2019-09-08 - The No Tell Hotel

The hotel on the edge of town isn't fancy, but it also isn't terrible. It's just cheap enough for a long-term stay for those who are waiting to find a home or apartment, or just there for a few weeks of business. The amenities are slim, but there is a lounge with a bar, which serves drinks and appetizer type things in the evenings.

At the bar sits a new face in town. One that some of the residents got to see a whole lot more of last night at the Platinum Cabaret. Echo, as she was called on stage, is seated at the bar. She's wearing a 50's style, vintage-feeling dress, black fabric bearing white polkadots, and a collar with the colors reversed. There are black silk stockings beneath, and high-heeled mary-janes on her feet. She's not hard to spot, as one of the few people in there. Her black hair is in the same blunt-banged bob as last night, so it may be her actual hair. She sips a sidecar in a sugar rimmed glass and watches the television above the bar with vacant eyes.

Some shitty sports that nobody at the bar, including the 'tender, cares about. Perhaps especially the 'tender, since he's forced to listen to this tripe night after night. "Have a seat," he tells the guy who prowls on in from the lobby, eyeing the liquor rack behind the bar. "Anywhere you like. Need a menu?"

"No, thanks. Just tequila, if it's decent." Older fellow, bit of a weathered face half obscured in salt-and-pepper beard, baseball cap tugged over dark eyes. He's attired in a faded tee shirt and dark cargo pants and plenty of ink. Might be familiar from the other night, the Mexican at the railing who 'helped' her with her routine. He slides into a seat two down from Roxy, cell phone out. Eyes on the screen, then eyes on her profile.

When the stool a few down is taken, Roxy turns her head his way, in a quick glance, that winds up lingering. She recognizes him. She's got a good memory for faces, and for tattoos. When the tender moves off to pour his tequila she pauses a long moment, and then asks, "You were at the Cabaret the other night, were you not?"

Her lips are painted a more natural blush tone, rather than the blood red during her performance. Her makeup is much lighter as well, which still doesn't seem to turn down the wattage of her bright blue eyes. Still that Scandinavian shade of pale for her skintone though. And her accent seems to back her heritage, as does the too precise, too formal choice of words. Not a native English speaker.

The man who's joined her at the bar is also clearly not from around here. Swarthy skin that's tanned fairly heavily with the hot summer they've had, and foreign-looking features that match his accent; some flavour of Spanish, all soft, rounded consonants and smoky warmth. "Mm. I was." The corners of his eyes crease slightly as he studies her, though one couldn't quite accuse it of being a smile. "The ballerina. Yes?" His drink is slid in front of him, and he looks away for a moment, lifts it to his mouth for a sip and a swallow. "You were very good," he tacks on, thumb brushing his lower lip as a trickle of liquor tries to escape.

"Yes, the ballerina." There is just the slightest shadow that crosses Roxy's features as she says that word. She curls her hands around her fancy drink. "Thank you for your good sportsmanship during my routine. I do not always get the correct reaction," she notes, with a faint twitch of a smile. Her eyes move to her drink, stirring it with the plastic sword the tender impaled the orange slice on.

He probably didn't mean that literally. But it's the closest point of reference he has for what she was doing that night. "De nada," he replies after a little while longer of watching her. It's not really a leer, so much as a thoughtful cogitation. Like he's trying to place something about her; studying her mannerisms, the way she smiles and the odd turn of her speech. "I'm sorry. Javier." He shifts and offers his hand; the back of it is inked as well, up to the first knuckle on each finger.

The woman takes the offered hand to shake it. Nails done in a modest french manicure. No stripper talons here. Her jewelry is also modest. She looks more like a pin-up girl from the 40s than someone who would take all her clothes off at the Platinum Cabaret, but there she was, in just what God gave her, for the brief moment before the lights went down. "Roxanne. Most just call me Roxy, though I go by Echo on stage. Nice to meet you properly, Javier. I will be working at the Cabaret going forward. I apparently impressed the owner at amateur night."

Her hand is shaken once, firm though not overpowering. Then his grip lingers so he can turn it over to study her nails. Mental note made, and her hand is released with a faint smile. The name, perhaps, amuses him. "Roxanne. Like the song. I'm sure you never get that." His glass is tipped toward his mouth for a sip, though his dark eyes keep her in their peripheral vision at almost all times. Periodically, they rove away to take stock of those around them, then tick back again like he's on a timer. "Congratulations then," he offers. And a moment later, "I'm assuming that's not what brought you to town?"

"Like the character, in Cyrano de Bergerac. The play by Rostand, written in 1897," Roxy clarifies. She blinks at him a few times. "There is a song? Oh! The one from the Moulin Rouge movie?" She smiles but yikes, she's too young to know the Police song. She doesn't look much over the age of legal to consume that sidecar.

At the question about coming to town she shakes her head. "No, I didn't even know about the Cabaret until I saw the flyer for amateur night. I came here because," she trails off a moment, sipping her drink. "Javier, have you ever felt inexplicably drawn somewhere? Like something inside you required and compelled you to go there?"

"Yes." He actually laughs at that, and nudges his glass away with the tips of his fingers. "Roxane. La précieuse. Of course." He doesn't look like the sort of man to know which way to hold a book, much less be familiar with Edmond Rostand. Though he might just be studying the girl's profile while she speaks, and making a few conclusions of his own in regards to her age. Her question, thusly, catches him a little off guard.

Have you ever felt inexplicably drawn somewhere?

Yes. "No, I'm.." Yes. "Not too sure what you mean by that." Yes. He sips his drink, adjusts the brim of his cap. It makes his eyes a little hard to catch, but he seems disinclined to remove it.

"Then I am not sure I can explain in a way you might understand," Roxy says with a small frown. It seems like a crime for it to exist on her face. Despite her profession, her face has that look of innocence to it. It's likely a good part of the appeal to people who watch her perform. The good girl gone naughty is a draw for many. Like that whole sexy librarian thing.

"For two years now I have felt like I needed to head this way, towards the coast of Washington. It was like a notion, that became an itch, then became a flame, then a pain unless I was making progress in this direction. Silly, I know." She waves a hand dismissively and sips her drink. "But it is what it is and has been since I got out of..." she doesn't finish that. Too much information.

He listens, and by the time she's done, so is his drink. He makes eye contact with the 'tender at some point, who bustles behind the bar to pour him another. The cop's been staying here long enough now that his proclivities are starting to become known by the staff. "I don't think it's silly," he offers at length, unperturbed by her frown. And then, "Got out of what?"

Roxy's shoulders tighten up, barely perceptibly, but noticeable to a cop. "A hospital, of sorts," she murmurs. She continues to play with the plastic sword in the glass. "Not something I like to talk about," she adds, as if hoping to dissuade him from pursuing that line of questioning. "What about you? What brought you to this metropolis of, well, not very much, known as Gray Harbor?"

The guy next to her appears to be keeping it casual, when she mentions a hospital. No shift in his demeanor; just his tonguetip pressed briefly against the inside of his cheek, then a flickered smile to the bartender when a fresh drink is set down for him. "Work," he tells her flatly, in answer to her question. His thumb traces the rim of his glass, then it's collected into his hand, and sipped from. "This place pulls a lot of people in. Como polillas a una llama."

Roxy listens to him attentively, but she seems lost at the Spanish. "Are you a fisherman?" she asks curiously. Because that is the only work she can think of that might bring someone to a small town in Washington. People don't come to Gray Harbor for work, they work in Gray Harbor to get out. At least that is what the former ballerina sees as the plague of small towns.

"There were many fishermen where I grew up," she says with a wistful smile. "We were surrounded by lakes."

It's not an entirely unreasonable guess. Of all the ink he sports - two full sleeves at the very least, plus whatever's hiding under his clothing - the roiling waves decorating his right arm are amongst the most detailed. A fishing trawler struggles to stay afloat atop them, and there is at least one stylized fish detailing the back of his hand. "No," he replies, chuckling soft. "Not a fisherman." The contents of his glass are swirled and sipped from, dark eyes slipping briefly to the tv screen and then back down again. "Where was that?" Surrounded by lakes.

In sharp contrast to the tattooed man, Roxy's skin is unmarred by either tattoos or piercings. He saw as much at the Cabaret. She seems surprised he is not a fisherman, but his reticence to tell her what he does is noted, and she stops questioning him on that subject. At the question of where she was born, she says softly, "A small town in Finland. Nothing you would have heard of. Very beautiful though. I remember skating on one of the lakes in the wintertime as a small girl."

He saw as much, indeed. He saw a lot. Maybe he's thinking about it while he sits there nursing his drink, or maybe his mind is somewhere else entirely; the cop's expression gives away little. "Finland? No. Never been there." Not much of a conversationalist, this one. He's silent for a while, and it may seem he's lost interest in her entirely, when a question surfaces out of the blue: "Did you dance much, over there? Seem like you've got training. There's a company in Helsinki.." His brows knit like he's trying to remember the name.

The mention of Helsinki gets a slight flinch from Roxy, that likely gives him his truthful answer. But her lips bring forth the lie. "I danced a little." How does one explain her situation without getting authorities called on her to get her deported to...well nowhere, as she doesn't seem to have a solid identity. "Helsinki is the Finnish capital, so yes, they have a ballet company." A non-answer.

"I'm sorry," she says suddenly. "I do not like to talk about Finland. I have not been there in a long time." She pushes her half-finished drink away and folds her hands in her lap.

"Mm." That's the sound he makes, to her I danced a little. Does he buy it? Probably not. He's a veteran cop; he's made a career out of suspicion and paranoia. It's probably why he's still alive instead of ten feet under with two bullet holes in the back of his head. His smile, should she happen to look over, is wraithlike, and edged with wolfishness. "There seem to be a lot of things you don't like to talk about." His glass is lifted, hesitates at his mouth for a beat, and then drained.

Roxy pales a little at that wraith-like smile. That flash of wolfishness in him makes her feel suddenly like prey. She moves to place cash on the bar for her drink and a tip, and slides off the stool. "I'm sorry. It's been a long day and I should get some rest." Flee little doe, flee. But politeness dictates she say a proper goodbye. "It was nice seeing you again, Javier."

A decent man might look chastised at the effect he's had on her. Apologetic, maybe. Don't leave, I'm sorry, I'll buy you a drink. But Javier only smiles more when the girl makes to flee. There's a flicker of it in his eyes; the desire to hunt her down and bring her to ground. But all he does is collect the bill she left on the bar and hand it back to her. And if she accepts, he digs for his wallet and tosses a couple of crumpled bills down to pay for both of them. "I'll walk you up," isn't a question, an offer or a request.

Roxy is stilled by the return of her money and the non-request. There is a slight tremble in her fingers when the bills are passed to her. She opens her mouth to protest, to tell him she can cover her drink, to tell him she can make it to her room safely alone, but something in his expression throttles the words in her throat. She is frozen, like a frightened creature with the headlights of a vehicle baring down on them.

The cop leans in slightly, not improprietously close. Just enough to make it clear he's addressing her, and not the bartender who seems to have taken an idle interest in the pair, what with the look on the much younger woman's face. "You aren't safe in this town. I know you might think that you are. But you're not." He's not smiling; those words seem sincere. Though whether that threat is from elsewhere, or from him..

"I'll walk you up," he says again, and climbs to his feet. He moves like he talks; slow and constrained, like he might be given to brutality in the blink of an eye. A hand is lifted, indicating for her to go first.

The whisper sends chills racing down Roxy's spine, pooling cold fear in her belly. She's not safe anywhere, but to have it spoken aloud seems to cement it as fact, rather than an idle worry. At his gesture she clutches her little purse in her hands and heads for the exit of the lounge, to the elevator, and presses the button. She swallows as they wait for the car to arrive. "This really isn't necessary," she states, afraid to look at him again and see what is behind his eyes.

He follows perhaps a pace or two behind her and off to the right. Positioned such that she won't notice him scanning the hallway they enter to get to the elevator. Or checking the exits. Or combing the shadows, or noting the angle of security cameras as if to make sure they aren't being watched. He lurks to one side while they wait for the elevator, instead of breaching her personal space. And incongruously, his phone comes out so he can respond to a message. "I didn't ask for your opinion," is what he murmurs as the elevator pings its arrival. He holds the door, phone shoved away again.

His words again have Roxy flinching. When the doors open she steps inside, pressing the button for her floor with a shaking finger. "Who are you?" she asks quietly, eyes flitting quickly to him, then back to staring at the panel's buttons, focusing. "What do you want from me?"

"Javier." He watches her steadily, still no smile in sight, like, didn't we just go over this half an hour ago? "And I don't want anything from you, Roxanne. That's your name, right?" There's no tease in his voice. No slyness. He doesn't seem a man given to such games. He pushes off the wall of the elevator once they reach her floor - which also happens to be his - and again holds the doors for her, and lets her through after a visual check of the hallway.

Roxy frowns at the mention of her 'name'. She's beginning to suspect he thinks she is not who she says she is. "Yes, that is my name." Lie. When the elevator stops and he allows her out, she moves down the hall with rapid steps, digging in her purse for her keycard, as if she could outrun the man who is teetering somewhere between friendly and sinister.

Ruiz prowls along after her again, hands shoved this time into his pants pockets, dark eyes on the younger woman as she hurries on ahead. He doesn't seem to be in any sort of rush to catch up; it'll take her a moment to swipe the panel and get the door open, and by then he's drawing close enough to murmur without breaking stride, "Ten cuidado. Las sombras muerden."

And then he keeps moving, after coming within inches of touching her.

Roxy flings her door open moments after the warning from Ruiz in Spanish, not understanding a word of it. She closes and locks the door behind her, falling back against it with her heart pounding a rapid staccato beat in her chest. She slides down to the floor and wraps her arms around her shins, her head dropping to her knees, as she cries.