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“Brute force has always worked pretty well for me,” Shark disagrees.
Meera flashes him her sweetest smile. “Let’s try it my way. If it doesn’t work, we can hit them hard, but at least we have options. If we do it your way, there’s no plan B.”
“It’s always good to have a plan B,” Terry chips in.
“It can’t hurt to try her approach,” James says from the front of the helicopter. I’m sure he’s only saying it to score points with Meera.
“OK.” Shark shrugs. “Take us in, Farrier. Meera, it’s your show — for now.”
As Meera talks us through her simple plan, we drift in over the building, hover closer to the roof, then set down. James kills the blades and as silence settles over us, we sit in place and wait.
Security guards soon spill onto the roof. Thirty or more. They’re all armed, but only with handguns.
“A few are ex-military,” Leo murmurs, studying the guards as they fan out. “But most look to have been privately trained. We could take them with our eyes shut.”
“Leave the taking for a while,” Meera says, and slides out of the helicopter. She nods for Shark and me to accompany her. As Shark moves forward, she tuts and looks pointedly at his weapons — a couple of revolvers and a small rifle strung across his back.
“Do I have to?” Shark pouts. Meera raises an eyebrow. Sighing, he drops his weapons and clambers out in a foul mood.
We take several steps away from the helicopter, then wait, hands in plain sight. One of the guards — an officer — speaks into a microphone attached to his shirt, waits for orders, then comes to meet us. His troops train their guns on us but keep them slightly lowered, so if one of them fires by accident he won’t draw blood.
The officer stops a few feet in front of us. He’s wearing a ring with a large gold L set in the center. Prae Athim wore a similar ring when I met her.
“Can I help you folks?” the officer asks with forced politeness.
“We have an appointment,” Meera replies smoothly.
The officer seemed prepared for any answer except that one. He blinks stupidly. “An appointment,” he echoes.
“With Prae Athim. Could you tell her Meera Flame and Co are here?”
“We’re not expecting any visitors,” the guard says, his voice taking on a slightly threatening tone.
“You might not be” — Meera smiles — “but Prae is. Let her know we’re here and I’m sure she’ll authorize our entry.”
The guard l
ooks troubled. He tells us to stay where we are. Moving out of earshot, he speaks into his microphone again. After a short conversation he calls to us. “Somebody’s coming up. Please maintain your positions.”
The guard returns to the ranks and waits with the others. As he passes orders along, the guards lower their weapons another fraction. I start to relax. Looks like they don’t mean to turn this into a shooting match. At least not yet.
A couple of minutes later, as Shark fidgets, the door to the roof opens and a tall, handsome, tanned man emerges. He’s wearing a suit, but no tie. His hair looks like a film star’s, thick and carefully waxed into shape. He smiles smoothly and his teeth are a perfect pearly white. Meera’s right hand shoots to her hair and she tries to pat it into place, suddenly irritated by the sharp wind whipping over the rooftop, making her job impossible.
“Good afternoon,” the man says, stopping closer to us than the guard did. He has a smooth voice. “My name’s Antoine Horwitzer. How may I be of service?”
“We’re looking for Prae Athim,” Shark says as Meera gazes open-mouthed at the man. He nudges her in the ribs and she recovers swiftly.
“Yes,” she snaps, a red flush of embarrassment spreading from the center of her cheeks. “We have an appointment. Is she here?”
“One would expect her to be present if one had an appointment and had flown in by helicopter to keep it,” Antoine chuckles. “But I don’t believe you really arranged a meeting, did you, Miss… ?”
“Flame,” Meera says with a nervous laugh. “Meera Flame.”
“She already gave her name to the guard,” Shark growls, eyes narrowing.
“Indeed,” Antoine says with a little nod. “I was being disingenuous. I wanted to see if she would give the same name again.”
“Why shouldn’t she? It’s her real name.”
