The Takedown, page 7
I used to want the distance. Not from Calla. Just from . . . everything else. Now, I’m kicking myself for it.
“Sydney Bean?” Grandma Ruby shuffles over to Nick and me, pointing at the record player in the living room. “Would you mind putting on something festive?”
“Sure.” I nod a little too forcefully. “Sure.”
Grandma Ruby runs her thumb along the rim of her glass, like she’s trying to make it sing. “Something on your mind, pumpkin? You’ve had that same look since you were a baby and you were trying to figure out how to pet a dog.”
This—this is why she’s so good at blackjack, why no one bets against her at the senior center anymore. She’s quietly perceptive. Sharp. She can read people better than most CIA officers in the field.
Outwardly, I cheer up, eyes brightening. I need to be as merry looking as the rest of them. Nick’s outdoing me with his stupid christmas sweater sweatshirt. “Just happy for Calla, that’s all.” I slip away from Grandma Ruby and Nick as nonchalantly as possible. “I’ll pick something good. Go celebrate! Go!”
At my back, Nick gives me a perceptive tilt of his head, wavy black hair shimmering under the kitchen lights. Despite the happiness on his face, his security professional mind might be picking apart my performance. I make a sharp turn into the living room, thinking, So! This is what an out-of-body experience feels like. My sister in the breakfast nook with a crime lord. Marrying him. This Christmas. By the stereo, I lean on my tried-and-true techniques for relieving anxiety. Everyone in the CIA has anxiety. We just know how to hide it better, how to harness it, and how to manage it in times of extreme crisis.
Silently, I box-breathe. Four-second inhale, four-second hold, four-second exhale. Repeat, repeat, as my fingers flick through old records, landing on a band called The Squirrel Nut Zippers. My dad . . . my dad used to play their Christmas album every holiday. He’d turn the volume up loud and do the Pulp Fiction dance, limp-wristed, just to make us giggle. He could really do Christmas, with the reindeer antlers and fake stomps on the roof; he’d actually get up there and trick us. Nearly slipped on the ice one year. Grandma Ruby had to tell us Santa was a bit clumsy.
I almost smile at this, the memory of Calla and me, necks craned up to the stomping sound—but then, ten Christmases later, nothing. Silence. A lot of people joke about just walking off one day, disappearing into the woods, but our dad—well, he put his money where his mouth was. As far as I know, he’s still walking.
I run a smooth finger over the record. He liked saying the band’s name. Zippers. Zippy. Zip-Zip. Zzzzzz . . .
My phone vibrates in my back pocket.
An encrypted text from Gail: Call me ASAP.
I might hear from my CIA handler once a week. Gail is oddly communicative.
Slapping on the record, I duck out of sight, climbing the creaky wooden stairs all the way up to the attic, not even bothering to flip on the lights. It’s private up here—and inside-of-the-fridge freezing. The cold starts numbing my fingertips, my eyelids . . . My eyelids are getting heavier. When was the last time I slept? Thirty hours ago?
Never mind. Doesn’t matter. I stand near the boiler for warmth and for a noise barrier.
“Sydney,” Gail says when I dial her. Her voice is crisp. “I’m not sure whether I should say congratulations, maid of honor, or offer you a Kleenex. Metaphorically speaking.”
I lean back to thwack my head—once, twice—on one of the attic rafters. You know the Christmas song that goes, He sees you when you’re sleeping, he knows when you’re awake? That’s not Santa. That’s the FBI. It doesn’t surprise me: There are bugs in the kitchen.
Gail goes swiftly on. “Needless to say, the landscape has changed slightly. Especially on your end. I thought we had more time, at least until New Year’s Eve, but once they’re married, Calla’s plausible deniability diminishes significantly. Of course, it’s not a wife’s responsibility to know everything her husband is up to, but . . .”
“I’m telling you,” I stress, still managing to whisper. Sound carries in this house, and I don’t want Johnny to hear me above the boiler. Or Nick. Or the attic raccoons. “I don’t think that Calla knows about the heists. She wasn’t hiding anything with her body language.” Not that I could see, anyway. But you don’t always see what’s right in front of you, do you, Sydney? “You don’t think we should bring her into the fold? Tell her who her fiancé really is and what’s about to go down on New Year’s Eve?”
“Absolutely not. We’ve spoken about this. We’d risk compromising the entire investigation. If your sister is innocent, by some miracle, there’s no way she could keep up the charade after we tell her. And then what?”
“Maybe we could put a wire on her,” I push gently, still wrestling with the choice. The spontaneous wedding—the swift switch in personality—has made me question my gut, but she’s . . . she’s Calla. “Who knows what Johnny might tell her if she prods him a little when they’re alone? We could give her a script, work in a specific question about the next heist that feels organic. Maybe tell her to ask him about her engagement ring. Did you see the ring?”
“I’ve seen the ring.”
“Okay, so—”
“So I’ll say it again: We cannot risk getting found out. We’d need much more information before making that sort of leap.”
She’s right. She is. Keeping this from Calla is my choice, too. “Then I’ll get the information. I’m planting the tracker on Johnny’s phone tonight, and I’ll keep working on my sister.”
It sounds like Gail sucks her teeth. “No.”
The flatness of her response throws me. “No?”
“A targeted approach is always better than a scattershot one,” Gail says after a moment’s pause. “No need to go poking holes in everything willy-nilly. Keep tabs on Johnny. Send me the intel from his phone and a close-up image of the ring, and I’ll see if it matches any of our records of stolen items. Keep a line of communication open with Calla, obviously, but it’s clear that you two aren’t as close as you once were, and my gut is telling me there’s a smarter way to go about this.”
Her comment slices its way into my stomach. It curdles there. True, Calla and I aren’t as close as we were, but hearing it out loud—from someone I met a little over twenty-four hours ago—is particularly brutal. “How’s that?”
“Nick,” Gail says, in the same way one might say duh. “You two clearly have some sort of . . . chemistry.”
The comment is a face slap. “With the Canadian guy?”
“What’s wrong with being Canadian? My grandmother was half Canadian.”
I shake my head furiously. “Nothing. That wasn’t a comment about his nationality. Just about him.”
Gail waits a third of a beat. “Since you haven’t jumped in immediately with a rebuttal, I think you agree about the chemistry.”
“Actually, I unequivocally disagree.”
“Too late,” Gail says. “The pause was noted.”
My jaw clenches. I see where she’s going with this. “So you want me to . . .”
“Make him like you,” Gail finishes, providing the answer I’ve already guessed. “Listen. Nick is closer to Johnny than anyone. Who knows more than the former bodyguard? Add to that, Nick’s new role as head of personal security and his friendly history with Johnny. This could be the break for us, Sydney. Nick has dated women in the past, and you’re a woman . . .”
Seduce him, she means. Seduce Nick Fraser.
I massage my forehead, which is beginning to feel like an ice cube. A throbbing, painful ice cube.
I’m confident about my abilities, but did it really have to be him? Besides the fact that I trust the guy about as much as a rabid wolverine, Nick’s goal is to protect Johnny and the Jones family at all costs. My goal is to take down Johnny and the Jones family at all costs. Not exactly a match made in heaven. Also, it isn’t an even playing field. I’m me here. I’m only half undercover in my own house, in my hometown. So many things about me are already out in the open; I can’t dole them out strategically.
There’s no barrier. No protection.
I need that.
Besides, who knows if Nick will play along? Who knows if he’s even attracted to me? What if he finds me as obnoxious as I find him?
Apparently, Gail interprets my silence as insubordination. “Your organization does unseemly, unethical, and grotesque things nearly every day. The CIA makes political prisoners disappear. They facilitate illogical coups on foreign soil. All I’m asking you, Sydney, is to flirt with the man over a chicken.”
I frown into my palm and say bluntly, “I legitimately lost you with the chicken.”
Some paperwork shuffles in the background, as if Gail is multitasking. “Christmas chicken! Or turkey. I mean turkey. Turkey, ham, pimiento loaf, whatever your family serves at holiday dinners. Just be whoever he wants you to be. Get him to open up and trust you. I know he works in the security world, so he might spot warning signs—tread carefully—but he was already starting to open up in the kitchen, even after that disastrous shower stunt. I think we have a decent chance.”
She isn’t wrong. I peek over my shoulder, triple-ensuring that no one’s followed me into the attic, then whisper over the sound of the boiler, “What about Johnny’s family? If they come in early for the wedding, can you assemble a task force to swoop in and—”
“Yes, yes, it’ll be handled. Don’t worry. Go back to the kitchen. Your grandmother is about to make some sort of pie with . . . cayenne peppers?”
“Cayenne pecan pie,” I say, distracted. “She’s obsessed with spice.”
“Mmm. Now, Sydney?”
“Yes?”
“Don’t fall for the target.”
Seriously? Fall for Nick? My brow fully crinkles. I’m used to the distrust. The CIA never fully trusts you—that’s what all the polygraph tests are for—but usually I don’t get this shit right before a mission. “Zero percent chance of that.”
“It’s happened before, historically. With other agents. Sometimes the lines get a tad blurry. It’s difficult to tell what’s real and what’s fake.”
“Well, I’m not other operatives. If I can recruit foreign spies, I think I can handle some guy in an airport sweatshirt. You’re forgetting that I’ve done this before.”
“Not like this. Those were far different circumstances.”
“Gail.” I harden myself. “Everything will be under control.”
5
In a training camp outside Williamsburg, Virginia, I learned how to tail a target from a distance. I learned how to maneuver an ATV in a high-speed chase, how to position your body in a parachute jump—and the steps to take if you’re cornered in a hostile crowd with nothing but the clothes on your back. I’m good at recruiting assets. I’m good at navigating maps, back alleyways, and tricky conversations. Theoretically speaking, I should have no problem maintaining a nearly weeklong fake flirtation that culminates in the transfer of vital intelligence.
Even if it’s with someone as repulsively criminal as Nick.
But I am worried, just slightly, about doing all of this as me. In my hometown, surrounded by my family. Despite what I’ve told Gail, I’m actually finding it kind of hard to be my previous self and my agent self at once—and it isn’t a one-and-done deal, like with Alexei. I can’t switch on the sex appeal and bail an hour later, disappearing on a Swedish night train.
The best I could do here is a very slow and slide-y Prius.
“Okay,” I tell myself, clapping my hands once in the attic. “Okay.” If seducing sidekick Nick is the best strategy we have, then I’m all in.
Less than an hour later, Johnny, Nick, Calla, and I are going out.
There aren’t many bars in town. In winter, the population of Cape Hathaway shrinks to just under seven hundred. The lobster boats pull in for the season, and the mom-and-pop ice cream stands shutter their windows. All that’s left is cold wind on the water, slapping the mossy, black rock—and a tiny inn by the sea, with dim lighting and a formidable whiskey list. This time of the year, Hathaway House is strictly for locals; it’s for anniversary trips and date nights, for couples snuggled into cozy booths. Oil paintings of ships and stormy seas line the walls, and the ambience is just slick enough for my purposes.
Our only other choice was the Moose Lodge.
With the taxidermied raccoons.
So this will really have to do.
“This place get a lot of traffic?” Nick asks, shrugging off his brown Barbour jacket and hanging it on the edge of his chair. His mask is slipping. He isn’t as calm or as lighthearted as he was in the kitchen; in fact, he’s mildly on edge, his brow knitted in an annoying little furrow. On the drive here, Johnny kept thwacking his shoulder and telling him, “Loosen up, Nicky boy, it’s Christmas. Marco’s off duty, and so are you.” But even now, as we’re perched at a rickety high-top near the bar, I can tell that Nick is fighting his protective mentality. His gaze keeps flicking over to Johnny, whose arm is wrapped loosely around Calla. Johnny’s laughing like he wants the whole bar to hear him; he’s shooting the shit with the bartender and ordering Calla a holiday-themed drink. It is called, dubiously, “Santa’s Surprise.”
Frankly, I trust that drink even less than I trust Nick. Which is really saying something.
“ ‘Traffic’ and ‘Cape Hathaway’ don’t really go hand in hand,” I say, eyeing him. “If you asked, ‘Does this place get a lot of knitting circles,’ then it would be a different story.”
Nick massages the ridge between his eyebrows. Not for the first time, my gaze stops on that faded scar on his chin; how’d he get that? A fight? Bet you did. “How many people like to knit in a bar?”
“More than you think.”
He drags a hand down his face, then shakes his head like a dog. No, not like a dog. I respect dogs. “Sorry, I’m sorry. I’m usually a lot more fun than this, I promise. I just get worried about the job. Johnny’s just said that he doesn’t want a bodyguard at the holidays. Wants it just to be about family. We’re in a town that’s so small, no one would care about him here. He’s probably right, but . . .”
“Oh, he is right. Our closest thing to a celebrity is the guy who keeps freeing all the lobsters at the grocery store.”
Nick snorts, cracking a smile. “Even I’ve heard about him, the legend.”
“The man, the myth.” Unshouldering my own parka, I smooth out the sweater beneath it. I’ve picked the trendiest, most approachable turtleneck in my suitcase: a black one, with shiny gold buttons. Some might say I should’ve gone for a more obviously sexy outfit, but seduction—I think—isn’t always about showing the most skin. Sometimes it’s about making them wonder what’s underneath the wool.
Nick’s shallow, I bet. He’ll take the bait.
“So how do you normally spend the holidays?” I ask, leaning forward over the table and wrapping my hand around a just-ordered glass of whiskey. Its oaky scent floats in the space between us, tickling my nose. Nick’s gone for an old-fashioned, and he’s swapped his christmas sweater for an actual sweater: an all-black number that hugs his shoulders in a try-hard way. His wavy dark hair is a touch damp with melting snow, and he smells of that woodsy-meets-sea soap that I should’ve clocked him with in the shower.
He’s put in some effort for tonight. Good.
“Depends,” Nick says, after peering over my shoulder to double-check on good-time Johnny, who’s indulging in a predrink sambuca shot, knocking it back with an ahhhhh. “What year is it?”
I pretend to consider this heavily, tilting my head back and forth. “Nineteen . . . ninety-nine.”
“Then I’m falling asleep every night wishing for a tricycle from Santa Claus,” Nick deadpans.
“Did he deliver?”
“Still waiting.”
“Damn.” I click my tongue. “Tough luck.”
“What about you?” he shoots back, still leaving his drink untouched. One of his eyebrows crooks in a flirtatious way, and I read the rest of his body language in a covert sweep. Open. Easy. Just what I want for the mission. “In fact, let me ask this: Why have I been instructed to”—he uses air quotes—“ ‘make sure you don’t leave the state’ this Christmas?”
A flush of heat threatens to rise to my cheeks. I play it off. “Oh yeah? Who told you that?”
“Calla,” Nick admits, voice climbing a little as “A Holly Jolly Christmas” bursts into the speakers in the background. “Then your Grandma Ruby. I’m supposed to keep an eye on you. I think they’re afraid you’re going to disappear before the wedding, pull a Runaway Maid of Honor.”
“Great movie,” I say, light and airy. The thought of my family agonizing over me sends a fizzled pang into my stomach, but “running away” isn’t exactly what I did. I lock those emotions up tight, resting my chin in my palm and drumming my fingers on the side of my cheek. “How are you going to keep an eye on me, then?”
I look up, meeting Nick’s gaze with the tiniest hint of mischief. It catches him off guard. I can tell, because Nick has tells. I’m learning them rapidly. When he’s surprised, one corner of his mouth ticks up. His pupils widen ever so slightly. His head rears almost imperceptibly back.
“Anyone ever tell you that you’re kind of intense?” he asks, squinting, after a moment’s pause. He’s matched my angle, leaning forward. A slow, borderline sexy smile works its way up his lips. Does that actually work on other girls, Nicholas?
“I may have been told that,” I admit, slowing my voice to a purposeful beat.
Nick’s eyes slide to Johnny, then back to me, his foot jiggling under the table. “It’s weird, I keep forgetting that I don’t already know you. Calla’s been telling us Sydney stories for months.”
She has? Whiskey swirls in my glass as I sip and swallow. The vintage is so strong, if I cough, fire might spurt out. “Like what?”
