Deep Sleep (Devin Gray #1)(4)
“Your dad sounds like my kind of guy,” said Wilson. “What’s his name? Maybe I know him.”
“Beautiful,” she said, nodding toward the blood-orange orb sinking behind the trees.
“Sure is,” he said, shifting his attention to the sunset.
She pressed the tape over his mouth and smoothed the edges firmly over both cheeks. Wilson’s body tensed, his eyes going wide. Helen grabbed his left hand and yanked it across his body, slipping one loop of a zip-tie handcuff over it and cinching the loop tight around his wrist. She forced the other hand through the other loop and pulled it tight. Maybe it was the early effects of ketamine. Maybe it was shock. But Wilson barely protested as she secured the plastic cuffs to the right arm of the chair with a short length of cord.
Helen glanced over her shoulder and confirmed that everyone still appeared laser focused on the sunset—and not the man she’d just prepped for abduction right in front of them. Amazing how the human brain worked. She popped the brake on Wilson’s wheelchair and turned it ninety degrees right, ready to maneuver him toward the walkway in the center of the patio. He stiffened, straightening his torso in an attempt to slide out of the chair. She reached around the back of the chair and grabbed his man parts through the fabric of his trousers.
“I’ll rip these right off,” she hissed in his ear. “Understand?”
No response, so she squeezed tighter. “Understand? Yes or no?”
He nodded, eyes shut tight—and she wheeled him off the patio. Several minutes later, they arrived at her car, nobody the wiser from what she could tell by scanning the parking lot and building windows. Helen positioned the wheelchair a few feet in front of the trunk, ready to tip him inside after injecting him with one of the yellow syringes. She had a long drive ahead of her, which included a lengthy surveillance-detection route, just in case someone had been assigned to watch over Wilson. She popped the trunk and turned to grab him, pausing at the unexpectedly wretched sight. His hands trembled, a confused and slightly unfocused look in his eyes. The drugs had probably started to kick in.
Helen stared at him for a few moments, not sure if she was savoring the moment or regretting it. Probably a bit of both. Finally standing in front of him, face-to-face, embodied a surreal experience. She’d spent the past twenty years contemplating nearly every aspect of the man’s existence but had never met him before today—by design. She couldn’t risk the possibility that he might recognize her. That he’d somehow been warned.
She knew him only through the lens of a surveillance camera, a pair of binoculars, or the comprehensive dossier she’d assembled, which meant she really didn’t know him at all.
Donald Wilson. A man shrouded in mystery. She’d often wondered what his real name had been before. Not that it mattered. The name had been extinct for more than a half century, and probably meant nothing to him at this point. It certainly meant nothing to her beyond a curiosity. Helen was far more interested in his connection to the extensive conspiracy she’d uncovered.
CHAPTER 2
The cocktail was a lie. Water with a generous pour of olive juice to cloud the mixture, and two plump, blue cheese–stuffed olives held together by a stainless-steel cocktail pick. The bartender had even shaken it like a real martini, without him asking—seemingly all too familiar with the ruse. He took a long sip, casually scanning the crowded rooftop bar over the rim of his drink. The night’s endgame loomed. Devin Gray tipped the glass back and emptied it.
“Any minute now.”
He spoke loudly enough to be heard through the microphone, but softly enough to avoid drawing a glance from either of the politicos flanking him. Devin barely heard the team’s acknowledgment over the ever-rising din of brash words and forced laughter. He resisted the impulse to fiddle with his earpiece. It may or may not help him, but it would most certainly give him away to a reasonably competent countersurveillance team.
Devin hadn’t detected one, but his target gave no indication of being surveillance conscious. He’d been doing this long enough to read even the most subtle body language—and she wasn’t concerned with anything but seducing her mark. Her mannerisms broadcast the kind of genuine calm and confidence that came only with trusted security in her line of work. She had backup close by.
He set the glass on the black polished-granite bar top and caught the bartender’s attention, signaling for another. While waiting for his fourth drink of the night, Devin finished the seared salmon he’d ordered to nurture his cover—tasting nothing. He was singularly focused on the job at hand, his senses diverted accordingly.
A few minutes passed before his drink arrived, each second stretching into the next as he casually watched the scene come to its seemingly inevitable conclusion. The honey trap, a petite woman with straight jet-black hair, was a smooth, seasoned operator. Unhurried but moving things along just fast enough to seal the deal. She’d already managed to separate her mark from his three colleagues and isolate him at the bar, where they’d each downed two real manhattans. He’d watched the bartender closely. As their hushed conversation progressed, her hand spent more and more time petting his arm. Definitely a professional. Any second now.
He took a generous sip of the briny water, which would probably play havoc with his stomach later tonight, before taking out his wallet and removing nine twenty-dollar bills. The bartender took notice while hurrying past with two cocktails, and gave him a quick nod. Devin didn’t have to time this perfectly. Just close enough to be in place for the next phase. The honey trap leaned in close and whispered something in her mark’s ear, prompting him to rather hurriedly take out his wallet. She waved it off and produced cash from her purse, making sure the bartender saw the small wad of bills before she ushered the mark toward the exit.