The Kill Shot

by Nichole Christoff

  Barrett set me on my own two feet. He pressed a hand to his side and I remembered he’d been beaten. Still, he managed to shed that horrible mask, shuck his green waiter’s coat.

  When he whistled through his teeth, I shushed him.

  “Don’t wake the cars,” I warned him.

  “I won’t,” he promised, then shoved me into a black cab that had swerved to a stop in front of us.

  “Must’ve been some party, gov.”

  The driver’s voice sounded like a fast slide down a long gravel road and for a second, I thought he was a man without a body. As far as I could see, he didn’t even have a mouth. Only his eyes and nose hovered over the back of his seat—until I realized I was seeing his reflection in the rearview mirror.

  Barrett seemed hip to this. Either that or a formless driver didn’t bother him. He shoved a neon banknote through the Plexiglas divider between the front of the cab and the back.

  I couldn’t make out its denomination, but given the way my eyes kept going in and out of focus, it was fun to try. Watercolor pools of electric color flowed across the bill. Queen Elizabeth, crowned in all her glory, looked out from her portrait.

  She turned, smiled, and winked at me.

  “Evening, Majesty.”

  To the driver, Barrett said, “Here’s fifty pounds. Put your foot to the floor.”

  The driver must’ve accepted Barrett’s proposal because we careened around a corner and Barrett slid into me, pinning me between his solid body and the wall of the cab. I nuzzled the collar of his shirt because it was there—and because he smelled so good. Like the sugar and spice of scones and morning tea…

  “…after a long night of making love.”

  Barrett cleared his throat.

  The cabbie began to cough.

  And it dawned on me I’d voiced my wayward thoughts out loud.

  Embarrassment threatened to burn me up. But the feeling didn’t last long. Because we’d arrived at Rabbit’s Revenge.

  Upstairs, Barrett hammered on the door to my suite with the side of his fist. Katie opened it. The security chain glittered beneath her nose like a golden mustache.

  The thought of Katie with a precious metal mustache made me start to giggle all over again.

  “Jamie!” she exclaimed. “What on earth’s happened to you?”

  “She needs an emetic,” Barrett growled.

  He deposited me on the sofa. The upholstery was fat and fluffy—like a unicorn pelt. But I was against cruelty to unicorns and so I began to cry.

  Ikaat thrust a tumbler of cut crystal under my nose. “Drink this.”

  The roar in my brain made me as biddable as a lost lamb. I did as she ordered. The taste was salty and sharp and got stuck in the back of my throat. Still, I forced myself to swallow because Ikaat had told me to. I gagged as I did.

  “It’s horrible,” I wailed.

  “It will make you vomit.”

  No sooner were the words out of Ikaat’s mouth than I did exactly that.

  Twice.

  Barrett, to his credit, kept my hair out of the toilet bowl and rubbed my back in slow circles while I was sick. I couldn’t imagine Philip doing such a thing. Somehow, I kept that opinion to myself.

  When my stomach settled, I decided I wanted to spend the rest of my life on the bathroom’s cool tile floor.

  “The drinks at that party came with a hell of a kicker,” I muttered.

  “You were drugged,” Barrett told me, “with a compound designed to make you spill your guts.”

  “Very funny,” I said, considering I’d just spilled them all over the bathroom.

  And then I realized what he meant. The drug was to make me willing. Willing to do anything. Willing to say anything. Willing to tell someone all I knew about any subject he chose—such as the Oujdads and what I was doing in London.

  Such a tactic was an intense interrogation technique. And not everyone in the world had access to the chemical compounds to make it happen. It would take a government connection to get them. And I’d just seen dozens of party guests at John’s townhouse, each with a connection of his or her own.

  Ikaat knelt beside me, wiped my face with a cool cloth. “Why would someone do such a thing?”

  “Because,” Barrett replied, “someone knows she’s close to finding your father and getting you both to the U.S. Only, someone wants to beat her to it.”

  “Who?” Katie asked, frozen in the bathroom’s doorway.

  “Good question,” Barrett said.

  Well, I didn’t have an answer.

  I squeezed my eyes shut.

  “Jamie?” Katie said. “Your handbag is ringing.”

  And so it was.

  Barrett helped me into the sitting room. Katie offered me my purse. The effect of the drug was passing now, so the bag’s rosebud clasp presented no problem, but I still wasn’t eager to open it. I had little doubt who was calling. And it turned out I was right.

  “Jamie, are you all right? I’ve been ringing your mobile for the last hour.”

  “I’m fine, Philip.” Or I soon would be. I told him about the Mickey Finn in the champagne.

  Barrett, looming over me like the Chrysler Building, asked, “Did he notice anyone who seemed too interested in your wineglass? Anyone too interested in you?”

  I waved him to silence.

  In my ear, Philip was upset.

  “You should be in the hospital,” he insisted. “Where are you? I’ll fetch you.”

  “I doubt this is the kind of thing your average doctor knows how to treat—”

  “That may be, but it’s also the type of thing that indicates you’re in danger.”

  “Well, a doctor can’t fix that, either.”

  “Perhaps not, but I shall.”

  I glanced at Ikaat, curled on the opposite end of the sofa. Her dark eyes glistened as she kept watch over me. Katie stood at her shoulder, her finger twisting the dickens out of her strand of black pearls.

  “I know you mean well,” I told Philip, “but I’m going to drink eight ounces of water, brush my teeth, wash my face, and go to bed. I suggest you do the same.”

  “Listen, Jamie—”

  “Good night, Philip.”

  “Don’t disconnect. Tell me where in the bloody hell you are!”

  But the urge to do exactly as I was told had passed.

  I hung up on Philip and tossed my phone onto the coffee table.

  Chapter 18

  After enduring a stinging shower and swigging a gallon of mouthwash, I felt a little more like myself. Especially if I ignored my sore knee. And the persistent ache of my broken wrist. And the itch where Katie had stabbed me with her fountain pen. The spot burned like a son of a bitch.

  When I emerged from the bath, Ikaat insisted I drink another glass of water and Katie urged me to go straight to bed. So that’s what I did. Or more accurately, Katie and Ikaat put me to bed. And all the while, I could hear Barrett prowling outside the bedroom door like a caged tiger. Or a frustrated Edwardian husband.

  I didn’t want to think about him like that.

  Once I’d found my way into the silky, carnation-pink sleep shorts and camisole I’d bought, Ikaat patted the plump mattress.

  “Sit here, Jamie.”

  To my surprise, she gathered my dark, shoulder-length hair into her hand and began to brush it with a lovely boar’s-bristle brush.

  “When I was a little girl,” she told me, “my mother would brush my hair just this way. When my aunts came to visit, each would take a turn. Pauvre petite, they would call me, because I did not have sisters to share this ritual.”

  “I didn’t have sisters, either,” I informed her. “And I turned out just fine.”

  Katie’s hands, fiddling with the top sheet and folding the hem of it over the coverlet, grew very still.

  And I wasn’t the only one to notice.

  Ikaat asked, “Do you have sisters, Katie?”

  “One,” she replied and her voice was as black as the pearls a
t her throat. “My big sister. She’s a drilling engineer for a major oil company.”

  “I remember,” I said. “She’s in the Middle East.”

  “Yes.”

  Her voice seemed to shrink as she said it.

  “You are close to her?” Ikaat asked.

  Katie tried to smile. “Our mother died when I was in middle school in Culpeper, Virginia. My father did his best, but that’s the age a girl needs her mom, isn’t it? My sister was in high school, then. She could’ve run around with her friends, done her own thing, but she worked hard to fill the gap for me. Since then, she’s been more than a sister to me. She’s been a parent.”

  Katie plucked the pearls at her throat. I’d imagined they’d been her mother’s—or were they perhaps a gift from her sister? In the Dark Ages, most of the world’s pearls passed through the wholesalers in ports like Doha. A large percentage of them still did, today. Katie’s sister could’ve picked up the necklace during her travels and sent them home to Katie as a gift.

  “My sister kept our family together.” Katie swallowed a sigh. “She even kept the old place in Culpeper after Dad died. Sometimes, I go out there on the weekends just to feel close to her. It’s like going home.”

  “Your sister sounds like a wonderful person,” I said.

  “She is,” Katie replied, and her hand fisted around her pearls. “I’d do anything for her. Anything at all.”

  The catch in her voice made the hairs on the back of my neck stand and salute.

  My fatigue and my battle with the drug were clearly making me a little paranoid. In any case, Ikaat didn’t seem worried by Katie’s attitude. And all of Katie’s doom and gloom melted away in the light of her sunny smile as she tucked me into the bed.

  “You had a close call at that party, tonight,” she told me, tugging the comforter to my chin. “Now, you need all the rest you can get.”

  I would’ve agreed with her, but I was already sliding into sleep. I needed my rest because I needed my strength. Something told me I’d need all I had to find Ikaat’s father.

  And even as I slipped into oblivion, I vowed I’d find him soon.

  I slept for what seemed like days, only to jerk awake when a distant pounding intruded on my dreams. A rustling in my room had me picturing rats and clutching the covers to my chest. Until my door opened. The sound of the pounding grew louder as someone banged on the door to the suite. And someone else exited my room to go and see about it.

  Shaky with sleep and a good dose of uncertainty, I snatched my glasses from the nightstand, fumbled for my new dressing gown. I found it at the foot of the bed. I wriggled into the thing, cinched the belt around my middle, and made tracks for the sitting room.

  The long nap had done me good. My head was as clear as a bell. So was my eyesight. From the corner, the desk lamp threw a soft glow that barely reached past the sofa, but the ambient light was enough to reveal Katie in her nightgown, emerging from her room. Ikaat, with curls everywhere, was close behind.

  The pounding began again. The brass locks on the door rattled with the force of it. And there was Barrett, ahead of us all.

  He swung toward the two women. “Return to your room. Lock the door. Stay inside.”

  He didn’t have to tell them twice. They disappeared. And before I could leave the shadow of my bedroom’s door frame, Barrett opened the door to the hall.

  A very angry Philip Spencer-Dean stood on the threshold.

  For one long moment, he and Barrett eyed each other. Neither liked what he saw. And just when I feared Philip’s police pals would push in to arrest Barrett, my old friend said, “Lieutenant Colonel Barrett. Fancy meeting you here.”

  They weren’t meeting for the first time, though. That impression came across loud and clear. And each had kept the intriguing fact that they already knew each other from me. Since he’d shown me the surveillance video of Barrett blowing away Dalmatovis, Philip had claimed to be trying to identify him. Barrett, on the other hand, had played dumb when he’d asked me about Philip just that morning.

  Now, here they were, glaring at each other like two dogs from the same litter interested in the same bone.

  Barrett said, “I’d ask you to come in, but Jamie’s sleeping. I’ll tell her you stopped by.”

  Philip’s patent leather dress shoe was the only thing that kept Barrett from slamming the door in his face.

  Philip took in Barrett’s bare chest, bare feet, and pinstriped pajama bottoms and frowned. His eyes swept across the room—and landed on me in the bedroom’s doorway. I glanced down, saw that one half of my robe’s satin lapels had slid away from the other half, revealing more than a peek of the dusky pink shorts and camisole underneath. I whipped the robe together, jerked the belt tight. But Philip wasn’t looking at me anymore.

  I turned and followed his line of sight—straight past me and into my bedroom.

  That curvy chaise longue still stood at the foot of my bed. A blanket pooled on the floor in front of it, joining the covers I’d kicked off in my rush to get to the door. And there, beside the bedclothes, was a dark puddle that looked suspiciously like Barrett’s T-shirt.

  He might’ve discarded it in a hurry. And we might’ve kicked off the covers together. Except we hadn’t. Barrett hadn’t been in bed with me, no matter how much it looked like he had. At least I was sure of that much.

  But Philip wasn’t.

  He said, “Are you all right, Jamie?”

  He had to speak past Barrett’s shoulder.

  Because Barrett wouldn’t let him in the suite.

  Before I could reply, Barrett said, “She’s had a rough night.”

  “I’m well aware of that.”

  “Someone fed her an interrogation drug. Maybe you’re aware of that as well.”

  Philip muscled the door wide. “What are you implying?”

  “Oh, I’m not implying anything.” Barrett grinned. It was a dangerous smile. “I’m stating she reacted like she’d been fed one of those synthetic compounds your boys in MI6 cook up.”

  MI6 is the British equivalent of our CIA.

  Philip said, “MI6 doesn’t drug senators’ daughters.”

  “They might. If their pet diplomat couldn’t learn what they wanted to know.”

  Barrett’s bald-faced accusation made me blink.

  And judging by the way Philip drew himself up, it made his blood boil.

  He said, “You were a trespasser at a private party, Lieutenant Colonel. I saw you impersonating a waiter. I saw you serving drinks. Jamie saw you as well. How are we to know you’re not responsible for Jamie’s drugging?”

  “I didn’t need to drug Jamie.”

  “Didn’t you?” Philip’s gaze wandered to the bedroom again. “Such a drug would make her awfully…suggestible.”

  Barrett’s mouth flatlined. His hands balled into fists. And alarm bells went off in my head.

  Philip said, “Not every man takes a lady’s rejection like an officer and a gentleman.”

  “Really?” Barrett replied. “What do you know about being an officer or a gentleman?”

  And that’s when Philip lost his temper.

  Without warning, he punched Barrett in the eye. The blow knocked Barrett backward. Until his feet found purchase in a fighter’s stance. He kept his fists at his sides, but with his boxer’s build, Barrett could beat the tar out of lanky Philip. And I couldn’t let that happen.

  “Hey!” I rushed into the breach, plowed a palm into Philip’s chest, dug an elbow into Barrett’s.

  “Jamie,” Philip said, “I think—”

  “I know exactly what you think. And I think you need to go. Now!”

  For the longest moment, Philip didn’t move. But when I tried to fold my arms across my chest, Philip frowned at the cast on my arm, at Barrett still on his feet, and he left. I didn’t bother to watch him step onto the elevator.

  I locked the door on his retreating shadow.

  Barrett said, “Nice friend you’ve got there.”
/>   I stormed past him on my way to the credenza on the far wall of the room. “What the hell is wrong with you?”

  “Me? You want to know what’s wrong with me?”

  “Yes.”

  Or rather, no. I was afraid to find out why he thought Philip had slipped me a Mickey. And why he was in Britain in the first place. Had he come with the intention of killing Teodor Dalmatovis? If so, would I be afraid to learn who’d sent him to do it?

  I wasn’t sure of that, but I was certain I was angry.

  And my anger overrode my fear.

  On the credenza, a silver-plated ice bucket sat sweating onto a matching tray. Beside it, a stack of fresh hand towels remained where Katie or Ikaat had forgotten them while tending me. I whipped one from the top of the pile, shook it open, and began stacking ice cubes in the center of it. Gathering the ends of the towel, I gave them a twist and voilà. Instant ice pack.

  “Sit.”

  Instead of doing as I said, Barrett drifted into my bedroom. He sat on the foot of the sinuous chaise. I followed him in, elbowed the door shut, and thrust the ice pack at him.

  He didn’t take it.

  “Jamie, you’ve got to be careful. Especially after what happened to you at that party tonight.”

  “I’m the most careful woman I know.” And this was true. Professionally. And personally. Though standing over Barrett in a luxe hotel room in nothing but short, satin pj’s and a slippery dressing gown didn’t seem very careful of me at all.

  Still, Barrett didn’t take his eyes from my face.

  “Take it.” I offered him the compress again. “Your eye is swelling.”

  And it was.

  Barrett would have quite a shiner in the morning. All black and blue, at least it would match the rest of him. His shirt still lay on the floor, giving me a good look at his strong shoulders and chiseled chest, not to mention the bruises darkening his ribs. His old shrapnel scars still blistered the right side of his abdomen before trailing south past the waistband of his pajama pants. They were a good reminder that Barrett had had far worse than a black eye from the likes of Philip Spencer-Dean—and that he’d lived to tell the tale.