Chapter 57
When they passed the exit for the town of Sens, Stuart arranged his mouth and teeth the way he had practiced and clicked twice on the left side.
He glanced at his cell phone, saw the text from the team.
Radar contact. Thumbs-up. He deleted the text, waited five minutes, clicked twice to disarm, and waited on confirmation. All systems go.
Ever alert, they saw nothing throughout the day that was even remotely suspicious. They were often alone, vulnerable, sitting ducks. No witnesses and no surveillance cameras within miles. Nothing happened.
—
How long can one stare at a used condom?
Nabeed had never considered the question before. Neither had Edouard or Christine. The three had had varying degrees of experience with the things, but like most folks they had always forgotten about them as soon as they were no longer needed.
It was lying in the center of the small flimsy table in the kitchen in the safe house.
It was on a white towel, also taken from the hotel, along with an assortment of the usual discarded items: a disposable razor, a paper wrapper that once held a bar of soap, pads for makeup remover, used tissues, a string of dental floss.
All of which had been delivered in a small plastic bag by a hotel employee who enjoyed bribes and was known to be trustworthy.
The rest of the trash made perfect sense.
But the condom? They were newlyweds, in their early thirties, and there was at least a 90 percent chance they had been sleeping together for some time.
Birth control? Rae Claire was taking the popular pill, Junel Fe, and had been for over a year.
Medical records were ridiculously easy to hack in the United States.
There were no diseases, infections, viruses, or lingering problems. She had once taken Ambien for sleep and Zoloft for anxiety, but had quit them recently.
Stuart had no prescriptions, no health problems.
Over numerous cups of tea, they had talked circles around the condom and what it might mean. Left unsaid was the obvious: If given the choice, men will always avoid them. Why, then, would a perfectly healthy couple use one?
And a real spook would never leave one behind. They were so easy to flush.
Though there were too many unanswered questions, it was clear that the two were not what they appeared to be. The grab-and-run strategy that had worked so well in the past would be altered. Plan B had been well rehearsed, and there was another one after that.
—
Dinner was in the small hotel restaurant just off the lobby. The setting was beautiful and festive and every table appeared to be busy with either Americans or Brits. Logs crackled in the fireplace. Soft carols echoed from the ceiling.
The sudden intimacy had worked wonders for their relationship.
There was more touching, longer looks, and sweeter smiles.
They whispered wisecracks about hustling back to bed.
Both had been through dry spells and they had some catching up to do.
And the sex they were suddenly enjoying was by no means out of line.
They were, after all, married! But it seemed a bit naughty anyway and that only added to the fun.
They skipped drinks by the tree and went to their room where they peeled off again and hopped in the sack.
Sleep came before they could brush teeth and put on pajamas. The day had been long and tiring, and now, topped off with a long dinner and a good romp, they were exhausted. Thoroughly entangled, they drifted away.
At midnight, the stillness slightly interrupted by the sounds of heavy sleep, the nitrous oxide was released remotely from two canisters hidden under the bed.
The odorless vapors were directed up toward the headboard.
The best guess was that five minutes of gas would do the trick, though this was far from certain.
Too much could damage their brains or even kill them. Too little might allow them to resist.
Their room, billed as a “bridal suite,” as were dozens of others in the hotel, was on the third floor of an old building that had lived many lives.
Currently doing just fine as a chic, hip hotel, its doors and floors had been reconfigured over the centuries.
Next to them was another bridal suite, currently occupied by Edouard and Christine.
He was holding the remote opener; she had the listening device.
They had tried to install a camera but almost got caught by a housekeeper.
Between the rooms was a heavy door that remained bolted from both sides, unless the guests wanted a two-bedroom suite, at which time the door was free to open and close.
The same security guard who had sneaked away the garbage-can liner had also provided keys and jimmied the deadbolts.
Edouard and Christine put on oxygen masks and opened the dividing door.
Christine jabbed a needle into Rae Claire’s thigh as Edouard gave a stronger dose of ketamine to Stuart.
Neither moved. With the remote, Christine turned off the canisters under the bed.
Edouard opened the window. They retreated to their room and waited for the air to clear.
For ten minutes they breathed oxygen in their masks, though neither felt the slightest dizziness.
They removed them and sat by the window for a moment.
When they were certain they were safe from the gas, they quickly got on with the job.
They dragged Rae Claire into their room, placed her naked body on the bed, and dressed her in a white bathrobe and shower shoes.
She did not make a sound. Stuart, at two hundred pounds, was more of a challenge, but they managed to wrestle him onto the bed, then dressed him in a matching robe.
What a cute couple. They jabbed them again with doses of ketamine.
For the next half hour, they quietly and methodically moved everything from Rae Claire and Stuart’s room into theirs.
Clothing, luggage, toiletries, shopping bags, guidebooks, magazines, ice bucket, empty champagne bottle, cell phones, laptops, and especially the hidden canisters.
Then they made up the bed and fiddled with the pillows and covers until it could pass for a perfect job by housekeeping.
When they were finished, the room appeared to have been empty for days, just waiting for the next happy young couple.
The easy part was over. Now they had to move the bodies.
At 4 a.m., Edouard put on his oxygen mask and cap and eased into the dark hallway.
There was one camera in a corner, an old model that probably hadn’t been serviced in years.
Their mole said the monitors were rarely watched, especially in the early morning hours.
Edouard walked under it, then quickly sprayed it with black paint from a small can.
The third-floor janitorial station was around the corner near an elevator and he had a key to the door.
The maids weren’t due for another two hours.
From it he took a housekeeping cleaning cart on wheels and rolled it back to their room where they removed the shelving and supplies.
Using duct tape, they bound Stuart’s knees, ankles, and wrists together, then covered his head and shoulders with a black garbage bag.
With another one, they covered his feet and legs.
The trick was stuffing him like a pretzel into the cart so he would not be noticed if they happened to bump into anyone.
Their solution was simply to secure him with plenty of duct tape.
Other than heavy breathing, he did not make a sound.
Edouard pushed and Christine pulled. They took the service elevator to the basement, where Edouard stepped out first to see if anyone was doing laundry or prepping for breakfast. In a small kitchen around the corner, two women chattered in some Slavic tongue as they peeled fruit.
At exactly 4:30, a white delivery van appeared at the hotel’s only service ramp, situated between two dumpsters in an alley.
Nabeed was the driver. The man Paul called Ninja was his wingman.
They opened the rear doors as Edouard pushed the housekeeping cart to the bumper.
Nabeed sliced duct tape here and there and Stuart rolled out onto the bed of the truck. He looked like a pile of garbage.
“Hurry,” Nabeed said, and Edouard and Christine disappeared with the cart.
A heavily accented voice called out in the dark, “What are you doing over there?”
Startled, Nabeed took a few steps and lit a cigarette. “Yes?”
An African came forward, with a doorman’s uniform on a hanger over his shoulder. “What are you doing?”
“Deliveries. What are you doing?”
“I’m coming to work. What are you delivering at this hour?”
“Italian wine, with no tax or stamps.” He pulled out some cash and handed over three 100-euro notes. “For you. The wine is for your guests.”
The doorman didn’t buy it, but he smiled anyway, took the money, and kept walking. Nabeed watched him disappear into the basement of the hotel.
Rae Claire, also wrapped in garbage bags, arrived ten minutes later and got the same treatment as her husband. Edouard tossed in a cheap duffel and said to Nabeed, “Phones, bottles, keys, garbage. No condom this time. Dump it all in the river as soon as possible.”
Nabeed and Ninja left in the delivery truck.
Edouard and Christine returned to the third floor, put their housekeeping cart back in order, and parked it in the janitor’s station precisely where Edouard found it.
In their room, they examined every piece of luggage and article of clothing belonging to Rae Claire and Stuart.
They removed the ID tags on luggage. They threw away sales and credit card receipts, but kept their wallets, cash, laptops, and passports.
When there was no trace of the newlyweds, Edouard and Christine headed to the lobby as daylight was breaking.
Each carried a backpack with a few items. The rest of their belongings were left behind, commingled with the other couple’s.
A sleepy-eyed girl at the front desk checked them out.
They had arrived two days earlier and checked in with fake Spanish passports and a credit card issued by a shipping company in Athens.
They said they had enjoyed their stay and left in no particular hurry.
They enjoyed a brisk morning walk for a few blocks, then stopped at a café for coffee.
As they sipped espresso and nibbled on a chocolate croissant, they began smiling as the tension eased.
They should have taken photos of their latest victims, lying peacefully on the bed in matching bathrobes.
Four successful jobs, and they were getting rich in the process.