lt_safe_house | Unexpected company

Entry tags:

Unexpected company

Date: June 11th, morning
Location: In front of the manor
Status: Public
Summary: Two mystery guests appear.

A car pulled up in front of the manor and swerved neatly into a free parking space. After a moment, the front doors opened, and two men got out. Both were tall and lean, but any semblance between them ended there. Where one of them wore his blonde hair cropped short, the other, a dark-skinned, dark-eyed fellow looking a good fifteen years younger than his fair-complexioned companion, sported an unruly mane of black curls, hardly tamed by a loose tie at the nape of his neck. The former wore the suit to match his well-groomed appearance, the second made do with worn jeans and a sleeveless shirt.

The dark one walked around the car to stand with the driver.

"It's out of the way enough to check, I guess," he mused.

"It's too far," the other replied. "He never could have made it this far."

The dark one snorted. "You've no idea what a man can do if he sets his mind to it."

"Not after I'm through with him," the other told him.

That made his companin grin. "Point being," he said, "you weren't through with him yet or he wouldn've have gotten away. Now let's get going."

They started ambling towards the house.

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Rose was jogging back to the manor after a wonderful morning run - complete with a small chase and a tasty rat for breakfast - when she saw two strangers afoot and one in a car. The two afoot seemed rather mismatched in their whole attire, was the first thing she saw. Then the morning breeze carried their scents with it, or rather their scent. For people who looked so different they smelled remarkably alike. Somehow clean without the additions many humans preferred, like deodorants or aftershaves or perfumes, but with a whiff of something like herbs or spices and.. Blood. Old blood, dried, faint, probably already washed off. But most definitely blood.

That made Rose slow her steps remarkably, her brow furrowed. Two strange men smelling of blood didn't really sound like good news to her. But still, not talking to these men wouldn't bring any answers as to who they were or what they wanted.

She walked slowly closer, keeping an eye on all three men so she wouldn't miss any sudden movements or one of them drawing a weapon.

"Good morning, sirs."

The men turned towards the approaching girl as one.

"Good day, Miss," the dark one said. He smiled at her in a fashion that made him seem younger than he was.

Indicating the manor with a gesture, he asked: "Are you a resident here?"

Seemed those guys didn't just smell alike, they also moved as one. Strange. And maybe someone should tell two-leggers some day that baring teeth was not the most reassuring gesture, no matter what they might think...

"Well, yes, I live and work here. Why, are you looking for a room?"

Not that she was all that keen on having these people live here, but it was a hotel after all.

She worked here? She had to be older than she looked, then. But all the better.

The dark one continued to speak. "Not precisely," he said. "But a colleague of ours may have come through recently. We lost all contact with him, so now we're trying the places where he may have stopped to rest. Would you know who to talk to about that?"

No, nobody smelling of old blood came through recently...

As she couldn't say that out loud she settled on

"Yes. Me or my superior, Mrs. Hodges. I don't know where Mrs. Hodges is right now as I have the morning shift today, but if you tell me the name of your colleague I might be able to help you. If he checked in while I was on free time his name would be in the books."

"Let's go inside then," the man suggested, waving his hand vaguely towards the door.

She had to be a good deal older than she looked if she was doing reception desk duty.

He took a few slow steps towards the manor to see if she would take the lead, given the chance. His driver fell in behind him.

Jan came out of the manor on the way to his morning shooting practise and instead of the peaceful morning landscape he was used to his eyes fell on two strangers and Miss Heerkens.

New guests most likely, he told himself, but somehow he felt uneasy leaving the girl alone with them. It was an unreasonable reaction, of course, but it couldn't hurt to hang around and get to know them. If they were harmless gentlemen, it was merely friendly and if they weren't, his presence would surely keep them from molesting Miss Heerkens.

"Good Morning," he called out to the group.

"Good morning, Sir," the dark one of them returned, while his companion hung back mutely. Wonderful. There was the first one of them to talk to, even though they would have to go inside with the girl first, at least to keep up appearances. He did not really believe that their quarry had properly checked in here.

He held out a hand for the man to shake. A design on three interlocked triangles was tattooed in black into the dark skin on the outside of his forearm.

A hint of a copy of the same design could be seen where his neck met his shoulder, as he shook back the hair hanging loose by the side of his face.

"Good morning, Mr. Skovasja!"

Rose smiled at the man and waited for him to greet the newcomers so they could all go inside. When the darkhaired one held out his hand to Mr. Skovasja she noticed the strange design on his forearm. What was it that made humans want someone to push needles and paint into their skin? And he seemed to have a tattoo on his neck or shoulder as well, which would have been painful to get. Humans were strange creatures...

The sight of the tattoo confirmed Jan in his decision to stick around in case Miss Heerkens needed protection. Of course he knew that jail wasn't the only place one could get a tattoo - just look at Benjamin and his secret society of stalkers - but it was suspicious. At least this man had picked a wiser place for it.

He smiled and took the man's hand, though.

"I'm Jan Skovasja," he introduced himself.

The man gave Jan's hand one firm shake, then released it.

"Nice to meet you, Mr. Skovasja," he said. "My name is Elias Greenwood. This is Joseph Murray. We're looking for a friend who may have spent a night or two here a little while ago."

He smiled amicably.

"The young lady here was just taking us to check the log."

"Yes, shall we then? What's the name of your friend?"

Rose started to walk to the front door to hold it open for the newcomers but then turned around again to say

"Oh, and my name is Rose Heerkens by the way"

She would have preferred to keep her family name out of it, but just saying her first name would have been strange. Not to mention that these men hadn't given her a reason yet to want to hide her name. Besides smelling of old blood...

The two fell into step behind her, alert enough not to run into her when she stopped again.

"Martin Cole," Greenwood informed her. "He may have been going by a different name, though."

He smiled at the girl. "Are you Dutch?"

Jan followed the group inside, still smiling, but watching them intently.

Rose shivered minutely and hoped nobody had seen it. That name she remembered. And she remembered the blood and Raphael's desperation and the way the man had died despite their attempts at saving him. She also remembered Atlan checking the man's identity. She didn't like the fact that these men were asking for the man now, smelling of old blood...

"Well, I'm quite sure we don't currently have a guest of that name nor had one recently but I'll check. And no, I'm not Dutch. But my ancestors were."

She was glad her voice came out steady and calm and went to the reception desk to 'check' the books, knowing full well the name wouldn't be in there.

"You said he would have passed through 'recently'; how far back in the books should I go?"

The name meant nothing to Jan, but he hoped that the strangers would leave peacefully now that they knew the man wasn't here.

"Try around 20 May," Greenwood suggested. "A couple days, give or take. It would have been around that time."

He considered for a moment.

"Of course he may have used a different name. He's not precisely this side of the law, you know."

Rose went to leaf through the reservations and registered guests, mumbling

"Cole, Cole, Cole... no, there's no Cole in here. Neither a Martin nor any other first name. Does your friend have a specific second name he likes to use? Or could you describe him?"

"May I see the entries for those dates?" the man asked, holding out a hand for the book already.

Rose didn't intend to hand the book over. These were no guests and she didn't know them and they made her uneasy, so she wouldn't let them read through their guests' personal information. She still smiled in a friendly way

"There isn't much to see, we only had three new guests in that time span, one of them a woman. Adam Pierson arrived on May 18th, and Anubis Delta on May 23rd. Do those names ring a bell?"

They looked at each other. None of the names were known aliases of the man they were looking for.

Anubis Delta sounded strange enough to maybe be a cover name of the 'too weird to be made up' kind. Adam Pierson sounded nicely nondescript - just the kind of thing one might use for a cover. The date was too early, though. On 18th May, Cole had still been happily part of their little organisation. But if he had managed to somehow fake the entry, change the date... They shouldn't take the risk.

"Can we talk to those two?" he finally asked. "I mean, are they still in residence,and if not, do you have any kind of contact information ... maybe for unpaid bills or to send forgotten objects to?"

Contact informaton? Surely Mis Heerkens wasn't authorised to give that to complete strangers.

Jan took a step closer to the counter so he could step in before they reached the girl in case they got agressive and slipped his hand into the pocket that held his gun.

"None of them checked out yet, so I'd say they are still here. If you tell me where they can find you, I'll leave both of them a note to please contact you."

She had no intention of telling these people where to find residents of the manor. It would be the choice of Mr. Pierson and Mr. Delta whether they wanted to talk to these men.

If this solution was not what the two had been hoping for, it registered in their demeanor only for the most fleeting of moments, replaced in an instant by carefully relaxed ease.

"Sure," the more talkative of the two said. "That would be wonderful."

He indicated a stack of post it's on the desk. "May I?"

Rose handed the post it's and a pen over, smiling.

"Sure."

He wrote down his cell phone number in neat print.

"I think it's easiest for everyone if we take rooms here," he suggested as he handed it back. "If you don't mind."

Rose took the post it with the number and smiled at the men.

"I don't mind at all. We have three different types of rooms here. The rooms on the first floor each have a king-size bed and a bathroom with bathtub. On the second floor are rooms with a single bed and a bathroom with bathtub. And the rooms on the third floor have a single bed as well and a bathroom with a shower. What type of room would you prefer?"

"I will have one of the large ones," Greenwood said. "Do you have any that have a smaller room attached for my driver?"

He gestured at his companion.

They were going to stay? For some reason Jan didn't like this. Of course it was ridiculous. After all they were obviously only looking for that Mr. Cole, but he still felt that they were a threat to innocent young Miss Heerkens.

"I'm sorry, but we do not have connected rooms. Would you like one of the smaller upstairs rooms for your driver then?"

Rose was already checking, which of the big rooms were still available. She was even considering putting the man in one of the rooms furthest from the other guests.

"I guess I will take two adjacent rooms then," the man said. "I really want him nearby, just in case. I will pay a week in advance."

"Two adjacent rooms it is, sir."

Rose took two check-in forms and handed them over along with two pens.

"Please fill these in. Rooms 124 and 123 are free. They are identically equipped, but room 124 is closer to the stairs. Just put the number of the room you choose on the form so staff knows where to find you."

Jan watched this a little nervously. What should he do, if Miss Heerkens went upstairs with these two to show them the rooms? He had no excuse to follow them, but didn't feel it would be right to stay behind either. Who knew what they might do once they were alone with her?

The two quickly completed their forms and handed them back to the girl, waiting expectantly for their keys.

Rose quickly checked the forms for completeness, filed them away with the others' forms and got the two keys.

"Would you like me to show you to your rooms?" she inquired.

"Yes, please," the one who had done all of the talking said before he nodded to Jan. "I trust we'll se eoyu around."

"Most likely," Jan agreed. "I am almost always around."

He hoped that Miss Herkens understood that he meant that he would remain close enough to be by her side in a moment should she scream.

"Very well," the man said before turning back to the girl. "Shall we?"

Rose put a sign on her desk that said she'd be back in a few minutes and then smiled at the new guests.

"Alright, please follow me."

With a smile to Mr. Skovasja she lead the way upstairs to rooms 124 and 123 and, once there, held out both keys.

"These are your rooms and the matching keys. On the inside handle of the door there's a sign. One side is 'do not disturb', the other signals to staff that you would like your room cleaned. If you only want part of the room cleaned, please put a note with the sign or place the note clearly visible on the table or bed.

Do you have any questions?"

"No. Thank you," the man said. "That will be fine. We will contact you if we have any furhter questions."

"Alright, have a nice stay and you know where to find me in case some question arises."

Rose then turned around to return to the reception desk.

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