SUMMER: No, you don’t.
No, I did not.
The light outside had thinned from gold to gray. My reflection hovered in the blank television screen, phone in hand, shoes abandoned by the desk, one hand still too close to the deadbolt.
My phone buzzed with a separate text.
SARAH: Johannesburg contact confirmed. Name: Pieter Botha. SAPS. He will meet you in the lobby at 1730 and remain through international check-in. Nick has details.
Former South African Police Service. Good. Someone who knew the local system, not just private security theater.
SARAH: Separate issue. Credentials used for manifest access were disabled last year. They should not have authenticated.
The room lost a degree of warmth.
I reread the message.
They should not have authenticated.
My door lock gave a soft electronic click.
The hallway outside went silent.
Not the lock opening.
Not yet.
Just a click.
My fingers closed around the phone.
Then Nick’s name flashed across the screen.
NICK: DO NOT OPEN YOUR DOOR.
Chapter 32
New Architecture
Juliette
Thehoteldoorhadnot opened.
It had not been a knock.
Someone had tried a keycard against my room before Pieter Botha reached the floor. The lock rejected it, hotel security flagged it, and Nick texted me twelve seconds later because apparently the man could command a South African reserve, a Johannesburg hotel, and my blood pressure from three hundred miles away.
Pieter arrived seven minutes later with his phone in one hand and the expression of a man who found incompetence personally offensive. He stayed outside my room until I was moved to another floor under a different name, then stayed again until I left for the airport.
Nick didn’t sleep.
He never said that, of course. Nick Mercer would confess to blood loss before fatigue. But his messages came shorter as the night wore on, each one clipped down to the bone.
NICK:ROOM SECURE.
NICK:Pieter in position.
NICK:Do not leave without him.
