woman’s eyes widened briefly. Then as if a shutter slid down over her face, she became completely expressionless. “No.”
“No, you’re not a guest?”
“No, I won’t go with you to the security guards.” She backed up a step, then another.
“Charlie, get behind me,” Gus warned.
“It’s okay. She said she wouldn’t hurt me.”
“Please, do as I say,” Gus insisted.
Charlie frowned, but moved behind him.
“Now, either you come with me willingly, or my partner and I will take you there unwillingly. Your choice.”
She shook her head. “I can’t.” In a flash, she turned and slammed against the door, pushing it outward enough to slip through and out into the night.
Declan came running down the hallway. “Charlie, are you all right?”
“I’m fine, but I don’t think that woman is.” Charlie shook her head.
“Stay with Charlie,” Gus said. “I’m going after her.”
“I’ve got her,” Declan said. “Go.”
Gus raced through the door and out into the night. Two guards caught him before he’d gone three steps. They pulled his arms up behind him and disarmed him. “What the hell. Let me go. There’s a woman I need to catch.”
“She said you’d come flying out the door after her,” the guard holding his right arm said.
“She also said you had a gun and you were going to kill her.” The man on the left held his pistol.
“I have a conceal carry license. I’m here as bodyguard to Charlotte Halverson. That woman tried to abduct her. You should have captured her, not me.”
“Right. And I’m Santa Claus.” The guard on the right snickered.
Two men raced around the side of the building and ground to a stop, silhouettes in the darkness.
“Gus?” one of them said. “Did you find her?”
“Mack? Snow?” Gus called out.
“Yeah,” Mack responded. “What’s the problem?”
“She got away, thanks to these guards.”
“Don’t come any closer, or I’ll shoot,” said the guard holding Gus’s Glock.
Mack and Snow held up their hands. “Don’t shoot. We’re here as bodyguards to Charlotte Halverson.”
“I told them the same, but they’re not buying it,” Gus said. “Call Declan. Tell him to notify the man in charge of security that their guards are holding up the wrong person.”
The guard holding his arm up between his shoulder blades pushed it up higher.
“Hey, you don’t have to break it,” Gus said. “I’m not fighting you.”
Gus could hear Mack talking to Declan through his headset. A moment later, the radios clipped to the belts of the guards holding him hostage both squawked.
“Peterson, Rawlings, check the identification of the man you’re holding,” the voice said. “If his name is Augustus Walsh, you can release him. He’s here with Charlotte Halverson and needs to get back to her.”
The man holding his arm gave it one last shove up between his shoulder blades before he released it. “Sorry,” he said, though he really didn’t sound sorry at all. “Just doing our jobs.”
“I get it,” Gus said. “I was, too.” He rubbed his sore arm. “If you see that woman again, detain her. She tried to take off with Mrs. Halverson.”
“We will.” The guard holding his weapon handed it back. “No harm, no foul.”
“Yeah.” Gus holstered his Glock and straightened his tuxedo jacket. “Now if you’ll excuse us, we have to get back to work.”
“By all means.” The guard who’d jacked up his arm waved him by. “You’ll have to go back around to the front of the building. The door you came through doesn’t open from this side.”
Gus took off, jogging. He met up with Mack and Snow.
“Did you see a black-haired woman in a long black dress?”
Mack and Snow both shook their heads.
“If you do, keep an eye on her. She tried to take off with Charlie.” Gus moved past his teammates, hurrying back to the entrance of the hotel. Declan was capable of handling Charlie’s safety on his own, but Gus wanted to be there in case the woman in black returned for a second attempt.
She should have known Charlotte Halverson would have multiple bodyguards protecting her. A woman of her wealth and status might as well have a target on her back at all times. A person could collect a significant amount of ransom money if he successfully abducted her.
Money wasn’t her goal with the Halverson woman. Answers were worth much more to her. Why did she have those coordinates on her wrist? Why did she have a Trinity-knot tattoo? Why had she been detained and tortured in Syria? Why had she been there in the first place?
More than anything...who was she?
All the effort she’d gone to in order to gain access to the gala had been a bust. All she needed was to talk to the Halverson woman and no one else. At this point, she wasn’t going to risk interaction with a single soul other than Halverson. If the woman’s bodyguard hadn’t been so attentive she might have gotten her alone long enough to figure out the puzzle of her existence. Now she was back to square one. Not even square one. The bodyguards would think she had tried to abscond with the rich widow. They wouldn’t let her anywhere near her now, and she still didn’t know if she could trust anyone other than Halverson.
Once she’d made it past the guards, she’d circled the entire building, counting the number of security personnel on the outside at every entry or exit point. The only reason she’d gotten through the first time was she’d gone in as one of the housekeeping staff, with her dress and shoes tucked beneath the uniform she’d pilfered from the back of a laundry van. She’d helped clean rooms, stating she was new.
Eventually, she slipped out of sight and hid in one of the unoccupied rooms until close to time for the gala to begin. She’d showered, dressed and applied the makeup she’d borrowed from one of the rooms. The shoes had belonged to one of the guests at the hotel. Appropriately dressed, she’d found her way down a staff elevator to the kitchen and from there into the ballroom after a majority of the people had already arrived. She’d mixed and mingled as if she belonged until she’d spotted Charlotte Halverson.
Thankfully, by the time she’d
