“You can take him hostage and promise not to turn him in if he cooperates,” Yardley said. “Assuming he wouldn’t sing like a bird if you gave him a good smile and asked if he wanted to do lines in the stable, which I’m entirely certain he would.”
“Too many spies in the kitchen,” KC whispered. “Simmer down.”
“Tech wants you closer to the stage,” Atlas told her. “They want to see what they can pull.”
KC headed in that direction, pausing to set her paddle on the chair with her number on it. There was no one to her right, but the seat to her left was occupied by none other than Jack Tremblay, Canadian spy. He nodded collegially. He wore an Armani suit with a bright shirt unbuttoned to the navel. She rolled her eyes and made her way to the dais, where a few very serious players were loitering.
Including Devon Mirabel.
He saw her. KC had to remind herself he’d never gotten a good look at the Starbucks.
He shouldn’t be able to recognize her. But if he did, there was always plan B.
KC stepped closer and extended her hand. “Daphne Sullivan. Thanks for the invite.”
Devon accepted her hand. His gaze lingered on her face for a long moment, searching her features. “You don’t look one bit like your father.”
She sent a silent apology to Daniel Sullivan before she replied. “Not anymore, thanks to the baby Jesus and the miracle hands he gifted to a doc at her discreet Beverly Hills clinic. Have you seen the nose on my dad? No, thank you. Bought this one as soon as I had access to my trust fund. Where’s this piece of plastic you’ve got us all so excited about?” She stepped closer to the empty pillow, hoping it was close enough for her tech support to pick up something useful.
“I’m surprised he sent you this evening,” Mirabel continued as though she hadn’t asked the question, searching her face.
KC didn’t want to suffer through one of this man’s endless personal auditions. She’d watched a lot of tape of a lot of encounters with Mirabel, and where her team saw a boss to beat, she simply saw tedium.
“Fucking kick me out,” she said cheerfully. “I don’t care.” She looked around. “But everyone else here will treat this tech like a toy to destabilize events literally no one will give a shit about in a single news cycle.” She pointed at Mirabel’s stupid face. “My dad didn’t send me. I edged him out with a set of steel basement window bars, a few friends who have automatic weapons andpoor impulse control, and genuine millennial ambition, which is a combination of astrology and white-hot rage at the capitalistic, heteronormative, boomer-bred patriarchy that forces us into anxious complacency. I’m here because I want to burn it all down. The question is, are you ready for a new world order?”
“Yikes,” Yardley breathed.
KC was gratified to see rage flare in Mirabel’s eyes. She did have a gift for repelling male dominance. He reached into an inner pocket of his suit coat and pulled out the micro drive, hushing the ring of buyers at the dais. Still looking at her, he slammed it on the pillow and strode away.
“Can you—” Gramercy’s voice.
“She’s already on it,” Yardley said. “Don’t bother my protégé.”
KC sidestepped, mashing the toes of a woman who’d made the mistake of wearing sparkly high-heeled sandals, and got to the pillow first. She put her hands on her hips, elbows wide enough to play defense against anyone who might be thinking of pushing her out of the way. Then she took a look.
Shit.
She strode off the dais.
“Tech requests another few moments with the device,” Gramercy said.
“That’s not it.” KC stalked away, waiting to say more until she’d found a spot close to the windows where she could contemplate the view unobserved. “I was really, super hoping for Plan A.”
“Tech didn’t quite—”
“The material that kind of drive is made of is an old-school casein-based plastic. It looks a way. The sage green color is distinctive. I didn’t touch it, but I know that if I had, it wouldn’t feel right. It’s a dupe.”
“You’re going by color and… anticipated feel of the drive case?” Atlas broke in.
“I have been looking at buying one of those adorably minuscule drives to play with for two years, but the agency doesn’t pay me enough. I know what’s in my unpurchased online shopping cart. Those are sacred items.”
“Affirmative,” Yardley said with a satisfyingly stern tone. “Plan B it is.”
Plan A had been straightforward: KC would win the bid. The U.S. government would transfer whatever obscene number of dollars KC spent, or convincingly pretend to—that was for the money guys, not KC’s department—and she’d put the drive in her briefs, tuck herself into the back seat of the agency’s car, and hand it off to someone who she would advise to take it to a secure room and incinerate it in a small, security-cleared kiln.
Simple.
Plan B was a lot more like trying to knock a hornet’s nest off the shed on a hot day while covered in pancake syrup.
