Free Fall

by Christa Roberts

  Nervous laughter spread throughout the room, and then Sydney felt her face flushing that familiar shade of pink. We weren't being spied on, she thought, realizing what had happened. The bugs were part of our training!

  Stephanie gave her a sheepish look. “I am such a dork,” she whispered back.

  Relief washed over Sydney. No one was spying on them. No one was after Sanderling. But what was the purpose of putting bugs in our room? she wondered. A glance at the superior agents in the room told her she was about to find out.

  “All right, we're ready for you,” Agent Sinclair called into the hallway, motioning to someone out of viewing range. The young agents craned their necks as several members of the hotel staff paraded into the room.

  “Agents, I'd like you to meet . . . your fellow agents.”

  A collective gasp went out from the group as a woman Sydney had seen dressed as a maid earlier stepped forward. She was now wearing a sleek black pantsuit and a pearl choker that would cost a domestic worker's yearly salary. “Good evening, everyone. I'm Agent Mary Cunningham.” She turned to Greg. “You were so accommodating, Agent Williams. Not only did you leave the door open when I brought the extra towels you had delivered, you kindly took a shower, giving me ample time to search through all of your belongings.” She winked. “Love the silk boxers.”

  Greg swore under his breath, then held his hands up in mock surrender. “Guilty as charged.”

  Sydney couldn't believe who was next in line—Slacker Bellboy! His hair was still long and messy, but he had crisp khakis and a button-down shirt for a uniform now. “Hey, all. I'm Agent Monrovi.” He walked over to her and took a thin silver chain out of his pocket. “I think this belongs to you, Agent Bristow.”

  “My necklace!” Sydney's fingers closed around the delicate piece of jewelry. It had belonged to her mother, and she kept it in a small box tucked away in her cosmetics bag. She hadn't even noticed it was missing.

  And the humiliation went on. A room service waiter had Maureen's Palm Pilot. Paul had failed to notice the tiny camera installed above his bathroom sink.

  “Glad to know you floss!” Agent Sinclair told him as everyone chuckled sheepishly.

  And Sydney was further horrified to learn that her entire cell phone conversation with Francie was noted word for word by a “hotel receptionist.” “Too bad you're stuck in smoggy L.A.,” the agent who had sat behind the desk said with a slight smirk. Sydney wanted to slap her.

  “What about Stephanie?” Maureen asked impulsively. “You must have something on her.”

  Paul reached over and patted Stephanie on the shoulder. “You don't know Steph, Maureen. The girl is flawless.”

  Stephanie smiled a slightly embarrassed smile. “Paul is right,” Agent Henry spoke up. “Stephanie is the only agent in this room who came through with a perfect score. Not only did she not let herself get compromised by anyone on the hotel staff, she made sure to do a thorough sweep of her room and discover the bug we had planted earlier.”

  “Everyone had a bug in their room,” Agent Sinclair told them as the formerly disguised agents said their good-byes and exited, “so Maureen, your homework for tonight is to go back and find yours.”

  The young woman nodded curtly. “Will do.”

  Agent Henry walked over and handed Stephanie the gift certificate envelope. “And I want everyone in this room to give some serious thought to what went on here tonight. One perfect score is pathetic. There are five agents in this room. How many perfect scores should we have, Agent Bristow?”

  “Five, sir,” she replied.

  “This should be old hat to you by now,” Agent Henry went on. “Always check your room—for bugs, for taps, for God knows what. Never let anyone carry your luggage, and never let your luggage out of your sight.”

  “You know, like those taped warnings that play over and over again at the airport,” Greg joked.

  But Sydney knew it wasn't a joke. It was a silly, stupid mistake—and seeing a guy she'd written off as Slacker Bellhop dangle her precious silver necklace in front of her eyes had proved it. Stephanie hadn't been too cautious—she was doing her job, the job Sydney should be doing on a regular, consistent basis.

  Sydney stared down at the small glass bowl that a waitress had put in front of her several minutes before. What had once been coffee ice cream was now a brown puddle. Ice cream had a way of doing that when you weren't looking.

  Sydney wouldn't get caught not looking again.

  “I have to tell you, I was kind of disappointed in the bathtub,” Stephanie said as she splashed warm water on her face and then patted it dry with a towel. “When I found out we were coming to Niagara Falls, honeymoon central . . .”

  “I know! I was thinking they were going to have a cheesy heart-shaped one,” Sydney confessed, putting her toothbrush back in its holder. She looked into the large beveled mirror that hung over the double vanity and wiped a dab of toothpaste from her lip. She was glad she had her bathrobe—the air conditioner was stuck on HIGH COOL and the motel room was freezing. I'll probably have icicles on my eyelashes when I wake up tomorrow.

  “The funniest thing ever was I had to stay in this total dive once, and the room had a vibrating bed.” Stephanie giggled. “You had to pay fifty cents to get it to move!”

  “Eww!” Sydney wrinkled her nose and walked over to her double bed. She sat down and gave the mattress a firm thump. “I'll take a standard box spring any day.”

  Stephanie plopped down on her own bed, which let out a loud creak. “Me too.”

  Sydney bit her lip. “You know, I feel really bad that you got stuck with that lumpy thing.”

  Stephanie waved her guilt away. “No problem. I'm so tired tonight I could sleep on a rock.”

  “You'll have the chance to do that tomorrow,” Sydney reminded her. They were going to a rock-climbing class early in the morning.

  Stephanie nodded. “Yeah.” She reached over to the nightstand and grabbed the bottle of Neutrogena moisturizer that sat there and poured some on her long tan legs. “You know, sometimes I can't believe the stuff I'm doing now that I'm part of SD-2. I mean, rock climbing? That's something people on Road Rules do, not me.”

  Sydney had often felt the same way. Chasing after rock stars who were arms dealers, being sent to some remote Scottish island posing as a Romanian heiress . . . sometimes she couldn't believe the life she was leading was actually hers. “I know exactly how you feel. Do you . . . do you ever have any regrets? About what we do?”

  Her roommate hesitated, then shook her head. “Not really. Only that I wish I could tell my mom about this crazy life.”

  Sydney smiled ruefully. “It's so hard keeping things a secret. I hate it sometimes.”

  Stephanie stared down at her chipped red toenail polish, then back over at Sydney. “Me too. But I'm not keeping it a secret from my mom. She died when I was twelve. Leukemia.”

  “Really?” Sydney blurted out. “My mother died when I was six. In a car accident.”

  “I'm so sorry,” Stephanie said, her eyes full of empathy. Neither of them said anything for several minutes. Then Stephanie sighed. “I didn't know how to deal with it and I was twelve. I can't imagine having that happen to you when you're six. Are you and your dad close?”

  Sydney choked back a bitter laugh. “Close isn't the word. Strangers? Enemies? Now that's more like it.”

  “My dad and I don't see each other much,” Stephanie confessed. She went on to tell Sydney that he worked in business development for a major computer manufacturer and that he was a total workaholic. “I wasn't even sure he was going to show up for my high school graduation,” she said, flopping down on her mattress. Creak.

  Could we be any more alike? Sydney thought, staring at her new friend in amazement. Our moms are dead, our fathers are fanatical about their jobs, and we both happen to be college students who were recruited to work for the CIA.

  Then Stephanie hopped off the bed and rummaged around in her dresser drawer, final
ly holding up a pair of red cable-knit socks. “I have two pairs of these, and I swear they keep your feet totally warm.”

  Okay, that seals it. “You rock!” Sydney said, happily taking the pair Stephanie held out to her. “My feet always freeze at night and I forgot sleep socks.”

  Stephanie clicked off the overhead lights and picked up the television remote. “Did you want to watch anything? We could get a movie.”

  Sydney shook her head and put on the socks. “Nah. Actually I'm really enjoying talking to you.” She stood up and pulled down the bedspread, then shot an apologetic look over at Stephanie. “It's so nice to talk to someone and not feel like I'm keeping this big secret from them. I have this great roommate back at UCLA, Francie, who's actually my very best friend at school, and I have to lie to her all the time.” She wondered what Francie was doing now. Probably creating a Georgia O'Keeffe–inspired finger-paint masterpiece. “She thinks I work for a bank and is always giving me grief for ditching her for my job.”

  Stephanie hooted. “Multiply that times two! Ingrid and Emma were my roommates at the University of Chicago. They're the ones who got these swanky finance jobs, and they think I settled to work at the insurance company. And they are constantly bombarding me with invitations to go shopping, go to parties, go to the Art Institute, you name it.”

  “Two roommates?” Sydney gave a shudder, partly for effect and partly because she was freezing. “I definitely couldn't deal with that. Lying to one person is hard enough. It's so frustrating having her think badly of me, when if she only knew what I was really doing . . .” Sydney trailed off, imagining how Francie would react if she found out Sydney worked for the CIA. You're a spy? Yeah, right. And I'm Julia Roberts.

  “I'm always paranoid that they're going to show up at the Peerless Insurance Company unannounced and ask to see me, and I'll be off working somewhere.”

  “Are you working now?” Sydney said before she could catch herself. “I mean, during this training . . . do you, uh, have a mission?” Dumb, dumb, dumb, Sydney scolded herself as she watched Stephanie's face tense up. If she had learned anything in the past few hours, it was that she and Stephanie had a lot in common.

  And if her new friend was anything like Sydney, she wouldn't feel exactly comfortable talking about something as private and personal as her life in the CIA.

  “Forget I asked,” Sydney said hastily, wishing she could take the question back. “It's really none of my business.” Despite her near-perfect comfort level with her new friend, it wasn't as if she was going to suddenly start spilling details about Sanderling and Sloane. That just wasn't protocol, friend or not.

  Stephanie shook her head. “No, don't be silly.” She giggled. “And to answer your question, other than to practice my horrible French, no. I don't have a mission.” Then she let out a monster-sized yawn. “I'm sorry, Sydney. I'm so beat. Can we talk more tomorrow?”

  “Sure,” Sydney said, clicking off the reading light above her head and snuggling down under the covers.

  That is, if I'm not frozen solid by then.

  6

  “THAT'S IT, SYDNEY. KEEP your focus.”

  That was easy for her instructor to say, Sydney thought as she looked warily up at the rocky cliffside in front of her where the rock-climbing guide, Chris, stood along with the other members of Sydney's group. After spending the morning going over the basics like tying knots, getting into harnesses, and belaying at an Ontario rock-climbing gym, Sydney and her fellow agents were now under-going a day of rappelling instruction on a cliffside not far from downtown Toronto.

  “We're on real rock, baby!” Greg had said when they arrived.

  “Show us the ropes,” Paul had added, carrying his heavy gear as if it was light as a crepe. “Those indoor gyms are for sissies. This is for the big boys.”

  “Don't even get me started,” Maureen had shot back, waving a friction boot at him.

  The gorgeous scenery had awed Sydney, boulders jutting out against a picture-perfect blue sky. Now, though, the scenery took a backseat to the task at hand.

  Sydney had been trained in the basics of the sport, as had everyone else when they had been recruited. The course they were taking was meant to enhance their skills—and to be a bonding experience.

  And if I stay in this location any longer, I'm going to bond with a large gray spider, Sydney thought as the thing idled inches from her face. With a deep, steadying breath, she considered her options, then moved her right foot carefully to the next safe resting place, the rock underneath her hands rough and warm.

  “Get the lead out, Bristow!” Chris shouted. “We can't wait all day. You all have to move or we'll never fit everything in.”

  “Come on, Syd. You're almost there,” Stephanie's voice called out encouragingly from the ledge above her.

  And her roommate was right. Sydney only had two more moves to complete. Seconds later she was on top of the cliff.

  Paul gave her a high five as she turned around and looked at the spectacular view behind her. “Way to challenge the vertical.”

  “Thanks,” she said breathlessly, looking back over her shoulder at where she had just climbed. Now that she had reached the top, her on-edge nerves were gone. Instead excitement churned adrenaline through her bloodstream. “Bring on the next cliff,” she called over to Chris.

  He laughed. “Oh, I will.”

  After lunch, Chris led the group along a dusty trail to an even more breathtaking cliff. This one was so high, Sydney couldn't see the summit.

  “Piece of cake,” Greg scoffed as they took it in.

  Sydney wasn't so sure about that. “It looks pretty difficult,” she said to Stephanie. Her roommate had been the clear star of that day's climbing expedition, at times seeming to know more than their instructor did.

  Stephanie shook her head. “You can't approach a climb like that. You need to walk up to this cliff, tell it you are about to kick its butt, and then do it.”

  Sydney laughed. “Let me know if you're free the next time I have to go meet a stranger in a dark alley, okay?”

  “Stephanie, Paul, you're on,” Chris called, waving them over. They would be climbing in pairs. “This time we're going to see how you are with lead climbing. I normally would avoid doing this in combination with a regular climbing class, but you lot are, well, a special group.”

  Sydney wasn't sure what Agents Henry and Sinclair had told their young, muscular guide about their identity. For all she knew, he was an SD agent himself. “If this goes well, we'll be back for your high-angle rescue and evacuation course,” Agent Henry told Chris as he and Agent Sinclair moseyed off for a cigarette break.

  “What exactly does going well mean?” Sydney wondered out loud as she, Maureen, and Greg gathered on the side.

  “It means SD-6 doesn't lose their yearlong investment,” Greg said straightforwardly, and Sydney paused to think that, as crass as it sounded, it was probably the truth. Training an SD-6 agent had to cost the government a fortune—not to mention all the expenses that were accrued on various missions. Losing a trainee was certainly not on the government's agenda.

  If my father only knew where his tax dollars were going! Sydney thought with a wry smile as she gazed around the sunny precipice.

  As Stephanie and Paul set up their gear, the rest of the group listened as Chris explained how the climb would work.

  “Capisce?” Chris said waggishly. Maureen gave him a thumbs-up. “See, you guys aren't the only ones who know a foreign language around here.”

  The climb was seconds away from beginning when Stephanie frantically motioned Sydney over. “Sydney, I feel like an idiot, but I really have to go to the bathroom,” she whispered as Paul waited patiently nearby. “I mean, I need to get behind a boulder now.”

  “And you're telling me that because—”

  “Because you heard Chris earlier,” Stephanie whispered, quickly unhooking her harness. “He's been watching the clock all day. A bathroom break at 3:05 is not on his itinerary.
Just take my place.”

  “But—” Sydney began apprehensively, glancing over at Paul and then up at the cliff. “I'm not ready!”

  “Sure you are,” Stephanie insisted, slipping out of her harness. “You've been the star climber all day long.”

  “Me?” Sydney protested. “But—”

  “What's going on?” Paul said as he caught on to what was happening. A frown crossed his lips. “Steph, you can't just switch partners in the middle of a climb!”

  “Well, I can and I did,” Stephanie said, handing her gear to a disconcerted Sydney. “And it's not the middle of a climb. It hasn't even started. I'll be back before you guys are halfway up.” She squeezed Sydney's hand. “Kick butt!”

  Chris strode over. “I don't care who Paul has for a partner, but I do care that he has a partner. Let's move.”

  Swallowing her protest at this unorthodox change of plans, Sydney strapped herself into her harness, made sure that everything was in place, and followed Chris's instructions as she and Paul readied for their climb.

  “I saw this documentary about climbers who climb choreographed to music,” Paul said as they carefully began their ascent. “Rocks, bridges, skyscrapers—the world is their stage.”

  “Don't get any ideas,” Sydney said as she climbed. They moved higher and higher up the incline, and soon the other agents were a good sixty feet below them.

  She had slipped into a comfortable rhythm, her foot and hand placement matching the composition of the mountain, anticipating Paul's every move as they ascended. Then the unthinkable happened. As Sydney went to place her foot in what she thought would be a secure hold, she slipped, showering rivulets of gravel on the group below.

  As she fell back, she held her breath, waiting for the harness safety mechanism to take over.

  But it didn't. Instead, she skidded down the side of the mountain, boulders bruising her shins, rock rubbing her hands raw.