Ravenswood: THE BOX OF ANSWERS

Here, at last, the Box lay before him, beckoning to be touched, to be opened, ready to reveal to him secrets heretofore hidden by the sand of ages. An entire lifetime, longer, he had waited, craved for this very moment. Now, everything depended on this - his life, job, sanity. With the Box he could regain them and more. Another step closer now, his hand reached out, fingers almost brushing the intaglios hewn into the rose tinted ivory lid. Nothing was going to stop him from seeing what it held inside.

1. LIKE THIS, BEFORE

"Looking for something?"

Startled and a tad embarrassed at getting caught noseying about in the hallways of Ravenswood Hotel, Sam found himself confronted by a hunk, shirtless and covered by little more than board shorts and a sheen of sweat. The stranger pulled his iPod earphones off and smiled at him. Whoa, as if that hard body wasn't enough to cause a minor meltdown, Sam thought before stammering a reply. "Uh, my room."

With the knee-weakening smile still in place, the man glanced at the key Sam held. "207 is the other way. The stairs you came up from? Hang a right."

"Thanks," Sam said, hoping he wasn't blushing, even as he tried to pull his gaze from below waist level where the low-slung shorts cut across the bottom row of clearly defined abdominal muscles. He gulped. Narrowing his sights back to the man's handsome face, Sam frowned. "This is going to sound really stupid, but have we met?"

"Have we?" The guy extended a hand. "Philip Vaughn."

"Sam Preston," he responded, clasping the warm hand in his then reluctantly but politely letting go. "There's just, uh," he gave Philip a quizzical look before shaking his head and chuckling nervously. "I'm not sure..."

"Staying with us a while, are you?" Philip asked, sidestepping Sam's awkward pause.

"Yes, a couple of days. Business trip. I work in Paris," Sam replied.

"Well, I haven't been to Paris in, oh, ten years? And I've barely left New Orleans in the last five."

"Oh," he said with ill-concealed disappointment.

"We could try jogging your memory over dinner," Philip suggested.

Now he was sure he was blushing. "I would really like that."

"Great. We could go to Commander's Palace. Why don't you drop by my apartment sevenish? I'm in 309."

"Looking forward to it already," Sam said as he stood to watch this brawny man walk away, blatantly regarding the mounds of a magnificently rounded ass set high atop the stocky legs of a European football player. Sam sighed and made his way to his own room without further incident. He deposited his bags into a closet in the commodious room and tossed his Lanvin jacket on the four-poster bed before making a quick exit.

Outside Ravenswood, he noticed an idling cab but there was already a man standing by its open door, eyes darting around seemingly in anticipation of someone else. Sam shrugged and settled for walking to his destination since it was actually only a few blocks away. As he strode down the sun-drenched street, delighting in the balmy air, his thoughts wandered back to Philip. There was just something about him, other than the total beefcake package. Something else he couldn't quite determine, tugging at the back of his mind, oddly familiar yet comforting somehow.

Curiosity had always been Sam's undoing, a tendentious inquisitiveness that often transgressed beyond the bounds of reason. The lure