“Maybe she should make the call, Rivers,” Frost said. “She and Grinkov seemed to have some real chemistry there.”
My eyes shot daggers at Frost. “It was an act!” I nearly shouted. (Think I doth protest too much?)
“Well, you’re a great actress,” Frost replied blandly, and my hands curled into fists.
“Hey,” Dutch growled. “She did great last night, Frost. Leave her alone.”
“I know she did great last night, Rivers. That’s what I’m saying. She can handle herself, and I think that we should let her make the call. She’s quick on her feet, and she might be able to get us that meeting.”
“No,” Dutch said again, and this time, his tone was deadly serious. “If I know Grinkov’s type, which I do, he’ll want to meet with her again . . . alone. I’m not going to let her go off on her own. She’s too green and she’s been in enough danger already.”
Waves of barely restrained jealousy were pouring off my fiancé, and I knew better than to argue with him. “Okay, Dutch,” I said. “You make the call and set up a meeting. But not today. Today, you need to rest.”
“I’m fine,” he said grouchily.
I squinted at him. There was a line of sweat on his forehead and I moved my hand to his brow. “You’ve got a fever,” I said.
“I’m fine,” he repeated.
I stared at Frost with a look that said, “Dude! Help me out here!” “We can wait a day or two,” he said to Dutch. “I’ve got people monitoring the airwaves, and so far, we haven’t heard any chatter about an auction. The minute we do, however, we’ll need to move on it fast.”
Frost left us after that for a meeting with his team and his superiors to brief them on our game plan. He had let us know that CSIS was going to be in charge of watching the building, but they’d agreed to let him know if any nefarious-looking types approached. He’d added that they would call us with an alert and he and the team wouldn’t be far away. He also promised to be back in a few hours to give us the lowdown on what Dutch should say to Grinkov. In the meantime, I helped my sweetheart get back to bed, and made him comfortable.
He was far more bruised on the left side than he was on the right. “Both of Grinkov’s thugs were right-handed,” he explained when I ran my hand very gently over his swollen cheek.
I leaned in and gave him a soft kiss. “Do you want another pain pill?”
He shook his head. “I’ll brick it out.”
I frowned and thought of an idea. “How about a smoothie?”
Dutch brightened. “We have stuff for a smoothie?”
I’d spotted both frozen blueberries and strawberries in the freezer when I’d gotten Dutch his ice pack. “We do,” I told him, scooting off the bed and discreetly tucking the bottle of pain pills into my sleeve. “You sit tight and I’ll be back in five minutes with one.”
I rummaged around in Des Vries’s pantry and came up with some protein powder, and his fridge revealed a pint of vanilla yogurt. Mixing all the ingredients into the blender, along with one of the pain pills, I pressed the blend button and smiled when the contents turned a pinkish purple.
I carried the glass back into the bedroom, quite proud of myself, and Dutch took a good gulp of it, pronouncing it delicious. “Your cooking’s improving,” he said.
I laughed. For the record, my cooking is so bad the local firemen know me by name.
“Yeah, yeah,” I said, waving my hand at him. “Just drink that down, okay?”
Dutch did, and within minutes after he’d finished, his eyes closed and he was fast asleep.
I had moved into the kitchen with the empty glass when I heard the elevator doors open. “Frost?” I called, looking at the clock. He’d been gone only an hour.
No one answered and I felt the hairs on my arms stand up on end.
“Hello?” I said loudly, grabbing a breadboard and holding it high like a baseball bat.
Footsteps sounded in the hallway. I waited for the person to identify himself, shaking slightly and hoping it wasn’t Kozahkov’s assassin coming back to finish off the witnesses.
Around the corner came someone familiar and completely unexpected, holding flowers and offering me a shy sad smile. “Hi,” she said, before spotting the breadboard in my hands. “You gonna hit me with that?”
“What the freak are you doing here?!” I yelled. My heart was pounding in my chest from the implied threat of someone unknown entering the condo.
Rick’s girlfriend held up the flowers. “I heard he’d been roughed up by Grinkov!” she explained, and tears filled her eyes with moisture.
I lowered the breadboard. “How did you get past the doorman?” I demanded. Stupid CIA, couldn’t even keep out a simple dumb blonde!
Mandy held up a set of keys and her key card. “I came up from the garage and used my card,” she said.
I wanted to yell at someone right then—preferably Frost for trusting the CSIS to guard the building while he and his team were out. Send us an alert my aunt Martha. “Mandy,” I said firmly. “You have to leave.”
“But—”
“Now.”
Mandy’s hand went to her mouth and she choked on a sob. “But he needs me!”
“Abs?” I heard Dutch call groggily from the bedroom.
Mandy’s face whipped around at the sound of Dutch’s voice. “Rick!” she cried, and before I could catch her, she darted around the corner and ran down the hallway into the master bedroom.
I tore after her and caught her by the wrist just as she pulled up short in front of the bed, staring in horror at Dutch while he lay propped up on pillows.
His one good eye opened a little more in surprise. “I’m sorry!” I told him. “She had a key card to the elevator and she used it to get in.”
“Who the hell are you?” Mandy yelled, pointing at Dutch accusingly.
“Mandy,” I snapped, gripping her arm tightly and trying to pull her out of the bedroom. “You need to come with me.”
“Where’s Rick?” she demanded, trying to pull out of my grasp. “You tell me where he is right now or so help me God, I will start screaming bloody murder!”
“Oh, yeah?” I replied. “And who do you think is going to hear you, huh? Des Vries owns this whole building and there’s no one in it but us!”
“Who are you and where is my boyfriend?!” she shouted again, slapping me hard on the cheek before launching herself at me, scratching and clawing with her long nails.
I pulled my head back after the slap and tried to duck away from those nails, but she was like a rabid cat. After getting raked on the side of my neck, I shoved her hard to create a little room, then stepped forward and swung for all I was worth.
My fist connected with the side of her cheek, and she went down like a lead balloon.
“Son of a beast!” I hissed, shaking my hand and dancing above her. “Sweet Jesus, that hurt!”
Dutch was attempting to get out of bed and struggling to do so. “You okay?”
I held up my hand. It was already swelling. “No!”
Mandy moaned.
“I think you knocked her out,” Dutch said, looking down at the crumpled form of our houseguest.
“I didn’t have much of a choice,” I told him, feeling zero sympathy for the wretched woman.
“Help me up, would you?” he asked me.
I went to his side and gently lifted while he pushed. I heard him suck in a breath as he clutched his side, but he managed. He then shuffled over to squat down and inspect Mandy. “Hey,” he said, shaking her shoulder a little.
She moaned, but otherwise didn’t respond.
“We need to call Frost,” Dutch said, standing tall again, clearly troubled. “She knew I wasn’t Des Vries right away, even with all the bruises.”
I stared at him in surprise. I hadn’t even thought of that. “You’re right!”
I looked from him to Mandy. “But how could she tell?” I said. “Honey, you barely look human. You could pass for anyone with dark hair and a goat
ee.”
“Gee, thanks.”
“Sorry,” I told him. “But it’s true, cowboy. There must have been something that tipped her off, and we need to know what it is before we set up another meeting with Grinkov. What if he has a chance to get a close look at you and starts noticing some differences?”
Dutch nodded. “Okay. Let’s get her to wake up and interrogate her. Then we’ll call Frost and have him take care of her.”
It took a faceful of ice water to wake Mandy up. And it took a bucket of ice to make the swelling on my hand go down. “You hit me,” she said sullenly, using the towel I’d handed her to mop her face.
“You started it,” I told her meanly, tapping the gun I’d borrowed from Dutch’s holster on the table just to let her know we meant business. I didn’t like Mandy so much after getting raked by her claws and slapped.
“Fuck you,” she said, glaring hard at me.
I guess the feeling was mutual.
“Mandy,” Dutch said from the chair I’d pulled over for him. “Why did you come here today?”
“I heard Rick’d been roughed up by Grinkov,” she told him. “And I wanted to see if he was okay.”
“How’d you hear that?” I asked her. After all, I’d brought Dutch home only the night before.
“Rick’s bookie called me. He said he’d heard that Rick got the shit kicked out of him by Grinkov after being picked up off the street. He wanted to know if Rick was still gonna be able to cover his bets. Where is Rick anyway?”
“He’s safe,” Dutch told her.
She scowled at him doubtfully.
“He is,” I assured her, and she cut me a look too.
“Why should I believe anything you say? You could’ve killed him for all I know!”
“Yeah,” I agreed. “We could have. And we could’ve killed you too, toots, but we haven’t.” Tapping the gun again, I added, “Yet.”
Mandy held the towel to her chest protectively and her lower lip trembled. “Are you going to?” she asked hoarsely.
“No,” Dutch told her.
I frowned. In my opinion he’d given in too easily. “We won’t,” I said quickly, “as long as you agree to tell us what we want to know.”
Mandy swallowed hard and looked absolutely petrified. “Is this about Rick’s gambling, or about his weapons dealing?”
My brow rose in surprise. “You know a little something about Rick’s business?”
Mandy nodded. “He talks on the phone a lot. I pretend not to listen.”
“What types of things have you heard him say?” Dutch asked curiously.
“Well, he talks a lot about guns and bombs and explosives and stuff. I figured out after the first two weeks we were together that he was selling weapons and shit.”
“To whom?” I asked carefully.
Mandy shrugged. “Anyone willing to pay. A lot of them have names I couldn’t even pronounce if I tried.”
“Have you ever met any of Rick’s associates?” Dutch asked her.
Mandy nodded. “Yeah.”
“Would you know if any of them would recognize you if they saw you?”
She shrugged. “Sure, I guess. I mean, he likes to take me to meetings sometimes and he shows me off at parties. Hey,” she added, as if the thought had suddenly occurred to her, “if you’ve been posing as Rick, does that mean that he hasn’t really broken up with me?”
I turned my head away so only Dutch could see and rolled my eyes. He ignored me and said, “We appreciate your willingness to cooperate, Mandy. And yes, you’re right, as far as we know, Des Vries hasn’t broken up with you.”
“Who are you guys, anyway?” she wanted to know.
“The good guys,” he told her.
Mandy’s eyes moved back to the gun in my hand, and she rubbed her swollen cheek. “Sure, you are.”
“One last question, Mandy,” I said. “How’d you know it wasn’t Rick Des Vries in the bed when you came in here?”
Rick’s girlfriend frowned distastefully. “It was the pajamas,” she said, pointing to the royal blue silk pj’s Dutch was wearing. The very ones I’d gotten him for Christmas. “Rick wouldn’t be caught dead in those. In fact, no real man would.”
I growled low in my throat. “Shih tzu,” I grumbled, glaring hard at Mandy.
Dutch glanced sideways at me. “What?”
“I wish my hand didn’t hurt so much so I could smack her again.”
Mandy flinched. “You asked!”
Dutch sighed. “Let’s call Frost. And Abs?”
“Yeah?”
“Better let me hold the gun.”
Frost wasn’t at all happy to hear about Mandy. In fact, he was downright furious when he found her with both hands cuffed to the chair in the kitchen and my iPod playing tunes in her ears. “She’s a Canadian citizen!” he hissed as we all huddled in the living room, just in case she could hear us over the music. “Do you know how much trouble this could cause?”
“She knew Dutch wasn’t Des Vries the moment she laid eyes on him!” I countered. “What were we supposed to do, Frost? Just turn her loose so that she could go out there and tell every one of Des Vries’s associates that Dutch is an impostor? She’s already admitted that she knows his bookie! She could make one phone call and get us both killed!”
“She knows too much for us to cut her loose,” Dutch added. “She’s fully aware of what Des Vries buys and sells and she claims that he takes her along to some of his arms deals.”
Frost had his hands on his hips and was looking completely exasperated. But when Dutch told him that, his posture changed in an instant. “She said that?”
I nodded. “Yep. We showed her some faces of known weapons dealers and she pegged three guys right off the bat. And if I were Rick Des Vries’s girlfriend, and I cared about him as much as she apparently does, I would stop at nothing to try to find out where he was and try to help him. And I’d start by calling his bookie. She tells that guy and it’s all over for us. Word’ll get back to Grinkov, who will no doubt tell everyone else—including Boklovich. She could blow our cover right out of the water with one phone call, and we wouldn’t know it until it was way too late.”
I wanted Frost to take Mandy away to some nice quiet cell for a while where she couldn’t cause any more trouble until all this was over. But I also knew that her being a Canadian citizen really complicated things for the CIA. “We can’t hold her,” he said, confirming my fears. “And we can’t hand her over to CSIS. They’ll interrogate her, and she’ll spill the beans that the guy they’ve thought was Des Vries is an impostor, and then they’ll start asking us too many questions. But, if we let her go, we’ll have to call off the mission.”
“So . . . where does that leave us?” I asked.
Frost sighed, took out his cell and began to punch the display. “We have no choice. It’s over.”
I slapped my hand on his wrist. “What if there was another option?”
Frost frowned, switched the phone to his other hand, and placed it to his ear. “There is no other op—”
I squeezed my hand on his arm, urging him to listen to me. “What if we recruited her?”
Through the earpiece of Frost’s phone I could hear someone answer the ring. I stared right into Frost’s eyes, willing him to at least hear me out.
Our handler hesitated. The person on the other end repeated the greeting. I nodded, knowing Frost was close to agreeing to listen to my idea. “Director,” he said at last. “I’m sorry to have disturbed you. I’ll have to call you back.”
I breathed a sigh of relief and let go of his arm.
“All right, Cooper,” he said once he’d disconnected. “You have sixty seconds.”
I pitched my idea to both Dutch and Frost, hoping they’d go for it. “Think about it, guys. Mandy said it herself: Rick brought her to meetings to show her off. And you used her image when you set up my original cover, right?”
Frost’s brow furrowed and he stole a glance at Mandy, who was now sing
ing—off-key—to Beyoncé.
Turning back to me, he said, “What’s your point?”
“My point is that she’s obviously memorable, and she could further cement Dutch’s identity as Des Vries. We can totally use her to our advantage! If we make it to the auction, Mandy and Rick can look like the happy couple everyone remembers, while I mingle in with the crowd to figure out who has the drone. With those boobs and that hair, she’s the perfect distraction. No one’s gonna look at me or Dutch twice with that eye candy around.”
“Don’t sell yourself short, hot stuff,” Dutch said.
I grinned broadly at him. Such a good fiancé!
“How the hell do you plan to convince her to go along with it?” Frost argued.
“By promising to reunite her with Des Vries.”
Frost’s eyes widened. “Are you insane? Cooper, I can’t promise her that! Des Vries is in a secure location being held by the Israelis!”
“We don’t have to bring Des Vries here,” I snapped, eyeing Mandy over my shoulder to make sure she hadn’t overheard. She was still singing along to Beyoncé.
“Then what’re you suggesting?” Frost asked.
“We just have to get the Mossad to agree to let the two of them meet,” I said. “I mean, it shouldn’t be hard to sell them on a visit of, like, ten minutes or so, whatever it takes to get them to agree to let the two see each other, and we can be vague on the particulars when we offer that as an incentive to Mandy. In return, we get her to agree to help us and not tell the Canadian authorities about holding her here against her will for the past two hours or so.”
Frost glanced at my knuckles. “Or about assaulting her, huh?”
“Hey, that was self-defense,” I told him.
“It was,” Dutch agreed. “I’m the witness.”
Frost’s hands went back to his hips and he hung his head while he thought the idea through. “Fine,” he said at last. “See if you can recruit her and I’ll try to sell the idea to the director. Assuming she goes for it, I’ll have the paperwork drawn up and Mandy can sign it this afternoon.”
“Perfect!” I said, feeling really confident.
An hour later I was feeling notably less confident. “Let me get this straight,” I said through gritted teeth as Dutch and I sat with Mandy and worked through the terms. “You want one hundred thousand dollars and a guaranteed spot in the Canada’s Got Talent semifinals?”