His radio chirped and Webb put it to his ear. “Three-twenty-seven,” he said.

Walt didn’t want to initiate a chase with O’Brien’s guy. But it seemed either that, or confrontation. That was when someone stepped between them and raised a camera. A pulse of white light exploded in the face of O’Brien’s soldier. Fiona.

Walt took off for the stairs.

The security man cleared his eyes and looked around quickly. “Where’d he go?” he asked Webb.

“Who?” answered Webb.

The guard spun around. The sheriff was gone. And so was the photographer.

D anny Cutter was on borrowed time. The police were after him for Ailia Holms’s murder-and his brother was acting strange. His fears, along with the financial repercussions of her death, had kept him up all night. He knew he looked beleaguered and beaten down. That wouldn’t help him any.

The reception for Elizabeth Shaler was held in a private dining room. Danny looked around for Stuart Holms but knew he wouldn’t find him.

Conversation quieted in the direction of Liz Shaler. Patrick escorted her through the room, making introductions. Danny tagged along and listened in. Those in this room had already made campaign contributions. The brush with fame was payback.

He heard someone in the group ahead address the attorney general. “We’d love to give more, if only we could, Your Honor, but as much as we’d like to see you in office, we’re not willing to go to jail for it.” His bellowing laugh followed.

Patrick piped up, saying, “You might consider her as a speaker for a company event.”

Liz looked noticeably uncomfortable.

At that moment, Danny understood his brother’s determination to make sure Liz gave her talk. He was overpaying her, setting a market value for others to match. Never mind the tax implications, money was money, and candidates were allowed to spend their personal wealth on the campaign trail. Patrick had found a way around the rules, and by doing so had made himself invaluable to Liz Shaler.

Dick O’Brien appeared out of nowhere. He caught Patrick’s eye. As O’Brien shook his head side to side, a ghostly pallor swept across Patrick’s face. Danny knew intuitively this had something to do with Walt Fleming and the fact that Doug Aanestad had spent the early morning in private with Patrick.

Something was horribly wrong.

W alt, out of breath, stopped in front of 327, Fiona right behind him. “You can’t be here,” he told her.

“Yeah? Well, guess what? I am.”

A plan formed in his head. “Okay…There’s a hotel phone back by the elevator. Call room three-twenty-seven. A man’s going to answer. Say you’re housekeeping or something. But keep him holding that phone.”

“Yes, of course. Now?”

“Now.”

She ran down the hall. Walt followed her with his eyes.

He waited. And waited.

The phone started ringing on the other side of the door. Walt waited for the ringing to stop, Webb’s passkey hovering over the card slot. But it kept ringing.

Walt slipped in the card. The electronic lock’s LED showed red, not green. Webb’s card should have been the equivalent of a master key. He tried it again: red. The only explanation he could come up with was that the privacy dead bolt was thrown from the inside. He tried the next door over: 325.

Webb’s card opened it. The room was pitch-black, the blackout curtains pulled. He called out, “Hello? Minibar.” His weapon was drawn and aimed at the carpet in front of him. Switched on the lights. The room was empty. There was a connecting door, locked from this side. He worked through the pulled curtains, headed out onto the balcony, and crossed to 327. Locked, and the blackout curtains drawn there also.

He debated breaking the room’s plate glass window, but its tempered glass would explode, and that would bring the cavalry. That, in turn, would mean a confrontation with Dryer or his men, and his father’s warning remained forefront in his thought.

He returned to 325. Fiona stood in the doorway.

“You cannot be here,” he hissed.

“We’ve been over that.”

“Shut the door. Lock it, and stay right there.”

She did so.

He unlocked the dead bolt to the connecting door. Connecting doors were paired-each lockable from its respective room-and he’d prepared himself to have to break down the second of the two doors.

But it hung open a crack-unlocked.

He raised his weapon. His chest was tight; his mouth dry. He eased open the door, but his eyes weren’t adjusted and he couldn’t see a thing in the dark room. He reached down for the Maglite at his belt, and the first thing he saw as the light flooded the room was a dog kennel, its door open.

Empty.

T revalian was led by a volunteer to his assigned seat at a table that still had empty chairs. He introduced himself and awkwardly shook hands with the four already there, making a point of Nagler’s insecurity and timidity. One of the women stared. It took a thumping from her husband to break her trance. There was an attempt at small talk, but Trevalian put a quick end to that. The dog lay on the carpet to the right and slightly behind his chair. From behind his dark sunglasses he stole a look at the program laid out on his plate. It opened with:

JUICE, COFFEE, TEA, PASTRIESI

MELON

THE HONORABLE ELIZABETH SHALER

ATTORNEY GENERAL NEW YORK STATE

THREE EGG OMELET, CAVIAR, AND CRÈME FRAÎCHE

or

MANGO AND STRAWBERRY BELGIAN WAFFLE

AND YOUR CHOICE OF

NORTH SEA SMOKED SALMON, IRISH BACON, BLOOD SAUSAGE

ROASTED TOMATOES, QUICK-FRIED KELP, CARAMELIZED APPLES

He was amused by Shaler’s listing as part of the menu. She appeared to be the second or third course.

This was not the program he’d been told to expect. Originally, her talk had been scheduled to follow the main course, not precede it. This accelerated schedule affected his planning. He had to arm the explosive now, well ahead of his original plan. He reached down and reassuringly touched the bulge in his coat pocket: the shock collar’s remote control.

“Oh my God,” the woman two seats away gasped. She moved her chair back. “It’s bleeding!”

Trevalian looked. There was indeed blood beneath the dog. His plan unraveling, right before his own blind eyes, he steadied his voice. “She was just spayed. I’ll go check on her.”

“Let me be your eyes,” the woman offered. “I love dogs.”

“I can handle it!” Trevalian said sharply. He excused himself. The dog stood, unbothered by her problem, and Trevalian headed out of the banquet room.

Moving against the crush of incoming guests cost him precious minutes. He worried that the woman was going to spring up behind him. Finally he was in the hall and headed for the men’s room.

As he made it inside, two men were just washing up at the sink. Both caught Trevalian’s reflection in the mirror and both made a point of saying, “Good morning.”

“Morning,” Trevalian returned, leading the dog into the tight stall and closing the door with some difficulty.

He sat down on the toilet, pulled Callie to face him, her tail swishing back and forth outside the stall door, and he waited to hear the two men leave. Another man entered and urinated, but Trevalian had no time to wait. He removed his sunglasses and, holding the dog’s collar tightly, reached into his outside coat pocket and withdrew a pair of tweezers. With no more metal content than a ballpoint pen, the tweezers had passed through security undetected, and he used them now, lowering himself awkwardly to one knee in the cramped space to where he had a good view of Callie’s chest. He spread the dog’s hair until the pink incision appeared-a string of fine-looking hook-and-knot stitches running in a straight line ten inches up her abdomen. Blood seeped from the middle, but he dabbed it with tissue and it seemed to stop.