"So, Avery, what do you have planned for Wednesday night," Nate asked with a sly grin.
"No, no, no. You have got to be joking. I'm not a field agent by any definition of those words and I'm sure whatever charity is running the event is against my religion. If you need someone to go with you take Carl or Liz," I told him, knowing that there was a good chance I was wasting my breath.
"Come on. It won't be that bad, just a little background sleuthing, besides Carl isn't my type, sorry Carl." He gave Carl an apologetic look, which I wouldn't have bought. "And I enjoy spending time with you over Liz."
"That's just because you haven't spent any time with her outside work. Why don't you try going out with her in the next few days. You might find her better suited for this kind of event," I said, pleading with my eyes that he rethought whatever plan he'd come up with.
"Nope, my mind's made up, you're going. Your tracing connected to this man, aren't you curious what he looks like?" Nate really didn't know me well if he thought that was any kind of enticement for me.
"No, I do this stuff all the time and I've never cared to find out what someone looks like."
Nate missed every signal that screamed I hated being around people. A charity event was bound to be loaded with people way above my social class. My class was pretty much down with the rats in the sewers, at least that's where I'd preferred to hang out.
After thinking for a second, Carl kindly piped in. I'd almost forgotten he was just sitting there listening to what we had to say. Upon hearing someone wanting me to go to a ball, any bit of sense I had flew right out the window.
"Wait a second guys, your conversation sounds like you've spent more time together then I've witnessed. Nate, you only talk to me and Liz while we're here. When did you guys spend quality time together?"
There was no way I was going to provide anything to clarify his confusion, and the sooner I could leave the office, the better. I gathered my phone and bag and headed out the door. As far as I saw it, it was Nate's mess to clean up, and I really didn't care what excuse he ended up giving.
I probably shouldn't have trusted him to not say something stupid, but it was just Carl, so eventually I could set him straight after Nate left. Of course that moment couldn't come soon enough.
Jogging to the train station, I hopped on and waited for it to take me home. It wasn't fast enough for me, but eventually I made it to my apartment in one piece.
I immediately changed into sweats, put in my headphones and scrubbed the house from ceiling to floor, listening to my take-no-crap playlist. It was one of the ways I liked to wind down and ease my stress. My other solutions were violent and I was trying to use those as little as possible.
Most people didn't enjoy the pine scent of all-purpose cleaner the way I did, but for some reason it always made me feel better. There were a lot of things wrong with me, but I didn't think people usually judged me on that one.
After an hour and a half, and having nothing else to clean, I decided a nice bubble bath was in order. While the water ran, I checked messages and saw three texts from Nate. Just reading the first one got me fired up. The fact that he thought it necessary to text me three times in the first place didn't help.
Hey Avery, don't worry. I've set Carl straight. I know you didn't want anyone to know about our love child yet, but he seemed really happy for us. Call when you get a chance. - Nate
He clearly wasn't a comedian. I found absolutely nothing funny about what he'd said. If that rumor ever got out, I'd barricade myself in my apartment and have delivery guys just leave food outside my door.
Not that Nate was hard on the eyes, or wouldn't have a lot to offer in creating a child, but we'd only known each other a few days. I didn't want people thinking just any good-looking guy could come by and make their way into my bedroom. There were a lot of hoops to jump through to get in there.
It seemed the second text was meant to calm my nerves. I could probably stop sharpening the skewers I was envisioning inserting into very painful places, like his eyeballs. There were other places that came to mind, and since my dream had left little to the imagination, it was easy to plot some other strategic places.
Okay, really didn't say that to him, just wanted to tease you since you're so against being my sleuthing partner. I only explained that we're friends of friends and got dragged into eating dinner together last night. No mention of previous blind date.??
The last message just said,?Call me!!!? Someone was a little impatient, and I'd say it served him right.
For his little tease, I decided I was going to take a long hot bath and think about calling him later. Apparently that wasn't good enough for him, though, because my phone kept ringing every five minutes, ruining the peaceful nature of my bath. He should've stuck to the text messages.
Finally tired of ignoring it, I picked it up and pretty much screamed, "What," as loud as I could. The noise echoed oddly in my tiny bathroom.
"Avery, is that any way to speak to your baby daddy? You're going to frighten Junior," he replied, evidently still in a joking mood.
"Since Junior is a figment of your imagination, I think we're safe. What's so important I can't take a bath in peace?"
Bringing up that I was in the bathtub, or thinking about being in the bathtub wasn't my smartest move. Nate had the ability to make me say the stupidest things.
"Not fair. The mental images I have running through my head now are going to take a second to clear. Are we talking regular bath or bubble bath? How many bubbles are included and do they cover all the best parts?" he asked.
"We're talking none of your business. If you remember, we have a business relationship. Nothing more, so quit trying to picture me without my clothes on."
I pushed the bubbles that were in the bath around to make sure they covered the best parts, just in case. I highly doubted he could see through buildings. He would've had to have quite a few tricks up his sleeve to see me if he was still at my office, but I didn't trust him not to have at least a few super powers. He'd made it through the food lines at the Garden in less than five minutes. If that wasn't a super power, I didn't know what was.
"Really? If it's only business, why don't you explain your dream last night to me?" he asked.
He didn't have to be in the room with me for the color to totally drain from my face. In a bath on the hot side, I suddenly felt a bit cold.
"What are you talking about? I didn't have any dreams last night, just nightmares." I worked hard to sound convincing, not only for him, but as my mind had wandered towards the dream many times throughout the day, it needed a little persuading to wipe the dream from my memory banks.
"I guess that's my mistake. I just thought that maybe since you've spent so much time with me during the past few days that you'd started making me the star of your dreams," he said, and I wished he was wrong.
His implication about what I'd been dreaming about made me curious about where his unconscious thoughts drifted. I doubted he got as much eye candy as I had.
"Like I said, no dreams, only nightmares." Wanting to move the conversation on, so I could get out of the tub, I asked, "So what did you want that was so important? I don't think teasing me about stupid things you could've come up with to explain things to Carl was an urgent matter."
"I was hoping we could go out again tonight. I got some intel that Zuba is already in town and staying at a hotel. I thought maybe we could do a stakeout and see if we can find anything interesting about his movements."
It was clear Nate had missed the part about me not being a field agent. It seemed like we both spoke the same language, but he for some reason couldn't understand a single thing I said.
"You want me to come out and sit all night with you in a car, watching some national security risk?"
I wasn't doing anything and sitting in a car was a lot better than going to a charity ball. If I went with him that night, there was a chance he could get his man and I wouldn't be forced into trying to find something suitable t
o wear to a ball. It went without saying that my wardrobe didn't contain a ball gown.
"That's generally what happens during a stakeout. I'll make sure to have plenty of whatever your favorite snack food is on hand. You never know how long these things can last."
"I wouldn't be required to do anything other than sit in the car, right? That's not something I have to go through special training to do."
"That's sounding like a yes to me. I'm downstairs parking my car. Why don't I head up and wait for you to get ready?"
"You're downstairs? What in the world are you doing out there?" I asked. "You seem like and educated guy. Have you ever looked up the definition of stalker in the dictionary?"
"That's a bit harsh. I knew I could convince you to come with me, so I wanted to be on this side of town to pick you up. I didn't expect you to be tied up at the moment, but I haven't seen anything that indicated you were the kind of girl who spends days soaking in the tub. I think the chances of you being ready by the time I get up there are pretty good."
The guy was cocky, and cocky didn't generally go over well with me. I didn't understand why I found it a bit enduring when Nate was involved. I should've probably asked how he found my apartment, but I figured between Frannie and any of my coworkers, he'd have found someone to give him the information.
"Fine, I'll be at the door in five minutes."
I hung up before he could say anything else. I didn't figure I had a lot of time, so I jumped out and dried off in record time. I didn't even bother to look at the clothes I picked out, just grabbing out of drawers and throwing them on my body. I got everything on in the right order, so I considered myself lucky. After a quick brush through my hair, I headed to the door and opened it just as Nate was raising his hand to knock.
"Imagine you being on my doorstop. Who would have ever guessed?" I smiled and moved out of the way to let him in. "Welcome to my humble abode."
I'd spent enough time cleaning that I was fairly certain there wasn't going to be anything laying around I didn't want Nate to see. I figured it was a good thing for him to get a look at the simple life I led.
?"I like the shirt. It's totally you, and way better than last night's."
I saw that his eyes appeared to focus on my chest, and thought maybe he was trying to compare the real life to what he'd dreamt about. I should've known that wasn't the case. Looking down, I read the shirt.?Dear Math, I'm not a therapist. Solve your own problems.?He was right, totally me, as in a giant geek.
"Yeah, Frannie thought it'd be funny for my birthday to get me a bunch of geeky shirts," I explained. "This is actually one of the better ones. Most people wouldn't understand half of them because they're too technical, for lack of a better word, but they're fun to wear around work, where everyone understands them."
"I wasn't really thinking in terms of geekiness, more your snarky attitude. So, you ready to hit the road? I figure we'll head over to his hotel for a few hours and try to see when he comes and goes. I'm hoping to get an idea of what he's driving around in. I'd love to get a tracker in place. Here's the picture I received this afternoon from my people."
Nate held up his phone, showing me a picture of a young-looking guy, not more than thirty. He had light blonde hair and it looked like green eyes. I didn't think the quality of the picture was the best to determine eye color. His face was handsome, but he didn't have any features that stuck out.
"I expected him to be older," I told Nate as I grabbed my shoes.
"A part of me did too. He's only twenty-three and an Army brat who has lived all over the country before settling into the Chicago area when he went to college. He's been there since and has started his own company. It's an electronics company that has been doing really well over the last six months all of a sudden. We have someone starting there undercover on Tuesday to try to find out if there are any whispers of top secret projects that would be red flags for us."
"Thanks for the bit of background. I don't usually hear this much about the people I find. I generally just give a name and location, and then move on to the next task. Oh, and I'm going to have to take you up on that snack offer; I'm getting hungry."
"Sure, let's first do a run around the hotel and get the lay of the land. After I get a feel for things, we'll hit a drive-thru window." With that we exited my apartment and made our way down to his car.
CHAPTER 8
What kind of spy doesn't know spy talk