It sounded like anger — no doubt from bidder number four. Sharp words were being exchanged, albeit in a hushed tone.
A glass smashed and Danielle heard the sound of someone stomping off. The heavy door opened, and then closed with a reverberating thud.
The thin man came to the center of the room, where he could be seen from all the alcoves.
“Bidder number four has decided to withdraw,” he said. “But the auction will continue.”
Danielle wished she knew who bidder number four had been; perhaps she could pry it out of the thin man. She had a hunch it was the false dilettante. She tried to lock his features in her brain: six feet tall, broad shoulders, dark curly hair, and wide-set brown eyes; his teeth were uneven and at least two were chipped. When she got the chance she’d describe these details to Moore and have someone back at the NRI run the profile.
Bidding began on the next item, and Najir offered the iPad back to Danielle.
“Want to finish me off?”
Danielle smiled. Despite Najir’s dour expression, she had no doubt that a U.S. government check would be forthcoming to replenish his bank account.
“That’s all right,” she said. “I’ve got what we came for.”
She turned to where the guards were boxing up the scroll. They placed it in the case and moved to seal it, but as one of the guards poured the wax, a minor vibration shook the room.
It was very slight, almost unfelt, but enough to make the filaments in the track lighting dim for an instant and a few glasses clink almost inaudibly together.
Danielle glanced around the room. The burning candles moved sideways for a second, as if air had been sucked from the room.
No one else seemed to notice. Bidding on the hoplite’s staff was still going strong; the sounds of whispers and quiet murmurs from the other alcoves continued. But the hair on Danielle’s neck stood up.
“Something’s wrong,” she said.
Najir nodded.
“Let’s get out of here.”
She put the champagne glass down and stepped forward just as a heavier boom sounded.
Still distant, this one shook things more visibly. Dust snowed down from the rafters; bottles clinked together on the wet bar. A glass fell to the floor.
This time everyone noticed.
Danielle and Najir moved first, pushing toward the exit, but another explosion rocked the building, blowing the door open and sending a wave of dust barreling toward them.
CHAPTER 27
Danielle crouched down and covered her nose in an attempt to keep from choking on the dust.
Najir gave her a handkerchief, which helped a little.
“Do you think we should go?” he asked.
She wasn’t sure. The explosion had sounded like a stun grenade used somewhere down the hall. She thought of the armed men they’d passed there.
Listening through the open door, she heard shouting, and then one of the guards stumbled into the main room, bleeding.
The thin man rushed up to him, and the two of them tried to close and bar the door; but just then it was smashed inward. Both the thin man and the Arab were flung away from it.
One of the auction guards fired a weapon and bullets began flying through the chamber. Danielle dove back into the alcove.
Lebanese words were shouted through the chamber.
“We are under arrest,” Najir said, putting his hands up.
“Arrest?” she asked.
“It seems this is a raid.”
“You guys own the police,” she said. “It doesn’t make any sense.”
“Someone here must owe a bigger chit,” he said.
The thin man backed into the alcove with them, hands above his head. The uniformed troopers moved in, pointing guns in each alcove, taking positions near the center of the room. Fifteen feet away, too far to lunge for. Another figure walked by slowly, inspecting the situation. He seemed to be their commander. He looked briefly at Najir and Danielle and then moved on, examining the remaining artifacts.
Danielle’s mind flashed back to what had happened in Paris. The men who killed Ranga posing as police. She thought about his statement, They are everywhere and they are nowhere. That could only be if they constantly seemed like others until revealing their plans.
“Something’s wrong here,” Danielle said.
“Yes, but it will be remedied,” the thin man said.
“No, it won’t,” she whispered, quietly enough so the trooper facing them could not hear. “This isn’t a raid — it’s a theft.”
“What are you talking about?”
“We have to do something or they’re going to kill us all,” she explained.
The thin man turned. “Are you insane?” he said. “Why should I listen to you?”
“Because I know who you are. You’re the number two here. That Arab guy who just took the door in the face, he’s your boss. He’s an Iraqi. Just low enough on the totem pole not to get his own playing card, but I’m guessing you’re one, too, and now you’re his lieutenant.”
“We are equal partners,” he said.
“Great, didn’t mean to insult you,” she said. “But either one of you should be able to tell what you’re seeing,” she said, then elaborated. “Look at their shoes. Do those look like soldiers’ shoes to you?”
The thin man glanced at the guards’ footwear: They were hiking boots, not polished soldiers’ boots like those of the men upstairs.
The leader walked by again, counting. He seemed to be looking for something. His shoes were more professional, but they were a businessman’s shoes, not combat boots.
“Imposters,” the thin man whispered. “But what can we do?”
The leader of the faux troops stopped to speak with the two guards at the center of the room. Whispering in their own right, probably discussing execution orders.
“How did you get down here?” she asked.
“These are the catacombs. There are many ways.”
Before she could make an additional statement, the leader stepped toward their alcove. Without a word he grabbed Danielle by the hand and dragged her from the spot. She did not resist much. But that was to the man’s detriment, for he kept his grip halfheartedly.
As he glanced away toward the front door, Danielle flipped her hand, reversing the grip by grabbing the man’s arm under his elbow and twisting it. Her other arm came down like a hammer and shattered his elbow.
At almost the same moment Najir shoved the thin man toward one guard and lunged forward, tackling a third.
Danielle whipped around, grabbing the hoplite’s dory. She came up swinging, jamming the silver butt into the first guard’s neck and swinging the spear end around, smashing it across the temple of the other guard.
Four of the men who’d broken in were down or occupied, but the others had begun firing.
Danielle and Najir ducked into separate alcoves as gunfire erupted. From the rear of the chamber the auctioneer’s remaining security members returned fire.
The thin man scrambled to her side, crowding her.
“Get behind me,” she said, shoving him farther into the alcove. She needed room to swing the spear.
“Faisal!” she shouted.
“I’m all right,” a call came back. “Get out if you can!”
She turned to the thin man. “Where’s the exit? The one you came in through?”
The thin man pointed toward the back of the room, but there was no way to make it without getting shredded from one or both sides. Shells cut close to the wall, blasting bits of the stone out.
She glanced forward. The men were dragging their injured comrades toward the front door, but they had something else with them. And from the size and shape of the box, Danielle guessed what it was.
“They have the scroll!” she shouted.