Chapter 2
The bolt slid home beneath Gabriel's hand.
The vault had no windows and no signal.
Wet stone. Old wine. One steel door.
Sloane had brought in a folding desk, a tablet, and a small monitor.
None of them belonged there.
She pressed a button.
The screen showed the cigar lounge upstairs.
Twelve armed men filled the room.
Gabriel sat in the center with his jacket off and his gun on the table.
Victor pulled a linen napkin from the bar.
Last spring, I had stood in the rain holding his daughter's veil off the pavement while Victor ran for an umbrella.
Now he wrote 10 MINUTES across the napkin.
Then he put fifty dollars on it.
Another man raised two fingers and said something that made the others laugh.
They were betting on when I would beg.
Gabriel did not place money on the table.
He did not sweep it off either.
Sloane opened a blank page on her tablet.
"Who had access to your office today?"
"I did."
"Two employees have standing keys. Give me their names."
"No."
"If they were home, they'll be cleared."
"And if your men frighten their families first?"
Sloane leaned back in her chair.
"Don't turn this into another argument about me and Gabe. Two men are dead."
She was the only person who called him Gabe in front of the family.
She used the name now as if I were a date who had wandered into a private conversation.
"I didn't mention jealousy," I said. "You did."
On the monitor, one of the younger guards looked at Sloane instead of me.
Her smile disappeared.
She did not answer.
That was answer enough.
I moved beneath the camera in the ceiling and looked straight into its dark glass.
"Write down the bettors," I said.
The laughter upstairs stopped.
Victor's hand stayed on the money.
"If this is an investigation, the record includes what happens on both sides of the door."
Victor pulled back his fifty.
He did not look at the camera again.
Nobody added another bill.
Sloane waited until the money disappeared.
"Good," she said. "Now give me the names."
"Still no."
She sealed my manager's badge inside a clear pouch and held it toward the camera.
"Gabriel, confirm her access is suspended."
On the monitor, Gabriel gave one short nod.
My smiling staff photo showed through the plastic.
Sloane set it beside my phone.
"You protected two employees," she said. "You lost every door in the hotel."
I kept my hands at my sides.
"Then why are you still asking me for something?"
Sloane's mouth tightened.
She picked up the tablet instead of answering.
"Let's see how long your loyalty lasts."
She played an audio file.
My own voice filled the vault.
"Use the south service alley. The gate opens at six-forty. His car will be second."
I knew every pause in that voice.
I had said those words to florists, cooks, and drivers. Just never in that order.
On the monitor, Gabriel rose so fast his chair struck the wall.
Sloane stopped the file.
"Tell him," she said, "why he should believe you instead of your own voice."