We were most definitely heading deeper in the city. Why?
I sat forward in my seat. “Where are we going?” I asked, speaking for the first time since I’d been escorted from my room up to Jacobs’s office and then down through a service elevator to the waiting van in the GTX parking garage.
All four security guys ignored me, except for a slight tensing of shoulders in the one nearest me. Two rows of seats away. Clearly my reputation preceded me. Their thoughts were buzzing with anxiety and anger, making them difficult to read.
I tried again. “Where is Dr. Jacobs?”
Again, silence.
The driver was torn between watching me in the rearview mirror and trying to pay attention to the cars around him. “I’m just going to keep asking,” I said, using that flat tone that so many humans—well, the ones who knew the truth about me—interpreted as threatening.
“He’s already on location,” the driver said curtly. “Because of the delay.”
Ah yes, the delay again. The fifteen minutes I’d suggested as the time I required had stretched into an hour and then two and then more before anyone had shown up to retrieve me.
It was already late afternoon. The sun was a bright orange blaze in the west, reflecting off mirrored high-rise windows in bright flashes as we passed.
Had we missed the meeting? Was that Jacobs’s brilliant plan? Just not show up?
I forced myself to inhale and then exhale to a count of ten. Staying calm and alert was my best bet.
Watching out the window, I counted off blocks and turns, memorizing our route. It kept my brain occupied.
When we drove past the sweeping entrance for the Manderlay Hotel, I didn’t think much about it, except to note that it looked like something out of a movie. The bustling valets and bellmen in red coats, the flags flapping on poles overhead, and the limousines idling in the drive.
But then the van slowed and pulled into the attached parking garage. The Manderlay? Seriously?
I moved to the edge of my seat. Maybe we were going somewhere else, another building that used the same garage.
But no, the driver was following the signs inside for hotel parking.
What the hell? The Manderlay looked expensive. Luxury, even. I would have felt better pulling up to a former meat-packing plant full of rats and tetanus or something.
This just didn’t make sense: a fight to the death in a place that turned down your covers and didn’t bolt the remote to the bedside table. I could understand why Jacobs would pick a nice place for the duration of the trials. Laughlin, too. And the as-yet-unknown military contacts who would be judging the trials. (Jacobs called them the Committee.)
But why bring me here? I was missing something, some important detail or fact that would make it all click. It made me uneasy. If one of my assumptions was wrong, then my read of the entire situation—and my plans, accordingly—might be wrong.
The driver parked and cut the engine.
I stood up, my head bent to avoid the roof, but before I could start for the van door, the guard closest to me, the nervous one, held up his hand to stop me. “No,” he said loudly, as if speaking to a stupid but large puppy. One with sharp teeth.
I raised my eyebrows. “I am fully fluent in English and four other languages. There’s no need to shout. I am more than capable of understanding basic human speech.”
He twitched at the word human but otherwise ignored me. I couldn’t resist tweaking him, though. “For example, no, bù, nein, nyet, la.”
No longer fearing for my life made me bold in ways that were probably not so good for my survival.
He glared at me as he climbed out of the van with his buddies.
I made him uncomfortable, which meant I’d need to keep an eye on him, if he was sticking around for the duration. Someone that edgy might be more likely to shoot first and never ask questions. Maybe I could use that to my advantage.
I watched as the four of them did a visual sweep of the area.
Apparently, someone was worried I’d die on the way to my death match. Interesting.
The guard nearest me gave a nod toward me through the van’s tinted windows.
As soon as I stepped out, the four of them positioned themselves around me, two in front and two in back, and led the way through the garage to a set of doors marked LOBBY.
Really? This should be fun.
Beyond the doors, the smell of new carpeting and fresh paint in a recently redecorated walkway filled my nose, making it hard to breathe until I adjusted.
The walkway had a few other people in it—families, a few couples, some of them heading toward the garage, others ahead of us in the trek to the lobby.