by Saul, Jonas
Parkman got Sarah back to the Hotel Erzsebet where he’d rented the room for another night. It was already going on 3:15pm.
“We can’t stay here,” Sarah said.
“Why not?” Parkman asked. He was in the act of unpacking something from his small suitcase, a toothpick in his mouth again. “They think we’re leaving today. In the morning we can go to the airport. This evening both of us can give Imre a statement of what happened at the Market Hall. Let him and his men hunt Armond down. He’s connected. Imre can get our description out to other agencies.”
“You’ve used a credit card to reserve this room. Everyone will know where we are, including Armond. The Hungarian authorities have asked us to leave the country by today. When we don’t leave they will want to know why. Sure we can surrender a statement but they’re going to want to know how we knew where Armond was in the first place. They may think it suspicious considering they already think that it’s my sole purpose in being here. Therefore, in order to figure this all out and stay under the radar we need to get out of here. No surprises. By staying here we could be the ones surprised and you know I hate that.”
“Okay, where do you suggest we go?”
“I’ve rented a room several blocks from here.”
Parkman looked at her. “When did you do that?”
“This morning. So I could do this,” she said as she used both hands to wave past her braided hair.
Parkman turned back to his suitcase and started moving things around to pack the rest of his belongings.
“Okay. You’re right. We leave in five minutes. We should go out the back door and catch a cab behind the building or on another street. No doubt someone is already watching the front.”
Sarah turned away and used the adjoining door to access her room.
“There’s something else that disturbs me about this morning,” she shouted through the open door.
“What’s that?” Parkman replied.
“If those American government men found me so easily that they could position themselves where they did in such an advantageous place, where were the Hungarian authorities? You and I were there because of Vivian’s note. Armond and his men were there as Vivian said they would be. But no cops were present. Only the Sophia Project people. Why no cops?”
Parkman stepped into the doorframe. “Sophia Project?”
“We’ll talk more about it on the way. But answer me that. Why no cops? You’re a cop. Is there an American government agency that could have the kind of power to supersede another country’s police force? Or are these government men just that good? Because if they are, and if they followed me to that street behind the Market, then they are really good. And I mean really good. That kind of good unsettles me.”
Parkman stepped closer. “They scared me too and I’ve been a cop a long time. But don’t worry. We’ll look into this and find out what their mandate is. America’s a free country. It isn’t State run. We never bought into the Communist Manifesto. Karl Marx left his stamp in other parts of the world. Not in America. So you’re a free girl right now. You really have nothing to worry about.”
Sarah grabbed her bags, set them on the floor by the door and looked up at Parkman.
“I understand what you’re saying but I think you’re wrong here. These men are powerful. The last thing the guy said to me was that I was now property of the United States Government. That was why they were there this morning. They can’t afford to have me killed. They need me for something. I think they want to do tests on me. They’re watching. They won’t let this go.”
Parkman stared at her a moment. “Okay. I trust your instincts. You’re rarely wrong on this sort of thing. But tell me, how are you with leaving Armond behind?”
“What are you talking about?”
“Leaving him for the authorities to pick up. Walking away. Going home, back to the States. Are you okay with that?”
Sarah nodded. “Sure. I almost shot him in broad daylight today right beside a shopping area. People were coming and going. If it wasn’t for Vivian I would’ve shot him and he would’ve killed another girl. Me.” She looked away, reached down and grabbed her bags and spoke again. “Yeah, I’m ready to leave it behind. He’ll be caught soon enough. My goal is helping people. Not being goaded into murder. If there was provocation I would’ve killed him, but there wasn’t. I’m not like him. I don’t want to be. I think…”
“Are you trying to convince me or yourself?”
Sarah opened the door and stepped into the hallway.
Two large men in suits grabbed her and shoved her back into her room with such force she lifted off the ground and landed by the foot of the bed seven feet away.
She heard Parkman yell something. Dazed, she shook her head and tried to stand.
Her vision blurred even as her mind was yelling get up and fight. She rested her head back down and tried to take in the room.
Parkman looked unconscious. She saw his shoes as he was being dragged from the room. More men than she could count stood in the doorway.
Then the hotel room door slammed shut.
She was alone.
Her neck ached.
What the hell is wrong with my neck?
She reached up to feel around but her arm felt like a chunk of lead. She finally got it to her neck and felt the end of a needle sticking out.
Drugged!
Her thoughts grew more fuzzy. Her eyes closed.
Her arm dropped at an odd angle as Sarah fell into an anesthetized sleep on the floor of her hotel room.
Chapter 8
Consciousness came back slowly. She wavered in and out and then reality seeped in and she recalled what had happened. She sat up too fast gasping for breath. Her head spun a little, the room tilting.
“Parkman? You here? Parkman?”
She eased up off the floor and sat on the edge of the bed. Aches and pains were evident everywhere. Her right arm was sore as it had been bent back while she slept.
What happened to Parkman? Who were those men?
She couldn’t tell. She hadn’t gotten a good look at them. They wore suits. Well dressed for sure. Strong, too.
She looked at the door to her room and then where she sat now on the edge of the bed. At least seven feet. Happy that nothing broke, she twisted her upper body back and forth to loosen her cramped muscles.
Needle. Drugged.
Shit.
She reached up and gingerly felt around her neck. The needle was still there. She eased it out slowly. Examining it revealed nothing to her other than it was shaped like a dart. There was no way to discover what had been in it without the aid of a laboratory.
Sarah tossed it into a corner and stood up. Her head was a little woozy, causing her to waver on her feet.
She looked into Parkman’s room. His suitcase sat on the end of his bed.
“Parkman?”
The early evening sun beat in through the window. There was still daylight.
She started for the open adjoining door and glanced at the alarm clock on the side of her bed.
7:15pm.
Shit, I’ve been out for four hours. Anything could’ve happened. What the fuck did they drug me with? That shit fucking pisses me off.
Parkman was gone. There was no sign that anyone had been there since the kidnapping.
Why take Parkman? He wasn’t a threat. If anyone should be prone to kidnappings it was Sarah. She’d been taken twice in the last four to five years. Both times by people determined to kill her. Both times she got away, and her kidnappers were all dead.
Except for Armond Stuart. He was behind everything from the start. So it stood to reason that Parkman was taken by Armond’s men. Big strong bodyguards. Strong enough to throw Sarah over seven feet.
Unless it was the Sophia Project men. Although, were they really with the University of Arizona? Could that be possible after what Parkman witnessed yesterday? They had weapons. They were about to attack Armond and his men. Or maybe the Sophia
shit was a ruse and they were really just government workers looking for a real psychic to add to some kind of war machine.
Parkman saw them yesterday. Parkman worked with Sarah. He knew Sarah better than even her own parents when it came to the psychic stuff. He’d researched her extensively and worked with her over a month ago, following her clues from Vivian to save Sarah’s life. Parkman was the only cop she trusted.
That’s why they took him. He added himself to the mix when he came for me and the agency men want to learn more about his motives. Parkman could be in some real trouble.
She turned away from his room and spoke out loud. “Vivian. You gotta help me here. This is getting scary and you know it takes a lot to get me scared. What’s happened to Parkman? What’s my next step? Where do we go from here?”
Nothing.
Her arm didn’t go numb. She received no response.
Maybe someone was already bugging the room?
She had to get to the hostel. There she was sure Vivian would talk to her.
Sarah grabbed her gun, slid it into the back of her jeans and headed for the door. She decided to leave everything behind as Parkman had said the room was paid for another night.
She eased the door open slowly. No one was in the hallway. She stepped out and walked past the elevators to the stairwell.
Sarah got downstairs and out the side door without trouble. She skipped around the building and started for the hostel. As often as she could she would stop and look in the windows of stores looking for a follower in the reflection. After all she had learned, and the skills she had acquired over the last five years, she could tell no one was following her. If anyone was, then they were either the best in the business or they had bugged her person somehow.
Her muscles felt better. Everything was acting normal again and her head had cleared. She kept walking as her stomach growled.
When was the last time I ate anything?
She couldn’t recall. She stopped at a street vendor and bought a small container of french fries and a Coke for energy. She ate them dry as she didn’t want any mayonnaise.
The fifteen minutes it took to order the fries and eat them gave her another chance to watch everyone passing by. No one appeared interested in her whatsoever.
Yet she still felt watched.
Twenty minutes later she walked into her rented room at the hostel and lay out on the bed. In the night table beside the bed she found a pen and paper. Sarah pulled them out and placed them by her hand.
“Come on Vivian. Give me something.”
It was around eight in the evening. As far as she could tell, no one knew where she was or where she would turn up next. This was a great opportunity for Vivian to work her magic.
As if on cue her hand grew numb.
Sarah closed her eyes and rested, waiting to wake and have Vivian tell her exactly what to do.
The sun was lower when she woke. She could tell by the amount of light in her room.
Vivian, she thought.
Sarah sat up fast and grabbed the piece of paper. It was riddled with her handwriting this time. The message was scrolled across two full pages.
Nothing about Parkman. Most of the note was about the immigration officer that worked with Imre. She’d never forget his knowing smile. Now she knew what he knew and who he was. Vivian’s note went on to say that the immigration officer was the one who ordered her jailed. He was the smug bastard who thought he had the upper hand.
According to Vivian he was also the one who facilitated Armond’s entry into Hungary without a problem. Vivian explained how much of a crook the immigration officer was and how to deal with him if she was going to get to Armond.
The note also went into detail about one of the immigration officer’s neighbors. Sarah had to read that part twice.
The bastard. The neighbor should die for that too, she thought. In a few hours I’ll make sure both of these men pay a dear price for what they’ve done.
At the bottom of the second page the note talked about a final date for Sarah.
The crypt. Eight days left. I’m sorry but there’s nothing we can do to avoid it. You only have eight days left.
It has to do with vampires.
What the hell was that? Is this some kind of fiction story now? Her life wasn’t a book or a movie. This was real. Vampires weren’t.
The “eight days” thing scared her. Was Vivian telling her that she was going to die?
Vivian had been right all along. She also said that dealing with the immigration officer would get her one step closer to Armond. If that was the case, then she would get her vengeance and if there was nothing she could do to avoid this crypt thing, then so be it. Armond Stuart was her priority.
If only she could handle that without being killed.
And what the hell is this “vampire” business?
Chapter 9
Sarah stood outside the immigration officer’s apartment building in the fifth district. It was close to midnight. At the late hour the streets were pretty empty. She was well rested as she’d spent four hours sleeping a drugged sleep and about a half hour at the hostel knocked out while writing the note.
Now, with real purpose again, something to do, she walked around the building twice, looking for a way in and attempting to see if anyone had been following her.
Surely she was being paranoid. But with so many new people in the mix lately, things could get out of hand rather quickly.
The front door was like any American building with a buzzer and locked access. With no way to get in she sat back and waited for someone to walk out of the building.
For tonight she had tied her hair into a pony tail to keep it out of the way. Things were going to get serious and she didn’t want to have to think about it.
A man, she guessed he was in his forties, approached the door wobbling along. He appeared from the distance to be quite intoxicated. Sarah was surprised he could even stay on his feet.
“How was your evening?” she asked as he drew near.
He stopped and looked at her. “Who wants to know?”
“You look like you had a great time.” She was grateful he knew English. While she had expected some people in Hungary to speak it, her experience so far in Budapest was that almost everyone she encountered spoke passable to great English.
“Kurva eletbe. A fine night.”
Sarah had been there long enough to know that he said something like fucking good or bitching good in Hungarian.
The man passed her and took out his keys. He looked over his shoulder and then opened the door.
“You want in?” he asked.
Sarah stood up. “Yeah, forgot my key.”
“Bullshit. You don’t live here.” He looked her up and down. Then he smiled a crooked smile and said. “Gonna cost you.”
It would be nice if some things in life were easy, Sarah thought.
“What do you want? Money? Booze?”
“No. Half hour of your time in my apartment.” He stepped into the lobby and held the door for her. “How about it, Miss America?”
“I don’t think so.”
Sarah stepped forward and made to enter the building. The drunkard pulled on the door at the same time. With the alcohol working in his system he didn’t have his normal strength. Sarah easily stopped the door from closing and stepped inside.
“Hey!” he shouted.
She pulled out her gun and held it up under his chin.
“Stay quiet or die.”
The threat worked. He stumbled back and leaned against the wall. Instantly a wet spot began forming on the front of his jeans.
“I was only kidding.”
“Me too. But now you can do me a favor.”
She lowered the weapon and gently eased it back into her pants at the back.
“Anything,” he said, suddenly a lot more sober.
“Call the police. Tell them you were threatened by a girl with a gun in the lobby. Also tell them that I will be on the
third floor.”
“What? You want me to call the police on you? Why should I do that?”
“Because I need you to. Will you do it?”
The light was dim in the lobby. She could tell he was thinking it over. He stared at her a moment longer. Time was running out. She needed to get this done.
“Well?” She asked.