“They were here for only a couple of hours. But Mr. Easton paid for a full day.”
“‘They’? Did he bring a woman?”
“Nothing like that,” she said, her lips pursing primly. “He was here for a meeting with two associates.”
“Mallory and Lewis?”
“I didn’t get their names.”
“Was one of them a fat guy, face like a bulldog?”
Seeming to be offended by the description, she said, “He was…heavyset. Not a handsome man.”
“Not handsome and nice like Agent Easton.”
She didn’t say anything to that, only looked at him with unblinking eyes.
He asked, “What about the third man?”
“I don’t remember him very well.”
Gif Lewis, Rudkowski thought. That guy faded into the woodwork. Rudkowski worried his lower lip between his teeth. “Easton used a credit card?”
She answered with a curt nod. “He reviewed the bill to make certain I had added the minibar charges. Plus the cake.”
“Cake?”
“He called down and asked me to have room service deliver—”
“Cake?”
“Yes.”
No more “sir,” he noticed. Not that he cared about her opinion of him, but he added a bit of saccharine to his next question, because it was the most important one. “Ms. Li, after settling the bill with the additional charges, did Easton happen to tell you where he was going from here? Did he make a reservation at one of your chain’s other hotels?”
“No. But he left something for you.”
“For me?”
“That’s what I was trying to ask you at the start before you interrupted. I was about to ask if you had come to pick up the envelope. Mr. Easton said that you might be coming by for it within a few days. Honestly, I was about to give up on you. Wait just a moment, please.”
She disappeared into an office and returned shortly with a letter-size envelope. “Here you are.”
He plucked it from her hand. “Thanks.”
“I’ve already been thanked. By Mr. Easton. I was happy to provide the service for him.” She turned her back on him and went back into the office.
Rudkowski stalked across the lobby and through the double doors, waiting until he was outside to rip open the envelope and pull out the single sheet of hotel stationery. In the center of it was printed: Hey there, Rudkowski. Kiss my ass.
Chapter 12
Stroking her cheek to remove the speck of chocolate icing had been one thing. Licking it off his thumb had been another. If Drex had stopped at the former, and hadn’t done the latter, she would have forgotten the incident by now. Probably. Maybe. But because he had done it, she was still thinking about it two days later. With each replay of the scene in her mind, the scintillation was magnified. As was her unease over it.
Because it hadn’t been a reflexive action that could be laughed off. He hadn’t noisily smacked his lips or wisecracked about her chocolate addiction. It wasn’t wittiness that had simmered in his eyes as they’d held her gaze. Nothing like that.
No, licking it off his thumb had been provocative. Which compelled her to report it to Jasper.
But she hadn’t.
She hadn’t told him later that afternoon when he returned from the country club, or during their dinner out that evening, or when they’d come home to find that Drex had brought back their fan, along with a note regarding tonight’s reservation.
On any of those occasions she could have mentioned the incident to Jasper in an offhanded manner, made light of it, and given it no significance. But she hadn’t slipped it into a conversation, and now too much time had passed, during which it had acquired significance.
Of late, there had been a mounting tension between Jasper and her, made even worse because neither of them acknowledged it. Telling him about the incident with Drex might force them to expose problems within the marriage, which, to this point, neither had been willing to do.
In any case, telling Jasper about it now would feel like a confession. He would want to know why she was just now getting around to informing him of it when they were an hour away from joining the man for a double date. She didn’t want to get into anything with him just before leaving for their evening out.
As predicted, Elaine was as giddy as a coed who’d been invited to the prom by the varsity captain. She’d called Talia within minutes of Drex’s inviting her and had recounted word for word all he’d said, speaking as though every sentence ended in a pair of exclamation marks. Over the