Chapter 1 #3
“Okay, we’re done here.” Montez stood, and Fisher’s eyes followed him eagerly. Idiot thought the whole thing was over. Montez glanced at Trey. “Take care of this,” he said quietly, and exited the room.
He could barely hear the shot out in the corridor. Trey used a suppressor, just like he’d been told.
San Diego
April 6
Ellen Palmer checked the address on the small brass plaque outside an elegant, super-modern building in downtown San Diego against the scrawled words torn off a napkin and verified that they were the same.
She didn’t need to do that. She had a near-photographic memory, and if a number was involved, she never forgot it, ever.
Morrison Building, 1147 Birch Street.
Yes, that was it.
Ellen recognized what she was doing. She was stalling, which was unlike her. She was alive because she’d been able to take decisions fast and act on them immediately. She’d have been six feet under if she hadn’t acted fast. Stalling was unlike her.
But she was so damned tired. Tired of running, tired of lying, tired of keeping her head down, in the most literal sense of the term.
Security cameras were everywhere these days and her enemy had a powerful face recognition program.
For the past year, she’d rarely presented her naked face in public in daylight.
Even now, where she was hoping and betting her life on the fact that she was moving toward safety, she had on huge sunglasses and her now-long hair was drawn forward around her face. She needed to buy a big straw hat.
There were two security cameras on the lintel of the twelve-foot street door of the Morrison Building, but Ellen kept her head down as she entered, walked across the huge glass and marble lobby and rode up in the elevator to the ninth floor.
Remaining anonymous in the elevator was hard.
The four walls were polished bronze that reflected as well as mirrors to the small security camera in the corner.
The door to RBK Security was guarded by two security cameras and you were either buzzed in or you dealt with a top-flight security panel located on the right-hand side, because the door had no doorknob.
She lowered her head even more as a whirring sound came from above her head. Good God, their cameras were motorized!
Well, it was a security company, and she’d been assured they were really good.
They better be, become otherwise she was dead.
She rang the bell. There was a click and the door slid silently open. Ellen walked in gingerly, heart starting to pound.
Was this a good idea? Because if it wasn’t, if she was putting herself into the wrong hands, there was no turning back, and she’d pay the ultimate price.
The lobby was wonderful. Luxurious yet comfortable, with huge, thriving plants, soft background classical music, the faint smell of lemon polish, deep plush armchairs. A secretary sat behind a U-shaped counter. She smiled in welcome.
“Are you Ms. Charles? Mr. Reston will be in shortly. Please have a seat.”
For a second, Ellen didn’t respond, thinking the receptionist was talking to someone else. But there wasn’t anyone else around.
She closed her eyes in dismay. Of course.
She’d booked the appointment under the name Nora Charles, which was stupid.
Any film buff would recognize it as a fake name, but she’d been so desperate when she’d called and she’d just sat through a triple feature of The Thin Man, After the Thin Man and The Shadow of the Thin Man last night in San Francisco, waiting for the first bus to San Diego.
An all-nighter at the cinema was the only thing she could think of to stay off the streets.
She’d started the journey the day before yesterday in Seattle, and hadn’t slept more than an hour or two in three days.
But exhaustion was no excuse.
Forgetting her cover name was terrifyingly dangerous. She was alive because she was always alert, always. Forgetting her cover name for just a second was inviting death. And if there was one thing the past year had taught her, it was that she didn’t want to die. She wanted—desperately—to live.
Nora Charles was her fifth cover name in twelve months. Forget all the others and concentrate on this one, she told herself.
She was mentally putting together a little fake bio for Nora, just to give Nora a little heft in her head, when the receptionist suddenly said, “Yessir, I will.”
Ellen really was exhausted, because she couldn’t figure out who the receptionist was talking to. There was no one else in the lobby and she wasn’t talking into a phone. Then she saw the very neat, very small and very expensive headset attached to one ear and understood.
Wow. She should have noticed it.
This was truly dangerous. Her exhaustion was catching up with her. She felt stupid with fatigue. Stupid people died, very badly. Particularly ones with Gerald Montez and his army after them.
“Ms. Charles?”
Ellen looked up. “Yes?”
“Mr. Reston has been delayed. But Mr. Bolt is free. They are both partners in the company.”
“How—how long will Mr. Reston be delayed?”
“He doesn’t know.” The receptionist had a kindly look, unusual in such upscale surroundings. Usually an employee in such a swank, obviously successful company was snooty and remote. This woman looked gentle. As if she somehow understood. “It might be a long time. Mr. Bolt is very good, too.”
Oh, God. The woman who’d told her about RBK Security, Kerry, had dealt with Sam Reston, who’d saved her life. She had no idea what this Harry Bolt was like. Maybe Sam Reston rescued women in danger on the downlow and this Bolt didn’t know anything about it. What then?
Ellen closed her eyes for just a second, wishing she could either rewind her life to a year ago or fast forward to a year in the future, when either she’d be settled in a new life or she’d be dead. Because if she didn’t do something, now, she was surely headed toward a slow and painful death.
Gerald Montez didn’t forgive.
But she kept having to make these split second decisions, with no training for them, no way to judge whether she was making the right choice or throwing her life away.
The lion or the lady, every time, every day.
And now toss exhaustion and sleeplessness into the mix. How to choose?
She looked the receptionist in the eyes.
Ellen was a good judge of character, and now she had to trust her instincts.
The receptionist looked back at her calmly, seemingly undisturbed that the lunatic lady, who looked as if she hadn’t slept in three days because she hadn’t, was staring her in the face, taking minutes over a decision that shouldn’t take a second.
Except—like all her decisions this past year, her life hung in the balance.
The receptionist stayed calm, eyes kind. Maybe she was used to desperate people. Maybe the desperate were tossed up on this doorstep daily.
“Okay,” Ellen finally said, clutching her hands. Please let this be the right choice. She sent the prayer up to whoever was up there, who’d been noticeably absent lately. “I’ll see Mr. Bolt. Thank you.”
The receptionist nodded. “The second door to your right. Mr. Bolt’s name is on the door. He’s waiting for you.”
Ellen nodded and slowly made her way to the big corridor on the right. As she passed in front of the receptionist’s desk, she looked up and Ellen saw understanding in her eyes.
“It will be okay,” the receptionist said softly. “Don’t worry. Mr. Bolt will make it okay.”
No, it wouldn’t be okay. It would never be okay again.
Harry sat at his desk, trying to clear his mind of his last client, London Harriman, heiress to a real estate empire. She wanted him to stop publication of a sex tape by a tabloid website.
She didn’t mind that the sex tape was going to be put online, mind you.
Oh no. She’d recorded it specifically in order to release it and she’d assured him that it had been shot ‘professionally’.
No, what had got her panties—or lack of panties—in a twist was that she wouldn’t be in control of the timing or the release venue.
She wanted him to stop the gossip website from putting it up. She’d handed him a copy with a coy smile, saying she wanted him to watch it. So he’d understand.
London had come on to him, real heavy, but then Harry imagined that London came on to anything with a penis, particularly if that man could even marginally help her in her goal of becoming the Socialite Sex Goddess of the World.