sure no one was around, then both pulled out their pistols, pulling the top-slides back halfway to make sure a round was in the chamber of each weapon.
One of them, a man with red hair, had a key-card in his right hand.
He eased it into the slot and the door clicked, a light on the panel flicking green. In the next moment, he pushed down the handle and the two of them burst into the room, pistols up and ready to fire.
But no one was inside.
It was empty.
The man with the splint ran forward and checked the balcony whilst the man with red hair looked in the bathroom.
‘Shit,’ he said, as the man with the broken nose re-entered the room from the sliding doors. ‘They aren’t here.’
‘I can see that, dumbass,’ the other man said. He looked around and saw that there was an overnight bag here, a solitary black suit hanging on a hanger in the closet. One man had been staying here, travelling light. ‘Shit. Gerrard told me this was his room.’
‘Maybe they’re somewhere else in the hotel,’ the other man suggested.
‘Nah, they won’t have come back here. Katic has probably found somewhere for them to stay, with a friend or something.’
He swore.
‘We need to find them. They start talking to people in D.C , we’re screwed.’
‘You think I don’t know that?’ O’Hara said.
Siletti pulled a phone from his pocket and pushed Redial, lifting it to his ear. The call connected.
‘Did you find them?’ a voice said.
‘No. They weren’t here.’
Pause.
‘This isn’t good. If you two go down, that might implicate me. That would make me very unhappy.’
‘I understand.’
‘You’d better pray you find them before the cops do.’
‘Understood.’
The call ended. Siletti looked over at his partner.
‘He’s pissed.’
‘No wonder.’
‘He said if we don’t find them, he’s going to come for us.’
There was a pause. The two men looked at the empty room for a moment longer, then Siletti cursed, blood staining the gauze in his nostrils, caking his moustache.
‘Screw this. Let’s get the hell out of here,’ he said.
The two men slotted their pistols back in their holsters and strode out of the hotel room.
Seventeen floors below the two men, Archer closed the door to 21 G quietly behind him and pulled the latch over. The door to the bathroom was open, the mirror steamed up, the bathtub empty, and he saw that Jessie was curled up in bed, fast asleep, exhausted but freshly bathed, the scary events of the evening temporarily forgotten. The shootout at the apartment had terrified her, but nothing that some velvet lies couldn’t fix. In the car on the way here, Katic had played down the attack, saying it was a training exercise from work, and although sceptical at first, the girl had believed it with the conviction that her mother was all-powerful, indestructible, the greatest person in the world.
Archer moved back into the room quietly, so as not to wake up Jessie, and stretched, taking off his coat and laying it over a chair. He pulled the pistol from the pocket and held it in his hand, cold, hard metallic reassurance. Everywhere he went tonight, the Sig was coming too. Jessie was asleep so he didn’t need to hide it. He saw that Katic was outside on the balcony, sat in one of the white chairs, facing Times Square. He moved out to join her.
She started as he opened the screen door and quickly reached for the pistol on her hip instinctively, but relaxed and smiled when she saw it was him. He stepped out, shutting the door quietly behind him.
‘Hey.’
‘Hey.’
‘Mind if I join you?’
She shook her head and he took a seat near her at the table.
There was a pause. Down below they could hear the constant hum and activity of Times Square. They were facing the east side, and if he sat up straight, Archer could see the tops of some of the billboards, illuminated in the night.
‘I spoke to my boss, back in the UK. He’s going to call me back.’
She nodded. ‘Good.’
Together, the two of them looked out over the city. The bright lights. The dark shapes of the buildings. The odd figure in windows far ahead, going about their business.
‘I’m sorry about your husband,’ Archer said.
‘Yeah. Me too.’
‘How did he die?’
‘Cancer.’
She paused.
‘He was only twenty six. We met the week after I left high school back in Chicago.’ Pause. ‘You’d have liked him. He was calm. Mature. Kind. Jessie was unexpected to say the least, but he never complained