When I drove away, I circled the blocks around Belltown until I was sure I was alone. The feeling that I wasn’t safe proved impossible to shake.
Seventeen
Elana Coll looked as comfortable in the lobby of the Neapolitan as if she were a guest in their Marchesa Suite every night. It wasn’t hard to imagine the owners making some arrangement with her whereby Elana would adorn the lobby during peak hours just to add some millennial appeal to the classical surroundings. She had the right look: very tall, very green-eyed, and swathed in an LBD that flirted with being too L.
If the owners knew how often those green eyes focused on the jewelry of other guests, they would rethink their options. Elana was Luce’s best friend, which said something about her magnetism all by itself. Luce was about as ethical as a human could get. Elana was never happier than when she was breaking a law.
“Hey.” She looked me up and down as I approached, my new shoes squeaking. “You took me serious.”
“As a heart attack. Why are we standing where every person and camera can see us?”
“Because guests of the hotel have no reason to hide.” She held up a wine-colored keycard between her first two fingers. “Room 502.”
“You checked in?” I sat down in the gold velveteen chair opposite hers.
“Technically Solange did. Personal assistant to Mr. Gilles Foster.”
I tamped down my impatience. Elana would have her fun.
“Mr. Foster has a number of personal assistants in various cities,” she said, with the tiniest of smiles. “One of them is my friend Winnifred, whose professional name is Solange.”
“Okay. And Foster stays here when in Seattle?”
“He usually stays at the Fairmont, but Solange made a special request. She finds the Neapolitan much sexier.”
“Where are the lovebirds now?”
“Gilles’s plane arrives from Montreal in two hours. Solange checked in early to make herself presentable. Two keys. Your friend Bilal and his wife are in suite 501, and his two angry-looking associates are in the adjoining room 503.”
“What else?” Elana looked too smug.
She waggled the key. “502 is the room on the other side of 501. Solange told Gilles she likes the eastern view. The Neapolitan has it so that entire families—or celebrity entourages—can occupy a floor without ever stepping into the hall.”
The lock of a connecting-room door would be a whole lot simpler to open than the door off the hall. And much more private. “Nice.”
“Say it.”
“You’re very good. Do you also know if Bilal and his team are at home?”
“I was with Winnifred half an hour ago when they left. We went down to the lobby after them. They took their car.”
I winced inside. “How much have you told Winnifred?”
“Just that Bilal is a bad guy and I promised we wouldn’t steal anything. Strictly fact-finding. And we need a lookout.”
“You’re the lookout.”
“Hell I am. I’m going in.” Elana stood up before I could protest further. “Besides, you need me to make introductions.”
The Neapolitan’s elevators had retained their old brass accordion gates as accent pieces after their modernization. Elana paused as I opened the gate for her.
“You’re going to be cool, right? About Winnifred?” she said.
“Yeah.”
“Some dudes get all flustered around sex workers. Just don’t embarrass me.”
“I’ll try not to faint.”
Suite 501 was at the end of the short hall, flanked by 502 and 503 on opposite sides of the corridor. Elana tapped softly on the door to 502. Winnifred-slash-Solange answered her knock immediately. She was nearly as tall as Elana, every inch the corporate businesswoman. Her blouse and skirt would have passed the dress code of any bank. As she glanced my way, a slight magnification of her blue eyes revealed her glasses weren’t just for costume.
“Van, Winnifred,” Elana said, striding into the room.
“Hello,” I said. “Elana said she talked you into keeping watch.”
“I offered,” Winnifred replied. “Just tell me what you need.”
A murmur at the back of my brain wondered if that would have sounded provocative even if I hadn’t known her profession. “Set up in the lobby where you have a view of the entrance. You’ve seen their Mercedes. Text Elana if it pulls up.”
“That’s all? I expected something more . . . covert.”
“The simplest plans are the best.” I was already examining the deadbolt on the adjoining door. A thumb turn allowed me to unlock our side. There would be a similar knob in Bilal’s suite. As a backup for the hotel, there was also a keyhole that would spring both mechanisms. I set to work with my lockpicks and drew the bolt back.
“Whoa!” Winnifred said at the sound of the click. She was still putting on her shoes.
“We won’t be long,” Elana said. Winnifred nodded and hurried to the hall. We waited three minutes before Elana’s phone buzzed to signal that Secret Agent Solange was in position.
Aura and Bilal had evidently told housekeeping to let the room alone. A twisted rope of bedsheets lay at the foot of the California king, and the soft pillows still showed deep depressions from their most recent nap. The towels on the floor of the bathroom were damp and the air in the small tiled space humid. They had showered before heading out for the day.
“Don’t touch anything,” I said. “They can’t know we were here.”
“What are you looking for?” Elana said.
Anything that might give me some chance of slipping the leash Bilal had fastened around my neck. Something that could help me stall him for a while or get him arrested and booted out of the country. A box of plutonium would be nice. Call the FBI with an anonymous tip and let them take over.
It didn’t take long to check every drawer and every piece of luggage in their room. Nothing unusual, not even a gun. The room safe under the dresser was open and empty. On the nightstands were books—two in what might be Urdu, with translated promotional quotes on the back from prominent European politicians. The books on Aura’s side were slightly flashier—a paperback suspense novel and a thick well-thumbed tome on health and pregnancy. Looked like the newlyweds weren’t wasting any of Bilal’s limited time.
In the bathroom, I found half a dozen prescription bottles from a Miami pharmacy for Bilal, treatment for his ALS. An evil part of me whispered that I could return and doctor the pills just a little. But Bilal had warned me that even death wouldn’t stop his vengeance if I crossed him. Even if I could set aside my scruples—no different than Oregon, the insidious voice whispered—it wouldn’t set me free.
Aura was taking a prescription as well. The largest of the bottles held fifty or more cream-colored time release capsules. A drug called olaparib. I was familiar with a wide variety of pharmaceuticals thanks to time spent in Army hospitals and in therapy, but olaparib was new to me.
The judge that had granted Aura probation on her identity theft charge had referred to health concerns. I’d considered whether Bilal might be sending me to steal a vaccine for his incurable disease. But maybe Aura’s own troubles were their real motive.
The only items of interest were two new-looking HP laptops on the desk. Bilal might be conducting business while on the road. If he’d been at all careless, the computers could be hard evidence. But I had no way of hacking past their log-in screens here, on the fly. I’d have to leave them. The idea of abandoning something so potentially useful made me grind my teeth.
Elana was admiring a set of black pearl earrings Aura had left on the room’s lone table. “What did you say this guy does? Hacking?”
“Something related to that. I don’t have a handle on him yet,” I said, running my fingertips over the back of the dresser to see if anything had been taped there. A last-ditch effort. “He’s more skilled than the average black hat.”
She tilted her head to see the pearls from another angle. “Must be. These
could pay my rent for a year.”
A high-end hacker must have high-end enemies. Small wonder Saleem and Juwad went everywhere Bilal and Aura did. Saleem struck me as someone with advanced training—maybe maroon berets or some other Special Service branch of the Pakistani armed forces. And devoted to his boss’s continued good health, at least against anything that could be cured by a well-aimed bullet.
The connecting door to 503 was unlocked. Saleem and his buddy kept their room considerably neater, though again without a hotel maid’s help. The blankets on both twin beds had been pulled back into place, and the surfaces of the dresser and table were bare. I set about searching, faster now. We’d already spent more time in the rooms than I’d intended.
The safe in Saleem’s room was closed. I punched the lock button twice to enter administrative mode, then tried 9999 as the factory default. It didn’t work. I tried all zeroes and then all ones, with the same result.
“Shit,” Elana said, thinking we were stymied. I pulled the safe out slightly to see the top. A small metal plate stamped with the safe company’s name decorated the center of the front edge, fastened in place with two hex screws. I used my multitool to remove one screw and swung the little plate aside to reveal a tiny cross-shaped keyhole.
I grinned. A manufacturer’s lock, to open the safe if guests forgot their codes. Elana leaned over my shoulder as I began to work the lock with the slimmest of Dono’s old picks.
Her phone buzzed, making us both jump.
“They’re at the valet,” she said.
Dammit. The lock clicked and the door came open with a whine of the bolts drawing back.
“Get ready to run,” I said, as I scanned the safe’s contents.
Boxes of 9 mm ammo. Two empty magazines for Saleem’s Steyr. All squeezed to one side. Filling most of the safe’s cubic foot was a white cylinder with a narrower top, like a large metal water bottle. A logo on its side read cxs-3001. I took the bottle from the safe.
“In the lobby now,” Elana said, waiting by the adjoining door.
The top of the bottle unscrewed. Removing it drew out a green plastic plug. The rest of the interior was filled with some kind of soft insulating foam.
“Van,” said Elana.
No time to take pictures. I replaced its screw top and set the bottle back in the safe, held the thick door shut, and began tweaking the lock with one hand. Elana cracked the door to 503 to peer down the hallway. The lock gave way and the servomotors buzzed as the bolts glided back into place.
A ping came from down the hall. The elevator, reaching our floor.
“Go,” I said, screwing the metal plate down with my fingertips. Elana closed the hallway door and raced to Aura and Bilal’s room. I shoved the safe back into position and almost leapt after her, closing the adjoining door and crossing in a rush to meet her in 502.
Relocking the connecting door gave me more trouble than it should have. From the hallway we heard the scuff of feet on carpet and light thumps as the door to the suite opened. Saleem’s voice, asking a question. I made myself relax. The mechanism gave a faint click as the deadbolt sprung back into the frame.
Neither Elana nor I moved. Just listened, as Bilal’s door thumped closed, followed seconds later by the sound of Saleem and Juwad opening their own room.
We slipped out to the hall and padded silently to the stairs. It was three flights before Elana spoke.
“That was perfect.”
“You have a strange dictionary.”
“I meant the timing. This might be the best holiday treat I’ve ever had. What’s next?”
We reached the lobby. I gave Elana a moment to talk to Winnifred privately. I was busy with thoughts of the insulated bottle in Saleem’s hotel safe.
It had clearly been designed to transport something under extreme cold, which made sense for biological material. Whatever Bilal wanted me to steal from Ceres, I was going to carry it away in that.
Reason it out: Bilal Nath is a hacker, dealing in information. Maybe Ceres made a breakthrough and Bilal found out about it. He’s stealing a sample to sell, or to ransom.
Elana interrupted my conjectures. Her emerald eyes sparkled with enthusiasm.
“When I asked what’s next, I meant it,” she said. “Willard let on that you have a score tomorrow night. I’m there.”
“No. It’s a one-person job. And dangerous.”
“Willard also said that limpdick will kill you if you don’t do it and might kill you if you do. So you obviously need friends.”
What I needed was a minor miracle. For Bilal to have a heart attack, or suddenly get religion, or become homesick for Karachi. But none of that was going to happen. Whatever was protected in Ceres’s cryobank had brought him to Seattle, and it would remain Bilal’s singular focus until he’d acquired it. I’d seen his and his wife’s expressions when they looked at the biotech company.
None of my options were sunny. Run, and Bilal would come after my people, either by sending his killer Saleem or through more devious online attacks. Hand over the goods and I would be beyond expendable. Ensuring my silence would become the new priority, at least for the few moments until Saleem squeezed the trigger.
The sun had gone down while Elana and I had been inside the Neapolitan. It wouldn’t be long before the museum gala opened its doors. I still had to figure a way to storm the gates and find one particular benefactor.
Ondine. She knew Bilal; she’d set him up with Dr. Claybeck. Odds were good that she also knew something about his plans on her home turf.
Crashing the gala would be a challenge. Convincing Ondine Long to help me might be impossible.
Eighteen
I chose a parking garage a block away from the museum and drove up the ramps until I reached the top level. A modicum of privacy for me to change clothes for the second time that day.
The tailor’s efficiency hadn’t stopped at the shirt. Hanging along with the tuxedo pants under the jacket I found a black silk cummerbund and bow tie. The cummerbund I could figure out. The bow tie was beyond my ken. It took a quarter of an hour and a couple of YouTube instructional videos for me to finally get it tied to where it didn’t look like a bat had squashed itself against my throat.
The tux made me the most overdressed guy at the Starbucks on 1st Ave. Watching the SAM entrance from across the street, I saw museum staff—employees drafted into putting on their finest and working the holiday—just inside the arched portico, using scanners to read QR codes off paper invitations and cell phones submitted by the guests. Security in blue blazers stood discreetly to one side.
There were cops, too. During my passes along the sidewalk, I’d seen a team of uniforms on the long low flight of granite steps inside the museum, pausing to chat by the Chinese statues of seated rams with the nonchalance of patrolmen on easy duty. I wouldn’t be sneaking in.
A knot of revelers waited at the crosswalk. Doyennes and dignitaries who had noticeably started their evening at dinner, with wine. Their dress was formal, their laughter considerably less starched. The ivory edge of an invitation showed from one pooh-bah’s tuxedo pocket.
Tempting, but risky. If the code on the invitation was unique to the guest, or their name was printed on the card, I might be finished before I started. These people looked like longtime supporters who might be known to museum staff.
Someone closer to my age, maybe. Like the half-dozen suited-up college kids under the legs of the Hammering Man statue, having a last vape before going inside. Maybe their families were donors, or maybe they were tech prodigies with a yen for modern art. Just so long as they had their invitations.
I tossed the dregs of my Sumatra and crossed the avenue, pretending to be as engrossed in my phone as most of them were. In the half light of the winter street, it was an easy task to review their screens as I paced. A blast of wind off the harbor steps made the nearest girl shiver.
“Let’s go,” she said, her teeth chattering either by natural reaction or to deliberately emphasize
her point.
Her date nodded without looking up. She nudged him impatiently before his screen changed to display the black mottled square of the QR.
“Could you grab my picture?” I said, abruptly holding out my phone. “I promised my folks they’d see me in the tux.”
They looked startled but the boy complied, and he even angled himself where he’d capture the moving statue in the background.
“Thanks a lot,” I said as he handed the phone back. “Have fun tonight.”
I looked at my phone and swiped away from the picture of me grinning sheepishly to see another app. The black square of the invitation code appeared, every pixel as crisp as the original.
It was a simple program on the surface. Simple, but highly illegal. Similar to the old applications that traded contact information or photos when two enabled phones bumped each other, this function stole a screenshot from the nearest unlocked phone on command. In this case, an image of the kid’s invitation code. I’d bought the app off an anonymous hacker from Hong Kong, thinking it would be useful for snagging texts or emails should I ever have need. But I could be flexible.
I quick-marched to the entrance, wanting to make sure my copy was the first one seen. A pass of the scanner gun over the phone resulted in a satisfying ping. All good.
The docent secured a black plastic bracelet with the SAM logo around my wrist.
“That’s your pass,” she explained, showing me the strip of flexible metal on the underside. “You can come and go now if you like. Don’t forget the director’s presentation at eight o’clock in the forum.”
I examined the bracelet. Classier than an ink stamp at a club. I wondered if its metal band also signaled if a guest was permitted in the VIP sections. There was bound to be a private room somewhere. Rich people loved exclusivity. The more select their daily lives were, the more they coveted reaching that next level. Ondine lived on the next level.
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