He frowned and looked over his shoulder at Yarbrough. “Has no one even been in here to check out the room?”
The agent pointed at the sign on the door. “If the men who took her put that on the handle, it’s unlikely that any of the hotel staff meddled with anything, especially since the room is paid for through to next week. They’d technically be obliged to obey the request.”
“Good.” Sean inserted the key card and turned the latch.
He pushed the door open cautiously, an old habit he fell back on when going into an unfamiliar space. He peeked into the first corner on the right, then back to the left toward the window. The place was empty: empty, and completely trashed.
Whoever had gone through there was definitely looking for something. Sean stepped forward, remaining cautious and moving slowly. He reached over to the inner wall and flipped on a light switch to get a better view of the mess. Two dresser drawers lay on the floor, the bottom one hung halfway out of the cherry furniture piece. Adriana’s clothes were scattered around the room as if desperate hands had aimlessly tossed the articles. Bed sheets and pillowcases had been strewn about as well, some thrown onto the floor. A small closet next to the bathroom was open, displaying a few of Adriana’s shirts, one yellow sundress, and a pair of her shoes.
“What were they looking for?” Tommy said in a reverent tone. He peered around the room at the chaotic scene.
Sean shook his head slowly. “I’m not sure, but whatever they wanted, they wanted it fast. It looks like a tornado went through here.” He fought back the lump in his throat. There was still a faint scent of Adriana’s perfume lingering in the air. To him, the room smelled just like her. He winced at the thought.
Agent Yarbrough walked over to the window. The drapes had been pulled together, blocking out most of the natural light from the morning sun. He started to pull one of them back, but stopped when he saw Sean staring at something behind the door. One of Adriana’s jackets lay in a heap on the floor near the doorstop. Sean reached down and picked it up, letting the scent of it fill his nostrils for a few seconds. He let out a deep sigh, and then frowned. A solitary key attached to a green rubber key ring was sitting on the thin carpet under a leather chair. If he’d not picked up the jacket, Sean wouldn’t have noticed the little object.
Sean cocked his head to the side and knelt down to get a closer look.
“What is it?” Yarbrough asked, taking his hand away from the window shade.
“It’s a key,” Sean said, picking it up. He eyed it curiously and turned it over to see the writing on the other side of the green piece. Stazione Termini, 57 was stamped on the back. “It’s a locker key from the train station.”
Tommy took a step closer and examined the object. “You think she dropped it?” he asked.
“Maybe,” Sean shrugged. He stared at the key. “But I don’t think it was an accident.”
Yarbrough still stood near the window. “Why would she leave a locker key?”
Sean knew the answer. Adriana believed he would come for her, and she also believed that Sean would know what to do. At least, that’s what he hoped. If Adriana had left him a breadcrumb to follow that meant there was something she wanted him to have, something important. What it was he didn’t know, but he knew he needed to find it.
“We need to get to the train station and see what’s in that locker,” Sean said as he stuffed the key into his khaki pants pocket.
“How do you know there isn’t anything else to find here?” Yarbrough said, turning back to the window and reaching for the drapes.
“Because,” Sean began, “they searched the room before she came back.”
“How do you know that?” Yarbrough asked, flinging open the curtains as he spoke.
Sunlight poured into the room, brightening it significantly. “Because this key would not have been on the floor here under her jacket.” He visualized what happened as if he’d witnessed it himself. “There was a struggle. She slipped out of the jacket and dropped the key with it onto the floor so that the men who took her wouldn’t see it. She knew I could come to find her.”
“That’s a big assumption,” the agent said dubiously.
“It’s all we got.”
Tommy butted in. “I’m with Sean. They would have already checked everything. If that key was lying on the floor, they would have easily seen it.”
Yarbrough put his hands on his hips and stared out at the square, stretching slightly. Something clicked from that side of the room, and the window suddenly cracked like a dozen spider webs. Agent Yarbrough instantly clutched his left shoulder and dropped to the ground. “Get down,” he shouted in agony.
The sickening realization hit Sean almost instantly. Someone was shooting at them from the outside.
Chapter 12
Eight men sat around the long, heavy table in the dim, candlelit room. An iron chandelier hung from the center of the ceiling above, providing the only electric light to the space. Seven of the men stared to one end of the table, where Dimitris Gikas sat with his hands folded on the surface. His face expressed compassion and patience, but inside his temper was brimming with rage.
A fleshy, round-faced man at the other end of the table stared at him vapidly. “You cannot just take over a country, Dimitris. And for you to think that we would all swear allegiance to you as our king is absolute insanity.” He crossed his chubby arms over his bulbous chest, hands barely able to reach beyond the girth. A toothpick hung loosely from the man’s mouth. Even though the room was a cool seventy degrees, the fat man perspired profusely.
Gikas stared quietly at him, forming his rebuke carefully. Before he could say anything, a slim, bald man named Michael Thropopolis spoke up from the other side of the table. His sloping nose and deeply receded eyes gave him a well-aged appearance. “He is not wrong, Dimitris. Greece has not had a monarchy in centuries. The people would not likely take kindly to the idea of being ruled.”
Dimitris Gikas had heard quite enough. “The people,” he interrupted before Thropopolis could continue, “have made a mess of this once-great nation. Like little children given the run of the house, there are broken toys everywhere. The economy is in shambles. Crime is rampant. Tourism, our main source of income for the country, is on the decline. The people need someone to lead them back to prosperity.”
The words hung in the room nearly as thick as the smoke drifting up from the cigars a few of the men had been puffing.
“And I suppose that you just have the best interest of the people in mind, eh, Dimitris?” Thropopolis was still skeptical.
He let a smile slip out. “In any government that has ever existed, the leaders always got their fair share.”
“You mean the lion’s share,” the fat man at the other end chimed in sarcastically.
“I mean what we deserve. And not just me, Niko; all of us. If you back me, you will all become the richest men in all of Greece. Your power will reach across all of Europe. As part of my council, your legacies will live on for all of history.”
Some of the men turned their heads, looking at each other as if to see what the others were thinking. Thropopolis seemed satisfied with the answer to his question.
The fat one, a man named Niko Teridis, appeared to be the last obstacle in the room. “I am already one of the richest men in Greece, Dimitris. We all are.” He splayed his hands out wide, displaying the others in the room. “And we already have power.” Niko leaned forward and put his hands on the table. “You think you have something we need, but you are wrong. This government may fall apart, but it has been good to all of us. It has made us all rich men. Now you seek to undo this? Why not just let things take their natural course? We will be fine no matter what happens. We all have enough money to weather any storm that comes our way. And when it is over, we will still be in control of everything.”