Dan turned on his heel, heading back the other way, knowing he couldn’t follow this corridor all the way to the main lobby. Yes, it was a big hotel and there were plenty of places to hide, but he was already getting hemmed in and he cursed himself now, for being sloppy, for spending too much time talking with Florian and Carter.
He dropped into another service corridor and headed for the clatter of the kitchens. It was busy in there, busy enough that he had to dodge a few bodies on the way through. A couple of the chefs and other staff threw glances in his direction, noting his presence without seeming inclined to challenge it.
He pushed out through the double doors on the other side, out into the narrow alley at the back of the hotel, lined with food bins and discarded produce boxes. He turned towards the street but instantly saw someone up ahead.
Dan recognized him right away; the guy in the leather jacket who’d been crouching down talking to the guys in the car. He walked directly towards him and the guy stood still and looked at Dan, as if waiting for him to come into the light, a look of general hostility in his eyes.
The guy seemed to realize who he was then, a moment of adrenalin and panic, a lunge towards his gun. Dan shot him in the face and picked up his pace, walking swiftly out onto the street and away.
He kept walking for a couple of hundred yards, then found a payphone and called the number she’d given him. It was only as he stood there that he realized he was out of breath, his heart kicking along at a canter.
When she answered, he said, “It’s me.”
“You’re out of the hotel?”
“I’m out of the hotel.”
He thought he heard a faint sigh of relief and couldn’t help but smile gratefully in response.
“Come to Hotel Bernet, Room 422.”
“Okay, I’ll see you soon.” He was about to hang up when his thoughts began to catch up with everything that had just happened, the missing suitcase, Inger’s disappearance, her warning. “Are you alone there?”
“No, I’m with a colleague.” She paused and added, “He’s fine. He’s probably the reason we’re still alive.”
Dan ended the call and looked back along the street, thinking through his exit from the Vergoncey, wondering how much of an edge Inger’s unseen colleague had given him. He knew it wouldn’t stop now, either, that the threat would remain at this pitch from here on in. Dan’s only real hope was to get to Brabham before his men finished the job.
Chapter Twenty-nine
The Hotel Bernet was a couple of blocks off the Champs-élysées, nice but anonymous, in a busy street. He walked straight through the lobby and up to the room he’d been given. He stopped and listened then, the sound of Inger and a man talking in Swedish, the tone and volume of a normal conversation.
He knocked and the talking stopped abruptly and he could hear some hurried movement before Inger came and opened the door.
She said something even as she opened it and stepped aside, and Dan saw the guy behind her putting away his gun in response. Dan looked at Inger, smiling, and she gave a relieved laugh back before closing the door.
He looked at the guy now, mousy hair, a close-cut beard, youthful and sporty-looking.
Inger said, “Dan, this is Ville. Dan Hendricks.”
They shook hands, and Ville said, “Good to meet you.”
“Likewise.” He noticed his suitcase standing near the bed. “So what’s happening?”
Ville looked at Inger, uncertain, and she nodded and said, “Confusion is what’s happening. Our people heard that Brabham has made you his priority target and they were coming for you tonight. The order was to pull me out of there.”
She smiled at Ville and he smiled too, and said, “Inger and I go back a long way, so I know she gets what she wants. This is the confusion she talks about. It seems you and her moved on before I could get there. It’s the only way for Inger to stay part of this.”
Dan nodded and said, “I have to move tomorrow anyway, out of Paris. I’ve got a lead.” He was distracted even as he spoke, looking at Inger. “Maybe it’s better if you do take a . . .”
She shook her head, a barely perceptible movement, but letting him know that she was part of this, that she would remain part of it, no matter what Brabham was planning.
In the pause that followed, Ville said, “You got out with no problem?”
Dan looked at him and said, “They were moving in. Another five minutes and I might have been in trouble. But no, I got out okay, thanks. Killed one guy in the alley behind the hotel, not CIA, a freelancer.”
“Oh, sure. I see.” Ville looked shocked, perhaps by the fact that Dan’s version of a trouble-free exit including killing someone. “Well, anyway, you should be okay for a while.”
Dan looked at the room, but Inger said, “Not here. I’ve booked us into a business hotel. It’s better that way, so Ville doesn’t know where we are. We go there now.”
Dan shook Ville’s hand again and said, “I appreciate everything you’ve done for us. I don’t suppose your channels picked up anything else that might be useful, anything on Brabham?”