Exposed - A Thriller Novella (Chandler Series) by J.A. Konrath & Ann Voss Peterson (7 page)

She narrowed her eyes. “What?”

“Your father pulled some strings to make sure
you were safe.”

“You think that’s funny?”

I shook my head. “Listen, I don’t know the
history between you and your father. You don’t want him involved in
your life, take it up with him.”

“My father left my mother before I was born,”
she said, voice flat. “I’ve never met him. Whoever sent you, it
wasn’t him.”

“
You are a weapon,” The Instructor said.
“You are a tool of your government. You’ll have to make calls in
the field, snap decisions, but don’t let that seduce you into
believing you decide anything. You may turn down an assignment, but
once you accept, your job is to carry out orders, no more. Your
handler will aim you, fire you, and it is up to you to make sure
the bullet hits its mark.”

I let her words sink in the rest of the walk
to the health club and focused on my usual security precautions,
doubling back, watching for tails.

The place was called Stretchers, a nationwide
chain exclusively for women. I didn’t have my membership card, but
I gave them my fake name and address and they confirmed my ID on
their computer. Julie waited in the lobby, and I popped into the
locker room and opened my rented locker. From the duffle bag I took
a clean driver’s license and a credit card in the name of Heidi
Orland, a thousand in cash, an S&W tactical folding knife, and
a spare charger for my cell. I still had Morrissey’s Glock, but I
figured I might have to return it, so I added a compact Ruger .380
LCP of my own and two extra mags, cramming everything into my purse
until it was so stuffed it refused to close. Then I secured the
locker and led Julie to the nearest hotel.

Once we were inside the room and I’d searched
the place for bugs using an app on my phone, I allowed my thoughts
to turn back to what she’d told me.

“So you don’t know your father.”

“Never met him, have no idea what he even
looks like.”

Julianne stepped to the floor-to-ceiling
window. Crossing her arms over her chest, she looked down on Times
Square. She looked small, lonely. Behind her, the clock on the
Paramount Building read four o’clock, a half hour slow.

“My name isn’t even Julianne. It’s Julie. I
just thought Julianne sounded more like a model.”

I attempted to run a hand through my
hopelessly tangled hair. While I had recovered from my earlier
desire to shave my head, as soon as this operation was over, I was
definitely getting the mess cut short enough to keep it out of my
eyes.

“What do I call you? I’m guessing your name
isn’t Claire.”

No harm in telling her my codename.
“Chandler.”

“Chandler. That’s cool. Like on that show
Friends
.”

I preferred comparison to the dead mystery
writer, but I supposed it didn’t matter.

Normal, not-a-model Julie turned from the
window and looked at me.

“So now what, Chandler?”

“Nothing has changed. My assignment is to
make sure you’re safe, whether your father is behind it or not
doesn’t really matter. Okay?”

She gave a little nod, but she looked less
than convinced.

“You’re going to be fine. I’ll make sure of
it. I promise.” I gestured toward the bathroom. “Now why don’t you
get cleaned up?”

As soon as I heard water hiss through pipes,
I called Jacob. We engaged in our usual security dance. By the time
I was able to speak, I felt like crawling out of my skin with
impatience.

“Who is the VIP, Jacob?”

He paused for a moment. “I hear the
extraction didn’t go as smoothly as we hoped.”

“She’s here. She’s unhurt.”

“But you left a nasty traffic snarl in the
Queens Midtown Tunnel. The media is calling it a terrorist
attack.”

“Couldn’t be helped. Who’s the VIP?” I
repeated.

Another pause. “All I was told is that he’s
the girl’s father.”

I was getting used to Jacob’s altered voice,
but there were times I still wished I could hear his natural
inflections, or better yet, look into his eyes, gage his
expressions.

“She says she never knew her father, insists
it couldn’t be him.”

He paused, then said, “Interesting.”

“That’s all you have to say?
Interesting?”

“Does she have any ideas?”

“She says she has no one, and I think she’s
telling the truth.”

I went on, filling him in on Julie’s real
name and my suspicions that our fake modeling agency was also a
fake when it came to the human trafficking business.

“You think they’re some kind of intelligence
operation?”

“It seems so. Several are South American. I’m
guessing Venezuelan, although they all might be mercs.”

“And that means there’s more to Julie than
the fact that she’s daddy’s little girl,” Jacob said, summing up my
thoughts.

“Right. I might have something on the
Bradford and Sims Agency. I took the memory card from one of their
cameras. It got wet, but if it works I’ll upload it to the dropbox
as soon as I can.”

Jacob and I often communicated via a series
of secure Internet drop boxes. It was a convenient system for
trading various types of files no matter where I was in the
world.

“Even if it’s damaged, I might be able to
recover the data.”

“I’m not sure anything useful is on the card.
But at the very least, you’ll be able to ogle some topless photos
of me.”

“You weren’t kidding about the strip club,
huh? I don’t know how you find the time.”

I smiled despite myself, and it felt good. I
might never meet Jacob in person, but that didn’t change the fact
that we seemed to ‘get’ each other, important when my life depended
on his communication skills and willingness to watch my back.

“You sure you can’t find out more about this
VIP?”

“Chandler …”

“Right. You’ll let me know when you know.” I
paused, trying to come up with some other approach we could take.
“How about my contact, Morrissey?”

“Morrissey? I have a dossier on him. He’s an
experienced field operative. He has a clean record, is reliable,
has been working undercover as a driver for a Manhattan car service
for about four years. Has provided Uncle Sam with all sorts of
intel.”

Four years of driving a car. I thought of his
rough hands, his calm and deadly demeanor. I wasn’t sure I really
suspected Morrissey of anything—actually I liked him, more than a
little—but it never hurt to be thorough. I wouldn’t be surprised if
he did a similar background search on me.

Not that he’d find anything. According to
government records, Morrissey was undercover. I, on the other hand,
didn’t exist.

“Military record?” I asked.

“Nope. Former FBI Recruited by NSA”

That didn’t seem right. Morrissey had combat
training. He was a fist, not an ear. Sticking him in a limo service
seemed like a waste of his talents.

“What else?” I asked.

“Not much. Parents deceased. Lives in an
apartment on Staten Island.”

“Previous operations?”

“Classified.”

“I thought classified doesn’t apply to you,
Jacob.”

“Are you asking me to dig?”

“Indulge me, will you?”

“You have your assignment, Chandler. Deliver
the girl to Morrissey unhurt. The rest isn’t your concern.”

“Maybe not, but I’ll feel better.”

For a moment I wondered if we’d been cut off.
Then Jacob cleared his throat.

“I’ll see what I can find.”

We ended the call. Jacob was right. Worrying
about this was not my job. I was trained to follow orders, a weapon
to be deployed. I’d saved Julie from the fake modeling agency and
now I was to turn her over and walk away.

The rest didn’t matter.

I had suspected from the beginning that I was
given this assignment precisely because my teen years were similar
to Julie’s. Because of those similarities, this didn’t feel like
any other mission to me. I cared about what happened to her, but
that didn’t mean I could allow my personal feelings to skew my
judgment.

If there was reason to worry, Jacob would
find it and let me know.

The drone of the hairdryer ended. Time being
short, a shower for me would have to wait. I focused on
accessorizing, strapping the folding knife to the back of my left
thigh, under the dress. On my right thigh, I donned a Velcro
holster for the Ruger. A brush through my tangle of hair, and I was
out the door.

Even without my taking time for a shower, we
were pressed to upload the camera images to the dropbox and make it
to Columbus Circle. I would have preferred to walk, since it was
much easier to spot tails by foot, especially in rush hour, but
since we were short on time, I opted for a subway ride to Lincoln
Center. Backtracking one avenue and four blocks, we reached our
rendezvous spot.

I checked my phone. Twenty minutes before
six, just as I’d planned.

Jacob hadn’t called back.

I focused on my surroundings. I hadn’t picked
up any evidence that we were being followed during our walk, and I
didn’t spot any shadows now. I smelled exhaust, hotdogs from a
nearby food cart, and the tang of horse manure wafting from the
park. A woman passed by, the scent of some sweet vanilla coffee
concoction trailing in her wake. Behind us, a small group of men
offering pedicab rides through the park spoke in broken English,
trying to talk tourists into paying a small fortune for an evening
jaunt in the half-bicycle, half-cart contraptions. Horns honked and
cabbies yelled, typical New York City on a summer evening.

When I spied the Town Car, my nerves
surged.

He was early.

The car swung to the curb and Morrissey
stepped out. He was tall and lean and calmly dangerous, and I felt
that same little burst of edginess mixed with lust as when I’d
first met him this morning. This time he wasn’t wearing his
sunglasses, and I caught a flash of ice blue eyes that just added
to his allure. Like the perfect chauffeur, he climbed out and
circled the vehicle.

“Nice car,” I said. “This one rigged to blow,
too?”

One side of his mouth lifted in a crooked
smile. “You did a good job.”

“You, too. Want your Glock back?”

“Sure. At least until the next time you’d
like to borrow it.”

He stepped close to me to shield the exchange
from onlookers. He smelled of Giorgio Armani For Men’s
Acqua Di
Gio
.

At least someone had gotten a chance to
properly clean up.

I took the gun from my purse. When he pulled
me into a hug, I placed it in his hand.

“Take good care of her, okay?”

He brushed my fingers as he took it from me,
lingering a moment too long, then he slipped the weapon into a
holster on his left side.

“She’ll be safe. And if you need to get in
touch with me, you have my card.”

“I do?”

Morrissey’s hand slowly made its way down my
side, then up under my dress. He slid a business card into my thigh
holster. His breath on my neck was hot, and for a brief moment I
could practically feel his lips on my bare skin.

He pulled away, then glanced at Julie and
opened the back door. “Ready?”

We exchanged a quick hug, her grip a lot
tighter than mine.

“Thanks,” Julie said. “For everything.”

“You bet,” I told her. “It’s all going to be
okay from here on out.”

When she climbed into the limo, Morrissey
shut the door behind her and circled to the driver’s door.

“I hope we get to work together again,” he
said.

“Me, too.” But I actually had play on my
mind.

On impulse, I took out my cell phone, miming
making a call. Instead, I took a quick picture of him.

It was natural to be horny as hell after a
mission, especially after almost being killed. It was an
affirmation-of-life kind of reaction. If I wasn’t going to get laid
tonight, I could at least have a photo to get myself off. And
fantasy sex was safer than real sex, especially in my
profession.

He smiled, then slipped behind the wheel and
pulled into traffic.

I watched them follow the flow around the
circle and head uptown on Broadway. My role in this was finished,
another assignment completed successfully. Soon I would be on my
way back to Chicago or on a plane bound for who-the-hell-knew. My
thoughts would be on other things, my focus riveted to threats from
other quarters. I would file this experience into its compartment
in the back of my mind and go on with my life.

The cell phone buzzed against my hip.

I answered.

“I need to speak to Ursula,” Jacob’s
electronic voice said.

The code signified urgency, and I could feel
a dose of adrenaline surge into my bloodstream.

“I’m afraid she has already left for the
hospital.”

“You’ve met with the contact?”

“He just took Julie.” I peered at the cars
flooding around Columbus Circle and up Broadway.

“Damn. He’s early.”

“What is it?”

“You were right to have me check him,
Chandler. He’s not Morrissey.”

Oh, shit.

“What do you mean?” I knew the suspicion was
originally mine, but Jacob’s words carried a shock wave anyway.

“Morrissey’s body was found—or at least part
of it was—a week ago in New Jersey. He was mutilated, no face, no
hands, so we didn’t identify him right away.”

“But you’re sure it’s him?”

“Yes.”

I didn’t ask how or when. Worrying about that
was someone else’s job. “So this guy, who is he?” I was already
walking, rimming Columbus Circle, waving my hand for a cab.

Goddamn rush hour.

“We have no idea. Can you describe him?”

“I can do even better.”

I forwarded the photo to Jacob, pleased that
being horny might have actually come in handy for once.

“Hmm, he’s cute.” Odd thing for Jacob to say.
“I’ll run it through facial recognition software. Hold on.”