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He’d left a note on the nightstand, telling her that he’d be back before eleven and that she should order room service again.
“Not on your life,” she said, flinging off the covers. She had to work fast. After dressing and combing her hair in record time, she dialed the overseas operator and was able to connect with the United States and the offices of the Seattle Observer. With any luck, Connie would be working the early shift. Nikki crossed her fingers. Within minutes, a pert female voice, thousands of miles away, answered on the fifth ring. “Connie Benson.”
“Holding down the fort?” Nikki asked, her voice lowered though Trent wasn’t due back for a few hours.
“Who is this?”
“Nikki. Nikki Carrothers.”
“Are you kidding?” Connie said, her voice suddenly friendly. “I thought you were somewhere in the South Pacific.”
“The Caribbean,” Nikki corrected, trying to keep her voice steady. She took a deep breath. “On my honeymoon.”
“On your what?” Connie screeched. “Hey, who is this? Is this some kind of joke or what?”
“It’s no joke,” Nikki said, explaining the circumstances as best she could, though she didn’t admit to her amnesia. For now, she decided, the fewer people who knew about her loss of memory, the better.
“I don’t believe it! You. Married.” Connie chuckled, and Nikki saw the image of a red-blond, big-boned woman with freckles and laughing gold eyes. “Well, you know what they say—never say never.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“You know, after that Dave fiasco, you swore off men for good. So who’s the lucky guy and why didn’t I meet him?”
“You know him,” Nikki said, crossing her fingers. This was her first chance to catch Trent in a lie. “His name is Trent McKenzie and he works for—”
“The insurance company? Puget Sound Insurance?” Connie said on a long breath. “God, he’s gorgeous!”
“Then you remember him?”
“How could you forget a man like that?” she said. “And you married him?”
I wish I knew.
“Let me tell you, if I ever snag a man like that I’ll hire one of those sky pilots to write it in the sky over downtown Seattle and I’ll have the biggest wedding this town has ever seen just to show him off! Come on, Nikki, why didn’t you tell me?”
Nikki was ready for that one. “We wanted to surprise everyone.”
“Oh, God, how romantic!” Again a long, envious sigh. “Wait until I tell Peggy. She’s gonna flip. She’ll think you’ll want to give up your job, stay home and raise about fifty kids.”
“I don’t think so,” Nikki said, but grinned. It felt good to speak to someone she knew she could trust. “So you remember introducing him to me?”
“Of course I do. It was that claim I had a few months ago. He was checking it out. Came into the office to talk to me, and you were there.”
So far, so good. Trent’s story was holding up, but there was still something wrong, something out of sync. “How’s the job going?”
“Same old grind,” Connie said. “It looks like there’s been some scam down at the docks. One of the union bosses has been skimming off of the dues and there’s a drug ring working out of Tacoma, but, of course, John and Max were given those assignments. I got to cover the arrival of Jana, that big-time fashion model from Europe, but other than that it’s the same old, same old. You know, school district stuff, city council news, nothing earthshattering. As for your friend Crowley, he’s still up to his old tricks, but no one seems to be able to prove a thing. If you ask me, Max has dropped the ball on that one.”
A little spark of memory flared. “Crowley?” she said nonchalantly, though her heart was thundering. There was something about that name, something important.
“Yeah. You know, Peggy went to bat for you to cover the story, but it was the higher-ups. Frank Pianzani, he’s grooming Max for his job, so he put the thumbs-down on a woman covering the senator. Sometimes I think the women’s movement never made it through the doors of the Observer. Sure, we can talk it up all we want, and report it—God knows we’ll get all the information into the paper—but practice it? That’ll never happen. Not as long as Pianzani and some of his pals are in charge.”
Nervously, Nikki twisted the phone cord. “So tell me about Crowley.”
“The good senator has been keeping his nose clean and his face out of the paper for the past couple of weeks,” Connie said. “I’ve been too busy to pay much attention to him. Gotta get all the hot news on the school lunch menu, you know. Someone’s got to report if they’re serving hot dogs or jo-jos.” She laughed and Nikki smiled. “You know, my most interesting story since you’ve been gone is whether there’s too much fat in the food that the schools are serving.”
“It’s a dirty job, but someone’s got to do it.”
Connie laughed.
