Deadly Beautiful by Sam Baker

Author:Sam Baker
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780345507617
Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
Published: 2008-08-19T00:00:00+00:00

twenty one

Harsh sunlight woke her, a startling brightness that Annie did not associate with dawn. Her face was squashed against the window ledge, the grooves of an air-conditioning grill digging into her cheek. Light was pouring into her huge hotel room, and a digital clock spread across two floors of an office block to the left of the Suntory Tower read 10:38.

“Shit!”

Dragging herself onto cramp-crippled legs, Annie headed for the nearest bathroom. So much for her plan to go out early and be waiting on Scarlett’s doorstep the minute her roommate awoke.

Even less forgiving than the sunlight outside, the lightbulbs in the cubicle that passed for a bathroom were bright enough to make Annie grimace. She’d never woken to semipermanent creases like tribal scars in her skin before. Equally, she tended not to use air-conditioning ventilation as a pillow.

When did that happen? When had her face begun looking like it needed a good iron first thing in the morning?

“Old age,” muttered Annie, scowling at herself in the mirror and seeing the creases double. The idea of hitting the big three-oh filled her with horror. Would thirty, Annie wondered as she examined a succession of plastic packets containing miniature versions of everything a wealthy tourist might need, be too young to start lying about my age?

Of course, she could ease up on the cigarettes and booze, both of which were doing her skin no favors, but she needed those to keep her both focused and sane. Only she wasn’t either of those, right now, because…

Shit, thought Annie, I promised Lou I’d sort things out with Chris.

The toilet and tub were in two separate cubicles, both within the bathroom. Tiny self-contained units that slotted together like Legos—toilet and bidet in one, tub and basin in the other. A Russian doll of a bathroom. Its door opening to reveal smaller, more compact rooms inside.

As Annie squatted on the low-level toilet, she felt its seat sink slightly and the cistern began to flush. Alarmed, she stood up and the noise stopped. Sitting made it flush again, only this time Annie realized there was no water, just a recording of water emptying and refilling.

What the hell? she thought.

The first button Annie pushed to get the toilet to flush for real activated a spray, which hit her bottom. The second sprayed her at the front. The third caused the toilet to flush, and the fourth simply twisted like a radio dial. It took Annie a second to get that this one adjusted the warmth of the seat.

Breakfast was even more bemusing. Jet-lagged and starving, a headache nagging behind her eyes, Annie took one look at the Japanese choices on her room service menu and ordered the Western breakfast, which translated as fruit salad and tiny bread rolls. Still, after the flight, anything without raw fish and miso soup was fine by her.

Fruit salad, it turned out, was precisely that: fruit and salad. Slices of apple, orange, pineapple, and melon lay across a bed of shredded lettuce leaves.

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