Double Crossed (4 page)

“Kat,” Abby snapped.

“Sorry,” Kat said. “What were you asking?”

“What is his training?”

“Oh…” And then, for an excellent liar, Kat had absolutely no idea what to say.

Abby seemed to read her face, because she inched closer and lowered her voice. “Look, I’m not a cop. And I’m not Interpol. I’m just someone who took an oath a long time ago to keep Macey McHenry safe, so whatever you can tell me…”

“He’s a con man. An inside man. He’s pretty good at short cons and street work. Picking pockets, sleight of hand—stuff like that—but what he does best is…lie.”

“Can he handle a safe?” Abby asked.

“What kind of safe?” Kat asked.

“A Scribner 9000,” Abby told her, and Kat couldn’t help herself—she laughed.

“I’m sorry,” she said, righting herself. “But that safe is drill-proof, hack-proof, and has an internal gyroscope with titanium shafts that bolt into place if anyone even breathes on it funny. Seriously. They don’t even install them in California because of earthquakes.” Kat watched the way Abby gaped at her. “Maybe I don’t know much about boys.…” Kat shook her head. “Doesn’t mean I don’t know about safes.”

“Can you pry your way into it?”

“You mean like with the Jaws of Life?” Kat thought about what Hale had seen hidden in the ballroom. “You can try, but it won’t work. Or…well…it didn’t work at the Israeli Diamond Exchange in 2009.” Kat thought about what she’d said, then quickly added, “
Allegedly
. There are only two ways into a Scribner nine series. Either you hire one of the half dozen or so safecrackers in the world who can work the tumblers or…” Kat cut her eyes up at Abby, who was totally not liking the answer. “You get someone to give you the combination.” Kat drew a deep breath. “Why?”

“I think we might have a problem.” Abby looked up at the high-rise. “What do you know about the new whole-house system from Sterling Security?”

“The new one?” Kat raised her eyebrows, impressed. “It’s good. I mean…really good. A friend of mine’s dad designed it, and there’s really no way around it unless…” Kat let her voice trail off, and Abby must have read her mind.

“Somebody cuts the power,” Abby said, and Kat looked up at the too-dark building. “The authorities turned off all electricity to the building five minutes ago.”

“What about—” Kat started, but Abby was already shaking her head.

“Backup generators too.”

“That’s why they needed the hostages,” Kat said, and in spite of herself she had to smile. “That’s why they weren’t in a hurry. This had to be big and public and scary enough to get the cops to black out the whole building. It’s genius.” She suddenly remembered who she was speaking to. “I mean it’s awful. But it’s also kind of genius.”

Suddenly, the hostages made sense. It wasn’t a holdup, Kat realized. It was a diversion. It had a purpose. And purposes made Kat happy.

Abby smiled and never asked how a fifteen-year-old girl could be so good at doing very bad things. “They’re past the security system, Kat. And now they’re working on the safe.”

“Whose safe is it?”

“Have you ever heard of the Calloway Canary?”

“Is Mrs. Calloway in there?”

“She’s in the ballroom now,” Abby said. “With a fake necklace that our gunmen evidently knew was a fake, because they went straight for the safe.”

“So someone is slipping them inside information,” Kat said, and Abby nodded. “What do you know about the gunmen?”

“Not much. According to our source—”

“You mean Macey?” Kat asked, but Abby didn’t answer.

“They’re Eastern European, probably muscle for hire,” Abby said. “There’s some big boss we haven’t identified yet. Someone’s calling the shots, but these guys are just here to do a job.”

But Kat was shaking her head. “There isn’t any honor among thieves, Abby. Not among that kind, at least. And right now they’re trying to get into a safe they can’t crack while holding on to over a hundred people they no longer need.” Kat watched the woman’s eyes, her worried posture and hasty glances toward an empty balcony.

“What is it?” Kat asked. “What aren’t you telling me?”

“Kat, can you blast your way into that safe?”

“Technically, yes,” Kat started slowly. “But in a private residence with close quarters and utilities you’d have to be crazy to try.”

“So we can’t let them try.”

“No.” Kat shook her head. “We can’t.”

Then Abby seemed to remember that she was the adult and Kat was the teen, the civilian, because she patted the younger girl on the back and said, “You don’t need to worry about it, Kat. You’ve done enough.” She turned away.

But there was something inside of Kat that was alive, thinking, planning, knowing that it wasn’t over and it wasn’t okay—that there were codes to her world and her life and anyone who would pick up an automatic weapon and take a hundred hostages wasn’t going to live by them.

Whoever these men were, they were not members of the family, and that more than anything made Kat yell through the darkness, “Abby!” The woman turned, studying her, as Kat said, “There’s something else that I can do.”

“S
TOP PACING
,” Hale said in the manner of someone who was used to giving orders. Sadly, Macey wasn’t used to taking them.

“No thank you,” she said, and kept on walking. Too bad there was no real place to walk to. The storage closet they’d found was small and crowded with dirty laundry and old housekeeping carts. But it was also private and far away from the eyes and ears of the men in the masks.

“Macey, calm down. We don’t know why they brought the C4,” Hale said.

“Well, we do know that there is a gas line running behind the Calloway safe. The bad guys with the big explosives don’t seem to care that there’s a gas line. Let me do the math for you. Gas plus explosions equals boom!”

“Don’t look at me. I would be more than happy to offer a short course on How to Conduct a Proper Apartment Heist, but I doubt these guys are going to take my advice.”

“Abby,” Macey said, trying her earbud again. “Abby, do you hear me? How’s it going trying to cut the gas to the building? Did you do it? Is it done?”

“And what about the gas that’s already in the lines?” Hale asked. “Never mind.” He shook his head. There was no doubt he already knew the answer.

“Guys.” Abby’s voice came through their earbuds. “Just sit tight. We’re working on a Plan B.”

“What kind of Plan B?” Hale asked.

He was almost holding his breath when a voice answered, “My kind.”

Macey tried to read the look on his face then, but it was gone in a flash. It had been a simple moment of peace and joy and pure happiness. That voice made Hale happy. It kept him calm. It was his backup and his conscience. Macey couldn’t help herself; she envied him.

Then Macey asked, “Okay, Abby. What do you have in mind?”

When the plan was set and the mission in motion, Macey had to admit she felt slightly better about the situation.

There are few problems a Gallagher Girl can face that cannot be improved by a job. A task. A target. So there was a new spring in Macey McHenry’s steps as she led the way back down the corridor that lined the ballroom. The carts were still abandoned. Trays of shrimp still lay carelessly tossed aside and they were starting to smell.

Macey walked through it all, feeling in her bones that it was over. She turned and looked at Hale. “Smile, thief boy. It’s a—”

But before Macey could finish she felt something—someone—run around the corner and into her side, knocking her against an ice machine and sending her spinning around.

The man in the Clinton mask seemed completely shocked to find he wasn’t alone. But shock quickly faded as Hale rushed forward, and the man shifted his weight and sent the slightly lighter boy flying too hard into the wall. Then the man turned his sights on Macey.

“Abby,” Macey whispered to her teacher, “I think we might need a Plan C now.”

And then she picked up one of the heavy platters of shrimp.

And swung.

T
HE LIGHTS WERE OFF INSIDE THE BALLROOM
. So Macey stumbled inside through the glow of the candles that still burned on the tables. At first there was a hiss and then a whisper. It was like the people on the floor didn’t know if she was shadow or ghost as she hobbled on a bruised leg and broken heel, slowly making her way through the flickering light.

“Macey?” a voice cried through the room.

“Daddy?” Macey called, but the man in the Clinton mask yelled, “Stop right there!”

And for maybe the first time in her life, Macey did as she was told.

She thought of the masked man’s gun and the rapid burst of bullets.

She thought of Hale lying on the floor.

She thought of the mission she hadn’t had the time to finish.

And Macey yelled louder, “Daddy?” Her voice cracked. Macey saw the senator moving her way, through the ballroom.

“What was that shooting?” the senator demanded. “What have you done to my daughter?”

The masked man whirled and sent the beam of his flashlight across the crowd until it shone on the tall man in the back of the room.

But Clinton just pointed his gun at Macey’s head and said, “Stay where you are.”

The man in the Bush mask was coming toward them. “Reagan needs you in the other room,” Bush said, but Clinton shook his head.

“Found this one out in the hall,” Clinton told Bush. “Her and her little friend. I handled them, though. Didn’t I, sweetheart?” He ran a finger down the side of Macey’s cheek and she shivered but didn’t fight.

It wasn’t the time, Macey told herself. It wasn’t the place. She’d have her chance later, but right then all Macey wanted to do was run into her father’s arms. She tried to push past Bush, clawed against his arms and his sides, but he held her in place, not moving.

“Please,” she said. “Please. I won’t try to sneak out again. I promise.”

“No,” Clinton snapped, and pulled Macey away. “You think we’re gonna trust you?” His drawl was obviously fake and sickly sweet. He didn’t sound like a former president. He sounded like a psychopath.

“You think we’re gonna let you go back to your daddy after what you did?” The man fingered the side of his neck—a place that was still bleeding from an earlier blow.

“Please,” Macey said, but Clinton just grabbed her arm.

“Come here.”

“No!” the senator shouted.

“Bill,” Bush said, “Reagan needs you in the other room.”

“She’s coming with me,” Clinton yelled over his shoulder.

He marched Macey to the farthest, darkest corner of the room, where he made a great show of tying her to a chair, and the man in the Bush mask went back to walking slowly among the hostages and holding his weapon.

If he had felt the hand that reached into the messenger bag he kept strapped across his chest, he didn’t show it.

If he thought it strange that Clinton had made such a scene of securing his hostage himself, he didn’t question it.

And when Macey whispered, “Okay, Kat. You’re on,” the fake President Bush didn’t appear to hear a thing.

In fact, in the darkness, none of the hostages seemed to notice when the air vent at the back of the ballroom slid slowly up. In fact, not a soul appeared to see the small girl who dangled out of the opening, her black hair and clothes disappearing in the shadows of the room.

“We missed our flight for Rome,” the upside-down girl said.

The Clinton mask eased up and the boy behind it gave her a smile. “I own the jet, remember? It’ll wait.”

“Hi,” Kat said, shifting just a little to the girl at her boyfriend’s side.

“Macey”—Hale gave a very Hale-ish grin—“may I introduce Kat Bishop?”

“It’s nice to meet you,” Macey said.

The upside-down girl grinned and took a small package from Macey’s hand. A moment later she was gone, into the air vent and scurrying away, perfectly at home in the black.

Macey shook her head. “Someday I’ve got to introduce her to Cammie.”