She walked to the end of the corridor, checked to see that there was no one else around, and knocked on a door.
“Entrez!” came the voice from within, the word spoken in a British accent: “Orn-tray.”
Before she could get away, the door opened. A middle-aged man was standing there, fresh from the bathroom, a towel around his waist. He raised an eyebrow and looked her up and down.
“Yes? Can I help?”
“Sorry,” she stammered. “Wrong room.”
“Well, do come in anyway,” he said, oozing an unwarranted confidence in his powers of seduction.
She shook her head and scurried away. The man stood and watched her, then retreated into his room.
She tried a second time, at the other end of the corridor. There was no reply. She slipped the pass card down the slot in the lock and a green light appeared by the door handle.
The room was unoccupied, the beds undisturbed, the closets empty.
The third room’s guest wasn’t in, but he was a lone male, with nothing that Alix could use.
Finally, in the fourth room she tried, she struck gold. A couple was staying there, the name SCHULTZ inscribed on their luggage tags. It looked as if they’d already gone out for the evening. There were daytime clothes scattered on the bed and chairs, damp towels on the bathroom floor, and Chanel makeup strewn around the marble basin. The woman had packed for a busy social life, because whatever she was wearing this evening, there were two more evening gowns hanging in the closet. The frocks weren’t Alix’s style, but the pretty pair of high-heeled black leather sandals, perched on a rack below them, fit just fine. By the time she left, five minutes later, the shoes were in her bag and her face had a freshly applied coat of foundation and blush.
On the second floor, she knocked on a door, received no answer, walked in, and found a couple making love. They had the lights down low and soft music playing. She’d raced from the room before they’d even realized she was there.
Five rooms later, she emerged with a black silk corset on under Carver’s coat, and glossy scarlet lips, courtesy of another woman’s Christian Dior. On the third floor Alix made excuses to an African woman about her own age and, a few doors down, a Chinese businessman hard at work at his laptop. But another room she tried provided a black skirt that clung to her in all the right places and a pair of sheer black stockings to wear beneath it.
She had been pondering the question of jewelry as she worked her way up the hotel. In one of the rooms there were a pair of simple diamond studs that would have finished her outfit off perfectly. But stealing someone’s diamonds seemed a step too far, both morally and practically. You don’t call the police if you can’t find a skirt. But you press the panic button when your rocks go missing.
She went up another floor. When she got there, she had to use the housekeeper’s card just to get out of the elevator.
On the ground floor, in the office behind the main reception desk, the hotel’s duty manager was checking the latest telephone logs, trying to sort out a complaint from a guest who swore he was being overcharged. A computer printout monitored all guest-room activity, including the use of phones and key cards. The duty manager couldn’t help but notice that one staff pass card was being used to gain access to numerous rooms, on at least two floors. The printer chugged and spat out another entry. The same card, this time exiting the fourth-floor elevator.
The manager sighed irritably. This distraction was the last thing he needed. He checked the pass-card number. It belonged to Madame Brix, the senior housekeeper. She had left work almost two hours ago, and it was unthinkable that she would knowingly allow anyone else to use her card.
He picked up the phone and called for the head of security.
17
As she looked in the full-length mirror, plumping up her freshly sprayed hair, adjusting the way her breasts sat in the corset, and examining the cut of the waist-length black jacket she’d just purloined, Alix felt reborn. For the first time in months she recognized the face looking back at her in the glass and took pleasure in her appearance. It was like meeting a bunch of long-lost friends, not just her looks, but her feelings of self-assurance, and even power. The dowdy, downtrodden woman she’d been that morning had vanished. This was the real Alexandra Petrova.
Satisfied that her makeover was complete, she put her old jeans, T-shirt, scarf, hat, and bag into one of the hotel laundry bags that were hanging in the suite’s closet. She couldn’t really afford to let them go, but they were a necessary sacrifice. Only her coat, and the purse she’d stuffed into one of its pockets, would stay with her. Next, she went into the suite’s bathroom, took a tissue from the dispenser, wiped down any surfaces she had touched, then flushed it down the lavatory. She pulled out one more tissue from the dispenser, to use on the door handle, then left the suite, carrying her coat and the laundry bag.
The suite was right at the end of the corridor, by the emergency exit. As she passed it, Alix thought she heard footsteps. She opened the door a fraction and listened. Yes, there were definitely footsteps, several of them, coming up the stairs, still some flights below. She muttered a Russian expletive under her breath. The housekeeper must have reported her missing key. They were after her.
She glanced down the corridor. If there were men coming up the stairs, others would be using the elevator. She prayed she had enough time. Leaving the coat and bag by the door, she dashed back into the suite. A pair of French windows led from the sitting room to a balcony with views across the city. She flung the glass doors wide open, then ran to the bathroom, wrapped the key card in toilet paper to make it sink, and flushed that, too. Then she bolted to the door, leaving it open as she went.
The footsteps from the stairway were much louder now. They couldn’t be more than a floor below her.
Alix started walking toward the elevator. Along the way, she draped the laundry bag around the door handle of another room. The housekeeping staff would pick it up and clean everything inside, removing any trace of her identity.
When the elevator doors opened and the hotel security chief and his men stepped out, she was there to meet them. Every single one of those men saw a hot blonde casually leaning against the corridor wall with her hands behind her back and her tits poking out of a sexy corset. Not one of them saw a thief holding a coat. By the time the doors of the elevator had closed behind them, she had slipped by and was pressing the button for the ground floor.
Alix sauntered into the hotel bar. The men’s gazes warmed her like sunlight, making her blossom. The women’s eyes were a challenge she was ready to overcome. Her back was straighter, her head held more proudly, her walk just a twitch more flirtatious in her tightly cut skirt and teetering heels. She thought of the last time she’d done this and the night that had followed. Then she ordered a kir royale.
“Please charge it to Room one thirty-eight,” she told the barman as she took a stool by the counter. “The name is Schultz.”
She cast a practiced eye around the bar, looking for the best marks. A man sitting alone at a table, just across the room, caught her eye. His dark hair, slicked back across a tanned but balding crown, was just graying at the temples. His dark-blue suit was immaculate, his silk tie perfectly chosen to complement the sky-blue cotton shirt. The watch was a gold Mariner model, on a polished brown leather strap. He was, in short, the epitome of sophisticated, middle-aged European wealth. And he was looking at Alix with a smile playing around the corner of his mouth that suggested he knew exactly what she was up to. And he didn’t mind at all.
She pretended not to pay him any attention. But from the corner of her eye, she saw him summon a waiter and hand him a piece of paper. Half a minute later, a freshly sparkling glass of kir appeared beside her. Slipped beneath the glass was a note. It simply read, Ponti, 446, 10 mins. By the time she turned around to acknowledge the message, his table was empty. She was impressed. This man was as practiced as she was.