by Cat Connor
“You think you were all supposed to go?”
“Yes. The head thing was a non-event, easily sorted,” Lee replied. “The interesting thing was that the two women with Danni were implicated in the placement of the heads on the ship. But neither of them were ever in Indonesia. Someone fabricated their part in this. To what end? We don’t know.”
Misha frowned again. “I was not aware of any of that.”
“One of the envelopes addressed to me came from New Zealand. It was given to Sam and Lee to bring home.”
Misha nodded. “The chances of all of you being in the same room when you opened it were high.”
“Yes.”
“If you had all gone, then maybe none of you would be coming back,” Misha said quietly.
My phone beeped. I looked at the screen: the app I was using to track Danni. She was on the move again. I swept my finger over the screen and tapped the app icon.
She was in the hotel.
“Danni is in here somewhere.”
“So is Alexandra,” Lee muttered. “Let’s go. We need to get hold of Danni and get some answers.”
Forty-Two
Killers
A thought rampaged through my mind: Danni might not be here officially, because she isn’t trying to reunite Alexandra and Anastazia but working for whoever abducted them in the first place. Cold clawed within my gut.
I walked up to the security guard by the entrance to the hotel and flashed her picture.
“Seen her recently?”
“No, ma’am.”
“Anyone come through that door in the last half hour?”
He nodded. “Half the hotel guests, ma’am, there is a conference on.”
Crap.
Mitch and I did a quick search of the bathrooms, bar, restaurants, stores, lobby. There was no sign of her. Lee and Misha talked to hotel staff and went through the kitchens. No luck.
Faced with a floor-by-floor search, my determination waned. Cleverly, I knew of another way to locate her. I smiled sweetly at the concierge and asked to be shown to the security room. A couple of minutes later, I showed her picture to the person responsible for monitoring the many CCTV cameras in the hotel. He ran back a tape from a few minutes earlier showing someone who looked like Danni exiting the elevator on our floor. As I watched the screen, she walked down the hall and stopped near the door to my room. Then entered my room.
Now how did she know which floor we were on? How’d she get in?
Giving him my number I asked him to call me if she reappeared and on one screen I noted the concierge walking down a long hallway, nowhere near the front desk. The security guard was otherwise occupied as well, surrounded by a gaggle of women.
Then thanking the man in the security room, I went back to the front desk; I had something I wanted to check.
“Concierge, please,” I said to an older woman manning the desk. She went to fetch him for me.
While she did that, I slipped around the desk and checked the computer screen in front of her. It took me under two seconds to bring up a guest list. All Danni had to do was send the woman on a wild goose chase and then she had computer access. But how did she know the names. Because in the guest book we used Priscilla and Elvis but on the computer you can access billing information. A little yellow duck quacked at me from the floor. I glanced at it. It quacked again. From behind the desk, there was also access to master keycards – such as housekeeping used. She could get into any room with one of those.
“Mitch, let’s go back to our room. I think she’s still there.”
I walked as quickly as I could to the elevator. Slowest elevator ride ever. Or maybe it just seemed that way. Lee and Misha took the stairs, just in case she left that way. My heart thumped. I wiped my hands down my jeans. With a deep breath, I swiped my key card and swung the door wide open.
“Hello! Housekeeping!” I called.
To my astonishment, a female voice answered, “Can you come back later, please? Thank you.”
Her voice came from the bedroom.
“Yes, ma’am,” I replied, signaling to Mitch to stay put outside the door. He shook his head. I gave him a look. No time for this. He stepped in and I shut the door. I drew my gun, adjusted my grip and crept to the bedroom with Mitch right behind me.
I pushed the door open.
Danni Lane was rifling through the clothing in my bags with a camera around her neck.
I coughed.
She jumped.
Could’ve been the gun pointed at her.
“Hello. Can I help you?” I tried the calm syrupy voice I’d used on mentally challenged people to great effect.
Flustered she replied, “I … um … I … ah …”
“Need something to wear?” I offered, indicating my black shirts strewn over the floor. I lowered my weapon slightly.
She moved a hand. My gun swung back to her head. Yeah, I’m not keen on being shot again.
“I was just …” She appeared lost for words. I struggled to believe she was some kind of wonder agent with Interpol.
“Breaking and entering. Doing a touch of burglary?” I tut-tutted softly. “This is no way for a lady to behave.”
Something snapped. Her eyes hardened. “You are making a mistake.”
Her right hand reached for something. My aim adjusted to her shoulder. My finger squeezed the trigger. She squawked like an injured bird and staggered backwards. Bit dramatic. I had the urge to roll my eyes. At least she didn’t crumple into a heap; for that I was grateful. Something black fell at her feet.
I saw the same gun I’d seen in my dream.
“Kick that over here,” I instructed.
She pathetically kicked at the gun. On the fourth kick, it made it to my feet.
“You shot me,” she lamented.
“You had a gun. You broke into my room. You’ve been following me.”
I kicked my smallest bag closer to the bed, and then hoisted it up, picking the gun up at the same time. Two feet away from me, dripping blood on the carpet from one hanging arm, stood Danni.
I forced her to her knees, searched her, took the flash drive from her wrist and then removed handcuffs from my bag. She screeched as I pulled her right hand behind her back. Guess it hurt her shoulder. Shouldn’t point a gun at me.
“You brought this on yourself,” I said, reaching for her other arm and snapping the cuffs on tightly. “We need to have a chat in a minute.” I took a small towel from the bathroom and some duct tape from my bag then wadded up the towel and taped it to her shoulder.
I found her bag and rifled through it until I came up with her notebook.
“Bet this makes exciting reading,” I said.
“They’re my notes for my next book. Nothing to do with you,” she muttered.
“I have a feeling they might have more to do with me than anyone realizes.”
There was a knock at the door and Mitch opened it. I heard Lee and Misha enter.
“Ellie?” Lee said from behind me, then stepped up beside me and surveyed the bedroom. “Not like you to have a messy room.”
“I didn’t do it.”
“You okay?”
“Yep. Our friend here needs an ambulance but not yet.”
“I heard a shot,” Misha said from somewhere back near the door. “You are okay, Ellie?”
I nodded.
I pushed Danni into a seated position on the edge of the bed.
“You are going to talk to us. If I don’t like your answers, or if I think you are holding back, it will go very badly for you,” I said.
She stared straight ahead. Not making eye contact with anyone.
Mitch moved. I caught him in the corner of my eye. “You don’t have to be here,” I said with a smile.
“I know. I want to be.”
“Okay.”
No secrets. I liked that. I liked that a lot. Made it easier to be me.
I looked at the pictures on her camera. They were all me, even shots when I knew some of m
y team were right next to me at the time. She’d cropped the pictures on the camera, taking everyone else out. Weird. The contents of her camera made me feel a little sick. I looked at her.
“Why are there so many of photos of me?” I scrolled through the photos. That was when I spotted a picture of what could’ve been Gallows Road. I took a closer look. A blanketed figure in motion. Me. Crossing the road after I escaped. “If you knew where I was, why didn’t you get help?”
I dropped the camera in disgust. Misha caught it.
“What are you talking about? It was a hospital. You were obviously ill.”
“Then why the escape, wrapped in a blanket?” I turned away, bile rising. Her peculiar detached smile made me feel ill.
She smiled, wide-eyed, a tad freaky looking. “You’re amazing. I met you once at a book signing. That moment changed my life,” she beamed. “I knew as soon as I saw you, I knew that we were meant to be more than friends.”
What?
“How so?”
“We have a connection. You know that. That’s why you stopped coming to my café. You’re denying the truth.”
I wracked my mind but could not remember ever seeing her in a café.
“You’re strangely talkative for someone who has a hole in their shoulder.” Very talkative.
“You’re my hero,” she said with a delighted grin.
What now?
“You’re Interpol and I’m nobody’s hero.”
She frowned for a split second then the crazy grin returned.
I spoke again, “We know who you are. You can drop the café-worker routine.”
She looked blank for a second then her mind rolled back, I could see it happen, weird. “I’m what?”
“Interpol.”
Misha stepped in. “Danni, you remember me, yes?”
Blank again.
What the hell? Something was wrong.
I looked into her eyes. Fuc’n hell.
I turned to Mitch. “Mitch, you gave me codeine when I had a migraine, where’s the bottle?”
“Bathroom, on the counter with the Tylenol and Advil.”
I left her where she was and hurried back to the bathroom. I turned as Lee threw me a balled up pair of latex gloves. “Thanks.”
I pulled on the gloves and carefully picked up the codeine prescription from the bathroom counter. I tipped the pills into my hand and counted them quickly. The bottle said fifty, thirty milligram tablets. Mitch gave me two. I hadn’t used any prior to that. There were ten missing. Well fuck, that sucked out loud and gave change.
I could hear Danni still talking in the other room. Still declaring we had a connection. The only connection we had was the tentative one that came from my bullet hitting her shoulder.
“Lee, call paramedics and tell them she has a shoulder wound and that she’s taken ten thirty-milligram codeine tablets and I don’t know what else.”
“Wonderful,” he growled.
I went back to Danni. “What else did you take?”
Her reactions had slowed. “Just some valium before I came. I was nervous.”
“Did you hear that, Lee?”
“Yep, she’s an idiot. Still think she’s Interpol?” Lee asked, pocketing his phone.
“According to Interpol she is,” Misha replied. “Danni, do you remember me?”
She smiled at Misha and nodded. “You know Seamus.”
She was getting chatty. Excellent.
“Danni, what are you doing in Washington?” I asked. “Why are you following me?”
“They’re two different things,” she said. “I got lucky with you.”
“Great, now go back to why you are here.”
“The Dobrovolný girls. They were abducted from Prague. Their father wanted them found. I traced them to Northern Virginia. Then one turned up at that old factory and you found her.”
“Okay, who turned her into a bomb?”
“Not us. Someone got to her while she was in ICE’s care. Before we could. That’s why Kennedy is here now.”
Chatty. I like chatty.
“Who sent letter bombs to me and Misha?” Grasping at straws. A duck quacked. I looked at it on the floor by the edge of the bed. The duck didn’t think I was grasping at straws.
Danni smiled vacantly.
“Hey, you with me? Letter bombs, who sent them?”
She shook her head. “I don’t know about letter bombs.” Her eyes darted sideways. “I know about Alexandra and you.”
“What do you know about me?”
“You are the best main character ever.”
“I’m not fictional. I am real.” I sighed. She was losing it. “What about Alexandra?”
“She was taken from Prague. I don’t know who took her, but her sister might be for sale.”
“For sale?”
The code. The price list.
“I think so,” she replied. Her voice became lazier as she spoke.
“Do you know anything about the sale?”
“No, not yet.”
Okay, moving on.
“Tell me what you were doing with my clothes,” I said, curiosity brimming.
“I wanted to buy you something pretty. I needed your size. Your wardrobe is so dark.”
“I’m FBI, Danni. It’s a dark job.” Some days darker than others.
Someone knocked. I called out for them to come in. Two paramedics bustled into the room. I spoke to the paramedics. “Danni Lane, thirty-year-old female. Has taken ten thirty-milligram codeine tablets and unknown valium quantity. She also has a shoulder wound, it’s a through and through. The slug is in the wall over there.”
The paramedics went to work. Lee got to work as well. He took her gun into evidence.
“She’s interesting, huh?”
“You believing her story?” Lee asked.
“Parts of it, only because she’s so whacked out, I don’t think she could lie right now … but I think she’s still withholding information.” I didn’t want to tell him that I was right about the stalker thing. I had a feeling that would get me razzed for years to come. I think he detected my reluctance.
“Ellie?”
“She’s stalking me, because we have a connection.” I still thought it was more than that. That wasn’t enough, not in my book anyway.
Book? Where was her notebook? I looked at the bed, there it was. The notebook and the flash drive. I must’ve put them down without noticing. I scooped them up. They needed looking at.
Lee’s face cracked with a huge grin. “I thought we’d seen the last of the crazy fanatical types when you ditched Grange. Seems Ellie fans are just as nuts. Ya think the gay Ellie fans will beat Grange fans to a pulp?”
“Shut up. We’re never going to find out.” I leaned on the wall. “How did she pass the psych testing or isn’t Interpol as rigorous as the FBI?”
“No idea. Maybe she was perfectly normal until she clapped eyes on you …” Lee laughed. His laughter bounced off the surfaces in our room and pinged out the door.
“Laugh it up, chuckles.”
“Write your statement, Ellie. I’ll take it then I’ll travel with the loopy woman to hospital and be in touch if she imparts any more tidbits or maybe a sonnet or a love poem all about you.”
“You think you are so freaking funny,” I grumbled. “I need your room key.” He handed it over.
I wrote fast, making sure to note the concierge, woman at the desk and lapse in security that made accessing keys and patron information so easy. Then wrote about the CCTV, the security guard and my version of the events from when I entered my room. I signed it and handed it to Lee. Mitch did the same and so did Misha. I didn’t want anything left unsaid or unwritten. Document everything, especially when dealing with lunatics.
Lee called the crime scene unit to my room. It would be half an hour before they arrived and an hour at least until they left. I sighed heavily. Lee’s room was the obvious choice for a temporary base.
I’d lost my codeine too, beca
use the silly bitch took my pills. I had a receipt for them so I could get a replacement script from my doctor or Kurt without being treated like a prescription pill-munching junkie. I thought about that for a second. Maybe I wouldn’t replace them and hope I don’t need them.
Forty-Three
Tornado Of Souls
We took our gathering to Lee’s room and assembled the rest of the team. Lee opted to stay, not go with Danni. He sent a uniformed officer instead.
Sam and Lee grinned at me.
“You really do attract aberrations, Chicky Babe,” Sam said, letting loose a low whistle.
“No denying it,” I replied, settling with care on the couch, cautious of leaning my head on the high-backed couch.
“Now what?” Sam asked.
“I have this notebook and a flash drive,” I said. “Let’s find out what Ms. Lane has been writing, shall we?”
I opened the notebook at the first page to a title. Her next book. IED. Ominous.
The next page had the beginning of an outline.
“What’s it say?” Kurt asked sitting in an armchair opposite me.
“Her next book is called IED,” I said. “Are her books first-person?”
“Yes, they are,” he said.
“Gimme me a minute or two to read this.”
The outline talked about terror attacks in Washington D.C. IEDs. I skimmed over the next six pages of outline. The pages that followed held detailed descriptions of all the places they’d visited and the security. Turning another page, I found a name and phone number. The phone number was a DC one. The name a codename. Not many people are called X in real life. I picked up my phone and called the number: State Department.
“Oh, crap,” I muttered hanging up. Seconds later I called Iain Campbell.
“Hey, I just made a call to a number at the State Department. You might want to check it out. This person’s number was in a notebook belonging to one of the women from the Navy Yard surveillance job.”
“Do you know who she called?”
“Yeah, a guy calling himself X, turns out his real name is on his phone. David Krauss.”
“I’ll have a chat with him.”
“Thanks.”
I hung up and delved back to the notebook. By the time I ran out of pages to read, my head spun.
“Share, Conway,” Kurt said, frowning at me.