Dirty Work (Stone Barrington 9)

“I just remembered what a mess my suite is. Where are you staying?”

“At the Waldorf, five minutes from here in a cab.”

/> “Why don’t we go there?” she asked.

“Fine with me.”

She led him back past the café and out the Madison Avenue exit, where a couple of cabs waited at the curb. In a moment, they were driving away.

He leaned over and kissed her on the neck, cradling a breast in his hand.

She didn’t react, just looked straight ahead, thinking fast. The cab turned onto Fifth Avenue.

He pinched a nipple hard. “What do I have to do to get your attention?” he asked.

“I’m sorry,” she said, patting him on the knee. “My mind was elsewhere for a moment. What do you do, Jeff?”

“I’m with the State Department, on the U.S. delegation to the United Nations. I spend two weeks a month in New York.”

“How very interesting,” she said, turning toward him with new interest. “So your wife’s back in Washington?”

“She usually comes with me, so she keeps some clothes here. But she had some meetings this week.”

“Well, isn’t that convenient,” she said, kissing him.

He ran his fingers through her hair, and it came away in his hand.

“Well, there’s a surprise,” he said, holding the wig in his hand and looking at her short blond hair.

“I’m just full of surprises, sugar,” she said, running her hand up his thigh.

55

Stone and Dino sat in Dino’s car outside the Carlyle, while Dino made a phone call. “Sir, it’s Bacchetti. We’ve found out where the woman is staying. She’s in a suite at the Carlyle. . . . Yes, sir, she certainly has good taste. I’ve ordered in a surveillance team. In very short order I’ll have the place covered and a couple of men in the suite next door with a listening device. . . . No, sir, I don’t want to take her in the street or in the lobby. There’s sure to be weapons fired, and we don’t want a mess. I want to let her come home and go to bed. We’ll know when that happens. Then, when she orders breakfast in the morning or leaves her suite, we’ll be waiting. I think we can take her clean. . . . Yes, sir, I know how important that is. I’ll call you the minute anything happens.” Dino hung up. “He’s not going to get any sleep tonight,” he said.

“I expect not,” Stone replied.

Dino’s driver returned with a paper bag holding coffee.

“We may as well make ourselves comfortable,” Dino said.

“I had a thought,” Stone said. “Suppose she’s in the café, listening to Bobby Short?”

Dino snorted. “Not everybody has your weird taste in music, Stone.”

The ride up in the elevator seemed a long one.

“I’m in the Towers,” Purdue explained. “The government rents an entire floor, where the UN delegation stays, and there are apartments for visiting dignitaries, including a presidential suite.”

“How interesting,” Marie-Thérèse said. “Who’s in residence at the moment?”

“I’m the only one of the delegation in town. Most of the others arrive tomorrow, for the opening of the Security Coucil session. I saw the director of the FBI in the elevator earlier, though, so I guess he’s staying. I’ll bet he’s commandeered the presidential suite.”

Marie-Thérèse laughed aloud.

“What’s so funny?”

“It’s just that I never thought I’d be this close to the director of the FBI.”