Seconds later, I found my way inside the busy venue. It looked like some kind of bar and arcade combo. People were equally crowded around the bar area and the various game stations. A DJ was pumping rock music so loud, I could barely think straight—which I really needed to do right now. I took a moment, ducked in behind a game station, watched the door from the back where I’d just entered. I wondered about my next move. Should I make my way out the front doors onto the crowded sidewalks of Sixth Street again? Or just stay put, hoping Perez couldn’t find me?
I had my answer a few seconds later when Perez appeared from the back. His eyes darted right and left. He spotted me before I could duck out. Cursing, I bolted for the front doors of the bar, threading through various groups of partyers, until I burst onto the sidewalk again. When I did, I rammed straight into a huge guy with spiky black hair and a black tank top. He looked like he hadn’t missed a day in the gym since birth. And he wasn’t at all happy with me. Before I could slip away, he grabbed me by the back of the shirt, started cussing me out. I couldn’t believe my bad luck. I was already running away from a deadly assassin, and now I was going to have to fight some meathead?
Before the guy could take a punch, I heard someone next to him yell, “Dude! He’s got a gun!” A ripple of panic hit the crowd. That’s when Perez stepped up to the muscleman and aimed his gun right in his face. The guy immediately let go of me and put up his hands in surrender. The crowd was scattering and knocking each other over in the process. Perez turned his attention back to me, took dead aim with the gun. I wasn’t sure if he was going to shoot me or if we were going to set off by ourselves again.
Neither scenario happened. Instead, I saw Perez’s head whip back in a weird way. Then I immediately spotted the hole in his forehead, followed by blood beginning to gush out. Perez’s arms dropped to his side, and he fell straight back onto the sidewalk. What was panic before from the crowd now exploded into flat-out terror. Before I could even try to make sense of what had just happened, I felt another strong hand on my arm, followed by a voice in my ear.
“Come with me, Alex! Right now! I’m with Greta!”
I peered up and realized it was Al Del Luca, the CIA agent whose house I’d broken into yesterday in DC. I didn’t have time to think. I went with him, up the sidewalk in a tidal wave of other runners, away from the dead man who lay behind me in a growing puddle of blood.
THIRTY-SIX
Del Luca sent me up the elevator inside the Driskill Hotel by myself. He said he wanted to hang around in the lobby and make sure there was no other trouble for us. I just nodded and kept moving. Was the man at all concerned he’d just shot someone dead out there and the police might come looking for him? It was hard to comprehend that a CIA agent had just killed a CNI agent outside on the sidewalk in order to save me. I was in shock. But I was certainly glad Del Luca had pulled the trigger. From the look in Perez’s eyes, I believed the man was about to shoot me and be done with it.
Stepping out of the elevator, I moved down the hallway until I finally stood outside of Room 314. I took a moment to gather myself. The woman inside had an odd thirty-five-year history with my father-in-law, starting when Joe still went by Daniel Gibson. I had no idea what to expect when I stepped inside this hotel room with her. But it was finally time to find out.
I knocked, waited. A second later, the door opened, and Greta poked her head out. Recognizing me, she fully opened the door and allowed me inside. The hotel room was a suite with a living room, a separate bedroom, and a balcony. Greta had the balcony door open. I could hear sirens outside. Would the police come looking for me, asking questions? Greta wore a black sweater and black slacks. She walked over, shut the balcony door, and blocked out some of the noise. Up close, she still looked every bit the stunner she was in the old pictures. It was a strange thing, standing face-to-face with a woman who had once been married to my father-in-law.
“Thanks for coming, Alex,” she said.
“Well, I’ve clearly been wanting to talk to you.”
“I know. I’ll explain. Are you okay?”
I tilted my head. “You know about what happened out there?”
She nodded. “Just got off the phone with Al, my man downstairs.”
“Are you CIA, Greta?”
She pressed her lips together, as if pondering where to start. “How about a drink first?”
She went over to a little antique bar cabinet, where she poured herself a glass of what looked like bourbon. She peered over to me with a raised eyebrow.