Page 5 of The Woodcarver's Model
“Sure thing.”
“And thanks for not making me beg for it. I get enough of that from Cedric. Now this’ll be a nice, gentle piece after Somalia.”
“So, where is this place?”
“Who the hell knows and who cares, other than you, of course. It’s probably one of those little rocks off the coast of Vancouver. I thought it might be a perfect excuse to visit Jessica.”
“Jessica?”
After a moment she threw him a lifeline. “Your sister.”
“Crap.”
“I thought you might like to visit her… Her birthday’s coming up.” She coaxed him into putting the pieces together.
“Crap again.”
“It’ll be her thirty-fifth, so you can stop taxing that poor brain of yours. Strangely, it falls on the same date as it did last year. Andyou’re welcomefor remembering.”
Chapter Four
The flight from Toronto to Vancouver took the prescribed five hours. Rob liked to spoil himself on planes. Business class—never first. That would be overkill. Even in business class, the comfortable seats, better food and drink, and cuter flight attendants made it almost worth the extra money it cost, and he could write it off as a business expense.
Colin—that was the flight attendant’s name—brought him almost everything he wanted. Rob wasn’t about to make a total ass of himself by pretending that the attention the cute young man was paying him was anything other than a professional courtesy. Older men would fall for that. Rob wasn’t about to become one of them. In the time it took the plane to fly across the country, Rob was able to have a fine meal, several strong drinks—which he would need to fortify himself for the day he would spend with his sister—and, most importantly, the chance to just stare out the window at the world below. The vastness of this country never ceased to amaze him. He could fly to Iceland in almost the same time it took to travel to British Columbia. It took twenty-four hours of nonstop driving just to cross the province of Ontario. Was it any wonder that with a country so large, people in this nation had trouble understanding each other?
He stared out the window as the plane flew over rock-rimmed lakes, past prairie expanses to mountain foothills, then from foothills over the Rockies, all while his fellow passengers around him watched the same old movies for a second time while the greatest show on earth was just outside their windows.Idiots, he thought.
Once they had landed and the baggage handlers had somehow magically got his flight’s luggage from the plane to the right carousel, he found his one bag—Rob always travelled light when he was working—and made his way to the cab stand where he grabbed a Yellow Cab. Why did every large city have a company called Yellow Cab?
“Sylvia Hotel, please,” he said, and the cab took off with little more than a “Yes, sir,” from the driver. If the cabbie didn’t kill him on the way, or take him far off the acceptable route, this guy was going to get a very good tip.
The Sylvia was Rob’s favourite hotel in Vancouver. It was old, reasonably small and comfortable. He even liked the name. Something like he would expect of an elderly aunt or aged female friend. It sounded reliable and discreet.
The cab pulled up beside the hotel on English Bay in twenty minutes. A big tip it was. Inside Rob was greeted at registration by a smiling, older woman who remembered him from an earlier trip when he’d had a holdover on his way to Hawaii where he’d been covering the booming volcano tourist trade.
“Good evening, Mr Hanson. So nice to see you again.” She had obviously checked the list and records of registering clients at the start of her shift. This was why he liked the Sylvia.
“I have you down for one night.”
“Just a quick stopover. A birthday party.” He hoped that hadn’t come across as too arrogant. A little arrogance was fine. Too much was trashy.
“We have the English Bay Suite for you, if that’s okay?”
“Perfect,” he replied, as he smiled and nodded. No chit-chat. She processed him quickly and warmly. He’d been here before and didn’t need to be told anything about the restaurant, the seawall walk or the hotel cat, Mr Got To Go.
He was in the suite for no more than ten minutes when his cell phone rang. Without even looking at the caller ID, he answered.
“Jessica. Perfect timing,” he lied. He always lied to her. It had become a habit. Jessica had ruled over his life since their parents had died. She’d been fifteen at the time and was convinced that their mother and father had been involved in uncovering an environmental wrong-doing and had faked their deaths to pursue the evildoers. She’d expected them to rise from the dead and return to her as heroes. Rob had been in no position to take care of a young woman, especially one with such a vivid imagination, so she’d been farmed out to their mother’s sister, Coco. They had called her Cuckoo behind her back. Her real name was Gertrude.
Even at fifteen, Jessica had bossed Rob around like he was the younger sibling in spite of the fact he was ten years older, and things had never changed. Jessica, who Coco had always called Kitty—did anyone in that generation believe in using one’s given name?—had moved to Vancouver as soon as she’d come of age and had control over her inheritance. Now, one might assume hers would be a story of squandered wealth—young girl moves to cosmopolitan city and fritters away her money on shoes, martinis and good-looking young men. No—that was not Jessica. She had turned out to be a master of finance, trusting no one and doubling her net worth in ten years. She even handled Rob’s investments. Rob wasn’t foolish enough to ignore her advice.
“I expect you to be here at seven sharp,” she said.
“I’ll be there. Are you still drinking red?”
“The darker and thicker the better.” With anyone else he might have made a joke out of her comment, but he knew Jessica better than that.
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