“You told me it was a gift when you first started at Annum Guard. I just guessed it was from a boyfriend.”
I can’t believe Yellow remembers something I told her in passing about my bracelet.
“We’ll sell these,” she says. “Or one of them, at least.” She unscrews one of her diamond stud earrings and holds it up, then she drops it into my hand. “You have to do it, though. Those suckers were five thousand dollars apiece, and I think I might pass out when they give me, like, a hundred and fifty for it.”
Yellow leads me down Washington Street and stops in front of a door. SHREVE, CRUMP & LOW is written on a sign out front.
“Tuck your hair up and pretend you’re a man,” Yellow tells me before I go inside. “They’ll give you a better price.”
“I’m in a flowered muumuu. They’re going to think I’m an asylum patient.”
“Oh. True. Well, then, just do your best.”
The man standing inside the jewelry store gives me a very blatant once-over, but all appearances are overlooked when I pull out that diamond stud. He tries to lowball me, but I talk him up to $175. I honestly have no idea if that’s a fair price or if I’m getting ripped off, but, oh well.
Next, Yellow and I duck into a small clothing shop down the street and buy dresses and shoes that are good quality but at least ten years out of fashion. At least that’s what Yellow says. But we can afford them; that’s the important part. Then it’s on to the Parker House.
The lobby of the hotel takes my breath away, even in 1894. Massive Corinthian columns line the room, stretching all the way from the marble floors to the coffered ceilings. Dozens of dome chandeliers dangle above our heads. We go to the desk, money in hand, ready with our cover stories. Yellow and I are the daughters of a foreign dignitary here in town on business. Our father sent us to check into the best hotel in Boston. But the man behind the counter doesn’t even blink. He gives us a metal key to room 303 and that’s that.
Finally. Something is simple for once.
The room is small, with two beds, a dresser, and a night table. Yellow collapses onto one of the beds, but I refuse.
“Uh-uh. Get up. I’m starving, and we have to figure out a plan. We can rest later.”
Yellow grumbles but pushes herself up off the bed. I grab the files and Alpha’s notebook, and we head downstairs into the restaurant, which is already filling up, even though it’s just five o’clock.
When we sit, I glance around, sort of to make sure no one is eavesdropping on us but mostly to see where the damned waiter is with the dinner rolls. I toss Alpha’s notebook onto the table, and Yellow scoops it up at once.
“Is this Alpha’s?” she asks.
“Yeah.” I drum my fingers on the table and look around again. “I took it from his office. I haven’t gotten a chance to look at it yet.” Yellow’s already flipping through it. “There’s so much to process here. What I don’t get is why Alpha wants Ariel Stender dead.”
“Who’s Ariel Stender?” Yellow asks, flipping a page. She doesn’t look up at me.
“He invented these,” I say, fingering the watch hanging from my neck. “I already told you that.”
I look around. Seriously, where the hell is the waiter?
Yellow flips another page. “But who’s Ariel Stender? Was he part of the original Annum Guard?”
“No, he’s still alive in the present. He’s . . . he’s my boyfriend’s grandfather.”
At that Yellow looks up at me over the top of the notebook. Her eyes are wide with surprise.
“Alpha told you to kill your boyfriend’s grandfather?”
I nod.
“And you considered it?”
“No!” I hiss. “I didn’t. I wouldn’t ever—”
And then the waiter sidles up to our table. Finally. Yellow ducks her head back to the notebook.
“Good evening, ladies.” He sets a small basket of bread on the table. I have to restrain myself from jumping on it. “Have you had a chance to look over the menu?”
I haven’t even opened it. Yellow’s sits untouched, too.
“I’ll have the green turtle soup and the filet of beef,” Yellow says, her head still down. “Rare, please. Oh, and a side of the truffled duck in jelly.”
I blink. Most of that sounds absolutely disgusting. I quickly glance at the menu and want to gag. Larded sweetbreads, kidney, mutton, tongue. I could never live in 1894.
The waiter clears his throat.
“The filet of beef, too,” I tell him. It’s like the only edible thing on the whole menu. “But medium, please.” On the outside, I might seem like a rare-meat kind of girl, too; but really, meat that is too pink and bloody and, well, raw makes me want to hurl.
The waiter raises an eyebrow. “Medium? I don’t understand.”
My head whips over to Yellow, and she quickly shakes her own. People haven’t heard of medium in 1894? I look back to the waiter. “Um, just not rare. A little more cooked.”
This doesn’t seem to clear much up, but the waiter takes our menus and leaves. I pounce on the bread basket and rip open a half moon–shaped roll with my teeth. I don’t pause to bother with the butter, and I sure as hell forget my manners. The roll is warm and buttery, and I could eat seventy of them.
“Anyway,” I say. “It’s clear that Alpha’s up to something, so we need to figure out what it is and then come up with a way to stop him, which is going to be difficult, considering I’m apparently a wanted felon these days. Any ideas?”
Yellow doesn’t even acknowledge that I asked her a question. She still has her nose buried in that damned notebook.
I clear my throat and grab another roll. “Ahem, I asked if you had any ideas.”
Finally she looks up. She has a bewildered expression on her face. “You haven’t read this?”
“No,” I mumble with a mouth full of bread. I should have ordered an appetizer. “When would I have had a chance to do that? When I was running from you guys? When I woke up in a hospital room, and you showed up like a minute later? While I was breaking into a colonial house to get back your necklace? Huh? When in all of that free time was I supposed to sit down and do some pleasure reading?”
Yellow shakes her head. “You don’t have to be so snippy about it.” She tilts the notebook at me. “It’s our missions. Every single one of them. I think Alpha was selling them on the side.”
I reach over and snatch the notebook out of her hands. It’s open to an entry marked June 5 from last year. It reads:
JL
7.5
I scrunch up my nose. “And how exactly did you come to the conclusion that this is a mission?”
“Because of the date. June 5. I remember that mission. Green and I tampered with a Supreme Court decision on some transportation statute, then he tried to cop a feel before we projected back. I kneed him right where it hurts. I’ll never forget that day.”
“What’s seven point five?” I say. “This doesn’t strike me as having anything to do with money.”
Yellow grabs back the notebook and flips it to the beginning. “Look, here.” She holds it up and points to a page of entries. My eyes scan them.
RF
$5.75
BB
$2.8
KP
$3.0
“He stopped using the dollar sign almost right away, probably because it was too obvious,” Yellow says.
I take the notebook from her and flip forward a few pages. She’s right. The dollar sign is on that first page and then it disappears. I thumb through and find the JL entry. “So what’s seven point five? Seven and a half million?”