“Why do you want to buy this place anyway?” I asked. “Business doesn’t seem to be doing particularly well.”
“That’s why I want it,” he answered. “This place used to be Chicago’s prime destination. People practically begged to stay here. If I buy it, I can rebrand and redesign. Make it into the sort of place people post about on Instagram.”
“Social media junkie, huh?”
Fletcher chuckled. “Not quite, but I do know that stuff matters if you want to run a successful business. The company who owns the Saint Angel isn’t keeping up with the times. The only people who book this hotel anymore are the regulars who’ve been coming here for twenty years. We need fresh blood if we want to succeed.”
“We?” I asked.
“A premature pronoun,” he admitted. “I can’t help but think I have a future with this place. Is that presumptuous of me?”
I shrugged. “You would know better than me.”
“All I want is for the Saint Angel to live on,” Fletcher said. “I’m the best man to resuscitate it.”
“How does one get into the investing business?” I questioned. “Was your childhood dream to throw money at stuff?”
Fletcher’s answering grin lifted his cheeks into cute wrinkles around his eyes. “I did play a lot of Monopoly. Ironically, I didn’t win much. My brother—”
The elevator finally opened, spilling Marie and Ned into the lobby. Marie launched herself at me, yanking me away from Fletcher.
“Thank goodness,” she panted. Over her shoulder, Fletcher winked at me as he stepped into the elevator. “I need you to do me a huge favor, Jack. I’ll pay you. I’ll buy you a pony. I’ll—”
“Take back what you said about ruining your wedding?”
“She said what?” Ned asked, bewildered.
“I’m hormonal,” Marie shot back. “I didn’t mean it. Please, Jack. I’m sorry. I know it’s not your fault Angelica left—”
I opened my mouth to tell her that Angelica didn’t leave, that she had most likely been kidnapped by the same person who murdered Megan Hollows, but Ned’s phone buzzed. He checked his texts and made a “hurry up” gesture.
“Greg says they’re in the elevator,” he reported. “We gotta move!”
Marie grasped my forearms and locked eyes with me. “Please. Our parents are driving us insane. We just want a couple hours alone together.”
“What am I supposed to do about it?”
“Distract them,” Marie pleaded. “Tell them we went to sample cakes or something. I don’t care. Say something that’ll give us enough of a head start.”
Ned tapped his foot impatiently. “Babe, they’ll be here any second.”
Marie seized Ned’s hand. “Please, Jack!”
“Okay, okay.”
She swept her lips against my cheek. “Thanks! I owe you.”
The happy couple made a run for it, laughing hysterically as they squeezed into the same section of the revolving door and pushed it around together. Right as they vanished from the sidewalk in front of the Saint Angel, the elevator doors opened again.
“What horrid colors,” Penelope Delacourt was saying to her husband, who gazed vacantly over his wife’s head as if she didn’t exist at all. “Peach. Peach! No man looks good in peach, least of all Ned. It will clash horribly with his skin tone.”
Sandra Grey followed Penelope into the lobby. “The dresses are done, Penelope, as are the florals. We can’t change the colors now. Besides, it’s what Marie wanted.”
Penelope scoffed. “What about what my son wants? Where are they? We have too much to discuss and no time to waste.”
The trio scanned the lobby. When Penelope couldn’t locate her son and daughter-to-be, she rounded on me instead.
“You,” she said, pointing straight at my chest like she had a sniper in the bushes ready to take me out. “Where did my son go?”
“Who?”
“My son,” she snapped. “Ned Delacourt. You must have seen him pass.”
“I have no idea, ma’am. I’m just the help.”
A pink tinge colored Penelope’s fake cheeks as Sandra stifled a snigger. Even Ned’s father, Edward, cracked the barest hint of a smile.
“Don’t play me for a fool,” Penelope hissed. “Where did my son go?”
I lazed against a velvet chair and examined my fingernails. “I’ll make you a deal. If you can remember my name, I’ll tell you where Marie and Ned went.”
Penelope glared at me. “It’s a man’s name.”
“That’s debatable.”
“Alex or George or something.”
“Not even close.”
“Trent.”
I feigned offense. “Do I look like a Trent to you?”
Sandra sighed. “Jack…”
“Jack!” Penelope said triumphantly.
I crossed my arms. “It doesn’t count if someone else gives you the answer. No deal.”
Sandra took me aside, away from Penelope’s prying ears. “Not that I didn’t enjoy the little show you put on back there, but we really do have quite a bit to discuss with Marie and Ned today. Do me a favor and tell me where they went.”
“Fine, I did see them,” I admitted. “They said they were going cake-tasting.”
“I thought they already chose a cake. God, I hope she doesn’t pick carrot,” Sandra added as an afterthought. “Thanks, Jack. Let’s go, Penelope. Edward.”
Sandra and Edward strolled away, but Penelope had one last word for me. She curled her blush-pink fingernails around my forearm and drew me close. Her hot breath—which reeked of cigarettes and mint breath strips, moistened my ear.
“You better be careful,” she hissed. “I hear women go missing from this part of town quite often. What a shame it would be if you were next.”
“Is that a threat?” I said at a regular volume, so everyone in the lobby could hear me.
Penelope released me at once. “Don’t you dare ruin this wedding, Jack.”
A laugh of disbelief made its way out of my mouth. “Are you kidding? You should take a good look at your priorities, Penelope. If your son is at the top of the list, you’ll butt out of the wedding plans.”
She stalked away without a backward glance. When her scarf got stuck in the revolving door on her way out, no one made any motion to help.
Someone let out a low whistle behind me.
“Sheesh,” Jonathan said, watching as Penelope finally dislodged her scarf and ducked into a Town Car with Sandra
