“Anyone got eyes on her?” Mitch asked. A series of negative responses filled his ears.
“She’s inside,” Jake said. He was standing beside Mitch in the war room now, watching the security monitors. “She’s not just good, she’s amazing. There’s no way we would have spotted her if we hadn’t known where to look.”
Mitch acknowledged Jake’s comment with a quick nod. She was beyond good, and that fact was making him sweat bullets. When he was told late last night there was a personnel switch on the valet list, he knew that was her way in. It was an easy leap to guess her route—around the garage, through the apartment, and down the stairs. In his mind’s eye, he traced her route. Once at the bottom of the stairs, she would turn left and walk through the door into the main hallway. She would move down the hall and take the third left into Drake’s office where the prototype was sitting on a thumb drive in the safe.
Or at least she’d try. Mitch’s security personnel were dressed in street clothes, so they’d easily blend in with the partygoers. He had all entrances and exits manned, so no one could come in and disturb the op. Once she was in the office, he and Jake, who were both wearing their all-black work uniforms, would follow her in and scoop her up. He also had five guys outside of the office in case she tried going out one of the windows. He watched the feed. Any second now she would open the door to the house.
She waited a few seconds until her eyes adjusted again and then moved across the apartment. Leo spent some time last night drinking with the groundskeeper. He’d managed to get the man drunk enough to find out all sort of things, like the apartment door wasn’t alarmed, but she checked for a security panel anyway. There was none. She opened the door leading to the garage and went down the stairs to the small office area below. There she turned right and walked over to the door leading to the vehicle area. She took a breath. Everything had gone according to plan so far. Almost there…
She reached into the backpack and took out the power line finder and ran it along the wall beside the security key pad. It flashed and then went solid when it hit the power line for the security sensor. No need to deal with the key pad when she could disable the sensor.
She took off her black Mary-Jane shoe and gave the wall a mighty whack, then quickly slid the shoe back on. Not the best shoes for a little B&E work but they matched her valet outfit and made a hell of a hammer. She took out her pen light. Flicking it on, she cleared out the hole, giving her a good view of the line. She got out her alligator clip and wire strippers. After stripping the sensor wires, she clipped them together to keep the circuit from breaking. She put all the tools back into her backpack and then reached out and opened the door. The keypad still showed the door as closed.
This was almost too easy.
“Where is she?” Mitch asked under his breath. He stared intently at the screen.
Jake leaned over the dining room table and stared at the screens as well. “This is taking too long.”
“I agree. Gunnar, what’s going on?”
“Not sure, boss. I’m still showing all doors closed. She’s got to be either in the apartment or in the office at the bottom of the stairs.”
“Do you think she stopped to search that office?” Jake asked.
Mitch’s gut rolled. Everything had just turned to shit. He knew it in his bones. “Gunnar, are you sure no door has opened?”
“Yes, sir. All lights showing red.”
“She hasn’t come out again either,” Dan said.
“Copy that, Dan.” Mitch frowned. “Something is wrong.” He stepped back from the table and started out of the room. “Jake, stay here and give me feedback on what you see.” He walked out into the hallway but turned away from Drake’s office. Instead, he left the house from the door by the pool and made his way through the crowd toward the garage.
“Maybe she got spooked and went back out the way she came in?” Gunnar’s voice in his earbud echoed his thoughts.
“Jake,” he asked “anything on the cameras?”
“Nothing. No joy.”
She grinned as she walked into the garage. Using the penlight, she took a quick look at her watch. Four minutes and twenty-three seconds had passed. She needed to hustle. She jogged to the last bay and flashed the penlight over the car.
She was a beauty, no doubt. Not very many of these in the world. The Ford GT shone in the beam of the penlight. Frozen White. That was the color Diana had picked and Alex had to agree with the choice. The car looked awesome. A boost of adrenalin hit her veins as she ran her hand over the roof in a loving manner.
She approached the door and tried the handle. It clicked, and the door opened. Her breath caught. No way could she be this lucky. She’d thought she was going to have to break in and risk triggering the car alarm. Fear hammered in her chest. She could hear her heartbeat in her ears. Was this some kind of setup? She had visions of the cops waiting for her the moment the garage door went up.
She moved over to take a quick peek out of the window in the garage door. No one was out there, which gave her a modicum of comfort. Finish this. You’re almost there. She went back and slid into the seat, got out the OBD2 and the key and set about creating a cloned key for the car. It was done within moments.
Next up was the scariest part. The getaway. She took a deep breath and then started the car. It was a huge garage, and she had tons of time before carbon monoxide would fill the massive area, but she still didn’t want to be in an enclosed space with a running car for any longer than necessary. She got out of the car and ran to the door. Taking a huge, heartening breath, she hit the button. As the garage door rolled up silently, she sprinted back to the car and threw herself in.
“We have movement. Garage door going up bay four. She’s stealing the Ford!” Dan yelled.
Drake’s voice roared in his earbud. “The prototype is in the car! Don’t let her get away!”
“What?” Dan bellowed.
“Fuck!” Mitch took off at a dead run, weaving his way through the trees. Who the hell had given Drake an earbud? Not once did it ever cross his mind she was here to steal a car. He’d been so sure she was mixed up with Tolliver. His only hope to cut her off was to reach the driveway before she passed him. He pushed himself to run faster than he ever had before. He had to get to her before she got out. His whole world depended on it.
The garage door had barely cleared the roof of the car when she shot out from under it. Alex turned right, gave the beast more gas, and the car rocketed ahead.
The driveway curved at the end, so she couldn’t yet see the gate. She could only pray Leo had done his part to ensure it was open. But a man came running out of the trees on her left. She swerved and fishtailed on the grass. As she brought the car back onto the drive, the asphalt behind her blew sky-high. The fireball was immense. The car rocked and slid. The boom was deafening. She looked in her rearview mirror but all she saw was smoke and bits of debris.
She caught a flash of black out of the corner of her eye. Mitch. She’d know him anywhere. He was moving to intercept her. Their eyes locked. A piece of debris landed on her left, ripping her gaze from him. She pushed the gas pedal to the floor. The car growled and took off with a jolt. Mitch was a blur when she blew past him. She came around the curve just as the gates were starting to close. She kept going and squeezed through. She hit the brakes, spun the car, and shot off down the road.
Mitch stood there stunned for an instant. Then he took off running toward the explosion, his legs and arms pumping for all he was worth. “Report!” he barked.
“Explosion in the driveway. Can’t tell what’s going on.” Jake’s voice boomed through the earbud.
“The guests are all by the pool area. All good here,” one of his team responded.
“We have Drake. Repeat—Drake is safe,” Gunnar’s voice came over the comm.
“Report in!” Mitch demanded as he came up to the hole where the driveway used to be. All his guys registered they were okay except for one. “Anyone have a visua
l on Dan?” A series of negative retorts came in rapid succession. “Shit.” Mitch could feel it in his gut. This was bad. Much worse than Alex getting away. Dan was down. He had a man down on his watch, the worst possible outcome ever. He heard a groan. Turning toward the tree line, he saw Dan. “Call nine-one-one. Dan is down! Repeat—Dan is down!
Chapter Twenty-One
“Holy shit, Leo! I mean, what the hell?” Alex screamed into the phone as she flew down the road.
“Thank God, you’re okay! I thought they got you or something. What happened?”
“I was on my way out when something exploded behind me. I have no idea what happened.” She could hear sirens advancing. She slowed the car to a more normal speed and flicked her headlights on. Seconds later, several fire engines rounded the curve ahead of her and screamed by.
“What’s going on?” Leo demanded.
“Fire engines, but the cops can’t be far behind. I’m a minute out.” She rang off. Her heart was pounding out of her chest. What the hell had happened? One minute she was driving, and the next, the world had exploded behind her. A picture of Mitch running to the edge of the drive flashed before her eyes. She fumbled with the turn signal as she turned into the Sterling’s driveway. Her hands were shaking.
This one was shorter than Drake’s, and the house was immediately visible. She pulled over to the garage where the door to the third bay rose slowly. She pulled forward and then reversed into the bay. She turned the car off and took a second to get her bearings. She needed to stop her hands from shaking. She flexed her fingers. She didn’t need to wipe anything down because she still wore her gloves. She let out a deep breath and grabbed her backpack.
Her clothes and tools were all over the passenger seat and the floor. They must have fallen out when she fishtailed around the driveway. She hastily leaned over and pushed everything back into the bag, but the strap of the backpack got stuck under the passenger seat. She cursed loudly and then scooted out of the car.
Alex went around to the passenger side and pulled open the door. She unhooked the strap from the bottom of the passenger seat. She put her hand under the seat and felt around to be sure she hadn’t left anything behind. Her fingers closed on what felt like a tube of some kind. Great, she’d almost left her lip balm behind.
Her phone buzzed in her pocket, surprising her so she whacked her head on the dash. “Shit.” She grabbed the tube and put it in her bag while she glanced at her cell phone screen. Leo was trying to rush her. His text was wasted. She was already going as fast as she could.
She stood up and then quietly closed the car door after making sure she left the key on the dash. She was sure there was damage to the car, but there was nothing she could do about it.
Going over to the side door of the garage, she let herself out. As promised, the lights were off. She slid through the darkness down the drive and out through the gate. About a quarter mile down on the left, Leo was waiting. She double-timed it to the car and hopped in.
“Please tell me you have a clue what happened back there?” she said as she buckled herself in.
Leo pulled away from the side of the road. “No. I was hoping you could tell me. Is there any possibility you could have done anything to set off that explosion?”
“I’ve gone over it again and again, and there is no way I did anything that would cause anything to explode. I was just driving down the driveway.” She tried to take a breath and clam down again. “Could it be a gas pipe or something like that?” she asked.
Leo shot her a look. “Be one hell of a coincidence for a gas pipe to blow the exact moment you’re stealing the car. I don’t believe in coincidence, lass, and neither do you.”
“But Leo, who would want to blow the car up? Why would they blow it up?”
“I don’t know, but I’ve got a bad feeling in my gut.”
“Me, too.” She leaned back in her seat and closed her eyes for a second, but all she could see was the fireball and then Mitch’s face.
Leo merged onto the expressway. “We stick to the plan. I’ll drop you at LaGuardia Airport and then I’ll head to Newark Airport. We’ll give it a couple weeks to cool down, and then we’ll hook up again back in Europe.”
She was about to agree when a new thought hit her like a sledgehammer. “Oh, my God,” she blurted.
Leo whipped around to see her face and then went back to watching the road. “What? What’s wrong?”
“He knows my name, Leo, my real name.” It came out as a whisper. She couldn’t get her vocal chords to work.
“He knows your name,” Leo repeated. She could tell by his tone that he was stunned. “The security guy, that’s who you mean, right? Mitch Callahan. He knows your real name?”
She ran her hands over her face. “Yes.”
“When were you going to tell me this?” Leo’s face turned gray before her eyes.
“I...” She paused and then decided she might as well tell him the truth, “I wasn’t going to if things went off without a hitch. It wouldn’t have mattered. But now...”
“I see.” Leo was livid. His knuckles had turned white on the steering wheel.
“I know I should have told you. I just...didn’t think...”
Leo swallowed hard. “No, you certainly didn’t.” He avoided looking at her.
She wanted to say something, anything, to make it better, but there was nothing to say. She stayed silent. She had put Leo in danger for her own ego. She should have waited like Leo wanted, stole the car back once Drake was gone. It would have been safer for both of them.
But after yesterday, she’d been humiliated and wanted revenge. Whatever caused the explosion, it was sure to blow back on her. Leo was going to be collateral damage, and it was all her fault. Some revenge.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Jake looked up from the screen as Mitch entered the boardroom and barked, “Anything?”
He shook his head. “No word yet on Dan.”
“That asshole Drake won’t talk to me yet. He’s doing “damage control” with all his high society guests.” Mitch slammed the table with his hand. “What the fuck was he thinking putting the prototype in the car?”
Jake just shook his head. Mitch drew in enough oxygen to fill his lungs to the max and then let it out slowly. He needed to be in control. As much as he wanted to kill his client, anger wasn’t going to solve this problem.
“How about the guests? Everyone is okay?”
“A few older ladies seemed to have a few moments of heart palpitations but that’s about it. We got the names and contact information for everyone. We should be good that way. There was a slight bit of damage on a few of the guests’ cars but Drake has already promised to have it all fixed.”
“Good,” Mitch said as he walked around the table and sat down next to Jake in front of the security monitors. He reached back and grabbed a couple of bottles of water from the mini fridge. He dropped one on the table in front of Jake and then opened his own before downing half the bottle in one swig.
“I talked to the fire chief and the police chief. Nothing more to be learned from them tonight. Maybe once they get their reports back on the bomb, but I don’t think it’s going to yield any major surprise. I looked at the remnants of the IED, and I think you’re right. It was made to go off when she went down the driveway.”
Jake nodded but continued to study the screens in front of him.
“What about this?” Mitch asked as he pointed at the screens.
“I’ve watched everything from yesterday at about five p.m. onward. She didn’t get anywhere near the area where the bomb went off. I’ve fast forwarded through it a couple of times just to be sure. I mean, I guess you could watch it in real time just to be absolutely certain. I’m ninety-nine-point-nine percent sure. Even when she was parking cars, she wasn’t in that area.”
“That’s what I thought. I didn’t figure she planted it. There’s got to be more going on here.” Mitch shook his head slightly as he leaned back in his chai
r.
“Whaddya mean?”
“Alex isn’t on film planting the bomb. The spot where the IED was hidden was out of any camera range, but she would’ve had to pass by one of the cameras to get there. And why set off an IED? She was already clear of the garage and going down the driveway.”
“A distraction maybe or to slow down anyone who was chasing her?” Jake suggested.
“Maybe.” He wasn’t convinced. He’d seen the expression on her face when the explosion happened. She’d been as shocked as he was. He was sure of it. “It seems like overkill, doesn’t it? She was stealing the car. She didn’t need a distraction. She already had us fooled.” And that still rankled him in all kinds of ways. It was a huge blow to his ego. He’d thought he was so smart, but she had him fooled.
“Why did she steal the car? Did she know the prototype was in it?” Jake asked. “It’s pretty damn easy to track down a stolen Ford GT. There just aren’t that many out there. Hell, you couldn’t get one today if you tried. Seems odd.”
“I agree,” Mitch said as he stood up, “but I’m pretty sure Drake knows, and he’d better be in a sharing mood because I am fucking done waiting. Check the cameras again for anyone disappearing into the area where the IED was planted. That includes our guys. I want to know how we, how I could have missed this.”
He stalked out of the room and went across the hall to Drake’s office. Drake was on the phone and sent Mitch a dismissive look, but Mitch refused to leave. He stood squarely in front of Drake’s desk and waited for him to get off the phone. Drake got the message and wound up his call.
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