Suddenly a Spy (23 page)

“I don’t want to know what order you’d rank
those two.”

“Yeah, probably not.”

Veronica might have originally craved some
time alone, but found herself enjoying Rick’s company. Shocked that
she’d never been to Chicago, he’d taken her to the Magnificent
Mile. She’d been content with her findings after the first few
shops and they were now in search of a pub where he could get the
decent burger and beer he’d requested.

He was downright jovial for being on a
shopping expedition. She was fairly certain his antics were
intended to lift her mood. Intentional or not, they worked.

“I still can’t believe you’ve never been
here,” Rick held the door open for her to step into the corner bar
& grill they’d settled on.

“I didn’t make it here pre-Seth, and after, I
just sort of deemed this his territory.”

“What are the odds you’d run into him in a
city with millions of people?”

“With my luck? Pretty good.”

Rick let the subject drop. He was more
interested in getting a Newcastle on tap than discussing Veronica’s
ex-husband. That suited her just fine; the mere mention of Seth’s
name sent her careening towards neurosis again.

She knew she shouldn’t eat like a stall-fed
mule—she hadn’t exactly been working out lately—but the food
smelled so good and she was craving red meat.

“So, what is this grand master plan?” she
asked after they’d settled in.

“If you’re going to mock me, then I’m not
going to answer.”

“Pretty please?”

“You really think I’m putty in your hands,
huh?”

She looked at him expectantly. He sighed, but
started talking.

“I don’t think they have physical guards on
these girls. Not on-site anyway. They use cameras and mind games to
keep them in line. Someone should be dropping them back off at the
building between two and three in the morning. We’ll be waiting
there when they do. Once the guards drive off, you go in and
convince the girls it’s safe to leave—you’ll have to promise them
their families are safe. I’ll go after the guards.”

“How do we know their families are safe?”

“Well, we don’t. I assume they are with Marko
so distracted, but I can’t guarantee he won’t make a phone call in
retaliation.”

“So, we could be killing their families by
freeing them?”

“That’s why they stay.”

“How do you stop that kind of evil?”

“As long as there’s money to be made, you
don’t. Supply and demand at its ugliest.”

“It feels so futile,” Veronica set her
sandwich back down; her appetite was gone.

“That certainly made it easier to walk away
from.”

“Why do you do it? I mean, why did you start
fighting this battle in the first place?”

“I’d love to tell you I was motivated by my
moral code, but it was for the paycheck. I was offered a lot of
money to work on the task force.”

“Was Vance making a lot of money?”

“Who knows where that man’s money came from,”
Rick shook his head. “But no, Vance was there because he felt like
he had to atone for the years he was on the wrong side of the
line.”

“Vance was…”

“…hired muscle for a pimp in St. Louis,” Rick
finished her sentence.

“Oh,” she chewed on that thought, not quite
sure how it made her feel. Rick held up his glass, indicating to
the waitress that he wanted another.

“Are you giving up on me already?” he sensed
her hesitation.

“No. But I don’t think I could live with
myself if I got some woman’s family killed.”

“Yeah, it’s different with these girls. We
knew the ones in Italy had been sold by their families. But these
girls, they were most likely lured here by the promise of a
waitressing job. Once here, they would have been told they owed
tens of thousands of dollars to pay for their way over. Then the
real hell begins.”

Veronica frowned. She thought of Anuli, the
woman she’d met in Italy. She couldn’t fathom being sold by her
family. Was that better or worse than these women, suffering daily
torture rather than inflict harm on a family half-way around the
world?

“Do we have a transition house for them yet?”
Veronica tried to regain her focus.

“I’ve been in contact with an attorney who
handles these sorts of things. She’ll make arrangements for the
girls once we have them safely away.”

Veronica nodded, reaching for Rick’s
Newcastle. Suddenly her Diet Coke didn’t seem quite strong
enough.

“Yeah, I didn’t want the whole thing anyway,”
he swallowed the last and only gulp of his ale before getting his
wallet out.

As they wandered out onto the street, he
tossed an arm over her shoulder and pulled her to his side.

“It does make a difference,” he brushed a
kiss on her temple. “Every act of kindness, that is. They add
up.”

Veronica nodded.

“Don’t let the enormity of it all catch you
like a deer in headlights.”

“Good analogy,” she smiled, enjoying the
solid comfort offered by being wrapped up in him. She looked up at
him, and then her gaze darted in a different direction. It
embarrassed her to think of how starry-eyed she must have looked
just then.

Rick chuckled. “I am so completely enamored
with you.”

“Aw hell,” Veronica muttered, her entire
demeanor changing as she fought the urge to climb straight up
Rick’s side.

“Is that a problem?” he stopped,
confused.

“It’s Seth,” she nodded in the direction of
her ex-husband who was crossing the street in their direction.
“Hurry. Maybe he hasn’t seen us.”

“So, you’ll stare down the head of an
organized syndicate—you’ll look death in the eye and laugh—but you
see a blond in a tweed coat, and you run for cover?”

“I don’t like seeing him.”

“You don’t still have feelings for him, do
you?”

“No, but…”

“Then it shouldn’t be a problem that he’s
waving.”

“Damn it, Dick. You waved first.”

“I did no such thing.”

“I’m standing right here. I saw you do
it.”

“But you don’t have feelings for him, so it’s
not a problem.”

Veronica sighed and plastered a smile on her
face.

“Seth, what a surprise,” her voice was polite
if not warm. She wished she were wearing one of her new outfits
instead of carrying them in a bag. She looked like a scrub in faded
jeans and a t-shirt that declared Reno the “Biggest little city in
the world.”

“Veronica, you look amazing.”

Pathological liar
, she called him in
her mind.

“So do you,” her words were true, as much as
she hated to admit it. Though she might not care for his disheveled
professor style, it was hard to deny his charm. With blond messy
hair and bright blue eyes that danced, she remembered all-too-well
how she’d succumbed to his wiles.

“I’m Rick.”

“Yes, sorry… this is my husband, Rick. Rick,
this is Seth,” Veronica shook off her fog as the two men shook
hands.

“So you’re married now.”

Veronica wondered what that was behind Seth’s
eyes. Regret, maybe? Or was that what she wanted to see? Did she
even care?

“Yes, I’m married now,” Veronica beamed up at
Rick. Rather than being a wreck around her ex, she was realizing
just how much Rick had helped her heal. How far she’d come on her
own, for that matter. “How about you? How is life treating
you?”

“Oh, well enough I suppose.”

Veronica knew he was lying. And not just
because he was breathing. She could just see it in his eyes—that
certain sadness one gets when they realize they chose the wrong
path. She felt very selfish in that moment, because she was glad
for his mistakes. Glad, because they’d set her on the path to
Rick.

“We should get going,” Veronica offered Seth
a small smile of forgiveness. “It was good seeing you.”

“You too.”

“Nice meeting you,” Rick nodded as they
walked away.

“Well that was some interesting closure,”
Veronica took a deep breath, feeling as if a weight had been lifted
from her.

“You really married that guy? He’s very…
academic.”

“Are you saying I should have stuck with the
dumb guys like you?”

“That’s not what I meant at all.”

Veronica giggled. Her mood was much improved.
Granted, she was still aching for a shower and clean clothes, but
she felt almost lighthearted as they made their way back to the
hotel.

Rick followed her up the stairs to their
room, making the occasional grab for her despite her protests that
he was going to make her trip. She darted from his grasp playfully
when she reached the top of the stairs. He laughed and chased her,
leaning down to kiss the back of her neck as she unlocked the
door.

“What is it?” his voice was low; he’d sensed
her fear as the door swung open.

“The scarf on the bed. I gave it away in San
Francisco.”

“Are you sure?”

“Positive.”

Rick drew his gun, his entire demeanor
transforming. The hairs on the back of her neck stood on end; a
chill ran the length of her spine. He’d been there. Marko had been
there; she was certain of it. Was he still in the room, waiting for
them? Or was he lurking in the hall, ready to attack from
behind?

Veronica pulled her own gun from her
waistband and stood back to back with Rick. He moved further into
the room while she watched the hallway for signs of a pending
ambush.

“Well he’s gone now,” Rick proclaimed after
what seemed to be an eternity.

“Did he leave anything besides the scarf? Did
he take anything?”

“It looks like everything is untouched. Watch
what you say until I do a sweep for bugs, though.”

“I will castrate him for what he did to
Vance.”

“Where did that come from?” Rick made a
pained face.

“Just in case the room is bugged,” she
shrugged. “I’m going to get a shower and change clothes.”

More than a desire to freshen up, Veronica
needed some time to gather her wits. She didn’t want Rick to see
how unsettled she was by the thought that Marko had followed them
all the way from San Francisco. He’d been with them the entire
journey; she was sure of that now.

Rick was probably going to be angry that she
hadn’t told him of the sightings. Would he understand how she’d
convinced herself it wasn’t real? There was no telling what Marko’s
game was. Perhaps he was toying with her before going in for the
kill. Or maybe he wanted them to lead him to something.

Petrov might be the freak of the family, but
Marko was the one who chilled her to the bone. Maybe it was because
he tugged at the darkness within her own soul; that, and she knew
one day the tug of war between the two sides of his personality
would one day end. She had a bad feeling the pleasant Marko
wouldn’t win that war.

“Well, nothing was taken and the place isn’t
bugged. Why did they break in to give back your scarf?”

“I bought it in Bulgaria—at the street
market. It was Marko; I thought I saw him a few times on the road
and convinced myself I was seeing ghosts. I think he followed us
here.”

“Probably a safe bet.”

“Do you think he hurt the woman we gave that
to?”

“Try not to think about it. There’s nothing
we can do now.”

Veronica blinked a few times, willing away
the tears that sprang to her eyes. She had felt good about helping
someone. Instead she’d brought pain and suffering to an innocent
human being.

“I really suck at this, don’t I?”

“You don’t suck at this,” he reached out to
pull her to him. “Don’t let him get to you that way.”

Veronica wondered if James Bond ever needed
his paramours to reassure him he was a good spy. The Sean Connery
James Bond certainly hadn’t. She couldn’t be so sure about his
successors.

His phone chirped and she grudgingly pulled
out of the comfort of Rick’s arms so he could answer it. He took
one look at the caller ID and handed the phone to her.

“Hey, Jeff.”

“Hey, little sister. We’re good to go here.
How are things on your end?”

“I think we’re all set.”

“You think? That’s comforting.”

“We’re ready,” she made a face a the phone.
“Marko is in Chicago. Any word on the other two?”

“Not a peep. Things are pretty quiet here.
The girls are being kept in a hole under a strip club. We checked
the place out this afternoon. Word of advice—never take our father
to a strip club. I thought he was going to have a coronary with all
those breasts in his face. I think he buys mom’s ESP claims.”

“You did tell him she isn’t really psychic?
That was just a line she tried to keep us under control.”

“I tried. He didn’t seem entirely
convinced.”

“Tell him I said thanks for risking our
mother’s wrath.”

“I don’t get a thank you?”

“Thank you, Jeff. Hey, how are the dogs?”

“Good. I’m getting kind of used to having
them around. And Courtney’s doing well, too.”

“I was going to ask that next. I can’t catch
a break with you today, can I?”

“I think she’s the one,” he blurted out.

“Who’s the one what?”

“Courtney. I think she’s the one. For me.
When we get back, I’m going to propose.”

“Propose what?” Veronica’s mind struggled to
wrap around what he was telling her. “Marriage? How long have I
been gone?”

“Yes, marriage. You’re supposed to be happy
for me.”

“I am; I am. I’m just… confused. Let it sink
in and then I’ll be thrilled.”

“There’s no sign of the Kulenovićs here. Did
I mention that?” He abruptly changed topics. “What about in the
windy city?”

“I think Marko’s here,” she let it slide that
they’d been over this. She’d never seen her brother in such a
state. “I think he’s been following us.”

“That can’t be good. Should we abort?”

“No. We’re too close to finishing this thing.
I’ll be careful.”