Siege by Simon Kernick Read Free Book Online

could lose my job over this.’
    ‘Then you’ll have to come back to Oz with me, won’t you?’
    She wanted to tell him then that she’d made her mind up to go with him, but decided to break the news when they were sharing a glass of wine after she’d finished her shift and everything had calmed down. ‘I don’t want to leave under a cloud. It wouldn’t be right.’
    ‘Look, you did the right thing. Don’t worry about it. If they try to sack you over it, we’ll sue the bastards.’
    ‘Do you think I should call Siobhan and let her know what’s happened?’ she asked, mounting the fire exit steps.
    Rod sighed. ‘I would, babe. Otherwise it’ll look like you’re trying to hide something. But don’t worry, all right? You’re going to be fine. We both are.’
    She had a sudden, overwhelming urge to go home. To walk out of the hotel and forget the whole bloody job with all its hassles and moaning guests and head back to their little flat and jump straight into his arms. Rod had taken the day off after their late one the previous night – as a self-employed plumber, he could get away with it – and he’d tried to get Elena to do the same. She should have done too. She hadn’t had a day off sick during her whole time at the Stanhope, which given the levels of absenteeism in the hospitality industry almost certainly put her in a minority of one. Instead she’d done the right thing – and now it was going to cost her her job. Siobhan was a supportive GM, and the two of them had always got on well, but Elena couldn’t see her boss siding with her over this one.
    ‘Shit,’ said Rod down the phone, interrupting her thoughts.
    Elena frowned. ‘What is it?’
    ‘They’re saying on the TV that there’s been an explosion at the Westfield. It sounds like it might be a bomb. Have you heard anything over there?’
    The Westfield was barely a mile from where they lived, and she and Rod had been shopping there the other week.
    ‘No, nothing. But I haven’t been past a TV in the last twenty minutes. Has anyone been hurt?’
    ‘I don’t think they know yet. It’s only just happened, but they’re saying it’s in the underground car park. Blimey, it’s all going on today, isn’t it? Maybe you ought to come home. Call Siobhan and tell her you’ve been traumatized by your experience with that Arab bloke and get back here for a bit of R and R.’
    Elena sighed. ‘I’ll be fine. Maybe I’ll take tomorrow off, but I’m the only DM on today so I need to stay put.’
    As she spoke, she heard someone talking on the steps above her. Looking up, she saw a young room service waiter on the phone by the third-floor doors. His tray was on the floor in front of him. She’d never met Armin before, but she’d have bet a week’s wages it was him.
    ‘I’ve got to go,’ she told Rod. ‘I’ll talk to you later, OK?’
    Without waiting for an answer, Elena ended the call and marched up to the waiter.
    He quickly ended his own call and replaced the phone in his pocket.
    ‘Armin,’ she snapped, reading his nametag. ‘Where have you been? Rooms 422 and 608 haven’t received their food orders.’ She looked down at the full tray at his feet. ‘I assume that’s them.’
    Armin was lean and wiry, and would have been quite good-looking if it hadn’t been for the pinched, aggressive expression he wore. He looked her up and down dismissively. ‘Sorry,’ he said in heavily accented English, sounding like he didn’t mean it. ‘I got held up.’
    ‘You left the kitchen more than twenty minutes ago. How held up can you be?’
    ‘I was on the phone.’
    ‘Who to?’
    He hesitated before answering. ‘A friend.’
    Elena considered herself a fair boss, and one who didn’t lose her temper easily, but Armin’s bizarrely unapologetic attitude was infuriating her. ‘You shouldn’t be calling your friends in office hours. Especially when you’re in the middle of delivering room service orders. What were you thinking