by Gini Koch
“Yes.” Chuckie sounded impressed with me. I wondered if this meant he’d let the walk to the Paraguayan Embassy and my slowness to share slide. It was unlikely, of course, but a girl could dream. “That’s why we can see the hands well, but not the face. I think he or she is taking care to be hard to see.”
“But Richard saw them.”
“Yes. I remind you that A-Cs have enhanced eyesight. I truly believe whoever’s up there wants to speak with us.”
“So why doesn’t whoever it is come out?” Kyle asked.
“Maybe he can’t,” Len said. “Or…maybe he’s afraid of being spotted.”
I decided I’d had enough standing around wondering. We were across the street from the Embassy, and at least three of the men with me were packing heat. Plus, I had four big dogs and an assortment of Stealth Poofs.
I shoved the stroller toward the front door. A little faster than I’d intended, but fortunately White was able to catch up and grab me before I slammed us into the building.
This meant, of course, that Chuckie and the boys had no choice but to follow us. Which was good, because I didn’t even have to knock. The door opened the moment we reached it.
There was no one there.
CHAPTER 61
“HELLO?” I WASN’T CROSSING the threshold until I knew we weren’t heading into the Romanian House of Horrors.
A young woman’s head peeped around the door. I realized she was behind it. “Please come in, Ambassador.”
It was such a shock to hear someone, anyone, refer to me as an actual ambassador that I gaped for a moment. Recovered quickly. “Thanks. Don’t let the stroller roll over your toes—it’s heavy.”
She smiled. “Not to worry.” She looked at the dogs. “Could you, perhaps, take your pets around to the back?”
“No,” Chuckie said. “Get the dogs back home,” he told Len and Kyle. “Advise the ambassador that we’re visiting neighbors.”
The boys shot worried looks at me, but they nodded and headed to our Embassy. The young woman looked a little disappointed for a moment, then put a welcoming smile back on.
We trooped in. It was nice inside. A big mahogany visitor’s desk dominated the entry room, with a staircase curving up behind it, very Turn of a Couple of Centuries Ago—though I didn’t spend a lot of time looking around. I was fairly sure Chuckie was handling that part of the festivities.
Once the door closed behind us, the girl bobbed her head. “The Ambassadress would like to speak with you. If you’ll wait a moment, I’ll fetch her.”
She trotted upstairs while we all exchanged the standard “what’s going on?” looks.
“You know her?” Chuckie asked.
“No.” I got Jamie out of the stroller. She had her Poof in her hands, and I decided that was probably smart. It looked like a stuffed animal, after all, and that way, if needed, her Poof could activate without issue. “Harlie, Poofikins, into Kitty’s purse. Other Poofies, guard Richard, Chuckie, and the stroller.” Poofs disappeared into male pockets as I put the diaper bag where Jamie and the Poofs had been and put my purse over my shoulder. “Chuckie, Fluffy’s with you, right?”
“Right,” he mumbled. Jeff always acted like this about the Poofs, too, which cracked me up. I refrained from singing “Macho Man.” Out loud. It was playing in my head, though.
White, unsurprisingly, had no issue with a couple of Poofs. “I don’t recognize the young lady, either. She wasn’t one of the guests at the…party.”
“Amy’s not here. We can call it a fiasco.”
“Then how does she know you?” Chuckie wasn’t going to let this one go. “Oh, and let me mention—you just lost whatever points you’d made by not going into Paraguay’s Embassy. We’re now on Romanian soil, meaning that we’re subject to their laws and there’s not one damn thing I can do about it.”
“Not to worry, Mister Reynolds,” a woman’s voice said from above us. “You are guests of Romania, not prisoners. And not enemies.”
We all looked up. The young woman was helping an older lady. She was older than Mom but not as old as my Nana, at least as I judged it.
She smiled at us. “We are alone; just Adriana and I are here right now.”
“I’m afraid you have the better of us, Madame,” White said with extreme courtliness.
She smiled again. “I do, do I not? I am Olga Dalca, wife of Andrei, who is our ambassador.” I opened my mouth to introduce ourselves, but she waved her hand. “No, no. I know who you are, Ambassador Katt-Martini, and your Mister Reynolds. And Former Pontifex White, I know you as well. Your two young men are new, are they not? The ones who took your handsome animals back home? I believe their names are Leonard Parker and Kyle Constantine, is that correct?”
“Yes,” Chuckie said, clearly unhappy she knew this information. I realized that, until this moment, I hadn’t known either one of their last names, or that Len was his nickname. I felt out of the loop, which was pretty much my par for every course. “I confess to failing to remember meeting you, however, Ambassadress.”
“Oh, you have not met me, Mister Reynolds. Not until today.” Olga sighed. “I would come down to greet you properly but…perhaps you would come up instead? I would very much like to see your child.”
I had Poofs on me, and she didn’t look or sound dangerous. I also figured the stroller would take care of itself. I trotted up the steps, White and Chuckie following me.
“This is Jamie, our Junior Ambassadress,” I said as I reached the second floor and realized why Olga hadn’t wanted to come down. There was a wheelchair behind her—Adriana was literally holding her up. The gloves on her hands had to have been custom-made; they were extremely fancy, dove-colored and dainty—but they were workout gloves like the ones I’d seen wheelchair athletes use. “Please, don’t feel you have to stand on our account.”
Olga smiled warmly. “Thank you. I would have asked your young men to assist me, but since they did not accompany you, that was not an option. Besides, it’s nicer up here.” She sat back down with a sigh. “Adriana, please bring our guests something to drink, they look thirsty.” Adriana headed downstairs while Olga turned her wheelchair around, then rolled down the hall. “Please bring the beautiful baby here, to the sunlight.”
I followed her along a short hallway. She was right—this floor was lovely, decorated in what I took to be Old Romanian Treasures and Trinkets style. But it was warm, comfy, and not at all what you’d expect from the outside.
We went into a room that was clearly a study, with what I realized was the window we’d seen her at. There were actually two windows in the room, near each other, one with a view of our Embassy and one with a view onto the Circle. Both were floor to ceiling, and there were handicapped railings around them, which explained how she’d been able to stand and signal to us.
Chuckie prevented me from going to the windows. He went instead, to each one, and checked out the surrounding buildings.
“Chuckie, really.”
Olga chuckled. “He is cautious, and this is wise. We are safe here, at least so I believe, but better to be sure.” She was turned sideways to the window that faced our Embassy. She reached for Jamie. “May I?”
She wasn’t Marcia Kramer—I handed Jamie to her. Jamie studied her for a few moments, then grabbed her nose. Olga laughed. “Oh, she is adorable. How old?”
“Three months.”
“So advanced.” Olga said this quite calmly. I felt some suspicions starting to wriggle.
“I suppose. She’s our first, so I wouldn’t know,” I lied.
Olga looked at me. “I see you are cautious, too. This is also wise.”
White cleared his throat. “Ah, Madame? I believe you wanted us to visit, and I have to assume it wasn’t just to meet the baby.”
“Oh, but of course it was,” Olga said, giving us a very wide-eyed, innocent look. “At least, that is what I will say, and you will be able to say it, too, since it is true.”
“What are you afraid of?”
I asked.
“Or who?” Chuckie added.
Olga shrugged, gently jiggling Jamie and making goo-goo faces at her, while Jamie giggled. “Afraid? I am not afraid so much. For myself, at least. For others? For them I am quite afraid.”
“Why tell us about it?”
She looked up at me. “Because you are the only ones who can stop it.”
CHAPTER 62
“STOP WHAT?” CHUCKIE ASKED, voice carefully neutral.
“There are a lot of ‘its’ going on right now,” I added. I doubted I’d achieved the same neutrality in my tone, but I wasn’t Mr. C.I.A., so I cut myself a break on that one.
Olga looked out the window. “I like it here. The medical care is very good. I would not be doing so well if I were back home.”
“What are you suffering from?” White asked. He didn’t sound impatient or anything. I figured I’d been going to all those classes for something, and if Olga wanted to extend the visit by getting around to the pertinent facts slowly, so be it. Diplomacy was going to be my middle name, at least for as long as I could manage it.
“Multiple Sclerosis. I can move without the chair less and less these days.” She sighed and looked back to us. “Therefore, I have a different view about many things.” She kissed Jamie on the head. “Because I sit here most days and watch the world outside, I see things. Many things.”
“Things of interest to us?” Chuckie asked.
“Oh, I’m sure.” She smiled and looked back out the window. “I know American Centaurion is…different. Sometimes I take pictures, so my Andrei can tell me who it is I’m seeing.” She chuckled. “He said your little party was quite the event. I would have enjoyed it greatly when I was younger.”
“It was a disaster, but I’m really glad you’re not holding a grudge.”
She laughed. “Oh, my dear, we all make mistakes. You’re all so young. You’ll learn.” She gave White a conspiratorial smile. “As those of us who have lived longer already know.”
“I’d appreciate learning what it is you want to tell us,” Chuckie said politely while White chuckled. “We’re on a schedule of a sort.”
“Oh, yes. The President’s Ball. I won’t be attending.”
“It’s handicapped accessible.”
Olga looked up at me. “Yes, it is. And the President sent a personal message, asking me to consider attending, especially under the circumstances.”
“Circumstances?”
“Our president is coming for the event. That is why only Adriana and I are here right now. The rest of our mission is with him on a tour of the city. He would like me to attend as well. But it’s hard to escape if you’re in a wheelchair. And I cannot be certain an Alpha Centaurion will be near enough to me when disaster strikes.”
I looked at Chuckie. “Does everyone in the world know?”
He shot me the “shut up, shut up” look. “I’m sorry, Ambassadress. I think you meant American Centaurion.”
Olga was clearly too well-bred to roll her eyes, but I was pretty sure she wanted to. “Mister Reynolds, please. Let us drop the pretense. As I said, it’s only Adriana and myself here. We know, she and I. Only we two. Andrei suspects, I believe, but it’s difficult to believe. Unless you spend your days watching.”
“What conclusions have you drawn?” White asked.
She shrugged. “You’re here to protect and serve. Most of you, anyway. I know you must feel you’re not doing well right now.”
“The Party from Hell was a tip-off, yeah.”
She shook her head. “You were genuinely trying. Andrei told me how devastated everyone seemed when things went…awry. I understand there were tears.”
“Doreen’s very pregnant, and Amy was really expecting better results.” Hey, I’d managed not to burst into tears in front of people. I’d saved that for when I was alone with Jeff. I was a good wife and ambassador that way.
“I can tell you truthfully that the people who had your mission before you would have thrown a perfect gathering.”
“Great, good to know.”
I got the Severe Mother Look. Wow, I hadn’t realized my mom hadn’t made that one up on her own. “Their party would have been perfect. And only some would have been invited—only those whose influence they were courting.”
“Our new Concierge Majordomo says we didn’t invite enough people.”
She nodded. “Perhaps not. But your oversight was based on location and being very new here. No one was left off the list as an intentional slight. Your invitation did say ‘our nearest neighbors,’ did it not?”
“Yes. Amy did a nice job with those. She did them by hand.” Why I was trying to get any kind of kudos for the fiasco I couldn’t say, but you’re supposed to support your best friends’ efforts.
“They were lovely. Please let her know I have preserved ours in a memory book.”
“Will do.” I didn’t want to ask if it was the Nice Handwriting memory book or the We’re Still Laughing At THIS memory book.
“However, your predecessors would never have invited most of the countries you did. And for those who were so lucky as to receive an invitation? No real emotions would have been expressed. No caring. They put on good faces, but they were not good people.”
Well, events had certainly proved that to be true. “That sort of sounds like D.C. in a nutshell.”
“No. As you will find, many are here to do the best they can. We don’t all agree, but most of us do try to do what is best.”
“Best is in the eye of the beholder,” Chuckie mentioned.
“True.” Olga chuckled. “However, I can assure you, those you replaced were not working for anyone’s interests but their own.”
She was right, of course. I was curious how she’d figured it out, though, since the former Diplomatic Corps had fooled most of the A-C community for years. “What makes you say that?”
“I met them. They were not pleasant because Romania was not of interest to them. We had nothing they wanted. And refused to perhaps give them things they might want in the future. We were not of…like mind.”
I could feel the hair on the back of my neck stand up. “What countries were they friendly and of like mind with?”
“Oh, all the majors. They had a particularly strong fondness for France.”
“Yeah, we sure know that.”
“They were also quite friendly with the South American countries.” She made eye contact with me. “Especially Paraguay.”
CHAPTER 63
I COULD FEEL CHUCKIE PRAYING that I’d keep my mouth shut. But as far as we knew, we had a world of hurt heading toward us, and we knew nothing. Olga, who apparently spent her days looking out of two windows, seemed to know a lot more than we did.
“Paraguay’s been coming up a lot recently.” I felt that was a noncommittal enough statement that Chuckie might not strangle me for it later.
“I’m sure it has been. It is quite pivotal for certain things.”
“What things do you mean, Madame?” White asked.
“So sad about the police force,” Olga said with a sigh. “I am not certain the correct decision was made.”
“You mean to put Titan Security in charge, or to lay off what seems like half the police force?”
“Either.” Olga smiled at Jamie. “So sad, to be willing to disavow your loved one, just for the sake of politics.”
“You mean the head of Titan, right? Someone influential is his son or daughter or something?” Per Oliver, anyway. Of course, also per Oliver, there wasn’t enough evidence to make an educated guess as to who said relative might be.
Olga kissed Jamie’s fingertips, which earned her the I Love YOU baby giggles. “What do you know of Titan?”
“What should we know?” Chuckie countered.
“Have you met him, the man in charge?”
“No.” I looked at Chuckie, who shook his head. “Really? You’ve never met him?”
“No need.” He looked at the desk. There was a newspaper on it. Chu
ckie picked it up, flipped to the business section, and handed it to me. “He’s always in there somewhere these days.”
“Wow, just like Ronald Yates used to be.” Of course, Yates had owned the media outlet, and this man didn’t actually look like Yates. But I could see the resemblance in his expression, which said he was taking over whether anyone else liked it or not.
He looked around sixty, plus or minus, and appeared trim. Nothing exceptional about Mr. Antony Marling really, other than that he headed the top private security firm in the U.S. and, per the article, possibly the world. “Huh. He’s a French expat.”
“He and his wife both have very interesting names, don’t you think?” Olga asked.
I scanned the article. He was “in” with the Pentagon as well as some others—Madeline Cartwright was credited with the “one of our most trusted suppliers” line. She really knew all the best dudes.
After the Pentagon’s little “we love Titan” paragraph and a typical “wonderful suppliers and people” quote from Cartwright, I found the wife’s name. Cybele Siler Marling, who had also been, per this article, “a weapons genius in her own right,” had died years before. Twins, a boy and a girl, were mentioned but not named. According to the article, they’d died when his wife had.
“Um, yeah. Interesting. Hers especially. Very French. Or something. So, his wife and kids are supposedly dead.” I looked over at Olga. “Any guess as to which one of them is really alive and working as a politician in Washington?”
Olga shook her head. “The only other thing I know of Mister Marling is that he is very fond of visiting France and Paraguay. And that he might have children the press is not aware of in both of those countries and here. Or he might not.”
Maybe he was more like Yates than I’d first thought. “So it could be anyone. Or no one at all. Great.” Story of our lives these days.
“You may keep the paper,” Olga said graciously.
“Um, thanks. I think.” I folded it up and shoved it into my purse. “So, Paraguay, France, Titan…is there a connection we should be making?”