“Thanks for getting the cheese bread, Mom.” Kyle trilled a hollow thank-you that made Gabby question all of her parenting decisions.
Her kids didn’t respect her. She was boring. Her ex was dragging her through the mud after fourteen years of marriage. She was done. She didn’t need to take that kind of disrespect anymore. Two goddamn CIA agents had come to the house and asked her, Gabby Greene, to be a field operative. She picked up her phone and dialed.
Agent Strong picked up on the first ring. “Ms. Greene?”
“Hello, yes, Agent Strong?”
“Speaking.”
“I… I think I’m in.”
Friday, 7:20 a.m., Greene household
The kids got on the bus at 7:27 a.m., give or take ten minutes. Valentina was picking her up at seven forty-five sharp, which gave her eighteen minutes to transform into a CIA agent. She shoved lunch boxes into their hands. “Kyle, remember that Sienna’s mom is picking you up from horseback riding today.”
“Why?” Kyle flashed her a bored teenage look. “What are you doing?”
“Remember that job I mentioned last night?”
Kyle looked skeptical. “You were serious about that?”
“Yep. Starting today I’m a…” She realized that she had no clue what she was supposed to tell people.
Luckily Kyle wasn’t worried. “Gotta go. Love you, Mom!”
As soon as the bus folded in its stop sign, Gabby ran for her room. It was go time. When she’d resurrected pants from her travel agency days, she’d proved Sloane Ellis right—her yoga pants had been lying to her. Her best black pants from 2010 would not be returning from the dead. This left her with a choice: 1) yoga pants or 2) a wrap dress she had worn to Becky Buckholz’s babyshower last year. With no time to spare, she went for her Becky wrap—a dress meant she didn’t have to pick a shirt.
In the end, she was waiting for Valentina in her foyer dressed in the exact outfit she’d worn to Becky’s baby shower: a lavender dress with pantyhose, Mary Janes, and a crocheted cardigan. She had pulled her hair into a French twist and secured it with a brown bitey clip. The only accessory she was missing was a pastel gift bag with a breast pump and diapers inside.
Valentina pulled up dressed in all black, in a black Dodge Charger, with her wavy hair freshly blown out and a bold red lip. Gabby was living inside a joke: “A Bond girl and your mom walk into a bar…”
She sat down and pulled the wrap together over her boobs because it kept falling open, and not in a sexy way, more in a “Mom, cover up your boobs!” way. Always cordial, Gabby said, “Thanks so much for picking me up.”
“I had to. The building’s location is classified.”
“Any chance we can run through a Starbucks? I didn’t have a chance to make coffee.” Finding pantyhose took up all of her time. She had even used clear nail polish to fix a run, like she was her granny. She knew pantyhose were out, but the CIA seemed formal. Would Valerie Plame wear pantyhose? Gabby guessed yes. The only thing she knew for sure was that she could really use a coffee.
“There’s coffee at the office.”
As Valentina swerved through LA traffic like a NASCAR driver, Gabby clutched the armrest. Valentina headed down the 134 to the 5 toward Echo Park. Last time Gabby had been in this neighborhood, she’d gotten a cupcake at Ms. Em’s. So that was one bonus of working for the CIA—cupcakes. Red velvet was herfavorite. Instead of heading for the trendy spots, Valentina veered toward Glendale. The Glendale Mall hadn’t been cool for a very long time, but there had been one store Gabby loved…
International Rug had been a knockoff Pier 1 chock-full of Mexican sodas, colorful dried noodles, bamboo chairs, and all of the best rugs. Basically, it sold ambiance. Before she could finish walking down memory lane with an imaginary pineapple Jarritos soda, Valentina pulled into the parking lot of the store itself.
Gabby gave her a questioning look. “International Rug?”
“Used to be. When it went out of business, the CIA scooped it up. It’s a perfect facility—no windows and lots of space for training. The government has been repurposing as many abandoned big-box stores as possible.”
“For real, this is the CIA?” Gabby had bought a papasan chair here, not to mention some vaguely tribal masks that Phil had objected to. She had meant to come back for a hammock when they were going out of business, but Kyle got the flu that week.
“Well… we are a specialized division of the CIA, an off-the-books division. We’re officially called the EOD, for the Elite Operatives Department.”
Gabby blurted out a shocked laugh. She wasn’t going to be a regular CIA agent; she was going to be aneliteone. Her stomach tightened at the thought.
“Most people on the inside call us International Rug.” She looked at Gabby with a flat expression. “It’s a joke, an inside one.”
“I got that.” Gabby smiled back, mostly tickled that she’d found something Valentina wasn’t good at. The woman wouldn’t make it as a stand-up.
“Is there any merchandise left?” Maybe she got a jobandthere would be a stockpile of lingonberry pancake mix.
