Page 47 of Safari Murder Party
“Don’t come near me,” she ordered.
With one eye pinched tight and the other eye staring down the viewfinder of a nose scope, Brian said, “Bertram gave us explicit instructions to bring you to him. Alive.”
They were nothing if not lemmings veering cliffside at Bertram’s command.
In Manhattan, Fletcher would have zipped her lips into a pretty, polished smile and bit her tongue until it bled. Lydell Fletcher didn’t. “Was that before or after he warmed your bottle?”
It almost felt good to say what she was thinking for once. Itdefinitelyfelt good to see the mix of shock and outrage on the Brians’ faces.
While they were busy snapping their jaws shut, Fletcher tested the weight of the blade in her palms. There was a reason why parents told their kids not to run with knives, and Molly was the evidence. Fletcher, however, didn’t have much of a choice.
She took off sprinting, her bag of produce slamming against her hip with every step. The fruit was about to be bruised all to hell. Skidding around the corner, Fletcher made a fast break down the east wing. All she had to do was make it to the garage in one piece.
Another dart flew in her general direction. It missed—thank god for Brian’s astigmatism and shaky hands—but shattered a hand-painted vase filled with pampas grass. Clay spewed through the hall. How much ammo did that thing have? Fletcher didn’t want to stick around to find out.
The first door on the right opened up into a theater. Rows of red leather chairs descended toward a silver screen, and ruched velvet lined the walls. It evensmelledlike movie theater popcorn. Dim light from the wall sconces might be enough to conceal her from the Brians. She was willing to take the chance.
Fletcher leaped down the stairs and threw herself on the ground in the fifth row. Army crawling, she wiggled toward the middle seats. Arguably the best seats in the house. As a plus, the sconces barely touched this section, so she clung to the shadows.
“I told you she wouldn’t come peacefully,” Brian snarked under his breath as the theater door nudged open.
Their footsteps were dull, padded against the plush carpet. Without peeking her head over the recliners, it was nearly impossible for Fletcher to tell where exactly they were.
Other Brian’s voice sounded closer when he said, “I still think the gun’s a bit much. Bertram said she knows everything about everyone. She’s an asset, not a threat.”
Fletcher slithered forward, far too aware of theswishof acrylic-rayon fabric against the carpet. If she died because of this hot-pink dress, she’d haunt the clearance aisle for the rest of eternity.
“That’s what makes her a threat, moron,” Brian said. “Just help me look for her. There’s, like, a thirty-six-point-eight percent chance she’s in here. Choosing door number one is like pissing in the first urinal. Everyone thinks no one will use it, so they all use it.”
“Whoa, reverse psychology,” Other Brian said.
Fletcher had to get out of there before the boy math melted her brain and it started dripping down her earlobes. Braving a glance up, she caught a flash of Brian’s dark hair as he crouched down to check the aisle a few rows up. Other Brian ran recon, pacing along the doorway.
Guarding the only way out.
Brian lurked down the staircase, only three rows up from Fletcher. The invisibility of women in the workplace unfortunately didn’t make a difference here. Especially not wearing fuchsia. But she couldn’t just lie there and wait for Brian to shoot her.
Contorting her body to reach into her tote bag asked a lot of Fletcher’s elbows, but she managed to wrangle a handful of grapes into her fist and lobbed them toward the screen. They scattered, splatting.
A surprised noise came from the doorway. Other Brian asked, “What was that?”
“Don’t just stand there,” Brian barked. “Come help me look.”
Fletcher waited until the Brians sped past her.
Then, thrusting herself upright, Fletcher made a break for the doorway. One of the Brians shouted after her, and their footstepsfollowed. As a decoy, she opened three doors in a row before backtracking to the second, barely squeezing behind it before the Paid Ads specialists appeared in the hall.
She pressed against the wall behind the door, willing herself invisible. Grooves met her fingertips. Where was she? The room was so dark, it was impossible to tell where she’d landed, but it smelled distinctly like cedar and lavender.
Laundry room? Sleep-study chamber? A portal to another dimension? Maybe one where her coworkers hadn’t turned into sociopaths?
Through the crevice of the doorjamb, there was just enough space to see the Brians stalking in her direction. On tiptoes, they crept forward, and it occurred to Fletcher that no grown man should be reduced to tiptoeing unless under very specific circumstances, like avoiding lasers mid-heist or preserving the magic of Christmas for a small child.
The Brians’ shadows loomed in the doorway, blocking some of the light from the hall. Fletcher sank deeper into the shadows. Behind her, a switch plate stabbed into her spine. Her elbow knocked against it, and the overhead lights flickered on.
“In here,” Other Brian said.
Damn it.
