Theaella

33

Unidentified Caller hadn’t lied. This wasn’t some dogfighting ring Matthew could walk into like a third-rate gunslinger.

For this he’d have to bring at least his second-rate game.

These men seemed to be stitched into the fabric of the community. Kids in private schools, gated houses with circular driveways, three-year leases on luxury SUVs for the missuses. Nicer suits, finer espresso, a courtyard of one’s own.

When acoustics allowed, Matthew could make out the occasional snatch of conversation from the table, though only the voices of the other men.

Removing the Turing Phone, he texted Unidentified Caller: ANY HEADWAY WITH THE KAMA SUTRA?

He stared across the dining room, past the bodyguard, through the French doors.

Waiting for confirmation.

It took a few seconds for the text to skitter its way through the encryption. But at last the silver-haired man reached inside his lapel. He removed a matching rectangular slab of Liquidmorphium. Eyed the screen.

His lips pursed with amusement.

He held up a finger, and the men around him ceased talking.

He typed.

A moment later his text appeared: IF YOU STILL HAVE YOUR SENSE OF HUMOR, YOU DON’T COMPREHEND THE FATE YOU’RE FACING.

Matthew: THE TERROR TRIED TO TELL ME THE SAME THING. RIGHT BEFORE I PUT A HOLLOW POINT THROUGH HIS FOREHEAD.

The man stared at the screen, the amusement fading from his face. As if he’d taken a joke too far with a child and was no longer willing to countenance any acting out.

He returned the phone to his lapel pocket, nodded at the men, and the conversation resumed.

Matthew had to identify him. He needed a name. If not Unidentified Caller’s, then at least that of one of his associates or bodyguards. He could backtrack from there.

Were Matthew not sitting in clear view of two of the bodyguards, he might have risked raising his phone to take a picture.

But the facial-recognition route would not be an option.

There were three men at the table, and a lot of espresso sipping was going on.

Which meant it was only a matter of time.

Surprisingly, it wasn’t one of the associates who moved first. It was the bodyguard from outside, the one watching the vehicles. He entered and nodded at the man by the French doors, who nodded at one of the redundant guards in the courtyard, who slipped outside to cover as the first guy headed into the bathroom. A seamless rotation.

Matthew waited a moment. Then he rose and entered after him.

It featured only stalls, as befitted a unisex bathroom.

From behind the closed stall door came the sound of a torrent of urine.

Matthew quietly threw the dead bolt behind him. He cupped his hands under the sink, sprinkled some water on the concrete, and then entered one of the vacant stalls. As he waited, he noted that his body temperature felt higher than usual, and then all of a sudden he was sweating as if someone had ramped up the heat. A familiar fogginess rolled over him, altering his perception, fuzzing the edges of the stall, the latch lock, his own hand held before his face. He didn’t know what an ideal time was to have a flurry of concussion symptoms, but this was not it.

The guy finished, zipped up, and cleared the stall, moving to the trough sink.

Matthew closed his eyes, focused on his breathing, willed his body temperature to lower. He had to be swift and precise in order to avoid any kind of physical altercation. He couldn’t risk another knock to the head.

Once he felt steadier, he emerged, giving a neighborly nod when the guard looked up to eye him in the mirror.

As the man reached for the paper-towel dispenser, his weight shifted forward, moving him up onto his toes on the water-slick concrete. Matthew grabbed the nape of his neck, swept his ankles back, and slammed his forehead into the lip of the sink.

The man’s knees buckled forward, and he sat froggy style, his torso flopped back over his legs. His eyes were open a sliver, showing a seam of white, and his breath came evenly and jaggedly. He would come to in a few seconds. The overwhelming likelihood was that he would remember nothing and dismiss it as an unusually painful slip in the bathroom.

Matthew lifted the unconscious man’s weighty arm, adjusting his grip around the right index finger, and rolled the finger pad onto the back of his own right thumbnail.

A nice hard surface that would hold the print.

He released the arm, and it slapped to the floor.

Matthew adjusted his hair in the mirror and exited.

He hooked left through the lobby and was out on the street in seconds. Too late he realized that in his slightly dazed state he’d inadvertently dined and ditched, which would make him memorable, especially to the snotty ma?tre d’. Now he’d be unable to return to surveil the area if the mission called for it, the first concrete cost of the concussion he’d sustained. He vowed it would also be the last.

Next door a concrete office building the color of sandstone rose five stories to a steep slope roof. The building probably didn’t offer a useful view of the courtyard, but it was the best and only option.

Matthew gauged it from outside and then rode to the top level. The lights of the elevator seemed unnaturally bright, aggravating the aching in his brain, making him squint.

A dermatologist and an internist shared the floor. A bathroom conveniently took up the center of the southwest side.

Matthew entered the bathroom, slid open the window, and stuck his head out.

He could see down onto the top of the courtyard but not quite to the table.

Another five feet or so would get him there.

But he didn’t have five feet. There was only open air. The ground gave a vertiginous swirl, and he took in a lungful of fresh air and moved his gaze upward.