Barry Eisler - The Detachment

After Tryst we improvised, trailing Shorrock and his party onto the casino floor, keeping Dox at a slot machine where he could watch Shorrock play blackjack and signal me the moment Shorrock excused himself for what looked like a bathroom break. Everything went smoothly, better than I would have reasonably expected, in fact-other than that I couldn’t get him alone.

What was doubly frustrating was that even though we knew the room he was staying in, we couldn’t get to him there. The two Secret Service guys had been keeping a fairly low profile, maybe because Shorrock wasn’t in the same league as, say, the secretary of defense, maybe because they were relying in part on the hotel’s own extensive security systems, maybe because Shorrock preferred his security detail to give him room to breathe. Whatever it was, one of them always stood guard outside Shorrock’s room when Shorrock was in it, as I’d confirmed via a discreet trip to the 58 thfloor, aided by a dental mirror, the day before. We could fix him in the room, but we couldn’t finish him there. It would have to be somewhere else.

The next day was the same. Shorrock used the gym in the morning, but not the spa, not even for a toilet break. The lunchtime keynote was a no-go because of the likely security posture. Then there was Shanghai cuisine at Wing Lei restaurant for dinner; a head-splitting mix from a DJ called Pizzo at XS nightclub; and more blackjack, this time with Treven watching from a slot machine. Five restroom visits overall, not one of them offering a moment alone.

At just before one in the morning, Treven called and told me Shorrock’s party was breaking up. He was heading toward his room, flanked by the bodyguards, and there was nothing more to be done that night, his last at the convention. Dox would monitor him until he was asleep via the camera I’d emplaced, and barring anything new, we would try for one more shot at him in the gym in the morning. But if that didn’t pan out, in the absence of some fresh intel regarding his subsequent movements, a stop at a church, for example, as Dox had been hoping, we were done.

I headed back to my room and opened the drapes, then sat silently in the reflected lights of the Strip outside and below.

It was dispiriting. I’ve never failed to complete a job, and I was disturbed at the sudden prospect of blowing this one. It was, I had to admit, nothing high-minded. Just the old and simple obsession with finishing what I’d started and doing it exceptionally well. Not a pretty motivation, no doubt, but at that moment, at least an honest one.

I ran through an increasingly wild set of scenarios, feeling the temptation to try something higher-risk. But that was Vegas talking, encouraging me to redeem my losses with increasingly reckless spins of the wheel. I’ve lasted a long time by not being stupid. It wasn’t a good time to start.

I sat for a long time in the disconsolate glow, waiting for the feel of being on the hunt, the sharp adrenaline edge, to subside. I was tired but I knew I couldn’t sleep. I had just decided to boil the tension out of myself in the room’s generous bathtub when my mobile buzzed-Dox. I snatched it up and said, “Tell me he’s going to church in the morning and I’ll buy you a bottle of Bombay Sapphire.”

“Oh, he’s going to need to go to church, but I don’t know if he will.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Well, partner, I am watching our friend, whose daily workouts have obviously gifted him with a level of stamina to which you can only aspire, banging the hell out of a call girl even as we speak.”

“You’re shitting me.”

“No, sir. She arrived ten minutes ago, but I didn’t call you because I heard a knock but couldn’t see what was happening-they must have started in the corridor or in the extra bathroom, and the camera feed’s only of the main room of the suite. But he’s got her on the couch now, and oh yeah, oh, look at that, he’s turning her over, a little doggy-style, I like this man’s proclivities! Tell me, partner, why is it so hilarious to watch other people fucking?”

I didn’t answer. My mind was racing. There had to be a way we could use this. There had to be.

“Hot damn, look at him go! I am proud, proud to know that our great nation is being steered by men of such exceptional energy and passion. Not to mention rectitude.”

Rectitude. That was it.

“We’ve got him,” I said. “This is our chance.”

“I don’t see what you mean. Right now, the man couldn’t be more un-alone.”

“No, but he’ll be alone soon. I want you to keep watching-”

“Yes, sir, I love my work.”

“-and the second she leaves, buzz me, then meet me on the casino floor. There’s a phone bank, just to the right of Blush nightclub when you’re facing the entrance. The second she leaves, understand?”

“Understood,” he said, his tone suddenly all business.

I clicked off and took three slow, deep breaths, forcing myself to pause, to think it through from every angle. If I missed even just one variable, we would blow the whole thing. But there was a chance. Dox had been joking about rectitude, but rectitude, or more accurately, the threatened loss of its facade, was what we suddenly stood to exploit. I thought about the shame this married, church-going, top-secret-SCI-cleared intelligence official would fear if word-if a damn celebrity porn video, from what Dox was describing-got out. And I thought about how, of all the emotions, it’s shame that most craves solitude, the very solitude we now required.

I imagined an approach, and quickly realized that with just a little luck, I wouldn’t even need the cyanide. I decided to do it the old-fashioned way-more difficult, but also more certain. I closed my eyes and began to picture every step, every variable, every when/then possibility.

When I was done visualizing all of it, I took a roll of sports tape from my toiletry kit and wrapped my forearms and wrists, all the way down to the first joint on my thumbs. Then I pulled on a long-sleeved white tee shirt, buttoned a blue oxford cloth shirt over it, and slipped on a navy blazer whose sleeves were a touch too long. Taped wrists and long sleeves might attract some attention at one of the card tables, but I wasn’t going to be gambling, or at least not in the Vegas sense of the word.

My mobile vibrated forty minutes later-Shorrock must have had the girl for an hour, and I supposed there were few professionals as punctual as a Vegas call girl. I stuffed a pair of deerskin gloves into one of the blazer jacket pockets and the sports tape into the other, then headed down.

Dox was waiting when I arrived, and I was pleased to note the continued density of the crowds on the casino floor, which would offer plenty of concealment. “Let’s walk,” I said, and while we circumnavigated the resort, I explained the plan, and his role in it.

When we were done, we walked back to the phone bank next to Blush. I stood close while he dialed Shorrock’s room, and he held the phone away from his ear so I could hear. Two rings, then a “Yes?” in a slightly nervous tone. I wondered whether Shorrock was concerned the girl, or her company, was calling, whether he was suffering from an afterglow comprised mostly of guilt and fear.

“Mister Shorrock,” Dox said, in his deepest hick drawl.

“Yes?”

“I’ll get right to the point. My associate just left your room. While she was there, she placed a camera under the television in the main room. We used that camera to record a video of your escapades on the couch.”

“What?”

“May I recommend that you just walk over to the television in question and feel along its bottom edge? You’ll find the camera, and then I can tell you how we can settle this so no one else ever sees the video we made.”