shout at Jerome to look out, the shape swings something at her brother’s head. There’s a terrible dull crunch and Jerome collapses to the pavement.
The shape grabs her, shoves her against the door, and pins her there with one gloved hand wrapped around her neck. From the other he drops a chunk of broken brick. Or maybe it’s concrete. All Barbara knows for sure is that it’s dripping with her brother’s blood.
He bends toward her close enough for her to see a round, unremarkable face below one of those furry Russian hats. That weird glare is gone from his eyes. “Don’t scream, girlfriend. You don’t want to do that.”
“You killed him!” It comes out in a wheeze. He hasn’t choked off all her air, at least not yet, but he’s cut off most of it. “You killed my brother!”
“No, he’s still alive,” the man says. He smiles, showing two rows of teeth that are orthodontic perfection. “I’d know if he was dead, believe me. But I can make him dead. Scream, try to get away—annoy me, in other words—and I’ll hit him until his brains spurt like Old Faithful. Are you going to scream?”
Barbara shakes her head.
The man’s smile widens into a grin. “That’s a good girlfriend, girlfriend. You’re afraid, aren’t you? I like that.” He breathes deeply, as if inhaling her terror. “You should be afraid. You don’t belong here, but on the whole I’m glad you came.”
He leans closer. She can smell his cologne and feel the meat of his lips as he whispers in her ear.
“You’re tasty.”
12
Holly reaches for her phone with her eyes fixed on the computer. The elevator’s floor menu is still on the screen, but below the diagram of the shaft there’s now a choice box offering EXECUTE or CANCEL. She only wishes she could be completely sure that selecting EXECUTE will cause something to happen. And that it will be the right something.
She picks up the phone, ready to text Ondowsky the code for the side door, and freezes. It’s not ONDOWSKY in the window of her phone, and it’s not UNKNOWN CALLER. It’s the smiling face of her young friend Barbara Robinson.
Oh dear God no, Holly thinks. Please God no.
“Barbara?”
“There’s a man, Holly!” Barbara is crying, barely understandable. “He hit Jerome with something and knocked him out, I think it was a brick and he’s bleeding so bad—”
Then she’s gone, and the thing masquerading as Ondowsky is there, speaking to Holly in his trained TV voice. “Hi, Holly, Chet here.”
Holly freezes. Not for long in the outside world, probably less than five seconds, but inside her head it feels much longer. This is her fault. She tried to keep her friends away, but they came anyway. They came because they were worried about her, and that makes it her fault.
“Holly? Are you still there?” There’s a smile in his voice. Because things have broken his way, and he’s enjoying himself. “This changes things, wouldn’t you say?”
Can’t panic, Holly thinks. I can and will give up my life if it will save theirs, but I can’t panic. If I do that we’re all going to die.
“Have they?” she says. “I still have what you want. Hurt that girl, do anything more to her brother, and I’ll blow up your life. I won’t stop.”
“Have you also got a gun?” He doesn’t give her a chance to answer. “Of course you do. I don’t, but I did bring a ceramic knife. Very sharp. Remember I’ll have the girl when I come to our little tête-à-tête. I won’t kill her if I see you with a gun in your hand, that would be the waste of a good hostage, but I’ll disfigure her while you watch.”
“There won’t be a gun.”
“I think I’ll trust you on that.” Still amused. Relaxed and confident. “But I don’t think we’ll be exchanging money for the flash drive, after all. Instead of money, you can have my little girlfriend. How does that sound?”
Like a lie, Holly thinks.
“It sounds like a deal. Let me talk to Barbara again.”
“No.”
“Then I won’t give you the code.”
He actually laughs. “She knows it, she was getting ready to tap it in when her brother accosted her. I was watching from behind the Dumpster. I’m sure I could persuade her to tell me. Do you want me to persuade her? Like this?”
Barbara screams, a sound that makes Holly cover her mouth. Her fault, her fault, all her fault.
“Stop. Stop hurting her. I just want to know if