“We-eell, we were,” Aster said. She sat back down and motioned to the empty seat at the small round table, in between herself and Kit.

  “If you don’t mind me joining you? The company of a bunch of degenerate gamblers can get so tiresome after a while.” He sat down, tugging on his pants as he did so in the way people who wear fine garments and want to avoid wrinkles sometimes do. It was obnoxious.

  Aster realized quickly that there was nothing he could say or do that she wouldn’t hate him for. She let go of a tense breath she had been holding by slowly blowing an errant curl off her forehead. Men liked it when she did this.

  Lane Brock called the bartender over, he looked around himself shocked for a moment, knowing he shouldn’t leave his post, but came to the table anyway and took the drink order. More of what they had before but make it three of them.

  The bar tender hurried back to the bar to make the drinks and brought them back quickly.

  “I admire young ladies who can hold their liquor, this is strong stuff.” Lane said.

  “We aren’t as young as we look,” Kit said coyly, raising his glass. “And maybe not as other things as we look either.” He clinked his glass against Aster’s and took a drink. Kit may already be a little bit drunk.

  Lane just laughed it off and took a drink of his own. “Allow me to introduce myself. Wealthy man about town, Lane.” He nodded to each of them in turn, his mustache practically quivering with self satisfaction.

  “Stylish student, and blossoming beauty, Kit.” Aster gestured to her friend across the table before pointing at herself. “Wannabe mermaid, or whatever this thing is, Aster-Rose.”

  Lane Brock tilted back his head and laughed and laughed, finding the self depreciation delightful, as Aster knew he would.

  “How does it come to be, I’ve never seen the two of you around here before?” Lane asked, casually sipping his drink. “Hey, keep it coming!” He called to the bartender. “I don’t want the ladies to feel neglected.” He winked.

  Of course he would try to get them to down several drinks to his one, getting them inebriated would be how he got paid back for his generosity. Guards down, they would go with him anywhere, do anything. By his estimation. It was nothing new to Aster, she had dumped many a drink discreetly in a potted plant or spittoon in order to feign “going along”.

  However, Aster did think a few drinks would make his company a lot more tolerable.

  “We just got on the ship not long ago,” Aster said. “Just hopping a ride, you might say.”

  “A bit fair and fancy for a couple of hobos,” Lane teased. “Or are you mermaids after all, hopped right onto the deck of the boat like a couple of frisky fishes, here to snag a two legged husband to take back home. Sorry, darlings, I’m not the aquatic type. We’ll have to do our business on dry land. Or dry boat rather.”

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  “Who says we’re going have any . . . business together?” Kit teased.

  “Maybe I do,” Lane said. He took another sip. “I’m a terrific . . . business man. Like no other.”

  “Well we don’t know how to play, cards,” Kit said, emphasizing the word cards, to imply there were other games they were more than capable of playing.

  Dru was working just as fast as she could. There was no problem at all in getting into the rooms, but these damn hotel safes had locks that were sturdier than the doors they were built into. A person could just walk away with the whole safe, she supposed. Dru scratched her head with the piece of wire hanger she was using as a not so great lock picking kit, as she contemplated whether to carry it out with her or use Aster’s technique and simply slam the thing into the floor. It was one way of getting it done. That was awful noisy though, and carrying it out with her was awful conspicuous, not to mention she would have to dispose of it somehow later. The contents of the heavy little box rattled when she shook it.

  Suddenly, there was a light rapping on the room’s door.

  “Darling, hello? Are you home?” A woman’s sweet voice called through the door. “I heard you just now.”

  Dru froze in place.

  “I’m coming in.” The doorknob turned (why hadn’t Dru locked it behind herself!), and A lovely young woman with long chestnut hair falling down over the shoulders of her voluminous white night gown, came into the room already mid conversation. “I am sorry about how I acted earlier. I miss you already.” She said.

  Dru didn’t have much time to think of a plan, but that’s alright, she always had worked better on gut instinct alone. “Listen babe, if you’re here for Lane, you’re going to have to wait your turn.” Dru slipped the safe behind her back and turned toward the door with the flash of a wicked smile.

  The woman’s mouth gaped open and her cheeks, then her entire face flushed with color like a sunrise. She clutched the front of her night gown as though there was something to cover there on the modest garment.

  Dru squinted at her, was this the fiancé or a girlfriend?

  “How – what –“ the woman’s eyes sharpened into a flinty glare. “He is an engaged man! You should be ashamed of yourself!”

  Ah, the fiancé then. “What do I care about that?” Dru said. “After all, you don’t seem to care yourself, showing up here in your underwear.” That ought to make her crazy. Dru was good at making people crazy.

  “You hussy! I am his fiancé!” the woman looked around her frantically and picked up a lamp from the bedside table, brandishing it like a sword.

  “That’s what you say.” Dru said. She suddenly realized if she was going to defend herself against this woman, it was going to be a hard thing to do with one hand behind her back holding a safe.

  The woman threw the lamp at Dru’s head.

  Aster laughed. “My friend is a little drunk.”

  Lane tipped his glass at them each and then drank it down. “I guess we had better catch up then! Who wants another?” Without waiting for their replies, he called the bartender over and ordered another round.

  Aster glanced at Kit, trying to catch his eye, but he was looking around again, probably for that deadbeat boy that was giving him the cold shoulder. Aster sighed.

  “So, sweet things,” Lane said, clearly unaware that they weren’t paying the slightest attention to him at the moment (he was the type to think he was the center of it at all times, no doubt). “If we don’t play cards, and we are about through drinking, what is it exactly we are doing here?” He leaned a little closer to Aster. “Are your services for hire?”

  Aster drummed up an outraged look. “Excuse me! We aren’t those kinds of girls.”

  It was Kit’s turn to laugh. “Yes, we cost nothing. We are for free. Worthless even.”

  “You two are a laugh a minute! I don’t think I have ever met women like you before.” Lane said. “Why don’t you both come back to my room.” He looked with disdain at what the bartender had brought him before downing it anyway. “I have some much better stuff than this and something to smoke.” He winked and said in a conspiratorial stage whisper. “Cruise ship contraband.”

  Kit shrugged. “Sure, what else have we got to do tonight?” He hiccupped charmingly in the middle of his sentence.

  Aster feared he had lost the plot of their mission.