Hunted (2 page)

“It’s okay, I’ve got it!
Come on!
” Ted gestured wildly at her and then fled for the door. For a moment, he was afraid Sinead would insist on sacrificing herself to save her brother, but then he heard a
thud
and her footsteps behind him. A quick glance back told Ted that Sinead had shoved the security guard to the floor. The man pushed himself up surprisingly fast and barreled after them. Ted skidded on some loose papers, nearly crashing into one of the shelves. He threw his weight forward, steadying himself, but a large hand grabbed the hem of his polo shirt.

Ted’s instincts kicked in. He whirled around and brought the side of his hand slicing down through the air onto the security guard’s wrist. A loud yell of pain followed, and the man released Ted’s shirt. Sinead was already in the hall, and Ted threw himself after her, slamming the storage room door shut behind him. He pressed a key on the keypad to lock it, and then he and Sinead were running away down the hall.

“What good is that going to do?” Sinead snapped as they went, slowing to a quick walk so that the people in the hall didn’t stare. “He’ll be out as soon as he punches in the code.”

Ted held up his cell phone and smiled. “He’s not getting out anytime soon. I wrote a quick program that allowed my phone to change the code on that door. They’re going to have to break it down before the guard can get out of there.”

A grin split Sinead’s face in half. “You wrote an entire program in ten seconds? You really are a genius, little brother.”

Ted smirked back at her, and they headed down the hall to rejoin Ned. It was still early in the Clue hunt, but Ted was feeling pretty good about their chances.

A short distance behind Ted and Sinead Starling, a silent figure kept pace with them, listening carefully. The watcher was pleased with the Starlings’ performance so far. This was the first real test they’d faced in the Clue hunt, and Ted had done especially well. Of the three Starlings, he was definitely the most promising. The watcher had read about his many accomplishments and was especially interested in Ted’s latest project — a satellite scrambling device that could disrupt communications across the entire planet. The Vespers could use someone with skills like that.

The watcher was less sure about the other two Starlings. Unfortunately, she could see now that she couldn’t have just one triplet. They were too close to one another. If she wanted one, she’d have to attempt to recruit them all, and that could be risky. Unless, of course, there was a way to eliminate the other two Starlings from the picture.

Either way, Ted Starling had too much potential to ignore.

Jonah Wizard wasn’t enjoying the city of Caracas, Venezuela, even though the fifteen-year-old hip-hop megastar had been excited to visit South America. His TV show,
Who Wants to Be a Gangsta?
, had aired on eight different channels in the last year, and there were more sales of Jonah Wizard bobbleheads in Venezuela than in any other country. It was nothing like Egypt, where he’d spent days trying to track down Amy and Dan. Nobody there even seemed to recognize him, let alone listen to his music or watch his show. It was shocking how backward some places could be.

But worse than the lack of fans was the fact that Amy and Dan had managed to escape Egypt with another Clue. The hunt had only started a few weeks ago, and already it wasn’t going as well for Jonah as he’d thought it would. He might be a worldwide hip-hop sensation with fans on almost every continent, but none of that was going to help him win the Clue hunt. It was time to prove himself, no matter what the cost. And proving himself meant that no one could know he was in Venezuela. He couldn’t hold a surprise concert in Caracas. He couldn’t sign autographs for the fans. He couldn’t even let himself be seen, or he’d never be able to get close to the next Clue.

Jonah’s mother, head of the Janus branch of the Cahill family, had recently received information that pointed to a Clue hidden somewhere in Caracas. It was believed that the Venezuelan hero Simón Bolívar had been buried with it. A famous military leader, Bolívar led the country to independence from Spain in 1821 and his remains were now entombed in one of the country’s most famous landmarks, the National Pantheon. Jonah had managed to get this information from his mother, though she’d had no idea he’d actually been planning to use it. But with no new leads on where Amy and Dan or any of the other Clue-hunting teams were headed, Jonah had taken matters into his own hands.

Crouching low behind a bush, Jonah watched the entrance to the National Pantheon while listening hard for the sound of movement nearby. His contact still had five minutes to arrive, but Jonah was getting antsy. He wasn’t used to being alone. Usually he was surrounded by fans, or backup dancers, or at the very least, his father was nearby. And the tight black shirt and pants he wore were necessary for sneaking around unseen in the middle of the night, but they clung to his skin, completely unlike the baggy T-shirts and jeans he usually wore.
I hope none of my fans ever sees me like this
, Jonah thought.
It would ruin my street cred.

A rustling from a few feet away snapped him back to attention. Someone was coming. Jonah tensed but the newcomer said, rather stiffly, “I want to be a gangsta.” It was the correct code phrase, but Jonah didn’t like the man’s lack of enthusiasm. Most Janus agents would have been thrilled to work with the most famous Cahill on the planet.

“ ’Sup?” Jonah said. “You got the equipment?”

The man dropped a large black duffel at Jonah’s feet in response. Jonah unzipped it and peered inside, inspecting the contents. He nodded. “Looks good.”

The man gave a curt nod and slunk back into the darkness. Once he was alone again, Jonah listened a moment, but the only sounds were a slight breeze and the rush of nearby traffic. Time to make his move.

From the duffel, Jonah pulled out the first piece of equipment — a grappling hook with a long line of cable attached to it. The hook’s launcher had a very sophisticated sight, allowing Jonah to aim the grappling hook precisely where he needed it to go. He lifted it carefully into the air, peering into the viewer. The sight was also equipped with an anemometer, a device used to measure the wind’s speed and direction. Jonah frowned. He was a pretty good shot, but the wind was unpredictable tonight. Even with this launcher, he could easily miss the target if his aim wasn’t dead-on.

Before Bolívar was buried there, the Pantheon had been a church. It was a pale structure, covered with intricate blue-gray ornamentation around the windows. The Pantheon had three towers — two shorter ones on either side and one in the center that stretched high above the the rest of the building. Jonah’s target was a small window on the tallest tower. As the final resting place of some of the most important figures in Venezuela’s history, the Pantheon was full of guards patrolling the grounds at night — he couldn’t exactly walk through the front door. But he only had one shot at getting the grappling hook secured to the window. If he missed, it would fall to the ground and be seen by the nearest patrol. His cover would be blown and he’d have to flee before Venezuela’s favorite hip-hop star was caught trying to break into a national monument.

Jonah removed a rock-climbing harness from his bag and put it on, placing the straps around his body and checking to be sure that all the buckles were secure. Then he moved around to the side of the bush, holding a pair of night-vision binoculars to his eyes and surveying the grounds of the Pantheon.

Two guards were disappearing around the side of the former church. Jonah stood, planted his feet firmly in the ground, and aimed. The wind was gusting strongly now; the moment Jonah locked on to his target, the wind changed and he had to adjust to compensate. He couldn’t seem to get a good fix on the window. But the guards would be reappearing soon. It was now or never.

Jonah adjusted his aim once more, then fired the grappling hook into the night air. Just then, the two guards reappeared on the far side of the Pantheon. The grappling hook made a slight whistling as it arced toward the Pantheon’s window, and Jonah held his breath.

The hook went straight through the window and caught snugly inside with a soft
thunk.
Jonah clenched his teeth, waiting to see if either guard had noticed the sound. But they continued on their patrol without looking up. Jonah let the air out of his lungs.

He waited until they were out of sight again before pulling the grappling hook’s cable taut and securing it to a nearby tree. Jonah clipped the carabiner on his harness to the cable and slung the duffel bag across his body. He was ready.

He reached up and began pulling himself hand over hand up the cable. Soon, his feet left the ground and his body hung suspended in the air from the harness. He wore thick protective gloves with a grippy coating that allowed him to hold on to the cable without slipping, but even so, Jonah was having a hard time pulling himself backward. He hung upside down from the line like a sloth, and he moved about as fast.

His biceps and back muscles started to burn and he wished he’d spent more time in the gym. His climbing harness would keep him from dropping straight to the ground, but it wouldn’t stop him from sliding back down the length of cable. And the noise of the carabiner screeching against the metal cable would be enough to wake Bolívar from the dead.

Minutes passed. Below him, Jonah heard the sound of the guards making another pass in front of the Pantheon. He worried they’d see him, but he didn’t dare stop. Better to get inside as quickly as possible, rather than be discovered hanging in midair, completely helpless.

And then a voice rang out through the air, shattering the quiet of the night.

“¡Hay un hombre en el cielo! ¡Mira! ¡Sube en el Panteón!”

“Oh, no,” Jonah muttered. His Spanish wasn’t quite as good as his French, but he knew enough to understand that he’d been seen.

Adrenaline charged through Jonah’s veins as he yanked himself toward the window, higher and higher. The guards had guns, and he didn’t want to find out if they were willing to use them.

He was almost there. Almost inside. Just a few more feet left . . .

And then he heard the unmistakable crack of a gun going off, and then another, and another. Jonah winced, expecting to feel the bullets plunge into his skin at any moment, but he didn’t stop moving. His hand brushed the side of the Pantheon, and he grasped the window ledge, rolling himself over so that he was balanced on top of the cable. It dug painfully into his body, but more shots rang out, and a bullet buried itself in the side of the Pantheon, half an inch from Jonah’s face. He let go of the cable, making a wild grab for the window with his other hand, and tried to haul himself inside. He barely fit and the duffel bag slung across his back slowed him down, keeping Jonah stuck in the frame. But with the last of his strength, Jonah managed to shove himself through the window, and he landed with a hard
thump
on the floor of the tower.

He tried to get up, but found himself unable to move more than an inch forward. A surge of panic washed through him like ice water before he realized that he was still clipped to the grappling hook’s cable. He reached to unclip himself, but the cable jumped to the side, away from his grip. And then it jerked upward, causing the grappling hook to come loose. Still attached to the cable, Jonah was pulled inexorably toward the window.

Someone on the ground must have grabbed the cable and was trying to drag Jonah back outside. Without the grappling hook in place, he’d fall straight to the ground, fifteen stories below.

Jonah struggled to grab the carabiner, planting his heels against the wall of the Pantheon to keep himself steady. The thick gloves on his hands made it impossible to unfasten the clip, and another jerk on the cable nearly pulled him straight through the window. But the duffel bag on his back kept Jonah from being pulled outside and bought him the time he needed to detach himself from the cable.