On The Loose

1

THE NEXT TIME I get the urge for something hot and hard between my legs, I’m going to buy a motorcycle.

Lauren Massey tossed back the last of the White Knight in her glass and considered heading to the bar for another, then decided against it. The crowd waiting for drinks was four people deep, and besides, she was supposed to be snagging interviews for a story for her column. With two drinks in a row, she’d be more likely to giggle or flirt rather than ask meaningful questions…or ask questions way too personal to put into print.

Her column, Lorelei on the Loose, ran in a paper called San Francisco Inside Out, a left-wing cross between for-real street reporting and the tabloids you got at the checkout counter. Oh, they didn’t report on alien babies and celebrity divorces—unless the celebrities were local or the aliens had agreed to appear on the Channel 4 News. Inside Out was about entertainment, with a little activism thrown in, and for now, it paid the bills.

In the snarky, no-holds-barred persona of Lorelei, Lauren also ran a Web log, or blog, connected to Inside Out’s Web site, where she commented live on everything from clothes to politics to local charity events like this one. Her identity was a secret closely guarded by the paper, partly because she had a knack for stirring up controversy and partly because readers couldn’t resist a mystery and were always trying to guess who she was. They also couldn’t resist writing in and taking her on in public, which meant that Lorelei got the highest number of hits on the Inside Out site. You’d think this would make the Queen of Pain give her a raise, but it just made her managing editor demand more content, more trend-setting commentary, more everything.

So, like any good columnist, tonight Lauren was going to be multitasking—doing her part for charity and hunting a story like a basset hound.

A vibrator’s cheaper. Lauren’s foster sister, Aurora Rory Constable, was still smiling over her motorcycle crack. Lauren glanced at the drink on the table in front of her, illuminated by a little Victorian lamp that tried to compete with the colored spotlights and the glittering bling-bling of the twentysomething crowd all around them. Rory would nurse her drink for the next hour on the principle that the calories in it would get burned off in proportion to her activity—which, at this charity event disguised as a key party, could amount to anything from casual conversation to sex in the broom closet.

A vibrator doesn’t have that ‘mess with me and I’ll kick your butt’ appeal, Lauren pointed out.

Bad date, sweetie? Michaela Correlli, the middle of the three foster sisters, slid an arm around Lauren’s shoulders and gave her a quick hug. She was also the clever so-and-so who had slipped Lauren an éclair during their regular Saturday-morning gabfest at Lavender Field last week and who, when her defenses were down, had talked her into coming tonight.

To survive in the foster care system, Lauren had learned that when life tossed you a lemon, you made lemon chiffon pie and invited other people to eat it. So, even though a key party wasn’t her usual scene, she could use it to further her career and to help out a good cause at the same time. But she was the lucky one. Poor Rory had had less than a week to come up with the donation of baked goods for five-hundred-plus people that Mikki had recklessly promised on her behalf in exchange for the tickets. It was a good thing Rory’s staff at Lavender Field, her chain of bakeries, all possessed the California attitude that considered goodies for five hundred a challenge, never a problem.

Mikki was good at talking people into challenges. Nobody messed with her. In high school, nobody had messed with Lauren, either, once they’d found out Michaela was her foster sister. Even now, after one look from those merciless blue eyes, deputy D.A.s and social workers alike dropped to their knees, begging.

For a lot of things.

The worst, Lauren replied over the canned pop music that was playing until the band was ready to start. Remember that really sweet guy I met online about four months ago? The wealth-planning advisor?

Didn’t you show us some of his messages? Rory asked. And his picture? I thought he looked nice.

Oh, he is nice, Lauren assured them. His mom told me so during our date.

Mikki set her diet soda on the table with a clank. You’re at the meet-the-parents stage already? Is there something you didn’t tell us about this guy? Should we be looking at poufy pink bridesmaid dresses?

God forbid. There’s a lot of stuff he didn’t tell me. Lauren glanced longingly at the bar again, then back to her sisters. Such as the fact that he isn’t a wealth planner at all. He’s a finance major at San Francisco State and a permanent student. As in thirty and still living with his mom.

So how did she get into this? Rory wanted to know.

He brought her on our date. In fact, she was a lot more interesting than he turned out to be. He writes beautiful e-mails, but in person? Lauren waved her hand, shooing away the memory of her brief foray into online relationships that had started out as research for a story and had ended as…well, as dinner with an entertaining fifty-year-old archaeologist. Oh, yeah, and her son.

As of tonight, I’m going to be like you, Mikki. I’m putting men on hold and focusing on important stuff, like nailing down this story.

It was clear Michaela was trying not to laugh at the sad state of her love life. Are you sure you want to do that? She fingered the white-gold locket on the chain around her neck, a little suitcase-shaped charm identical to the ones worn by Lauren and Rory and half the crowd at this fund-raiser. What if Johnny Depp shows up with the key to your suitcase and you win the getaway for two?

He wasn’t invited. But even if he was, I’d swap with you and you could have him, Mikki Mantis. I’m here to mingle and interview people. That’s all.

Mikki swatted her on the arm for using the nickname she hated, and while Lauren got the last laugh on her sister, Maureen Baxter pushed aside a burgundy-velvet curtain and grabbed the microphone. The music faded and when she said, Welcome to Clementine’s, everyone, the noise level in the crowded club dropped by a couple of decibels. I’m Maureen Baxter and I’m your hostess this evening.

She paused while the crowd hooted and whistled. Maureen knew everybody here, and if she didn’t know you, she had a contact who did. Tall and elegant, with dark hair cut in a bob, her taupe chiffon gown hugged her curves and its sequins caught the spotlights trained on the stage. Mikki and Rory both knew her better than Lauren did. Maureen, too, had been one of the kids at the old house on Garrison Street where Emma Constable, Rory’s real mother and Lauren’s and Mikki’s foster mom, took in the teenage hard cases from the foster care system.

Where Lauren had finally found her mismatched but true family.

You’re probably wondering what the deal is with the keys and lockets you were given at the door. Well, here’s how it works. All the men have keys. All the women have locked suitcase charms. Maureen dropped her voice. Yes, girls, these are white gold, from Deerfield, and we get to keep ’em. More hooting and some applause. Guys, your job is to find the woman whose lock fits your key—and I mean that strictly in the practical sense. Every couple who gets a match gets a prize and a chance at the grand prize for tonight’s charity event—a getaway for two. Best of all, you get to meet new people and have some fun.

Cheering from the crowd. Maureen waved a hand for quiet.

And let’s not forget why we’re really here. Tonight’s event is incredibly important to me because it will make the building fund for Baxter House healthy again. So far we have the land, which I inherited, the planning cycle is complete, the foundation has been poured and a couple of contractors—among them a wonderful guy who is actually here tonight—have donated their services.

Lauren glanced at Mikki and Rory and made an I’m impressed face.

Good on you, Maureen, Mikki said in the direction of the stage, then turned to her sisters. With land at a premium around here and contractors booked a year in advance, you’ve gotta believe she worked her butt off for this.

I wonder who the guy is? Rory said.

Our little suitcase charms mean something, as anyone who has ever been in the foster care system knows, Maureen went on. Sometimes all you have is what fits in a single duffel bag. Your whole life, all your memories, everything that is unique to you, stuffed inside a single suitcase. Some of you here know what I’m talking about.

The three women glanced at each other again. Some kids came with a lot of stuff. Some came with nothing. Lauren had been one of the one-bag kids—a gangly fifteen-year-old with nothing to her name but a picture of herself as a baby with her parents, a pair of jeans and a couple of T-shirts and a battered copy of the Norton Anthology of English Literature that she’d lifted from her last school.

Mikki’s face told her she remembered the same thing and she slid an arm around Lauren’s shoulders.

Your fifty-dollar cover is not paying for the club or media coverage, Maureen assured them. It’s going toward the building fund, to purchase rebar and beams and drywall. This may not seem very glamorous, but I can’t tell you how much it will mean to an eighteen-year-old girl who has just been released from the system and has no idea how to go about starting her life other than taking it to the streets. Baxter House will mean a new start for that girl, and I’m grateful to each of you for coming out to support it.

Maureen grinned at the crowd and waved behind her at the band, who had been quietly filing onto the stage while she was talking. But now, we’re going to have fun. So go out, find your key partner and have a good time!

The band launched into a dance number with a great beat and Lauren’s foot began to tap. Somewhere in the crowded club was a person who had the key that fit her locked charm, but Lauren just couldn’t bring herself to go from person to person, allowing them to try out their keys. Some were having a lot of fun with it. She had work to do.

And she’d better get on with it.

She leaned over to Rory. I’m going to go talk to people. Are you going to see what’s going on in the kitchen?

Lavender Field specialized in a dazzling array of breads, rolls and other sinful things. They were so good that rumor had it you could tell how well a company treated its employees simply by the presence of a box with the green-and-lavender logo in the coffee room.

White-gold charms and rolls and pastries from Lavender Field? Maureen knew how to treat her guests—and potential contributors to her project.

Rory tossed back the last of her drink and draped her lavender shawl over the back of her chair. Hell, no. I’m going to dance.

Lauren watched her sister tap someone on the shoulder and, on the pretext of trying out the man’s key, invite him to dance. The light from a gold spotlight slid over Rory’s graceful, generous body as she passed under it, and then she and her partner disappeared into the crowd on the black-and-white-checkered dance floor.

Music blasted from the stage, lights flashed and swooped, and from somewhere in the back, a woman screamed with laughter. People laughed and talked over the beat as they danced, the whole crowd bobbing up and down in time with the music.

Lauren scanned the room for her first victim.

She’d already picked Maureen’s brain about the background of the key party and the logistics of setting one up. A woman as driven for her cause as Maureen was didn’t waste her time on angles that didn’t succeed—and a key party was pretty much guaranteed to succeed. But what Lauren needed was the voice on the street who, let’s face it, came to these things not because they were as passionate about the cause, but because deep down they believed—hoped—they’d find true love.

Or at least a date for the evening.

She zeroed in on an Asian girl in turquoise silk sitting in one of the dining alcoves, partially hidden by sound-absorbing velvet drapes. She blinked as the girl turned her head and she recognized the glossy fall of blue-black hair and the sloe eyes of her own roommate. Well, why not? Vivien’s opinions were as valuable as those of a stranger, and it was an easy way to start.

Sorry, I’m straight, Vivien Li deadpanned as Lauren slid in beside her on the padded leather-look bench.

Sure, you are. You’re not getting away from me that easily. Lauren grinned. Nice dress, by the way. You didn’t tell me you were coming to this shindig.

She and Vivien had been roommates since their junior year at Berkeley. Once they’d graduated—Lauren with a degree in communications and Viv with one in computer electronics—both of them had concluded there was no reason to give up a comfortable living arrangement. Besides, Lauren often thought, what sane woman would let go of a roomie who could cook as well as Viv did? So they’d moved across the Bay and Lauren had gone to work while Viv slaved at her post-grad degree and worked part-time to pay her half of the rent.

Someone at work couldn’t go at the last minute, so he gave me his ticket. It said ‘Unlock the Possibilities.’ What does that mean, exactly?

Lauren laughed. "That’s what I’m trying to find out. How about I interview you for Inside Out?" She took her minirecorder out of her evening bag, turned it on and put it on the table between them, next to the red glass lamp with dangling crystals that propped up the wine list.

How come I always have to be your lab rat? Viv complained. You know ‘Lorelei’ scares me silly. I always picture her looking like Cruella De Vil. The cartoon one, not Glenn Close.

Lauren shook her head. "Nope. She looks like Alicia Silverstone crossed with Maggie Gyllenhaal in Secretary."

Ai-ya, Vivien moaned. A demented blonde who wants to pick my brain. And probably eat it.

"No, that would be the Queen of Pain. To her, the word freelancer has no meaning. Every time I go into the office she has her people locked up in meetings, and she tries to suck me into the vortex with them."

Other than having to endure her editor, working on the Lorelei column and blog for Inside Out was fun. And a regular paycheck, no matter what its size, was nice, too. Realistically, Lauren knew blogging was a phase that, like Bennifer and platform shoes, wouldn’t last. What she really wanted to do was to work for a high-profile magazine, and not just as a contributing freelancer, either. Someday she’d be on the staff at Left Coast, which was based here in San Francisco and ran the kinds of stories that were nominated for major literary prizes.

However, Lorelei wasn’t going to get her noticed there. In fact, she was probably more of a liability than an asset. But her press pass got her into more events than not, and it all gave her material she could use.

I need some insight into this whole key thing, Lauren said. I value your opinions. Besides, you’re in my demographic.

What’s that? Lesbian Chinese-American master’s candidates?

No. Singles. It’s a very broad demographic. So, what brought you out tonight besides the fund-raiser? What’s the attraction in it?

Vivien considered the question. It’s more personal than want ads and doesn’t have the commitment factor of dinner and a movie, you know?

Commitment factor?

Yeah. Do I sleep with her because she had to pre-order the duck à l’orange? Or did we go to Korean barbecue when I was expecting the Top of the Mark, so all she gets is a kiss and some garlic breath? With a key party, you don’t have to ask yourself questions like this. Your key fits, you like the person, you hang around and talk for a while.

What if you don’t like the person? What if they have garlic breath?

Then you go put your ticket in the prize-drawing thing, slip them a mint and move on. Everyone knows the drill, so there’s no hard feelings.

It’s like a giant mixer.

Viv nodded. Only cooler.

Lauren turned off the recorder. Cool was good. Inside Out liked cool, though Left Coast would probably turn up its nose at it. Thanks for the insight.

Mind you, this event is set up for hetero mixing, Viv said. I have to work a little harder.

Lauren looked out over the twisting, laughing crowd. What you do is swap your lock for a gay guy’s key. That way both of you are lined up to get the right partner.

Oh-oh. Viv’s face, a perfect oval with the kind of fine complexion that needed no makeup, brightened. Good plan. I’m all over it. She leaned over and gave Lauren an affectionate peck. Gotta go unlock some possibilities.

Lauren followed her out into the crowd and, for the next forty-five minutes, did her best to circulate and talk to people.

Mind if I try you on for size?

Oh, please. She’d heard at least five versions of that one. Lauren pasted on a polite smile and turned to the man—well, kid, really—in the scuffed leather jacket and presented her chest to him. Just how many variations of I’ll show you mine if you show me yours could people come up with? By the end of the evening the odds were good she’d find out.

The backs of the kid’s fingers brushed the peach silk of her tank top as he lifted the tiny suitcase. He jumped. She didn’t. Lauren gazed at him thoughtfully as he flourished his little key and tried to fit it into the lock. He looked familiar. Where had she seen him before?

Her lock didn’t open.

Oh, good.

Nice to have met you, the guy said cheerfully, obviously not that cut up that he wasn’t going to be spending the rest of the evening with her. He moved on to Rory, who was standing ten feet away. She topped him by a couple of inches, but he, evidently, was a brave man. He reached for her cleavage.

Lauren looked out over the crowded dance floor. The guy was in her reader demographic. She should have interviewed him while she’d had the chance. But she’d already talked to six or seven people and so far hadn’t found one who