Exposed - A Thriller Novella (Chandler Series) by J.A. Konrath & Ann Voss Peterson (2 page)

“The strap has a steel wire in it,” Jacob
continued. “It can be used as a garrote.”

I tugged on the strap, feeling the bite of
the wire inside the leather. “Talk about a killer handbag.”

“So now that we have your wardrobe covered,
care to hear what you’ll be doing?”

“Shoot.”

“That’s it, actually. You’ll be going to a
photo shoot.”

“As in a modeling photo shoot?” Not a typical
day in my line of work. “Explain.”

“The Bradford and Sims Modeling Agency is a
front for—”

“Let me guess. Porn.”

“Too easy, but yes. And human trafficking.
They promise stardom to young girls, then ship them overseas and
sell them.”

“Sexual slavery. Nice.”

“We’re still gathering information on the
group.”

Gathering information? In our first two ops,
Jacob had been all about preparation. He’d known everything about
everything. That he was sending me in before he really knew what I
was facing made me uneasy.

“Is this a rush job?” I asked.

“Marked urgent, and we only have a small time
window, so we’ll need to keep in close contact in case the
situation changes.”

“These traffickers, you want me to read them
bedtime stories?” Before I put them to sleep.

“They aren’t the important thing here.
They’ve recruited the eighteen-year-old daughter of a VIP. You are
to return her to her father unharmed. Not a scratch. The orders are
specific about that. She cannot be harmed in any way, not even
slightly. I’m sending her photo. She’s using the name Julianne
James.”

A babysitting job. A first for me. I glanced
at the phone, and a picture of a pretty blonde came up on the
screen.

“Who’s her daddy?”

“I don’t have that information.”

It had to be someone important if they were
sending me in. There weren’t very many agents in the world with my
kind of training.

“Where is the shoot?”

“North of the Hamptons. Your contact is
working as a driver for the modeling agency. Your exchange is
E-B-P-D
.”

“Got it.”

“He’ll introduce you as new recruit Claire
Thomas.”

“Claire Thomas,” I repeated, trying on my new
name. I used and discarded identities like Kleenex. The only
constant was my codename: Chandler. My real name was nobody’s
business.

“You’re twenty-five years old, an aspiring
model from Brooklyn. Your contact will get you in. After you get
the girl, text your location to this number, and he’ll pick you
up.”

A number appeared on the screen.

“He’ll be at the curb in twenty minutes. And
Chandler?”

“Yes.”

“The girl thinks she’s getting her big break.
She might need some convincing before she’ll be willing to
leave.”

“And if I can’t convince her?”

“Just get her out of there in one piece.
Unharmed.” Jacob signed off.

I got dressed and did my best to channel my
inner Max Factor while I sank into the role. I was a wannabe model.
Several years younger than my actual age. Pretty. Spoiled. Used to
getting my way, but still naive about men. I was looking for my big
break. I would do whatever I could to get it.

I went heavy on the make-up, dark eyes and
too much pink lip gloss. The dress fit as if it was designed for
me, and the shoes made me feel like sex on a stick.

“I’m Claire Thomas,” I said into the mirror.
And I believed it.

I slipped my phone into the purse, then
headed down to meet my contact.

Human voices, background music, and the clack
of heels on marble floors all rose to greet me before I reached the
ground floor. The scent of coffee drifted from the resident
Starbucks, and a woman passed me wearing enough perfume to enchant
half of Times Square.

I personally disliked big anonymous hotels.
But due to my frequent need to be anonymous, I stayed in them
often. Sometimes the best place to hide was in a crowd. Even so,
negotiating the revolving door and stepping out into summer’s hot
chaos on the flashing neon streets of New York overloaded my
senses. The smell of hot dogs on the street corner and falafel down
the block warred with exhaust and teeming humanity. The jangle of
car horns and voices and the thump of a bass guitar assaulted me
from various angles. The late morning was warmer, stickier, than
the hotel lobby, a bit of autumn cool threatening to make an
appearance but chickening out.

I paused and forced myself to focus,
cataloging each noise and smell and sight, becoming grounded in the
now. At the same time, I shut off part of myself—the part that
worried about applying makeup and got an ego boost from a good
dress and sexy shoes—and I let the other part take over.

The part that had been trained to kill people
for the government.

Dismissing the white noise and glitz and big
city smells, I ignored what belonged there and singled out what
didn’t.

Someone was watching me.

I glanced north to 46th Street.

A man stared at me, standing with his hands
at his sides, on the curb next to a black Lincoln Town Car. He was
in his mid-thirties, handsome in that GQ kind of way, dressed in a
dark suit and sunglasses. It wasn’t his appearance or the car that
raised my notice—in midtown Manhattan, the only type of vehicle
more common than a black Town Car was a yellow taxi cab, and many
of the chauffeurs dressed as if they were auditioning for a role in
the
Men In Black
sequel. No, it was his air of calmness, of
stillness, of total focus, that was strong enough to raise the hair
on my arms.

And in that split-second assessment, I judged
him to be a dangerous man.

My contact, no doubt.

I made a quick visual sweep of the street to
be certain he was alone, and then I walked to the car. As I
approached, he climbed out, circled to the curb, and reached for
the back door handle with his left hand.

“Miss Thomas?”

I nodded. “Hello, Eddie.”

“Going to the ballet?”

“How about the park?”

“Yes. They have ducks.”

I suppressed a smile, amused that the only
noun beginning with the letter
D
he could manage on the fly
was
ducks
. His danger vibe went down a notch.

He opened the door and I settled into the
leather seat, then he circled back to his spot behind the wheel,
and soon we joined the flow of cabs, limos, and delivery
trucks.

Traffic moved well, and it took less time
than I’d estimated for us to get through midtown, take the Queens
Midtown Tunnel under the East River, and hit the Long Island
Expressway. Industrial landscapes gave way to shopping malls and
carefully managed green space, then on to nature preserves,
beaches, and country clubs. I inched the window open. The scents of
salt water and fresh cut grass tinged the air and the screech of
gulls rose over the whistling wind. The expressway dwindled to
winding roads and the housing seemed to range from vacation
mansions to vacation palaces.

“These aren’t nice men, you know.” The first
words he’d said since I’d climbed in the car.

His face tilted up to the rearview mirror,
and I met his stare.

“I’m not nice, either.”

I watched his lips turn up in the barest hint
of a smile. “I know we’re strangers, but can we get on a code-name
basis?”

“Call me Chandler.”

“Call me Morrissey.”

I wished I could see his eyes, but they were
hidden by his sunglasses. “Thanks for the tip, Morrissey.”

He swung the car into a long drive that wound
through a copse of salt-stunted trees.

“They aren’t going to let you take her. Not
without a fight. And they’re armed. You’re not.”

“How do you know I’m not?”

“Your purse doesn’t have anything heavier
than a cell phone in it. I can tell by how it hangs. And that dress
… you couldn’t conceal anything in that dress.”

“Just make sure you’re ready to pick us up
when you’re called.”

“I’ll be ready for more than that.”

The car emerged from foliage, and I caught my
first glimpse of the house. All contemporary angles, glass and
sprawl, it looked cold and hard and expensive. The blue of the
water beyond held the unreal look of a movie set.

I scooped in a breath of salt air.
My big
break. Photos on the beach. My name is Claire Thomas, and The
Bradford and Sims Modeling Agency is going to make me a
star.

“Remember,” Morrissey said out of the corner
of his mouth, “she can’t be harmed.”

That again.

I was going to ask him what the deal was with
that when the front door opened, and a man wearing a blue polo
shirt and gray trousers stepped out. Shoulders as wide as a
linebacker’s, he squinted blue eyes into the sun, his scalp pink
under blond stubble. He stood at the top of the staircase, a Tec-9
submachine gun hanging under his arm on a strap.

What kind of modeling agency required that
much fire power?

“Follow my lead.” Morrissey gave me a final
look and stepped out of the car. He circled the Lincoln and opened
my door. Like a good chauffeur, he offered his hand to help me from
the car.

I took it. His skin felt rough, a man used to
doing more than driving for a living. Jacob hadn’t told me anything
about him, but most likely his work was similar to mine. Though I
didn’t let on, I liked that he noticed my dress. After all this,
maybe we’d have an opportunity to get together. There was no room
in my life for a real relationship, but that didn’t mean I had no
needs. Someone like him might be just the ticket. No strings, no
complications.

He hauled me out into the sun and released my
hand. I allowed myself to look him over as I followed him up the
steps. The stillness I’d noticed earlier left his body, and his
stride took on the swagger of a man who fancied himself a player.
He tossed a look over his shoulder, pride with a hint of ownership
in his gaze, as if he’d just won a hand of blackjack in Vegas and I
was his prize.

I had to wonder if I changed that drastically
when settling into character. Probably. It was hard to know who
another person really was, but in this line of work it was damn
near impossible.

I’d be smarter to stick to the usual outlet
for my sexual energy; random men picked up in bars.

Morrissey stopped in front of the burly
sentinel and cocked one leg. “Hey, Udelhoffer. How’s it going?”

The behemoth eyed me. “Who is this?” His
accent carried hints of Eastern Europe but with Brooklyn overtones,
suggesting to me he’d been in the States for a while.

“Nice, huh?” Morrissey said, continuing with
his schtick. “Your boss said if I found girls to model, he’d give a
bonus. If they had something special clients liked, a little
extra.”

“This is a closed shoot.”

“Not what I heard.”

The big man gave Morrissey a dead-man’s
stare. “You heard wrong.”

I kept silent. A young girl in my situation
wouldn’t dare be too forward, not with her dreams on the line. If
Morrissey couldn’t pull this off, I’d find another way.

Morrissey thrust out his hand, palms up. “So,
what? You expect me to turn around and drive all the way back to
the city?”

Another stare for an answer, silent this
time.

Morrissey shook his head. “Not gonna happen.
I was given promises. I stuck my neck out here. This one?” He
motioned to me, “A favor for Tony D’Angelo.”

The man didn’t even spare me a glance but
kept his attention on Morrissey.

“You know who D’Angelo is, right?”

A nod from the hired help.

Morrissey continued, punctuating his words
with thrusting waves of his hands. “I said I’d help her get a job,
know what I mean? He’s not going to like it if I don’t come through
on my word. He might even call some of his friends, you know? And I
ain’t going to take all the blame.”

Udelhoffer let out a heavy sigh. “Wait here.”
He stepped into the house and closed the door behind him.

I did a quick scan of the doorway and eaves.
No closed circuit cameras. Probably not needed with an armed guard
at the entrance. Even so, I kept my voice low, paranoid about
bugs.

“D’Angelo? Let me guess. Gambino family?”

Morrissey gave a curt nod. “I needed to make
it easier to let you in than turn you away.”

“And you think they’ll buy that I’m some
mistress he needs to get rid of?”

“That depends on how well you sell it.”

When I’d assumed a cover identity in the
past, I had prided myself on preparation. Knowing everything about
who I was supposed to be and who I was dealing with had saved my
ass more than once. This operation had been rushed from the
beginning, and now I was supposed to be the pawn of a mob figure I
knew nothing about. I had to wonder if, in getting me in the door,
Morrissey had just handed me a death sentence.

“I can sell it.”

I would have to. Not only was my life
dependent on it, but so was a girl’s future.

The door swung open and Udelhoffer motioned
me inside. As soon as I stepped into the marble foyer, he held up a
hand, blocking Morrissey. “You’ll hear from me if she works
out.”

Morrissey nodded and the door closed in his
face.

I was on my own.

The man stared down at me with the dim look
of hired muscle. “You wanna be a model, huh?”

I channeled eager. “More than anything.”

He shrugged a shoulder and heaved another
sigh. “Yeah. We’ll take care of you. Purse.”

“Huh?”

He grabbed it without asking, digging a paw
inside, fingering my phone and make-up. If he noticed I was
conveniently missing a wallet or any kind of ID, he didn’t give me
any indication it made him suspicious.

“Come with me.”

I followed Udelhoffer to the back of the
house, taking note of my surroundings as I went. The house was
furnished in a modern, generic style, the pieces and arrangements
big on price tags but low on originality or warmth. I smelled
gardenias from the back porch, a hint of some sort of animal musk,
and the distinctive oniony, deep-fried smell of McDonalds coming
from the kitchen and breakfast nook. A police scanner erupted in
fits and starts, blending with a faint Latin beat drifting from
somewhere in the house.