Girl Undercover 4 & 5: Ariel & Financial Devil (3 page)

“I suppose. How about you tell her something to let her down easy though? You should have seen her this morning. She was practically beaming she was so ecstatic after your date.”

“Okay, I’ll think of something. Maybe I’ll tell her my ex-girlfriend from London is coming to America and that I want to give it another go with her.”

“Yeah, that’s a good idea. Hey, speaking of Ariel, guess who she was talking to this morning when I got to the club?”

“Who?”

“Janine Eastwood. In the cafeteria.”

“The senator?”

“Uh-huh. And it looked like they were in the middle of a heart-to-heart in which Ariel looked scared and the senator almost pissed. I walked up to the food counter to pick up a drink to see if I could hear what they were discussing, but before I could get too close Janine spotted me and her entire demeanor changed.”

“How so?”

“She went from stern to friendly and told Ariel she wanted to train this Wednesday at eight p.m. Ariel told me the two of them have been training for the last couple of weeks, but not that often.”

“Very interesting… Now I think I might have another date with Ariel after all. If she’s as into me as you claim, she’ll tell me what’s going on.”

“You mean so you can see what they were talking about? You think it might’ve something to do with Adler?”

“Absolutely. Don’t you?”

Here we go again…
“Not really. They could have been discussing anything. I’m not sure it’s worth it for you to lead Ariel on only so you can try to pump her for information. How about I try to talk to her first? She might tell me.”

“Sure, go ahead and try. And do it soon. If you fail, I’ll call Ariel and ask her for another date. It might seem cruel to you, but if you knew what I’ve seen and what I’m trying to stop, you wouldn’t think so. For all I know, Ariel might be part of their team.”

I laughed. “Oh, yeah? And what exactly would she be doing for them?” But even as I said those words in a derisive tone, I remembered how I myself had wondered why Ariel was so eager to become friends with me when she wasn’t a friendly person. I already knew it wasn’t because she wanted to get close to Ian since I had yet to start to train him at that point. The only person who knew I was about to start training Ian was my manager Rolf and the sales associate who had sold him the sessions.

“I don’t know that yet,” Ian said. “That’s why I want to have another date with her. So I can find out.”

“As I said, let me talk to her first and see what I can dig up. You could always hang around the area when they’re training and see what they’re talking about.”

“I doubt they’ll talk about anything incriminating while I’m around.”

“You don’t know unless you try.”

“I might try. And you should try to find out what other government officials might be members at the club. You’ve had several days to do this. I need to know who else might be here. Please stop stalling, Gabi. It’s too important.”

“Fine. I’ll have it done by tomorrow.”

“You promise?”

“You have my word.”

Ariel came out on the sundeck then, wearing a pair of tiny shorts and an equally tiny sports bra. The dark sunglasses on her face were so large they covered half of it. She stretched out on one of the sun chairs close to the entrance and pulled out her phone that she began typing on, completely immersed.

“I have to go,” I told Ian and hung up.

I watched Ariel, pondering whether I should go up to her now and ask her about Janine or wait. I decided to wait until it looked like she had finished typing at least. As I waited, I lay back down on my own chair and turned my face to the sun, enjoying the warm rays against my skin, all the while throwing glances in Ariel’s direction.

By the time I spotted Janine Eastwood, she was already standing next to Ariel’s sun chair. With the tall woman towering over her, Ariel appeared even smaller than she was. She instantly put away her phone and turned her face toward Janine, who was saying something to her. Ariel responded something lengthy, looking apologetic while shaking her head slowly. I was at the other end of the spacious sundeck and the sounds of the city drowned out any conversation the light breeze might have carried in my direction.

Even though I was fairly far away, I wished I had a magazine or something to hide behind. If Janine raised her gaze from Ariel and looked straight forward, she would instantly spot me as there were hardly anyone else on the deck at the moment. But she didn’t; she just kept talking and talking to Ariel, who nodded and said something every now and then. All of a sudden, the big woman grabbed Ariel’s upper arm and shook her hard as though Ariel was a kid that needed to be punished. Punished severely.

What the hell?

Before what was happening fully sank into my mind, the senator let go off Ariel, barked something at the smaller woman and then swiveled around, marching off the sundeck. Ariel watched the glass door the woman disappeared through and rubbed her arm. I looked around the sundeck to see if anyone else had noticed what had just happened. But the four other people up there lounging on chairs were still just either reading or keeping their eyes closed as they lapped up the sun. It was impossible to tell if they had seen the little tiff.

That must be what it had been. Some kind of argument.

I pushed myself off my own chair and walked up to Ariel. I wanted to make sure she was okay. As I stopped next to her, she jerked a little and her hand left the sore spot on her arm.

“Oh, hey, Jamie,” she said, trying to smile. It looked more like she was feeling sick.

“Hey, Ariel,” I said. “Are you okay? I saw what that big woman did to you. Is she nuts?”

Ariel licked her pouty lips nervously. “No, she just has a bit of a temper. It was nothing.”

I frowned. “Nothing? She was shaking you like a ragdoll!”

“Yeah, I know. But, really, I’m fine.” There was a finality to Ariel’s voice that told me she didn’t want to discuss it any further. She stretched out like a cat on the sun chair. “Don’t you just
love
this weather? I can’t wait for summer to come.”

“Yeah, it’s nice.”

“I think I’m gonna take a nap. I have an hour to kill before my next client.” Ariel put her hands behind her neck and turned her face up to the sun.

I looked at her for another moment and when she didn’t say anything else, I figured I should leave.

“Okay, sweet dreams,” I said. “See you later.”

Ariel didn’t respond.

Chapter 3

“She texted you again?” I asked Ian. We were walking up to the fifth floor at the club where we would be doing his workout today. He had just finished telling me that Ariel had contacted him a second time. “What did she say?”

“That she wants to go out again,” Ian replied. “Basically.”

“Really? Wow, I didn’t see that one coming. Or actually, maybe I did. She was pretty persistent when she was crushing on Nick.”

Ian turned to glance at me. “Your husband?”

“Yeah. They went out on a date while he and I were undercover. She kept texting him even after he told her he wasn’t interested in going out again. What did you reply?”

“I haven’t responded yet. Did you get a chance to talk to her yet?”

“No, but I did witness something curious yesterday.” As I told him what I had seen transpire between Ariel and the senator, we entered the area where the heavy weights and the bench presses were and went over to a corner empty of people.

“She actually shook her?” he asked when I’d gotten to the end of my story.

I nodded. “Yeah. And pretty hard too. But Ariel acted like it was nothing when I went up to her and asked if she was okay. She said she was fine and then brushed me off, so I left. Something’s not right between those two.”

“It doesn’t sound like it. When were they going to have their session again?”

“Tomorrow at eight p.m. That is, if they’re still working together. Who knows after that incident? I sure wouldn’t be training someone who did something like that to me.” I told him to do a set of fifty jumping jacks to warm up. He instantly began jumping.

“I bet they are,” he said, arms and legs moving sideways back and forth at a rapid pace. Ian never had a problem maintaining a conversation while working out vigorously. “Well, since you haven’t found out what their deal is, I’m going to ask her out for this Thursday and coax it out of her.”

“Do you really think that’s such a good idea?”

He sighed. “My dear, you’re giving me no choice. You need to move quicker. A lot quicker. We can’t afford to lose more time. And besides, I’d rather tell her in person that I’m back with my ex. I’m not sure a text will do the trick. Not when I’m getting the sense she thinks there might be more between us than there is.”

“What makes you think she thinks that?”

“Just the tone of the text. She didn’t really ask me if I wanted to go out with her again. Instead she named a couple of restaurants she wanted to go to for our next date. So I would know where to take her.” Pearls of sweat were forming along Ian’s hairline.

“She actually said ‘so you would know where to take her’?”

“Not verbatim, but a version of that.”

“Wow. That’s quite aggressive.” Not that I should be very surprised. Ariel might be petite, but that had never stopped her from boldly going after whatever she wanted. “And presumptuous. Well, now I don’t feel so bad for her any longer. She should just have asked you if you wanted to go out again.”

“Agreed.” He finished his jacks. “What’s next?”

“Let’s do some deadlifts.” I pointed to another corner of the big gym floor where several barbells were lined up. We went over there and grabbed one that weighed 120 pounds. Ian began squatting while holding the heavy barbell with both hands.

“So I’m thinking I’ll pick one of the places she suggested,” he said, “and hopefully I’ll get her to open up a little before I tell her about my ex. Find out what the deal with the senator is.” He lowered his voice. “Incidentally, what other government officials do you have for me...?”

I had completely forgotten about going through the rest of the club’s members for Ian like I had promised. It had been easy to forget; I really didn’t see the point in me spending more hours combing through Nikkei’s database. I’d just about had it with his obsessive conspiracy theories. There simply wasn’t enough conclusive evidence there was a conspiracy of any kind and his delusions were seriously holding me back in my own investigation. One day I’d tell him he needed to snap out of it. Get some help if they were remnants of his days as a drug addict. In the meantime, I’d pretend like I had gone through the rest of the database. It wasn’t like he could verify that I hadn’t.

“I didn’t find anyone else,” I said, not meeting his gaze in the mirrored wall before us that we were both looking into. “Unless there are ones I’m not familiar with, Eastwood and Chatterly are it. Since I know most of the big names, I don’t think I missed any. I spent three hours this morning looking.”

“I see,” he replied curtly and finished his set of deadlifts. “Well, thanks for checking.”

I turned away from him so he wouldn’t see how my cheeks were flaming. Spotting a water faucet a few feet away, I excused myself and said I’d be right back. I took my time drinking water. When I was with him again, my face had returned to normal temperature.

***

Ariel was sitting in the cafeteria when I went down there to have lunch the following Thursday. She waved to me the second I entered. I smiled and walked up to her. There was a big grin on her lips.

“Hey,” I said and smiled. “You look happy.”

“I am. Ian and I are going out again tonight.”

“You are? That’s fantastic.” Knowing that she’d been the one to make the next date happen, I felt weird adding something along the lines of “I told you he was seriously interested.” Instead I just asked, “Where are you guys going?”

“To La Bonne Soup in the West Village. I’ve always wanted to go there. Great French restaurant. So cute.”

“Did Ian pick that place?”

Ariel shook her head. “No, I did. I had a few places in mind that I wanted to try out and he went along with it.”

“Good for you.” Making sure my tone was light, I asked, “Have you guys been in touch a lot?”

“Yeah, but only via text. We text all day long!” Her brown eyes glittered excitedly.

“Really? That’s great.” I nodded toward the food counter. “I’m starving. I’m gonna get something to eat. I hope you guys have fun tonight.”

I walked over to the food counter and placed myself behind the last person in line. The cafeteria was hopping with people as it so often did around noon. I found my phone and texted Ian:
Just bumped into Ariel. She told me you guys text all day long and that you’re going out tonite.

It took until I had ordered a salad and was about to pay for it for Ian to respond.

SHE is texting me all day long. I’m only responding and trying to be polite. Am anticipating a tough night tonight.

I gazed over at the table where I’d seen Ariel. She was still seated there, in the middle of texting someone. I paid for my salad and went back there.

“Hey again,” I said. “Mind if I join you?”

She looked up from her phone. “No, not at all. Please do.” There was a dreamy look on her face. “I just exchanged another text with Ian. He’s
so
sweet.”

I sat down next to her. “What did he say?”

She leaned into me. “Let me show you all his texts.”

“Okay,” I said and looked down at the iPhone with the yellow shell in her hand. She used fingers that had hot pink nail polish today to click the phone’s text icon.

A long string of texts appeared on the screen and, based on the length of them, there was no question Ariel was the one who spent the most time typing out messages. Most of Ian’s texts were a couple of words or a short sentence, whereas hers were long paragraphs. This alone should have given her a hint that maybe she was more invested in this budding non-romance than he was. But the way she was giggling and pointing at the different short texts he had sent her in response to hers—that I quickly scanned to make sure she was in fact the driving force—told me she clearly had no clue.