“What about if I wanted to identify the four or six digit code that had been used to lock a safe in the first place. Is it possible to find that out as well?” Lewis went on.
“You cunning bastard, Lewis. Are you the rookie master criminal all of a sudden?”
They had joshed a bit, but then Ollie had relented.
“It depends on the make and model. But on most of the older varieties, if you key in ‘**0000**’ and hit unlock, then on the LED screen you should see the last password used to lock the safe.”
With Ollie’s instructions still fresh in his mind, Lewis is looking at the room safe. He is pleased to see that it is old, much like everything in the hotel. With some trepidation, he types in two asterisks, four zeros and a further two asterisks. The keypad beeps at him every time a digit is entered. Finally, he lets his finger hover over the unlock button and then presses it. The display screen shows four numbers. 6-7-3-5. There is no need for Lewis to write these down, he has an encyclopaedic memory for strings of numbers and letters. It is why he can remember all the greatest chess moves. They just appear in his mind without seemingly trying. Karpov versus Spasky, Leningrad, 1974. 1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.Nf3 d5 and so on. 6-7-3-5 he could do in his sleep. He types the same numbers into the keyboard and presses the ‘enter’ button. The motor whirs and the safe unlocks.
Ollie is a genius.
The safe is almost empty: almost but not quite. Tucked to one side, lying on a blue satin pouch with a strange gold-embroidered emblem on the exterior is a little pendant necklace. He picks it up. It is a gold chain with tiny, ultra-fine links. At the end, designed to hang in front when the chain is worn, is a gold key about three inches long. Lewis places the chain inside the blue pouch and puts both in his front trouser pocket. He then closes and locks the safe behind him. He will examine both items in more detail later.
Now for the moment of truth. He removes Zamani’s iPhone and presses the unlock button. The screen prompts him to enter a four-digit password. Lewis’s lateral thoughts about how to unlock the phone have been based on a childishly simple hypothesis. Every day people are bombarded by requests for passwords and four-digit pin numbers. How many can any one person realistically carry around in their heads? The answer is very few. Many simply use the same four-digit number for everything: credit and debit card PIN numbers; and mobile phone unlock codes. So, he reasons: why not four-digit room safe codes as well?
The big unknown is whether Leyla Zamani is one of these people or not? There is only one way to find out.
Lewis keys in the first three digits carefully. From outside in the corridor there is the sound of hoovering. He pauses, unconsciously holding his breath. His finger is poised above the last remaining digit, the number ‘5’.
The Dutch Marines have a motto. It has always seemed more inspiring to Lewis than Per Mare per Terram, the Royal Marines rather drab ‘By sea by land.’ The Dutch motto is Nunc aut Nunquam.
Now or Never.
This is a ‘now’ moment, if ever he knows one.
38
Edgware Road
The security code screen disappears, the phone miraculously and instantly is unlocked.
Lewis should be feeling elated. However, his mind is already several moves ahead, eager to learn what secrets the phone will reveal. The sound of hovering from out in the corridor is getting louder. It reminds him that he ought to be heading somewhere where he can explore the contents of Zamani’s device at leisure and in greater privacy. He puts the phone back in his pocket and checks the room one final time. Retrieving the piece of paper from key slot, instantly the lights go out. Time to be going.
The woman with the hoover is Chinese, dressed in a similar blue and white uniform to the maid who had let Lewis into the room in the first place. She is across the corridor, about four metres away. As the door is opened, she looks up at Lewis and smiles. Then the hoover drops from her hand and in its place is a taser stun gun. Lewis has no time to react before the deadly twin probes are shooting across the corridor in his direction. The high voltage charge packs an enormous punch. It is sufficient to render him unconscious instantly.
Sui-Lee is emotionally charged and brimming with nervous anticipation. Having used her considerable strength to drag Lewis onto the king-sized bed, she extracts from her rucksack four pieces of webbing that she has prepared in advance. These will allow her to enhance her pleasure with the handsome Englishman during the short time they have together. Sui-Lee positions the looped ends of each of the four pieces of webbing under the corner castors of the king-sized bed. Then she ties Lewis’s hands and legs to the four strands of webbing, taking care to remove his trousers but not his underwear. She is especially delighted to discover Lewis’s white boxer shorts. It is exactly the way she wanted her fantasy to be played out in real life.
When Lewis comes too, he finds himself strung out on the bed in a star shape. His hands and feet are bound tightly, with no room to move any part of his body other than his head. When Sui-Lee sees him awake, she even smiles.
“What do you want from me?” Lewis asks.
Sui-Lee gets up from the chair and walks over to the bed, her long dark hair flowing. Despite his predicament, she looks strangely beautiful. She is undoing the buttons on her blue and white pinafore very slowly, watching Lewis all the while. She is teasing him. Eventually she brings her mouth close to Lewis’s ear.
“I want your life, Ben.” She smiles again and then starts unbuttoning his checked shirt button by button. “But first, I want your body.” She runs her hands over his torso, slowly inching her way down his midriff, her fingers teasing as she toys with the waistband on his boxer shorts.
As if remembering something, she jumps off the bed and reaches into her rucksack. She picks out a cell phone, presses a few buttons and Lewis hears a cell phone ringing. It is his ringtone, the phone with Leyla Zamani’s SIM card in it. She is dialling Leyla’s number. Following the ringtone, Sui-Lee reaches into Lewis’s inner jacket pocket and locates the vibrating device. She holds it up triumphantly and beams.
“Thought you could keep this from me did you Ben?” She laughs again, wrinkling her nose up at the end. Lewis considers that in normal circumstances she might even be cute.
“Why did you take it from the woman, Ben?” she asks, placing it in her rucksack along with her own cell phone. “I saw you do it. It was an expert palm job.” She allows herself a little laugh. Without warning she places her warm hand on top of Lewis’s boxer shorts. This action causes a different form of electric shock to rocket through Lewis’s body. Despite his predicament, it is not unpleasant. “I am quite good at palm jobs too.” She makes a high-pitched giggling sound as she rubs the heel of her hand against him, feeling him stir beneath her touch.
“Was it you that planted the bomb in my apartment?” Lewis tries distraction therapy, knowing that it is unlikely to succeed for long.
“Too bad for the Russian woman, wasn’t it?” She steps towards the bed. Lewis can see that she is wearing nothing under the pinafore. “It was meant for you, Ben darling. But no matter, the Russians had killed a colleague of mine recently, so now we’re evens.”
“Was that you on the motorbike this morning as well?”
“You shouldn’t keep reminding me of my mistakes, Ben. Look on the bright side. If I had succeeded, you and I wouldn’t be able to be doing this, would we?” She is back on the bed once more, this time grinding herself on him as she brings her face close to his. Lewis can feel himself grow as she gyrates her pelvis. He is powerless to stop himself.
“Why are you so keen to kill me?”
Sui-Lee sits up sadly and looks down at him, arms crossed over her now bare breasts. “Because I have my orders, so sorry, Ben. We always obey orders, don’t we? ‘Destroy the phone and anyone who might know its secrets’ they said.” She leans down closer to him and whispers in hi
s ear again. “There was nothing in my orders, however, about not having fun along the way.” She giggles, slowly slithering down the bed and beginning to unbutton his flies.
39
Edgware Road
The device is identical to the one that Sui-Lee has used in his apartment. It is as crude as it is effective. She shows it to him before placing it next to the foot of Lewis’s bed. She tells him how the bomb will be primed to go off the moment the door is opened. Lewis’s mind is going overtime, trying to find a solution to this sudden nightmare, each time drawing a blank.
“Is there no way we could do this differently?” he asks at one point. “We could have such fun together, you and I.”
She looks at him sadly. “Ah, so sorry, Ben. It would have been delicious, truly. But it’s just not possible, not this time.”
She is positioning one of the ‘L’ - shaped metal plates on the doorframe.
“How did you always know how to find me?” he asks.
She laughs. “That’s my little secret, Ben.”
Sui-Lee joins the two wires from the bomb to each of the ‘L”- shaped plates. The wires are long, certainly long enough to stretch from the doorframe to the device at the foot of the bed. Satisfied that her work has been completed correctly, she comes across to where Ben lay and kisses him briefly on the lips. “I have to go now, Ben. So sorry. Hopefully we can meet in the next life.” She kisses him again, turns to pick up her rucksack and then heads for the door. Opening it briefly, she places the ‘Please Make Up My Room’ on the outside handle. Whispering a final “Goodbye, Ben,” she pulls the door shut behind her. She takes the arming device from her rucksack and points it at the where the bomb is located behind the door. Lewis hears a loud ‘click’ as the bomb becomes primed, a tiny yellow light now illuminated on the top of the device indicating that it is armed and ready to detonate.
How the hell do you get out of this one, Marine?
40
Edgware Road
In the excitement of the moment, the one thing that the Chinese woman has not done is to check the tightness of Lewis’s bindings. What began as no possible movement has changed during the course of their playtime. The one faint glimmer of hope that Lewis has, now that he has been left alone with the room door closed and the bomb primed is that there is suddenly a small amount of wriggle room in his right hand restraint.
The webbing tied around Lewis’s hands and feet is held in place by the tension of the straps. Around each wrist there is a form of slipknot that binds itself tighter the greater the tension. If he could somehow increase the amount of slack on the right hand strap then perhaps he might even be able to create enough movement to get his hand free? He reasons that the small amount of give that he now can feel must have been caused by one of the bed castors having bent a little. If he exerts more pressure on all four straps at once, then possibly this might further bend the offending castor? In the absence of any other alternative, it is worth trying.
He tugs away with all his might for several minutes. Very quickly, his body becomes drenched in sweat. He, on the other hand is simply exasperated by any discernable lack of progress. The more he pulls on the webbing, the tighter the slipknot binds on itself. This makes the prospect of ever being able to undo the knot even more remote. He continues at this for a while longer, still without progress, his shoulder sockets and arm muscles under immense strain from the forces he is putting them through. Soon the joints are sore and very tender. He is becoming angry and desperate in roughly equal measure, trying to put every ounce of effort he can muster into creating slack in the webbing. There is still no movement. Bracing himself for yet one further monumental effort, he tries once more, pulling fiercely on each of the four straps at the same time.
A remarkable thing happens. The webbing around his left wrist suddenly breaks free of its restraining castor. His left arm is now completely free. At the same time, one of the leg restraints also seems to have given a little. With one hand now free and less tension on his body, it surely has to be possible to loosen the tension in the right hand strap? If only he could work the slipknot loose a bit, he might be able to wriggle his way out of that strap as well?
Nothing moves initially. Using fingernails to inch the knot strands apart, little by little they begin to slacken. Another couple of minutes and the slipknot is looser. Eventually Lewis, with much effort, is able to remove his hand from out of that restraint as well. Two down, two to go, the remaining two in theory easier.
Some while later, his legs finally free, his priority becomes one of immobilising the bomb. For this he will need wire. There is a desk lamp on a table in the corner whose cable flex looks ideal. He picks up the lamp and is carrying the whole assembly over towards the door when he stops dead in his tracks.
Someone is quietly knocking on the outside of the door.
Worse still, he can hear a key card being inserted in the lock.
41
Edgware Road
Lewis races to the door and sits on the floor quickly. With his back now pressing firmly against the door itself, he calls out as loudly and as succinctly as he can muster. “Whoever you are, do not open this door. I repeat, do not come in, do you understand me?”
There is silence for a moment, and then he hears a voice he recognises.
“Ben? Is that you?”
“Mel?”
“What the fuck are you doing in Leyla’s room, for God’s sake, Ben?”
“Trying to diffuse a bomb.”
“A bomb? Are you trying to be funny?”
“Listen, Mel, and listen carefully. I don’t know why you are here. I have been tasered and then tied up in this room by a Chinese woman who placed a bomb at the end of the bed. It is primed to go off the moment anyone opens the door. Do you understand me?”
“Shit, Ben. Are you being serious? This isn’t some kind of perverted wind up?”
“I am deadly serious. I can see the device as I’m speaking. If I hadn’t just been able to escape, the plan was for me to have been blown sky high the moment someone like you came barging in.”
“We should evacuate the hotel, send in bomb disposal, that sort of thing.”
“Yes to all of the above. However, first I need to try and get out. You can help by making sure that no one, I repeat no one, tries to come in until I say it’s safe.”
“I hope you know what you’re doing? I still say we should be evacuating the building right now.”
“Trust me. I need five minutes, and then I agree.”
With Mel standing guard, Lewis has time quickly to get dressed before attempting to make the door safe. Checking his jacket, he is relieved to find Leyla Zamani’s original phone still in his inner pocket as well as the gold chain and key in his trouser pocket. He smiles to himself as he sets to work stripping the flex from the desk lamp. He might just have pulled one over that perverted Chinese bitch after all.
Minutes later and he has extracted a two-metre strand of plastic coated wire from the lamp flex. He strips the plastic sheathing from either end to reveal a few centimetres of exposed copper wire. Hands steady and controlling his breathing, he joins one of the bare copper wire ends to the ‘L’ – shaped plate attached to the door frame. The then affixes the other end to the exposed end of wire that links the bomb to the other plate attached to the door itself. With both ends of this new wire firmly and robustly connected, a new electrical circuit has been made that bypasses the doorplates completely. It is now time to detach one of the plates from the door itself, a procedure that once complete will allow the door to be opened. It is a bit of a struggle, the tape holding the plate in position tricky to remove but in the end he succeeds. Gingerly, the whole while holding his breath, he opens the door.
“Mel?” he calls out eventually, leaning against the frame. “Time to hit the fire alarm.” He can see her cowe
ring behind a pillar several feet way, a mixture of terror and disbelief etched on her face.
“Are you okay?” she asks uncertainly. Lewis isn’t sure whether it is genuine compassion or curiosity in her voice. He is beyond caring at this point.
“We need to get this place evacuated. You should call the police and the bomb squad. Before you ask, no, I am not about to subject myself to any further police questioning. And yes, the Chinese woman did take Leyla’s phone. Sorry. There was nothing I could do to stop her.”
“You can’t simply walk away from all this Ben. There’ll be questions that need answering.”
“Like why are you here this morning, do you mean?”
She gives him a look before answering. “I told you I was coming to this conference today. I thought I’d have a look in Leyla’s room for myself to see whether I could find this wretched dossier.”
Lewis thinks about this for a moment. “It’s not here. I checked.”
He is standing alongside her and, without warning, kisses her on the lips. “That was for last night. It was good. Perhaps it might even have been very good. However, for now, I’ve got to be going.”
They walk side by side as far as the lift lobby.
“Don’t run too far, Ben. There are always ways of finding someone.”
“I wouldn’t bet on that.”
“Trust me, Ben. I can find you.”
‘We’ll see.” With that, he hits the fire alarm button positioned on an adjacent wall: all manner of sirens begin blaring.
“Until next time, Mel. Don’t forget to call the bomb squad.”
Then, with that, he is gone.
42
Nr Edgware Road
Edgware Road is pandemonium. Conference delegates are pouring out of the Europa hotel and wandering aimlessly. Everyone is confused, with people walking randomly amongst the gridlocked traffic. The noise of police and fire sirens fills the neighbourhood and, to compound matters, it has started to rain. It is the slow, steady mist that autumn frequently brings to London.
The Dossier (Ben Lewis Thriller Book 1) Page 11
