No One Lives Twice (A Lexi Carmichael Mystery) (33 page)

We trudged up to the third floor and unlocked the door. The room wasn’t huge, but it was clean. One bed, one small table with two chairs, and a wooden wardrobe. The loo, I was told, was down the hall. It wasn’t The Ritz, but it would do.

“Guess the one bed means I’ll be sleeping in the chair,” Finn said. “Unless, of course, you’d like company.”

“We can sleep in shifts,” I suggested.

“You sure know how to bring a lad’s ego down a notch,” Finn said.

I glanced at him in surprise. “Why? I’ll let you go first.”

He let out a loud breath. “Never mind. Want to get something to eat?”

“Later,” I said, dropping my bag on the bed. “I need to check my email first.”

Finn shrugged. “Okay, I’ll go change some money and check things out a bit. When I come back, we’ll go eat.”

“Sounds good,” I said, pulling my laptop out of my bag and setting it on the table. He left as I plugged the adapter into the wall and booted it up. As it hummed I leaned back in the chair, closing my eyes and rubbing the back of my neck. My entire body felt sore and achy, not to mention my throbbing wrist. I would have loved to stretch out on the bed for a solid eight hours of sleep. But I had to meet Basia this evening and had a lot of work to do before then. I presumed someone on Slash’s team had picked me up at the airport and tailed me here since I’d used my real passport to enter the country. But Bouker was another story entirely. I needed to find out whether he had taken the bait the twins had dropped and was on his way to the party.

Once I logged on, I accessed my mail and saw two emails from the twins, both marked urgent. I opened the first one and quickly decoded it.

The fish took the bait, headed out last night. Will arrive 1800 hours Monday and should be in place by 2300. You have a green light.

I breathed a deep sigh of relief. That had been the part of the plan I worried most about. Now that Bouker would be in Sweden in about two hours, the rest would hopefully fall into place.

I closed that message and pulled up the next one. The message was short—just one sentence. It took me about a minute to decode it. My blood turned to ice. I stared at the words as if they were written in a foreign language and then blinked.

“Impossible.” I carefully copied down the message again, this time taking extra time to decode. But the words didn’t change.

Finn Shaughnessy working undercover for MI-6.

“Shit!” I cried, standing up abruptly and knocking the chair over. “I
knew
he couldn’t be trusted.”

Why Finn, an Irishman from Cork, would be working for the British equivalent of the CIA was a mystery. But somehow, it fit. Something had bugged me about Finn from the get-go. He had seemed too capable, too smooth. And hadn’t it been damned convenient how he showed up at the gas station, wielding not just one, but two guns, just in time to save my butt? I hadn’t suspected British intelligence, but that was probably the point. This was a tricky development because it meant Finn had likely been keeping British intelligence, and possibly by extension, the Americans, apprised of my every move. Feelings of betrayal and anger swept through me. It hurt more than it should have because in a small way, I’d let Finn have a glimpse of my inner self. Worse, I’d been dumb enough to think we’d made some kind of deeper connection. All the time, he’d probably been laughing his head off at the clueless geek girl. God, he’d even kissed me to further his mission.

For a minute I paced the room, my hand pressed tight to my forehead, thinking. Neutralizing Finn was going to be more challenging than I’d anticipated.
Stay calm, Lexi.
If I removed my emotions from this unnerving development and looked at this objectively, uncovering Finn’s secret life didn’t change much. I’d planned to ditch him anyway. The key was to keep him thinking I was clueless so I could use this to my advantage. And playing clueless just happened to be one of my more impressive strengths.

I shut down the computer, scooped up the papers where I had worked the code and methodically ripped them into tiny pieces that would flush down the toilet. I’d develop a plan to neutralize Finn, but first I needed a hot shower and some clean clothes.

I stripped and soaked my aches in the bathtub before soaping up and shampooing my hair with one hand. Then making the water as hot as I could stand, I used the detachable showerhead to rinse off.

Afterwards I combed out my hair, leaving it loose so it could dry, and pulled on the wrinkled white T-shirt and jeans. My wrist felt better from the soak, and I was able to flex my fingers a bit. I refastened the sling and went back to the room where Finn had still not returned. Good, because I hadn’t yet figured out how to keep him from mucking up my plans.

I sat down on the side of the bed and then realized my throat was dry. Maybe I’d take walk around a bit and see if I could buy a bottle of water somewhere.

I grabbed the room key and walked out the door, nearly running over my next-door neighbor exiting her room. She had platinum hair with pink streaks and was dressed in a spiked collar and black leather dress, with a pair of handcuffs dangling from a belt around her waist. A row of earrings dotted each ear and a matching one glinted in her right nostril. When she opened her mouth, I saw a stud on her tongue. As I stood there staring at her dumbly, a whole crew of punks spilled out into the hallway, laughing and jostling each other. It was just my luck that I’d booked the only hotel in Stockholm that was apparently hosting a punk convention.

“Uh, hi. Do you speak English?”

“Sure, I went to Oxford,” she said in perfect clipped English with only the faintest trace of a Scandinavian lilt.

“Do you know where I could get a bottle of water and some ice?”

“You must be American.”

“Is it that obvious?”

“Oh, yes. The café at the corner will probably have some if you’re willing to pay.”

She smiled as one of the other guys came up beside her. He was tall and skinny, and like the others, dressed completely in black leather. His hair was dyed magenta, and he had two stud rings in his nose, a large silver hoop in one ear and a collar with metal spikes around his neck and both wrists. It was a good thing he was smiling all friendlylike because if not, I’d have run screaming the other direction.

“This is Manfred,” the girl said. “I’m Annika.”

“Um, nice to meet you,” I said. “I’m Lexi.”

Manfred clicked his boots together and saluted me, and as he did it, he jingled. I saw he also wore a pair of handcuffs attached to his belt. I wondered if they carried them to make a fashion statement or wanted to be prepared for some kind of weird, kinky sex.

A light bulb popped in my head. Weird kinky sex! That was it. It would be the perfect idea to neutralize Finn. But first I had to part one of these young punks from their handcuffs, and I wasn’t certain it would be an easy thing.

I pasted a bright smile on my mouth. “This may sound like a strange request, but would either of you be willing to sell me your handcuffs?”

They looked at me as if they hadn’t heard me right. “Handcuffs?” Annika finally asked.

I pointed to the pair attached to Manfred’s belt. “Would you be willing to sell those to me?”

Both she and Manfred kept staring at me in open-mouthed amazement. I could tell by their expressions they didn’t make me as the type who used handcuffs.

“Have you ever used them before?” Annika asked me.

I put one hand on my hip and tried to look cool, knowledgeable and relaxed…a handcuff connoisseur. “Sure…sort of.”

“It will be difficult with your hand hurt,” Manfred finally said.

I looked down at my wrist and flexed my fingers. “Actually, it’s feeling better. And the cuffs aren’t for me anyway.”

Manfred said something to Annika in what I assumed was Swedish and she shrugged. “Fifty dollars,” she said.

“Fifty dollars? Are you nuts?”

“It will be worth every dollar,” Manfred promised me. “He will like them very much. Mine are extra long and not so easy to find.”

I couldn’t help it; I blushed. Yeah, I was the real handcuff master all right. “Twenty,” I countered.

“Thirty and we deal.”

“Okay,” I said. “Wait here. I’ll be right back.” I returned to the room, peeled off three tens and returned to Annika and Manfred. He’d already taken the cuffs off his belt and they dangled freely in his hand. Annika took the cash and Manfred handed them to me, along with a small key.

“By the way I saw your bloke in the hall,” Annika said, winking. “Quite a bobby-dazzler. I think he’ll have fun.”

I didn’t know what a bobby-dazzler was, but nodded like I did. “Uh, yeah, and that reminds me,” I said. “There is a chance that my bobby-dazzler may, ah, complain a bit at first when I use them. You know, yell for help or something. But if you hear anything, just ignore it. I’ll take care of him. It will be all part of the game.”

“Cool,” Manfred said, looking at me with what I was pretty sure was admiration. I felt my stomach go a little queasy and hoped I wasn’t giving him the impression that all Americans were as perverted as me.

“We won’t be around anyway,” Annika assured me. “Tonight is the big concert with Rancid Duck. We’ll be out all night. Have fun.”

They waved and walked down the corridor. I took my thirty-dollar handcuffs back to the room and attached one side to the bedpost and hid the other side down behind the back of the bed, the cuff open. I sincerely hoped Finn wouldn’t find the cuffs, but even if he did, I could play dumb. Like maybe they came complimentary with the room or something.

Finn returned about thirty minutes later, probably from giving his bosses a full report on our activities. I suppressed my desire to smack his handsome face because it was imperative he not notice my feelings toward him had changed. His lengthy absence had actually been welcome since in addition to the handcuffs, it had given me time to get water, a map of Stockholm and directions to Djurgarden Island.

“Anything interesting on email?” he asked, sitting down on the bed.

“Not a thing,” I lied. “Where’d you go for so long?”

“I took a walk and got some fresh air. Are you hungry yet?”

“Actually I’m famished.”

“Good, let’s go get something.”

We headed out the door and Finn locked up. “So now that we’re here, what’s the next step?” he asked.

“I guess it wouldn’t hurt to let you know that I’m meeting Basia tomorrow evening,” I said even though I was actually meeting her tonight.

He looked surprised. “You’ve been in touch with her already?”

“Not here. When I was back in the States. She set up a rendezvous point.”

“Where?”

“Sorry, that’s on a need-to know basis. No more questions for the time being, okay?”

He didn’t look happy about it but to his credit, he didn’t press.

We found an outdoor café not far from the hotel. Finn had the fishballs, called
fiskbullar
in Swedish, and I tried the crayfish. It was delicious.

“I take it you’ve been to Sweden before,” I said, setting my fork down and leaning back in my chair.

“Several times. I like it very much.”

“I’m clearly not as cosmopolitan. This is only my second trip abroad. My first time was an eighth-grade trip to Paris.”

“You speak French?”

“Only if I need to find a bathroom.”

He laughed and we chatted as we drank some excellent Swedish wine with dinner. Finn, of course, picked it out. Now that I knew his family background, I was interested to hear what he could tell me about wine. To my delight, he told me about his family’s winery in Ireland and about the wine-making process. I realized although he may not have wanted to work in his father’s business, he had definitely picked up the know-how.

After dinner we took a leisurely stroll along Strandvagen Road where I discreetly noted the tram stop across the bridge to Djurgarden Island. My back-up plan had me taking a ferry across, but I typically didn’t do well on boats, so that would be a last resort.

When we finally returned to the hotel room, Finn disappeared down the hall for a bath, and I strategically put some of my junk on the side of the bed without the cuffs. That way if Finn wanted to rest for a bit, he’d have to lie down on the side with the cuffs. I sincerely hoped that a full stomach, clean body and jet lag would conspire to put him out just long enough for me to snap a cuff on his wrist and chain him to the bed.

After that I logged on the computer again to see if I’d received any further messages from the twins. There were none, which I presumed to mean all was well. I sent a quick message back to them in code updating them on the developments. Finn returned when I was in the middle of typing the message, so I casually urged him to stretch out on the bed for a while. To my relief, he didn’t argue and promptly lay on the side of the bed with the handcuffs.

I congratulated myself. So far, so good. Plan A of what I was now calling “Neutralizing Finn” was moving along nicely.

I surfed the web some more, checking out weather conditions for this evening in Stockholm and reviewing an online map of the city so I had a back-up plan to get to the rendezvous point in case something happened.

Thirty minutes passed and I heard Finn’s steady, even breathing. A glance over my shoulder showed that his eyes were closed, hands folded atop his stomach. I looked at my watch and saw it was nearly ten o’clock. That meant an hour and a half before game time. I wanted to make sure I had plenty of leeway, so I decided I had to make my move now. I slipped the sling off and flexed my fingers. My wrist was still swollen and an angry black-and-blue color, but I could move my fingers and hand, and that would be critical for what I needed to do next.

Still sitting in the chair with my back to Finn, I unbuttoned the top two buttons on my blouse and fluffed up my hair. I didn’t think it would be necessary, but just in case Finn awoke before I had the cuffs on him, I needed to be ready. I slowly stood, my stomach churning with nervousness. Seduction was a game I’d never played and I was pretty sure I wouldn’t be good at it. But we all do what we have to do when lives, not to mention national security, are at stake. Still, actual seduction was Plan B of Neutralizing Finn, and whereas I was one hundred percent certain it would be a pleasurable experience, at least for me, I hoped I wouldn’t have to go that far.