Death by Denim

by Linda Gerber

  “My job is to protect you. I had … to know where you were… .”

  I took a step closer and stared him down. “Where is it? My wristwatch? No, it would be too easy for me to leave behind. My earrings maybe?” And then my breath caught. “My shoes.”

  Ryan hesitated and then he nodded.

  I closed my eyes, shaking my head as I thought of how easily Lévêque had gotten us to take the shoes. How excited I had been to have them. “You embedded something in the shoes so you could follow me.”

  “Your mom, too,” he said sheepishly. “We were afraid she would take you and go into hiding again and we wouldn’t know where you were to protect you.”

  “You’re such an idiot.”

  Seth stared at my Pumas, his fists tightening again. “They’re going to follow your shoes to find us?”

  “Yeah,” I replied. “Ironic, isn’t it? Caraday probably tipped off The Mole about the GPS and from that moment on, we were walking targets.”

  Ryan just shook his head. Not like he was denying it, I don’t think, but like he couldn’t believe it had happened. He looked so bewildered that I almost felt sorry for him. Not Seth, though. He rounded on Ryan, injuries or no.

  “What were you thinking? Did it never occur to you that The Mole could use your own technology to track her as well?”

  “He shouldn’t have known. Shouldn’t have …” Ryan leaned his head back against the rags and closed his eyes.

  “What I don’t get,” Seth said, “is why they left Anderson here alive.” He glanced at me. “I can see if he needed to follow you to find out where my family was, but what did they need him for? After he passed along the bugged shoes, why didn’t they take him out right there?”

  My mouth dropped open. “Nice, Seth. Real nice.”

  “No, he has a point,” Ryan said weakly. “This …” He let his gaze wander around the room. “The entire thing is a game. Remember what … Caraday told you. The Mole is a psychopath. We all … crossed him one way or another. He’s gathering us … together. To punish us.”

  A metallic taste spread through my mouth. I felt like I was going to throw up. It was a game. A game! My mom, Seth’s parents … racing to save us, but running straight into a trap. So he could have his amusement. So he could have his revenge. He was so sick, watching us like rats in a cage. Arranging every little detail. Every little detail …

  I groaned. “She must still be wearing her shoes.”

  “She what?”

  “Her shoes. Her shoes! The GPS things! They’re tracking my mom. That’s how they know where she is. And if they’re clearing out, it means she’s close. And when she gets here …”

  Seth’s eyes met mine. “Boom.”

  Seth was right about his not having the touch to pick locks. Even with Ryan patiently instructing him, he couldn’t get that first lock. “I’m sorry,” he kept saying. “I’m sorry.”

  “It’s okay,” I told him. “Really. I know how hard it is.”

  But that didn’t make him feel any better. Especially when Ryan reached out to me weakly and said, “Come here. Let me try.”

  I couldn’t see Seth’s face because he was behind me, but I heard the little disappointed huff as he dropped his hand. I caught Ryan’s eye and gave him a slight shake of my head. “No, Seth. You almost had it,” I said. “Give it one more shot.”

  Ryan pressed his lips together, nodding as if he understood. I wasn’t sure I did. Understand what I was doing, I mean. Since we didn’t have a lot of time to mess around with, letting Ryan undo the handcuffs would have been the smart thing to do. But something told me that Seth needed to be the one to do it. I had to go with my gut on that one.

  Finally, I heard a tiny click. He’d gotten the first lock. “The second one is easier,” I assured him. “Much—”

  “Shhh!” Ryan hissed. “Seth, down! Put your hands behind your back.”

  I could feel Seth’s hesitation, but only for a heartbeat. He dropped to the floor just as the door swung open. Labruzzo’s tall frame filled the doorway.

  “Ah. You found him,” he said.

  I followed his line of sight to where Ryan lay, eyes closed, on the pile of scraps. When neither Seth nor I responded, Labruzzo grunted and took a couple more steps into the room. “You, signorina,” he said, pointing to me. “You come with me.”

  A rush of icy fear swept through my veins. “Where are we going?”

  “You’ll see soon enough.”

  “I’ll go,” Seth said. I twisted around to see him rising to his knees.

  “It’s the girl I need,” Labruzzo said. His oily voice slid over my skin and made me want to retch.

  “She’s not going,” Seth said.

  Labruzzo just laughed. “I don’t remember asking your permission, Romeo.” He grabbed my arm and yanked me to my feet. I bit my lip to keep from crying out from the pain.

  “She’s not well,” Seth said, now standing.

  I took his cue and feigned a cough. All that accomplished is that Labruzzo’s grip tightened, his fingers digging into my skin like talons. “I don’t really care.” He pulled me closer to him.

  I thought I might puke all over his shiny black policeman’s shoes. One thing I knew; there was no way I was going to let him take me out of that room even if he dragged me. Which gave me an idea. I went limp. Because he had such a tight grip on my arm, my dead weight pulled him off balance.

  That was all Seth needed. He jumped forward and swung his arm with the handcuffs still attached and caught Labruzzo right in the face. Unfortunately, handcuffs, even at a high rate of velocity, have only so much force. The impact didn’t take Labruzzo down as much as I wished it had. It did, however, catch him off guard and he dropped me like dirty laundry as his hand slapped to the welt on his face. He snarled in pain and anger.

  I had fallen to my knees so that I was facing away from him, but I could feel him close behind me. And I knew that it was only a matter of nanoseconds before he recovered from the shock of the handcuff whip. And then he would go for his gun. I didn’t even think—because if I did, I might have hesitated, considering what I was aiming for. Like a slingshot, I swung forward and then threw all my weight into a back-of-the-head head butt to his groin.

  The air whooshed out of him like a punctured tire. He doubled over and I rolled to the side so that he wouldn’t fall on me. But he didn’t fall at all. Stumble, yes. Curse a blue streak, yes, but hit the ground, no. All we’d succeeded in doing was to make him very angry. As I had feared, his hand immediately went for the gun at his waist.

  Dead, cold fear swept over me. All I could think at that instant was that Labruzzo was going to kill Seth. I didn’t care what came after. A low growl escaped my lips, so feral that it surprised even me. Labruzzo’s head turned just as I kicked out at him. He danced away, leveling his gun at me.

  The distraction was enough for Seth to swing his handcuff nunchuks again, this time clocking Labruzzo across the top of his head. Labruzzo roared and swung the gun toward Seth. I coiled my legs back again. I knew I had only one more shot at him and if I missed, Labruzzo would probably kill us both. I kicked out with every ounce of anger, pain, and fear I had bottled up inside and my foot connected with his knee with a sickening thunk.

  Labruzzo fell to the ground, bellowing like a wounded bull. The gun tumbled from his fingertips and before he could reach for it, Seth snatched it from the ground.

  “Down!” Seth yelled, brandishing the pistol with chilling disregard for someone who had not even been able to handle a gun just a few short months ago. But he didn’t have to worry; Labruzzo’s eyes rolled back and he passed out.

  “Good work,” Ryan said.

  Seth’s head shot up, as if he had forgotten Ryan was there.

  “Get Aphra’s cuffs off. We have to … get out of here.”

  Seth looked at me like he was in shock. Now that the action was over, the gun trembled in his hand. His fearlessness had been a bluff.

  “The hard part’s over
,” I assured him. “The second lock is easy.”

  His face crumpled. “I lost the pick,” he said.

  I could have laughed if he wasn’t so serious about it. “That isn’t the first one we’ve lost. Just make another one.”

  “But hurry,” Ryan put in.

  I shot Ryan a look to let him know he wasn’t helping. He shrugged as if to say “what?” but I didn’t miss the shadow of a smile on his lips.

  Seth made his pick and to his credit, he was able to open up the cuff on the first try. I sighed with relief as I brought my arms forward, rolling my shoulders to relieve the tension. An angry red band circled my wrist where the cuff had been. I rubbed at the soreness with my other hand.

  “Undo Mulo’s other one,” Ryan said.

  I glanced down to where Labruzzo lay moaning on the floor. “Maybe we should just get out of here.”

  “We don’t want … to leave him loose.”

  He had a point. I eyed Labruzzo again, wondering if I should just check him for keys. That would be much easier than fiddling around with an improvised tool. But he wasn’t completely out and I wasn’t about to get close to him by myself until his hands were good and secured. “Seth, hand me that pick.”

  It was much easier picking the lock when I could actually see what I was doing, but still it took several tries before I was able to pop that elusive first lock. By the time Seth was completely free of the handcuffs, Labruzzo was starting to stir.

  Seth grabbed one of his arms. “Help me get him over by the pipes.”

  I hesitated, but he gave me another one of his earnest looks. “I won’t let him touch you.”

  Together we dragged Labruzzo across the floor. Seth snapped a cuff around one hairy wrist and then fed the chain behind the pipe before twisting Labruzzo’s other hand back and cuffing that one, too.

  “Get his … keys,” Ryan said. “And cell phone … if he’s got one.”

  I reached forward to check Labruzzo’s front pocket, but Seth stopped me. “I’ll do it,” he said.

  By the time he had been relieved of his personal property, Labruzzo was starting to come to. He opened his eyes slowly, painfully. When the understanding of his predicament registered on his face, he rattled his handcuffs against the pipe. “Porca miseria!” he cursed.

  “Yeah, that’s right,” I assured him. “You are a miserable pig.”

  Seth pulled my arm. “Come on, let’s go. We’ll have to help your friend over there.”

  I didn’t miss Seth’s sour expression at the mention of Ryan, even though it lasted for only a fraction of a second. “Wait.” I turned back to Labruzzo. “Where are they?”

  He didn’t say anything, but his black eyes fixed me with a stare so cold I felt like I needed a jacket.

  I shook off a shiver and bent so that I was eye level with him. “This place is wired, right? So where are the explosives?”

  He raised his chin and made a big show of clamping his mouth shut.

  “Fine.” I stood. “Your decision. Hope you can live with it when we’re gone and it’s just you and the explosives.”

  He stared straight ahead and pretended not to hear me. Idiot. I turned to Seth. “Let’s get out of here.”

  CHAPTER 13

  Seth and I each took one of Ryan’s arms and slung them around our shoulders and practically carried him from the room. He barely had the strength to stand, let alone walk. I noticed with a sick twist in my stomach that the rough bandage around his head was completely soaked through. No wonder he was so weak; he was still losing a lot of blood.

  “What now?” Seth asked.

  “We have Labruzzo’s keys,” I said. “I think we should get out of here. But should we call someone first? Tell them what’s going on?”

  “With … Labruzzo’s phone? No.” Ryan said it with such incredulity that I felt really stupid. I had already considered the possibility that his phone was tapped or traceable or whatever you call it, but it’s not like I was talking about carrying on a personal conversation. Just a simple “hi, don’t come to the textile mill because it’s going to blow up” sounded good. But I had to defer to Ryan’s judgment. He was the operative, not me.

  We had made it as far as the loading dock before Seth drew to a halt. “Wait. What about your shoes?’

  “My what?”

  “Your shoes. You know, the tracking things. You leave here with them on, The Mole can see wherever we’re going.”

  I pulled them off like they were on fire, but then I realized that if I left a locating device at the factory, my mom would follow the signal to find me, which is exactly what The Mole wanted her to do. Seth was right, though; I couldn’t take them with us, either. I stared down at my shoes. All that time I’d been running around in them and I had never even guessed that I was being tracked by the CIA, let alone by The Mole and his minions. “Can we just … turn it off?” I said to Ryan. “The GPS thing, I mean.”

  “There is … no off.”

  “Then we’ll smash it or something. Which shoe’s it in?”

  “Both.”

  “Where are they? Can I pull them out and—”

  Ryan winced. “They’re … built into the … sole.”

  Of course. Leave it to the CIA to make things complicated. I took a deep breath and let it out my nose before I spoke. “Fine.” I chucked one shoe across the loading dock. “We’ll split them up at least. We can dump the other one somewhere down the road. Maybe the confusion will be enough to keep Mom from bringing the rescue squad here until we can warn them. Let’s go.”

  I helped Seth half guide, half carry Ryan down the concrete steps to Labruzzo’s car. Ryan leaned heavily against me as Seth jangled the keys, trying and rejecting them one by one in the car door. “It’s not here.”

  I peered over his shoulder. “What’s not?”

  “The key to his car.”

  “But … he used his keys to drive us here.”

  “Maybe he has another set.”

  Ryan was getting heavier. I don’t know if he was starting to sag more or if I was just getting tired, but whatever the case, he needed to get help quickly. We needed Labruzzo’s car.

  “Can you hot-wire it?” I asked Seth.

  “What makes you think I can hot-wire cars?”

  “I don’t know. Because you lived in Detroit?” I said, repeating the explanation he had given me in Seattle when I questioned how he knew how to break into a car.

  “Sorry, I flunked Auto Heist 101.”

  I almost didn’t want to ask, but I did, anyway. “So what do we do now?”

  Seth sighed and looked back toward the loading dock. “I’ll go see if he has another set of keys.”

  “What? No. Not alone.” I turned to Ryan to ask if he’d be all right if I ran back inside with Seth, but Ryan’s face had gone slack. His eyes were closed. “Oh, crap. Seth, help me!”

  Seth climbed up onto the loading dock and wrestled one of the bales of cotton free from a pallet and heaved it so that it landed just feet from the car. It burst open on impact, sending tangles of stale cotton in all directions. He jumped down after it and piled enough of it together that we could lay Ryan down in relative comfort.

  He took my hand but after only a few steps he stopped and looked deeply into my eyes. “I need you to know,” he said, “no matter what happens, I’m glad you found me again.”

  I squeezed his hand. “So am I,” I whispered.

  He nodded, like that made everything all right. “Let’s do this.”

  We crept back up the stairs to the dock and through the swinging doors. I clung to Seth’s hand, dreading the necessity of looking into Labruzzo’s black eyes again, worrying with every step that the place was going to go up like a Roman candle. Since I had abandoned my shoes, I had to be extra careful to watch for stray pins, for which I was almost grateful. It was a good distraction from the growing fear rising like a tidal wave above me.

  When we reached the refuse room door, Seth glanced at me once more. His reassurin
g smile warmed me completely through. He pushed the door open and in an instant the warmth evaporated.

  The wave came crashing down. An empty pair of cuffs lay on the floor near the pipes. Labruzzo was gone.

  The seriousness of our situation came to me in stages. My first reaction was completely visceral. My mouth went dry and my heart raced. A cold sweat prickled from the back of my skull down the length of my spine. Labruzzo was loose and he was angry. I thought of Ryan lying alone and defenseless outside. Next came the terrible realization that my GPS Pumas were on the loading dock, beckoning my mom and Seth’s parents and anyone else foolish enough to come help us. And the building was a ticking time bomb.

  “What do we do now?” I whispered.

  “We get out of here,” Seth whispered back. We retraced our steps. Desperation clawed its way up my back. Where would we get out to? The factory was out in the proverbial boonies. We had no transportation. And, since I hadn’t been paying attention as we made the drive from the city, I wasn’t even sure where we were.

  But all those worries came to an end as we turned the corner toward the loading dock. Because they were eclipsed with a much greater concern.

  “I’m very disappointed in you,” The Mole said, aiming a much nastier-looking pistol at us than the smaller version Labruzzo had carried.

  Labruzzo himself stood just behind The Mole, sneering at us like a playground snitch. One of his eyes had completely swollen shut, which made him look even more menacing, if that was possible.

  “Perhaps you didn’t understand your role in my soiree this afternoon,” The Mole drawled. “Your presence is required to make it a truly memorable occasion.”

  I just stared at him, mind racing. If he was able to appear so quickly after we had escaped the refuse room, he must have been close. Close enough to see us on the loading dock—unless Labruzzo had a way to summon him without the cell phone. And if he was standing there trying to impress us with his genteel speaking manner, then he must not be too concerned about the explosives going off. Which meant that either we had plenty of time before the factory was set to blow or perhaps that the explosion would be set off remotely.