Masked

CHAPTER 18 | ever danced with the devil by the pale moonlight?

Hotel Sofitel, Montreal, Canada

Parked glanced around the hotel bar, readjusted the tablet on the small table, and leaned into the comfortable leather chair. She casually leafed through the thick document she held, and frowned, grabbed a pen off the table, and made a mark on one of the pages.

"Hey, boss, you do know you're only supposed to pretend to work?"

She peeked over the rim of her glasses. "Zeke. Did you get this report from a first grader? The spelling is diabolical."

Laughter echoed through her earbuds, then what she could have sworn was Zeke muttering about grammar police.

"The documents and reports are from one of the keynote speakers at an Agricultural and Fisheries Symposium in Florida, boss."

Parker crossed her legs and jiggled her foot as she continued to leaf through the document. "How's the feed? Is it clear?"

To the casual observer, she looked as though she were talking on her phone, or listening to music and working on her tablet. If anyone had walked by, they would have noticed the screen was filled with graphs and charts.

She was actually kitted out with the latest surveillance equipment, and in two-way communication with the rest of the team at their base of operations in a suite at another hotel a short distance away. Both audio and video were transmitted directly to the team monitoring the goings on in the bar.

"We had a bit of interference, but it seems to have cleared up. We've control of both front and rear cameras."

"What about the hotel's video feeds?"

"Not having much luck at the moment."

"And how is the audio?"

"You're coming through loud and clear."

Out of the corner of her eye, Parker spied a waitress heading in her direction.

"Bonsoir, bienvenue au le Bar. Voudriez-vous commander quelque chose?"

She looked up at the young woman and smiled apologetically. "Peut-on parler en anglais, s'il vous plaît, mon français est terrible."

The woman smiled and nodded. "Certainly, madam, welcome to Le Bar. Can I get you something to drink?"

She ordered the cocktail of the day, and resumed assessing the other patrons in the room. A few minutes later, she heard a commotion through her earpiece. Daniel had put all his men in place and returned to the hotel suite. His voice, curt and business-like, came through her earbuds. "Any sign of him?"

Parker glanced around the room. "No, but it's early yet."

"I still don't like this," he said. "At the first sign of trouble, I want you out of there. Are we clear?"

Rather than answer him, she rolled her eyes. They were receiving a video feed from both front and rear cameras, so he would have seen her. She held back a smile as she imagined him glowering at the monitor.

It wasn't the first time they'd had this conversation.

When Clara mentioned the name Sandulf, Parker's mind rocketed straight to the account they had tracked the money to. The one that had them chasing ghosts in order to discover who ultimately owned the account, and who was responsible for the carnage.

The shell company that owned the account was Sandulf GmbH. They needed to get back into that account and find anything that could lead them to Elise.