Girl Undercover 4 & 5: Ariel & Financial Devil

by Julia Derek

  “That was quick,” I said. “How’d it go? Is he gonna do it?”

  Ian smiled. “Yup. It all went very smoothly. He took less than a minute to get down to the restroom. Even when he went to get a shaker, he was back in no-time.” Our plan consisted of a tiny, dime-sized recording device being attached to the bottom of a salt or pepper shaker. What with so many people being carb-conscious these days, attaching it to the bread basket was much too risky. Not so with the salt and pepper shakers; no one ever asked to have them removed from the table.

  “Really?” I said. “Wow. He didn’t hesitate even for a second?”

  “No. He was extremely cooperative. I’m guessing he needs the cash badly.”

  “Hmm. That’s a good sign.”

  “It sure is.”

  “I can’t believe he didn’t ask any questions.”

  Ian shrugged. “Maybe he’s used to getting propositioned.”

  “He must be or it’s almost too good to be true. Do you think he’ll be able to do it without screwing up?”

  Ian exhaled and pushed over his half-full wineglass so that it ended up next to my arm.

  “If he can manage to exchange the salt and pepper shakers on their table without them paying attention, it should be fine.”

  “Let’s hope he can,” I replied and adjusted the wineglass, moving it a little closer to the edge of the table. Since we were both right-handed and my right arm was next to the side of the table that wasn’t against a wall, we had decided that I would take care of this part of our plan. Also, I was a woman, Ian had added. Women are clumsier than men. I had just looked at him when he’d uttered that last statement, not laughed as I was pretty sure that was his idea of a funny joke.

  The waiter in question walked into the dining room right then and headed toward Davis and Ron’s table. He was holding a wooden holder containing salt and pepper shakers.

  “Here we go,” Ian whispered. “Get ready.”

  “I’m as ready as can be. Just let me know when since you have a better view of them than I do.”

  “I will.” His eyes were on the men’s table.

  Looking down, I pushed the big wineglass even closer to the edge of the table.

  “Now,” Ian hissed under his breath.

  Quickly, I swiped the glass over the edge. As it hit the stone floor below, it produced a satisfyingly loud, crashing sound. Everyone around us turned to look in our direction.

  I made myself look horrified, covering my mouth while gasping. A busboy ran toward our table and threw a couple of napkins over the mess I had created and to stop the wine from spreading. Soon another joined him with a broom and an upright dustpan that he used to sweep up all the glass. Then our waiter came.

  “I’m so, so sorry,” I said in a distraught tone. “It just slipped out of my hand as I put it down.”

  “No worries,” the waiter replied. “Let me replace it for you. What was it?”

  “Oh, that’s not necessary.”

  “Are you sure? It’s really not a problem.”

  “Yes, I’m good. If you can bring me a club soda with a lime instead, it would be great.”

  “Sure.” The waiter left together with the two very efficient busboys. The floor next to us looked like new.

  I turned to Ian, whose content expression had already answered the question I’d been about to ask. So instead I said, “He did it then?”

  “Yup. He exchanged them while their heads were turned in our direction. They’re clueless.”

  “Really? Fantastic! The hard part is over.”

  “Yes, now we can just enjoy our lunch—and listen to their conversation in real time.” His eyes gleamed with satisfaction at my surprise as he handed me a tiny earpiece that looked like a skin-colored earplug. He hadn’t told me about this part. “Put this in your ear.”

  I took it from him. “Are you telling me we’re gonna be able to overhear their entire conversation?”

  “Exactly.” Ian smiled.

  “Awesome.” I put it in my ear and could immediately hear the two men talk.

  “This thing is amazing,” I said as I listened, each word the men exchanged entering my ear with crystal clarity.

  “Isn’t it?”

  The two men took their sweet time eating. Ian snapped a few discreet photos of them using his smartphone to include in the packages we would supply the NYPD and the FBI with. By the time the men asked for the check, Ron had incriminated himself several times over by talking about the dirty money he was investing for Davis in real estate and so had Davis, mentioning the human trafficking a couple of times. Not that it was really necessary for Davis to provide more evidence—Ian already had several damning transcripts from the chatroom the man visited on an almost daily basis. Ian and I couldn’t wait to get our hands on that tiny device so we could send all of the evidence to the authorities.

  These two guys were so screwed.

  Just as I was about to remove the earpiece, Ron said something that made me pause:

  “Is your man taking out the problem tomorrow night?”

  “Yes, Nina and her friend will be gone then, don’t you worry,” Davis replied.

  I looked at Ian, who was staring at me.

  “Tell him they have to be dead for sure,” Ron said. “For sure. If he wants more money, just let me know. I can pay more.”

  “No, the ten thousand is enough,” Davis said. “That’s his usual fee.”

  “Okay, good. And he knows where to find them? I apologize for asking so many questions, but if it comes out, I’m done, you know that.”

  “Yes, he needs to be at—”

  “Can I get you something else?” our waiter asked right then, drowning out the rest of Davis’s words.

  Ian and I turned toward him and at least I had to really focus not to snap at the poor man, who couldn’t know how inopportunely he’d appeared.

  “Do you have chocolate cake?” Ian asked in a clipped voice.

  “Yes, our soufflé cake is delicious—”

  “We’ll have one of those and two coffees,” Ian said.

  As soon as our waiter had left, Ian looked at me. “Were you able to make out where the hitman was going to take out Nina and her friend? I couldn’t hear it.”

  I sighed. “No. It might’ve been something with ‘hotel,’ but I’m not at all sure.”

  Ian’s nostrils flared. “Bloody hell. Now we really need that device.”

  “I know.” I glanced toward their table just as the men left. Any moment now their waiter would come to pick up the holder containing the salt and pepper shaker. As soon as he was alone, he’d take the shaker with the device and give it to Ian at the restrooms. In exchange, he’d get his remaining five hundred bucks.

  Two seconds later the waiter came and picked up the shakers, then disappeared with them on a tray through a couple of swing doors.

  Ian removed his earpiece and got to his feet. “I’m heading down to the restrooms.”

  When almost ten minutes had passed and he had yet to return, I was getting worried. What was taking him so long? Our coffee and chocolate soufflé cake had arrived. The cake was staring up at me, the vanilla ice cream melting next to it. I was in no mood to even taste it. When our waiter came by to see how I was doing, I asked him for the check.

  Finally Ian was back and he did not look happy.

  “What’s wrong?” I asked, instantly tense.

  Ian’s face was dark. “He lost the bloody shaker.”

  I stared at Ian. “What do you mean he lost the shaker? How can he lose the shaker?”

  “That’s what I asked him. He claims he put the tray with the holder down and went to pick up something real quick. When he turned around, the holder was gone.”

  “Damn… How can it just disappear like that? Are you sure he’s telling the truth?”

  “Why would he lie? He wants his other five hundred, which he’s not getting now.”

  “Hmm. Maybe he’s angling for more money.”

  Ian
gave something between a smirk and a sideways smile. “No, I already asked him that. The moron just didn’t pay enough attention. He thinks some busboy might’ve taken the shakers as he had his back to them to put on another table. ”

  I tskd and blew out an annoyed breath. “I knew this was going way too well…”

  Ian took a seat and got out his earpiece. “Put your earpiece back in. We might be able to locate the shaker with the device by listening.”

  “Good idea. Let’s try.” I put my earpiece back in at the same time as our waiter returned with our check.

  As we pretended to enjoy our dessert and coffee, we tried to make sense of the sounds in our ears. We could definitely hear people talking, but we both had difficulty making out what they were saying. It didn’t sound like they were near the recording device. I thought it also sounded like people were walking around close to it.

  “Yes, that’s what I’m thinking too,” Ian said when I mentioned the clomping sounds in my ear, stating it must be footfalls. “Maybe it’s already back on another table, but no one’s seated there yet.”

  “Yeah, that could be.”

  Ian and I both looked around the big dining area and as far as I could tell from my vantage point, all the tables were occupied at the moment.

  “Can you see any empty tables?” I asked Ian. “Or ones with only one person there.”

  He twisted and turned in his chair as he took in the dining room, then shook his head.

  “Maybe they aren’t talking right now,” I suggested. Of course, given that we’d had the pieces in our ears for a few minutes now, I didn’t think that sounded like a plausible possibility.

  “No, from what I can tell, everyone in this room is communicating with others at their table,” Ian said, eyes still searching the big space. He nodded at a man seated alone. “And he’s spoken to his waiter once, so we should’ve heard him if it was there. I think the shaker has ended up somewhere else in this restaurant. The device can pick up sounds within a twenty-yard radius, but more clearly, if they’re close.”

  I closed my eyes. Fuck. If that was the case, we could probably kiss that damn thing goodbye.

  “What are we gonna do?” I asked Ian. “We should tell the guy you bribed to go check the shakers on all empty tables in the other areas. That’s the least he can do for fucking this up, don’t you think?”

  Ian shook his head. “It’s better if we do it. I don’t trust that he won’t fuck up again. How about you go out to the bar area and check the shakers on the tables out there? I’ll wait for you here in the meantime. The device is attached at the bottom of a pepper shaker. You know what it looks like. If you see it, bring the entire shaker back.”

  “Okay,” I said and stood up.

  “I’ll take care of the check and try to think of what else we can do to find this bloody thing. Maybe someone will say something we can make out.”

  So far, all we’d been able to hear was the same distant talk and laughter and walking people in addition to other muffled sounds that could be anything.

  “Okay, I’ll see what I can find,” I said and left Ian, heading for the long bar area where we’d first been.

  Almost as soon as I was out there did I spot an unoccupied table on which there was a holder with a pepper and a salt shaker in it. As far as I could tell, it was the only table that didn’t have people around it. I marched up to it and turned the pepper shaker upside down. My heart sank when I discovered that nothing was attached at the bottom. Just in case Ian had misspoken, I took a look at the bottom of the salt shaker as well. As clean as the pepper shaker.

  I put it back down and looked around the busy eating area. Except for a table from which two women got up and left, all others were occupied. My eyes stopped at one at the far end of the long room where a woman was seated on her own, sipping on a glass of wine.

  There was a wooden shaker holder on her table.

  Without thinking any more about it, I walked over to where she, a platinum blonde with heavy makeup, sat. She looked up as I stopped before her, revealing a face that looked like it had been enhanced with lots of fillers it was so unnaturally puffy.

  I gave her my friendliest smile. “Hello, do you mind if I borrow your salt and pepper shakers for a moment?”

  Not returning my smile, she blinked a couple of times before answering. Then, “Yes, I do mind.”

  Her reply was so unexpected that I was momentarily stunned. I thought quickly about the best way to solve this strange problem and decided I might as well just say “okay,” then return to Ian. If the device was under the woman’s pepper shaker, he would have heard our interaction. So I walked out of the bar area.

  Moving as fast as I could, I was back at Ian’s table. The expectant expression he was wearing didn’t suggest he’d overheard our brief conversation.

  “Do you have it?” he hissed before I could sit down again.

  “So you didn’t hear me talk to the woman then?”

  Ian frowned. “What woman? The device has been picking up exactly the same sounds as before.” He exhaled, frustrated. “So no luck then. I’m beginning to think it may still be in the staff area. Just to be sure, how about you go check the beer garden for empty tables?”

  The beer garden was The Standard’s always packed café.

  A minute later, I was there.

  Chapter 7

  The bustling café had two empty tables that I managed to check out without any success. Despite my weird, uncomfortable experience with the puffy-faced blonde, I walked straight up to the two people who were seated alone at their tables and asked if I could borrow their shakers for a moment. If they refused, I’d just go ahead and grab it anyway and then leave. I doubted they’d make a scene about it.

  It turned out I didn’t have to—both people were a lot more obliging than the blonde and within short I had verified that no device was attached to their shakers.

  By the time I was back at our table, Ian was gone. I looked around for him and spotted him in a corner where he was exchanging quiet words with our sloppy spy. Judging from the tense way Ian’s jaw was set, I could tell he was pissed. Finally his hand disappeared into his pocket and when it came back up, he shoved something into the waiter’s hand. Then he swiveled around and returned to our table.

  “What was that all about?” I asked.

  “I gave him my card and a hundred bucks,” Ian said through clenched teeth. “The card was for him to be able to reach me if the shaker turns up and the hundred to encourage him to look for it. I’m praying it’ll do the trick. Let’s get out of here.”

  We were soon in a cab on our way back uptown.

  “I wonder why Ron needs to get rid of Nina and her friend so badly he’s willing to pay for it to happen,” I whispered as our cab stopped at a red light. “Why he needs to do it at all.”

  “Yeah, who knows?” Ian replied. “He’s clearly more deeply involved in all of this than we’d originally expected.”

  I exhaled. “God, if only he wasn’t... Then we could’ve chalked up losing the recording as an annoyance and just forget about it. The case would’ve been manageable if it weren’t for what we heard there at the end.” Considering what I’d said, I added with a smirk, “or didn’t hear I should say. Anyway, the photos you took of them together and the chatroom transcripts should be enough to prompt the authorities to do an investigation of these two.”

  “Of Davis for sure, but maybe not of Ron. Pictures of them eating lunch are fairly useless on their own. We can’t count on Davis turning Ron in. Even if it isn’t admissible in court, including the actual recording in the anonymous tip we’ll be leaving would make it too strong not to act on. Everything the authorities need to know about Ron is in that conversation. After listening to it, they’ll know exactly what to look for when doing their own recording. All they need to do is replicate our efforts. It’d be almost impossible for them to screw it up.”

  “You’re right. Well, let’s see if the waiter’ll be in touch
again. The shaker has to be somewhere in that restaurant.”

  Ian looked out the window. “Yes, you’d think.”

  “If he doesn’t, what do we do? We can’t just let them go ahead and complete the hit. We have to stop them somehow.”

  “I know.” Ian turned to look at me again. “I’m giving the waiter till six tonight. If I haven’t heard from him by then, we’ll get together and think of how to stop them. If worse comes to worst, we’ll alert the cops about the upcoming hit. They’ll find a way to stop it—if we can make them believe us. Unfortunately, it’ll sound pretty outlandish. For them to believe us, we might need to talk to them in person. You, I should say since I’m a disgraced FBI agent.” He rolled his eyes. “And I know revealing who you really are isn’t something you want to do.”

  “No, but I’d do it if it meant I could save lives.”

  “Let’s hope it won’t have to come to that.”

  When we reached the Upper West Side, Ian dropped me off at my place and continued to his. I found my phone in my purse and dialed Dante’s number.

  “Hey, chica,” he said after only a couple of rings. “How you doin’?”

  “Okay. You?” I wasn’t looking forward having to tell him I’d wasted his and Jose’s time looking for connections to Cardoza down in Texas, but it needed to be done.

  “Not bad,” he replied. “Not much to report though. Gab, I don’t think either of these two have anything to do with your target. We’ve spoken to so many people I’ve lost count.”

  “Yeah, you’re right. I’m thinking I made a mistake in sending you two down there. I no longer have reason to believe my man’s involved.”

  “Why’s that?”

  “We found the dirty client our other target’s working with. And it’s major.” I proceeded to give him all the details, being careful not to use any names as I remained paranoid.

  “So does that mean you’re coming home?” Dante asked when I’d finished my story.

  “What makes you think that? Because you think I need to reveal who I am to the NYPD? I really don’t think it’ll come to us having to go to the police to stop the hit from happening.” “Hope it’ll come to” might have been a better way to convey what I wanted to say, but I couldn’t make myself use that word. I’d rather die than give up my search for Nick’s killers.