Undercover With the Enemy

by Sharron McClellan

  …

  Setting the timer on her watch for sixty seconds, Holly strode across the room.

  According to HRS’s intelligence, the photos were in the filing cabinet. She grinned both at the simplicity of the job and the fact that people assumed their valuables—from files to diamonds—were safe once they locked the door behind them.

  But a filing cabinet? She chuckled, took out a screwdriver, slid it into the small gap between the drawer and the frame, and torqued it. Seconds later, the locked popped open.

  “Bingo,” she said.

  She took a quick glance at her watch. Fifty seconds to go.

  She opened the bottom drawer.

  Hidden beneath a stack of manila folders was a two-inch thick, dark brown accordion folder—just like their client had described. She opened it and took a quick glance at the contents.

  Pictures. A toddler dressed in pink lace. Their client and her daughter on the beach. Lazing on the couch. A whole perfect suburban life in color prints. She dug deeper. There had to be more. “Come on. Come on.”

  In a corner at the bottom, she found two small flash drives. Each bore a small label citing Grace.

  Bingo. The digital copies of the pictures in the file. The soon-to-be-ex-husband had stolen the pictures of his deceased daughter to use as a bargaining chip in the divorce proceedings.

  What an ass.

  Fortunately for his estranged wife, she was a wealthy CEO who earned more than enough to hire HRS to get them back. Jobs like this were usually a cakewalk for HRS operatives—who often extracted people and valuables from war-torn countries or high-security prisons in hostile nations—but they paid the bills.

  Holly tucked the entire file into her backpack, went to the window, and opened it. Wrapping a second rope around the leg of the heavy, oak desk, she tossed the other end through the gap.

  Fifteen seconds left.

  From her vantage, she watched the van barrel down the alley toward the meeting point. She made a quick rappelling harness using the rope and jumped out the window. Kane was waiting, lights off and engine running.

  She counted off the last seconds with each push off the building.

  Four. Three. Two.

  She landed feet first in a flower bed, crushing a patch of yellow mums.

  “And one to spare,” she said, untangling herself and running to the van. Flinging open the back door, she jumped in. Kane started driving even before her feet hit the floorboards.

  Sitting in the back, Holly watched the building on the monitors as they sped down the street. It remained quiet, but she knew it wouldn’t last. The elevator had reached the top floor by now, so the security guard would be on the roof. She changed the channel to find him.

  There. The security guard was on his phone, pacing and looking rather panicked. It wouldn’t be long before he called the police.

  Backpack in hand, she turned off the monitors and went to the front of the van, plopping into the passenger seat.

  “Mask,” Kane said.

  She had forgotten she was wearing it.

  Her hair cracked with static as she pulled the ski-mask off and tossed it behind her.

  “I take it you got the file?” he said.

  “Of course,” she said, buckling in. “What kind of person treats his wife that way? Even an almost-ex. What kind of person uses pictures of his dead daughter as leverage?”

  “The worst kind,” Kane replied.

  He gave her a sideways glance. She knew that expression—the furrowed brow, deep frown, and the silent tsk tsk.

  Combined, they screamed disappointment. She sank into the seat with a sigh.

  “What?” Kane asked, turning his attention back to the road.

  “You’re angry, aren’t you?”

  “The job was to get in and get out, and you did it.”

  “But?” she asked, wishing she could let it go, but that one little word hung in the air, impossible to ignore.

  “I am running this op, and you ignored my orders.”

  “I got it done. I have the file,” she said. What more did he want?

  “I know, which is why I didn’t say anything.”

  Until now. “You’re still pissed.”

  “Not pissed. Frustrated,” he said with a shake of his head. “But it highlights why I don’t like to work with you. You don’t have any idea of how to be a team player.”

  She flushed at the reprimand and was glad it was dark. As involuntarily as the sudden heat in her cheeks, her hands clenched into fists. He didn’t know anything about her or her ability to work with others. She did it all the time when she was home. She worked, played, and hung out with an entire freaking circus. She’d been part of a team her entire life.

  Not that she planned to tell him that.

  “You don’t know me,” she said, keeping the rest to herself.

  Ahead of them, flashing blue lights lit up the road. Kane pulled over to let the cops speed past—going to the office building no doubt—and put the car in park at the curb. “You’re right. I don’t know you, but that doesn’t matter. I should be able to trust you when we’re working together.”

  She hated it when he was right. “You can trust me,” she said, but the words sounded less than sincere despite her desire to prove otherwise.

  He turned in the seat to face her, his square jaw made sharp by the play of light and shadow. “If we do things your way, yes. But what about when I’m calling the shots?”

  She hesitated, not sure what to say.

  He stared at her, gray eyes turned black by shadow, making him difficult to read. His sandy-colored hair was perfect, as always. Her fingers itched to run her hands through the strands and test the texture. Silky or coarse? She guessed silky, but she kept her hands in her lap, resisting the urge.

  Finally, he shook his head, put the car into drive, and steered the van back onto the main road, pointing them in the direction of HRS. “That’s what I thought.”

  Chapter Two

  “Do you think they know it was us?” Holly asked, watching the lights of the cop cars responding to the robbery recede in the mirror.

  “Hope not,” Kane said.

  She kept watch in the side mirror. The flashing blue lights reflected in the windows of the surrounding buildings, growing more distant, before they stopped and changed direction. The cops were coming back, and intuition told her that she and Kane were the marks.

  “They know.”

  “Dammit,” Kane replied. He turned a corner and hit the gas. In seconds, the company van—a vehicle that was designed to blend in with soccer-mom suburbia but could outrun almost anything on wheels—was doing over sixty and climbing.

  “Not even going to try and talk our way out of this?” Holly asked¸ grabbing the “oh hell” handle above the window.

  “Have you seen yourself?” He had a point. In her black-on-black cat suit ensemble, she was dressed like a walking cliché when it came to burglary. While she was good at talking her way out of a bad situation, the mission would be a bust if the police took the pictures as evidence. “What next?”

  “We need cover. That means traffic.”

  “This is L.A. That shouldn’t be hard to do.” Even at this hour, the 405 was almost guaranteed to be a nightmare.

  “One would think,” he replied, his attention alternating between the road in front of them and the police behind them. “I’d like to not put others in jeopardy.”

  They were getting closer to the populated areas now. The buildings were getting taller. There were more concrete and billboards. More vehicles parked on the side of the road and fewer parking lots were visible. Ahead of them, a car cut them off, and Kane cranked the wheel.

  She squeezed her eyes closed and braced herself for impact.

  There was no crash. No sensation of anything other than a jerk to the left and back, and then speed. When she peeked through her lashes and into the side mirror, the car was falling back behind them.

  But the blue lights of th
e pursuing squad car grew closer with each passing second.

  “It’s only going to get worse,” Kane said, but it sounded more like he was talking to himself. His jaw tight with a grim set, he reached over to a panel between them, flipped a switch, and adjusted a few knobs. Seconds later, the sounds of a police scanner emitted from the radio in time for them to catch the tail end of a conversation…westbound on Los Felix Boulevard. Requesting backup.

  She wiped her hands on her thighs. She was good at many things, but sitting back and waiting for an outcome wasn’t one of them.

  “I need you to take the wheel,” Kane said.

  Her heart lurched into overdrive. “What?” A tightrope was one thing, but driving in a high-speed pursuit? That was out of her realm of experience.

  “Just keep it on the road,” he said. Unbuckling his seat belt, he reached over to do the same to hers. “And don’t hit anyone.”

  Her mouth went dry, but he was halfway out of the bucket seat.

  “Come on,” he demanded, almost shouting the words.

  You can do this. Hands shaking, she wiped them on her legs again, took the wheel, and slid over Kane and onto the seat, her backside nestled against him for a split second before he slid out from beneath her and slipped to the back of the van.

  This would be erotic if it weren’t for the cops and impending jail time.

  The flicker of thought sped through her mind, vanishing just as quickly.

  Breathe.

  She focused on the task at hand. Ahead of her, the road seemed to stretch for miles, but she knew that was an illusion. At the rate they were going, they’d reach the populated areas in minutes.

  When that happened, they were in trouble, because population in L.A. meant traffic jams. She was a decent driver, but she wasn’t Kane. His ability to weave in and out of traffic could almost be classified as a super power.

  No more cars. No more cars.

  The plea went through her mind like a chant or a child’s song, but it wasn’t enough to keep her growing fear at bay.

  Using the rearview mirror, she watched him at the computer console. “Don’t let them get too close,” he said, his fingers flying over the keyboard. “This will be easier if we can keep distance.”

  “I’ll try.” She forced her attention back on the asphalt stretching out in front of her. “What are you doing?”

  “Don’t worry about it. Just watch the road.”

  She managed a quick glance at him. He was smiling.

  Smiling?

  They crested a small hill, and ahead of them, perhaps a half-mile away, she spotted the green glow of a traffic light. To the sides—low beams of cars glimmered. Her stomach did a full somersault and possibly a cartwheel. “Whatever it is you’re doing, you should hurry,” she said. “We’re running out of road.”

  “On it,” he said. Slipping on a headset, he held up his index finger—the international signal for “be quiet.”

  “Assistance is on the way,” he said, his voice echoing over the police scanner. He lowered his finger. “That should help.”

  He hacked the cops’ radio signal? Impressive, except she was less than thirty seconds away from getting them both killed. The light turned red.

  Two hundred feet.

  “What do I do?” Her voice trembled. Should she stop? Run it?

  “Keep going.”

  One hundred feet.

  She swerved around another car, and whatever moisture that was left in her mouth evaporated.

  Fifty feet. She gripped the wheel, forcing her foot to remain on the accelerator. The light turned green seconds before she blazed through the intersection.

  There seemed to be cars everywhere. And roads. And decisions that she wasn’t prepared to make while driving a one-ton vehicle. “What do I do?” she asked, wishing she were home. When it came down to it, being shot out of a cannon was a hell of a lot easier than trying to navigate L.A. traffic at high speeds.

  “Just go straight,” he said.

  She swerved around a Mercedes and glanced in the mirror. The green light was now red. The police car slowed down, beacons flashing as people scrambled to get their cars out of the way. Another traffic light ahead of them turned green as she grew close. Then red as soon as she was through.

  The clacking of the computer keyboard caught her attention. Was Kane making the lights change?

  “Take the next right,” he said, typing like their lives depended on it.

  She slowed as much as she dared and took the turn, praying they didn’t flip. They made it, but there was more traffic, and she had to either slow down or start hitting cars.

  “You’re doing great. Take the next left. Then turn off your lights but don’t stop.” He turned on the headset. “They’re heading east on Beachwood. Will intercept at Scenic.”

  Beachwood. The road they had left two turns ago.

  “Don’t slow,” he snapped.

  “Sorry.” She hadn’t realized she had taken her foot off the gas.

  “We need to get lost. And fast.” Then he was at her side. “Turn here.” He pointed toward a winding road, and for the next ten minutes, she followed his directions as he took her through the Hollywood hills and to safety.

  …

  Holly tossed the backpack with the photos and the flash drives on Temperance Smith’s desk.

  It was almost midnight, but the V.P. of HRS had waited up for them. The company was her life, and she treated all operations—no matter how small—as if they were the most important op in the world.

  Tempe unzipped the pack’s compartment and dumped the contents onto her desk. At the top of the pile lay a picture of their client and her daughter during bath time—the toddler almost lost in a sea of bubbles. They had the same dark brown curls. The same smiles.

  Marriages ended. Things went wrong. But how did they go this wrong? Holly wondered.

  “This all of them?” Tempe asked.

  “Unless he stashed more elsewhere, yes,” Holly replied. “If so, I’d be happy to go back and get them on my own time.”

  Kane cocked his head, catching her attention. He stood at the window, his gaze on the city below them. To the casual observer, he might appear disinterested in the conversation, but the slight movement combined with the tense muscles in his broad shoulders told her otherwise.

  “Same here,” he said, confirming her observation.

  Tempe gave a solemn nod. “Understood.”

  “Thanks,” Holly said, ready to go home and sleep. With the clock hands pointing at midnight, it was later than she liked, and she wanted to get to the gym in the morning. HRS had a new hand-to-hand instructor, and she’d heard his seven a.m. class was not to be missed.

  Besides, it had been a long night.

  “A minute,” Tempe said. “We need to talk.”

  Holly stopped mid-step, hesitated, and took a seat. That wasn’t something she wanted to hear.

  Kane followed suit, his puzzled expression a reflection of her own confusion. “Is there a problem?”

  “How did it go tonight?” Tempe asked, her expression unreadable.

  Holly glanced at Kane. Did Tempe know about their encounter with the police? She fought the urge to fidget. She could lie, or keep a secret, under most circumstances, but dealing with Tempe was different. The V.P. might only be two years older, but she sported the same, penetrating stare as Holly’s mother, Madam Sarah.

  “Why do you ask?” Kane asked before she could either confess or hide the details of their high-speed pursuit.

  “It’s been a while since you two worked together, and I wanted to see how that went.”

  Tempe didn’t know about the chase. Holly held her breath. Waiting. Would he tell?

  Kane continued, “There was a bit of an altercation with the police, but nothing we couldn’t handle.”

  Of course he would, she exhaled with a little groan of annoyance. He was incapable of lying.

  Tempe’s eyes widened. “Plates?”

  “They
didn’t get them, but I’d change them anyway. Perhaps a new paint job. If they’re motivated, they might pull the traffic cam info.”

  Tempe’s eyes returned to normal, and after a few seconds, she gave a nod of approval. “Anything else?”

  “We’re professionals,” Kane said. “It went well. Holly can be a little hard-headed, and she has issues following directions but otherwise, fine.”

  “Hardheaded? I’m right here,” Holly said.

  “I know. I wanted you to hear it.”

  Jerk. She’d rather work with Tempe than deal with Kane and his inability to do anything besides follow the plan to the letter. It was partners like that—men and woman who couldn’t adjust—that made her job harder than it needed to be.

  She wasn’t going to tell Tempe that and prove Kane right or brand herself a whiner. “Like he said, we’re professionals.”

  “Good,” Tempe said with small nod of approval. Uncrossing her arms, she took a glossy, white binder from one of her desk drawers, but instead of handing it over, she placed it in the middle of the table as if daring either of them to try to take it. “You are my two best agents when it comes to recovering stolen property, but the last time I paired you together, you blew it.”

  Holly’s cheeks heated as she remembered the almost-botched job. They’d been going in for files and had barely gotten away. “We recovered the data.”

  “By dumb luck. It sure wasn’t because you functioned as a team.”

  The heat in Holly’s cheeks deepened. She wondered if Kane felt the same shame but didn’t dare check.

  “So, what was the point of pairing us again?” Kane asked. “To test us?”

  “Exactly,” Tempe said. “You passed. I’ve always thought you two would be a good match in the field and was disappointed last time. I’d hoped things had changed, and it seems I was right.”

  Weren’t they past being tested? Holly snuck a look at Kane. His face was almost as unreadable as Tempe’s, but the set to his jaw told her that anger boiled beneath the cool exterior.

  She couldn’t blame him.

  What was done was done, and Tempe never did anything without a reason.

  That reason was in the binder Tempe had just taken out of her desk.