Chapter Ten
Ten
I let the call go to voicemail.
It rings again, and then a third time. I ignore it while I look at some shoes at a stall in front of the market’s huge stained-glass entrance under the crowned sign reading St. Josep Mercat.
Dane peruses sunglasses at the next stall over.
He picks them up and sets them down right away, and I sense we’re both still trying to regulate ourselves.
I purchase the shoes. As I’m changing out my unpleasantly saturated sneakers, a text appears on my phone’s screen.
Eric: I know you don’t want to talk to me, but this is important.
I sigh and stuff my wet sneakers into the shopping bag the stall vendor gave me.
It feels good to get them off; my feet were shriveled.
My jeans are still wet but are starting to dry from my body heat, and I can live with it for now.
I don’t buy that whatever Eric has to say is that important, but there is one thing I want to know more about: the meeting he set up in Madrid.
Dane’s muted suspicion yesterday about it stoked my own too.
I dial Eric and start walking toward where Dane’s gone into the dark depths of the market arcade.
“Zoe,” he answers. “You sound like you’re in a public place.”
“What’s so important that you called me three times and texted?
” Stalls piled several layers deep with colorful fruits and vegetables and candies line the main walkway.
The noise is stronger here as people crowd through.
Ahead, a butcher’s stall is a red wall of hanging cured meats: legs of jamón and long strings of botifarra, Catalan sausage.
Rows of paper cones with sausage spilling out of them sit on display.
Dane is just up ahead, well within view, strolling with his hands in his pockets.
He glances back a few times, sees I’m on the phone, and raises his eyebrows once to indicate, I assume, that he’s keeping his distance so I can take my call.
“I wanted to make sure you’re okay,” Eric says. “Are you still in Madrid?”
I am not confident he’s interested in my well-being, but we’re in uncharted territory here. “I’m fine. Did you have that meeting with your cryptologist friends?”
There’s a long inhale of frustrated breath on his part. “You’re sure you’re okay? You can trust me. I’ll help you with anything. I know we didn’t end on a good note, but I am always here for you. Not just as your boss, but as your friend.”
Not answering the question about the meeting. Interesting. Despite his warnings about the Enigma Challenge, it would be just like him to play and try to get information out of me about the puzzles. “What was the emergency, Eric?”
“Are you with Dane Seaver?”
I feel my muscles tighten in response to the words, as though in defense. That’s what this call is—he’s still on his I Hate Dane Seaver trip, and he can’t stand that I’m with him.
“I don’t have time for this,” I say.
“Zoe, come on. You’re not acting like yourself. I’m worried about you. Are you really okay?”
I pass a stall packed with cones of fried sweet potatoes, delectable-looking hand pies, and spiraled peels of potatoes on a stick.
In front of me is a booth lined with hay and piled precariously high with fat brown eggs.
Standing next to a fake chicken is a man, staring at me.
A little too intently. I dart a glance around for Dane and see the top of his head a few stalls away. I start walking toward him.
“Meet me at the hotel, Zoe,” Eric is saying. “We can talk. Just you and me. That is, if you’re still in Madrid…?”
I glance behind me to see that the man who was staring at me is now following me through the market.
I weave around throngs of tourists taking selfies in front of a confection stand stacked full of pastries and candies.
My heart is pounding now even though the crowds are thicker and they’re slowing down his progress—but also my own.
These people are absolutely relentless. The man with the gun can’t have discovered my puzzle was fake already, so who is this guy?
Where is Dane? How have I lost him now, when it matters?
I see his dark head again and increase my pace.
“Nice try. I’ve got to go.” I end the call and shove my phone in my bag.
I’m half running now. If Eric is playing the game, then at least he doesn’t have the first puzzle’s solution that leads him to Barcelona.
A large family spreads around the aisle, cutting me off from Dane.
It’s getting more difficult to pivot between bodies as the crowd thickens.
I dart a look back, and the man is still following—and worse, he’s gaining.
My pace isn’t cutting it. I’m sweating now, and that trembling feeling is back.
I break into a full run toward Dane. The stalls are a blur of color as I weave through people, trying not to push as I go.
I stumble into a couple, right myself, and apologize, and my pursuer nearly reaches me.
This place is a rabbit warren of stalls and lanes, and the fox is in here with us.
I catch up to Dane just as he turns, causing me to slam into his chest. He steadies me and darts a glance at the guy following me.
In unspoken agreement, we start running along fish stalls with crushed ice holding oysters and lemons and enormous red lobsters.
Ahead is a huge round stall with giant slabs of whole silvery fish on ice.
We swing around it just as the guy chasing me catches up.
Dane is right beside me, and he stops abruptly to push the guy behind me back.
The man stumbles into the ice and the fish.
Instantly the vendors start shouting and yelling at him.
We don’t stick around to see what happens.
Dane’s got my arm as we weave through the stalls. The cold of the fish stalls seeps into my damp pants, overlaid by the briny smell. My heart’s beating furiously, that fight-or-flight instinct fully triggered with flight dialed up to a thousand.
“Almost there,” Dane says, and the encouragement comes at the right time because my legs start burning and I have to fight the urge to slow.
Ahead is a bright square of daylight as we near the back exit in this market.
We’re almost there when someone slams into Dane from the side, sending both of us smashing into another fish stall.
“The puzzle,” someone hisses in my ear.
Never, I think.
Their hand is on my arm. I shove them back, hard.
The man stumbles against a stall, but it’s enough that oyster and mussel shells slide off an icy display, clattering across the floor.
A second man pushes Dane, unbalancing him, and I propel forward and kick the man’s ankles from the side, unsteadying him just enough that he teeters.
I can’t believe I’ve done that—it’s like I’m suddenly a stunt woman—but my astonishment is short lived as he starts to right himself, using the momentum to grab at Dane again, pulling him backward.
I do the only thing I can think of, which is to grab the tail of a fish off the ice and slap it hard at my attacker, hitting him squarely on the head.
It works. The man recoils and stumbles back on his ass.
We don’t waste the opportunity. We run.