Kitabı oku: «Out-Foxxed», sayfa 2

Marshalling the requisite tears, she dove deeper into the part of terrified hostage.

Her new friend shoved her to the floor next to her cart. “Don’t move,” he snarled, “while I decide what to do with you.”

Shaking for the benefit of those watching, Sabrina huddled against the cool stainless steel of the cart and covertly took a look around the room.

Two men lay on the floor near the massive wall of windows that, behind the drawn drapes, overlooked Manhattan. Both men were bound and gagged, and either dead or unconscious.

The unmistakable sound of a hard fist connecting with soft flesh tugged her attention to her extreme right.

An older man was secured to a chair. His face bore the signs of a severe beating, yet he somehow managed to look distinguished in his distress. As she watched, he groaned and attempted to turn away from the next blow coming his way.

Mr. Stavi.

Well, at least he was still alive.

The guy beating him made Goon Number Three. The taller guy standing back watching the torture was Number Four.

Four to one.

Not the worst odds she’d ever encountered.

But not the best, either.

Since the wife and children were not in this room, her initial assessment had likely been correct. The family, dead or alive, was being held in one of the bedrooms. Since Goon Number One had ordered Goon Number Two back to his post, she would work under the assumption that he still had live hostages to oversee.

The sound of a round being chambered hauled her attention once more to the man hovering over her. She stared into the ominous black barrel of the 9mm, then at the bully beyond it.

“I’ve made up my mind,” he declared.

CHAPTER TWO

“GET UP.”

In her earpiece, Big Hugh reminded her that all she had to do was say the word and a team would move in and do the takedown.

“I’ll do anything you say,” she offered, sending a pleading look at the man with the gun and a definite message to Big Hugh that the team should stand down for now. She refused to allow the new wave of fight or flight that surged to divert her focus. She had to be ready for any scenario. “Just don’t hurt me.”

“Get up,” her captor roared.

Sabrina scrambled to her feet, mindful of the thigh holster she didn’t want making an appearance. Sheer determination kept her heart rate far calmer than it should have been, ensuring a clear head. She’d learned long ago the secrets to remaining cool and collected in the face of death. The enemy could only kill her once and only if she allowed herself to screw up. No matter the situation, some amount of control always belonged to her, no one could take that away.

The fear and panic she permitted on the surface were for the enemy’s benefit. She needed these men to continue to believe that she was just a hotel maid, an innocent civilian who had no clue what was going on here. As long as they felt in control, their actions would be more predictable.

“Take her into the bedroom with the others,” Goon Number One, the man who appeared to be in charge, told his minion. The boss was older than the others. Streaks of gray had invaded the raven-colored hair along his temples. His grim face told her he’d had more than his share of experience in this sort of activity. Despite his age, he looked lean and fit physically. What was more, his heritage was impossible to calculate. He didn’t look Middle Eastern and he certainly didn’t sound so.

Goon Number Four, the man she decided to call Tall Guy since he was well over six feet, grabbed her by the arm and hauled her toward the French doors that separated what was likely the master suite from the parlor. Inside the elegant spacious bedroom, a woman and two children cowered in the farthest corner from the door.

The wife and kids of the man currently being tortured.

Also in the room was Goon Number Two, the one she’d heard ordered back to his post before getting a visual on him. His age was easy to guess, maybe twenty-two or twenty-three. His inexperience was even easier to see. He handled his weapon as if he weren’t sure how to hold it or what to do with it next. His eyes were wide with his attempts at taking in everything at once.

Goon Number Two was scared.

Unfortunately, that wasn’t necessarily a good thing. His inexperience could cause any number of mistakes. Not to mention that his presence reconfirmed the odds against her—four to one.

But hey, what good was a challenge without interesting odds?

The French doors abruptly shut behind her, sending her tension to a new level. With the doors closed, it would be difficult to hear what was going on in the other room. She would simply have to depend upon Big Hugh to keep her informed for now since he was monitoring that room via the rigged cart.

“Over there,” Goon Number Two commanded, directing her to join the other hostages.

Keeping up the necessary facade of fear, she edged past him and moved hesitantly toward the woman and children.

As she passed the en suite bath, she noticed three men, well dressed and obviously dead; they didn’t move and were unrestrained, piled on the floor in front of the elegant marble vanity. The three dead guys most likely were—had been— Stavi’s security detail. What a shame. Even a family’s own personal security couldn’t keep them safe in the finest of hotels.

Sabrina scrutinized the woman and her children. She saw no signs of mistreatment. That was good. She hoped like hell she could make sure it stayed that way. “It’s going to be okay,” she whispered, hoping to reassure the woman with the words and her determined expression.

“No talking!”

Sabrina sent Goon Number Two a scornful glare but he was too busy watching his friends through the French doors to notice. She got the distinct impression he didn’t like being left on babysitting duty. He wanted in on the important stuff like the torture. He wanted to be in the middle of the part that really mattered, killing an Israeli VIP.

Too bad for him.

The little girl, who was six or seven years old, Sabrina guessed, started to sob. Her mother tried to reassure her to no avail.

“Shut that kid up,” Goon Number Two growled, “or I’ll shut her up for you.”

Well, wasn’t he the tough guy. Terrifying women and children surely made him the man of the hour. Not.

Sabrina analyzed the dialect. Not Middle Eastern or European, she was reasonably sure. Even those who’d lived in this country for many years had a difficult time dumping the accents they’d learned growing up. There was training for that purpose, but these people sounded like heartland citizens. Midwestern U.S., maybe.

Were these guys homegrown terrorists? Somehow the idea made her all the more furious, sick to her stomach.

The woman picked up her little girl and held her close. But that left the little boy, who looked to be only four or five, standing alone and clinging to his mother’s leg. He would probably start crying, too, as soon as he figured out his mother would have trouble picking both him and his sister up at the same time. Poor kids. And at Christmas at that. Sabrina wanted to hurt these guys just for that.

But antagonizing these goons would not be helpful, though she already understood that their mission included killing not only Stavi but his wife and children, as well. Delaying that move as long as possible was essential. To do that, she had to play submissive and cooperative. Sabrina wanted the trouble to go down later rather than sooner. She needed time to prepare a strategy that included saving all the hostages.

“I have to go to the bathroom.”

The plan was hasty and lacked originality, came pretty much out of nowhere, but at least it was a step.

Goon Number Two glared at her. “Shut up,” he hissed from between clenched teeth.

Not to be thwarted so easily, she did this little bounce from the knees, the universal gotta-go gesture. “Please, I have to go.”

Another of those icy glares. “So go, just don’t step on the bodies.” He smirked and nodded toward the bathroom where the three men lay in a pile. “And leave the door open where I can see you.”

Making her way across the room, Sabrina stayed close to the wall, as far from Goon Number Two as possible. Once in the bathroom, she stepped over the dead men and scooted in next to the toilet. Knowing that her guard was likely watching, she hunkered down over the toilet which was, thankfully, shielded to some degree by the wide vanity and added plenty of realism to her ploy. While she pretended to relieve herself, she sized up the three men on the floor. Whatever weapons they’d been carrying appeared to have been taken.

She righted her clothes, tore off a piece of toilet paper and used it to protect the tips of her fingers as she flushed the toilet. She wouldn’t be leaving any prints lying around. The guard glanced in her direction but immediately returned his attention to the goings-on in the parlor. While the sound of rushing water provided some amount of cover, she whispered, “Four. Possibly American-born. Hostages still viable.”

“Roger that, Fox,” came Trainer’s voice in her earpiece. “We’re running voice analysis right now.”

There was always the chance that a terrorist would be in one or more data systems, including voice recordings, but the chances of a voice match were more unlikely than not.

Careful not to make any sudden moves, Sabrina eased back into the bedroom to join the other woman and her children in the corner between the king-size bed and the wall of windows. As in the parlor, the curtains were drawn for privacy, blocking out the magnificent view of the city she loved.

Goon Number Two opened one side of the French door and said something to his cohorts in what sounded like butchered Arabic. Since Sabrina was not that familiar with the language, she could only guess at some of the phrases. Hugh would keep her informed. She seized the opportunity and whispered to the woman, “I’m here to help you.”

The woman’s breath caught and her watery gaze locked with Sabrina’s. Her lips parted as if she might say something but, thankfully, she held back whatever had been on the tip of her tongue. Relief rushed into her wide dark eyes.

Sabrina’s options were pretty much limited at the moment. If she gave the word for the tear gas to be released, Stavi would likely end up dead. Maybe even the woman and children. And, of course, her.

Best thing to do was ride it out a few minutes more.

The exchange continued in the language she didn’t understand. The fact that they had stopped speaking in English was a bad sign.

“Fox, can you get a little closer to the man speaking? There appears to be a malfunction in the listening device we planted on the cart,” Big Hugh said in her ear piece.

She coughed, which meant not likely.

Goon Number Two glanced at her.

“The man nearest you has asked how the hell they plan to get out of there and why it’s taking so long. He’s nervous, it seems.”

Nervous was definitely a good assessment. Goon Number Two was antsy as hell, partially motivated by his feelings of being left out.

“We’re going to send Angie to the door with towels in an effort to get you back into the parlor.”

Sabrina cleared her throat, giving the “affirmative” signal.

Since Goon Number Two was still chatting with his friends, Sabrina decided to make some preparations for the children. She eased closer to the woman, keeping an eye on their guard while she whispered as softly as she could and still be heard, “Have the children sit down on the floor close to the bed. Tell them to crawl under the bed if anything happens.”

The woman nodded. She murmured in her daughter’s ear, since she still held the child in her arms. The mother settled the girl onto her feet and she immediately did as Sabrina had suggested. The little girl tugged her brother down to the floor next to the bed alongside her. Obviously knowing her children would not stay in that position unless she was as close as possible, the mother scooted in as near as she could.

The discussion between the four men appeared to be turning less and less friendly. Though Sabrina didn’t understand the words, she couldn’t have missed the tension in the exchange.

“Looks like we have a whole new ballgame here, Fox.”

Sabrina focused on Big Hugh’s voice while maintaining a visual on Goon Number Two.

“Our man Stavi apparently has some information these guys want. The man in the room with you mentioned that if he didn’t talk soon, they would have to move without the information or risk being captured.” That meant that the stakes had just been upped. If Stavi had intelligence these men needed, then allowing any one of them to leave this hotel room would be a mistake with ramifications more far-reaching than they’d first thought.

“Marx wants one alive if possible.”

Great. How the hell was she supposed to keep one goon alive?

She cleared her throat just loudly enough for Big Hugh to hear. She had her orders, no point arguing. All she could do was her best. Protecting the lives of the hostages was priority one as far as she was concerned.

The knock on the door to the room silenced the men.

“Housekeeping!”

The boss, looking annoyed and harried, appeared at the French doors and pointed at Sabrina. “You! Come!” he demanded harshly, his voice kept low to ensure that whoever was at the door didn’t hear him.

Sabrina, maintaining her scared-to-death demeanor, hurried over to the doors. “That’s my coworker with the extra towels I ordered for this room.” She moistened her shaking lips and drew in a ragged breath. “If I don’t go to the door, she’ll just assume I’m finished and come on in anyway.”

Fury streaked across the man’s face. “Get rid of her or she dies.” Sabrina nodded frantically.

The boss ushered her to the door. He stepped back so that the opening door would block him from view. He indicated the gun in his hand just in case Sabrina had forgotten.

She reached for the lever, took a moment to visually brace herself for her attentive audience’s benefit, then pulled the door open.

“Oh! Mary, you’re still in here.” Angie stood in the doorway, her short, stocky frame filling out a maid’s uniform, her arms loaded down with fluffy white towels.

“Yeah,” Sabrina said, “the bathroom’s a mess. Those kids wrecked the place. It’s taking longer than I expected.”

“I’ve got your towels.”

When she took a step, Sabrina moved to meet her, from all appearances blocking her path. “That’s okay, I’ll take them.”

Angie passed her the towels. “Well, if you’ve got it under control, I’ll move on. Natalie’s got problems in ten and fourteen, as well.”

“Thanks, Ang.”

When she walked away Sabrina closed the door. So, the control team was in position in the rooms on either side of them. Angie purposely didn’t specify the floor to throw off the men listening.

The control team would prepare to launch devices into the room for auditory as well as visual monitoring. If they made a single wrong move or sound, the guys in here could go ballistic. But it was a necessary step at this point. Attempting to position any sort of device before an agent was in place would have risked the hostages’ lives. With Sabrina inside to do what she could to protect the hostages, the next step had to be taken.

The tall guy grabbed the towels and shuffled through the stack. Sabrina used the opportunity to check on Stavi’s condition. He looked a little the worse for wear while Goon Number Three, the man who’d been beating him, looked revved for the next round. At this rate Stavi would be dead very soon.

“Please,” Sabrina said to the boss. “I don’t have anything to do with this. Just let me go. I’ll leave. I won’t say a word to anyone.”

The boss nodded toward the master suite and the tall guy hustled her off in that direction. The thuds and groans of new torture resumed behind her.

The woman, looking wide-eyed and wringing her hands, stood exactly where Sabrina had left her.

The tall guy shoved her toward the bed and then made some remark to Goon Number Two about her having a great ass. This he did in English, so she understood he wanted her to know he’d made the statement.

As soon as Sabrina was next to the woman, she whispered, “My husband?” Her face reflected her anxiety about his fate.

Sabrina arranged her expression into a mask of optimism. “He’s okay so far.”

The intense discussion between the men recommenced. Sabrina was pretty sure this swiftly deteriorating situation wouldn’t last much longer. Stavi would be dead and then they would all die.

“Oh, hell.”

Sabrina stiffened. Whatever had just gone down had Big Hugh worried.

“Fox, they’ve just asked your guard to bring in one of the children. We’re standing by for your instruction.”

A new kind of tension roiled through Sabrina.

“We’ll be okay,” she said to the woman, but her real agenda was to let the team know that no movement on their part was necessary, she had the situation under control for now.

Goon Number Two stalked over to where Sabrina, the woman and her children cowered in fear.

“What’re you doing?” Sabrina asked, her voice infused with terror.

“The boy,” the man demanded. “Give me the boy.”

The mother howled in agony. “No, no, no, not my son. Not my son!”

The man slapped her hard. “The boy,” he commanded.

“Wait.” Sabrina reached toward the man.

He reared back to slap her. She lunged at him, her right hand fisted, the pad of her thumb set against that extra stone on the back of the ring she wore. She rammed her fist, ring first, into his throat.

The back of his hand connected with her cheekbone sending pain radiating up the side of her head. Then he froze. He stared at her for a moment as if he didn’t understand what had just happened. When he started to reach for his neck, his eyes rolled back in his head and he collapsed to the floor.

The woman and children started to wail and sob, Sabrina joining the cacophony.

The tall guy barged into the room. “What the hell is going on in here?” He spotted his pal, then aimed a suspicious glare at the women. “Shut up!” He leveled his weapon on Sabrina. “Move against the wall.”

Sabrina flattened against the wall next to the window behind her. She reached for the woman and ushered her back as well. A child clung to either side of her. All were sobbing hysterically.

“What happened?” the tall guy demanded, his question directed at Sabrina.

“I don’t know.” She forced her voice to quiver. “He came over here to get the boy and he just stopped, looked kind of strange and then crumpled to the floor.”

That she hadn’t reached for the downed man’s weapon would lend credence to her innocent bystander status.

Keeping an eye on her, the tall guy squatted down just far enough to touch his fallen comrade’s neck. He felt for a pulse, a frown overtaking his expression.

Speaking in that broken foreign tongue again, he called out to his pals in the other room.

The torturer in the other room stormed in next. “What is taking so long? I need the boy.” He drew up short when he saw Goon Number Two on the floor.

Sabrina held on to one of the woman’s arms and made small sounds of terror; the woman did the same. The children continued to whimper and sob, amping up the frustration level of the enemy.

Sabrina figured that this was as good as it was going to get. Only one, the boss, was left in the room with Stavi.

She pulled downward on the other woman’s arm. Their gazes locked. Sabrina nodded to the floor. The woman moved her head up and down in acknowledgement.

Her right hand easing down to the hem of her uniform, Sabrina watched the two men prepare to drag their friend away, probably to join the dead security detail in the en suite bath.

As soon as each man had crouched down and hooked an arm under the dead guy’s, she snatched her .32 out of its holster. Two rounds, one in the temple for the tall guy, one smack in the middle of the forehead for the torturer who turned to look up at her in surprise.

She was halfway across the room when the boss suddenly loomed in the open doorway, his weapon leveled on her. Two more shots, this time straight through the heart. She hit the floor and rolled just in time to avoid the round he managed to squeeze off before he dropped. Unlike the jarring blasts from her .32, a swift hiss and pop were the only sounds his silenced weapon made.

Back on her feet, she holstered her weapon and rushed to the corner where the woman and children huddled together near the floor.

“Everything’s all right,” Sabrina assured. “Come on, let’s check on your husband.”

Thank God the woman and children hadn’t been in the way of the single shot the bastard had managed. One of the lavish pillows on the bed hadn’t been so lucky.

The husband was already shrieking and making all kinds of noise. He kept calling a name—his wife’s, Sabrina presumed.

While the woman and children crowded around the injured man, Sabrina checked the two other hostages bound and still unconscious on the floor to ensure they were still breathing. Both were alive—drugged, she presumed.

Time for her to get out of here.

Other guests would no doubt have called the front desk by now to report the sound of gunshots.

Sabrina propped the door open and prepared to wheel her cart out of the room.

“Please wait.”

Sabrina hesitated, then turned to the woman who’d called out to her.

She hurried to where Sabrina stood poised to get the hell out of there. “Thank you.” The tears rolling down her cheeks and the quiver of her lips told Sabrina that she wanted to say much more but wasn’t sure how.

Sabrina smiled. “You’ll be fine now.”

She had to get out of there.

Pushing the cart with all her might, she hurried to the elevators and stabbed the call button. “Come on, come on,” she muttered.

The control team in the rooms on either side of 1012 would stay put until hotel security had arrived and called the local authorities. Once the Federal Bureau of Investigation was on site to take charge, the control team would withdraw.

No one would ever know that IT&PA had ever been there.

That was the way it worked.

Anticipation seared through her as she trekked the slow movement of the damned elevator on the digital readout above the closed doors. If security caught her up here, they would want to question her. She couldn’t let that happen. Abandoning the cart wasn’t doable since it was rigged. She had no choice but to ride this out.

One of the two elevators stopped on her floor and she held her breath as she waited for the doors to slide open and reveal the occupants, if any, of the car.

Empty.

Her arms weak with relief, she shoved the cart into the empty elevator and selected floor six. No sooner had the doors started to close when a ding announced the arrival of the second elevator.

Close. Too close.

Even as her car started to descend, she heard running steps pounding in the corridor beyond the elevator alcove she’d just vacated.

Hotel security had arrived.

Director Marx wouldn’t be happy that she’d had to take out all four of the perpetrators, but there hadn’t been any other option.

Those men would have killed her and the hostages had she not used deadly force. Wounding one of them in hopes of interrogating him later simply hadn’t been feasible.

Outside 608, she had just reached for her passkey when the door opened.

“He’s not happy,” Trainer said.

Angie had already grabbed the other end of the cart and was helping Sabrina guide it into the room.

“It was my call to make,” Sabrina countered, not the least bit intimidated or sorry she’d chosen the course of action she had. Stavi was alive. He surely knew what those men wanted with him. All the Bureau had to do was convince him to share the information. As far as Sabrina was concerned, that was their problem.

She’d done her job. All four hostages were rescued.

Angie, still sporting a maid’s uniform, rushed over to help Sabrina disrobe.

Trainer turned his back and focused on unrigging the cart. Big Hugh jumped into the fray and helped get the job done.

When all the equipment and disguises were packed in typical wheeled, upright luggage, each member of the recovery team left with at least one bag in tow.

All but Sabrina, who carried only her briefcase as she took the elevator down to the lobby and stopped by the front desk. “I’m leaving very early in the morning,” she told the clerk. “Can you clear me without my having to bother checking out?”

“Certainly, Miss Freeman. We’ll slip the final bill under your door by 3 a.m.”

“Excellent.”

Sabrina strode out of the hotel, her sneakers silent on the shiny marble floor. The same doorman who’d greeted her what felt like a lifetime ago, bid her a good evening. She gave him a smile of thanks and hurried off into the gloomy night.

The rain was gone, leaving the city she loved with a crisp bite in the air and smelling pretty damned clean for a place that teemed with no less than eight million people.

Once in a while, a taxi cruising for a fare rolled by on the street, the tires cutting through the water puddled there.

She didn’t bother hailing one. She would walk, at least for a while, to give herself time to unwind and to let the cold air remind her that she was still alive. That was the great part about her work. She came so close to death at times…close enough to appreciate living one more day. Not everyone understood how that felt. It was the most satisfying feeling she’d ever known. Maybe that made her a freak, if so, that was okay.

The scene back at the hotel would be one of chaos until the feds arrived to take control of the situation. The Stavi family would only know that a maid had saved their lives.

Sabrina hadn’t touched anything in the room so there wouldn’t be any prints left behind, not that it mattered. She didn’t exist in any of the traditional spy world databases. IT&PA wasn’t known in any capacity whatsoever by its sibling agencies.

All involved in the rescue would do exactly as Sabrina was doing now—disappear in the night…until next time.