Ryan, Chris - Zero 22

Right now, there were two. The guy in the suit was leaning towards her. Danny could see him side on. The forced smile, the fast talking. Bethany remained unimpressed. When her champagne arrived, she idly traced her finger round the rim of the glass, apparently impervious to the guy’s charms. It didn’t seem to deter him. He leaned a little closer – Danny thought he might be at risk of falling from his stool – and stretched out one arm so that he was almost touching her. Bethany recoiled, but in such a way that made her seem superior rather than threatened. The guy took the hint and retracted his arm. But he was still leaning towards her, still chatting. Still clearly of the opinion that his luck might be in.

However, by now the General had noticed her.

Danny had to hand it to Bethany. She was playing this well. The first rule of a honeytrap was to make the target come to you. Make a clumsy approach and you do nothing but cause suspicion. Let the target think this is all their great idea and you’re halfway there. Especially if your target is an oversexed Yank with a highly developed sense of his own attractiveness. The General had picked up his cocktail in its delicate martini glass and was sauntering towards Bethany. Bethany was tracing the rim of her champagne glass again, pointedly ignoring the guy in the suit. As the General sat on the stool to her right, she made no attempt even to acknowledge him.

The arrival of the General had a strange effect on the man in the suit. Maybe he thought this broad-shouldered white guy was there to ensure Bethany wasn’t being hassled. Maybe one alpha male had seen off another. The man sat up straight again, made a big show of looking at his watch, then downed his orange juice and left the room.

Danny could immediately see that the General was the more skilful player. He didn’t rush it. He didn’t appear too keen. Both he and Bethany had their backs to Danny, but so far as he could tell the General hadn’t yet initiated a conversation. Danny felt like he was in the presence of two predators slowly circling each other, waiting to go in for the kill. He stood up and headed to the gents. Bethany was handling this well and he didn’t want to draw attention to himself by sitting there staring at them for too long.

It was a long time since he’d taken a piss in a room this posh. An obsequious toilet attendant handed him a fresh towel once he’d washed his hands. Danny dropped a bank note in his dish – a failure to tip would make the attendant more likely to remember him – then returned to his seat in the bar. As he passed Bethany and the General, he could see they were talking. A slightly flirtatious smile played across Bethany’s lips, and O’Brien was leaning in towards her and waving one hand.

There had still been no eye contact between Danny and Bethany as he took his seat again. He sipped his drink, swiped his phone and, in the quiet of his mind, said to himself: ‘Contact made.’

Cunningham, Hobbs and Moore were crouched low on top of the lift. The shaft extended into the darkness above them. Dim service bulbs glowed every ten metres, but there was insufficient light to see to the top of the building. Three sets of cabling extended from the body of the lift up along the chute: the main cable and two security ones. At the front of the lift roof, housed in a grey panel, were a set of external controls for safety and servicing purposes. Cunningham hunkered down over them. There was an override switch, a red button to move the lift up and a green one to move it down. To the left, clipped to the side of the control panel, was a piece of apparatus: a half-metre long metal lever, somewhere between a key and a jemmy. This was to prise the lift doors open from inside if necessary.

In a moment, it would be necessary.

Time check: 16.30 hrs. There was a hiss and the lift started to rise. The movement up here, where there were points of reference along the lift shaft, seemed much faster than it ever did in the enclosed confines of the lift itself. They shot up. Every few seconds they passed the doors of each floor, light seeping in through the cracks. The grinding sound of the pulley system was surprisingly loud and grew in volume as they rose. As the top of the shaft came into view, Cunningham, despite having done this before, felt an irrational moment of fear that the lift wouldn’t stop in time and they would be crushed. But it did stop, rather suddenly. Cunningham felt his stomach lurch and he gripped on tightly. Three loud pings announced the lift’s arrival at the penthouse level. Cunningham listened for the sound of the doors opening.

Hunter and Parsons stood at the back of the lift, side by side, little and large. The manager stood in front of them, facing the doors, his hands behind his back. Hunter held the canvas bag of tools lightly in his right hand. He acutely felt the absence of a weapon, but that was necessary because he knew there was a good chance he was about to be searched.

Nobody spoke. The manager dug his fingernails into his palms and blinked several times.

‘Take it easy, buddy,’ Hunter said under his breath. ‘Don’t freak out.’

The doors slid open.

There were two guys standing in front of the lift. Burly. Flat noses. Thick necks. One, brown-haired with a white blotch on his face that looked like an old burn mark, the other, steely grey hair and several days’ stubble. They both wore black suits. Hunter immediately clocked the bulges under their jackets that indicated they were armed. The grey-haired guy started shouting. ‘Get out of lift! Get against wall!’ A rough, heavy voice, Russian or Eastern European. In a partnership like that, the first person to talk is the dominant one. Hunter made a mental note as he allowed a terrified expression to cross his face. He dropped the canvas bag as the manager emitted a weak moan of fear. He raised his palms in a ‘hey guys, take it easy’ gesture. Parsons, next to him, did the same.

The brown-haired guy entered the lift, grabbed Hunter, pulled him out and threw him hard against the opposite wall. Hunter winced in mock pain as he took in his surroundings. The service lift was at the end of a corridor. Turn left, you hit a wall. Turn right, the corridor extended for fifteen metres before opening out into a larger room. Here, Hunter could see the doors of the main lift, the edge of a painting on the wall next to it and a bright orange designer sofa. There was thick carpet on the floor, good for cushioning the sound of footsteps. ‘Mate,’ he said, breathless, timid, ‘I’m just here to look at your phone lines.’

‘What do you mean?’ asked the grey-haired gunman. He pulled Parsons out of the lift and threw him against the wall next to Hunter.

The manager stumbled over his words as he crept out of the lift. His blinking was off the scale. It made him look shifty. ‘Please, it is nothing serious. These gentlemen are from the telephone company. They would like to check the line coming into Mr Rostropovic’s apartment.’

The man sneered. ‘Why didn’t you fucking call in advance? You know rules.’ Each word sounded like he was spitting.

‘I . . . I apologise, sir. I’m assured it will only take a few minutes.’

The two guys didn’t seem to be listening to the manager. As he jabbered away, they started roughly patting down Hunter and Parsons. Hunter caught a glimpse of a pistol holstered under the brown-haired guy’s jacket. The guy clearly saw him noticing. ‘Wh-what . . .’ Hunter stuttered. ‘Is . . . is that a gun?’

The guy didn’t answer. He just kept patting him down. When the two guards were satisfied that neither Hunter nor Parsons were armed, the brown-haired guy looked askance at the grey-haired guy. Something passed between them. The grey-haired guy looked at Hunter and pointed at the canvas bag that was still in the lift. ‘Get it,’ he said.