A/N: More story.


(She Was A) Hotel Detective

Chapter Seventeen: Pastwords


Monday, November 8, 1965
The Palmer House Hotel, Chicago


Casey stepped closer to Sarah. He noticed the to-go bag. Sarah still was not-noticing it.

"Well? Are you going to answer before your food gets cold?"

Sarah felt a little like she had the day she resigned from the CIA, although on that day she had been so sickened by it all, so profoundly ashamed of herself and the Agency, so angry, that any feeling of disloyalty or ungratefulness was wholly eclipsed. Here, though, that was not true. Her...feelings...for Chuck were such that she was not repentant about her disloyalty, but she felt it keenly. Casey had been good to her. He was another person, she realized, who had become a friend. Who knew she had so many? Friends. Not contacts, not marks. Friends.

Casey, her friend. Her employer.

"Casey, I…"

Casey peered at her closely. He put up his hand. "Look, Sarah, I know that transitioning back into civilian life can be hard, that it can take a lot more time than we think. When Ilsa and I came back from Korea, I had the devil of a time. Thank God for her! She held me through night sweats and screaming dreams. Helped me see that the people around me were not divided into friends and foes. Got me to where I didn't feel naked without my rifle.

"And then Mr. Hilton took a chance on me — saw something in me, I guess. He wanted the hotel run with 'military precision'. I told him that wasn't truly possible; the employees are not soldiers. But I've done my best."

Sarah started to talk but Casey kept his hand up. "As much as I owe him, as much as I love this hotel, I love my wife more. I hope never to have to choose between them, but if I had to, had to, mind you, I'd choose her in a heartbeat. A heartbeat.

"My point is this. If you have feelings for this Bartowski — I'm happy for you. Genuinely happy. You've looked haunted in quiet moments for far too long, Sarah Spook. But I have to say, today, despite looking tired, you do not look haunted. You look like a tired — and worried... — well, a tired and worried woman in love." He dropped his hand.

"So, let's not lie to each other. I know you'll protect the hotel up to the point where protecting it means leaving him unprotected. It's the woman you are, a protectress...Is there such a word?..." — he paused to consider his own question for a moment, then went on — "...and as long as you do that, we're square. I trust you and your instincts. I made no mistake when I hired you."

Sarah felt her eyes moisten; she rubbed them. "Casey…" she finally choked out.

He grunted uncomfortably. "Good luck, Sarah. And remember, the tape recorder's on the third floor. I'm around if you need me. Be careful of Rizzo." He gave her a sharp nod, parade-ground turned, and left the office before she could speak.


Sarah ate in the office quickly, once she recovered from Casey's visit. As she ate, she made a call. Sarah still had contacts at Langley, a couple of analysts, women, who she respected and who had respected her. One was in. Sarah gave her the phone number she found in the Moe's file in Larkin's office. They chatted for a moment, pleasantries, then Sarah ended the call. The woman would call her back when she had identified the number.

Sarah then took the blank page from Larkin's notebook and put it flat on her desk. She took a pencil from her desk drawer, and, holding it almost sideways, shaded over the complete surface. In a moment, words were visible, photo negatively, write on grey.

Chuck Bartowski. Tall. Brown hair. Due to arrive on Thursday, Nov. 4. Flight originating in Burbank. Arrives Midway Airport. Reservations at the Blackmoor. Meeting with TA at GM on Friday afternoon.

So Larkin had been waiting for Chuck, and knew was coming. Larkin had been tailing him, as Sarah had already figured out.

But why? Was Accardo worried about meeting with Chuck? But why would Tony Accardo be worried about meeting with Chuck?

And why take the meeting at all? How did Chuck arrange it? She should have asked Chuck for the full story earlier, but she had been distracted in...various ways, some bad, some surpassingly good.

The phone rang, tintinnabulating.

It was the analyst from Langley. She reported, with a due degree of dread in her voice, that the number was Tony Accardo's private number, a number known to the CIA. She told Sarah to be careful, very careful, but she asked Sarah no questions. Sarah thanked her.

As Sarah put the phone down, Zondra came into the office. She shut the door behind her.

Sarah nonchalantly put the take-out bag on the floor behind her desk and then took a final bite of her lunch. After she swallowed, she looked up. "Ah, Agent Rizzo. Good afternoon."

Zondra frowned deeply. She stayed by the locked door.


"Good afternoon, Agent Walker."

Sarah's chest tightened but she calmly wiped the corners of her mouth with her napkin. "I'm sorry, Zondra, what did you call me?"

"CIA Special Agent Sarah Walker. We finally...beat...the right bush, and your name crawled out from beneath it. " Zondra stalked toward Sarah's desk. "So, we now know who, and what, we are dealing with." Her index finger punched out the rhythm of her words, aimed right at Sarah.

"You must have beaten the wrong bush because I don't…"

"Stop. I know who you are, who you were. And I'll know more before the day ends. You never seemed like a hotel detective to me. Nothing like that Holbert — that's a hotel detective. And nothing like Devon," Zondra's voice softened a bit, "...a white knight in street clothes. No, you, Agent Walker, are something else, something much, much...darker. Does Casey know who he has working for him?"

Sarah held her expression bland. "And who is that?"

"The CIA's Ice Queen. Frigid. Cold, efficient, merciless, infiltrator, deep-cover op...a real ball-buster. — Or should I say a literal ball-buster? Our informant told me that guy still walks sideways when he walks at all." Zondra cocked an eyebrow and smiled, a challenging taunt.

Sarah kept herself reined in. "Okay, so you know about my past. How is that relevant to our present?"

"Well, it makes me wonder just what you were up to accepting a second coffee invitation from Bartowski. But mainly it makes me wonder what you are really up to. I've told Casey, and now I will tell you. The Palmer House is forbidden to investigate the Tomek murder. This is a federal investigation and you have been told to stay out of it. More than once, now."

Sarah was silent for a second or two. "I guess we both know something about being a bitch, huh, Agent? We've both had to climb a ladder built by men, for men, a ladder they won't let us climb unless we're wearing a short skirt. And even then, the topmost rungs are off-limits."

Zondra nodded. "I suppose we do. But my work is clean...upright; I shower at night and then I'm as clean and innocent as a newborn. Not you. What you do, did, that's...not clean, upright. Nothing washes that off. I know what infiltration and deep cover involve, Agent Walker...burning marks, 'seductions', lots of compromises — and compromising positions, ass-peddling…"

Sarah stood up, unable to check herself, the memory of Sadie fresh in her mind, the things she wanted to tell and dreaded telling Chuck fresh in her mind. "Look, Zondra, I was what I was. But I got out. Yes, I burned marks, I ran 'seductions' — but I never slept with marks, I never 'ass-peddled', as you mean it. I used...myself...to distract bad men, lure them into traps, but nothing more…I won't argue about the compromises. They drove me out, but I will argue about the compromising positions...the insinuation that I was a...working girl with a CIA badge…"

Zondra backed up a step. "I just wanted to know what I was up against, how far you were, are, willing to go for the job. How far with Bartowski."

"I've told you, Zondra. Two coffees."

"Yes, you've told me. But that was before I knew you were a professional...liar. I'm onto you now, Agent Walker. You're mixed up in this in some way. Maybe just because Casey fears the good name of the Palmer House getting muddied somehow. But I am onto you now. We're watching you."

Sarah came out from behind the desk. She stood very close to Zondra and Sarah took off her glasses. "Then we understand each other. I am going to do my job. You do yours. And, speaking of which, why the nasty handling of Ellie Mills? Devon saw her last night after your little get-to-know-you session, and she was in a bad way. It bothered Devon."

Bullseye. Sarah saw Zondra blink, her lips pressed together. "I...There's evidence that links her to Maria Tomek. I was just doing my job. I'll explain that to Devon when he comes in tonight." Zondra took hold of herself. "Listen, Sarah, the charade is done. I know what you are."

Sarah let that go and continued to hold Zondra's eyes. "How long have you been partners with Lakoff?"

Zondra's eyes clouded. She had not expected that. "Why do you ask?"

"You two aren't the only ones who can beat the bushes."

Zondra's lips remained closed but her jaw was working. "Cheap tactic, Sarah. Lakoff's not been my partner long, but he's a lifelong agent. A good one."

Sarah shrugged. "Maybe. But, as you keep insisting, I've spent a lot of time in the dark. I've got an eye for shadows."

"Jesus, Walker. I guess there really isn't anything that's off-limits for a spy."

Zondra walked to the door and unlocked it. "Stay away from Ellie Mills, Sarah. And stay away from everyone else and anything else connected to this case. Or I'll take you out of the hotel, march you through the damn lobby with full fanfare, cuffed."

Zondra left Sarah standing in the office, Sarah's stomach filled with the old, low-grade nausea that she had carried around while still in the CIA.

The situation had gotten better (Casey) and worse (Zondra) in just a short time. But the real cause of her nausea was the thought of telling Chuck all that she had been, done. Zondra had brought it all back up, like bile.


Despite Zondra's visit, perhaps a little because of it, Sarah took the stairs up to the eighth floor, carrying the to-go bag. She cracked the stairwell door and then softly shut it as an elderly couple made their way from their room to the elevator. Then Sarah entered the hallway and stopped at Ellie's door. She listened but heard nothing. She knocked.

Devon answered the door. He blushed when he saw Sarah. "Hey, Sarah. I came in early. I wanted to see how Ellie, Eleanor, was doing." He suddenly seemed aware of the situation and glanced down the hallway. "Sorry," he whispered, "come in."

Sarah walked in. Ellie was seated on one end of her couch. The door to the bedroom was open, the bed made. Ellie looked up at Sarah with worry on her face. "Is Chuck okay?"

"Yes, Ellie. I just wanted to stop by to see you. I have some food here for Chuck."

Devon spoke. "If you want, Sarah, I can make the climb, take it to Chuck."

"Okay," Sarah said, watching the grateful look form on Ellie's face as Ellie looked at Devon, "that'd be great. Take the elevator up part of the way and climb from there. I know your knee isn't great on the stairs."

Devon looked embarrassed but nodded. He took the bag from Sarah and, after checking, he left the room.

Ellie watched him go. "He's...so nice, Sarah. We were just chatting a bit before you came in. Turns out we both want to be doctors. He's smart, isn't he?"

"Yes, he is. Everyone categorizes him as a jock, but he's not really, for all that he once was a gifted football player."

Ellie's eyes sparkled for a moment. "He was? Wait, is that why you mentioned his knee?"

"He didn't tell you? He was a star linebacker for Illinois, people compared him to Dick Butkus…"

"Who?"

"A truly great professional linebacker for the Chicago Bears. He went to Illinois too. Devon was supposed to be the next great middle linebacker when he blew out his knee. He hasn't ever said this to me in so many words, but I think he was so disappointed by the injury, the lost career, that he dropped out of school for a while. He's back now, at UIC. But it took him a while to let that dream die."

Ellie blinked. "There are all kinds of loss, aren't there?"

Sarah's nausea tugged at her. "Yes, Ellie, there are. — I've been putting off telling you something, but I have to tell you now, Ellie."

Ellie turned away from the door — she had been gazing absently at it — and returned her attention to Sarah. She looked immediately worried. "What?"

"Yesterday, I snuck into the FBI's room on the ninth floor. I looked at the desk and I found a Xerox of a letter."

Ellie's brow knitted in confusion. "A letter? What's that have to do with me?"

"It was from Aidan, Aidan Mills, to Maria Tomek."

The color drained from Ellie's face. "Are you sure?"

"Yes."

"Was there a date?"

"No, and I got interrupted; I didn't get to read the letter. Just the greeting and the closing."

Ellie sat still and quiet. Sarah stood and waited.

"Was it...a love letter?"

"I don't know, Ellie. Maybe, I just don't know. But Aidan never mentioned her to you?"

"No, he never did. But I knew so little about his past, especially before he came to LA. Do you think it might have been a letter written before he knew me? Maybe she was an old girlfriend?"

"I don't know. It was a Xerox, so I couldn't tell anything about the age of the original. I'm going to try to get back in there soon and read the letter. But Agent Rizzo now knows about my CIA...background, and she's going to start to take precautions against me, I fear."

"Does she suspect...you and Chuck?"

"No, not much, anyway. She certainly doesn't suspect he's here. But she suspects, knows, that I have been following up on the case, that Casey told me too. She's threatened me if she finds me following it up again."

"I'm sorry, Sarah. We're all in such an awful bind."

"I'm not sorry, Ellie. Your brother, he...I...you see...He's worth it...to me."

Some color returned to Ellie's face and she smiled. "Thanks, Sarah. That's always how I felt. Taking him on after our parents died, being unable to live the normal life of a girl my age, it was a sacrifice, sure, but I never regretted it. Although, I suppose the loss of those years probably had something to do with my first, delinquent summer with Aidan. Catching up on my wild-oat sowing, or something equally ridiculous and self-indulgent…"

"As you said, Ellie, there are all sorts of loss. Losing your childhood, or part of it...That's a hard thing."

Ellie looked closely at Sarah but did not ask the question Sarah could see in her eyes. "So, what now?"

"I've got things to do, things I need Chuck to do. I'm sorry to have told you about that letter, Ellie, but I didn't want to keep it from you. I'll try to figure it out as soon as I can."

Ellie nodded thoughtfully. "If you see Devon, thank him for thinking of me and stopping by."


Sarah took the stairs quickly to the third floor. She wanted to find the tape recorder and get it, unseen, to 2022. She was headed to the storage room when she ran into Louisa Murdoch.

"Hi, Miss Walker," Louisa said, not holding Sarah's gaze.

"I thought you weren't going to make it in today, Louisa. That's what Morgan told me."

"I wasn't. My husband's sick. It's a mess. We need both jobs to make it, but he's been so sick I've had to stay home to nurse him. But I was...able to get some help today, so I picked up an afternoon shift."

"Some help? A relative."

"Um...Yes, yeah, a cousin of mine who had the day off."

"Well, I hope he feels better, Louisa, your husband."

"Thanks, Miss Walker."

Louisa pushed her cart onto the elevator with a heavy stride. She was going down. Sarah watched her for a second, thinking. Then she went to the storage room.

She found the tape recorder easily enough, making sure that it had audiotape and that the cord was with it. She went to the housekeepers' room and grabbed an empty cart. She pushed it to the storage room door, then put the tape recorder on the cart, draping a pillowcase over it. She pushed the cart to the elevator and pushed the button. She stepped to the side as the doors opened. She peeked around; no one was on the elevator. She pushed the cart on and pushed the button for the twentieth floor.


Sarah had made her visit with Chuck all about business. Almost. There had been some frantic kissing after she arrived and before she left.

But in between, she read over the 'transcript' Chuck prepared and marked sections for him to read and record. They talked about whether there had been any music or ambient noise in the Green Mill when Chuck talked to Accardo; there hadn't been any. She left Chuck to make the recording.

She left with her low-grade nausea still lingering, nagging. She had started to say something to Chuck, but she had not been able to follow through. Zondra's words kept ringing in her ears, 'dark', 'not clean', 'not upright'. It would have been one thing if Sarah could treat the words as false. But while she might not mean them of herself as Zondra had, Sarah did not think of the words as false. They were too true in their way.

The words had chased her from the CIA, or at least they had dogged her footsteps as she left Langley. She thought she had left them behind when she got to Chicago, and she had, at least to the extent that she no longer actively heard them as she had before. But she now knew that they had still been behind her: she had missed the significance of much that had happened to her since she blew into the Windy City.

She had missed that she had made friends. Carina, first and foremost, Velma, Morgan, Devon, Casey. They did not just work with her, calculate how she could be of use to them. They cared about her. Carina, especially. The distance between them, a distance Sarah attributed to Carina and her roller derby friendship, had been more on Sarah's side than on Carina's. Sarah had no more experience at having friends than at having a boyfriend.

But somehow Chuck had broken the spell cast by the words that had been following Sarah. She had left Langley behind, and her badge, but not the form of life that she had inherited from her father and that had been more deeply ingrained at the Farm and during her years as an agent. You can take the girl from the Farm, but you can't take the Farm from the girl. Unless you are Chuck Bartowski. Still, she needed to tell him. The final exorcism of Joad, the CIA, the Farm. But would Chuck still want her when he really knew her?

She made herself put the question aside.

She would have faith in Chuck about this, as she had about Maria Tomek. But her faith in him could not still her doubt in herself, or keep her from shrinking at the thought of telling him.


Sarah met Carina at Patel's late in the afternoon, in the early darkness.

They ate, mostly unmolested by Lester, who was heading home as they arrived, and then they walked to the "L".

It was snowing again and the temperature had dropped sharply. The frozen city flashed by the windows, parts of it lit by streetlights, others sunk in the winter gloom.

Sarah told Carina about all that was going on. Carina was disappointed that her gift had not yet been shared with Chuck, the red lingerie. But she got a special delight from Sarah's embarrassment in admitting both that she had not worn it yet and that she was so eager to wear it.

They both grew more serious as they neared their apartment building.


Once Sarah and Carina were on the stairs leading up to their third-floor apartment, and the heavy wooden door closed, choking off the freezing wind, Sarah took out the S&W 60, its stainless steel gleaming in the fluorescent light.

"God, Sarah, where'd you get that thing? I thought the one you owned was, like, black, not silver, or stainless steel, or whatever that is...The Woman with the Silver Gun."

Sarah gave Carina a hard look. "What?"

"You know, the Ian Fleming Bond novel, The Man with the Golden Gun. They've been serializing it in Playboy."

Sarah laughed quietly. "Funny you would mention that magazine. I didn't know you read that?"

Carina gave a slight shrug. "I don't — normally. But there're copies around in the break room at the Green Mill, and sometimes, when I have my coffee, I sit back there to give my legs and my bottom a break from non-stop eyeing."

Sarah started quietly up the stairs, stopping after a few to whisper to Carina: "Doesn't that strike you as weird, to take a break from being ogled to read a magazine devoted to ogling?"

Carina gave Sarah a sigh, then whispered back. "The print content is very good. Intelligent."

"Isn't that a little like lifting your from eyes from her body to say, 'But I also appreciate her mind'?"

"Again, God, Sarah," Carina said softly. "What's got you in this mood, other than our apartment having been burglarized?"

"To answer your earlier question, I stole this gun from Bryce Larkin's office. From a drawer in the outer office file cabinet in which he kept this gun, bullets, cameras and film, and a box of condoms. Does that strike you as...revelatory?"

"All the...tools...of his trade. — The tool."

"Exactly. And in the inner office, his office, in his desk, was a gold Playboy lighter. — Maybe you and Larkin could get together to smoke, drink coffee and trade intelligent banter about the magazine's print content." Sarah punctuated the remark with a soft giggle.

Carina rolled her eyes so hard that the rolling was almost audible. "Lord, falling for Chuck is doing things to you, Sarah. And I think I like them."

"Okay, enough. Be quiet. Let me go first. Stay in the hallway 'til I tell you to come in the apartment."

Carina's face sobered. She nodded one time and Sarah started up the steps again. Once on the landing, she motioned, redundantly, for Carina to be quiet, to wait.

Sarah put her key in the door and turned it slowly. She pushed the door inward. The apartment was dark. She reached in and turned on the hallway light. There were coats on the floor but nothing looked worrisome otherwise. Keeping the gun ahead of her, Sarah went in. She walked to the entrance of the kitchen. Light from the hallway lit it adequately. Drawers were open. A pan was on the floor.

Sarah passed the stand with the phone and pushed open the door of her room. The bed was a mess, the mattress crooked on the box springs. Her nightstand's top drawer was open. Her gun. She stepped inside and looked. Her gun was still there, where she had left it Saturday. She went back and turned on the light so that she could see clearly. She scanned her room, blinking in the bright light. Her closet door was open, some of her clothes on the floor. Her dresser drawers were askew.

And then she saw it. In the middle of her bed among the lumpy, irregular mounds of covers: the sheet of paper from her notebook, the one with Chuck's name doodled in the corner. Shit. Clearly Larkin had figured out that she was the 'S' from the note to 'C', that the phone number was hers. He — or someone — had come to the apartment hoping to find Chuck or something that would lead to Chuck.

The note, the 'S' and 'C' note, was on Palmer House stationary. She had known that from the beginning; Chuck had registered there as a guest; Larkin knew that. The sheet from her notebook was not on Palmer House stationery, but the notes she had made, guest names, room numbers, observations, would suggest a hotel. Larkin perhaps now knew that Sarah worked there. Worked there...

She fought back panic. The intruder had been in the apartment in the morning. No one had shown up at the hotel all day.

And then panic gripped her and she could not fight it back.

Louisa. Why was she there? She had called in. Her sick husband. But she came to work. Money problems. A cousin. Louisa knew Sarah worked there. And who better to search the hotel than a hotel maid? Larkin couldn't do it himself, not without drawing attention. But Louisa...

Oh, no. Oh, no. Sarah ran to Carina's room and checked it. Empty. She ran out to the landing. "Carina, it's clear. Go inside. Prop a chair against the door and call the super in the morning. I have to go back to the Palmer House."

Carina registered Sarah's panic. "Chuck?"

"They've guessed I've hidden him there, and they've got someone looking."

There was no reason for Louisa to check 2022 in particular. There were so many rooms. Still…


Sarah shivered as she stepped outside. Then she felt the barrel of a gun pushed into her back. A voice she did not recognize growled in her ear. "The green car on the curb. Get inside. Now! Move!"

The man was standing to her side. The passenger window of the green car was down, a gun pointed at her from inside it. The rear door of the car was open. She felt the barrel push her forward.


A/N: We are in the middle of the second arc.

Hotel Detective may end here. Reviews are down. I came here to write for reaction — not validation — those are two different things. Given that I wanted reaction, and wanted to figure out what works and what does not, there's no reason to write when I can gauge virtually nothing of my reader's reactions.

So, I am going to step away from the story for a few days and decide whether it is worth continuing. And don't give me nonsense about writing for the pure joy of it or out of selfless devotion to the craft. I have plenty of writing projects going on, almost any of which would benefit from the time I am giving this, so I am as devoted to the craft as ever, even if I take this story down.

If the story's no good, it's no good. I certainly knew it was risky. A different pace, a large cast of characters, a twisting plot.

Thoughts?