Chapter 267: Chapter 269: Room Fourteen
MARCUS’S POV
The call came in at 11:43 AM.
His contact’s name was Reyes and she did not waste words.
"Room fourteen," she said. "Clearwater Motel, Pioche. White male, late fifties, approximately five-ten, grey hair, heavier than the photos you sent. He went to the vending machine at nine and the office at ten-thirty to extend his stay by another week." A pause. "He’s paying cash. He looks like a man who hasn’t slept properly in months."
"You’re certain."
"I’m always certain," she said, which from Reyes was not arrogance. Just fact.
"Stay on him," Marcus said. "Don’t move until you hear from me."
He hung up.
Sat back in his chair, picked up the phone and called Damien.
"He’s there," he said, when Damien answered. "Room fourteen. Harold Ashford is in Pioche, Nevada." A pause. "What do you want to do?"
The line was quiet for three seconds.
"Bring him in first," Damien said and ended the call
Marcus looked at the satellite image one more time.
Then he started making calls.
****
HAROLD’S POV
The vending machine was broken again.
Harold stared at the empty B7 slot, then kicked the machine once at the base. Nothing happened. He walked back to room fourteen.
Six weeks in this motel and that machine had eaten his money four times.
Small things. That’s what his life had become. Broken vending machines and weekly cash payments at the front desk and knowing which floorboard outside room nine creaked at 2am because the trucker staying there kept strange hours and Harold had learned to track every sound in this building.
He locked the door behind him. Both locks. Then the chain he’d installed himself in the first week....a basic thing, hardware store purchase, but it was his and he knew exactly how much weight it could hold.
He sat at the desk and opened the laptop.
The money was there. He checked it the same way every morning. Twenty million, sitting clean and untouched in an account that didn’t exist under a name that wasn’t his. Victoria had come through. He hadn’t been completely sure she would but she had.
He pulled up his alerts.
There was a photograph from four days ago. Aria Chen leaving Metropolitan General. Blackwood beside her, his hand at her back. She looked thin. She looked tired.
She looked alive.
Harold closed the laptop.
Alive complicated things. He’d known that when the hospital reports started coming through....the treatment, the recovery, the fact that she’d apparently identified the compound herself from memory while she was still half conscious. He’d spent three days sitting in this room processing that particular piece of information.
He should have been more careful.
He stood up and went to the bathroom. Ran cold water over his face and looked at himself in the mirror. He looked like hell. He knew he looked like hell. Six weeks of bad food and no sleep and the specific grinding fear of a man who knew he was being hunted and didn’t know how close they were.
He turned the tap off.
Went back to the desk.
He didn’t hear anything until the knock.
Three knocks. Even. Patient.
Harold went completely still.
He looked at the window. Ground floor, end of the building. Thirty feet to the perimeter fence. He’d walked it in twenty-two seconds on a good day. Twenty-five if he was carrying the bag.
The bag was by the bed. Always by the bed.
"Housekeeping," a voice said.
Housekeeping didn’t come on Sundays. He’d confirmed that the first week.
He stood up slowly.
"Mr. Ashford." Different voice this time. Quiet. Not aggressive. Somehow that was worse. "There are four of us. One at this door, one at the window, one at the fence, one at the car park exit." A pause. "I’m telling you so you make a smart decision."
Harold looked at the bag.
He looked at the window.
He thought about the twenty million dollars and a plan that was still taking shape and Victoria on the other side of the world who had believed in him enough to send it.
He looked at the window latch, and how fast he will be able to run for it if he wanted to. But then, how fast can he run to successfully outrun four professional guards at fifty-eight years old and after six weeks of gas station food and bad sleep.
He sat down on the bed.
"It’s unlocked," he said.
****
The chain snapped on the first kick.
Marcus entered the room and saw Harold sitting on the bed with his hands on his knees. He didn’t move when they came in. Didn’t speak. Just looked at Marcus with the eyes of a man who had finished running and knew it.
Marcus looked back at him.
He’d seen this before. Men who’d been carrying something heavy for so long that getting caught was almost a relief. It didn’t make them cooperative. It just made them quiet in a different way.
"Hands," Marcus said.
Harold put them out.
Marcus bagged the laptop first. Two prepaid phones from the bedside table. The bag by the bed....documents, cash, a second phone at the bottom wrapped in a t-shirt.
"Clean," Reyes said from the bathroom doorway.
Marcus photographed everything before he moved it. Then he stood in the middle of the room and looked at Harold.
"Is there anything here I haven’t found."
Harold looked at the floor.
"We’ll find it anyway," Marcus said.
He stepped outside and called Damien.
Damien picked up on the first ring.
"Confirmed," Marcus said. "We have him. No resistance."
***
Damien’s Pov
Damien said nothing for a second.
"Condition."
"Fine. He sat down when we came in and put his hands out." Marcus paused. "He asked one thing."
"What."
"He asked if she was okay."
Damien looked at the desk in front of him.
"Bring him in," he said.
Okay boss. we’ll be back to the city in Fourteen hours.
Damien hung up and he sat there for a moment. Just sat there. Then he stood up and went to find Aria.
She was in the garden when he found her, he crossed the lawn and sat down beside her on the bench.
He didn’t say anything for a moment.
"Marcus has Harold," he finally said. "In a motel in Nevada. He is bringing him back."
Aria looked at him.
She waited for something big to arrive. Relief or rage or the release of all the fear that had been living in her chest for months.
What came was quieter than that. Just a slow exhale that she hadn’t realized she’d been holding.
She looked down at the notebook in her lap. The Victoria notes.
"Victoria," she said.
"I know."
"Harold doesn’t change....."
"I know." He put his hand over hers. "But today he can’t get to you. Let today be what it is."
She looked at him.
"What are you going to do with him," she said.
Damien looked back at her steadily.
"What needs to be done," he said.
She held his gaze. She knew what that meant. She’d known since the first time he’d said it.
"Be careful," she said. "That’s all I’m asking."
"Always."
She nodded.
Then she looked back at the garden and didn’t say anything else.
