Something He Can't Quite Remember

People Don't Really Enjoy Waking Up Locked In...?

BERKLEY SQUARE, MAYFAIR, LONDON, ENGLAND

Hero leant over the James' sleeping form, as the black cab drew to a halt in the open, leafy square, just as he jerked awake and smashed his head into hers.

"Sorry," he muttered, fumbling for the door, and, having opened it, falling out onto the pavement. He walked into the hotel without a glance in her direction. She rubbed her head, and jumped out after him, grabbing her rucksack as she went. She threw a twenty and a hurried "Thank you!" at the cabbie, and hurried into the small but no doubt exorbitant hotel.

James was leaning against the long mahogany desk, talking and laughing with the blonde behind it. She grinned, and skipped over.

"Hey, sweetie! Why'd you leave me all alone outside?" she said, slinging an arm around James' shoulder and leaning into his side.

The girl stared. "He's so cute, isn't he?" Hero grinned. "Met him at the airport," she explained, and giggled.

"My usual room, please, Miss Sharpe," said, James said, rolling his eyes and going off to call the single elevator.

Sighing, James collapsed onto the huge double bed. Hero placed her one bag, on the silk-covered chair and looked around. The room was spacious, with a small hidden cupboard set into one wall. A door led to an en-suite, and there was a small surveillance camera in the corner of the ceiling. She moved to the window, and looked out to the busy London square. Two CCTV cameras were mounted on the bank opposite, one on the hotel they were in, and one on the office block to their right.

"We're safe," she confirmed, and James let out a small sigh of relief. "For now," she felt compelled to add, if only to reduce the unbearable smugness.

"Now what, Miss Pierce?" he asked, raising a perfect blonde eyebrow.

"There's someone we need to see," she said.

"Okay, well tell me later, please. I've never felt so terrible... not since... God, I think that hangover is the first thing I can distinctly remember."

Hero's head snapped around. "What?"

"I have this memory of waking up in my Manhattan apartment with a splitting headache, and no idea who I was."

"Do you remember anything before that?" she pressed.

"No..." James trailed off. Hero thought it was because of his annoyance at his apparent amnesia, but then he passed out on the gold bedspread.

"Why is it this guy keeps passing out on me?" she muttered. "It has got to be a new habit. Though maybe not..." Lost in memory, Hero left the room smirking, and locked James in.

She was taking the lift down to the ground floor when her phone buzzed. She glanced at the caller ID and went cold. P. Jones. She counted twelve rings, and the phone went silent. An alert popped up on the screen: Missed call from P. Jones. Redial?

She declined the extremely gracious offer, and turned her phone off. Flipping it over, she pulled the reverse side off and prized the SIM card from the back. Placing it carefully on the floor, she raised her heel and drove it into the little plastic card. That is why I wear heels.

Scooping up the pieces of circuit, she shoved both them and the phone into her pocket. The lift reached the ground floor, and she stepped out into the Persian carpeted, chandelier-adorned foyer. Sweeping out into the street, only pausing to place the room key on the desk, smiling bitterly at 'Miss Sharpe,'she attracted more than one glance from the men in polo shirts or

pinstripes lounging on glamorous settees, and glares from their small, fox-faced wives. Her dark hair was coiled in a loose knot that fell onto her pale neck, and though that was where the men started looking their eyes soon drifted lower.