Page 2 of The Wrong Monster

“Oh.” She pulls her hand back as if she’d been burned, and I step into the elevator. “Well, enjoy your evening.”

“I intend to.” I slip past them into the elevator. The doors begin to close.

“Pretty girl like you shouldn’t work so late,” the man says with a grandfatherly grin as the woman is getting her purse together.

I meet his eyes just before the doors seal shut.

“Pretty girls have mortgages, too.”

The doors slide closed. Silence.

Ugh. I should’ve been more careful about what I said. Not because I was rude, but because now they’re going to remember me.

I should’ve just smiled, sucked it up, laughed, and wished them a happy evening. But my body feels strung tight, about to snap, and it’s obvious what I really need to take the edge off.

A good lay.

The numbers in gold on a screen shift upwards. 4, 5, 6.

Tonight could be the night I get a break in this case. If this informant is as easily intimidated as that couple, he’ll stop dodging me and give me something his lawyer can take to the prosecutor. Gun-running for a dealer in NYC isn’t the best career choice; hopefully he becomes the weak link in the chain. The case file in my purse is straightforward enough:

Has lived in the Adirondacks for his whole life and got hooked on dirty cocaine to kill time in the winters. Ended up owing a dealer more than he could comp when he lost his factory job. Money compiled until he owed that dealer’s dealer, then the next guy up, stretching all the way back to the city. Now he has a new job running guns and coke further out to the Midwest, where it can be hidden and moved more easily. Except he’s sloppy and dips into his own supply more often than he should.

If everything works out tonight, soon I’ll be able to take a few days to decompress, meet some random guy in a club, and blow off some steam.

8 glows gold as I shift from foot to foot, hamstrings tight and jaw clenched. I shove the case file back in my purse and step out into a marble-lined hallway like something out of a sci-fi novel. It feels futuristic and minimalist at the same time.

The key in my hand is warm. It’s a literal key, rare these days, antique-style and worn even though the Pandora opened only a few months ago.

Room 814.

Stopping to turn the key over in my palm, I hesitate outside the heavy door.

No one else is in the hallway.

But the fine hair on the back of my neck stands up, anyway.

Get out.

That warning voice in my head starts getting louder. It’s my own instinctual alarm that I trusted throughout undergrad, law school, and into my career.

You should leave now.

No. I can’t.

Rolling my shoulders to ease how tight they are, I focus instead on what comes next. It’s one conversation; I’ve seen surveillance photos of this guy. He’s small, and I’ve been strength training with Sacha for the past year and a half. One conversation and I can drive back to the city tonight if I want to, buzzed on double shots of espresso and Honeybuns.

The key fits into the lock with a click that’s satisfyingly analog. Turning it, I realize belatedly that this doesn’t make sense.

Why wouldn’t he have chosen a ground floor? Handicap accessible with multiple exits and dingy lighting?

Can he be that stupid?

The door swings open, heavy under my palm, and I step in. I try to catch it before it closes, but the sight of high-end Varvatos men’s boots in the foyer distracts me and my fingers slip. It shuts with a heavy thud.

One step back and my shoulder blades are against the door frame. I take in my surroundings quickly. It smells good, like wood-smoke and a hint of cologne and that too-clean sterilized undertone that hotels have.

Light music plays somewhere up ahead. There’s a suit jacket hanging in the open closet to my left. Dark, almost melding into the shadows. My lips part.