From Russia, with Love (1957)
One elevator was still in use when we darted down the hallway. We took our chances that Ivanov was inside that one and called up the other. Meanwhile, Daniel texted both the desk clerk and the midshift van driver and asked them to keep an eye out for Mr. Blue Baseball Cap and “a tall Vladimir Putin fucker in a suit.”
By the time we’d made it back down to the lobby, we’d learned three things. (1) Darke and his female companion had left the hotel in a private rideshare that was idling outside at the curb. (2) Ivanov had used express checkout from inside the room—skipping the front desk completely. (3) Ivanov had just left the hotel on foot . . . but not before he asked the porter out front for directions to Pier 54.
That was all we needed. We raced around the corner of the Cascadia, and before you could hum the latest James Bond theme song, we spotted him waiting for a crosswalk light. He was on his phone, using a Bluetooth earpiece.
“Who is this guy?” Daniel said in a low voice.
No idea, but we kept a cautious distance while the man chatted nonstop on his phone, gesturing to no one as he quickly crossed the street. I mentally struck “arms dealer” off my list of possible careers for this guy. Not that I personally knew any, but Ivanov had the aura of a dealmaker. A stockbroker, or a real estate go-between. I hated to let Daniel down, but this big mystery he’d stumbled upon was probably something boring. Maybe Darke was just buying a big piece of property. He was a millionaire. Didn’t they do things like that?
Ivanov ended his phone call waited for the signal before crossing Alaskan Way to the waterfront. As we followed, Pier 54 came into view, which was basically a tourist trap, like all the piers here. This one had a boat charter booth and a couple of sailboats, and a little farther down, Ivar’s Acres of Clams—a Seattle institution I saw every day from the ferry.
“Maybe he’s got a hankering for fish and chips?” Daniel said.
Nope. The man was headed straight for the end of the pier. “Ye Olde Curiosity Shop.”
“Should we go inside?” Daniel asked, glancing up at the darkening sky and the drizzle that was now falling. “Ivanov doesn’t know our faces.”
“And he doesn’t have guard dogs.”
“Fuck it,” Daniel said enthusiastically. “Let’s do this.”
The Curiosity Shop had been one of my favorite places in the city when I was a kid; Mom and I must have come here a hundred times. One-part museum (actual mummies), one-part carnival side show (Fiji mermaid taxidermy hanging from the ceiling), and one-part novelty gift shop (vampire hunter kits), it was a popular tourist attraction. If you wanted a totem pole or a necklace with your name carved on a piece of rice, this was your store. Or you could just browse the glass cases filled with turn-of-the-century oddities.
I hadn’t been in here for years, and the shop itself had moved between a couple of locations on the waterfront, but it smelled the same as I remembered, pleasantly musty. And at the moment, it was moderately crowded; a lot of families with loud kids gawked at an antique hinged educational aid nicknamed Medical Ed.
The crowds were good for us, since we were trying to avoid Ivanov’s attention. He looked around a little, scanning the jam-packed shop, and then made a beeline for the Javari shrunken-head display.
Curiouser and curiouser . . .
Daniel and I pretended to be browsing while we listened in to a conversation Ivanov was having with one of the store’s clerks. “Are these heads real?” he asked in a heavily accented voice.
The clerk answered, “Some of them came from the Heye Foundation in New York before the government banned the trafficking of human remains. A few may be monkey heads. Those were often sold to Northern tradespeople. Monkey or human, the process is still the same—Javari tribesmen in Peru would remove the skull from the back of the head, sew it up, and boil it to shrink it down.”
I puffed up my lips to stop myself from gagging. Daniel pretended to chop my head off with his hand, and I swatted him away.
“However, the heads for sale are made from goatskin,” the clerk informed him, showing him a line of gruesome heads hanging from a pole, each about the size of a fist.
“Fascinating,” Ivanov said. “I have a twelve-year-old son who loves morbid things, so he will be happy if I bring him one back.”
“Where are you from?” the clerk asked.
“Kiev.”
“Is that the Ukraine?”
“Indeed, it is,” Ivanov said.
Not Russian! Daniel and I shared a look.
“That’s a long way away,” the clerk said. “Here on business?”
Ivanov nodded. “Both here and in San Francisco—that’s where I’m headed tonight. I’ve been in the States for a month. I’m homesick for my wife’s cooking.”
“Being away from home is hard,” the clerk said.
“Yes. I’m ready to return, but I’ve got a couple things to tie up before I go. San Francisco this week, then back here to Seattle, then home, finally.”
The clerk talked about jet lag and how that kind of traveling was tough on a body.
Ivanov studied the shrunken heads more closely and said, “The next time I come through Seattle, I won’t be in this area—it will be more of a quick jaunt uptown for a show before I fly home to Kiev in July. Because I’m downtown today, an associate of mine suggested I stop here while I wait for a rideshare to the airport.”
“Nothing says Seattle like a shrunken head,” the clerk agreed with a smile.
Ivanov was buying up several of them, and then he got a text and informed the clerk that his rideshare car was pulling up, so he needed to hurry. We watched him pay for his heads and rush out, shoving his purchase under his coat to shield it from the rain as he entered a car. Then he was gone, and we stood outside, unsure what to do next.
I flipped up the hood of my jacket. “He’s Ukrainian.”
“And he’s been here for a month—also in San Francisco. That may explain the address he used to check in, and it definitely matches up with all of Darke’s visits to the hotel. They started about a month ago.”
“I wonder if Darke was the ‘associate’ who suggested he come to buy shrunken-head souvenirs.”
“Maybe. I mean, this is more information than we’ve discovered so far, but . . .”
“It still doesn’t tell us much,” I said.
“He said he wouldn’t be coming through Seattle again until July and not in this area.”
“Uptown for a show. We have an uptown?”
“He probably means Lower Queen Anne. Seattle Center, all that,” Daniel said, dismissive. “I’m more concerned that he won’t be coming to the hotel again. I mean, is that what he’s saying? Whatever was happening in the hotel is finished? Darke won’t be coming back? This is over?”
Exactly what I was wondering, only he sounded more upset about it. “Don’t be discouraged,” I said. “Mysteries aren’t solved overnight. We can stake out the hotel for Darke again next Tuesday. Maybe this is just one piece of it. Maybe Ivanov is just one player.”
We flattened ourselves against the wall of the building, standing under an overhang. Then Daniel crossed his arms over his chest and said, “You know what we should do? Get back to the hotel before room 514 is cleaned. Snoop around. See if any clues were left behind.”
“Isn’t that against company rules?”
Daniel’s smile was mischievous. “Not if we don’t get caught.”
It took us a few minutes to hike it back up to the hotel. And after checking where the manager on duty was (in the back offices), we made another trip to the fifth floor—this time with someone from housekeeping named Beth. She was a little too friendly with Daniel, all smiles and coy jokes. But then she used her master key card to let us into the room and assured us no one had been inside to clean. Then she closed the door and promised to keep an eye out for management while we looked around.
“Let’s see what we can find,” Daniel said, rubbing his hands together. “I’ll search on that side, and you search here.”
“All right.” I glanced at the bed. Made, of course, the foot draped with a Pendleton wool Nez Percé–tribe woven blanket. My side of the room looked utterly untouched. Room service menu propped on a console table. Curtains opened to a rain-speckled view of Puget Sound and the sprawling waterfront docks we’d just left.
I checked the bathroom. All the toiletries were in their places except the hand soap, which someone had used to wash their hands. Toilet paper was still folded into the silly triangular point that’s supposed to be a sign to guests that the room’s been cleaned . . . but really just lets you know the housekeeper’s fingers have been there, possibly right after they were wiping down the germy toilet.
“You and Beth known each other a long time?” I called out from the bathroom as I checked inside the jetted tub.
“Huh? Oh, I used to sometimes work in the day when I started. So, about a year, I guess.”
“She likes you.”
“She’s just friendly. We dated once. Sort of a bomb.”
That bothered me more than it should have. “Isn’t that against hotel policy—fraternizing with other employees? How many coworkers have you dated?”
“Yes,” he said, sounding irritated. “Much like what we’re doing now, it’s against the rules. But it depends on what you consider a date.”
“Hooking up in the back seat of your car?” I said, unable to control the annoyance in my voice.
He was quiet for a long moment. “That wasn’t a date. And you’re the only one, if that matters.”
“I don’t know, Birdie. You tell me. You’re the one who brought it up.”
I didn’t respond to that. He was right. I was being petty. And we were having such a nice day together, so why was I trying to sabotage it? I glanced though a stack of bath towels and called out, “I’m not finding anything in the bathroom.”
“Oh, shit. No way! Birdie, check this out.”
I popped my head out of the doorway and spotted Daniel standing in front of the sofa, holding something. When I got closer, he turned around and held it up.
“Is that . . . ?”
“The bag Darke was carrying,” he confirmed. “All the times I’ve studied it in the security footage . . . I never noticed this. Look at the front.”
Excited, he handed me a black-and-white striped plastic bag. It was wrinkled and creased, as if it had been balled up. An unassuming logo was printed on the front—so small, anyone might miss it. A stylized music note surrounded by the words TENOR RECORDS.
“Oh, wow!” I said. And then it hit me. “It’s empty. It wasn’t when he was carrying it in the hallway. And he left it behind.”
“Whatever was in that bag, he gave it to Ivanov. So, I’m thinking cash.”
“Where was it?”
“In the trash,” Daniel said, pointing to a gold trash can near a desk. “They must have sat here on the sofa and chairs—a pillow from the sofa is on the floor.”
I nodded and smoothed out the bag, peering inside. A piece of paper was stuck to one side. “Did you see this?”
“What is it?” He tugged one corner and we read it together. It was a printout, one that was hard to read; the ink was light, and the font was strange. The edges of the page were jagged, as if they were perforated.
“Dot matrix,” Daniel murmured. “Who even has a printer like this that still works?”
“Someone from the Ukraine, apparently.” All the headings at the top were Cyrillic. But the bottom half of the paper contained a spreadsheet, and inside its columns were English letters.
“It’s a list of names,” Daniel said, reading aloud, “Oleksander. Aneta. Danya. These are all names, yeah? What’s this column?”
Initials. Maybe abbreviated surnames. And then another with either an M or an F. “Male or female?”
“Probably. And this column has dates, I think.”
“They’re in the European format,” I said. “See? All this year.”
Except one from last year, which was crossed out with a blue pen, and two more that had future dates. Neat blue checkmarks had been added to one of those names with future dates, and one dated last month. Both males.
“What the hell is this? A prostitution ring?” Daniel said. “I was joking before, but Christ. My mind is going straight to sex trafficking or mail-order brides.”
Daniel nodded. “Okay, yeah. That sounds way less scary. But it doesn’t make sense. Why is Darke involved in . . . whatever this is?”
I didn’t know, but inside my head I compiled all the information we’d learned today into a quick profile:
Suspect: A. Ivanov
Background: Ukrainian; married; at least one child
Age: 40s?
Occupation: Unknown. Involves him flying to the United States for multiple private meetings (Seattle and San Francisco) with clients in hotel rooms.
Medical conditions: Unknown.
Personality traits: Punctual and efficient (regular short meetings with “associate” in pricey hotel room every week). Fond of twelve-year-old son. Fond of wife’s cooking. Friendly and chatty to store clerks.
Other details: Returning to Seattle in July. Left behind mysterious spreadsheet in hotel room after meeting with client Raymond Darke. (What does this say about his secretive hotel meetings?)
Daniel and I stared at the printout for a long time, tossing theories around. None of them seemed reasonable. The only thing we could agree upon was that we’d finally made real progress. Ivanov might be headed back overseas soon, but our investigation wasn’t dead in the water. We had a tangible clue in our hands, and that was exhilarating. I just wasn’t sure what this clue was or how it added up in the bigger picture.
“It either matters or it doesn’t,” Daniel murmured out of the blue.
“What does?”
“Why you asked me earlier about dating people from the hotel.”
Ugh. I was hoping he’d forgotten that. Why did I bring it up? “It doesn’t.”
“No?” He folded up the printout. “So, you don’t care how many people I’ve dated?”
“No.”
“No?”
“I don’t give two hoots about it.”
“Hoots? Oh my God, Birdie. You’re priceless.”
“Two whatevers,” I said, frustrated. “Damns.”
“Shits,” he corrected. “You don’t give two shits.”
“That’s right. I don’t give two shits. Two shitholes. Two bear balls.”
“Yikes,” he said. “You really don’t care about Beth.”
“Should we keep the bag? I think so. Could be evidence. You take the bag home, and I’ll hold on to the printout. I’ll see if I can translate it,” I said, taking it from him and stuffing it inside my purse. “And, no, I don’t care about Beth.”
“Because you have no interest in my love life,” he said.
“No,” I said firmly, turning to face him. “I do not. I was just being nosy.”
He nodded slowly. “And I have no interest in yours. You could be pining away for Joseph, for all I care.”
“Joseph? He won’t even look me in the eye.”
“Or Chuck.”
I made a face. “Not if he was the last boy on earth.”
Daniel shrugged. “I’m just saying, it doesn’t matter to me. I get it. You’re not interested.”
“In what?” And why were we still standing so close? We were done reading the printout.
I backed up a step.
Something flickered in his eyes. Leonine, limbs loose, he stepped forward and erased the distance I’d put between us. “You’re not interested in me.”
“Oh.” How was I supposed to answer that?
“And you don’t care about us,” he said, as if “us” were a thing that existed anymore. “You’ve made that clear.”
“I . . .”
His face was awfully close to mine. I’d forgotten that he was just the right height, not too tall, not too short. “We have no chemistry. That’s why it didn’t work between us. It was a mistake.”
“A mistake,” I agreed. I just wish I sounded surer of it.
“And you definitely don’t want to try again. I mean, you can’t rewind time, and there’s no do-overs, right? We’re like soured milk. Just throw it out and buy a new carton. Nothing to salvage.”
“Well, I wouldn’t go that far.” I wiped my hands on my pants. For the love of Pete, WHY DID I SWEAT SO MUCH AROUND HIM?
“But you don’t believe in second chances.”
“I never said that.”
“Did so. In that reply to that Truth or Lie text I sent you.”
“You asked me if we’d still be together if we hadn’t gotten into your car the first day we met. I said I wasn’t sure.”
“And you were lying.”
“I was?”
“That’s my guess.”
I felt as if this were a trap, and I wasn’t running at full brain capacity with him standing so close. “Obviously we can’t physically go back and erase what we did, so I guess if you’re asking how to do everything all over again differently . . . ? I wouldn’t know where to start.”
“Where to start?” he murmured. His gaze circled my face. “Well, if I were to hazard a guess—and I’m just spitballing here—I think I’d say something like, ‘Hi, my name is Daniel.’ And you’d say, ‘I’m Birdie, the most adorable name ever, just like me.’ ”
I chuckled nervously.
“And then you’d say, ‘I like to solve mysteries.’ And I’d say, ‘Cool. Want to solve one with me?’ And you’d say, ‘Oh, Daniel. That sounds dynamite.’ ”
“I’d never say that.”
“Sorry. I meant, ‘That sounds GD dynamite.’ ”
“I sort of want to strangle you right now.”
The corners of his mouth curled ever so slightly. “I hear that a lot. So, anyway, you’d agree, and we’d start solving a mystery, much like this one. And I’d say, ‘I love investigating with you, Detective Birdie. Look how great we are at solving things together.’ ”
“We’ve solved nothing, just for the record.”
“Shh. This is my fantasy, not yours. Then I’d say, ‘Uncovering criminal activities is exciting, but how will we ever figure out what it all means? Wait, I have an idea. Maybe we should go out tomorrow night to discuss what we’ve found, because I checked the schedule, and unless Melinda gets a wild hair up her ass to have another pointless staff meeting, we’re both off.’ ”
“Uh . . .” My voice squeaked and crackled when I asked, “That’s what you’d say?”
“Absolutely.”
“I see. And what would I say?”
He lifted his hand to my hair and gingerly touched the petals on my lily. “You’d say, ‘Wow, Daniel. You’re the sexiest guy ever and the coolest detective partner of all time—so much better than that jerk Watson. Of course I’ll go out with you tomorrow night at seven thirty.’ ”
“That’s awfully specific.”
“Then you’d let me pick you up at the ferry—the Colman Dock one here in the city, not on the island. Just to be clear.”
“At seven thirty.”
“At seven, actually. We’d need time to get there,” he explained, eyes on my hair as he traced a line down from the flower to my neck. “So, yeah. We’d go out and do a fun thing right here in the city, for which I’ve already reserved two tickets, just in case you’d agree.”
“Oh,” I breathed, feeling shaky. “Tickets to what?”
He picked up my hand and placed it over his heart. It was racing as fast as it was when he was spying in the hallway. As fast as mine. “Can’t tell you that until you say yes.”
“Are you asking?”
“Will you say yes? I think you should.” He leaned forward until his nose was touching the lily and inhaled deeply. Waves of chills raced over my scalp. And across my arm, radiating from where his warm hand pressed over mine, which hum-hum-hummed with the faint but insistent echo of his heartbeat. “Just two friends, enjoying a pleasant night out. In public. Nothing can happen.”
He was confusing me, touching me like this, saying we’re only friends. . . . “We were in public the first time around. And look what happened then.”
He huffed out a little laugh that shook his chest and reverberated through my hand. “True. We do have a history of not being able to control ourselves. Never fear. We’ll have a strict hands-off policy for this date that isn’t a date.”
“Mostly no hands,” he assured me. “But for sure we’ll keep our pants on this time.”
“Oh God,” I mumbled.
He pressed my hand more firmly against his chest. “Birdie?”
“Yes?”
“Seven o’clock tomorrow?”
Before I could answer, a triple-fast knock rapped on the door. We pulled away from each other as the lock beeped. Beth’s face poked inside the room. “Manager is on his way up here with two guests. Out, out!”
Heart hammering, I dashed toward the door, only to stop short when Daniel blocked my exit with his arm. “You didn’t answer.”
“Are you serious?” I said impatiently, utterly panicked. “Let me out!”
“Please, Birdie. I’m begging you to go out with me. Please, please—”
“Fine. Yes, whatever!”
He nodded firmly. “You won’t regret it. Let’s go.” He released the door and urged me forward into the hallway unexpectedly. I had to lunge to avoid Beth’s housekeeping cart, and in doing so, tripped over my own feet, barely catching myself from falling on my face.
“Oof!”
“Sorry!” he said, steadying me. “Oh, almost forgot. Wear purple tomorrow if you can.”
“What?” I said a little too loudly.
“Oh my God, you two. Shut the hell up!” Beth whispered angrily. “If we get caught, we’re all in deep trouble.”
“Nah. We’ll just be fired,” Daniel whispered cheerfully, beaming at me with a big, stupid grin on his face.
Beth made an exasperated noise. “How do I let you talk me into this kind of shit? Sometimes I really want to strangle you, Daniel Aoki.”
You and me both, Beth. You and me both.