Girl Undercover 8 & 9: Traitor & The Smiley Killer (12 page)

Ian did not look happy, though, which instantly deflated the smile on my lips. Something was wrong. Very wrong.

“What happened?” I asked, that dread from earlier in the day back with renewed force.

“Nadja’s gone.”

“She’s gone? How can she be gone?”

He sighed heavily. “I don’t know. Burt doesn’t know. Our fear is that someone from Adler has taken her. Someone who tagged me either the first or the second time I drove there.” He flung out his palms in despair. “Hell, for all I know, they tagged me
both
times.”

“Are you sure she’s gone?” A tiny part of me was waiting to hear that this was Ian’s attempt at a very, very poor joke, but it didn’t last long—Ian simply wasn’t that crude he’d ever joke about something like that. Besides, it was too elaborate. He was telling me the truth. “Maybe she just went out for a walk and got lost in the city?”

Not even I believed that. Why would she do such a thing in the middle of the night?

“Hardly,” Ian said, confirming my assumption. “The house is miles away from Philly. Also, there were clear signs of a struggle having taken place there. The lampshade in the bedroom where she was supposed to be sleeping was crashed on the floor, and there was blood on the rug.”

My hands flew up to cover my mouth.
“Damn.
So you really think they came for her then? And that she tried to resist them?”

“That’s what it looks like.” Ian shook his head slowly, as if in despair, sighing. “Fuck, how could they’ve found her? I was so sure no one tagged us. I took every imaginable precaution.”

He seemed so upset I had to grab his shoulders, calm him down. “You did what you could, Ian. It’s not your fault. You can’t think of everything. For all we know they’ve been following us always.” I wanted to tell him that maybe The Adler Group was just playing us the way I was playing Jonah, but I bit my tongue at the last second. Saying such a thing out loud would only serve to upset Ian further; surely such thoughts had already entered his mind and I didn’t need to stoke them. However, I thought it timely to bring up my suspicions regarding Burt. “Do you think Burt might have alerted them somehow?”

Ian gazed at me with those chameleon eyes of his. Then, “No. I know what you’re getting at, but I really don’t think so.”

“How can you be so sure?”

He shrugged. “No one’s that good an actor. He was very, very upset when we concluded that she was gone, really gone. Not out for a walk, but taken somewhere.”

“Where is he now?”

“Still in the house I would think.”

“What?
Why?
If they came for her, wouldn’t they come back for him, too?”

Ian inhaled, looking pensive. “That’s just it. Burt is not as convinced as I am that people from Adler came to take her. He thinks someone else did.”

“Really? But who would that be? And why would they do such a thing?”

Ian shrugged again. “Beats me. But that’s what Burt thinks. And that’s why he’s still out there. He’s determined to figure out who it could be. He wants to catch them in the act.”

“That doesn’t seem like a smart approach. Does he even have something to defend himself with?”

“Yes, I gave him one of my guns. I have a couple in the trunk of my car. He’ll be contacting me with updates as soon as he gets his own burner. In the meantime, you need to work on Jonah, see what he has to say about everything. Burt is his roommate, so he’s got to know something’s up with Burt if the bloke’s no longer at home.”

“I already spoke to him some this morning when I got to work. He does know that Burt’s been taken somewhere to ‘be straightened out.’” I made quotation marks with my fingers. “His words, not mine.”

“Really?” Ian brightened somewhat. “Interesting. So he knows more than I’d have thought then… Burt told me Jonah was often kept in the dark about stuff going on with Adler because of his temper.”

“Yeah, he does have a big mouth, that’s for sure.” I thought of what he’d said about Nicki being after Burt then. I told Ian about how he was certain she’d been the one visiting their place, not me.

He rolled his eyes. “Wow… That bloke sure is a nutcase. No wonder they keep him in the dark about stuff.” He gave a wry little smile. “That’s really all the evidence he needed to draw the conclusion Nicki’s the one who got into his house?”

I snorted. “Apparently. I warned her about what he’d said about making an example out of her. I really didn’t like the sound of those words.”

“That’s good. Hopefully she’ll stay out of his way. But you need to stay
in
his way, try to find out if it looks like Adler has anything to do with Nadja’s disappearance. Especially now that it seems they tell him more than we thought. It might clear up the situation.”

I blew out a breath and nodded. Yes, I definitely needed to stay on Jonah, try to find out what had happened to Nadja. But I couldn’t say that I was looking forward to it.

Ian must have sensed what I was feeling because he suddenly took me in his arms and pulled me close.

“I know that it won’t be easy for you, but you’ve got to still do it,” he said, gazing down at me in a way he hadn’t done since before the time I told him I was going to “date” Jonah. Tingles of pleasure rushed up my spine and I wrapped my own arms around his waist.

“I know,” I said, not wanting him to let me go, stop looking at me like that. “It’s going to be very tough, but I’ll still do it.”

He smiled down at me, his eyes glittering darkly. “I know you will, Gabi. You’re a soldier like me, and you’ll never give up. Together, we’ll beat them one way or another.”

“Yes, we will,” I said, tilting my head backward as I waited for him to lower his face to mine, kiss me like he’d never kissed me before. The moment called for it. Screamed for it. I didn’t even care if Jonah would suddenly burst out onto the rooftop and spot us. Which he wouldn’t anyway, so we could afford to steal a kiss or two. I desperately craved one.

But instead of crashing his lips to mine, he landed a feather-light kiss to my forehead and then let go of me like the moment had only existed in my mind.

“I’ll call you later,” he said, then turned around and left.

Chapter 2

I was lucky enough not to have to spend lunch together with Jonah because Rolf wanted to discuss a member complaint with me then; apparently, the member thought I had been inconsiderate while stretching out a client, taking up too much space on the mats. By the time I was done explaining my side of the situation to our fitness manager and he agreed it was a non-issue, Jonah needed to train a client.

As heavily as he pursued me, there would be plenty of time for me to pick his brain regarding Nadja later. Like tonight. When I returned to the cafeteria table where he still sat after my impromptu meeting with Rolf, he suggested we should get together for dinner instead. I had smiled and accepted, telling him I could hardly wait to see him again.

By the time I was done at work and on my way home, I received a text from Jonah.

Something came up, so can’t see you tonight after all. So sorry, baby. See you tomorrow?

I was both relieved and annoyed when I finished reading it. By now, I had prepared myself for an evening with him. I was mentally ready to endure his company. I would do my best to avoid getting too close to him at the same time as I’d try to squeeze information out of him regarding Adler and Nadja, not to mention his dad. As big a mouth as he had, it should be fairly easy to get him to talk about both issues.

The sooner I got together with him, the sooner we could hope to solve everything.

Oh, no!
I texted back.
Yes, I’ll see you tomorrow then.

My phone vibrated and I saw that he’d responded with three big heart emoticons. I grimaced with disgust, but made myself type back a couple of hearts myself, consoling myself with the fact that at least I didn’t have to be near him.

Now that I didn’t have plans for the evening, I didn’t know what to do with myself. I called Ian to see if he’d heard from Burt or Nadja, but he didn’t pick up. I called Dante to see if there was any news about Captain Brady. He did pick up, but said he had yet to return to the hospital to talk to Brady. Which was to be expected given that only a couple of days had passed since the first time he’d gone.

Having nothing better to do and in need of a workout anyway, I changed into running gear. A long run would do me good and it was still light out, which meant the park would be full of people. Ever since the incident with Felix Bose, I didn’t feel comfortable running in the park after dark.

By the time I was almost done with my six-mile run, I found myself passing by the block with Jonah’s massive apartment building. The sun had set and the sky was a mixture of burning red, orange and pink colors across which gray clouds stretched like giant brushstrokes made by someone careless. I was glad that I was about to reach the finish line as, soon, night would fall, obscuring everything. Since I was running without my gun, I really wanted to be out of the park then.

Experiencing the beginnings of a cramp in my calf suddenly, I decided to use the exit close to Jonah’s building and walk the rest of the way to my house. I was about to cross the multi-lane road when I spotted Jonah and one of the new trainer guys, a stunning young Puerto Rican, coming out of the main entrance. When I saw who was walking between them, I did a double take, stopping dead in my tracks.

Nicki.

And she was not looking happy. Stepping back behind the low stone wall and the trees that grew right at the exit, their branches low and leafy, I watched them as they stopped on the sidewalk. Jonah raised his arm to ostensibly hail a cab. It took a while before one slid up next to them and the three of them entered it.

As soon as their cab was on its way, I jumped out from my hiding place and stuck out my own arm to get a cab. I could use the ATM card I’d put in my sports bra to buy water after my run to pay for it. I really didn’t like the idea of Nicki going off with Jonah and Carlos, looking that unhappy. Not after Jonah had told me she needed to be straightened out, not to mention be made an example of. What the hell was up with that? I hoped I was about to find out by following them.

“Hello,” I said to the baldheaded cabdriver and leaned between the two headrests, pointing at Jonah’s cab. “See that cab there? Can you please follow it?”

Much to my relief, the driver didn’t say anything and immediately took off instead, driving after the vehicle.

Because there was little traffic, we followed them with ease for the next twenty, twenty-five minutes, not once losing track of them as we headed downtown. Finally, their cab stopped on a quiet street on the Lower East Side.

My cabdriver came to a halt at the opposite side of the street.

“Now what?” he asked, the first words that had come out of his mouth.

I reached for my ATM card in my sports bra and told him that I wanted to exit, all the while watching Jonah, Nicki and Carlos leave their cab out of the corner of my eye. The driver told me to swipe the card in the machine behind the passenger seat headrest to pay. I did, then stepped out of the cab, just in time to see the three trainers walk into an Irish pub at the end of the block they were on.

It had become significantly darker now, but streetlights made it easy to see what was going on across the entire block, so I needed to be careful. I waited a couple of minutes before crossing the street over to the side where the pub was, pondering whether to go inside or wait for Jonah and company to come back out. If the pub was as small as it appeared from the outside, a hole in the wall really, chances were they’d see me if I entered. Did I really want to risk that? I couldn’t think of a good enough reason to explain to Jonah what I was doing all the way down here on the Lower East Side, in the same trashy pub they had chosen to go to. There simply was no good explanation for it.

I took a seat on the graying bench next to a bus stop, a fair distance from the pub and waited for them to reappear. Hopefully, it wouldn’t take too long. Wishing I had my latest burner phone with me so I could contact Ian and tell him what I was up to, I scanned my surroundings. It was a typical Lower East Side street, on the smaller side with a one-way road parting the block in two. Nondescript low-rise walk-up buildings lined the poorly maintained sidewalks, the colorful storefronts of small businesses such as nail salons, eateries and hardware stores taking up the ground floor of most buildings. A few of the businesses appeared to be Chinese-owned, which told me we were at the outskirts of China Town.

Just as I was switching position on the bench, I caught sight of someone familiar coming out of a cab that had stopped close to the pub.

It was Sam, another of the new trainers, an Asian guy in his early twenties who specialized in martial arts. He disappeared into the pub.

Hmm,
I thought.
I wonder if more people from the club will show up here.

I was dying to find out what they were doing in there. The good news was that, if other trainers were appearing, I could feel confident the others were still in there, not having left through some backdoor. But what could they be doing? Were they just drinking?

Getting to my feet, I walked closer to the pub. There was a window on either side of the narrow entrance with the word “O’Malley’s” written diagonally across them. Unfortunately, the letters were so large and the glass so dark that it was surely hard to see into the place unless you were very near. I had resisted going over there for the longest time, as I didn’t know whether it was equally as hard to get a view of the street from the inside. Plus, I had no idea where the trainers were seated. If next to the windows, they might be able to glance out without much effort. I didn’t want to risk that. But I also didn’t feel like just sitting on my butt on that bench, waiting for them to come out, either. Patience had never been one of my strengths.

I sighed as I debated what to do, my body moving closer to the first window, as if my legs had decided on their own that taking a peek was indeed worth the risk. Before I could reach it, however, the door to the bar opened and the four trainers filed out in a long line.