by Gina LaManna
“We have no such thing.”
“No Pop-Tarts? Or no snack cupboard?” I froze while double dunking my biscotti. “Travesty.”
“I don’t recommend eating that.”
I looked down at my plate. The pre-dunked cookie was turning to mush. “I think it’s too late to turn back, Captain.”
“Each piece of biscotti contains eighteen percent of your daily fat. You have eaten almost two thirds of your daily fat content in the last five minutes. And that doesn’t include whatever you scrounged up for breakfast prior to arriving here.”
I deliberately took a bite. “Are you calling me fat?”
“Oh, dear.” In bustled Mrs. Dulcet. “Let me clear some of this away. Can I bring the fruit for dessert?”
I winked at her. “I’m waiting for his answer first. Mr. Clark, what do you think?”
He blinked, gave a startled shake of his head. “No, I don’t think you’re overweight. In fact, your BMI appears to be perfect. I’m merely suggesting that for proper nutrition—” he stopped short as Mrs. Dulcet whispered something in his ear. “My butler has requested I stop speaking.”
I couldn’t help it. I burst out laughing in a deep, belly laugh that did not fit the decor of our breakfast ambiance in the slightest. “You think I’m perfect?”
Mr. Clark glanced toward Mrs. Dulcet. She gave the subtlest nod of her head. “Yes,” he said finally. “Perfect. But—”
From halfway behind the door, Mrs. Dulcet gestured for him to stop talking. Thankfully, he did.
“Before we go any further into this job,” I said, “I need to put in a request to leave the premises. I have prior plans that I can’t change for tomorrow night.”
“Plans such as…?” He glanced around the room. “Exercise? We have equipment here. As for your shop, Psychic in Pink, the facility will be taken care of while you are away. Your friends may visit you here if you desire company.”
“No, none of those. Believe me, exercise is last on my list.”
He stared at me for a long, long time. So long that my ears started to turn red, and I took another bite of biscotti, not caring if he commented again on its nutritional information. My insides warmed; he really was handsome—both in his intensity and in the rugged angles of his face. Then I realized I was staring back, and the whole situation felt incredibly intimate. Too close for someone I’d just met.
I waved. “Hello, earth to Mr. Clark?”
“That was a joke,” he said, offering the slightest of smiles. “I believe the correct phrase might be that you pulled my leg.”
I gave him the thumbs up.
“What brings you to leave the premises?”
“I have a date. Tomorrow night.”
“An appointment?” He paused. “Oh, a date. A romantic date. With your handyman?”
“Well, yes.”
“Ah. Then breaking your pipes worked? Curious. Curious mating ritual indeed.”
“It’s not a mating ritual! It’s just dinner.”
“This date is tomorrow night?”
“Yes, does that fit into your contract?”
“Yes, of course.” He seemed perplexed by the concept of dating; his forehead wrinkled in thought. “You gave advanced notice as requested. I’ll simply schedule my exercise during that time so we won’t lose progress on this assignment. Speaking of timeline, I’m thirty-two minutes behind schedule. Our talk should have lasted eight minutes, and that was started eighteen minutes late. I must now skip my reading break.”
“What should I do? You never gave me information about the assignment.”
“Get situated. I have given Mr. Flanagan, an associate, the briefing information. I’ll have Mrs. Dulcet give you a tour of the living area after Mr. Flanagan is finished.”
“Oh.”
“Lastly…” He paused and glanced at the sunglasses which I’d stowed next to my plate. “Salmon works even better on you than green.”
“Salmon? You mean the sunglasses? They’re pink!”
“Salmon.”
“Fuchsia.”
“Have a good day, Miss Pink.”
He left the room before I could clarify any of it. Slumping back in my chair, arms folded across my chest, I wondered what in the hell I had gotten myself into.
“That’s Agent Pink to you,” I mumbled to nobody.
I took my phone out of my pocket and flicked through the pictures of Gerard—even caught off balance, he looked dreamy. I forwarded the photos along to my cohorts in crime with a note stating the potential need for a rescue before lunch.
“Agent Pink, is it?” A man’s voice sounded behind me. “I’ve been looking for you.”
I couldn’t bring myself to turn around. “You heard me talking to myself?”
“Guilty. But don’t worry, Mr. Clark can have that effect on people.”
That got a smile out of me, so I turned around and faced the middle-aged man dressed in simple jeans and an Oxford shirt. He could’ve been a soccer dad or a banker. An ordinary Joe stuck in the middle of a fantasy world.
“My name is Nick Flanagan, though I suppose you may call me Agent Flanagan if we’re going by nicknames.” He grinned and extended a hand. “My official title is Director of Operations, but that’s mostly code for ‘I do everything’.”
We shook hands, the tension in the room dissipating. After suffering through an awkward breakfast with Dane, it was nice to talk to a human again.
“How can I help you?” I asked. “I’ll be honest; I’m feeling a little lost.”
“I’m actually supposed to help you. Mr. Clark asked that I give you a tour. Once we’re back, I’ll hand you off to Mrs. Dulcet to show you the living quarters.”
“Great. I don’t suppose you can tell me what Clark Company is up to?”
“Sorry?”
“What does everyone here do?” I threw my hands up. “That’s the biggest mystery of all.”
“Then we are doing our jobs correctly,” he said, cryptic with his raised eyebrow. “Let’s walk and talk. You have a lot to learn, Agent Pink.”
“You can drop the Agent, probably,” I said. “I’ve embarrassed myself enough.”
“Being in the same room as Mr. Clark does that to everyone.” Nick Flanagan held the door open for me. “The man is too smart for his own good.”
“You don’t say.”
“Since Mrs. Dulcet will cover the castle later, I’ll show you the back. The headquarters of all things Clark.”
For some reason, my heart raced a little faster and my breath came in smaller bursts as we moved through the house. Every turn boasted an older, more beautiful piece of furniture. Paintings worth more than the Psychic in Pink’s yearly revenue hung from the walls with softly contoured faces watching our every move.
“Clark Company is, at its foundation, a technology company.” Nick stopped just before a wooden door taller than most trees. “And it’s through here that the magic happens. Unfortunately, I will need you to turn your phone over to me now. We’ll be leaving it here in a locker due to the no cameras policy within campus grounds.”
“Well, it sounds like I don’t have a choice.” I pulled out the phone from my pocket and handed it over. I watched as he slid it into an aged hutch and turned the key on a drawer, wondering if I’d ever see it again.
Once he’d sealed my phone away, he pushed the doors open. I half expected a dragon to fly at me, or an alligator to pop out of a moat. However, none of this happened. Instead, as I walked through the doorway I had the distinct feeling I’d emerged into a snow globe.
Not a literal snow globe, but something modeled loosely after such a toy. A set of gigantic buildings formed a circle, each of them labeled with the numbers one through ten. If I had to guess, these were the warehouses. Beyond the buildings towered a thick, dense forest blocking out any sights and sounds from nearby cities.
A clearing the size of several football fields formed a quadrangle in the middle of the buildings. It was there that the resembla
nce to a snow globe began.
“Welcome to Clark Company,” Nick said, watching my face as I took it all in. “Impressive, isn’t it?”
My jaw opened, and then shut without real words coming out. I mumbled an agreement.
Within the quad lay a variety of walking paths made from cobblestone, and fountains likely imported from Europe. Weeping willows hung over crystal clear ponds, while koi fish and turtles swam above shining, silvery rocks below.
Benches were scattered at random intervals throughout the park, and a handful of employees sat around reading, eating, or puttering on small electronic devices.
A loud blast rattled my eardrums, startling me to take a few steps back.
“That’ll be the train,” Mr. Flanagan said. “Toes back, please. This is the platform.”
I looked down and, sure enough, there was a yellow line painted just inches before my feet. “Train?”
My answer came in the form of a locomotive rushing toward us. Built like a life-size model train set and painted in a light blue, it was smaller than any other train I’d seen. Like a personalized version.
“It circles the warehouses all day,” Nick explained. “You swipe your card and it reads your level of access. Go ahead. Try yours out. You can get off at any location that you have access to.”
The train stopped before us and I swiped my card in the little box next to the platform. The doors flew open. I glanced at Nick, and he stepped on first. I followed, grasping onto a pole for balance. The inside resembled a San Francisco trolley car—clean, quaint, and dressed in shiny wood. Nick rested his foot against a bench as the doors closed, and the train—a single car—began its trek toward Warehouse 7.
“Mr. Clark had a thing for model trains,” he said. “And this really cuts down on the walking time for employees bouncing between warehouses.”
“I had no clue there was a whole new world behind the castle.”
We lapsed into silence as the doors swung open revealing a number seven on the platform. I stepped off first, and Nick followed.
“Warehouse 7 is one of our R&D buildings.”
“Research and development?”
“Where we come up with the ideas for new products, work with designers, and manufacture prototypes. Once a potential product gets the green light for larger distribution, it’s passed to Warehouse 10.”
“How do you keep track of where everything is happening?”
“Picture each warehouse as an individual silo; there’s only one project happening in each space at any given time, and the name of the project is the name of the warehouse. It keeps things simple, streamlined, and efficient.”
“And the plans Mr. Clark mentioned were stolen from here?”
“Right here.” He swiped his card, causing two steel doors to open. “Stay close—your permissions are limited.”
All signs of the quaint courtyard disappeared once we moved into the lobby of Warehouse 7. In its place, steel, shiny black and white surfaces took over. An air of cutting edge technology permeated the area, smelling like metal, sterility and cleaning products.
Nick signed us in at the desk where a stern-faced young man frowned in my direction. He looked like a beanpole with dull gray eyes, but the scowl on his face was enough to keep me in check.
“Here’s where the designers sit.” Nick gestured toward rows of tables with computer monitors as thin as a slice of toast. Screens plastered against the walls, green, red, and blue dots forming three-dimensional images in the middle of the workspaces.
“I think I recognize this.” I stopped moving, taking a closer look at a rotating image made from lasers that resembled some sort of robot. “This was the set of the last James Bond movie, wasn’t it?”
Nick’s face crinkled into a smile. “I assure you, James Bond himself couldn’t crack the security on our mailbox.”
I shivered at the thought. “Remind me why I’m here again?”
“Because you’re the most resilient private investigator Mr. Clark could find.”
“I run a psychic shop. And I’m not even a psychic.”
“Well, you got the job, so don’t ask too many questions.”
“Seriously though, why me?” I stopped mid-step, letting Nick crash into me from behind. “All of this, and you guys can’t catch a simple thief?”
Nick’s face lost all signs of joking. He steadied himself using the handrail, and then met my gaze head on. “Mr. Clark thinks it’s an inside job. While you’re here, you will be posing as his new personal assistant. You’ll be able to access secure places, ask questions, and observe behavior in a way that nobody else can who works here. It’s a small company—under a hundred employees, each of them top in their field—and they can’t blend in.”
“He never told me that.”
“Because he gave me the briefing papers. It’s my job to explain away all your questions. We couldn’t hire police or FBI—the employees here would smell a cop a mile away.”
“I’m not a cop. I’m not even a PI. I probably don’t smell like one.”
“Exactly.” Nick smiled at me. “Now follow me because we have a blueprint to find.”
“The files were in here.” Nick opened the door to an office that overlooked the rest of the warehouse. “Every warehouse has one of these offices. We call it the Eagle Office—they’re all nested high over the rest of the floor. They’re available for meetings between the lead designer, Mr. Clark, and myself. Everything regarding the project is done here—and kept here. Imagine a sealed dome and nothing—no notes, plans, or materials—leaves this building without approvals.”
“Any clients?”
“Only in the very rare case. As a general rule, clients aren’t allowed in here.”
“Who are the clients of the Clark Company?”
“Now, Miss Pink, I can’t reveal that information.”
“NDA’s and all,” I groaned. “They’ll be the death of me.”
“Each Eagle Office, and the safe inside, can only be accessed by biometric scanning of our fingerprint.”
“If somebody broke in here, they’d need to bring your finger with them?” My eyes darted down to Nick’s fingers to make sure they were all present.
“Or somehow configured their own way to bypass the system, but don’t ask me how they’d have done that. The machine that stores the biometric scans is inside Mr. Clark’s office. I’ve only been in there once in my time here.”
“When were the blueprints stolen, exactly?”
An embarrassed pink glow crossed his face. “Well, that’s the thing. I don’t have an exact time or date for you, which is what makes this case so difficult.”
“What do you mean? Either they were there, or they weren’t. How could they have been missing without you knowing?”
“Because these blueprints are classified documents, they are locked in a safe in the Eagle Office around the clock. The only people who have access to this safe are Mr. Clark and myself. Even the lead designer needs one of us to access them. We don’t reference them every day, so they’re not checked every day. We reference them only at major intersections for the project.”
“You don’t have an exact time or date for when they went missing?”
“Correct.”
I frowned. “Well, when’s the last time you used the blueprints?”
“Three weeks ago.”
“There’s a two-week window then between the last time the blueprints were seen, and the time you discovered they were missing. There hasn’t been a security breach at the warehouse, as this office requires a fingerprint scan of one of the three of you to enter, and the safe can only be accessed by you or Mr. Clark.”
“Correct again.”
I tapped a finger against my lip, digesting the information. “How long have you worked here?”
Nick leaned against a desk that contained zero traces of personal artifacts. The whole room was rather sterile, more like a conference space than an office. The walls were glass on all sides e
xcept for the ceiling—the floor was misted over, a blurred effect that prevented wandering eyes from below.
“Is this where you start your questions?”
“I suppose. Unless there’s a better time?”
He grinned. “No, go right ahead. You can ask me anything. I’ll also set up time for you to talk privately with Mr. Clark and Joseph Anderlin. Joseph is the lead designer and the third person to have access to this space.”
“I need a meeting with Mr. Clark? I’m his personal assistant.”
Nick winked. “Yes, you are. If you haven’t noticed yet, he’s a bit… particular with his schedule.”
“Huh. I never would’ve guessed.”
He laughed. “I asked Mr. Clark for a loose sketch of the blueprint that was stolen. Here’s what he came up with.”
I moved to the other side of the large desk, peering over Nick’s shoulder at a series of complex drawings created from thin, blue lines and writing so cramped I could hardly tell if the words were in English. “Why didn’t you have the designer re-create the images?”
“No one except Mr. Clark, myself, and now you, know about the theft.”
“You didn’t call the police?”
“This is private property. Mr. Clark chooses who he calls about what.”
I put a hand on my hip and narrowed my eyes. “Tell me the things being made in these warehouses are legal.”
He cleared his throat.
“They’re not?” My mouth hung open. “What the heck are you manufacturing?”
“The products we’re manufacturing are so new in the technology world that legislature doesn’t quite know what to do with them. So, I suppose they’re legal, unless a law comes along that renders them suddenly…not legal.”
“At least tell me he’s not making weapons or something.”
“Gadgets. Computers. Variations on artificial intelligence.”
“He makes robots?”
Nick blew out a breath. “A vast oversimplification on what he does but…not entirely inaccurate.”
I turned my attention back to the drawings. “What specifically were these plans being used to create?”
“A computer chip that will eventually power a larger invention.”
