Marshall was half asleep on the couch, his eyes kept dropping every few seconds but the sudden scream from the Football game he was watching brought him back to the present. He wasn't exactly alone in the house, none of his girls were there, but Clara was, although she'd only had dinner with him before excusing herself for being tired. He'd scoffed to himself thinking about what's she'd said, even he wasn't that stupid to notice she didn't want to be near him.

He was starting to doze off again when the click of the front door made him shoot straight up from his position. His first thought was that someone was breaking in but then realised that it would make more sense that someone was actually breaking out.

''Where are you going?'' Clara visibly jumped up from her position trying to open the door to whirl around at him.

''Shit, I thought you'd gone to bed,'' Clara responded, an innocent look on her face. Although Marshall wasn't fooled, he was very much confused as to why his assistant was trying to get out of his house, while she thought he was asleep.

''I am I that horrible that you feel the need to sneak out when I'm asleep?'' Marshall asked and Clara realised then how strange it was that she'd be leaving at ten at night.

''No I just didn't want to wake you up when I left. I'm meeting a friend, I ordered a taxi, look out the window if you don't believe me,'' Marshall frowned before ducking back into the living to look through the window. He furrowed his eyebrows when he noticed a taxi out the front.

''I could've just dropped you off. All you had to do was ask,'' Clara just nodded at him before turning around to continue unlocking the door so she could get out.

''I'll bear that in mind next time. I'll see ya tomorrow,'' Marshall opened his mouth to say something, but before he could she was gone.

''Ok that's it I'm googling this chick,'' he muttered to himself instead, running up to his room to grab his laptop and boot it up.

°°°

The taxi driver had asked Clara if she wanted him to wait for her, she shook her head, knowing that she'd be there for quite a while and didn't want to pay the bill at the end. So instead she got his number and said she'd ring when she needed picking up. Luckily, the driver agreed and gave her his number, before then leaving her at her destination.

The outside of the hotel was even worse than before and Clara didn't think I could have been possible. There now was a distinct soldered patch on the left of the building where the fire had occurred almost two days ago. Even more, windows seemed to have been deliberately smashed in. Now there was a wooden sign posted out front which read, 'closed,' Clara couldn't help but laugh as she read it since it was so obvious the hotel would've been closed.

The front door, was off its hinges meaning Clara had to squeeze herself between the gap it had created. For once her height and skinny stature were good for something. Once inside she took the torch she had brought with her out of her bag and switched it on. She was struck was the overwhelming smell of burnt metal and wood as she waited for her eyes to adjust to the change in light. The next step for Clara was to locate the room that she would have been staying in, the one where the fire allegedly started as a result of an air conditioning system that had overheated.

Every single step that Clara took, the stair creaked and groaned beneath her. The cracking got louder and louder as she climbed, making her feel as if it would collapse at any second. Thankfully, she made it to the top without a single foot getting stuck or even her whole body falling through. At the top of the stairs, she was met with a hallway that led off in all sorts of directions. However, the ash and burnt wallpaper was enough to lead her straight to the room that she needed to be in.

Upon entering the room, Clara knew something was wrong because for one surly if an air conditioner had overheated it would have exploded and completely destroyed the room. Another problem Clara found was that after swishing the torchlight around the room for at least five minutes, she found no sign of an air conditioning unit anywhere. It was if there hadn't been one in the room at all.

''Miranda, I don't think the fire was a coincidence,'' after searching the room some more Clara decided to call Miranda.

''What have you found?'' Miranda asked and Clara could tell that she wasn't liking the lateness of the call.

''It's more a question of what I didn't find. There's no air-conditioner unit in the room and I'm pretty sure this building is too old to have them anywhere,'' Clara explained, a moment of silence fell between them as she continued looking around, this time crouching down on the floor.

''What do you think started the fire?'' Miranda asked. There was a distinct shuffle of paper through the phone, alerting Clara that she was ready to take down anything she said.

Clara ran her hands over the burnt rug, keeping the torch in between her teeth as she knelt down. It was when she came into something both soft and hard that she realised why had caused the fire. The product that crumbled between her fingers was clearly wax. Then running the torch across the floor below her feet she saw remnants of it everywhere.

''Candles,'' she simply stated, ''someone lit a bunch of candles and I'm guessing knocked them over, there's wax still everywhere.''

''But why? They must have known you weren't going to in the room at the time so why do it?'' Miranda asked and at that moment Clara didn't have an answer.

'''Maybe to scare me or...shit,'' Clara had just lifted the cover off of the metal framed bed to look underneath when her blood ran cold.

''What is it?'' Miranda asked, worry laced in her tone, a result of her agent's sudden outburst.

''They knew this was the room I was going to be in. So they set fire to it, knowing full well I'd come back and investigate it,'' Clara paused in her explanation to take a deep breath before uttering her next words, ''there's a bomb under the bed.''

The bold red numbers flashed up at Clara. It had been placed under the bed after the fire and a possible trick switch to start the countdown was probably located somewhere in the room or just outside, because the countdown hadn't started yet. That was the only good part, the problem was that the countdown was at one minute meaning she needed to find a way of getting out of the room without triggering the explosion or she wouldn't be able to look out for Marshall anymore.

''Is it counting down?'' Clara explained that it hadn't started yet and Miranda understood the predicament she was in, ''I'll get an expert.''

''I could just jump out the window,'' Clara suggested, carefully standing up and checking the floor as she made her way over to the window, shifting it open. There were only two floors to the hotel, so the jump wasn't far, blush there was an old mattress already under the window to catch her.

''And allow the next innocent person to come across it and blow themselves apart. No way,'' Clara huffed waiting by the window waiting for the expert to come to the phone.

''Agent Taylors I'm Tom.''

''I don't give to shits about pleasantries right now, just tell me what to do with this bomb,'' she could see Miranda rolling her eyes at Clara's rudeness from where she stood halfway across the world.

''Um right, you need to carefully move it from under the bed so you can get a look at the internal wiring,'' Clara gulped, placing the torch on the floor by her feet and the phone on speaker next to it. With shaking hands she carefully picked the bulky unit up, placing it on the rug.

''Ok what now?'' She asked, picking the torch up so she could flash it around the bomb to get a better look at it.

''Open up it up at the back. You shouldn't need a screwdriver since it's probably a homemade one of shorts and the back should just slide off,'' again she rested the torch on the ground next to her as she slid the back off. She breathed a sigh of relief as the wires came into view and the countdown hadn't gone off yet.

''Let me guess I gotta cut some of these wires now?'' She asked, already delving into her bag to find some wire cutters. She'd brought them just in case there was some sort of wire fence she'd have to get through to get into the hotel.

''Er yeah there should be a blue one, cut that one first,'' her heartbeat was all she could hear as she bent over the wires. She kept having to pull her away as her hands kept shaking, that she was afraid she'd cut the wrong one.

''You can do this,'' Clara whispered to herself as she readied the cutters over the blue wire, ''I did not sign up for this shit,'' she muttered, squeezing her eyes shut as her hands tightened around the leaves. There was a click, Clara opened her eyes slowly, nothing had happened, apart from the blue wire completely disconnected from the others.

''Which one now,'' she although, she had a feeling she knew which one it would be.

''The red. Be careful, if one wrong move and it's over.''

''Thanks for the confidence boost,'' Clara muttered to herself as she prepared herself to cut the wire. Again she couldn't stop her hands from shaking as she pressed the cutters together around the red wire.

''Don't fuck up now,'' she whispered squeezing the handles together. She couldn't look, moving her head to the side and scrunching her eyes shut as she curled her hands around the cutter handles, feeling the pressure as they clamped around the wire.

It was now or never.