by Julia Derek
“Unbelievable,” he said, running a palm over his face. “Who switches table after having their amuse bouche served?” He chuckled without humor and said under his breath, “Maybe they’re not as powerful as I thought they were…”
“Probably not,” I replied dryly. “So what do we do now? I’m thinking that we can say goodbye to that recording chip now.”
Ian’s nostrils flared and it was clear that he was royally pissed off. “No, we’re going to get it back one way or another and get it on their new table.”
I frowned at him. “How?”
Ian was a clever man, but barring from going up and removing it from the old table, I couldn’t see how he would ever get it back.
He sank down on the barstool in front of me, grabbed the fresh gin and tonic and chugged half of it, a light wrinkle having formed between his eyebrows. Slowly, he lowered the glass back to the bar counter.
“You’ll go and get it from the table,” he said matter-of-factly.
I stared at him like he was even crazier than I’d previously thought. “You mean I should just go up to that table and grab the candleholder? I don’t even know which candleholder it is!”
“There’s only one on the table. All you need to do is go up to the new party and ask them if you can borrow their candle for a sec. As lovely as you look, they won’t be able to say no.”
“Why can’t you go up and do it?”
He gave me a wry smile and patted my knee. “Darling, who do you think they’re most likely to respond positively to, a sweet-looking lady like yourself or the bastard of a man in front of you? Besides, I can’t afford to make another appearance in that room.”
“What’s that supposed to mean, you can’t afford to make another appearance? What difference does it make?”
“I can’t go in there one more time. The first was bad enough wearing only the glasses and the fake mustache as a disguise. I can’t count on those politicians not knowing who I am. If even one of them knows me and gets a close enough look, he’ll know I’m up to something and will tell the others. And then they might not feel comfortable enough to talk freely about what they’re doing. I can’t risk that to happen.”
“You were wearing a fake mustache while you were in there?” I asked, not sure if he was being serious.
He stuck his hand into his jacket pocket and when it came back up, he held what looked like a little, hairy mouse in his palm. He extended the weird thing to me and I realized it must be the mustache he was talking about. Moving it up to his face, he pressed it onto the skin above his upper lip. Then he produced a pair of square glasses with jet black frames that he stuck onto his nose. The effect was subtle, but striking. The man I was looking at appeared like someone other than the Ian I’d gotten to know. Even so, if I took my time studying him, I soon recognized him again. But the fact that he’d worn these two items when exchanging the candleholders further explained why I’d not seen it was him.
“Very hot,” I said and smirked as he gave me his version of a sultry look through those thick frames followed by a lopsided grin.
“Isn’t it?” he said and removed first the mustache, then the glasses and put them back into his jacket pocket. “Hot or not, I’m sure you realize it’s better if you go back and get the device. The politicians are only two tables away from their old table and may see me.”
“I don’t agree. All of the people around Janine’s table know exactly who I am now, and if they see me again, they may start to wonder why I’m running around in there. As ‘smashing’ as I am”—I made quotation marks with my fingers—“surely they’ll spot me hanging around their old table. If these people are aware of who you are and that I’m your trainer, they could easily suspect that you’ve put me up to something.”
In reality, I didn’t think Janine and company would suspect me of anything shady was I to go back and get the candleholder. I was only resisting because I was tired and wanted to go home. It was stupid of me to have agreed to do this with Ian in the first place. I had wasted enough time as it was on his nutty conspiracy theories.
“That’s not a bad point you’re making,” Ian said and stroked his chin.
I tilted my head, surprised at how easily he was giving in to my objection. Before I could say anything else, he spoke again.
“But it’s still better that you go get it. They may know who I am, but it’s doubtful they’re aware of how much time you and I are spending together. In other words, they won’t connect the dots.” He leaned forward and looked me deeply in the eyes. “You didn’t happen to notice that a Texas senator sat at Janine’s table, did you?”
“No, I can’t remember everyone around it. Would it have mattered if I had?”
“Probably not, though after I tell you what I’m about to tell you, you’ll never forget him.”
“Go on.”
“Senator Rupert Graham—that’s the Texas senator—is a friend of Cardoza’s. In fact, Janine is also friendly with the Mexican. A couple of years ago, I spotted them talking at an event in Germany. I was UC there. I actually heard what they were saying too.”
I stared at him. “You’re kidding me! Why didn’t you tell me all this right away?”
“I forgot about it until I noticed Graham at the table. I was planning on telling you as soon as we were done here. Forgive me for thinking that tapping their meeting was more important. Only the whole world as we know it is at stake.”
Ignoring those last snarky comments, I grabbed Ian’s lapels and pulled him closer. “What exactly did Janine and Cardoza discuss at the event?”
Ian gazed down at my hands that were still firmly gripping his jacket. “Unless you want to create a scene, you should let go of me.”
Reluctantly, I released him. “What exactly did Janine and Cardoza discuss at the event?” I repeated.
“How Cardoza would fit into her future projects.”
“Really? Well, he’s in prison without parole, so there can’t be any future projects involving him any longer.”
“That doesn’t matter. They’ll just pardon him at some point.”
“Come on! Only the president has the power to pardon and you told me you don’t think he’s involved.”
“If Adler and their cohorts reach their goals, the next president will be someone attached to them. And he’ll be able to pardon anyone they want. I’m sure they’ll be discussing Cardoza tonight.” He gave me a challenging glance. “In fact, they might be doing that right now.”
Biting my lips, I considered Ian’s words. What if he was just making up all this to make me do what he wanted? Surely he was. But what if he wasn’t? What if all he was saying was true and Cardoza was somehow involved with these people? Listening to them now might give me the insight I needed to figure out who had killed Nick and why.
“Fine,” I snapped at last. “I’ll go get it. But how are you gonna get it back on their table?”
“Let me worry about that. You need to go now. The more we sit here talking about it, the more we’ll miss of their meeting. Go in there and get the device off the candleholder on the table. I’ve attached it to the bottom of the holder. All you need to tell those people is that you want to take a closer look at that beautiful holder because you want to buy it for your house. When you have the device, come back here right away so I can get it back on the politicians’ table.”
Chapter 5
There were seven people around the table Janine and company had previously occupied, all of them middle-aged or older.
Taking a deep breath, I sidled up to the two men who were seated together closest to the entrance and farthest away from the corner table where all the politicians now sat. I was hoping to be able to complete my mission without drawing any attention from them.
Having almost two glasses of wine in my body, gone were any of the nerves that had plagued me the first time.
I stopped between the two men, who were in the middle of a conversation. Putting a light hand on the shoulder of the ma
n with the salt-and-pepper hair, I cleared my throat and spoke.
“Excuse me, sir. This is going to sound a bit odd, but may I take a look at your candleholder? I want to see what brand it is as I’d like to buy some for my summerhouse.”
Both men turned around to look at me. I gave them my most charming smile, praying that they would immediately hand me the holder. The three women around the table might not be as eager to help me, and, so far, they hadn’t noticed my presence.
“What did you say?” the man asked in a loud, scratchy voice that I immediately recognized. It was he who’d spoken in my ear earlier. The entire table stopped talking then and suddenly all eyes were on me. Damn.
“May I take a look at the candleholder?” I repeated. “It’s so lovely and I’d like to buy some for my house, but I don’t know what brand it is.”
The emaciated, raven-haired woman next to Mr. Salt-and-Pepper reached for the candleholder and eyed it closely for a few seconds. Then she turned to me. “It’s from Tiffany’s.”
“Really?” I said. “Hmm. I could have sworn it was a Waterford.”
“Me too,” another woman, a chunky one with her honey brown curls stacked on top of her head, inserted. “It looks just like a Waterford holder.”
The raven-haired woman turned to look at the brunette. “It’s from Tiffany’s. I bought similar ones as part of my niece’s wedding gift.”
I took the opportunity to snatch the candleholder out of the woman’s hands. Before she could let out an affronted gasp at my audacity, I had turned it sideways enough to be able to see the underside of it without the tea candle in it falling out. Just as Ian had promised, there was the recording device. I peeled it off and handed the holder back to the woman, who seemed unable to get a word out she was apparently in such a state.
“You’re right,” I said and smiled wide at her. “It is from Tiffany’s. Thanks for letting me take a peek.”
I swiveled around and hurried out of the dining room, back to where Ian was still seated at the end of the long bar. He got to his feet as I reached him.
“Do you have it?” he asked quietly.
“Yes,” I said and handed the tiny device to him.
“Great job,” he said and grinned, pleased. “I’ll be right back.”
Sitting down on my barstool, I watched him as he went up to a waiter with a bottle of champagne in his hands and a couple of flutes in his other. As the two of them exchanged a few words, Ian took the bottle out of the waiter’s hand and gazed at it, smiling with admiration. Then he handed it back to the waiter and something else while talking. The waiter kept nodding, then disappeared through a swinging door.
Ian was soon back to me, the grin on his face even bigger.
“Get ready to put this back in,” he said and held out his hand that contained the earplug. He took a seat on the barstool before me. “It won’t take long before we’ll hear their conversation.”
“Really? How are you gonna get the device on the table again?”
“I bought the most expensive champagne in the house and told the waiter to tell the governor of Illinois that it’s a gift from one of his biggest supporters. The waiter will tell the governor that I saw him as you and I finished dinner and that I wanted to show our gratitude for all the great things the governor has done for Illinois. Before the waiter comes out with the champagne in an ice bucket from over there”—Ian indicated the swinging door through which waiters and busboys came in and out—“I’m going up to ostensibly inspect the champagne.”
“But really you’ll be attaching the recording device to the bucket, right?”
“Exactly. And I told him to place the bucket in the middle of the table and to keep it coming if they empty the bottle. That way the ice bucket will remain in place.”
I was impressed against my will at how clever Ian’s thinking was. But then something struck me. “Wouldn’t it have been smarter to say that we were still in the room, but that we preferred to be anonymous?”
“No, that would just create suspicion. The governor would wonder how come we wish to remain anonymous. Now the waiter can just describe me and only me. He doesn’t know what you look like since he never saw you.”
“But won’t the waiter think it’s weird we’re hanging in the bar after we’ve finished dinner?”
“We’re not going to stay here. In fact, you’ll be leaving right now and go to the Starbucks across the street. When I’ve made sure the device is on the bucket and in the middle of the table, I’ll join you. We can listen to their conversation from the Starbucks across the street.” Ian turned his head away from me. “There’s the waiter. Go to Starbucks.”
“Fine.” I got to my feet and left the restaurant.
I soon spotted the Starbucks Ian had referred to and entered the coffee shop. Before I went over to claim a couple of empty seats in a corner, I bought two plain coffees, one for me and one for Ian.
Waiting for him to join me, I put the listening device into my ear. Almost instantly, I heard Janine’s voice talking about what sounded like her workouts with me, Governor Chatterly chuckling when she claimed I was a slave driver hell-bent on turning her into a female version of Arnold Schwarzenegger. Luckily, it sounded like her rantings were in jest, so I didn’t need to worry about her firing me the next time I trained her.
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw that Ian entered the Starbucks. I waved to him as he scanned the coffee shop, thinking that he must be very happy that his idea had not only worked but so quickly, too. As clearly as I could hear Janine and the governor, the bottle must be standing somewhere in the middle of the table, exactly like Ian had wanted. He must have tipped the waiter generously for all of it to have gone so smoothly.
The second Ian spotted me, he strode over to my table. Sitting down, he stuck his own device into his ear and took the coffee cup I handed him, mumbling “thanks.”
The sound of someone clinking a piece of silverware or similar against a glass entered my ear then. Janine and the others participating in the conversation quieted down. A man’s voice I didn’t recognize spoke.
“I think it’s time we get to why we have all gathered here tonight,” the man said.
A murmur of agreement ensued.
“As some of you may already know, there’s been a change of plan,” the man continued. “Instead of us going to…” The piece in my ear started to crackle in that moment, making it hard to hear what the man was saying. I pulled it out and put it back in, hoping that having done so would make it stop making that disruptive noise. Unfortunately, the crackling was still there, so I struggled to understand what the man said. I looked at Ian to see if it seemed like he was experiencing the same issue. Judging from the focused look on his face and the way his hands gripped his coffee cup, he must be fine.
The crackling in my own ear increased in strength and frequency, and soon it was impossible to make out what was being said.
“Ian,” I said, touching his arm. “I can’t hear what they’re saying. Can you?”
He held up a hand, signaling for me to hold on while he kept listening. The disturbances in my ear suddenly disappeared then, and I could hear a woman saying that one of the offices was going to be moved to London. A male voice thought this was an excellent idea and added something I couldn’t make out because the crackling started again, albeit softly.
I kept moving my piece around in the hope that adjusting it would fix the weird disturbances. It didn’t, instead the crackling got louder and more frequent, making it impossible to hear anything else. Soon it began to hurt my ear, so I removed it.
“What’s wrong?” Ian asked.
“My earpiece isn’t working properly.”
“Really? Mine’s working fine.” He picked up my earplug from the table and eyed it, pressing the one in his own ear closer to his head. His eyes narrowed as he listened intently, then they widened again. Then he sucked in a breath, as if amazed at what he was hearing. Slowly, he shook his head and clenched his teet
h, his lips turning into a thin line.
“What are they saying ?” I hissed, dying to know what it was that made him look like that; clearly, important details were being revealed. He held up his hand again to signal for me to be quiet. It was with the utmost restraint that I managed to control myself and didn’t tear his listening device out to use it myself.
“Hold on,” he hissed. “I need to hear this.”
I picked up my own device and stuck it back into my ear, praying it was working better now. But this time I didn’t even hear jarring crackling sounds—I heard nothing at all.
I pulled it out again and checked to see if I’d turned it off by mistake somehow. Nothing that could be an on/off switch was visible anywhere. Finally I got so tired of not being able to hear anything and Ian not wanting to share his own earpiece with me that I got to my feet and walked over to the food counter. As always when I was frustrated, I craved bad carbs. I told the black girl behind the counter that I wanted an apple cinnamon muffin. The delicious-looking muffin was soon in my hands.
Walking back to our table, I took a seat and watched Ian as he kept listening intently to what was being exchanged over at Le Bernardin. He was so wrapped up in what he was hearing that he seemed blind to me having returned. Sighing, I didn’t even attempt to make him see me and instead began eating my muffin. I could always hear what was being said when we had retrieved the recording device.
Finally, half an hour later, he pulled out the plug from his ear. The only reason I had remained at the coffee shop was because I was very curious to know what had made Ian gasp and moan at times, as well as making weird faces while listening to the politicians’ dinner conversation. Yes, he’s definitely going over there to get the recording device so I can hear everything right now, I thought. That was the least he could do for me after I’d helped him so much.
“Wow,” he said. “That was so worth it. Thanks so much for bringing the device back, Gabi.”
