Page 29 of The Eagle (Spy Girl 2)
I blink a few times, thinking about my own key. "I'm not sure, but I know."
"Let's wait until we are there to call," he suggests. "And I'm driving. How long has it been since you've slept?"
"About thirty-six hours, maybe. I think I napped a little on the fighter jet."
"Fighter jet?"
"We had to get from D.C. to Paris in under four hours to be there in time for The Priest's next hit."
"I don't know who the hell this Black X group is, but they have serious military pull to make that happen."
"Maybe they aren't a covert spy agency. Maybe they have ties to the military. Ari's father was an important general."
"There isn't such a thing."
"There could be. A form of special forces, maybe?"
Intrepid nods his head. "Nothing would surprise me at this point."
I get into the backseat with the boy. We pick up dinner and eat in it the car, then the boy lays his head on my lap, curls up into a little ball, and falls to sleep. I push his hair back off his forehead, running my fingers through it, as I lean my head against the window.
Five hours later, I wake up with a start when the car comes to a stop. A glance at the clock tells me it's nearly midnight.
"I tried calling the number on the key," Gallagher says. "It's not a working number, so I figured we'd just show up."
I wake Chauncey and tell him we're in Zurich.
"Excellent," he says, rubbing his eyes as I discreetly slip my own key out of my handbag.
"Are you ready to sign your name?"
He hops out of the car and leads us to the front of the sleek marble building with only a gold sign with the words Z Investments giving any indication that we are at a bank.
"I don't have to sign my name here, silly," he says, putting his index finger on a little glass circle under the placard.
The door clicks, and a man dressed in a suit greets us. "Do you have your key?" he asks in Swiss German.
Chauncey replies in the same language and then walks across the room. He comes to a door behind the reception desk and places his finger on another circle of glass, causing it to open.
I start to follow him, but the banker says to me in English, "The key holder must enter alone."
"I have one, too," I reply, speaking in his native tongue and causing Intrepid to narrow his eyes at me.
"Very well," the man says. "After the door closes, scan your fingerprint. I will take your companion to the exit lounge where he will await you."
I scan my fingerprint, go through the door, and find Chauncey already inserting his key into a box. I walk straight to the back wall and touch box number six twelve, then shake my head, looking at the key to determine which one is mine.
"Six twelve," my mom's voice says. "Your birthday." I close my eyes, concentrating, trying to hold onto the memory, trying to remember when I was here before, but the boy clanks his box on the table, and the memory is gone.
I watch as Chauncey pulls out a leather pouch, puts it in his backpack, and then returns the box. "Ready?" he asks.
"Wait for me, okay?" I mimic his actions and am removing the box from the wall when we hear gunfire.
"Shit." I stuff the metal container into the backpack, not bothering to look at its contents.
"Sounds like trouble out front. Do you have your gun?"
"I don't," I reply. "I left it in the car."
He reaches in his backpack, opens the leather pouch, and pulls out a Glock. "I'm not a very good shot yet. Are you? If you are truly a knight, you should be."
We hear shouting then more shots fired.
"There's a secret exit, Huntley. Only accessible by fingerprint." He points toward a door. "William will be waiting for us there. Go get him."
"You're kind of bossy," I say. "Definitely knight material."
I do as the kid says, but the door won't budge.
"I think some people might be after us."
"Then we'd better hurry." He runs to the back corner of the room with me hot on his tail.
There is one long blast from an automatic weapon and the shooting stops.
We hear a voice yell out, "Clear!"
"They're trying to blow the door to the vault," I yell. "Hurry, Chauncey!"
The boy presses his finger against the wall, causing a door to slide open. We enter the next room, the door slides shut, and we find ourselves in a soundproofed tunnel.
The tunnel is about one hundred feet long then comes to a dead end. The boy places both his palms against the wall and a screen lights up, showing us security feeds. This allows us to see the assault team, all dressed in black and carrying the same weapons as the men who came after The Priest. I want to believe that they are just robbers and we chose an unfortunate time to visit the bank, but I know better.
The question is, which one of us caused them to come?
Me or the boy?
I study the monitors more closely, searching for Gallagher. But I can't find him anywhere.
Please, don't let him be dead.
"I can't remember what to do next," Chauncey says. "Do you know?"
I lean my head against the wall in defeat. I have no idea how we're going to get out of here, but I need to stay positive for the boy, so I put my hands on the wall and push myself upright. "I don't know, but we'll figure it out."
Suddenly, a series of numbers flashes by.
Then my mother appears on the screen and speaks. "If you are seeing this message, Lee, you are in grave danger. This account includes a safe passage clause, but use your best judgment. Bankers can be bought."
The screen turns black and a wall to our right opens to reveal another passage.
"Is your mommy an angel, too?" the boy whispers.
"Stay behind me," I tell him, not answering the question as I hide the Glock behind my back and prepare for the worst.
Ari takes a private plane from Paris to Montrovia. Ellis is there to pick him up when he arrives.
"Have you heard from Huntley?" he asks.
"When she called in to report the completion of her mission, she was told to take a few days off. You probably could use some R&R as well."
"I'm afraid I don't have time for that. Terrance is supposed to be meeting me here."
"He is in the basement awaiting your arrival," Ellis replies. "He said you may be down there for a while, so I have fully stocked it with food and caffeinated beverages."
"Thank you."
Once in the basement, Ari lays out everything he found at Clarice's home on a table. Terrance suggests starting with the phone, so they listen to the messages from her boyfriend, Armend.
Since she'd moved back to Paris and renounced her claim to the throne, she had been avoiding him. He was upset about it. By the last message, he had gone from desperate to mad and then back to desperate again.
But none of what he says seems to relate to her being in danger or her knowing anything about her sister's plan to overthrow the monarchy of Montrovia.
The same is true of her recent call list and her contact list. All are checked and double-checked, but still lead nowhere.
While Terrance starts sifting through the files on her computer, Ari uses her phone to check all of her social media sites. An easy task, since she was already logged on.
Ari reads her profiles and posts, going back a year, and checks all of her messages.
"This is useless," he says, slamming down the phone and feeling frustrated.
"Going through all of this requires much patience," Terrance says, looking up from the computer. "Take a break if you need to. Go work out or something. Clear your head. Sometimes it's not until later that you realize you passed over something of importance. When you get back, why don't you start on the diary? At least that should make for interesting reading."
I move stealthily down the dark passageway, the b
oy following me. We come to another dead end, this one, we can't find a way out of. I press on the walls, as does the boy, but nothing happens.
I search my mind, but can't recall anything, my memories seemingly walled off and surrounded by a moat.
I try everything, putting both hands on each wall. Looking for a hidden lever. A hidden door.
Anything.
The good news is no one seems to be coming after us. The bad news is no one seems to be coming to help us either.
I think about the explosives that were used on the door to the safety deposit box room. There are a couple of grenades in the backpack. I've thought about trying to blast our way out, but I fear they would not have the desired effect of taking out an exterior wall, but rather would explode down the tunnel, killing us both.
"That's it," I say aloud. "Maybe there's a trap door. Like at your house."
I drop to my hands and knees and knock on the floor, hoping there is something below the carpet.
Suddenly, the room shakes violently. Although we couldn't hear it, we could definitely feel another blast.
They are blowing their way through the tunnels and vaults, trying to get to us.
I rip up the carpet and place both my palms on the floor; which then lights up and causes a trap door to pop open.
Feeling both relief as well as an odd sense of deja vu, the boy and I climb down the ladder and come to a steel door. Chauncey touches a visible screen to the right, causing it to unlatch and open. I jump in front of him, my gun at the ready.
We are now in a subterranean concrete garage, subtly lit with pale purple lights, where a fleet of vehicles awaits us.
There is a rack of keys on the wall in front of me with a number corresponding to the parking spots. I move the child behind a concrete pillar and fire the gun at a Bugatti Veyron, thrilled when the bullet ricochets and the window remains in tact.
Apparently safe passage equals armored cars.
I grab a set of keys, load the child in the front seat, and tell him to get strapped in. Although he'd be safer in a car with a backseat, I need something fast to get us out of here, and even fully armored it will double the top speed of anything that would have brought an assault team. It will even outrun a helicopter.
As I slide into the lush cockpit of the beautiful and outrageous car, I feel like Huntley Von Allister. No one will suspect this car is carrying a trained killer and the son of the world's most infamous one.
As we emerge from the underground garage, a few blocks from the entrance to the bank, we hear sirens. I know I shouldn't, but I can't help it. I need to know.
