One Night In San Francisco

Time is Everything

"Fine! But I swear, if you f-ck this up, it's on your head."

Clancy smiled. "Hurry up. Time is everything."

Travis exited the Insurion building and yanked off the hot, sweaty ski mask. he breathed in fresh air that didn't smell like sweat-dreched cotton. Then he took off his sweatshirt, revealing a white t-shirt underneath and threw it into the sewer, where the putrid current swept it away quickly.

He walked briskly through the streets to the Hilton. He didn't check behind him because he knew there couldn't possibly be any cops on his tail. They were preoccupied. 

But still, he cursed under his breath. He had to get to the building by 11:15 or else. Blue had made that clear.

He didn't like working with Blue that much. But the man paid the bills. But who would have thought that San Francisco's crime boss was actually, in real life...

He had to focus. But Blue's sneering mockery stayed glued to his brain. How had this mix-up happened. The man was way too cryptic. He forced you to decipher everything until you ended up looking for messages that simply weren't there. 

But he had set up the crane man for Travis, who cursed again. Maybe he shouldn't have killed the portly man. Maybe he should have gotten information. And after all, a black barrel was quite convincing.

Could Blue have messed up too? That was incomprehensible. He was so confident, so sure of himself. Everything was meticulously planned out. 

Maybe he mixed up the locations. But that was also impossible, considering his connection to Insurion. He owned the Hilton and the InterContinental. Something had happened, whether by accident or purpose. Maybe the middleman had f-cked it all up. But he remembered the indistinguishable low voice clearly confirming it was the InterContinental.

He neared Kearny Street. The Hilton logo shone above him like the Batman logo over Gotham. There was no turning back. He had to do this. 

He walked into the air-conditioned lobby. There was a pompous looking young man at the concierge desk. Travis walked over confidently.

"Excuse me, sir, too late to get a room?" The boy's name was Brian. He kind of reminded Haley of the dog from Family Guy.

"No, not at all. Rough night?"

"You have no idea. Uh, wife troubles."

"Oh, I understand." But his look made it clear he didn't. 

 "Uh, can I request a room?"

"Of course, as long as it's open."

"3408."

The man searched through the computer. "Yeah. Why that room, though? I'm just curious."

"U-uh, a friend recommended it to me. Said the view was great. Uh, Derek Frost." Travis had recalled the first name that came to mind, the man he had shot dead earlier in the night.

"Oh, really? He worked here. I guess I have to check up him. Make sure he didn't spend any, you know, nights he shouldn't have up there." They laughed, and Travis wanted to get out of there as fast as possible.

Travis wondered grimly how the man would react once he found out he wouldn't be able to remind Frost of that. Would he remember Travis? The longer Travis spent, the more time he gave the man to get a clear desciption of him in his head to give to the authorities.

"Well, can I pay? There sort of someone looking for me."

"Wife?" The man's expression oozed faux understanding.