I knew my respite would be short lived since next week the hotel was the site of the annual convention for one of our city’s Major League Baseball teams (I won’t mention which one – suffice to say that it was the better of the two).
I liked to take downtimes like these to better familiarize myself with other departments in the hotel and their various policies and procedures. Today, I was conducting several room cleanliness inspections for housekeeping. Then I was going down to the sales and catering department to take part in their weekly inter-department resumé meeting. This was a meeting where we discussed the upcoming groups and events taking place at the hotel as well any special needs or notes that might be associated with said events. And after this, I was scheduled to meet with Mike in finance to assist with a regularly scheduled internal audit that called for the participation of an outside department manager.
It was as I was finishing my fifth room inspection for housekeeping that the most interesting event of the day occurred. My last room being on one of our Honors VIP floors (these were rooms reserved for members of our Shared Resorts frequent guest program and were located on the 23rd and 24th floor), I decided to walk the two flights up to housekeeping.
As I opened the door to the stairwell, I instantly caught a glimpse of the bottom portion of two pairs of legs through the open handrails a flight above me. Each flight of stairs was broken into a switchback with a small landing halfway up. The landing between the 23rd and 24th floor is where I saw the legs, facing each other, and in close proximity. I could tell that the couple, whoever they were, hadn’t heard the door open, and they were speaking in hushed tones. Employee or guest, I wasn’t going to let their presence deter my progress considering that this was a public space. So I started up the stairs – stepping maybe just a tad more lightly than I might have otherwise.
Just as I was able to glimpse the two people – a housekeeping houseperson and a room attendant – they must have recognized my presence because they quickly pulled apart from their embrace.
I’d heard that the stairwells were frequent meeting spots for amorous employees. Guests rarely used the stairs to navigate the hotel, preferring the elevators instead, so their secluded nature made them nice spots for private engagements if only for a minute or two.
The two housekeeping employees stood apart, waiting awkwardly, only nodding a slight greeting as I passed. I didn’t interfere since they weren’t my department’s employees, and technically, they weren’t doing anything wrong – a least not at the moment. When I turned my inspections over to Marian in housekeeping however, I did make mention of the incident.
She nodded, frowning, “I bet I know who it was. I’ve had trouble with two of my people on the Honors floors getting a little frisky with one another in the stairwells before. Thanks for bringing it to my attention.”
“Not trying to get anyone in trouble or ruin love lives or anything. I know this is a hotel and it tends to breed that sort of thing, but it’s got to be kept outside of work hours.”
“I know it, you know it, but try telling it to some of those horn-dogs on my staff,” she grimaced. “It’s like musical chairs around here when it comes to romances. There are more rumors floating around about who is hooking up than we have actual staff. And by the time you actually do find out something is going on between two of the employees, they’ve already switched partners and are dancing with someone new.”
“It’s not much better at the front desk,” I shook my head. “There are just a lot fewer dance partners.”
* * *
The rest of the day dragged on. While I thought the low occupancy would make for an easier day, it really just made for a longer one. Without the regular calls on my M.O.D. phone to break things up, the hours seemed to slide by tediously until around four, I broke away from the sales and catering department and went down to the front desk to see if Jason was still around. I figured he’d already left for the day, but I was surprised to find he was still working…well, I guess “working” is a strong word. He was in the breakroom, shooting for a new high score on one of his arcade games.
“Yes!” he celebrated as he broke the necessary points barrier but kept pounding away on the “fire” button to shoot little electronic bleeps of bullets from his spacecraft.
“How you feel about an after-work drink to commemorate this crowning achievement?” I asked him as I watched from behind.
“Hold on,” he breathed, bobbing his head and weaving his body as he guided his craft, as though his physical efforts had any bearing on how his joystick-maneuvered-craft performed. “Ahhh,” he cringed after a moment, leaning back and batting the joystick with his hand when his spaceship disintegrated into a puff of smoke as an enemy vessel plowed into it in a kamikaze-like move.
He turned to look at me after he confirmed that it was indeed his last craft that had been decimated.
“A drink?” I asked again.
“On you?”
I nodded.
“Sure,” he perked up. “Carlisle’s?”
“Let’s try the Triton Club,” I looked at my watch. “They just opened. Probably not too many people down there yet, so we should be able to grab a quick drink or two. I want to give them some business.”
“You like that musty old 1B, don’t you?” Jason gave me a look.
“Always have; always will,” I nodded.
“Why?” he asked incredulously.
“I don’t really know,” I shrugged. “Just do. I’ve always felt at home down there…at peace…as though my mind becomes clearer.”
“You’re weird,” Jason grinned at me, grabbing his suit jacket off the back of a nearby chair.
“I know,” I said, and left it at that.
* * *
The Triton Club was almost empty when we arrived. A young couple sat at a small table in the corner, but besides me and Jason, that was it, and that was just fine with me. I was here for a drink, not for people watching.
We took seats at the bar on refurbished vintage absinthe green vinyl stools.
In keeping with the atmosphere, I ordered a Harvey Wallbanger, heavy on the Harvey. Jason ordered a Tequila Sunrise.
“Your day was so bad you had to have a drink?” Jason questioned, turning to me with an eyebrow raised. “That’s not like you. You must have some really heavy stuff on your mind.”
“It’s not that so much as…well, I don’t know. Something has just been bothering me about this murder. I can’t shake the feeling that I’m missing something rather obvious.”
“Well, don’t ask me,” Jason took a long sip of his drink. “Ahhh…that hits the spot. Detective work is definitely not my thing. So that’s where you’ve been all day, out working the case for that detective buddy of yours? What’s his name? Marino?”
“No, I was doing some cross-training in other departments. Caught a couple of housekeeping’s people making out in the stairwell.”
“Well now, that’s exciting,” Jay perked up. “Pray tell.”
“No, it really wasn’t like that,” I said. “Nothing exciting. They’d pretty much broken up whatever was going on by the time I got there.”
“No naughty bits dangling?” Jay grinned.
“No…nothing like that,” I snorted, shaking my head.
I paused and took a long drink.
“Jay, you didn’t happen to leave something in my mailbox on Christmas morning, did you? Like a gag gift or something?” I decided to shift gears. I figured chances were slim that it was him who had left the broken heart necklace; but knowing Jay, there was always a chance.
“No way. You know me and holiday shopping. I’m lucky to get my mother a gift, let alone my close friends.”
“Yeah, you’re such a sweetheart,” I mumbled.
My phone rang. It was the detective.
“Hello,” I answered hopefully, thinking he might have some good news from Statler’s boss regarding the client in the building across the street from the hotel. But I could tell immediat
ely by the sound of his voice that things hadn’t gone our way.
“You got a second, Haze?” he asked.
“Sure,” I said. “What’s up?”
“We struck out. The whole theory that Statler was watching the client across the street was a bust. Statler’s firm only did some minor work for that client and Statler wasn’t even involved.”
“Are you positive there was no chance he picked something up about that company? Maybe he snooped on a file from a co-worker who was working more intimately with the client and learned something he shouldn’t have.”
“I’m pretty positive. It was only a two-day job, and there was hardly anything in the file they had on hand. It’s a tiny little tech startup that’s struggling just to make it. Nothing illegal looking about it, and no big money there for the taking that I could see. Looks like another dead end,” the detective sighed into the phone.
“Thanks anyway for letting me know,” I said.
“Sure thing,” the detective hung up.
“What is it about hotels and romance?” Jason said, getting back to the important stuff. “There’s always so much hooking up going on around here.”
“I know,” I nodded. “I’ve always thought it was all the beds. They kind of radiate desire or send out subliminal messages or something. Constantly keeps sex on the brain.”
“Maybe,” Jason said. “Fine for the guests…okay for the employees, as long as they keep it on the down low…but god forbid the two sides ever meet.”
Yeah,” I agreed. “I’ve seen a few such situations…employees intermingling with guests…the results never end well.” I stood up abruptly, sloshing my drink and nearly knocking over my bar stool. “That’s it!” I cried.
Jason sat staring at me as though I was crazy, and was apparently a little freaked out judging by the look on his face.
“Well…maybe that’s it,” I reconsidered. “I’ve gotta go, Jay,” I said, throwing a twenty dollar bill down on the bar. “I’ll catch up with you later.”
“Okay…” Jason sat mouth-opened, drink in hand as I rushed out of the club and back to the service elevators where I rode up to housekeeping.
At this point in the afternoon, most of what little housekeeping staff there was on a lower occupancy day like today had already departed for the day, but I found several managers still milling about the main office. They nodded their greeting as I entered.
“Need to check some paperwork,” I explained my presence.
“You know where to find it,” Maria, one of the floor managers nodded at a nearby file cabinet.
“Thanks,” I said, pulling open one of the drawers. It took me only a few seconds of rifling through the paperwork for January to realize that what I needed wasn’t there. “Where’s the stuff from previous months?” I asked.
“Gone,” Rhoda, another of the managers, explained.
“Gone where?” I asked, feeling my stomach drop as I prayed it hadn’t already been shipped to the offsite storage and disposal facility where the hotel’s less important paperwork went to die.
“In the back,” she tilted her head in the direction of the housekeeping “crawlspace” as it was known. “Last three months are boxed up in the crawlspace. They’re all labeled, so it shouldn’t be too hard to find what you’re looking for.”
“Thanks,” I said, closing the file cabinet drawer and hurrying to a set of steel double doors at the end of the hallway outside housekeeping’s main office. Behind these doors, in a dimly lit, concrete-floored room (one of just several that weren’t coated with a thick layer of floor wax) was where things like the snow blowers, bags of extra ice melt and spreaders, snow shovels, and several of the floor cleaning machines were stored. At the rear of this room and to the left was a hallway that followed the hotel’s roofline. The ceiling was low and so steeply pitched to one side that you had to duck when navigating it. A brick wall formed one side of this scalene triangle-shaped corridor. The rooftop and floor created an angular space that opened to the other side and continued with the sloping roofline. It was used to store various odds and ends. Toward the end of this space sat several Lanigan relics. There was a massive piece of granite block, the cornerstone of the original Lanigan that burned in the Chicago fire. I certainly pitied the poor people who had to haul the thing all the way up here and then stash it way back in this hidey hole. There was a large bronze bust of our hotel’s namesake – Samuel Lanigan. There were also old portraits of former general managers, boxes of various trophies and awards that the hotel had won throughout the years for service and cleanliness, as well as other hotel memorabilia from bygone eras that the hotel just didn’t have a use for or a proper place to display.
At the front of this space were several rows of cardboard file boxes. Inside were items like the room attendant assignment sheets, floor manager reports, and various other reports related to out-of-order rooms, discrepancy rooms, and the all-encompassing “all-status report” that provided an overview of the status of all the guest rooms. These reports were run on a daily basis, typically at the beginning and end of each day.
It took me almost half an hour of sitting in the dingy darkness on the dusty floor sorting through the boxes for October, November, and December to find what I was looking for. But once I had it, I knew that it was definitely worth the time and effort. I took another 10 minutes to make copies of my gathered documentation and return the paperwork to its rightful boxes before going back downstairs. There, I did some matching up of days and dates for the past 90 days with the correlating paperwork I had for Mr. Statler’s room history before calling Detective Marino.
“Detective Marino speaking. What’s up, Haze?” he answered.
“I’ve got something you need to see,” I explained.
“Right now?” the detective sounded tired.
“I think it will definitely be worth your time,” I said, smiling into the phone, unable to contain my excitement at what I’d uncovered even though I knew full well what it might mean for the hotel.
* * *
It was about a 20 minute drive, slicing down Cermak Avenue, from the Lanigan to the near western suburb of Berwyn. There, room attendant Felicia Gonzalez lived in a rented, yellow-brick, turn-of-the-century bungalow. The home was nestled in a row of homes almost identical to hers, the row resting among several blocks of similarly constructed domiciles.
The detective had wanted to meet with Ms. Gonzalez as soon as I showed him the paperwork I’d discovered. He drove since, living at the hotel, I had neither need for a vehicle nor a place to store it.
The room attendant, enjoying her day off, looked surprised to see us, but not overly so when she opened the front door. The detective hadn’t called ahead, preferring the element of surprise. He’d allowed me to be present at his interview with Felicia since I’d been the one who’d uncovered the incriminating evidence and he thought my insider’s knowledge of the hotel might come in handy during the interview.
Felicia was in the midst of cleaning up from dinner when we arrived, a hand towel slung over one shoulder, a toddler cradled in her other arm. She invited us inside, hustling her two children – the other who appeared to be age six or seven – into a nearby bedroom. She then offered us something to drink. Both the detective and I declined. Then we took seats at the dining room table.
I had to admit, she was a reasonably attractive woman. She was maybe five foot five, probably 120 pounds, give or take a few pounds, had thick, light-brown hair with a reddish tint, a wide mouth with medium-sized lips, a petite nose, and eyes that pulled at the corners in a way that made them appear almost Asian in nature.
It didn’t take long for her to crack under the pressure of the detective’s withering gaze and our finally having put two and two together.
“I wondered if you’d notice that,” she said in heavily accented English as she stared down at the housekeeping paperwork I’d given the detective and that he’d spread out on Ms. Gonzalez’s dining room tabletop. It detailed, in br
ight yellow highlighter slashed across her room assignment sheets and Mr. Statler’s room history reports, the correlation of dates and locations.
“You and Mr. Statler were having an affair,” Detective Marino stated more than asked. “That’s why he always requested the 200 side of the 15th floor…your regularly assigned section. That’s why his stays at the hotel match up perfectly with the days that you were scheduled to work.”
The room attendant kept her eyes sullenly affixed to the papers laid out before her. She nodded slightly. A single teardrop trickled down her cheek, hung for a moment, and then fell upon the dining room tabletop.
“Is that why you killed him? Was he trying to break things off with you?” the detective pressed.
I sat silently, watching, curious. I’d never been involved in an actual police questioning before, and I found it intensely interesting. I was caught up in the moment, and I kept telling myself to make mental notes of techniques that I could use in future hotel investigations.
“No!” Ms. Gonzalez looked up suddenly, a fierce determination in her eyes. “I did not! I would never! I loved him!”
“Then tell us who did,” the detective pushed. “You must have some idea.”
She shook her head, “I…I…I don’t know.”
“If you refuse to tell us, you’re going to be charged with the murder,” the detective explained. “I’ll have to take you in and the Department of Child and Family Services will get custody of your children.”
I wondered if this was true, but the detective’s confidence in stating it sure made it sound like it was, and it looked like the threat certainly rattled Ms. Gonzalez.
“I have enough evidence here,” he gestured to the paperwork on the table. “And with the phone records I’m sure I can procure showing calls between you and Mr. Statler, I can prove motive and opportunity.”
The Case of the Linen Pressed Guest (The M.O.D. Files Book 2) Page 16