Beck turned and told Nydia, “Get her into that SUV.”

Beck burst out of the exit door and jumped into the scuffle without breaking stride. He pulled the driver’s head back with his right hand and punched him in the throat with his left.

Beck didn’t even pause to see the result. If the security guard couldn’t take him down now, he didn’t deserve the job.

He ran out into the street and jumped into the driver’s seat of the double-parked SUV. Keys were in the ignition. He turned over the engine, shoved the gearshift into drive, and accelerated east on Fifty-eighth, tires squealing, the trucklike SUV fishtailing down the street.

Police sirens were already converging on the hotel. Beck turned left onto Park Avenue, blasting through a red light, just missing a cab.

The light ahead was green and Beck floored the accelerator. The four-hundred horsepower engine hesitated, and then the massive torque kicked in and he streaked through the intersection as the light turned red. He continued accelerating, catching green lights one after the other until the light on Sixty-sixth turned red while he was a half block away from the intersection.

He braked hard, hoping Nydia and Olivia had had time to get their seat belts on. He hadn’t, but braced himself on the steering wheel. They slid into the intersection. Luckily there was no cross traffic. Beck managed to wrestle the big SUV into a right turn and headed east on Sixty-sixth. He braked hard at Lexington, peered to his left looking for empty cabs. He didn’t see any, the light changed and he continued east at a normal speed, stopping at Second Avenue. He pulled the SUV into an empty space near a fire hydrant, shut everything down, took a deep breath, and turned to Olivia and Nydia seated behind him.

“Fuck. You two okay?”

Nydia said, “Yeah.”

“What’d you hit that guy with? Couldn’t have been your fist.”

Nydia pulled out a set of brass knuckles.

Beck pictured the blow. Thought for a second how hard that man’s face smacked into the marble floor when he went down.

“Thanks. You saved us.”

“No problem,” said Nydia.

“Olivia?”

“Yes?”

“You okay?”

“When I stop shaking. God, what happened back there?”

“You guys almost died,” said Nydia.

43

Gregor Stepanovich knew after missing with his first shot that he wouldn’t get another. He had to leave. There was no point. The police and hotel security would be on him before he could kill Beck, or capture the woman.

He had turned and walked out of the front entrance of the Four Seasons as fast as he could, nearly shrieking with frustration that Beck had gotten away from him yet again. It took every shred of his willpower not to chase after Beck, shooting at him until his gun was empty.

What the hell was he doing here? Guarding the woman, obviously. Even so, Gregor couldn’t believe Beck had wiped out three men he couldn’t have known were coming. How does this fucking guy keep doing this?

He had lost another man. He assumed Kolenka’s two men were also lost.

Markov would be furious. Kolenka? Who knows? This might send the old Vory over the edge. Good, thought Gregor. Kolenka has plenty of men. Maybe this will persuade him to send them against Beck.

Stepanovich vowed never to go after Beck, or anybody connected to him, without enough men to crush him. Next time, there would be no chance for Beck to fight him off. Stepanovich vowed to literally shoot Beck into unrecognizable pieces.

No one tried to stop the tall, raging Bosnian from leaving. He walked straight out the door, hailed a cab, and was gone before anybody could identify him as the man who had shot off a gun in the lobby of the Four Seasons.

*   *   *

They’d all piled into a cab on Second Avenue. Nydia directed the driver to her neighborhood up in East Harlem. Beck thanked Nydia again, dropped her in front of her apartment building, and then gave the driver directions for the long ride to Red Hook.

He sat on the right side of the cab’s backseat. Olivia to the left. Beck didn’t much want to talk, but he had to know how they had found her. Manny wouldn’t be stupid enough to check her in under her real name. And Beck was sure he had rented the room for cash.

“You checked into the hotel with Manny, right?”

“Yes.”

“Then how did they know your name?”

Olivia paused. For the first time Beck heard her curse. “That fucking idiot, Raymond.”

“Raymond? Who’s Raymond?”

“The manager.” Olivia turned to Beck. “Look, I know him. He comes on to me every time he sees me. Offers me discounts at the spa. Preferred rates at the hotel. I have lunch in their lobby café a lot. He saw me check in.”

“So you asked him for the preferred rate?”

“No. No. I specifically told him that”—Olivia made a quotation mark in the air—“I wasn’t supposed to be there. That I was checking in under a different name.”

“What name?”

“I told them to put the room under the name Ellen Grey.”

“Ellen Grey?”

“I was thinking of Earl Grey. The tea. So I changed it to Ellen.”

Beck asked just to make the point. “Do you have a credit card under the name of Ellen Grey?”

“No.”

“He has your card on file?”

“I don’t know. I’ve used it enough times in there.”

“For hotel rooms or the restaurants?”

“Both. I’ve stayed there a couple of weekends. And I’ve used my rate for friends. What does it matter? Manny paid cash. I told them I’d pay cash for incidentals. Told them I wanted privacy.”

“He probably used your card to credit you back the difference, trying to score points with you when you saw the nice surprise on your next statement. That automatically checked you in under your real name. Using a phony name for people calling around trying to find somebody doesn’t change the hotel billing system.”

“Christ, I can’t believe it. I could kill that idiot.”

“I should have made you go to a hotel where nobody knew you. It’s my fault.”

“No. It’s mine. But how did they find me?”

“Obviously Markov has connections to people who can access credit card records. And phone records and e-mails and blah, blah, fucking blah.”

Beck shook his head in disgust and slumped down in his seat, doing his usual inventory of where it hurt. His left elbow was going to be sore. There’d be the usual aches and strains in the aftermath of yet another fight. At least he hadn’t hit anything with his hands. Just the butt of his gun.

When they arrived at the safety of the Red Hook building, Beck let Manny find a room for Olivia on the third floor and settle her down. He went straight to his room, showered off the sweat and blood from his two fights, took four Ibuprofen, and collapsed into bed.

*   *   *

Markov had continued to work and wait for Gregor’s call to verify they had the woman. It was nearly two-thirty when his phone’s ringtone pierced the quiet of his room at the Waldorf. Too long. Markov knew Gregor had failed, but he waited to hear the words, “They got away,” and then he cut off the call without saying one word in response.

He muttered a stream of Russian curses. And then his phone rang again. He was about to throw it against the wall rather than speak to Gregor, but the caller ID showed it was Ivan Kolenka. Kolenka sounded very calm, which made it all the worse. He told Markov, “We are going to solve this Beck problem now. Come see me.”

Markov checked his watch. Two thirty-seven, Wednesday morning.

“When?” he asked.

“Two hours. The place near the boardwalk where we met last time,” said Kolenka. “I want to know exactly how many reliable men you can put into this. Exactly.”

Kolenka broke off the call.

Markov called Gregor back and told him to come to the lobby of the Waldorf in one hour and wait for him.

Sixty minutes later, after showering, shaving, and changing into his last set of clean clothes, Markov walked out of his room, towels on the floor, toilet unflushed, his clothing bag over his shoulder, heading for the lobby.