Chapter One

The Naked Trap

 

Archie Picket shifted his feet, finding no comfort in the thick pile carpet. It was late, and he was tired. Twenty-four hours without sleep was not his first choice, certainly not in the middle of an operation. Alertness was called for, not exhaustion. Unfortunately, they were too close to the end for a nap, regardless of how the comfortable hotel bed called to him.

Instead, he stood at the window of room 246 in the Ottoman Hotel in Palm Beach, staring down at a maroon, Olympic style one-piece bathing suit with a buxom blonde girl in it. She'd been doing steady laps in the hotel pool for nearly half an hour. As he watched, she finished a final lap by the arched steps in the shallow end and climbed, with no visible sign of exertion, up into the warm Florida night air.

God, what a body.

Picket was grateful for the distraction.

The cell phone vibrated in his pocket. He took it out and thumbed the screen to life. A one word text message. "Now." About time, too. He turned his back on the swimmer and left the hotel room, pushing the borrowed service cart out into the hall. The elevator was three rooms down. He pressed the up button, and heard the doors close and then the soft whine as the box rose to the second floor. When the door slid aside, the girl from the pool looked at him briefly. She had a hotel robe over her bathing suit and expensive sandals on bare, well-tended feet. And he'd been right. She was a beauty.

"Good morning," he said.

She shifted to the side, nodding to him with a faint smile turning up the corners of a beautiful mouth. "Bon jour," she replied in nearly perfect French, with all of fashionable Paris entwined like wisteria in those two words. Archie heard something else in the inflection, as well. The girl's French was good, educated, but there was some Eastern Europe in there, too.

Archie was surprised. He had pegged her as an over-the-hill cheerleader, as American as a Missouri corn field. You just don't get eyes like that in Eastern Europe. Standing just behind and to one side allowed for a leisurely, but unobtrusive inspection.

About thirty, he decided. Intelligence in the pretty blue eyes, pale buttery blonde hair, and a heavy dusting of cinnamon freckles over all the skin he could see. Five seven, and a little on the hefty side, although she wore it well. She was wide in the hips and heavy in the breast, with a steeply indented waist that exaggerated her curves even further. Hundred and forty pounds give or take. Size ten. Maybe a twelve to fit the impressive shelf of breasts. He noticed her earrings, tiny gold handcuffs. An interesting choice, that. A statement? It was hard to tell.

There was something distinctly North American about a body like that, and about what Europeans generally referred to as those perfect fucking American teeth. The accent was out of place as well, although it sounded natural enough. That puzzled him. He wondered about it in the few seconds they were together. Maybe she was an American raised in Europe. Archie wasn't personally concerned with the girl, but anomalies of any sort drew his interest.

Language was a knack. Earlier in his career Archie spent a lot of time in Europe, and had an ear for the dialects, especially eastern European ones. He spoke six fluently and six more sufficiently to get by. He identified the oh-so-faint guttural undertone as Croatian, possibly from the Zagreb region. It was a matter of no import, of course, but interesting. That said, he would bet money he was right.

The minor puzzle went unresolved. The elevator stopped and the girl got out ahead of him, turning left. Archie pushed his cart out into the hall and turned right, moving down to room 346. He tapped lightly with a knuckle, holding his face in line with the peephole.

Myoko Jones snatched the door open from inside as if she'd been waiting for him. Which she had. She was a remarkably pretty girl, naked save for white knee socks and a pair of heavy, silver plated butterfly clamps swinging from her nipples. She flung herself into his arms.

"Christ, I thought you'd never get here."

"Let's do this inside," Archie said.

"I don't want to." She clutched him with desperate strength. "I don't want to be anywhere around that bastard ever again." She was trembling visibly almost vibrating.

"It's nearly over," he said. "Come on, get inside. The neighbors will talk. I'm here now. Everything's cool."

"My hero," she said, and took a deep breath, gathering herself.

She led the way back into the room. Archie, in his stolen hotel uniform, pushed the maintenance cart in after her and closed the door behind them. He set all three privacy locks Then he turned. Myoko peeked around the corner at the bed like a kid spying on her parents, proffering what in Archie's mind was the most beautiful backside in the world. He looked over the top of her head. Beyond, Aaron Farnsworth stirred sluggishly on the hotel bed. She recoiled, looked at Archie with wide eyes.

"You'd better hurry."

The tone confirmed how rattled she was. That from the newly baptized tennis pro who'd gotten to round sixteen at Rolánd Garros in her first year, and been chosen as most promising new player at Wimbledon a few short weeks later. Who faced thousands of fans, millions of television viewers, and some of the best players in the world. Did it without flinching. But something about Farnsworth had gotten to her down in the guts where she couldn't control herself. She was deeply afraid.

Archie took a loaded syringe out of his pocket, uncapped it and eased the plunger in enough to bring a single diamond glitter of fluid to the tip, verifying there was no air in the barrel. Then injected the whole thing into one of Farnsworth's fat buttocks. He stepped back and looked at his watch.

"That'll do it," he said. "He'll be out for a couple of hours. Now, how about you? Are you okay?"

"Do I look okay?"

"You look like the entreé at a pedophile lunch meeting," he said.

She smiled at that, finally. Christ, she was beautiful: blended Caucasian and Japanese features, braids, long bangs, knee socks, slender, with a hairless crotch. She was nineteen years old, but had passed as fourteen. Five three, hundred and five pounds, inscrutable eyes easily mistaken for innocent. Predator heaven, with fangs.

"Let's get this over with," she said. "I need a long, hot shower and some serious cuddling away from him."

Him being the aforementioned Aaron Farnsworth, Harvard grad, pride of Palm Beach society and one of the best jewel thieves in the business. Unfortunately, he had other bad habits as well; sadism, a taste for very young girls, and a budding career in serial murder among them. Unfortunate for him, of course, as he was about to draw a full ration of paybacks; naked on the bed, he didn't look like much. Semi-conscious. Eyes unfocused. Not quite alert enough to do more than wonder what the hell had happened.

"Did he hurt you?" Archie asked.

"Took longer than I thought, that's all," she said. "He was very attentive."

"So I see. Your butt is all pink and shiny."

"What can I say? He's a spanker."