Chapter 29
Thursday, after lunch, eStocks Enterprises
G abby might have stolen the files, but she had three things left to do: 1) transfer the stolen goods to a second flash drive, 2) deliver one flash drive to EOD, and 3) bring the second flash drive to Smirnov. Only then would she be home free. On and off throughout these activities, she was going to have to pretend to be in the bathroom. Markus wasn’t going to like that…
Gabby drove Darcy’s car a few blocks away, out of view of nosy eStocks employees, aka Fran. On the passenger seat, she set up Kyle’s laptop and inserted the flash drive. Then she pulled the cartoon bunny head off Kyle’s flash drive and shoved it into the remaining USB port. Eat your heart out, James Bond.
Not surprisingly, whatever was supposed to happen when she put in the flash drive didn’t, and because she didn’t have anything but a surface understanding of anything technical, she couldn’t troubleshoot. Damn her for letting Phil do all of the finances and tech stuff for the last fifteen years. Damn her for always taking the easy path. It was not fucking paying off.
She drummed her keys on the steering wheel. Markus texted. U ok?
IBS. A sexier lie would have been nice, but that was all she had.
“Siri, call Queen Palm Elementary and Middle School.” There was nothing to do but to get tech support on the line.
“Hi, Shamika. This is Gabby, Kyle and Lucas’s mom.”
“Oooh, hi, Gabby.” Shamika sounded amused. “Who was that who dropped off Lucas’s lunch the other day, because whoo-eeeee.”
Gabby was breathing too fast. She didn’t have time at the moment to gossip about the hot EOD agent who had inexplicably dropped off her kid’s allergy-friendly lunch. “He’s cute, isn’t he? Can you get Kyle on the phone for me? It’s sort of an emergency.”
“Okay.” She paused for a second and said, “It looks like she’s in PE.” To someone else, she called, “Wayne, can you run and grab Kyle from the gym?”
Gabby wanted to knock her head into the steering wheel. Wayne was the kid who was always at the principal’s office because he could not follow directions. Her family’s safety and a delicate national security mission now rested on Wayne’s shoulders. The child had pulled the fire alarm twice in the last year, and Kyle reported that Wayne was the one who had plugged the boy’s toilets with Orbeez in the epic plumbing fiasco of 2021. The school had been shut down for a week.
Shamika said, “So about that fine-ass man…”
Before Gabby was forced to answer any more questions, she heard Kyle’s voice, and Shamika, sounding disappointed, said, “Kyle, it’s your mom on the phone.”
She was going to buy Wayne a pizza.
“Mom?” Kyle said her name as a question.
“Sweetie. I need your help. It’s sort of an emergency.”
“Okay,” Kyle said, her voice tinged with confusion.
“Nothing to worry about. I’m just trying to impress my boss, and I can’t get that flash drive to work. Can you walk me through it?”
“Okay. They were making us do a sit-up challenge, so this is great.”
Kyle proceeded to walk her through transferring the files. “Insert both flash drives.”
“At the same time?”
“Yes, Mom.”
Kyle made it sound easy, but Gabby had never had a computer issue go smoothly.
“Is there supposed to be a box that pops up?”
“Yes. And then you drag and drop the files where you want them.”
“Ohmygod, I only see one.”
“Seriously, Mom?” Kyle groaned. “Just take it out and put it back in. See if it pops up this time.”
“Child, give that phone here,” Shamika said loudly in the background.
“Bye, Mom.”
“Gabby—” Shamika sounded impatient, as if she were actually involved in the mission rather than just bored at work and getting involved in everyone’s business. “Are you on a Mac?” Shamika asked. Before Gabby could answer, she got sassy. “Why did I ask? Of course it is.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Come on, your shed-free, allergy-friendly dog probably has a Mac too.”
Gabby laughed. Fair enough.
“Go to the Finder. Do you know what the flash drive is called, Kyle?”
“BunBot,” Kyle called from the background.
While Gabby looked, Shamika said, “After all this, you should definitely bring that man by. At least slip him my number.”
“Uh—”
“Don’t tell me. You’re already after him. Of course you are.” Shamika paused her narration to sigh. “I don’t blame you, but…”
When Gabby finally copied everything, she ejected and pocketed the flash drives and yelled thanks to Kyle and Shamika, who was still conjecturing about her relationship with Markus.
First mission accomplished, she flipped on her earpiece and camera. “Hi, Markus. I’m here.”
“Feeling better?”
“Much,” she said, still a little breathless, not from intestinal distress but from tech anxiety.
At the end of the day, Gabby shut her computer down, neatened her desk, and grabbed her lunch box from the fridge. The Tupperware with the flaming meat loaf was in the dumpster out back, probably where it belonged in the first place. It was too bad about the Tupperware, though. It had been a really nice, medium-sized container that fit in her lunch box. Tupperware with a lid that hadn’t disappeared into the back of the cabinet never to be found again—that was as hard to come by as a pair of matching socks.
Now, off to the EOD to hand off the flash drive. Compared to Smirnov, the EOD was nothing. She might as well be heading to the petting zoo. And to think she’d been in a near panic over them just a week ago.
In the car, she called Granny. “Want me to pick up dinner on the way back? I have two errands that will hopefully be quick. I was thinking sushi.”
“No. Prepare yourself. I cooked.”
“Mmm. Really?” Granny was a notoriously bad cook. It was a proud family tradition, along with red hair and, apparently, gambling.
“Yep. I’m still trying to impress Burt. We’re in the beginning of this relationship. He doesn’t know I don’t do housework yet.”
Gabby rolled her eyes. She was eighty and acting like a teenager. And who in the hell needed to impress Burt. BURT!
“He used to be a doctor, you know.”
“You’re kidding me.”
“No, he did a lot of side work at the home.”
“So what’d you make?”
“A frozen lasagna, but he won’t know the difference. Your taste buds start to go at a certain age. He probably only has a few years left.”
“Lucas can’t eat lasagna.”
Granny groaned. “Gabby, that boy is not allergic to everything you think he is. I think you should get him retested or just let him try a few things.”
Gabby released a breath. Granny was half-right. Lucas might have grown out of some of these allergies. It was probably time to reintroduce a few things before he was thirty-five. If she could take down the Mafia, she could face Lucas eating a baked good made with eggs. Maybe. The doctor had mentioned a few times she could let him try it in the ER parking lot to alleviate her anxiety. She’d always responded, “If he has to eat it at the ER, he doesn’t need it at all!”
“Let’s get through Saturday before we change anything, okay?”
“Okay, honey.”
Like it was nothing, Gabby went through the biometric screening and wandered in as casually as if it had still been International Rug. Actually, more casually. International Rug used to have some really good sales.
Inside the EOD, everyone was waiting. Valentina and Alice were in the conference room when she arrived. She planned to hand the flash drive over, say thanks, and keep it cool.
A guy she didn’t know clapped. She smiled awkwardly.
Valentina begrudgingly nodded her head. “Good work, Agent Greene.”
Markus appeared from out of nowhere with a bottle of champagne. “You ready for a toast?”
Alice said, “Markus, we’re on duty. Put that away,” to which he held up the tiniest glasses imaginable.
“There’s more alcohol in that kombucha than one of these cups.”
Under her breath, Valentina said, “I think we can wait until we make the arrests for that,” but Markus ignored her.
As he poured the glasses, Alice said, “It was a great day. Everything went like clockwork. No one was hurt except for a couple of cars. Everyone here did their job. Good work, especially to Agent Greene. Your first mission is a success.”
Gabby felt herself blush furiously as everyone raised a glass to her. The Elite Operatives Department singing her praises, incidentally in the former throw pillow section of International Rug. Someone needed to get her a cervical collar, because she was getting whiplash.
“Thank you,” she managed to say through her absolute swell of feelings. She, Gabby Greene, mediocre housewife with a failed marriage, had managed an EOD mission.
But it wasn’t completely untarnished. Among the faces smiling back at her, one of them was working for Smirnov, a person who would have ratted her out if she talked. A person who cared more about money than her or her family. Did that person know Smirnov had threatened her kids?
Whoever it was, she’d really made their day. They were probably going home with a fat wad of cash, and they hadn’t even had to strong-arm her.
After all of those congratulations, Gabby reached into her pocket for the flash drive and accidentally handed Alice the wrong drive. The plastic bunny with its bucktoothed smile looked up.
“What’s this?”
“Oops. I lost the one that Markus gave me, so I grabbed one of my own. Don’t worry, it’s goofy, but was really highly rated on Amazon.”
Valentina poured herself another miniature glass of champagne.
Alice frowned. “As long as you have the information on here.”
“I do.”
Alice plugged the flash drive in and nodded as the files appeared. “The bunny did its job.”
She might have only worked for the EOD for a short time, but it was intense—life-changing even. This would be the last time she was here. Saturday at the party, they would arrest Orlov and Kramer, and she would go home, back to her regular life. As she looked around at the people who had trusted her to run a mission, tears burned the back of her eyes.
Markus put a hand on her shoulder and made eye contact so direct, she almost wilted. He said, “Hey, Gabs, you did good.” The way he was looking at her she couldn’t help but recall how he wanted to “revisit” their kiss.
“Only because you were with me every step of the way.”
With a laugh, he said, “Well, most of the way.”
She’d talked more to Markus than she had to Phil in the last few years. Sure, she talked to her kids, but she was their mom. Besides Justin, no one knew her better.
The Starbucks gift card she bought for him was burning a hole in her pocket. It was her go-to, end-of-the-year teacher gift. He was technically her teacher. It had seemed like a good idea at the time, but now she was so uncertain, especially after last night. They’d embraced, and his lips had brushed hers. That wasn’t the kind of moment you followed up with a Starbucks gift card. Was it too much, not enough, or, most likely, completely off-key?
Abruptly, she reached into her purse and pulled it out, thrusting it into his hands too forcefully. “This is for you.”
“Really?” he raised his eyebrows, clearly expecting something meaningful. “You didn’t have to?”
A smile quirked his lips, and she said, “I mean, if it’s weird, you can just give it back.”
He held it out of reach. “No, I want it.”
Valentina, smelling blood in the water, stepped closer as Markus opened the card. “What, I didn’t get one?”
“Ohmygod. I’m so sorry. It’s just that Markus was in my ear all day. I should have gotten one for everyone.” This was the same problem she had at the end of the year. There was a classroom teacher, a teacher’s aide, music teachers. It was almost easier not to buy anything so she didn’t offend everyone.
“Well, anyway,” Gabby said in a too-perky voice, “I know you need a lot of caffeine for all of your missions, so…” Her sentence dissolved into thin air. She looked down at her feet, her hair falling into her eyes.
Tenderly, Markus brushed her hair out of her face. “Maybe we can get a coffee together and debrief after it’s over.”
In the corner, Valentina choked on her champagne, probably at the word “debrief.” Gabby almost choked on that one too.
As perfect as he was, she couldn’t get rid of one nagging thought. Now that the mission was over, Gabby might never know if Markus had been the mole or if he would have followed through on Smirnov’s threats. She could maybe trust him, but she wasn’t sure if she should. Nothing expired faster than trust, except for dairy.
Alice thankfully interrupted Gabby’s anxiety with more business. “Okay, everyone, while I have you all here, let’s talk about Saturday. Are we ready to go?” she asked, looking at Gabby.
Gabby said, “Yep. It’s going to be a great party.” Justin had spent the last forty-eight hours doing nothing but preparing. All she could hope was that there wouldn’t be fireworks and a live band. The only thing holding him back was the time limit.
Alice nodded. “Good. We have six agents posing as guests, including the three of us. Hopefully, you won’t need us before the arrest, but we will be there if anything goes down.”
Gabby nodded.
“Gabby, just act natural and focus on keeping the party running smoothly,” said Markus. “We don’t need any logistical problems throwing us off.”
Alice adjourned the meeting with a “That’s it. Everyone get some rest before Saturday. I’ll need you all on your toes.”
As Gabby was walking out, she heard Alice say, “The Oobleck report… what is that? Someone get me a dossier on Oobleck. I think we have another Mafia boss on our hands.”
Gabby snuck out before they started reading about the unpredictable behavior of slime. Kyle might have gotten a C, but she did some A plus work today.
Gabby had given out the end-of-the-year coffee gift card and toasted success with the crew, but it wasn’t over yet. She still needed to hand the other flash drive over to Smirnov. There would not be champagne and a promised coffee date after that one. He had given her a burner phone with only one number programmed in. Thank god she hadn’t lost it.
She texted the code 8675309 to the anonymous contact. Why was it so easy to remember? Then it hit her, the song—“Jenny, don’t change your number.” Like every other fifty-some-year-old guy, Smirnov loved eighties music.
He texted her the meeting location: 3501 Montlake. North Gate Hollywood Reservoir. Above the dam.
Were they going to throw her in? Why couldn’t they have just met at Starbucks like civilized people? At this time of day, it was going to take forever to get there. Damn rush hour. At least Granny was making dinner.
After an hour in traffic, she pulled onto Montlake and found her way to the designated location. It wasn’t the kind of place Gabby would ever stop. Barbed wire fence. Tow-away zone with no stopping at any time. Based on the map, she was above the upper reservoir and dam, but she could see only an abandoned building and scrubby trees. It might be scenic if she weren’t scared for her life. A sign on the fence read 3501 MONTLAKE, RESTRICTED AREA . Was this where he’d taken her when he kidnapped her?
Gabby gripped the steering wheel and kept her eye on the rearview mirror. A few minutes later, the same van that had abducted her pulled up, her BFF in the driver’s seat and Smirnov riding shotgun.
Smirnov stepped out while his goon scrolled through TikTok. “You got it?” he asked.
With a nod, she slipped him the sleek black flash drive that Markus had given her.
When she made a move to leave, he said, “Where do you think you’re going? I have to make sure this works.” He opened up his laptop on the hood of her car and slid in the flash drive. A songbird trilled from a bush nearby, ignorant of the mob business going down in his territory.
“It’s all there,” Gabby said, impatient to get home.
“The codes?”
“Everything Kramer has is on there.” Markus had been one hundred percent sure.
“Dasividaniya, Agent Greene. Spasibo.” He slipped her an envelope.
Gabby opened it up, just to see what it was, and Smirnov said, “It’s all there.”
“Pozhaluysta,” she said, pulling out one of the six Russian words she knew. Please, thank you, whore, bitch, and shithead. Thank you, Granny, for the Russian language crash course.
“I keep liking you more, Gabby Greene. So many tricks up your sleeve.”
She returned a smile, unsure what to make of being complimented by a mob boss, but sure she was going to hang on to the moment forever. That time she had spent in the Russian Mafia—no one would ever believe her.
Smirnov’s van left in a plume of dust, leaving Gabby standing on an empty road in the middle of Hollywood. She watched the van get smaller and smaller until it disappeared. She had done what she needed to do, and they were out of her life forever.
Out of curiosity, she opened the envelope, and gasped aloud at the fat wad of cash.
She was standing next to a NO TRESPASSING sign and a barbed wire fence, nothing but trees, a reservoir below her and mountains behind. Everything was just fine, though. She’d done her job.
As soon as Gabby got through the party, she was walking away from spying forever. Double agenting was over. Hell, agenting was just about over. Like her favorite robe said, Gabby Greene was just a mom.