Stories from New York #3 (10 page)

“Okay,” I said. “I think you’re onto something, Tally. So what do we know about her?”

I was sitting on one of the desks, Buddha style. Tally perched on top of another, frowning in thought, and Miko was leaning next to her.

“She’s really young,” Whit said. “I know that. She hasn’t graduated from high school yet. She has to work with a tutor on set to keep up with classes. I read that in
Vanity Fair
.”

“I saw that article, too,” Ivy said. “It said she’s got such a crazy schedule she sometimes has to work seven days a week. She said something about never being able to be alone, not even for a second. Maybe she wanted to be by herself for a bit. What about that glassed-in courtyard behind the cafeteria? They’ve filled it with all these potted trees and flowers—it’s a really nice, quiet place.”

“It’s closed for three days. They’re replacing the skylight windows,” Whit said.

“Is there a big conference room or some place where they’d have important meetings? Where maybe there are nice chairs or a couch, somewhere she could just hole up and rest?” I asked.

“The executive conference room is like that,” Dakota said. “But that’s right between reception and Helvetica’s office. Constantia would have looked there first thing. She’s obsessed with that conference room.”

“Quincy is super into fashion,” Miko said. “I know that. She goes to the big shows at Fashion Week, and she’s always wearing the latest things. I once saw
an interview with her where she said she thought designers had the best job in the world.”

“Could she be on one of the floors in the building that aren’t
City Nation
’s?” I asked.

Dakota shook her head. “No, our elevators only go to
City Nation
floors. If you wanted to go to a different floor you’d have to go to the lobby and go to a separate elevator bank. She would have had to go past security, and I don’t think she could have done that.”

“Okay, wait,” Tally said suddenly. “Let’s get back to the fashion thing. She’s obsessed with clothes, and she’s at
City Nation
. Where would anybody into clothes want to go? I’m Quincy Vanderstan. Where do I want to go?”

Dakota snapped her fingers and pointed at Tally. “You’re absolutely right. That would be the very first place she’d want to go.”

“Oh, of course,” Miko exclaimed.

“You’ve lost me,” Whit said.

“The sample room!” Dakota and Miko said in unison.

“The sample room?” I asked.

“Totally,” Miko said. “Remember yesterday when Dakota was talking about the Louboutins coming in? There is this big room here, just like the one they have at
Vogue
and magazines like that, where designers
send over samples of pretty much everything. Dresses, coats, shoes, bags, hats, jewelry, formal gowns. If it’s in and it’s this year, there will be one in the sample room. But it’s not just stuff from
this
year. They’ve got vintage stuff, too. Chanel gowns, Pucci dresses. I’ve heard it’s like a museum in there.”

“That’s absolutely right,” Dakota said.

“Why do they have so much stuff?” Tally asked.

“Because
City Nation
’s fashion editor has a lot of influence,” Dakota said. “I mean, it’s not like
Vogue
or anything—they are the final word in fashion. But
City Nation
covers designers a lot, too. If some company or designer sends their latest thing over and
City Nation
ends up writing about it or including it in their ‘What’s Hot’ page or giving it any kind of shout-out, their sales will go through the roof. And every designer in New York wants that. So they all send stuff over.”

“Okay, but if that’s where all the stuff is kept, wouldn’t they have taken Quincy there, anyway? To get her stuff to wear for the photo shoot?” I asked.

“No, they wouldn’t!” Ivy said, suddenly excited. “There is always an art director in charge of the look of the photo shoot. They figure all that stuff out way in advance, and it can go back and forth for days. They pick things from the sample room that they think would look good for the shoot, and they
show them to Helvetica. She makes the final choices. Whatever she’s chosen is pulled from the sample room and brought up to the studio ahead of time. That’s one of those things Mom was talking about that has to be taken care of before the shoot.”

“That’s right,” Whit confirmed. “They don’t want people picking out stuff and telling the editors what they want to wear. The art director makes those choices for them. Though I’m sure they’d have brought her down there to have a look if she’d asked them.”

“Well, you can all sit here talking about it, but there’s only one way to find out,” Dakota said. “We go and see for ourselves.”

“We could just call Constantia, or your mom for that matter, and tell them what we think,” I said to Ivy.

“Now where would the fun be in that?” Dakota asked. “I thought the whole point was trying to figure this out for ourselves. I’m going to go look.”

“Well, wouldn’t someone have already thought of this and gone to look there?” I added.

“Maybe,” Dakota said. “But they haven’t found her. I’ve been in that sample room. There are plenty of places to hide if you don’t want to be seen. I think we should go and look for ourselves.”

It had seemed like a good idea before. But we were
guests at
City Nation
, and the only reason for that was Ivy’s mom. I didn’t want to do anything that might get us in trouble. But Ivy was nodding now, too.

“I agree. Plus, it isn’t just a question of finding Quincy. She was obviously upset about something. She’s not all that much older than we are. She might listen to us.”

“Well, the sample room is only two floors up,” Whit said. “Somebody could go and take a quick peek and see what they see. So the only question is, who goes?”

“
Me
,” Dakota said. “No one knows the building better than I do.”

“That’s true,” Ivy said.

“So you and Dakota go,” Whit said.

Dakota didn’t look thrilled with that idea, but she didn’t object. I was guessing she’d rather have Ivy with her than leave her with Whit.

“You come, too, Paulie,” Ivy said. “You’re great at thinking on your feet.”

I wasn’t so sure about that. But if Ivy wanted me with her, then I would go. She was my best friend, and I wasn’t going to let Dakota try to ruin our fun anymore.

“If you’re in, I’m in,” I told her, sounding much more confident than I felt.

“Okay, if we’re all done bonding now, we need to move,” Dakota said. “It’s quarter to ten now. Isn’t the whole point to try and get Quincy back to the studio before Helvetica arrives?”

“How will y’all know when Helvetica is back?” Tally asked.

“Oh, believe me.
Everyone
in the building knows, from Garamond to the people in the mail room,” Whit said.

We were about to get a priceless, uncensored view into the workings of
City Nation
magazine for
4 Girls
. Unfortunately, it was already obvious to me that for those same reasons, we wouldn’t be able to write a word about it.

Who will believe it, anyway?
I thought, getting up and joining Ivy and Dakota at the door. A secret mission to find an escaped movie star and return her to a photo shoot before Helvetica returned?

I wasn’t sure I believed it myself.

Ivy and I were both wearing rubber-soled flats, but Dakota had on a pair of towering heels that made a
clackety-clack
sound that echoed through the hall at a deafening level.

“What?” whispered Dakota.

Ivy pointed at her shoes.

Dakota made a face. “You have got to be kidding me,” she said. But Ivy just shook her head.

“Fine. I’ll try to tiptoe.”

Dakota had briefly explained that our best and fastest option was simply to take the main elevator up two floors to where the sample room was. There weren’t a lot of people on our floor since everyone was busy with the photo shoot and the missing movie star. The thirty-fourth floor would be much busier. We would have to get through a room full of cubicles where the junior designers and editorial
assistants sat. After that, we’d have a clear shot to the sample room.

We reached the elevators without seeing anyone at all, and Dakota pushed the up button.

“What do we do if there’s already someone on the elevator?” I said suddenly.

“Who cares?” Dakota asked.

The usual
ping
told us the elevator had arrived, and as the doors opened, I was startled to see Garamond with a phone pressed to one ear. Dakota could have any number of reasons to be there, but Garamond would know that Ivy and I were roaming the halls when we shouldn’t be. I nudged Ivy hard.

Ivy dropped her bag, and we both turned our backs toward the elevator and began picking up the contents.

“Hello?!” Garamond was yelling into his phone. “Are you still there? I can’t keep a signal in the elevator. Hello?”

“No, she has not been found!” we heard him shout as the doors slid closed again.

“That was close,” I said.

“He’s in crisis mode,” Dakota said, pressing the button again. “He probably wouldn’t have noticed if the queen of England had been standing here.”

The next elevator that came was empty. We got in, and Ivy pressed the button for the thirty-fourth floor.
My heart was still pounding from our close call with Garamond. I was not good at sneaking around—my fear of getting caught was too severe. And at the moment, we were only in an elevator. What would happen if someone found us trying to get into the sample room? I began to wish we had thought our plan through a little more thoroughly.

The thirty-fourth floor had no reception area at all.

“Why don’t they have a desk like the other floors?” I asked as we stepped out of the elevator.

“This floor isn’t open to everyone,” Dakota said. “You need to swipe an ID card to open the door.”

“Well, where would Quincy have gotten one of those?” I asked.

“You need them to open some of the bathrooms,” Dakota said. “They would have given her a guest ID for the photo shoot.”

“They didn’t have those the last time I was here,” Ivy said.

“Watch and learn, rookie,” Dakota told her.

She took the ID badge she wore on a cord around her neck and swiped it through a slot next to a plain, metal door. There was a buzzing sound, and Dakota pushed the door open.

“So far, so good,” she said. “Now we might start running into people. This isn’t like thirty-two—people sometimes do stop you and ask what you’re
doing. Just look worried and walk fast. Don’t make eye contact with people. They’ll notice you less that way.”

I would have no trouble looking worried. The thought of how much trouble we’d be in if we were caught made me feel sick. And if we got Ivy’s mother in trouble…that I didn’t even want to think about.

“Sounds like you’ve done some sneaking around before,” I said, trying to reassure myself that Dakota and Ivy knew what we were doing.

“Of course,” Dakota said. “How do you think I keep on top of all the gossip?”

“Let’s just go,” Ivy said.

Dakota pushed the door open and held it for us. We walked through into an unadorned hallway. Everything was beige: the floors, the walls, even the light fixtures. It had a generic, institutional feel that made it feel more like an old school than an office building.
City Nation
seemed to spare no expense glitzing up its appearance for the public. But here on the private floors, it was bare bones.

“Follow me,” Dakota whispered. “See that water fountain down there? There’s a doorway right after which leads into the junior designers’ area. Just walk through it as fast as you can. Take your phones out and pretend to be texting. Don’t look around.”

“Okay,” I said, and Ivy nodded.

We paused briefly at the doorway, then plunged in. Where the hallway had been pretty quiet, the design area was like a circus. People were snapping into phones, barking at each other. Two women were pushing a huge rack of clothes past a row of cubicles, trying not to bump into anyone’s space. Someone was playing music, and in another cubicle was the sound of different music. I pulled out my phone and stared at it intently as I walked, typing an imaginary text to a fake person. Ivy was doing the same thing, and Dakota had her phone pressed to her ear, saying things like, “Yes, I can. When do you need them? And how many would you like?”

We’d gotten practically two-thirds of the way across the room toward the door at the opposite end.

This is working
, I thought, typing another non-word on the phone.
We’re going to make it.

“Oh no. You are not supposed to be here,” I heard a familiar voice say. My heart seemed to stop beating altogether. I didn’t know many voices here, but I knew that one. It was unmistakably Garamond.

Don’t react,
I told myself.
He isn’t talking to us. Just keep walking.

“Dakota Whittier, Ivy Scanlon, and Paulina I’ve-forgotten-your-last-name, don’t pretend you don’t hear me.”

Oh. Maybe he WAS talking to us.

We all stopped walking and turned toward Garamond. I felt a rush of panic and dropped my phone. It landed just a few feet from Garamond’s shoes. I picked it up, keeping my eyes down. I could not look at him. I had no idea what to do, and I’m sure Ivy didn’t, either.