Ratio: A Leopold Blake Thriller (A Private Investigator Series of Crime and Suspense Thrillers) (28 page)

“You’re lying.” He increased the pressure on her spine. 

“Okay, they left just a few minutes ago,” June said. She tried her best to keep her voice steady. She didn’t want to antagonize him, or come off sounding threatening. She wanted him to think she was on his side. 

“Those guys rushed in and hauled him off,” she said. “Just like that, our date was over. Right now, I’m kinda pissed off about the whole thing.” She paused. “Why do you want him?”

He ignored her. “Where’d they take him?”

“Hell if I know,” she said. “All I know is that this has to be just about the worst weekend ever. And I’ve had some pretty shitty ones. Are you going to kill me when you don’t find him?”

“I might kill you just to shut you up.” He tapped her with his gun, getting her moving again. “Convince me you’re telling the truth.”

“Check the bathroom. There’s only one bathrobe left now.”

With the pistol in the small of her back, he nudged her toward the bathroom. There was only one more room to search after that, the last room that he would find empty. She knew the conditions of the relationship would change, then. To what, she had no idea.

She walked slowly. When she got back to the kitchenette, she stopped. She faked a reach to the coffeepot with her right hand.

“Hey!”

With her left hand, she swept behind her, knocking the gun’s aim away from her back. Pushing his arm up with hers, she spun in a move she’d practiced hundreds of times. She locked his gun arm under her armpit, made another quarter turn, then locked his other elbow with her free arm from behind.

Now suddenly behind him, she had control over the weapon and his arms. She tried reaching across him to grab it, but he anticipated her. Larger and stronger than June, he overpowered her grip. With a rearward blast of his elbow to her chest, she stumbled back and fell into the wall.

He came at her. Blindly, she lashed out with a kick. It landed hard, connecting with his groin. He bent over, groaning. She started to scramble up. The intruder growled, still clutching his crotch with his free hand. His gun hand raised, the gun quivering, the muzzle aimed in her direction.

“No!” June shouted.

The man got a shot off, but aimed poorly. The bullet slammed through the wall over her head, throwing up a cloud of plaster dust. A second shot splintered the wood of the doorframe. He drew up to full height, steadying his aim. 

Before he could fire again, June landed another kick to his hip. The impact knocked them both backward. June landed awkwardly, hitting her head against the wall. She saw stars.

By then, the man was up. He took a third shot at June, grazing the top of her shoulder. She sent him another kick, this time connecting with the gun in his hand. It flew from his grasp, tumbling across the tile floor. June charged forward, using the distraction to body check him. She slammed into his side, feeling the wind knocked out of her. The intruder fell back, hitting his head on the kitchen counter behind him, knocking the coffeemaker to the floor. The glass pot shattered, spilling scalding-hot liquid onto his face. 

He screamed in pain, clawing at his skin, and dropped to the tiles.

Ignoring the pain in her shoulder, June stepped forward, grabbed hold of his black outfit, and slammed his head into one of the kitchen cupboards. He stopped screaming, barely conscious. But June wasn’t done. 

She took a side step, bent her knee, and slammed her foot deep into his chest. His body bounced against the cupboard, knocking it off his hinges. 

The intruder toppled forward onto his face, still breathing, but not getting up for a while. June nudged him with her foot. Nothing. She retrieved the gun, tossed it in a drawer, and checked his body for other weapons. She found an assault knife and a crowbar tucked into his belt. She threw them into the oven and closed the door. 

Fetching a sheet from the laundry cupboard, June slipped it under his body and dragged him across the floor and into the bedroom. Muscles straining, she lifted him onto the bed on his side. Checked his breathing. 

Hands shaking, June slumped into a chair. 

So much for waiting to be rescued
, she thought.

Chapter 50

KANEZAKI HEARD THE announcement through the PA system. They were evacuating the hotel, getting everybody out. The police were on their way, the announcer said. In the meantime, everyone was to make their way calmly to the exit doors. Kanezaki swore and ducked through one of the double doors leading out of the lobby.

He looked up and down the corridor. Plush carpet, beige walls. Some inoffensive pastel-colored paintings hanging at head height, spaced at regular intervals down the hallway. A sign pointing toward the stairs, leading up to the guest rooms. Kanezaki glanced toward the elevators. No doubt they were shut off.

He pulled out his cell phone and then dialed a number. 

“
Moshi Moshi,
” a voice answered. 

“Isa, you in position?” Kanezaki said. 

“Yeah. Engine still running. What’s going on?” 

“They’re calling in the cavalry.”

“Yamada?”

“No sign,” said Kanezaki. “He’s got less than ten minutes to pull this off.”

A paused. “And if he doesn’t?” 

“Two ways this goes down. Both end with him dead.” 

“You need to get out.”

“I need to find Yamada first.” 

“You know what’s going to happen if you get caught,” Isa said. 

“Just be ready.” Kanezaki hung up. He stuffed the phone back into his pocket. Turned back to the doors behind him and peered through the glass window. The lobby was crammed full of people, jostling and wrestling each other out of the way. They were headed for the main doors. A porter was holding them open. Two police cruisers were parked outside, a handful of officers setting up a temporary cordon. The few people who had managed to squeeze through were being ushered out of sight, probably to have their IDs checked. 

Kanezaki swore again. He needed to find Yamada before the
bakayarou
slipped out one of the rear exits. His
baita
girlfriend probably had them all mapped out. Yamada had to be present when the shit hit the fan, had to get noticed. The police were already here, a fortuitous turn of events Kanezaki hadn’t predicted, but it was all for nothing if Yamada escaped. 

He checked his watch. Nine minutes left. If he didn’t get the hell out of here before then, none of it would matter. He and Yamada would be dead anyway, along with everyone else in the hotel. And it wouldn’t be a pleasant death, either. Not if the Korean
chibis
had done their job properly. Dumb assholes thought they were doing their Supreme fucking Leader a good turn; they sure as hell wouldn’t have risked screwing up.

Kanezaki broke into a run and headed for the stairs.

Chapter 51

“LESS THAN NINE minutes.”

The words were lost in the noise from the generators, but Leopold already knew what Harper was saying. He stared blankly at the detonator, a mess of circuitry hooked up to the particulate filtration unit, a digital timer counting down second by second. 

“Can’t we just disconnect it?” Harper knelt down next to Leopold, her words barely audible.

He looked over. “Sure, we could risk it. I could pick one of these wires,” he gestured at the tangled cables weaving in and out of the circuit board, “and we can all hope to hell I don’t accidentally set the damn thing off.” He sighed. “Or we can use what little time we’ve got to figure out how to deactivate it safely.” 

“Any bright ideas?”

Leopold peered in a little closer. “It looks homemade. Skillful, no doubt, but made using everyday components. Your suspect could have picked these up from just about any hardware store.”

“So?” Harper squinted at the detonator. One of the agents angled the flashlight a little higher. 

“So, whatever failsafes are built in will be pretty basic. Probably just a code, entered here.” He pointed at a keypad. It looked like it had been fashioned from an old cell phone, hooked up to the main board.  

“Great. That’s just great,” Harper said. “Even if we’re assuming a four-digit code, that’s over ten thousand combinations. And no way of knowing if an incorrect input will set the whole thing off.” 

“It’s a start.”

“It’s a dead end, Blake.”

“No other choice. We can’t get a bomb squad here in time. Not with the roadblocks, not with the hotel locked down. They’ll never get through.” 

“So we get out of here.” 

“In less than eight minutes?” Leopold checked the timer. “The exits are jammed. How many people are stuck down in the lobby? A hundred? Two hundred?”

“We can’t save everyone, Leopold.” Harper looked at him. Her expression softened. “Even if we wanted to.”

“Maybe not,” Leopold said, picking up his cell phone. “But we can sure as hell try.”

Chapter 52

JUNE RUBBED HER head, wincing as her hand brushed over a large bruise where she had fallen against the wall. Her ankle hurt, an understandable side-effect from kicking a man in the chest, and the bullet graze to her shoulder smarted a little, but June was otherwise uninjured. She gazed down at the unconscious man lying on her bed. She had used some silk stockings to tie his hands and feet.

I guess I’m out of shape
, she thought.
He should be dead. 

She looked back at the man’s face and realized why he looked so familiar. She’d seen him hanging around Jack’s house, just after he got back from his surgery. He’d introduced himself, but she couldn’t remember his name. Probably fake anyway. She heard a soft moan. His unconscious state was lifting. He turned his head, his eyes opening slightly.

Pressing a washrag on her shoulder wound, she watched as the man spluttered blood onto the bed sheets. Somewhere between conscious and asleep, he was barely able to control his breathing. If his throat filled with blood, he could easily choke to death. June’s brain switched into doctor mode. 

She bent down to feel for a pulse. Noticing a strong heartbeat, she listened for his breathing. A thin strand of blood drained from the corner of his mouth. She rolled him onto his side in the recovery position, reducing the risk of choking. Even though he had just invaded the room to kill Jack, and then taken several shots at her, she could afford him some basic humanity. 

June went back to get her smart phone, and then stared at it. She had no idea whom to call. She certainly wasn’t going to call her sister, especially without having bought her a damn birthday present. It wasn’t worth the grief.

She sat on the floor near the restrained man, checking his pulse and breathing again. Content he wasn’t going to die on her, June inspected the ankle she had twisted in the final kick. It wasn’t turning a funny color, but looked puffy around the bone. She leaned her back against the wall and tried to gather her thoughts. 

Her phone rang. It was Leopold again.

“Please tell me you’re getting me out of here,” June said. “I think I’ve had enough of this place.” She glanced up at the body on the bed. “And the room service sucks.”