The face is familiar, one that’s been on the covers of magazines, the nightly news, endless social-media feeds. One that still looks much the same as it did twenty-five years ago in the dining room of their group home.
Something catches her eye. A reflection—a sharp glimmer from the rooftop of the building across from her, just past the restaurant.
Then it hits her: It’s the sun glittering off of another scope.
She’s not the only hitter. There’s a backup team.
This job felt “off” since the start. This is not how The Corporation operates. Jenna’s nerves are on fire. She needs to get out of here.
She presses her eye back to the scope.
In one fluid movement, she sets her aim, takes a breath, and pulls the trigger, light as a feather.
CHAPTER FIVE
The recoil slams into her shoulder. Through the sight she sees that the bald man is already surrounded by his human shields, who quickly shuffle him inside the restaurant. No one is hit. Precisely as Jenna intended.
She wipes down the gun, leaves it where she found it. She’s been careful not to touch anything else.
Examining herself in the long mirror near the door, she straightens the wig, puts on the sunglasses, tucks the burner phone in her pocket. After one deep breath, she calmly steps out of the room into the hallway.
Lowering her head in case there are cameras, she moves toward the elevator bank. It’s quiet. No one has connected the shooting to the hotel. Yet.
She senses another person in the hall and glances up. The woman’s back is to her; she’s searching her handbag for her room key.
Something is off. Unnatural.
Jenna turns and walks in the other direction. She takes a quick look over her shoulder and sees the guest—the woman from the bus stop and from the SoulCycle bathroom—in a double-handed firing stance. Jenna dodges to the right, hears the cut of wind from the suppressor. She sprints, zagging left and right and left and around the corner.
She spies the door to the emergency stairs and dashes through it, the woman running close behind.
The stairwell spirals down all ten floors. She won’t have time to outpace the woman. Jenna climbs over the railing and hangs, her arms outstretched, body a vertical line. Her chest is hammering.
She needs to collect herself. Remember your training. Hanging there forever, she gets her bearings.
And she releases her grip.
She drops two floors, whiplashing to a stop when she catches the railing.
She hears movement above. The woman’s head appears over the ledge for an instant before it pulls back. The shooter tries the move again, from a different position, hoping to avoid a bullet to the forehead. She peers over once more and gets off a shot. But Jenna’s already dropping two more floors, where she again catches the railing. This time one hand slips and leaves her hanging tenuously.
With every ounce of strength she has, she reaches for the rail with her free hand. But now her other hand’s losing its grip.
There’s the sound of the suppressor again, a ricochet of metal on metal, as the bullet bounces around the stairwell. Jenna looks up and sees the woman pointing her gun straight at her.
So she releases again.
Jenna misses the railing on the next floor, then the next blurs past, and she’s not going to make it.
But her hand slaps the metal on the next rail down and she lets out a primal roar as her body yanks to a stop when she maintains her grip.
She looks up. The woman’s head has vanished. She’s going to try to beat Jenna to the ground floor.
Jenna pulls herself up and over the railing, bursts through the door—it has the number 3 on it—
and into the hallway. There’s a luggage cart nearby. A bellhop appears from the room and stacks a large bag on the cart, then disappears back into the room. Jenna walks slowly as a family appears from the room. A father holding a fussy baby and mom trying to wrangle two toddlers. The bellhop loads another bag and, seeing the squirmy kids, tells the parents to go on ahead to check out, he’ll meet them in the lobby. The father palms him a few bills and the family shuttles away. The bellhop disappears into the room again. Jenna has only a few minutes before the police—or, worse, the woman and the backup team—sweep every floor. Confirming the thought, she hears sirens outside.
If they’ve found the connection to the hotel, it may scare off the woman and her team. But Jenna can’t be caught here. The bellhop tugs another bag and lugs it onto the cart, not noticing her.
The luggage includes an oversized bag. The kind with a structured interior made for sporting equipment or something large. It will have to do.
Jenna removes the bag from the cart, unzips it. Inside is a folded baby stroller. She pulls it out and races back to the emergency stairwell and tucks it away there. She’s perspiring, the wig is lopsided, but somehow it stayed on during her descent. The bellhop is still inside the room, probably doing a final sweep to make sure he’s not leaving anything behind. She doesn’t have much time. Jenna dashes toward the cart, climbs into the oversized bag, contorts her body, and zips it shut from the inside.
Her mind trips to Savior House. Hiding in the footlocker from the pack of boys at the group home. Come out come out wherever you are.…
She’s a tiny ball, her limbs ache. She’s not as agile as she used to be. But the muscle memory is there again. It’s hot and she’s dripping with sweat. She hears the hotel room door shut, the bellhop curses under his breath, and she thinks she’s been caught. But instead, the bag is hoisted upward and dropped onto the luggage cart.
The cart bumps and jostles as it wheels away, then comes to a stop. She hears the ping of the elevator, and the cart starts rolling again. The interior noise soon turns to the sounds of the street.
Cars honking, sirens not too far away. She manages to open the bag a trace, the air feeling good on her face, in her lungs. Her view outside is obstructed, so she listens.
The area is being cordoned off, a valet says to someone. There’ll be a slight delay. “Welcome to D.C.,” he says, with the nonchalance of someone accustomed to terror-threat drills, presidential motorcades, and protest-march street closures.
The cart rolls a few feet, and she peeks out through the opening. She’s trying to control her breathing, and she’s feeling nauseated, the inside of the bag sweltering. She sees men in hotel uniforms standing at the curb, looking toward the restaurant. Two cabs are parked, their drivers outside the vehicles. A valet is talking to a uniformed cop. Everyone is looking at the Capital Grille.
Except for one woman.
Jenna’s heart sinks. The woman wears large sunglasses concealing much of her face, but it’s her.
She’s staring at a cell phone. She walks slowly, oblivious to the chaos around her. Her eyes move from her phone to the street, then to the phone again. As if she’s following directions on Google
Maps.
Jenna feels a chill course through her. If this job was a setup—and it was—they never planned to let her out of the hotel alive. They’d want the ability to track her, if necessary. And she’s still wearing the clothes, the disguise they gave her. And she has their burner phone.
The woman is getting closer now. She looks up and has a curious expression on her face. Then it turns to revelation.
Jenna manages to unzip the bag, shift her body so she rolls off the cart, and untangles her limbs.