Pirate

Forty-six

Alexandra followed Fisk from the room. “We need to talk,” she said, quickening her pace to keep up with him as he strode down the hallway.

He glanced back at her but didn’t stop. “Later. I’m in a hurry.”

A maid came around the corner, her attention on the ice bucket with champagne bottle that she was carrying. Fisk barreled into her, knocking the bucket and bottle from her grasp and sending the coat flying from his. He landed against a potted palm, nearly toppling it.

The poor girl’s eyes widened as he swore at her. “I’m so sorry, sir. I didn’t see you there.”

“Apparently,” he said as he bent down and swooped up his coat, then stormed off.

Alexandra followed through the lobby, but he stopped her at the door, turning toward her, his voice lowered so that only she could hear. “What part of ‘I’m in a hurry’ did you not get?”

“You’re not going to kill anybody,” she whispered. “Not here. The room’s in my name.”

“You wanted to be part of this. That means you play by my rules. If and when I find it necessary to eliminate someone, I make that decision. Not you, not Jak or Ivan. Me. Do I make myself clear?”

Shaken by his anger, she nodded, then walked back through the lobby and down the hallway, where the maid was down on the floor, picking up ice cubes from the carpet and dumping them into the bucket.

The young woman looked up at her, her eyes glistening with unshed tears, as she apologized. “I didn’t see him.”

“It’s not your fault,” Alexandra said, feeling sorry for her. She started to reach for the champagne bottle that had rolled into the corner by the potted palm. When she bent down to pick it up, she noticed something in the base of the potted palm. The cipher wheel.

She left the bottle where it was. “Let me help,” she said as she started scooping some of the ice into a small pile near the palm. “It really was our fault. We were arguing and didn’t see you.”

“No. You shouldn’t trouble yourself. I’ll clean this.”

Alexandra moved in front of the palm, blocking the maid’s view. She shoved the wheel into the dirt and covered it, then picked up the champagne bottle, holding it toward the maid.

“Thank you,” the girl said, taking the bottle from her as Fisk rounded the corner.

He stopped, appearing surprised to see Alexandra and the maid still there.

“Forget something?” Alexandra asked.

“Dropped something.” He walked around them, his gaze on the floor.

When he reached the palm, pulling back the fronds to look behind it, Alexandra tried to keep her breathing even.

He looked up at her. “You didn’t find anything here, did you?”

“No. What is it you’re looking for?”

“Maybe it’s in the room,” he said, then strode that way.

Alexandra smiled at the maid, worried about her safety if she happened to walk past their room at the wrong moment. “Whoever opens this is going to have quite a surprise. Have you ever seen a champagne bottle that’s been dropped?”

“I didn’t think of that. I should change it out.”

She left, and Alexandra returned to the room in time to see Fisk searching under the bed. “Maybe if you told us what you lost, we might be able to help look.”

He dropped the bedspread, then stood, looking her over, his gaze lingering on the pockets of her light jacket — making her grateful she’d left the thing in the palm pot. “Maybe it’s in the car,” he said.

“And if you can’t find whatever it is?”

“Doesn’t matter.” He took one last look around the room. “I have photos.”

She glanced over at Nigel. The poor guy was trying to loosen the zip tie binding his wrists, and she wanted to tell him to just stop. They’d kill him in a second if he tried to escape. Which reminded her exactly of what she wanted to talk to Fisk about.

She followed him into the hallway again.

This time, he didn’t look back. “I told you, not now.”

“I got the message,” she said, deciding it wiser to avoid him altogether. “I’m going up front to get a menu from the pub across the street. Thanks to our uninvited guest, we’re going to need to get our meal to go.”

They turned the corner, and he slowed his pace, undoubtedly searching for that lost wheel. Her gaze lit on the disturbed potting soil in the palm. It seemed so obvious to her, and when he walked up to the plant, she froze as he moved the branches to look behind it.

The fronds rustled as he let them go, and he cursed softly under his breath as he continued out into the lobby. She made a right to the front desk and asked for a menu from the pub, looking it over as he left. When she saw his car drive off, she returned to the hallway, dug her fingers into the potting soil, and pulled out the cipher wheel. She brushed it off, stuffed it into her pocket, then hurried to her own room, where she hid it in the lining of her suitcase.

She had no idea what she was going to do with it. She only knew that if the thing was so important that Fisk was carrying it with him, then she wanted it for herself.