Chapter 41: Backup
"Simon — double date tonight. You in?"
It was twenty minutes before the end of his shift when Chuck and Morgan materialized at the Nerd Herd desk with the coordinated energy of a proposal that had been discussed and agreed upon before being presented.
"Double date," Simon said. "Who's the fourth?"
Morgan's expression suggested he'd been waiting for this question. "Her name is Carina. She's — we met recently and she's incredible and I think tonight's going to be—"
"Carina who?" Simon said, looking at Chuck.
Chuck made a small, careful expression that communicated a great deal without words.
"She's a DEA agent," Chuck said quietly.
Simon looked at Morgan.
Morgan was already organizing his jacket.
"Morgan," Simon said. "How did you—"
"It's a long story," Chuck said. "The short version involves Morgan being Morgan and somehow it worked."
Simon processed this. A DEA agent and a Buy More employee on a double date, with Chuck and Sarah as the other half of the equation, in a social setting adjacent to an active intelligence operation. Every part of that sentence contained a variable he didn't want Meg anywhere near.
"I already made plans with Meg," Simon said. "Movie tonight. Sorry."
Morgan's face fell with the genuine disappointment of someone who had wanted a specific kind of evening and was now having to revise it. "That's — yeah, okay. We'll find someone else."
"Or you won't," Chuck said, "and it'll be a triple date, which is statistically worse than a double date but Morgan is committed to the word double for reasons I've stopped questioning."
"Have a good time," Simon said. He clapped Morgan on the shoulder. "Genuinely."
"We will," Morgan said, recovering. "This Carina — Simon, you don't understand. She's—"
"I'm sure she's great," Simon said. "Tell me tomorrow."
He clocked out and went to get Meg.
The movie was an action film that Simon enjoyed more for the stunt choreography than the plot, and Meg enjoyed because she was starting to watch fight scenes analytically rather than just dramatically, which was a sign the morning training was changing how she processed things.
Afterward, they stopped at a diner for pie and coffee, and talked about nothing consequential, which was its own kind of valuable.
He dropped her home at eleven.
He was in bed by eleven thirty.
His phone rang at one forty-seven PM the next day, during third period.
He looked at the screen under his desk. Sarah.
He excused himself, stepped into the hallway, and answered.
"Casey's been out of contact for over an hour," Sarah said. Her voice was controlled but moving faster than her usual register. "Last known position was the Meridian Hotel downtown. I've been trying to reach him on the watch, on his phone, through the backup channel — nothing."
"You think he's been taken."
"Yes."
"Are you secure?"
"For now." A pause. "I need eyes in that building and I can't go in myself — they may already have eyes on me."
"Send me the address," Simon said. "I'll leave now."
He went back into the classroom, leaned down to Meg's desk, and said quietly: "I need to go. Something's come up. Can you tell the teacher I had a family thing?"
Meg looked at his face and made the read in about two seconds. "Go," she said. "I'll handle it."
He was out of the building in ninety seconds.
The Meridian was a mid-range downtown hotel — twelve floors, business clientele, the kind of place that hosted corporate conferences and had a bar off the lobby that served adequate cocktails at prices calibrated to expense accounts.
Simon parked two blocks east, tucked the Beretta he'd taken from Doc's security into his waistband under his untucked shirt, and put two spare magazines in his jacket pocket. He walked to the hotel at a pace that read as purposeful without being rushed.
In the lobby: marble floors, a fountain feature, a lounge area with upholstered furniture visible from the entrance.
He moved to the elevator bank.
The doors opened.
A group of people came out — six, seven people, moving with the slightly-too-casual energy of people who were aware of each other's positions without wanting to appear to be. Simon processed them in the three seconds of crossing.
Third from the left: Sarah Walker. Posture controlled, expression neutral, moving in the direction determined by the man at her right elbow whose hand was inside his jacket and not holding a phone.
Simon kept his face neutral and walked into the elevator.
The doors closed.
He pressed 2.
He needed thirty seconds to think.
Sarah was mobile and under direct control, which meant she was being used as leverage or transported to a secondary location. The lobby setting suggested she was being held in place, waiting for something — a trade, a handoff, a specific person to arrive.
Which meant Casey was elsewhere. And Casey's team hadn't broken the operation because they still needed something — probably from both of them.
The elevator opened on two. Simon went straight to the stairwell and came down fast, back to lobby level.
He came through the stairwell door into the lobby's east corridor and moved to the edge of the lounge area.
Sarah was on a couch near the center of the space. A man sat beside her — large, relaxed in the particular way of someone who didn't need to appear menacing because the weapon under the table communicated everything necessary.
Simon counted: two visible in the immediate vicinity of Sarah, plus the man who'd been at her elbow in the elevator group. Minimum three, possibly more stationed at exits.
He moved back to the elevator.
Casey was being held somewhere in the building — probably above the lobby, probably on or near the floor Sarah had specified. If they'd taken both of them, they'd want them accessible but separate, which meant different rooms on the same floor or adjacent floors.
Sarah had texted the address with a room number: 1102.
Simon went back to the elevator, pressed 12.
He knocked on 1202 — one floor above the specified room — and got no answer.
The door was standard hotel construction: solid core but a lightweight frame, with a card reader that was the only thing between the corridor and the room.
Simon didn't have a card.
He stepped back, planted his foot, and kicked just to the left of the handle.
The frame gave on the second impact.
He was through the door and across the room in four seconds, out onto the balcony.
The drop to the floor below was twelve feet of exterior wall, with a narrow decorative ledge at mid-height. Simon went over the railing, found the ledge with his feet, and moved laterally until he was at the window of 1102.
He looked through the glass.
Casey was in the room.
This was immediately both reassuring and very funny.
He was on the bed — specifically, handcuffed to the headboard — in a state of dress that suggested the operation had escalated without warning. A guard was in the adjacent sitting area with a newspaper and a cigarette, positioned between Casey and the room's main door.
One guard. One entry point from the main corridor. One entry point from the balcony, which was where Simon was.
He checked the window latch — unlocked, because hotel guests occasionally wanted air, and whoever had set up this holding position had prioritized the main door.
Simon eased the window open.
He came through it in two steps, crossed the room, and hit the guard from behind with a running knee strike to the base of the skull — high enough to stun, calibrated to avoid serious injury, sufficient to take the man out of the immediate situation.
The guard went down and stayed down.
Simon straightened up.
Casey was looking at him from the bed.
Casey's expression was doing several things simultaneously. The primary thing was the specific controlled fury of a man who found his current situation professionally humiliating. The secondary thing was the recognition that Simon had just resolved said situation, which complicated the fury without eliminating it.
Simon looked at Casey.
Casey looked at Simon.
Simon took out his phone.
"Don't," Casey said. The word was slightly muffled by the tape across his mouth.
Simon took the picture.
"I'm not showing anyone," Simon said. "I just want something to remember this by."
Casey communicated several things through eye contact alone, none of which were positive.
Simon found the handcuff key on the guard, removed the tape from Casey's mouth — at a speed Casey would probably describe later as enthusiastic — and unlocked the cuffs.
Casey sat up, rubbing his wrists, and looked at Simon with the expression of a man reviewing his threat assessment of everyone in the room.
"Sarah," Simon said, before Casey could establish any conversational dominance. "She's in the lobby. Someone has a weapon on her — I made at least three hostiles when I came through. They're waiting for something. A trade."
Casey's expression shifted from personal grievance to operational focus with the speed of a man who had been trained to do exactly that.
"Diamonds," Casey said, picking up his jacket from the floor and checking his pockets. "There's a handoff scheduled — someone's using us as leverage to ensure the transaction goes smoothly without interference. They were going to release us after."
"Do you believe that?"
"No," Casey said. "Nobody releases federal agents after a hostage situation. They were going to walk Sarah out with the buyer, get clear of the city, and then handle both of us." He found his watch on the nightstand. "We need to move before the buyer arrives."
"How many people total?"
"Four that I saw before they separated me from Sarah. Possibly a fifth on the exterior."
"Three in the lobby area," Simon said. "That accounts for it."
Casey looked at him. "Plan?"
"I go in first," Simon said. "They don't know me — I'm just a hotel guest. I get close, find my angle, and create a situation. The moment I move, you come through from wherever you can position yourself."
Casey thought about it for three seconds. "The bar off the lobby — it has a sightline to the lounge area. I can position there and cover your flank."
"Good." Simon checked the Beretta. Full magazine. Round in the chamber. "Ready?"
"One thing," Casey said.
He picked up his jacket, took a moment to straighten it, and checked his own weapon — which had apparently been left in the room with him, either as carelessness or arrogance.
"The picture," Casey said.
"Deleted," Simon said.
Casey looked at him.
"I said I wouldn't show anyone," Simon said. "I meant it."
A beat.
"Fine," Casey said. "Let's go."
They moved to the door.
Simon looked at the corridor — clear in both directions.
They went out.
[500 PS unlocks 1 Extra Chapter]
[10 Reviews unlock 1 Extra Chapter]
Thanks for reading—reviews are appreciated.
P1treon Soulforger has 20+advance chapters