Rakesh blinked. His grip went limp under her pressure. His eyes darted up and then down and around, as if expecting men to come out of the walls. "I… cannot."
"You can," Nina whispered. She closed her eyes, drawing something from his touch — a conduit that amplified her psychic abilities. And then she saw it — just a flash, but it was enough. A brief snapshot, like a Polaroid drying into clarity: a young boy and a girl, sitting on the stained floor of a locked room. A slot in the door for food to slide through. Two armed men outside, guarding them.
Nina blinked and it was gone. She trembled at the vision, it having stirred up old memories she had tried hard to forget. Rakesh pulled his hand away, but she had seen enough to guess at his motivation: that Davarius held the ultimate leverage over his key employee.
She thought quickly. She needed an edge, a way to break the game. This was her one and only shot. "Help me," she whispered, "and I'll help them."
Rakesh's eyes widened. But then he blinked, and looked straight ahead again. "Time is ticking. If you don't start running, they'll come for you."
She waited a moment. "Ten hours," she said sternly. "I'll be in the Taj, admiring your beloved national heroes and enjoying a rest."
With that, hoping she had at least placed the seed of betrayal in Rakesh's mind — she turned and raced through the alley.
Just before the street — with the tumult of cars creeping along in thick traffic and people congesting the sidewalks — she skidded to a stop. She had just come out of the shadow of the steep tenement walls and into the blazing hot sun, when she had a glimpse of something she had sensed before.
The high-rise buildings across the street. The tallest among them, easily thirty stories, was just to the left, opposite from this side alley.
A flash and she saw: Five men dressed in casual Western clothing sitting on fold-out chairs on the roof. A keg of beer rested in a barrel of ice behind them and one of the men, wearing a cowboy hat and mirrored sunglasses, pumped the tap. He had a silver .357 Magnum in his belt next to a sheathed KA-BAR knife. The other four men peered into the scopes of their sniper rifles, angled downward.
Nina backpedaled, then pressed herself against the left wall. Seriously? A sniper attack right out of the gate? She wondered how many others would have been picked off after only a few steps. She supposed it added some degree of difficulty to hit a moving target from so far, and in the midst of all the crowds. But still. She also wondered about the pricing specifics of this game. Was there a refund for those who were waiting somewhere down the road and would be let down by a quick kill right here? Consolation prizes?
She didn’t have time to think about it. Right now she needed a plan or she wouldn't make it anywhere close to ten hours. She looked up at the full clotheslines hanging in the heat and the non-existent breeze, and a smile slowly formed on her face.
She started to look for handholds. And began to climb.
Ten minutes later, she exited from the side entrance, dressed in a flowing Muslim jilbab with a head scarf and veil over her face. As soon as she stepped into the sun she thought, God, how do women not pass out in these things?
She slid into a crowd where many women wore similar garments. Indistinguishable from the citizens of Agra, she moved calmly, head down, waiting at a street crossing, then shuffling ahead with the others. Try to find me now, bastards.
She glanced around, getting her bearings. This city was unfamiliar enough, although she had made a quick study of the map on the way to the hotel. She knew she had to make it to the Taj Mahal and it shouldn't be hard — she could even catch a tourist bus right now and it would probably take her right there, but she had no money. But she did have other options. She could go to one of the numerous Internet cafés she had seen earlier. Humbly ask to borrow someone's account — and then send an email to Waxman to fill him in on what's going on and to request a team of bad-ass commando types to come in and clean house. Davarius wanted a challenge? Well, that would up the difficulty level of this game considerably.
And sure, Davarius claimed he had the resources to track them down if she fled, but leaving was an option too. Waxman could wire her the money, then she could get out of Dodge and live to fight another day, and on her terms.
So many options. She hesitated a moment as men in business suits walked past her without a glance and old women pushed her this way and that. Someone grumbled something and three Muslims wearing similar jilbabs came up behind her.
One suddenly cried out in pain. Then another screamed and suddenly the crowd split apart, people running away from her — and the two women on the ground. One was on her back, dead eyes looking up as blood trickled from the hole between them. The other was clutching her shoulder, screaming as blood sprayed from between her fingers. Nina gasped, already backing up — just as the woman jerked sideways, another splotch appearing on her back, sending her face down over her dead companion.
How the hell!?
Nina turned and as she lowered her head she saw the laser-red dot of light dancing on her own chest. She ducked and rolled, and a piece of the sidewalk exploded behind her. Damn it, they know!
Head down, she sprinted into the fleeing, screaming crowd, where she peeled off her jilbab in the confusion. No point now and it might buy her a few seconds. How did they know? Maybe someone had seen her scaling that tenement wall and relayed the information to the rooftop snipers?
Well, this should confuse them for a time. Maybe enough to get to the next objective — which had just changed.
No chance she'd make it to a bus stop or taxi, much less the Taj, if she didn't get out of the range of those snipers first.
Either that, or… She had a sudden thought that brought a smile to her face. She quickly switched directions. Heading against the crowd, she made her way to the high-rise.
THREE
In the elevator, head-down, she glanced at the control panel, seeing the numbers light up. They stopped on the fifteenth floor and half the people got out. On the twentieth, all but two left. One was a thin Indian man wearing a traditional surka. The other was a German-looking guy with slick wavy blond hair, dressed in a blue business suit and carrying a silver briefcase.
Stands out like a sore thumb. She leaned against the back wall, between the two men, inching slightly toward the German, who was now whistling softly. His eyes darted sideways once, then back to the door.
Nina brushed against his shoulder, closed her eyes and got a flash of something…
That briefcase, open… a soft black Styrofoam interior, revealing a silver .38 revolver with a scope and a section for six gold-tipped bullets.
Smiling innocently, Nina turned to the Indian man as the twenty-seventh floor lit up. "Can I borrow a pen?" she asked, nodding to the three pens in his shirt pocket.
"Sure," the man said in decent English, handing her one as the doors opened. "My floor, so just keep it."
Nina leaned back, twirling the pen in her fingers. She glanced sideways and the German looked at her, nodding.
"Enjoying your time in Agra?" she asked.
"Yes," he said, then frowned and looked ahead, back at the panel. The 30th floor lit up, two away from the Roof, and she imagined what he was thinking: she hadn't pressed another button, which meant… He turned, slowly, looking back at her, eyes widening.