The Agent's Daughter (26 page)

“
No problem, sis. I will
call you if I hear anything. Bye.”

Angela hung up the phone and let out a deep
breath, unsure what to do next.

“
You know,” Alex said, “I
think you’re right that my dad, Melina and her dad being missing
are somehow related. I can’t get past that they both happened in
the same elevator.”

“
Yes,” Angela said,
sitting down on the couch. “And they are both unable to be reached
by phone. An FCAN would explain why Evan didn’t respond to the
emergency operator. However, for the two of their situations to be
related it would seem as if they were-”

“
Kidnapped,” Alex
said.

“
Precisely,” Angela said.
“But the agency has looked into the elevator, and the police won’t
do anything until tomorrow.”

“
If they were kidnapped,
tomorrow may be too late,” Alex said.

“
What can we do?” Angela
asked.

They both sat in silence on the couch,
trying to think what their next move should be. Finally, Alex sat
up and turned to Angela.

“
I remember my dad telling
me that the watches that agents wear have a GPS tracking feature on
them. Doesn’t Melina’s dad have one of those watches?” Alex
asked.

Angela’s face lit up. “Yes, yes he does! The
problem we have is that since I do not work as an agent anymore, I
don’t have access to the specialized agency equipment I would need
to track him down. It’s locked up in a secure room at the
headquarters downtown.”

“
Oh,” Alex said. “Do they
keep that equipment anywhere else?”

Angela looked over at Alex and smiled. “Why,
yes. As a matter of fact, they do. ”

…………………………
.

Melina, her dad, and David had spent an hour
scouring every inch of the room looking for anything that they
could use as a weapon. While the room was rich in shelves and
drawers, they had found nothing beyond the old paint cans that Evan
had found earlier and the extension cord that Melina had found. The
room was empty.

Evan picked up the extension cord and took
it over to one of the metal shelf units. Grabbing the cord near the
end, he rubbed it on the exposed metal of one of the sides of the
shelf until the end of the extension cord sheared off. Then he
rubbed the end of the cord on the cabinet until the bare metal of
the two wires inside was exposed. He carried the end of the cord
over to the door and wrapped one of the exposed wires around the
doorknob and the other one around one of the door hinges. This
would complete the circuit and give anyone that touched the
doorknob quite a shock. He walked over to the plug end of the cord,
picked it up, carried it over to a nearby outlet, and laid it down
on the floor.

They had already established a plan to try
to overpower whoever showed up at the door to the room, and they
all had a role. Melina would be in charge of plugging in the
extension cord. David would be behind the large shelf unit next to
the door, ready to tip it over on anyone that entered. Finally,
Evan would be positioned behind where the door opened, ready to try
his best to fight them, using the bullet deflection capabilities of
the watch as a shield and a paint can as a weapon. Now all they had
to do was wait for the sound of footsteps.

After he had finished setting up the
extension cord, Evan looked around the room. Melina was sitting on
the floor with her back against the far wall. She had her head in
her hands as she stared down at the floor. David was across the
room, pacing nervously in the area near the door. It appeared as
though he was muttering to himself as he paced. It had been a while
since anyone spoke.

Then it occurred to Evan what was going on.
Melina and David were unaccustomed to pressure of this magnitude.
They had never been in the position of having to fight their way
out of a room with people trying to kill them. Evan realized that
they were going to have to loosen up, or they were not going to be
very useful in the coming battle.

After a moment of thought, he walked over
toward David, waving his arm for David to join him.

“
You want to see something
funny?” Evan said in a low voice as he approached.

David walked up to Evan, leaned in and
whispered. “Okay. What?”

“
Watch this.”

Evan removed the watch from his wrist. He
pushed a series of buttons on the bezel, and then he held the watch
in front of his face. Cupping his other hand in front of the watch,
he talked into it as if it were a microphone.

He walked over to where Melina was sitting,
and pushed a button on the watch face. Then he set the watch on the
ground behind the empty paint can that was lying on the ground a
few feet away from Melina. After he had finished, he walked back to
David and stood next to him. The two of them stared at Melina.

Thirty seconds later, the room reverberated
with the sound of a loud voice.

Did someone here order a pepperoni
pizza?

Melina jumped to her feet and got into a
fighting stance, with her arms up ready to strike. She glared at
the empty paint can where the loud voice was coming from. From
behind her, she heard her dad and David laughing and only then
realized that they had played a trick on her. She reached down,
picked up the can, and saw the watch on the ground behind it. Still
holding the can, she walked toward the others with a look of anger
on her face.

“
Uh… Evan,” David said as
he backed up. “I don’t think that she thought that was
funny.”

Evan watched her as she approached, but he
held his ground. He had upset Melina in a way that he had not
anticipated.

“
What’s wrong, kiddo?” he
said as he put one hand on her shoulder. “This isn’t something that
I thought would bother you.”

“
It’s just … that I’m
scared. I do not know what to expect and then you bozos play a joke
on me. I’m sorry. I’m not in the mood for that.”

“
Scared, you say,” Evan
said, crossing his arms and smiling. “Tell me something. When you
heard that voice coming from behind that paint can, what was the
first thing that you did? Did you run to the other side of the room
to get away from it? Did you scream?”

“
Ummm,” Melina said as she
looked over at the wall and tried to remember.

Evan crouched into a fighting stance, a mean
look on his face. “You looked like this. You looked as if you were
going to pummel whatever was making that noise. That is not the
look of a scared person. That is the look of a person that is
unafraid.”

“
Well, umm,” she said,
still unconvinced.

Evan put his hands on both of Melina’s
shoulders. “I have another confession to make.”

“
You already told me about
you and Mom,” Melina said.

“
This is not about us, it
is about you,” Evan said. “Do you remember, earlier, me telling you
about the Stress Environment Simulator at the agency?”

“
The one from
take-your-daughter-to work day?” Melina asked.

“
That’s the one,” Evan
said. “When you were in fourth grade, you came to your first
daughter-at-work day, and they hooked you up to the simulator along
with all of the other daughters. But your test was different from
the others. You scored so well on the basic test that is given to
all of the daughters that they increased the stress level. And
increased it. And increased it some more. By the time that they
were finished, you were taking the same stress test that they use
to evaluate potential agents.”

“
So how did I do?” Melina
asked.

“
You scored better than I
did,” Evan said.

“
You became kind of a
legend around the agency,” David said. “Evan’s ten-year-old kid,
the one that dominated the simulator test.”

“
Of course, every year you
do a little better,” Evan said. “You may have noticed the crowd
that gathers when you start your test. It has to be seen to be
believed. The head of the agency asks me about you all of the time.
He thinks that you will ultimately make an excellent field agent. I
do too. That is why I enrolled you in krav maga classes. Those
classes are open only to agents.”

“
I don’t feel very
dominating now,” Melina said.

“
Look at me,” Evan said.
“The response that you just had to that watch cannot be taught or
learned. Either you have it or you don’t. And you have it. It is a
part of you. I am confident with you at my side. You will do what
needs to be done when the time comes.”

“
If it means anything, I
was pretty scared a moment ago when I saw you coming at us,” David
said, only half-joking.

Melina stepped back away from her dad and
stood up straight. She felt better. A calmness was starting to
settle over her, and she began to feel an increased sense of
confidence. She felt as though she could take on the world.

Evan could see that Melina was going to be
okay. He put his arm around her. “You know, earlier this week, I
used that recording feature on my watch to distract someone that
was holding a gun on me?”

Melina looked at him with keen interest.
“Someone was holding a gun on you? Can you tell me about it?”

Evan looked up and began talking. “I
remember it as if it were yesterday …”

“
Excuse me,” David said,
rolling his eyes and walking away. “I’ve already heard this
story.

…………………………
.

Travis’s bedroom door was closed, so Angela
knocked and then waited patiently in the hallway for him to answer.
Alex stood just behind her.

“
Yes?” Travis said as he
opened the door a crack and peered out. He sounded annoyed that he
had been interrupted from whatever it was he was doing. When Travis
spotted Alex, he opened the door a little more, and added an
additional greeting to Alex, “Dude, what’s up?”

“
I have a question for
you,” Angela said sternly, trying to get him to focus on her. “Is
there a room in the house that your mother used to spend a lot of
time in? Like for several hours with the door shut?”

It was a strange question, but Travis’ face
lit up as if she had asked him a question that he had always
wondered about.

“
Yeah,” he answered.
“Pretty much the only room in the house that Mom spent that much
time in was that small office downstairs. That’s what she called
it, but I wouldn’t call it an office. It’s just a spare bedroom
that has a small desk with a computer on it. It also has a few
recliner chairs and a large bookcase against the wall. She used to
spend hours on end in that room with the door shut. When I asked
Mom what she did in there, she said she sometimes just needed some
time alone to read.”

“
Could you show me this
room?” Angela said, touching his shoulder and ushering him toward
the hallway.

Travis knew something was up, but Angela
gave him a look that meant she did not have time for questions. He
started down the hallway, and Angela and Alex followed. He led them
down the stairs and into a small room just off the bottom of the
stairs. Travis was right. There was not much to the room. There was
a large bookcase that lined one entire wall and a few large,
comfortable chairs with a small table between them. A computer sat
on a tiny desk in the corner. What was a surprise to Angela was the
size of the room. It was smaller than a normal bedroom. And it did
not have any windows or a closet. Like it was a small study.

Angela paused to think. If she wanted any
more help from Travis, she was going to have to tell him about his
parents’ real lives. This was a momentous step that was always
handled by the parent of the child. And it could all be for naught.
But her gut told her that Evan, Melina, and David were in trouble.
Evan had told her earlier in the week that he and Laura had planned
to tell both the kids the previous summer, but he just could not
find a way to tell the kids by himself.

Angela turned to Travis. “Okay. I haven’t
much time, and there is no easy way to tell you, so I’m just going
to tell you.”

Travis leaned away from Angela and gave her
a confused look, unsure what she was trying to say. Angela paused,
now unsure how to tell him.

“
Dude, your folks are
spies,” Alex interjected, wanting to get to the point. “They work
for a super-secret organization called the Executive Reconnaissance
Agency.”

“
They work directly for
the President of the United States,” Angela said. “Your father is
an agent that travels the world infiltrating other countries to
gain intelligence and up until her accident, your mother worked in
the group that supplied him with weapons and gadgets.”

Travis stared at Angela, mouth wide
open.

She shrugged. “Your parents started working
at the agency before you and your sister were born. In fact, that’s
where they met.”

Travis thought for a moment and then burst
out laughing. “Okay, okay. You got me. Very funny. Did my dad and
sister put you up to this?”

Angela grimaced and sighed. “We are not
trying to play a joke on you.”

“
You guys know my dad,”
Travis said. “He’s a total geek. He writes software for a living. I
don’t think he’s ever been out of the country. And my mom totally
doesn’t even work.”

There was more silence as Angela and Alex
struggled to think of the words that would convince Travis that
what they were saying was true.

Then Angela got an idea. “Hold on a moment,”
she said.