Blood Loss. Alex Barclay

are coming back to reclaim Leo that they know which room to go to.’

      Jared paused for a moment, then smiled. ‘Peter Parker is Spiderman, right?’

      ‘Yes, he is,’ said Mark, ‘just so we’re clear …’ He smiled, and turned around to see his wife struggling back to the reception desk with her bucking son jammed onto her hip and shouting at her to let him go.

      ‘Take him,’ said Erica to Mark. She almost dropped Leo at Mark’s feet. The little boy sprang up.

      Erica shook her head. ‘He’s like those indestructible, I don’t know, zombies that you can’t kill – they keep coming back to life.’

      Mark looked at Jared. ‘We don’t want to kill him,’ he said. ‘Honestly. Or return him to the Parkers.’

      Erica had clearly heard the Parker reference before. She called, ‘Laurie, sweetie?’

      Laurie closed her book and came over.

      ‘Just like that,’ said Erica, squeezing Laurie against her, and kissing the top of her head. ‘How are you feeling, sweetheart?’

      ‘I’m fine now,’ said Laurie. ‘I don’t know what happened, but the pain’s gone.’

      Erica held the back of her hand to Laurie’s forehead. ‘No fever. And you’ve got good color in your cheeks. I pronounce you fit and well.’

      Laurie smiled. ‘Why, thank you.’

      Leo was swinging out from the reception desk, his feet working hard to climb to the top. He dropped to the floor and ran away.

      ‘Your turn,’ said Erica.

      Laurie ran after him.

      Jared went into the back office.

      ‘Loving the loose cannon desk clerk,’ said Mark.

      ‘I know,’ said Erica. She wrapped her arms around Mark, and kissed his neck. Then she moved up to his ear.

      ‘Is this about hotel sex?’ said Mark, leaning back.

      Erica smiled. ‘That goes without saying,’ she said. ‘This is about dinner.’

      ‘What about Laurie … is she feeling better?’ said Mark. ‘Is she OK to be left with a sitter?’

      ‘Oh, she’s fine,’ said Erica. ‘I think it might have been a little attention seeking?’

      ‘Or she wanted to make sure we wouldn’t leave her to go to dinner,’ said Mark.

      ‘No,’ said Erica. ‘I was just talking to her, she said she was absolutely fine. So?’

      Mark hooked his arm around Erica’s waist, and pulled her close. ‘I promised the kids I’d watch Toy Story 3.’

      ‘Well, I promised myself I wouldn’t lose my mind,’ said Erica. ‘So, you watch the movie, I’ll go down to the bar and pick up a snowboarder.’

      ‘Mrs Whaley,’ said Mark, ‘the kids and I can watch the movie while you take a bath, slip into something less comfortable, and by the time you have done the makeup I don’t think you need to wear, yet apply so beautifully, I’ll be ready to accompany you to the bar to oversee your choice of snowboarder.’

      ‘Deal,’ said Erica.

      Jared came back to the desk. ‘Alrighty,’ he said, setting two keys on the desk.

      ‘Old-fashioned keys,’ said Erica. ‘Nice touch.’

      ‘You’ll be in Room 304,’ said Jared. ‘That’s on the third floor. Elevator is that way. You’ll be staying in a family suite – two inter-connecting rooms. Do you need help with your bags?’

      ‘No, thank you,’ said Mark.

      ‘Well, OK then. Enjoy your stay.’

      ‘Oh, we will,’ said Erica.

      ‘We’d like to arrange for a sitter to look after the kids for a couple hours, while we go down to dinner,’ said Mark.

      ‘Not a problem,’ said Jared. ‘For what time?’

      ‘Eight thirty for the sitter?’ said Mark. ‘Nine for dinner?’ He turned to Erica. ‘That’ll leave us some time to check her out before we entrust our prized possessions to her.’

      3

      Agent Ren Bryce sat at her desk in The Rocky Mountain Safe Streets Task Force, a violent-crime squad of eleven based in Denver. It was Saturday night, and everyone had gone to the bar, except the boss, Special Supervisory Agent Gary Dettling, and Cliff James, Ren’s big-bear buddy. Cliff was ex-Jefferson County Sheriff’s Department. At fifty-three, he was the eldest of the team, and at two-hundred pounds, the most huggable. Cliff and Ren, along with blond, kind, grandma-friendly Robbie Truax and arrogant, short-ass numbers-guy Colin Grabien, had become a mini-squad of movable parts. The arrangement of their desks and the maneuvering of two filing cabinets could create a subtle break in the squad’s bullpen that was more psychological than visible. Otherwise, their boss would have done something about it. If he could have only thrown Colin Grabien out into the general population, that would have worked for Ren. The book was The Three Musketeers. Not The Three Musketeers and the Dickhead.

      Ren’s cell phone rang, and the screen flashed with a photo of her older brother Matt – her best friend, therapist, and moral conscience rolled into one. He was thirty-nine – two years older than Ren – and lived in Manhattan with his wife, Lauren, and their three-month-old son, Ethan.

      ‘Finally,’ said Matt when Ren answered.

      Silence.

      ‘You’re alive,’ said Matt.

      ‘Yes, I am,’ said Ren.

      ‘Just, you didn’t text back,’ said Matt. ‘And … did you get my voicemails?’

      ‘Sorry, yes,’ said Ren.

      ‘Are you OK?’ said Matt.

      ‘Yes!’ said Ren. ‘Why wouldn’t I be?’

      Pause. ‘Um … maybe because last month, you could barely make it from the bed to the sofa? And you phoned me several times bawling your eyes out. In the middle of the night—’

      ‘I’m so sorry,’ said Ren. ‘I know that’s hard with Ethan and everything …’

      ‘You can call me any time, you know that,’ said Matt. ‘I’m always here, but … that’s not the point. You dropped off the face of the earth.’

      ‘I’m sorry,’ said Ren. ‘I didn’t mean to worry you.’

      ‘You never do,’ said Matt.

      ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ said Ren.

      ‘Exactly that. You never mean to. Next time, keep me posted, that’s all.’

      ‘Fine.’ Jesus.

      ‘So … what have you been doing?’ said Matt. ‘Are you OK? What changed? I was so worried. Ever since Helen …’

      Ren was bipolar, unmedicated, and shrink-free. Her beloved psychiatrist of two years, Helen Wheeler, had been murdered four months earlier, and Ren and her FBI undercover past had been painfully entangled in her death.

      ‘Positive thinking!’ said Ren. ‘Talking to you really helped that last time, Matt. You cheered me up. And when I got off the phone, I just said, OK, what can I do? So I went online, looked at positive thinking websites, ordered some positive thinking books on Amazon. I looked up psychiatrists in Denver, printed off a few names … and I just told myself, get a grip.’

      ‘And did you find a psychiatrist?’ said Matt.

      ‘No