by Stuart Gibbs
Catherine laughed. “Did you think she hatched from an egg?”
Now Zoe turned pink from embarrassment. “Of course not. But . . . Erica’s never mentioned you. Ever. Although, given that she’s barely ever spoken to me unless we were on a mission, I guess that shouldn’t be so surprising.”
“Erica does tend to be a bit tight-lipped where I’m concerned,” Catherine said. “I hate to be stereotypically British, but do you have any tea? I had a very long flight, and I’m knackered.”
Mike hurried into the kitchen. “Hot tea, coming right up! Any type in particular?”
“English breakfast if you’ve got it,” Catherine replied. “Though orange pekoe will work in a pinch.”
Paul Lee emerged from his hiding place under the coffee table. Or perhaps he had emerged quite a while earlier and I simply hadn’t noticed him. Paul had such an absence of personality he was easy to miss. He now did his best to make himself presentable, however, smoothing his hair and straightening his rumpled shirt. Evidently, he was already smitten with Catherine. “Er . . . ,” he said nervously, extending his hand as graciously as he could. “Ah . . . hello. I’m, uh . . .”
“I know exactly who you are, Mr. Lee,” Catherine said disdainfully. “And I know exactly what you’ve done. Forgive me if I don’t shake your hand, but you are one of the most putrid, vile, despicable excuses for a human being that has ever existed, and the mere thought of having physical contact with you makes my skin crawl.”
Paul meekly withdrew his hand. “Oh . . . er . . . um . . .”
“What’s SPYDER up to?” Catherine demanded.
“He doesn’t know,” Erica said, before Paul could begin stammering again. “He’s been completely useless.”
“Figures.” Catherine sighed, then glanced toward where Murray was regaining consciousness on the floor by the front door. “Do you have anything to contribute? Or have you been useless too?”
“Murray?” Zoe laughed. “If you look up ‘useless’ in the dictionary, you’ll find a photo of him.”
Murray staggered to his feet, clutching his swollen jaw, and looked curiously at Catherine. “Apparently I missed something here. Who are you, exactly?”
Erica desperately signaled us not to say anything, but Zoe missed it and said, “She’s Erica’s mother.”
“No way!” Murray looked to Erica and grinned. “You came from a flesh-and-blood person? I always figured you’d been assembled at some sort of spy factory.”
Mike returned to Erica’s side, bearing a steaming cup of tea. “Here you go, Ms. Hale.”
“Why thank you, Michael. What a gentleman you are.” Catherine gave him a coy smile. “Handsome too. If I were back in spy school, I’d have my sights set on you.”
“Mother!” Erica gasped, mortified. “Please don’t flirt with my classmates!”
“That wasn’t flirtation,” Catherine said, taking a sip of tea. “It was observation. There’s a difference.”
Murray sprang onto the couch by Catherine’s side. “Enough talk about Mike. Let’s talk about Erica. What was she like as a child? Do you have any embarrassing stories about her? Or better yet, embarrassing photos? Ouch!” Murray yelped as Erica seized his ear in a vise grip and twisted hard. “There’s no need for physical violence! I’m just being friendly.”
“Yeah, right.” Erica dragged Murray off the couch and shoved him toward the kitchen. “Keep your distance from my mother.”
Paul Lee slipped into the gap on the couch that Murray had left, trying his best to be debonair and failing miserably. “Ms. Hale, er . . . I fear that you, um . . . may have gotten the wrong . . . er, idea about me. . . .”
“You keep your distance from me as well,” Catherine told him. “Or I’ll let Erica rip off your kneecaps and make castanets with them.”
Paul paled and slunk away.
“Now then.” Catherine took another sip of tea. “Do we have any intel at all?”
“SPYDER is holed up in the penthouse suite at the hotel,” Erica reported. “As of now, we know that Joshua Hallal is there, along with Ashley Sparks, Warren Reeves, and possibly four bodyguards.”
Catherine arched an eyebrow. “Possibly four bodyguards?”
“Dane Brammage fell into the shark tank earlier this morning,” Erica explained. “He might have been eaten alive, but knowing him, we can never assume his death.”
“It’s conceivable that he ate the sharks,” Mike suggested.
“There weren’t any other SPYDER officers?” Catherine inquired. “Joshua Hallal still isn’t that highly ranked. He wouldn’t be running this show all by himself.”
“I figured that as well,” Erica said. “However, if there were any other SPYDER officers in the penthouse, we didn’t see them. Unfortunately, our reconnaissance mission ended before we had a chance to make a complete sweep because someone thought it’d be a good idea to rescue this piece of garbage.” She pointed at Paul Lee.
Catherine sighed. “Erica, Ben’s decision might have been rash and reckless, but it wasn’t necessarily bad. I suspect Mr. Lee here hasn’t been completely useless.”
“That’s right!” Paul Lee announced. “I’ve only been, er . . . mostly useless. Oh.” He frowned as he realized how that had sounded.
“He did give us some intel,” I added. “He’s shipped three entire cargo ships full of nuclear weapons to Ushuaia, Argentina, for SPYDER.”
Catherine did the most refined spit take I had ever seen, daintily spewing a mouthful of tea into a fine mist. “Three entire cargo ships? Oh my.”
Erica said, “We expect that SPYDER intends to use Ushuaia as a base to threaten the rest of the world with nuclear annihilation.”
“Right.” Catherine set her teacup down thoughtfully. “Mr. Lee, are you aware as to whether or not SPYDER has any missile-launching facilities in Ushuaia?”
“Er . . . no,” Paul said. “I didn’t, ah . . . sell them anything like that . . . um . . . only the, ah . . . the missiles themselves.”
“It’s very hard to launch nuclear missiles without an intricate system of silos or launch platforms,” Catherine observed.
“SPYDER could have bought that stuff from another dealer,” Erica told her. “Paul isn’t the only scumbag they’ve made arrangements with.”
“We’re relatively sure they bought arms from Vladimir Gorsky, too,” I put in. “And then they tried to kill him at the White House.”
“Along with you and the president and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff,” Catherine recalled. “And Gorsky hasn’t been seen since. Until this morning, at least.”
Everyone perked up at this, intrigued. Even Erica was uncharacteristically caught off guard. “This morning?” she repeated. “Where?”
“Right here,” Catherine replied. “At the breakfast buffet at the Coco Loco Lounge. I saw him while I was on my way over here—although I wasn’t quite sure it was him until this very moment. He’s lost some weight, dyed his hair, grown a beard, and gotten a tan. Also, he was wearing sunglasses and the most horrid Hawaiian shirt.”
Erica sprang to her feet. “If here’s here, then we need to find him!”
“We will, dear,” Catherine said calmly. “In good time. Let’s not be rash about this. Given his tan, I suspect he’s been at this hotel for quite a while already. At least two weeks. My guess is, he tracked SPYDER down here himself and is looking for revenge. Can anyone here hack into the hotel’s database?”
“Oh, I already did that,” Zoe said.
“Really?” I asked. “When?”
“This morning while you were out on your mission.” Zoe returned her attention to the hotel computer and entered a few commands. “You think I just slept that whole time? I have things to contribute. I got straight A’s in Intro to Hacking last semester, and this hotel’s security has more holes than a golf course. There.” She finished typing with a flourish. “What do you need?”
“A list of all guests and their rooms.” Catherine picked up her teacup again an
d carried it to the computer.
Zoe’s fingers flew across the keyboard until the computer displayed a long list of names. “Ta-da!” she announced.
“Excellent,” Catherine said. “Now, let’s check out the pricier rooms. Gorsky isn’t one to travel economy.”
“Here you go.” Zoe typed in a few more commands.
Catherine only had to look at the screen for a few seconds before her eyes lit up with recognition. “Ah! Here we are. Luxury Villa Twenty-Three! Under the name of Benito Cacciatori. That’s one of Vladimir’s secret aliases. He likes to pretend he’s Italian. Thinks it makes him seem sexy.”
“That villa’s right down the beach from ours,” Erica observed. “We passed it this morning.”
Catherine returned to where her luggage lay on the coffee table and unzipped it. “Gorsky will certainly have bodyguards with him. We need to be prepared for trouble.”
She flipped open the suitcase. Inside, in addition to her normal clothing, there were weapons: guns, knives, a few pounds of explosives—as she’d warned—along with some more medieval items like nunchucks and a mace. In addition, there were several ammunition belts, plastic baggies full of bullets, two timers, and a device with a large red button that looked awfully familiar.
“What’s that?” I asked, pointing to it.
“Um,” Catherine said, reddening slightly. “Those are my undies. Sorry, I should have packed them separately.”
“I mean next to your undies,” I said, turning red myself. “The device with the big red button.”
“Oh, that!” Catherine laughed and picked it up. “This is the latest technology in long-range detonation. The T-38 Boombox from MegaCorp. Most of the old detonators relied on radio waves, but this uses satellite feeds so you can remotely blow up anything from anywhere on the globe.”
“I think Joshua Hallal had one of those in the penthouse,” I said.
“Really?” Catherine asked. “That’s intriguing. Are you sure?”
“Not a hundred percent,” I admitted. “There was a lot going on at the time.”
“That’s what he had all right,” Erica said. “Exact same make and model.” She pointed to one of the guns. “Can I borrow this, Mom?”
“Of course, sweetie,” Catherine said. “And take some knives, too, just in case.”
Erica selected a few knives and set about holstering them onto her utility belt.
“How’d you get all that onto an airplane?” Mike wanted to know.
“Oh, I didn’t fly commercial,” Catherine replied. “I borrowed a private jet from a friend and flew myself down here. Didn’t want to make any waves.” She suddenly smacked Murray on the wrist as he inched closer to the suitcase. “Back off, you miscreant. Those are only for children who behave themselves.”
“I was just looking,” Murray whined, massaging his hand.
Catherine turned to me apologetically. “Benjamin, I hope you understand. . . . Good sense forbids me from allowing you to carry a weapon as well. No offense.”
“None taken,” I said. I didn’t even want a weapon, for fear that I’d accidentally shoot someone on my own team. In fact, I felt nervous even being near the suitcase at all. “Can you launch a missile with a detonator like that?”
“I suppose you could,” Catherine replied. “Although detonators are usually used for, well . . . detonating things. Like explosives.” She picked up a smaller device that looked similar to the detonator, but without the button. “You attach one of these receivers—or two or three, or as many as you’d like, really—and when you press the big red button, they all send an electronic burst which sets off the explosions. I wonder what Joshua had one for . . . ?”
“Why do you have one?” Zoe asked.
“Or a mace?” Mike added. “And . . . are those hand grenades?”
“Oh, you never know what will come in handy on a mission,” Catherine replied cheerfully. “I once defeated a splinter cell of a radical terrorist group with only a slingshot and a bag of marbles. Ah, memories.” She sighed wistfully, then shook it off and returned her attention to the present. “Come to think of it, a grenade might come in handy today.” She plucked one out of the suitcase, along with two guns, which she quickly tucked into holsters hidden beneath her skirt.
“I’m ready whenever you are,” Erica said, grabbing several more things from Catherine’s suitcase. She spoke with the eagerness a normal girl might have used to discuss going on a horseback ride with her mother, rather than chasing down an international arms dealer.
“Very well,” Catherine said. “Here’s the plan: Zoe and Michael, stay here and keep an eye on both Murray and Paul.”
Zoe began to protest, but Catherine interrupted her. “I know it sounds like a lame babysitting job, but it’s not. Keeping an eye on these men is crucial to this mission, and I give you both my full permission to keep badgering them to see if they can tell you anything else about what SPYDER is plotting. Can you handle that?”
“Yes,” Mike and Zoe agreed.
“Good,” Catherine said. “Benjamin, you’ll come with Erica and me. We’ll handle the guards, but I want you there when we ask Gorsky why he’s here. You’re the best of any of us at seeing the connections and putting together what SPYDER is up to.”
“All right,” I said, wishing I had the same confidence in my own abilities that Catherine did.
“Enough delegating,” Erica said impatiently. “Can we go?”
“After breakfast,” Catherine said calmly. “You know how I feel about going on missions with an empty stomach. I’ve had more maneuvers fail because someone was hypoglycemic and cranky than anything else.”
Erica groaned, exasperated.
There was a knock at the door. “Room service!” someone called.
Mike cautiously peered out the window and confirmed that it was actually room service this time and not someone looking to attack us.
“Let’s have a good meal,” Catherine said, “and then we’ll go confront Gorsky and get to the bottom of this once and for all.”
“Fine,” Erica agreed sullenly, disappointed she had to wait any longer.
As for me, I wasn’t quite as excited. In fact, I was quite sure that, despite being ravenous, I wouldn’t be able to eat a thing. Even though Catherine and Erica, who were perhaps the two most competent spies I knew, were with me, I was still very nervous about our upcoming mission. The day’s previous mission had gone badly enough, and now SPYDER knew we were alive and close by.
No matter how confident Catherine and Erica were, I couldn’t shake the feeling that this wasn’t going to work out well.
And it was going to work out even worse than I’d feared.
18
INFORMATION EXTRACTION
Luxury Villa 23
Aquarius Resort
March 30
0700 hours
Vladimir Gorsky’s villa was even nicer than ours. It was newer and bigger and had a larger private garden, which I got a nice tour of as we infiltrated the compound. Catherine figured Gorsky wouldn’t fall for the old trick where we knocked on the door, said “room service,” and then popped him in the nose when he answered. “He knows SPYDER wants him dead,” she explained. “So he’ll have his guard up.”
She was right. In Gorsky’s case, this meant having two Russian men the size of silverback gorillas protecting him at all times. However, neither of them was any match for Catherine and Erica.
The first was on patrol in the private garden. Catherine sprang onto him from the top of the wall and rendered him unconscious with some masterful martial arts moves in less than five seconds. She handed me some zip ties, and I dutifully bound his arms and legs behind his back. I might not have been much of a fighter, but I was getting pretty good at tying up unconscious bad guys.
The second guard was watching TV. The first had left the sliding glass door to the garden open when he went on patrol, so all Catherine had to do was fire a sedation dart through it. The second guard winced as it
hit him in the neck, then slumped unconscious in his chair.
We could hear water coursing through pipes in the walls, indicating that a shower was running upstairs. We could also hear the cries of what sounded like someone in horrible pain.
“Do you think he’s torturing someone?” Erica whispered.
Concerned, Catherine focused on the noises a bit longer, then sighed with relief. “No. That’s just Gorsky singing in the shower.” She grinned and led us up the stairs to the master suite.
Gorsky’s singing got louder and more painful as we approached. It wasn’t quite as bad as Murray’s yodeling, but then, Murray had been trying to sound bad. Gorsky was just naturally awful.
The master suite’s door was locked, but Erica jimmied it quickly.
The suite was a wreck. Gorsky had obviously been living there for weeks, during which he hadn’t allowed a cleaning crew inside. This might have protected his privacy, but hygienically, it was a disaster. The man was a slob. Dirty clothes were strewn over every conceivable surface. Piles of filthy dishes moldered on the floor, attracting hordes of insects. A cockroach the size of a mouse was making off with an ancient pizza crust.
Given that Gorsky was an arms dealer, there were also a lot of weapons lying haphazardly around the room. Semiautomatic weapons were piled on a chair, a flamethrower rested on the unmade bed, and a pair of grotty boxer shorts dangled off the business end of a grenade launcher.
The bathroom door was also locked. As Erica went to jimmy it, Catherine raised a hand, looking a bit embarrassed. “Darling, while this is an opportune time to get the jump on him, you might want to avert your eyes. The man probably isn’t showering in his clothes. . . .”
“I’ll do my best, Mom,” Erica assured her, then picked the lock.
We all stepped inside. Gorsky was in the glassed-in shower, butchering “ ’O Sole Mio” and lathered up so thickly that he looked like a sheep. Thankfully, between the lather and the steamed-up glass, his nether regions were hidden from our view. He was so busy cleaning himself, he didn’t notice our arrival right away. A gun sat on the vanity within arm’s reach of the shower door. Catherine calmly picked it up, then pointed it at Gorsky.