Alice stared back, not even bothering to answer the question.
Gabby turned over “taken out” in her mind. Could that mean what she thought it meant?
She looked down at the picture of Darcy Dagger. Valentina’s words echoed in her mind: “This was Agent Darcy Dagger.”
Was…
Past tense. Darcy Dagger was dead. Gabby was staring at the face of a woman who had been killed. She hadn’t died in a car accident or of cancer. She’d been “taken out” while serving her country. Gabby’s stomach dropped to the floor next to all the vegetables Lucas had been trying to sneak to the dog.
As tempting as it was, she had to say no. This was not one of those jobs where she could try to massage her résumé to look like a reasonable candidate. Cooking, cleaning, and chauffeuring kids could not be built up into spy credentials. Not to mention, she couldn’t even keep on top of the laundry. How was she going to be an undercover operative? Gabby had two children. She needed to be there to pick them up from school; she needed to be thereto watch them grow up. Agents Strong and Monroe could take a chance on her, but Gabby didn’t take chances. She played it safe. It was part of being a good mom.
With her kids in mind, she said, “I’m so sorry, but I have to say no.”
Agent Strong didn’t react, so Gabby kept talking. “Thanks so much for the offer. I would love to, but it’s just not going to work.” She sounded like she was turning down a dinner party invitation.
Agent Monroe looked relieved, but Agent Strong narrowed her gaze and moved a step closer. “Are you interested in the salary?”
She lit up inside. Money—she needed that. “How much is it?”
The corner of Agent Strong’s lips quirked up. Like it was nothing, she said, “A full year’s salary, eighty thousand dollars. Plus benefits. We will pay for the full year, regardless of how long the mission takes.”
The number punched a hole a mile wide in her resolve, but Gabby tried not to let it show on her face. She said, “Okay, I’ll take that into consideration,” which made it sound like she would make a methodical list of pros and cons. In reality, she would probably hyperventilate a little and think, “Holy shit! What do I do?” over and over for an hour before she had to pick her kids up.
Gabby walked them to the door, Mr. Bubbles trotting beside them in his ridiculous bow tie and freshly styled hair, highlighting just how different her world was from theirs.
“Thanks again,” Gabby said, always an accommodating hostess.
Agent Strong simply said, “You have until the end of the day to decide.”
Thursday afternoon, Greene household
Gabby looked at the clock. It was one thirty, and she had to be at school in an hour to pick up Kyle and Lucas. Between cataloging all of her faults in a self-help workbook and getting a job offer from the CIA, she hadn’t managed to go grocery shopping, clean the house, or pull up her old résumé.
If she told anyone what had happened, they wouldn’t believe her. No one. Hell, she barely believed herself. But when she looked at the kitchen table, there were three coffee cups. Agent Strong’s “World’s Greatest Mom” cup was empty. Gabby imagined that she ran on coffee.
Get it together, Gabby. If she was even going to consider this, she had to chill—have coffee with CIA agents and then seamlessly pick up the kids, breezing past all of the other moms in the parent pickup line like she was just that cool.
Gabby threw on a fresh pair of yoga pants and hoodie. She was fully invested in her athleisure, emphasis on the leisure, look. She had an unused gym membership and brand-new running shoes to go with the lifestyle. There were so many benefits: 1) she liked theway the pants lied to her (sorry, Sloane); 2) it was a uniform; and 3) she could run away from bad guys, which now seemed like a possibility. Athleisure was a solid trend.
With her uniform on, her frizzy brown hair under a hat, and her phone fully charged, she was ready to get the kids. On her way out of the house, she remembered the package the mailman had brought. Another fucking court order from Phil, which made almost no sense. They’d finalized the divorce four months ago, or at least she’d thought. With a deep breath, she picked the damn thing up. She’d open it up while Kyle was riding a horse. Whatever it was, it was definitely going to take a minute to process, and she was late.
“Be a good boy, Mr. Bubbles.” She patted him on the head. If he didn’t freak the horses out, she’d bring him.
Forty-five minutes later, she was outside a horse barn, the smell of manure and hay oddly comforting, real and uncomplicated, unlike her life. Kyle and Sienna hopped out and ran for their lesson while she and Lucas parked under a tree nearby. Lucas immediately started begging for her phone. “Can I play a video game, Mom?” A horse whinnied in the background.
“Sure.” Gabby handed her phone over. She needed him to keep busy for a minute while she dealt with the paperwork. With a deep breath, she peeled open the envelope with all of its ominous “you have been served” language on the outside.
Inside there was a half-inch stack of indecipherable legal documents, stamped and official. Gabby wasn’t an idiot, but figuring out what any of this legal garbage meant required a JD or a $200-an-hour lawyer, which she could not afford at the moment. Phil could.
First the CIA, now court documents—Mercury was in retrograde for sure. She didn’t know what that meant, but it was nice to be able to blame the universe for something.
She scanned the headings, some of which had become vaguely familiar over the whole process. There was a “request for order” and a “notice of hearing.” In other words, Phil was trying to make her do something. Last time he’d been by, he’d taken the guinea pig, Dr. Piggie, to make his place homier for the kids. It was pathetic, living in a hotel down the street with a hijacked guinea pig.
Next to her, Lucas squealed, “I won. Can I play another round?”
“Sure, honey.” She gave him a hug because she needed the moral support. He pushed her arm away.
What was it going to be about this time? She’d have to drive through LA traffic and sit in a courthouse with a ton of sad, lonely people. So many of the women there had problems way worse than hers, like abusive partners, kids they didn’t have access to, no money. Every time she got there, she counted herself lucky. Kyle and Lucas were healthy, and she had them. She couldn’t afford her house, but she knew she could figure it out. Her main problem: an ex who couldn’t leave well enough alone.
