Martha gasped, shrinking back into the corner of the booth.
I looked up toward the entrance.
Two men wearing heavy black tactical coats had just walked out of the freezing rain. They both wore the silver Ironclad shields on their lapels.
They weren't here for coffee. They bypassed the counter entirely, their eyes scanning the worn leather booths with cold, military precision.
The guard from the hotel entrance had sent them to find us. Richard wasn't just keeping me out of the hotel. He was hunting me down to ensure I couldn't even try to come back.
The taller of the two guards locked eyes with me. A cruel, satisfied smile spread across his face as he reached under his coat and began walking slowly down the narrow diner aisle, directly toward our table.
The heavy footsteps of the Ironclad guards echoed against the diner’s cheap linoleum floor.
“Hang up the phone, Arthur,” Martha whispered frantically, already sliding out of the booth.
I pressed the red button, cutting the line with Elena. I shoved the phone into my pocket and grabbed Martha’s hand, pulling her toward the swinging aluminum door that led to the kitchen.
“Hey!” the taller guard barked, his voice booming over the quiet hum of the refrigerators. “Don’t make this difficult, old man. Sit down.”
We didn’t sit down. We hit the swinging kitchen door at a dead sprint.
The sudden burst of heat, steam, and the smell of frying onions washed over us. Two line cooks looked up in shock as a seventy-two-year-old man in a tweed jacket and his wife bolted past the deep fryers.
“Out the back!” one cook yelled, instinctively pointing toward the heavy steel fire door at the end of the narrow aisle.
I slammed my shoulder into the crash bar. The door flew open, spilling us out into the freezing, rain-soaked alleyway behind the diner.
Behind us, I heard the kitchen door crash open, followed by the shouts of the guards knocking over a stack of metal trays.
“Run,” I gasped, my chest already burning from the sudden exertion.
We scrambled down the dark, narrow alley, our shoes slipping on the wet cobblestones. We ducked behind a massive industrial dumpster just as the heavy steel door of the diner burst open.
The two guards spilled into the alley, flashlights instantly clicking on, sweeping beams of harsh white light through the freezing rain.
“Split up,” the taller guard ordered, his voice echoing off the brick walls. “He couldn’t have gone far. Sterling wants him held in the hotel basement until the vote is done.”
Martha pressed her face against my shoulder, trembling violently. I wrapped my arms around her, trying to suppress the ragged sound of my own breathing.
We waited in agonizing silence as the heavy footsteps moved past our hiding spot, fading toward the far end of the block.
When the alley was finally quiet, Martha looked up at me, her face pale in the ambient city light.
“Arthur,” she whispered. “We can't get back into the hotel. They have the front and the lobby completely locked down. We have fifteen minutes left.”
I stared across the street at the towering, floodlit structure of the Beaumont Hotel.
“We aren’t going through the front,” I said, a dangerous new clarity settling over my mind.
I grabbed her hand again and led her out of the alley, staying in the deep shadows of the awnings until we reached the side street that bordered the eastern wall of the hotel.
There was a massive, rusted steel roll-up door set into the brickwork, marked Beaumont Freight and Loading - Authorized Personnel Only.