“It unfolded like I thought it would. My message was passed on to her and she reached out directly. Expressed her condolences over Culpepper’s death, yada, yada, yada. She asked me to report into Langley so that I could update her on my movements and prepare to transition to a new handler. Her request was so over the top considering I haven’t been into HQ for more than six years and Culpepper and I only had contact every few months, that it was easy to counter with something that sounded a lot more conservative but is, in reality, just as outrageous. If she were anywhere near Culpepper’s caliber, she would have recognized my suggestion to meet in person in Puerto Rico as suspicious. But as she’s not of his caliber and my request to meet one-on-one seemed like a compromise, she took it as a win.”
Alexis sipped her coffee and stared at the agent for a moment before speaking. “I get what you’re saying, but it’s too many machinations for how little sleep I’ve had recently.”
“And yet, you’re still able to use the word ‘machinations’ in a sentence,” Serena pointed out.
Alexis didn’t bother responding. “Okay, so you go to PR today to meet with Rosen, then what?”
Serena’s gaze bounced between everyone in the room, then landed on Alexis. “Not ‘me,’ darling. We go to PR.”
Chapter Eighteen
Ninety minutes after Serena had interrupted what Alexis had hoped would be a leisurely morning, she, Beni, Dominic, Damian, and Serena were boarding a small charter plane for the twenty-eight minute flight to San Juan, Puerto Rico, leaving Jake behind to continue their research. While much of PR was still feeling—and living with—the impacts of the hurricanes from several years before, as well as the recent earthquakes, downtown San Juan still bustled with tourists and the bars still poured drinks. It was as good a place as any to meet a traitor.
After landing, Dominic and Damian headed straight to the main airport terminal in order to follow Angela Rosen, while she, Beni, and Serena headed to the hotel Shah had booked for them. They had the room for the night, but unless something went awry, the three planned to head back to Tildas as soon as Serena’s meeting was over. Dominic and Damian would stay and trail Rosen.
“So, are you presenting as a man or a woman tonight?” Beni asked as she lay crosswise on one of the beds, thumbing through the hotel information magazine.
“She expects The Gentleman, so that’s who she’ll get,” Serena answered.
“So, going out on a limb here,” Beni said, rolling to her side. “You’re not going to give her your real identity?”
Serena shrugged and took a sip of the beer she’d grabbed from the minibar. “I have dozens of identities that are disposable, and despite what I said about leaving the investigation in your hands, I am a little curious who will end up paying for it. So, to answer your question, no, it won’t be my real identity, but it will be one I’ve used before.”
Listening to Serena, Alexis was glad it wasn’t her life. Sure, being an FBI agent wasn’t always a walk in the park, but at least she had an identity of her own.
Part of which included excellent taste in clothing.
With a devious grin, Alexis pushed away from the wall she’d been leaning against and looked down at Beni. “Well, since The Gentleman is making an appearance tonight, I think it only fair that he has the escorts someone like Rosen would expect. We need to do a little shopping. The boutique in the hotel should meet our needs.”
Serena snorted as she took another sip, and Beni groaned as she flopped onto her back. “Are you really going to make me shop?”
Alexis flashed her teeth. “Benita Ricci, turn yourself over to me and you won’t know what hit you.”
“That’s what I’m afraid of,” she muttered, even as she dutifully rose to her feet and slipped her flip flops on. At least she’d had a pedicure recently.
“Your fairy godmother awaits,” Alexis said, sweeping by Serena on their way to the door. She’d been waiting months for an opportunity to take Beni shopping. Alexis didn’t often flaunt her wealth and she didn’t intend to flaunt it now, but she did intend to make good use of it.
“You know how I feel about fucking fairytales, Lex,” she grumbled.
Serena’s laugh followed them out the door and Alexis was still smiling when they stepped into the boutique five minutes later.
Alexis’s silvery dress shimmered in the light cast by the street lights as she, Beni, and Serena—dressed as a man—walked to the bar where Serena’s meeting with Rosen would occur. With a hem that hit mid-thigh and a back that draped practically to the top of her tail bone, the dress was fairly comfortable as far as club-appropriate attire went. On the other side of Serena, Beni wore a green dress that Alexis had insisted on. The color suited her friend’s skin tone and highlighted her green-gold eyes. Not to mention that the sharp “V” on both the front and back of the dress, showcased Beni’s body perfectly. Their clothing was, perhaps, a little fancier than the evening called for, but with Serena dressed in a suit and tie, the three presented the exact image they intended.
Stepping into the bar ten minutes before the scheduled meeting time, they scanned the room. According to Dominic and Damian, Rosen had arrived and gone straight to her hotel. She was currently running five minutes behind which gave the three of them time to make an entrance and find a table. Or tables as the case may be. Alexis and Beni took a seat at a half-moon shaped booth toward the back while Serena picked a place at the bar. Looking all the world as if she/he could be one of James Bond’s colleagues, Serena ordered a drink then gestured toward her and Beni. The waiter glanced over then nodded, presumably taking a drink order for the two of them as well.
The restaurant and bar were already filling up, and though Serena wore a wire so that the entire team could hear her conversation, Alexis felt a measure of comfort that her position would allow her to keep the two in sight. Based on everything they knew, Rosen only intended to sell Serena’s identity—and killing or harming her would seriously interfere with that—but trusting entirely in logic didn’t seem wise.
The waiter, a good looking man in his mid-twenties with a dimple, brought their drinks over then left the fruity concoctions with a wink. Alexis made a face.
“He was cute,” Beni said, taking a sip of something in a martini glass that was the color of the Caribbean.
Alexis’s glanced at the man as he crossed back to the bar. He did look good in jeans but he did nothing for her. “He’s like twelve and my displeasure wasn’t at him, but at this drink. Isn’t Serena supposed to just know random shit? How on earth could she think I’d like this?” As she spoke she raised her glass. The liquid inside was a creamy white color and it was blended with crushed ice. For god’s sake, it even had a pineapple on the rim and an umbrella.
“It’s called a Pina Colada and he isn’t twelve. He is definitely of legal age,” Beni shot back.
Alexis opted not to respond and instead, she eyed the drink before taking a small sip. The sweetness of it made her mouth pucker and she quickly set it down. “God, that’s disgusting. Maybe I can wave him over and order something potable.” She scanned the room for the waiter.
“Oh, I’m sure you could wave him over. Any time you want,” Beni said. Alexis switched her attention from the bar to Beni.
Alexis narrowed her eye at her friend. “Not interested.”
“Why’s that?”
Alexis reminded herself that she liked having friends. She did. Most of the time. “You know why.”
Beni leaned back in her chair and took a sip of her electric blue drink. It reminded Alexis of a melted popsicle.
“I don’t know why. Care to elaborate?”
She caught the waiter’s attention and he crossed the floor toward her with a smile.
“I’m sure this is a lovely drink.” She waved to the thing sitting in front of her. “But it’s not my style. Can you bring me—”
“Let me guess,” he cut her off. “A shot of whiskey or a beer?”
Beni’s snort of laughter
wasn’t as muffled as it should have been and Alexis shot her a quelling look. Bartenders sometimes had a preternatural sense about people, but his assessment was too accurate.
“A martini. Dirty. Very dirty.”
His smile deepened. “Your wish is my command. And by the way, the gentleman at the bar said you wouldn’t like this. But he said he wanted to see your reaction.”
Alexis glanced over to Serena who winked at her and raised her/his glass. “And I suppose he told you I preferred whiskey?” Alexis asked.
The waiter shook his head. “Nope, that was all me. But a dirty martini fits, too.”
Before Alexis could respond, the man walked away. She glanced back at Beni, who waggled her eyebrows and grinned.
“Isiah and I are a thing. There, does that make you happy?” Alexis asked on a long exhale. She was not used to discussing her love life. Not that she ever had much of one. Or someone to talk with about it.
“Extremely,” Beni said, sitting back in her seat. “So, like how much of a thing? Like Damian and Charlotte level of a thing or something else?”
Beni didn’t back down from the warning glare Alexis fixed on her. No, instead she smiled. But it wasn’t until Beni waggled her eyebrows again that Alexis accepted she didn’t stand a chance. “Fine,” she huffed. “If you must know—”
“Oh, I must. He’s a fine specimen of a man.”
“He is and if that was intended to get a rise out of me, it won’t work. I know both of you well enough to know that fidelity matters to him and loyalty matters to you.”
“Well, that’s not much fun,” Beni said, conceding defeat in her attempt to rile Alexis. “Actually, it’s still kind of fun,” she continued. “You’re right in that I’m nothing but happy for you, but as your closest girlfriend—”
“You are not my closest girlfriend,” Alexis interjected.
“Yes, I am,” Beni stated, her tone more factual than Alexis would have liked because in truth, there probably wasn’t any other woman Alexis trusted more both as a colleague and a friend. Well, Beni and Charlotte.
“And so as your closest girlfriend, I’m nothing but thrilled for you so long as he knocks your socks off in bed—or wherever—and has you screaming his name every night. I already know he treats you well outside of the bedroom—or, again, wherever.”
Alexis blinked. Beni and her other teammates had always been more open and graphic in their conversations than she, and they’d always, in their way, respected the boundaries she’d put up around that topic. But things had changed.
And with that thought, it hit her how much things had changed. Not just her relationship with Isiah, but everything. Over the past several months, she’d spent more time with her teammates than she had with any of her other colleagues in the prior years, put together. She’d invited them over, introduced them to Yael and Eric, and she’d told them about her abduction, as well as her work with the local shelters on Tildas. And while the former was certainly a more dramatic tale than her work with the dogs, it was something that had happened to her, something she’d had no say in. Whereas her fostering and volunteering was a choice she’d made and a reflection of her.
Things had changed. And she liked it.
“Believe it or not, last night was the first night we slept together—and yes, that’s a euphemism for what happened,” she responded. If things had changed, she was going to embrace it and so, in for a penny, in for a pound.
Surprise flashed in Beni’s eyes and Alexis continued. “He’s amazing. In more ways than one, he’s amazing. And while I’m glad we’re here figuring out what the hell is going on with Angela Rosen, I will admit that I was loath to get out of bed this morning. If we had not been interrupted, I would have been a very happy woman. An orgasm or three is always a nice way to start the day. But it would have been nice to just spend the day with him, too.”
Alexis experienced a little thrill of satisfaction at Beni’s wide-eyed reaction. Her mouth didn’t drop open, but it was very near. Alexis almost regretted that Angela Rosen showed up at that moment and halted whatever response Beni might have offered.
“Angela,” Serena purred through their earpieces. The tenor of her voice was husky in the growing clatter of the popular bar.
“I wish I knew that trick,” Beni said, instantly all business and the prior topic of their conversation little more than a memory.
“You mean that thing she does with her voice? To give it that male, bedroom-ish quality?”
Beni nodded as Angela Rosen spoke.
“You have me at a disadvantage,” the woman said. “I don’t know your name.”
Serena chuckled. “You can call me Al.”
The waiter dropped her martini off and he probably thought her smile at Serena’s joke was for him, but whatever.
“Let me buy you a drink and we can sit somewhere quieter,” Serena said. Angela ordered a glass of white wine and the two moved to a small bar height table directly in Alexis’s line of sight.
Beni shot her a questioning look, and Alexis nodded, letting her colleague know she could see everything.
“The powers that be aren’t happy that you didn’t come back to the States,” Rosen said, once they were seated on the tall stools.
“Puerto Rico is the States,” Serena said, casually taking a drink and letting her gaze drift around the room. To most, the pair would seem like a disinterested man in conversation with a woman who, in her slacks, silk blouse, and low heels, looked dreadfully out of place. But Alexis suspected Serena was scanning the area to see if Angela had any cohorts in the vicinity. Damian and Dominic had followed Rosen from the airport and they hadn’t seen anyone with her, but that didn’t mean she might not have local contacts.
“Culpepper died two weeks ago in a car accident,” Rosen said.
“As you say,” Serena acknowledged.
Rosen hesitated at the reaction then bullied on. “As you know, the operatives assigned to Culpepper were confidential between him and the computers at Langley that did the assigning.”
Alexis had heard rumors of an algorithm that linked handlers and operatives such that no one person was ever in possession of all the information, but she’d never known if it was true or a figment of someone’s overactive—and paranoid—imagination. She supposed that was one interesting thing to come of the night, at least now she had the answer to that question.
Angela continued when Serena said nothing. “There is a protocol in place for situations such as this. When a handler dies,” she clarified. “It involves four senior members of the leadership team and a complex series of verifications. But the thing is, when we accessed Culpepper’s files, yours wasn’t in there.”
Serena didn’t respond for a moment and she looked more bored than anything. “Not really my problem is it?”
Angela took a large sip of her wine then set her glass down. “There were two women and two men in his files. One of those men died a month before Culpepper did and the other has been located. As I said, you weren’t in his files.”
Serena shrugged then twisted her head to follow an attractive woman who passed by. “Like I said, that doesn’t seem like my problem.” Her attention lingered in the direction the woman had gone.
“There was some talk you weren’t actually one of ours.”
Serena chuckled at that. “A double agent? How very Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy of you all,” she said, referencing the famous John Le Carre spy book and movie.
“The actionable intelligence you’ve given us leads me to believe you aren’t, but I need your file number to assuage my colleagues.” The file number Rosen referred to would be the original file created by the agency when Serena had been a recruit—the one that would contain her real identity.
Serena let out a long exhale. “Who will be my new handler?”
Angela cocked her head, but Alexis didn’t miss the gleam of triumph in the woman’s expression—what she sought was so very close to being handed over. “You know I can’t tell
you that. Once I have your file number, I’ll submit it to the matching system, and whatever algorithm resides in those computers will match you with a handler. Culpepper always referred to you as The Gentleman. So long as your new handler doesn’t use the same moniker and applies the appropriate protocols to mask your identity when reporting your intelligence back to the commission, I won’t even know who you were assigned to.”
Rosen spun a good tale. It was almost convincing. But they all knew she had no intention of submitting the number to the system that would match Serena with a new handler.
Alexis watched Serena’s disinterested gaze lazily sweep the room. “Any chance you’ll be my handler?”
Angela pursed her lips. “Unlikely, no. Especially not after this trip.”
Serena straightened, then rose from her chair. “Good, because Culpepper never liked you,” she said, before tossing a small slip of paper on the table. “Now, if you’ll excuse me. I so rarely get a night in a city such as this. I have friends to attend to.”
Alexis sipped her drink as Serena approached them. Without a word, she and Beni slid from their seats when she approached. Draping an arm around each of their waists, Serena guided them from the bar. Alexis shivered as the spy’s cool fingers brushed against the bare skin of her lower back, just above the drape of her dress. To all and sundry, they would look like a well-heeled man with two willing women at his side.
Alexis hoped Angela Rosen was as gullible.
Chapter Nineteen
The three women considered stopping by another, higher-end bar—something that, if Angela was following them, would align with her opinions of The Gentleman. But when Dominic and Damian confirmed that Rosen had headed straight back to her hotel, so did Beni, Serena, and Alexis. Within the hour, the three were dressed in their regular clothes and on a flight back to Tildas Island—leaving Dominic and Damian to tail Rosen. Dominic had also been able to slip into Rosen’s room while she’d been out and had planted a bug, so the team felt pretty comfortable in having her covered.
Night Deception Page 20