This time of night, the hotel lobby was utterly empty; distant noises from the direction of the beach indicated the Christmas party was in full swing. The desk was unmanned.
Sebastian’s phone vibrated in his pocket. He tapped the earpiece to answer Jay’s call. “Where’s Yun?”
“In his room,” Jay replied. “He’s watching something on his laptop. No sign of Tate yet.”
If they were lucky, they’d have the cold wallet in hand before Tate returned and made his move against Yun.
Sebastian reached the staff-only door and tapped the emulator against the reader. The lock beeped; he propped the door open with his foot. “The cameras are down, right?”
There was a pause. “What?”
“The cameras,” Sebastian repeated. “They’re definitely off?”
“Shit. Yeah, they’re down.” There was a distracted quality to Jay’s voice—that gummy was starting to kick in. “I can’t see you.”
Sebastian eased through the door and let it close behind him as he moved toward the end of the hall.
Bypassing the fingerprint reader wasn’t a complex process—he’d recognised the model as soon as Volkan showed it to him. The reader’s internal computer compared each scanned print to a remote database; a match prompted the reader to send an unlock signal to the mechanism that controlled the door’s deadbolts.
The reader was a sturdy piece of equipment, and Sebastian wouldn’t have much luck if he tried to crack it open. But because the mechanism controlling the bolts was designed to receive a simple, true/false signal, it could be manually tripped by a sufficiently powerful magnet. Such as the one he’d borrowed from Jay.
Sebastian fished the magnet out of his pocket and turned the switch before laying it against the door. He moved it along the metal surface in slow circles, searching out the spot where the controller was installed behind it.
There was a loud thunk from somewhere inside the door. Sebastian turned the handle; it spun freely, and he hauled it open.
“I’m in,” he told Jay. “What’s Yun’s box number?”
Jay’s search of the hotel records crawled by at an agonising pace before he announced, “Box 19.”
Sebastian located box 19 and set to work on the master lock first—which proved unusually fiddly. Up until now, Sebastian had been confident he could pull off a vault heist on a moment’s notice; it occurred to him now, for the first time, that he was slightly too drunk to be attempting this.
Finally, the lock turned. Sebastian left the tension wrench in place to hold it open as he started on the guest lock. His fingers fumbled for a moment, and the pick dropped to the floor with a loud clatter. He groaned and knelt to pick it up.
It took a moment longer than it should have to notice there was someone standing in the open doorway of the vault, wearing a familiar tracksuit.
“Fuck.”
“What?” Jay’s voice was sharp in his ear. “What’s wrong?”
“Tate’s not going after Yun.”
There was a gun in Tate’s hand; after a moment’s consideration, he levelled it at Sebastian. “Keep going,” he said. “Open it.”
“Easy.” Sebastian rose carefully to his feet, keeping his hands out in the open. “Watch where you’re pointing that gun.”
“Gun?”
Sebastian hummed an affirmative.
“I’m on my way. Just … just try to stall him.”
“Don’t,” Sebastian snapped. Jay could defend himself in a pinch—Sebastian had seen to that personally—but he was smaller and lighter than Tate, unlikely to win in a head-on fight. Against an opponent like this, Jay’s training was clear: do whatever it took to escape, then run.
“Okay.” Jay seemed to recognise that, too. “Okay,” he said again, more decisively this time.
Tate took a step forward. His finger was on the trigger. “I said fucking open it!”
“Sebastian,” Jay said, quiet and clear. “I just turned the security system back on.”
Sebastian risked a glance at the motion sensor up in the corner of the ceiling. There was a small red light at the bottom.
He took one large, deliberate step back. The red light started to flash.
Ten seconds.
Tate advanced, covering the space that Sebastian had just surrendered and then some. “I’ll fucking shoot you,” he barked. “Open the box!”
Three, two, one …
The alarm went off.
As Tate’s focus went from Sebastian to the screaming klaxons overhead, Sebastian tapped the earpiece and hung up on Jay.
With the security system back up and running, Jay had access to the cameras again.
He watched as the Serenidad’s security staff converged on the vault—on Tate and Moran. Tate fought like a rabid weasel even after they wrestled the gun away, but Moran was quietly cooperative. In fact, he almost seemed relaxed.
Jay wished he could say the same. His pulse hammered in his throat as he hunched over his laptop, eyes fixed on the camera feeds.
Once the two culprits were restrained, the guards conferred with someone over the radio units clipped to their belts. The feeds from the security cameras didn’t include audio—and when Moran had hung up to keep the guards from realising he had an outside accomplice, he’d cut off the only other audio source available.
Whatever the guards were asking, they received a response within moments. They set out through the back corridors of the hotel, dragging Tate and Moran with them.
Jay switched from camera to camera, following their progress. Their route took them to the hallway outside one of the ground-floor suites—Volkan’s office. As they disappeared inside, Jay switched to the feed from the office’s television.
Volkan was standing behind his desk, arms braced against the edge. His expression was neutral, but even through the camera feed Jay could see the dark, calculating look in his eyes.
The guards sat Tate and Moran down at opposite ends of the sofa. One of them had to keep Tate in place with a firm hand on his shoulder; Moran eased back into the cushions, one leg crossed over the other.
Another of the guards handed over Tate’s gun. Volkan examined it with a disdainful air, then let it drop to his side.
This feed, at least, had audio; Volkan turned his attention to the two men on the sofa, his voice light and affable as he said, “Would either of you like a drink?”
Moran raised a hand. “I’ll take one.”
Tate stared at him with an expression of utter disbelief.
Volkan stepped out from behind the desk and moved to the dry bar. He poured two glasses of brandy, then returned to the desk, standing in front of it as he handed one of the glasses to Moran.
“Well, Mr. Tate.” Volkan wet his lips with the brandy. “What were you doing in my vault?”
“You’re not asking him?” Tate waved an indignant hand in Moran’s direction.
“Captain Moran is a well-trained government dog.” The look on Volkan’s face was almost fond. “When they recruit soldiers into the SAS, they train them to resist interrogation. I could question him all week and not learn a single thing he didn’t care for me to know.”
Moran apparently chose to take this as a compliment. He raised his drink in a little toast and took a sip.
Volkan turned a pitying look on Tate. “You, on the other hand, are very poorly trained. You wouldn’t be here if you weren’t. I doubt you’ll hold out nearly as long.”
Tate’s only response was a defiant glare.
Volkan shrugged and turned to the guard who’d handed him the gun. “Kaarlo, would you fetch the drill?”
The guard crossed the office to dig through one of the cabinets along the wall. He withdrew a hard plastic case and returned to the desk; Volkan opened it and pulled out a large, heavy power drill.
He tapped the trigger, revving the motor inside. Tate flinched.
Volkan looked dissatisfied. “When did you last charge this?”
“Would’ve been after that thing with the Albanians,” the guard replied.
“That was weeks ago.” Volkan revved the drill’s motor again, finger tight against the trigger.
“Fuck!” Tate snapped. “All right! I was trying to get into Michael Yun’s deposit box!”
Volkan lowered the drill. There was an intrigued look in his eye. “What’s in it?”
“A cold wallet,” Tate said through his teeth. “There’s millions in crypto on it. Maybe billions.”
“I see.” Volkan beckoned to the guard holding Tate down. “Get him up.”
The guard hauled Tate up off the sofa.
Volkan handed over the drill. “Put some holes through his feet, then turn him loose. And inform Tasha she needs to do a better job disciplining her pets.”
“Wait,” Tate snarled, “wait,” but the guard was already dragging him out of the room.
As the door closed behind them, Volkan turned back to Moran.
“Well.” Moran was still at ease, but there was a touch of wariness in his voice. “What now?”
Volkan gave a frustrated sigh. “I really should kill you.”
Jay’s heart flipped over in his chest. He had a sudden deranged impulse to reach through the screen, drag Sebastian to safety, sink nails and teeth into Volkan for even thinking—
“But,” Volkan went on, “I must admit I am a sentimental old man. And we’ve known each other for many years.” He turned to address the guard next to him. “Please locate and lay hands on Michael Yun.” He glanced at Moran. “And have someone retrieve James Moriarty, while you’re at it. Bring them both here.”
Something in Moran shifted. He didn’t move or visibly react in any way, and yet there was now a readiness to him: a lethal tension in every line of his body. Jay had seen him like this only once before—in a hotel room in Soho, where he’d had a knife and a half-delirious need to protect Jay at any cost.
Volkan appeared to notice something of the change, even if he didn’t fully realise the danger he was in. “I’m very fond of you, Sebastian,” he said, soft and apologetic. “But I don’t know your boyfriend.”
Moran’s eyes darted to the gun in Volkan’s hand.
“Jay’s smart,” he said after a moment. “He’ll be long gone by now.”
He knew Jay was watching. He was telling him to run.
In the decades before he’d come to work at the Serenidad, Kaarlo made a living off odd jobs—mostly intimidation and enforcement, but he’d taken on an execution or two every once in a while to keep his hand in. Retirement had been a distant concern until a lucky hit with a tire iron put him out of commission for a few months.
After that, it was hard to turn down Volkan’s offer of a quiet day job in Marbella. Between shifts of wrangling drunk tourists, he even got to break some arms every now and then.
A quick call to the front desk confirmed that Michael Yun was staying in room 262. As Kaarlo stepped out of the elevator onto the second floor, his radio crackled.
“Volkan, this is Marcello. I’m in Moriarty’s room. Nobody here—looks like he left already.”
Bad luck for Marcello.
There was a “Do Not Disturb” tag on the door to room 262. Kaarlo knocked anyway.
From behind the door came shuffling, then footsteps. A shadow passed across the light coming from beneath the door, then withdrew—as if someone had taken a brief look through the peephole.
Kaarlo knocked again, louder this time. “Hotel security. Open the door, please.”
No answer came—only tense silence.
Kaarlo’s security pass gave him access to every room in the resort. He tapped it against the lock and let himself in.
The room was small—surprisingly so, for someone who supposedly had as much money as Michael Yun. One of the dresser drawers was open, clothes scattered about as if tossed aside in a hurry.
Women’s clothes.
From behind Kaarlo came the unmistakable sound of a gun being cocked.
It was a very big gun—a .44 Magnum revolver, absurdly huge in the hands of the tiny woman holding it.
“U.S. Federal Agent!” she snarled. “Put your fucking hands up, now!”
Even with a gun in his face, Kaarlo couldn’t help but smirk at the sight. “Now, miss,” he said, slowly and gently. “You should put that down, before—”
There was an ear-splitting crack.
Kaarlo reeled, head ringing. There was a hole in the wall behind him, not an inch to the left of where his face had been.
The woman’s finger slowly lifted from the trigger. She had a wide-eyed, intense look as she cocked the hammer once more.
A high, terrified laugh burst from Kaarlo’s mouth. He raised his hands.
Five minutes later, he had his wrists zip-tied to one of the desk legs while the woman—and her enormous gun—stormed from the room.
Volkan checked his watch with an irritated air, then gestured for the nearest guard to hand over his radio.
“Kaarlo, this is Volkan,” he said. “Do you have Yun?”
Long seconds passed without any response.
“Kaarlo,” Volkan repeated, thumb pressing hard against the radio’s button. “Where are you?”
More silence.
Sebastian carefully schooled his expression and posture as he rolled the empty snifter between his fingers. A hard knock against the arm of the sofa would shatter the glass, putting enough of an edge on it to pierce the artery in Volkan’s throat. The gun still hanging at Volkan’s side should take care of the guards, although Sebastian would most likely take a shot to the leg while wresting it away. Maybe a second shot to the hip or gut, if Volkan took too long to bleed out.
That was fine. He’d find Jay, make sure he was safe, and then … whatever happened, happened.
Volkan just needed to move about six inches closer.
And then Sebastian’s phone rang.
Volkan lowered the radio and gave Sebastian an expectant look. “Are you going to get that?”
Moving slowly, Sebastian pulled the phone from his pocket. The call was from Jay.
“Speakerphone,” Volkan instructed. His grip tightened on the gun in his hand.
Sebastian hit the button to answer the call and put it on speaker.
“Volkan.” Jay’s voice was cool and quiet. “You have something of mine.”
The word “mine” did something to Sebastian’s insides. He suppressed a shiver.
“Of course.” If Volkan was surprised to hear Jay address him directly, he didn’t show it. “A dog needs a master. I couldn’t help but wonder who was holding the leash these days.”
“I can offer you three million euros for Moran’s safe return.”
It was the last thing Sebastian had expected him to say. This wasn’t how it was supposed to go—Jay was supposed to run, like Sebastian had taught him to.
Volkan looked unimpressed. “You expect me to believe you have that kind of money?”
“It’s sitting in your vault right now.”
“If you mean Michael Yun’s cold wallet, then what you’re offering is already in my possession.”
“It’s encrypted. Won’t be any use if you can’t unlock it.”
“And one of my men is retrieving Mr. Yun as we speak.”
“No, he’s not. I changed your records. Your man is headed to the wrong room.” Jay’s voice took on a wry tone. “It’s a big resort. You won’t find him in time.”
The amused expression slid off Volkan’s face, leaving behind a blank, cold mask. “In time for what?”
“You saw Moran place a phone in your vault. That phone’s been running a very specific malware suite for the past ten hours—overloading the battery. It’s primed to explode, and I can set it off any time I want.”
Which wasn’t possible. Jay had specifically told Sebastian it wasn’t possible. But Volkan didn’t know that.
“Everything in that vault is about to be incinerated,” Jay went on, “unless you agree to the deal I’m proposing.”
“Three million,” Volkan ground out, “is a minuscule percentage of what’s in that wallet.”
“You can get a minuscule percentage, or you can get one hundred percent of fuck-all. Your choice.”
Volkan shifted on the balls of his feet. Sebastian waited for him to take that crucial half-step forward, but instead Volkan leaned back against the desk.
“Suppose I agree to this,” he said. “How would the exchange take place?”
“Get the cold wallet from your vault and meet me down at the beach club.”
“In public.”
“Yes.” Jay’s tone brooked no argument; a public meeting would keep both sides on their best behaviour. “You hand over Moran, and I’ll transfer the money.”
“Once the wallet is out of the vault,” Volkan said with a faintly mocking air, “your exploding phone is no longer a threat. Why would I follow through on the deal after that?”
“Because you like to think you’re a man of your word.”
Jay’s hand shook as he knocked rapidly on Michael Yun’s door.
It opened, and Mike’s confused expression brightened into a smile when he saw Jay. “Hey, man. What’s up?”
Jay put a hand on Mike’s broad chest and shoved. The man was well over twice his size, but sheer surprise propelled him back into the room as Jay followed him in. The door slammed shut behind them.
Last time Jay was here, they’d spent the entire time in the suite’s spacious living room—Jay on the chaise with his laptop across his knees, while Mike sat on the sofa with his own computer resting on the coffee table. It was still there; Mike had been watching Christmas movies on it.
“The retired smuggler who owns this hotel knows you have fifty thousand Bitcoin in his vault,” Jay said in a focused rush.
“Oh,” Mike said. A beat later, he added: “Shit.”
“I have the situation under control.” Jay closed his eyes and took a breath. “It’s fine. It’s fine.”
“Dude, are you high?”
Jay groaned and waggled his hand in a non-committal gesture.
“Okay.” Mike approached, hands out as if to soothe him. “Maybe you should sit down for a minute.”
“No time.” Jay scrubbed his hands over his face. “He has Sebastian.”
“Oh, fuck. Your boyfriend?”
A slightly hysterical laugh bubbled up through Jay’s throat. “He’s not my boyfriend.”
“Sorry, dude. Your partner, then.” Mike paused, uncertain. “Husband?”
Sebastian was … he was a constant. The only person in Jay’s life who’d never tried to change him, never wanted him to be anything but exactly who he was. Who’d never once let him down. Sebastian was safe.
Jay wasn’t sure there was a word for that.
“I have to ask you something that’s going to sound insane,” he said.
“How insane?”
“I need you to come with me to the beach club and hand over three million euros.”
“Oh,” Mike said, suddenly relieved. “Is that all?”
Volkan still had the gun, tucked into the back of his waistband. He took up the rear of their little procession down to the beach club; Sebastian was unrestrained, but had two guards abreast of him and another walking at his back.
Considering how little he’d managed to sober up, he couldn’t help but be a bit grateful for the support.
The Christmas party was still going when they arrived; it was that time of night when the mingling crowd split off into smaller, tight-knit groups of laughter and conversation and dear god, the karaoke machine. Mrs. Bray had a death grip on the microphone as she sobbed out what sounded vaguely like the final chorus of Sinatra’s “My Way.” The Russian stood at the edge of the small platform that served as a stage, egging her on.
The sullen teenager—Evan—sat at a table in the corner with his parents. He spoke to them in quiet tones, with a look of carefully-mustered courage.
Michael Yun was easy to spot at one of the low tables near the edge of the club’s deck. Next to him, almost in his shadow, sat Jay.
A brief flicker of stark relief passed across Jay’s face, and a fraction of the pacing, snarling rage in Sebastian’s chest calmed at the sight of him.
Volkan sat across from Jay and Yun, gesturing for Sebastian to join him.
“You all right?” Jay asked quietly.
Sebastian nodded. The three guards took up positions around the table; none of them made any aggressive moves, but Sebastian watched them carefully.
If any of them tried to hurt Jay, the gun tucked into Volkan’s waistband was well within arm’s reach.
“To business, please.” Volkan placed on the table the only thing that had been in Yun’s safe deposit box: a vintage Babylon 5 lunchbox.
Yun opened it; the lunchbox was empty, until he lifted a false bottom to reveal a single-board computer, little more than a tiny motherboard with a few chips and ports attached. He ran a USB cable from the computer to his phone, then began typing. “This might take a few minutes.”
From across the club, someone shouted, “Imogen!”
The guards startled and reached for the batons on their belts. Sebastian clutched at the arm of his chair, quickly aborting the twitch his hand had made toward the gun.
Bray froze, the microphone dangling loosely from her hands. “Olivia?!”
There was a slight lull in the din of the party as the other guests turned their attention to the woman standing in their midst, gazing up at the little stage with complicated longing.
Sebastian could just make out the sound of someone shoving their way through the crowd.
Bray quickly fumbled the microphone into the Russian’s hands. “What are you doing here?”
“I needed to see you,” replied Bray’s soon-to-be-ex-wife.
There was a yelp as one of the guests took a sharp elbow to the kidney.
“I’m sorry,” Olivia went on, “I’m so sorry for everything, Imogen.”
Near the table where the exchange was taking place, a large man in a pair of floral swim trunks was unceremoniously pushed aside by the relentless charge of Special Agent Elyse Callahan.
She did not look happy. And she had a gun.
“U.S. Federal Agent,” she barked, badge in hand. “Michael Yun, you are under arrest for—”
“Sorry?” Bray screeched. “You’re sorry you’ve been fucking your secretary for the past year?”
“—for multiple counts of wire fraud. You have—”
“It was a mistake!” Olivia shouted back.
“What, you tripped and fell on his dick, is that it?”
“—you have the right to remain silent—”
“He doesn’t mean anything to me, Imogen! I love you!”
“You ran away together, you absolute—”
Callahan gritted her teeth, hefted her gun, and fired a shot into the air. The ear-splitting crack of it echoed across the water.
A smattering of screams went up among the party guests. The club fell into the shocked silence of many people who were suspicious they’d heard a gunshot, but not absolutely certain.
Then a harsh synth beat crackled through the cheap speakers of the karaoke machine, and a thick Russian accent bellowed out the words, “We broke up on a Tuesday—”
Callahan gripped the gun in both hands and levelled it at Yun. “Get up. Now.”
One of the guards grabbed for his radio, moving too fast; Callahan reacted on instinct.
There was a second, deafening crack as the guard’s ear dissolved into a spray of blood and bits of cartilage.
And with that the party guests finally concluded there was, in fact, a gun in play. The club dissolved into panicked chaos.
Volkan shot to his feet and put a hand to the small of his back.
Sebastian lunged across the table, catching Jay up in his arms as their bodies collided, and bore them both down to the deck. He landed over Jay, shielding him as they hit the floor together.
Jay made a breathless, agonised sound.
Terror seized Sebastian’s throat. “Are you hit?” he gasped into Jay’s ear.
“No,” Jay replied, wheezing, “you’re on my tits, you fucking—”
They both flinched as another gunshot rang out. Volkan was returning fire.
The deck vibrated beneath them, heralding a stampede. Some of the guests fled the club, rushing up the beach; others bolted for cover, ducking down behind furniture or throwing themselves over the deck railing into the water below.
More gunfire rattled overhead; Callahan and Volkan were trading shots, firing from behind benches and overturned tables as they stalked each other across the deck. Neither of them had much luck actually hitting the other: there was a tremor in Volkan’s hands, a bleary unsteadiness to his eye, whereas Callahan’s elephant gun was so massive she could barely aim it, much less fire it.
The Russian was still singing, glaring down the two gunfighters as he howled out the lyrics to whatever pop song he’d selected.
Sebastian eased his weight up off Jay’s chest, and Jay’s relieved gasp puffed across the side of his face.
Crack. A nearby chair rocked back and toppled over; stuffing sprayed from the new bullet hole in its upholstery. Jay grabbed at Sebastian’s waist and dragged him back to the floor. “Get down, you fucking idiot!”
“I’m the idiot?” Another bullet bounced off the deck, just narrowly missing the guard wedged down behind a chair, shouting into his radio. Sebastian tucked Jay’s face in close to his neck. “You were supposed to run!”
“And leave you here with that lunatic?”
“The lunatic who wanted to hurt you to punish me?” Sebastian rolled his eyes. “Yes!”
“Oh, right. And if I’d cleared off, obviously he’d have just—what? Let you go?”
“Of course not—that doesn’t matter!”
“What?” Jay pulled back, staring up into Sebastian’s face with a look of horror. Splinters of wood showered down as a bullet struck one of the timbers holding up the canopy. “What do you mean it doesn’t matter?”
Sebastian’s answer caught in his throat.
Jay’s expression settled into a firm glare. “You wanted to know why I asked you—”
Mrs. Bray, hiding under a table, screamed as a glass shattered above her.
“It was part of the fucking act!” Sebastian shoved his forehead against Jay’s. “I didn’t—”
“I asked,” Jay went on, relentless, “because I knew you’d say yes!”
Sebastian froze, face still pressed to Jay’s, feeling his breath against his cheek.
“You matter.” With the grip he had on Sebastian’s waist, Jay gave him a firm shake. “I need you.”
It was the worst possible time to kiss him.
Then again, it wasn’t much of a kiss. Sebastian’s mouth collided with Jay’s, knocking their teeth together. Jay made a shivery little noise in his throat and pushed up into the kiss, biting hungrily; his hands clutched tight at Sebastian, dragging their bodies together like he wanted to crawl inside.
Distracted as they were, it took a few seconds to notice the shooting had stopped. The club fell into silence—except for the Russian, still singing.
Sebastian risked a quick look around the club. He could just make out the shape of Callahan, sheltered behind an overturned table. There was the distinctive clatter of multiple empty shells falling from a revolver.
Volkan emerged from cover with a smug look. “Out of bullets?”
Quiet curses emerged from behind Callahan’s table; there was another clatter, indicating a handful of fresh cartridges had been dropped on the floor.
Volkan strolled to the bar. There was one unbroken bottle on the bar top; he pulled it toward him and retrieved a glass. “Perhaps,” he said, “we can now speak more reasonably—”
Callahan popped up from behind the table. A gunshot ripped through the air, and the bottle in Volkan’s hand shattered.
Volkan swore colourfully in Turkish and dove behind the bar. “That was top shelf, you little bitch!”
They began trading shots again, just as the Russian launched into the song’s bridge—mostly moans and cries of “Oh, god!”
A bullet hit the karaoke machine, and the performance came to an abrupt and profanity-laced end.
Sebastian flattened back down to the floor, covering as much of Jay’s body with his own as possible. Not far from their position, Yun had taken shelter behind a sofa. He noticed Sebastian looking and gave him a little wave—then flinched as a bullet struck overhead.
Callahan tucked and rolled out from behind a table in a manoeuvre that offered a perfect shot at Volkan’s exposed flank. She sighted down on him and squeezed the trigger.
Her gun’s hammer came down on an empty chamber.
“Ha!” Volkan barked, popping up out of cover. He levelled his own gun at Callahan, now out in the open with nowhere to hide.
That gun clicked, empty as well.
And that’s when the police finally arrived.
“I’m not really sure what happened,” Sebastian lied, right to the copper’s face. “My partner and I were down at the beach club for the party, and the next thing we knew, someone was shooting.”
Jay leaned bonelessly into Sebastian’s side, barely paying attention; Sebastian’s arm was around his waist, hand splayed across his hip. They were curled up together on one of the low sofas in the hotel lobby. The police had gathered all the party guests here to take statements, a task that was proceeding slowly and unsuccessfully as the clock crept past midnight.
The copper, concluding that he wasn’t going to get anything else out of Sebastian, snapped his notebook shut and moved on.
A little distance away, Evan and his parents were in the midst of a hushed conversation.
“But you said you needed to tell us something,” the mother said.
“Oh, my god,” Evan groaned. “It can wait, Mum—”
“You said it was important.”
The father broke in: “You can tell us anything, you know that—”
“Fine!” Evan snapped. “I know Alfie didn’t run away! I know you ran him over!”
There was a pause.
“Well,” said the mother, “technically your father ran him over—”
The father glared. “Don’t start—”
Jay tipped his head back to meet Sebastian’s eyes; Sebastian’s baffled expression matched his own.
Sebastian broke first, a snort of laughter sneaking past his sealed lips, and that set Jay off. They both dissolved into quiet giggles.
Jay glanced over Sebastian’s shoulder and spotted Michael Yun at the other end of the lobby, wrapping up his own police statement. Mike grinned and gave him two thumbs up.
Still laughing a little, Jay tucked his face against Sebastian’s chest and relaxed into the sound of his breathing, the beat of his heart. He’d have fallen asleep, if he hadn’t felt Sebastian tense beneath his cheek.
Footsteps on polished tile approached their position. Jay lifted his head to see Volkan making his way across the lobby.
Sebastian watched him with a blank, weary expression. “You’re not under arrest,” he observed.
Volkan looked entirely too pleased with himself. “As far as the official record is concerned, there was only one shooter here tonight.”
There was a commotion from the other end of the lobby; two police officers had Special Agent Callahan by the arms and were hauling her, with great effort, toward the exit and the patrol car waiting beyond.
“Call the embassy!” she screamed, thrashing in their grip. “I am an American federal fucking agent!”
The doors closed, muffling her shouts as the coppers shoved her into the car.
Volkan’s attention, however, was on Jay. “My accountant tells me the transfer went through,” he said, with a professional air. “I have my three million, and Captain Moran is safely returned to you. I believe that means our business is concluded.”
From the corner of his eye, Jay could see Sebastian watching him. He wasn’t saying anything—he wouldn’t, until Jay made the call.
Jay sat up a little. “I suppose it is,” he replied evenly.
With a brisk nod, Volkan turned and walked away.
“That was professional of you,” Sebastian muttered—impressed, if a little surly.
Jay slumped back into his side. “First thing tomorrow,” he said, “we’re switching hotels.”
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