Iris

General

Iris is an actress and model staying in Room 216 at the Hotel Dusk.  She seems self involved and snobbish at times, and it is unknown why she is staying at a place like Hotel Dusk.  Something about her seems familiar to Kyle Hyde and author Martin Summer.
 

History

Iris and her older sister Grace were always on the move.  Their mother always seemed to be with a different man, who would use her, abuse her, and then lose her.  Iris would find it hard to deal with life, and it was up to Grace to calm her down.  Life would take a fateful turn when their mom died in a plane crash.  The airline gave the girls a large payment, but the man their mom had been with at the time took the money for himself and sent the girls to separate orphanages.

Iris was adopted, but did not care for the life she was given.  At fifteen, Iris ran away from home and spent five years in a mix of highways and hotels.  At twenty, she found work as a waitress in Los Angeles.  It was there that she once again saw her sister.  Grace wandered into the dinner, and Iris recognized her right away.  The sisters caught up on their lives, and Iris found out Grace was working at an art gallery in Santa Monica, Gallery May, and was engaged to a doctor.  They promised to stay in touch and meet again.
 
Iris broke her promise, though, as she was ashamed of the life she was leading in comparison to Grace.  Iris would find a eventually find a lucky break and found work as an actress and model.  Working under the name of Cecily Lee, Iris worked in some small soaps and would eventually gain a measure of fame.  She had a notable magazine cover shoot for the publication Va-Voom!.  It was through this shoot that Grace tracked her sister down once again.  This time, Grace looked worn down and desperate.  Grace asked for a large sum of money (the amount needed for Kevin's malpractice suit), that Iris was unable to give.  Grace broke down, saying that she really just needed to see Iris to gain the confidence to do what was needed. 

Iris would hear from Grace once more, a year later.  Grace contacted Iris and gave her an envelope.  The envelope contained a cassette tape.  Grace gave Iris instructions to go along with the tape.  If Iris did not hear from Grace by Christmas of that year, Iris was to take the tape to Hotel Dusk and give it to "the man who paints angels".  Iris did not hear from Grace by Christmas, so she went to the hotel.  When she got there, though, Iris had no idea what to do next.  She could find no clues as to who the man Grace referred to was.

Unknown to Iris, Grace's husband and daughter (Kevin and Melissa Woodward) were staying at the same hotel on the same night.  At dinner, Iris saw Melissa's doll and saw it was similar to the ones she and Grace owned as children.  It was actually a doll Grace had made for Melissa, making it look like their childhood dolls.  While out, someone stole the envelope from Iris's room.  Desperate from this turn of events, she turned to Kyle Hyde for help.  Kyle was looking for information on Gallery May and found out Iris had a connection, so he agreed to help.  He found the tape in the trash in the hotel's trash can.  Listening to the tape, it was clear that it contained a conversation from a room that had been bugged.  Kyle believed this was insurance for something, probably connected to the money Grace had gathered for Kevin's malpractice debts.  He returned to Iris and got her to tell him her story.  After hearing the facts, Kyle promised to do what he could to help in the search for Grace.