Game On (The Bod Squad Series Book 1) (11 page)

‡‡‡

SUSANNAH HAD JUST
finished telling her mother the full story, eating ten peanut butter brownies in the process. She had concealed the details about FTP; it was the professional thing to do, since she’d signed a nondisclosure agreement. She did, however, tell her mother that she was not a secretary, but an undercover operative, that her cover had been blown and her reputation smeared, that she certainly was
not
a whore, or a call girl, and that, yes, a man had been involved. At this, Janice let out a low sigh.

“Well, of course a man is involved. There’s really no other reason for a girl to waste so much good mascara.”

“Oh, Mom, he played me for a fool,” Susannah moaned.

“Well, sweetheart, it sounds like you played him right back.”

There was silence for a moment, the sound of the wind through the trees, the fading sunlight creating long shadows on the front lawn. Then Susannah spoke. “I just—I felt something with him I’ve never felt with anyone else, and it . . .” Her voice broke off.

“What, sweetheart?”

“Well, it made me believe that true love was possible.”

Janice sighed again and looked her daughter in the eye. “Honey, anything is possible, truly. But love? Love is tricky. It’s so rare to find the right thing, and if you think, I mean, if you truly believe this may be right, well . . .”

“Well what, Mom?”

“Well, then you need to go get him, sweetheart. Get him or
for
get him. That’s what I always say.” She went on. “And if you can’t forget him, then you need to see if there’s anything else worth looking at.”

“But, Mom,” Susannah cautioned, “he blew my cover.”

“Well, you don’t know that for sure, not yet. Not in the way you think. I think it’s always important to look at both sides of things.”

“Both sides of
what
? What could be worse than blowing someone’s cover? Or at the very least calling someone a whore? I mean, it’s my livelihood.
It’s my whole life
. And to top it off, he called me a joke!”

“Well, you’re no joke, sweetheart, everyone knows that. You can’t actually harm someone unless they are what you say, and honey, you are as real as they get. I just think there’s more to the story than we know. And—” She was interrupted by Susannah’s cell phone playing a jazz riff. “What on earth is that?”

“Sorry, Mom, it’s AJ, probably calling to see how I am. Let me run upstairs and get this, okay?”

“Sure, send her my love,” Janice said as Susannah made her way up the stairs to her room. She watched her daughter with a wistful expression, wishing she could help her and knowing that all she could do was listen and bake. She smiled as she thought of Susannah’s father, knowing how proud he would be of his little girl, and went to make another batch of brownies.

‡‡‡

SUSANNAH WALKED UP
the long carpeted staircase to her childhood room. It had remained unchanged from high school and still bore the markings of a different era. There was a four-poster twin bed with a patchwork quilt, and flowered wallpaper on the walls. The flowers were abstract, and Susannah had always imagined faces hiding in the paint splatters, faces she’d come to know as old friends. The room had an orange shag carpet she had spent her childhood upon and large windows decorated with flowing curtains that had made her feel like a princess. Shelves lined the walls, and upon them were old awards for horseback riding and soccer as well as childhood trinkets: an old Rubik’s cube, a sculpted horse, her many and varied failed attempts at jewelry making. There was a pencil drawing of Susannah as a teen framed next to the shelves, and below it the phrase “Someone Prove Me Wrong.” It was her catchphrase in high school, and AJ, who had an excellent hand, had drawn the print. Susannah’s stuffed animal collection, relegated to a corner of the room, still made her smile, and she grabbed a particularly large giraffe named Gus as she sat down on the twin bed to answer the phone. “Fingers?”

“Legs, honey, have I got some news for you,” she said, and began to tell Susannah what she had discovered. Susannah listened, rapt, as AJ told her all she had learned about Chas in the past few hours. She ended with, “Here’s the point, honey—he’s been hunting his father’s killer all these years. That’s what this is all about. I don’t know to what extent he can be exonerated of these crimes, because he was instrumental in certain ones, but most of them were faked. It’s almost as if he was trying to cover the fact that he
wasn’t
really involved. Amazing, right? He made it look like he was a part of something he wasn’t. Understand?”

“Not really,” Susannah said, “but I get the drift.”

“So you see,” AJ said triumphantly, “he’s been honest with you, for the most part, all along. It’s really like a cover within a cover within a cover. He’s living life like one of those Russian dolls, where each layer is another lie. But at the center? Him hunting his father’s killer. Who is one of these guys he’s been palling around with in France for sure.”

Susannah blew out a long breath. “So what do I do with any of this?”

“Well, I’m not sure. I just wonder about something. The main thing missing here is who did it, right? Who killed his father, who’s the head of the operation, who’s he really after? I mean, we know he said something about an Italian, but that hardly narrows it down. How do we find that out?”

“Search me. I can’t do much of anything with a blown cover.”

“Well, it ain’t been blown yet. Meaning, yes, your pretty face is on the front of the paper with the word ‘whore’ all over it, but who cares? It actually doesn’t break your cover, it kinda adds to it. Frankly, I’m jealous. And it ain’t over till the fat lady sings.”

“Meaning?” Susannah asked.

“Look, sweetheart, I’m only seeing a bunch of trashy local rags calling you a sex machine. We know these guys know who you really are, so you can’t be anywhere near ’em till we take ’em down. Past that, I think it’s time to figure out how you can still do what you love and be with who you love. And patch together whatever’s gone wrong. Right?”

“Now, the L-word seems a little premature, Fingers—”

“Hang on a sec.” Susannah could hear AJ typing furiously at a keyboard, and a few moments went by in silence. “What do you think his father meant when he said all that stuff about the weather? The bride and the weather? The bride and the wind? What the fuck did he say?”

Suddenly, Susannah sat up like a lightning bolt. “Oh SHIT! Holy shit, Fingers, you hit it right on! His father was making a reference to a print that’s hanging in Chas’s office, a Kokoschka painting called
Bride of the Wind
. He wanted Chas to figure it out. But why? Why on earth would he do that?”

“You tell me, sweetcheeks.”

“Wait a minute—what about this?” she asked, her voice rising in excitement. “Something must be hidden in the office!”

“Oh, yes, yes, yes!” AJ said. “When you get excited about a case it just warms the cockles of my cold, cold heart. How soon can you get to New York?”

“What?”

“Do you want to find some way of doing the work you love, honey, or not? Do you want to patch your reputation back together, or not? Do you want your man back, or not? Don’t you think there’s actually a possibility that this could be The One, and don’t you think you deserve the chance to find out? Get on a plane, train, or automobile, get to New York, get the fucking hidden treasure, and save the day. It’s what you want, right?”

“Right, but, I can’t just break into Chas’s town house. And what if he’s home?”

“Oh, sweetie pie, you really don’t know me at all, do you?” AJ cackled.

“Your meaning, Oh mysterious one?”

“Chas just got on a plane to New York. You have an entire evening until he gets home. I have the codes to all his security systems, and interior surveillance of his home, car, and cell. You just put me in your ear, and I’ll get you in.”

There was a pause. Then Susannah smiled. “Oh, Fingers, I do love you. And I never want to know how you know all that. Gimme half an hour, and I’ll be on headset.”

“I’ll be waiting with bated breath, Sugar Britches,” she said. Then she disconnected the call.

Susannah sat on her bed for a minute, trying to catch her breath. Looking skyward she said, “Dad? Do you think I should go back to New York and try to figure this out? I’m confused. If you have any thoughts, I need a sign. Scratch that. I need a
really big
sign.”

She waited for a moment. Then she muttered, “Well, of course. I’m being ridiculous. I have to learn to make my own decisions.”

And with that, she grabbed AJ’s drawing off the wall, took it out of the frame, and tucked it in her pocket. “ ‘Someone Prove Me Wrong’ indeed,” she said with a smile.

‡‡‡

SUSANNAH’S HEART WAS BEATING
a mile a minute as she ran down the stairs and directly into her mother, who had been listening, it seemed, from below. “Sorry, Mom! Gotta run. I’ve got important business to take care of, and—”

“Yes, Susie, I heard. Anything I can do to help?”

“No, Mom. I’ve just got to hightail it back to New York—I’ve got to get on the next flight out,” she said breathlessly.

“Can I drive you to the airport?” Janice asked.

“Oh, I don’t know. It’s no big deal, really, just—”

“Sweetheart,” Janice said with a wan smile, “did you really think your father was a salesman? And that he traveled for business last minute to sell
life insurance
? Really? I thought you were smarter than that.”

Susannah’s eyes widened. “Wait, Mom, you mean—”

“I mean that I’ve been dealing with this my whole life, it seems. Secrecy is in your blood, and justice pumps it through your veins. I know the quickest route to any airport, train station, rental hub, or private helicopter service you can name.” She smiled wider. “And my car is faster than yours. Come on, sweetheart. Grab a few brownies for the road. You’re gonna need ’em.”

10

SUSANNAH ARRIVED AT
Chas’s town house a little before ten p.m. She was wearing all black and had a backpack and an earpiece, nothing more. She was in a hip-hugging pair of spandex pants, a skintight tank she’d gotten at a Tribute to Metallica concert, and new boots that were all shiny patent leather and silver buckles. She felt exciting and sexy like Catwoman or a Bond girl—but she also still felt like a bit of a clown.

She didn’t have any of FTP’s fancy in-ear surveillance on hand since she’d been fired, so she was forced to use her Bluetooth headset. The minute she got out of the cab she dialed AJ, who picked up on the first ring.

“Well, I dig the Catwoman getup,” she said upon answering.

“First of all, I love that you can see me, and secondly, it was all I could think of last minute.”

“Are those boots new? HOT.”

“I got them on Zappos,” Susannah said proudly.

“Well, Sugar Britches, you know how I love to talk shoes, but we’ve got a job to do.” Susannah heard keys clicking, and the faint sound of jazz. “Okay, so you’re actually going to go to the alley, it’s to your right when you’re facing the town house, two stoops down . . . there you go. Now that you’re at the entrance, turn left. Excellent.”

Susannah found herself in a New York City alley, which looked, for the most part, like every scene she’d ever seen on SVU where someone winds up dead. “Seriously, Fingers? This is pretty—”

“Yeah, yeah, I know. Don’t worry. No one’s around. Now walk down about halfway, and there should be a door to your left. Down the stairs, past the graffiti that says ‘Nark Loves Potato,’ past the trash. Black door, no markings, old padlock.”

“Right, got it. The one that looks like it has dead bodies hanging behind it?”

“That’s the one. You got your gun?”

“Always. It’s the smartest thing I can think of to keep between my legs.”

AJ let out a laugh that sounded like a foghorn. “Right on, sister. Well, grab it, and shoot the lock off.”

“What? Isn’t that going to—”

“Honestly, honey, just shut up and trust me.”

“Well, all right, but it doesn’t seem like the best idea.” Susannah took aim at the lock, shot it off, and the door popped open. There was a cacophonous alarm that sounded. “Fuck, AJ!”

“I know, sweetie, I know. But we have thirty whole seconds. Look to your right. There’s a clock in the shape of a rooster. Behind it, there’s an alarm keypad. Type in these numbers: 55378008.”

Susannah did so, and the alarm immediately stopped. “See? I told you to trust me,” AJ said. “By the way, do you know what those numbers are?”

“No,” Susannah said, “should I?”

“It was something we all did as kids. If you type that series of numbers on a calculator and turn it upside down, it spells ‘BOOBLESS.’ We all thought it was riotously funny . . . .” She trailed off. “Didn’t you do that?”

“No,” Susannah said. “That’s ridiculous. I mean, really?”

“My guess is that it was his favorite password when he was a kid. There are different codes on different doors, and this entrance hasn’t been functional for years, though he probably still changes the code with some regularity. Anyway, make your way upstairs. It’s time to find this
Bride of the Wind
and hear what she has to tell us.”

“Roger that,” Susannah said, and made her way to the nearest staircase. She was in what appeared to be servants’ quarters, or at least they must have been at one time, and she had to take a serpentine route to find her way back to the main entrance and up the two marble staircases to the office. She entered Chas’s inner sanctum, and it was just as she remembered it: there was the globe, the scotch, the dark wood. And yes, on the opposite side of the room, the credenza with the painting above it. “Bingo!” Susannah said. “I’m gonna search the room and report back.”

“Whoa whoa whoa, sweetie pie,” said AJ, sounding excited. “First things first. Check behind the painting. Any safe? Or on the back of the painting itself?”

Susannah lifted the print off the wall and put it facedown. There was nothing behind it. Grabbing a Swiss Army knife from her bag engraved with the word “Legs” she sliced the back of the frame open, hoping for a discovery of some kind, but it, too, revealed nothing.

“Right,” said AJ. “Step two. Credenza. Describe it to me. Sadly, there’s no surveillance in this room. And you know how pissed off that makes me.”

“Okay, well, there’s a series of drawers.”

“Great. Open all of them and look inside.”

Susannah opened each drawer in turn. When that yielded nothing, AJ said, “I need you to look for anything around the credenza that’s out of the ordinary.”

“I already have. But there’re a few other things here. Hang on a sec.” Susannah searched through the items, most of which were liquor related, and found a handful of things that belonged in a junk drawer. “Nope. Nothin’ doin’.”

She could hear AJ furiously typing away, and the music in the background suddenly got louder. She thought she also heard the sound of a match being lit. Finally, after some time, AJ exhaled loudly. “Check the back of every drawer. Feel around. See if there’s a hidden compartment.”

“Honestly, Fingers, I know how to search a room. Do I really have to wait for your go on all this?”

“Yes. I want to be in control
of everything
. Sorry. Of course you know how to do this, it’s your job. I just got a little overexcited is all. Ransack and report back.”

“Roger that,” Susannah said with a smile.

She began to explore every nook and cranny, using the skills she had honed during years of performing searches. She had to remove all the liquor bottles and feel around the edges. Then she removed a small flashlight from her backpack and shed light on the only unexplored part of the credenza, which was farthest from her reach. The beautiful antique backing was loose, and, with a bit of work from her handy Swiss Army knife, it easily came off, revealing what appeared to be a small rusted brass safe tucked within the wooden frame. “Holy guacamole, Fingers. You’ve done it this time. It’s like I just found the safe at the end of the rainbow. Now how do I get in it?”

“What does the lock look like? Combination? Keyhole?”

“Hmmm . . .” Susannah mused. “Neither. Looks like—well, like something out of
Indiana Jones
. Or
Lord of the Rings
.”

“Explain.”

“Well, there’s beautiful handiwork, and Gaelic lettering, and a sort of missing piece, like a key that goes on the surface. It looks like that door in
Game of Thrones
—did you see the episode where Daenerys is being wooed by one of the statesmen of the weird gated community they all come across, and he boasts of having an entire safe of treasure, but when they get there—”

“Enough, honey, I got it. For fuck’s sake! Now we need a fucking artifact? I mean, this guy—”

“I know,” Susannah agreed. “Tell me about it.”

“I mean, he’s almost TOO good. Really. All right, gimme a minute.” Once again, Susannah heard furiously ticking keys and the music got still louder. She heard AJ mumbling as she typed but could only make out certain words like “fuck” and “holy grail” and “men.” As the time lengthened, Susannah began to get nervous. She was anxious about when Chas would be coming home, and if anyone else would be coming to check on the place, and if she should clean up, and if Chas had really ruined her life or not, and did he feel
anything
for her at all? Would she ever date again, would she ever like/love/lust again, would she ever wear a pretty dress and flirt and kiss anyone again? Would she grow old and die alone in a big cottage in the woods where trees grew through the house and she had seventeen cats?
Feral
cats, angry cats, a cacophony of loud, spraying, untrained cats, cats having kittens and playing with balls of yarn and eating off the dining room table? And newspapers from years past piled so high you couldn’t see over them? As she began to have an anxiety attack, she reached for a strand of hair to play with, but she had put her hair back in a ponytail, so she reached for her necklace, which was . . .

The Celtic family tree.

“Oh, fuck. Fingers? Fingers, turn the music down. I’ve got it. I think I’ve got it. I’m wearing it!”

“No,” AJ said. “No way. It’s not that fucking family tree? I thought that was all a big bunch of bullshit.”

“Well, let’s see.” She pulled it up over her head, and the silver tree fit perfectly on the lock face. She turned it, and it opened.

Inside the minuscule safe were a flash drive and a piece of paper. And on the piece of paper were four words. “The Italian: Heavenly Balls.”

‡‡‡

THE BOSS, JACKSON,
and Lisa Bee were sitting in a New York hotel room playing poker and wondering what their next move would be, both in the game and in the case. The Boss was nearly out of chips, Lisa Bee was holding on to a small pile, and Jackson had everything else. Jackson’s pile of chips was so large that his face could barely be seen over it. Normally, he would be grinning like the Cheshire cat; he did so love to whip Bossman’s ass at cards. But tonight, the mood was somber. They were trying to take their minds off the loss of Susannah, and their FBI contact Fritz’s threats, and the fact that a group of truly unsavory criminals were about to win this de facto war. They each felt like a failure in slightly different ways. The Boss felt like a failure as a boss. Lisa Bee felt like a failure as a friend. And Jackson felt like a failure as a man.

They were at the end of a hand, and the Boss’s eyes lit up for half a second. “Full house,” he said, smiling drily at Jackson. “FINALLY. At least I can keep my man card tonight.”

Jackson sighed and looked resigned. Fanning his cards on the table he said, “Four of a kind, Bossman. Hand the man card over. Sorry, old friend.”

There was a long, ugly silence. The Boss took his remaining chips and pushed them to the floor. Then he took a large swig of Jack Daniel’s and said, “Perfect. Looks like I can’t do anything right.”

Now it was Lisa Bee’s turn to sigh. “Okay, boys, I’ve had it. The truth of the matter is that none of us can do anything right. None of us saw this coming, none of us knew how to save her, none of us knew how to stop this from happening, and none of us know what to do next.”

“You’re right,” said the Boss. “There’s really only one thing we can do for Legs. We can find these guys, and we can take them down.”

“Better yet,” Lisa Bee said, “we can stop them before they have a chance to harm her further. She’s been called a whore and an international joke. We can’t stop that. But we can keep her safe. Can’t we?”

Jackson didn’t say anything. He had already solved the problem. No one messed with his people, especially his inner circle. He still had contacts from his time in Morocco, and some of them owed him big. He had ensured that Pierre, whoever he was, would never talk. Jackson’s oldest friend, Mahmoud, would find the scumbag. And when he found him, he would slit his throat.

“It’s taken care of,” Jackson finally said. “She’ll be fine. I say we worry about Chas Palmer. After all, it seems they can’t do anything without his say-so, right?”

“What do you mean, ‘it’s taken care of’?” Lisa Bee asked.

“I’ve got friends in low places,” Jackson replied. He liked it when he did something that made Lisa Bee curious. “That’s why Bossman hired me.”

“Yes,” said the Boss, “that and your uncanny ability to seduce every woman in the room while emasculating every man.”

“Well, he’s not seducing me,” Lisa Bee said.

“Oh, just you wait,” Jackson hummed, more excitement in his tone than he wished. “I haven’t even tried yet.”

“Enough. Really, ENOUGH!” Bossman growled. “It’s back to business, team. Jackson, keep it in your pants. Bee, get us hooked up. We’ve got all the intel we need. We’ve got the equipment and the intelligence to deal with the situation. So we know what it’s time for, right?”

“Enlighten us,” Jackson said grimly.

“Now we go get the bad guys.”