Hearing his murmur, Amy felt as though Evan had just enveloped her in one of his comforting hugs. “I know,” she said softly. “I was thinking the same thing. I’m so sorry that you got dragged into my mess. You didn’t sign up for this.”
“I did sign up for this,” Evan said. Across the many miles, she heard the firmness in his voice. “You’re in trouble. Do you expect me to just walk away?”
“I wouldn’t hold it against you if you did.”
“I know you wouldn’t. That’s only one of the reasons I’m crazy about you. I’ve got a million more.”
“Just a million?” she teased.
“Okay, a million plus one – your cat.”
She giggled. “You’re bonding with Saladin?”
“Somebody has to protect that cat from your cousin Ian. And I even feed him. The cat. Not Ian. He’s on his own. Anyway, if that doesn’t get me Perfect Boyfriend status, I don’t know what will.”
“Emptying the litter box?”
“Hey. I have my limits.”
Amy laughed. She had the phone pressed to her ear so tightly it burned. She closed her eyes, picturing his face… .
Ian’s crisp voice broke in. “All right, lovebirds, let’s move on. No offense, but I believe Amy and Dan might need a short course in style and class.”
“Is this the nonoffensive part?” Dan asked. “I can’t wait until you really insult us.”
“Let’s deal with reality, shall we? You don’t just walk into an auction house in your jeans and backpacks. You have to blend in. And that’s going to be hard.” Ian sniffed. “Considering that you’re Americans.”
“What are you talking about, dude?” Dan asked. “This is my best SpongeBob T-shirt.”
“Exactly my point,” Ian said. “An auction is a place of taste and refinement. If you barge in looking like … well, you …”
“I get your drift, Ian,” Amy said, cutting him off. “Do you know the most exclusive shop in Lucerne?”
“Of course. Here’s an idea,” Ian said. “Video your trip to the store, and I can advise you. Or else you’ll emerge looking like a mushroom, and Dan like he just rolled out of bed.”
Amy sighed. Just when she started to almost like Ian again – after all, he’d flown across the ocean and had been working around the clock to help – his snob quotient went through the roof.
She felt a sharp elbow in her ribs. Dan thrust his phone in her face. He had imported the photograph into a sketch program on his phone. He’d colored the bright blond hair brown and the eyes dark. He’d added a beauty mark above Cheyenne Wyoming’s lip.
Amy gasped. It was Vanessa Mallory!
She quickly told the others what Dan had figured out. “But why was she tailing us?” she wondered.
“Vesper One wants to keep tabs on us,” Dan said. “What else?”
“Remember, it’s in his best interest to keep you two out of jail,” Evan pointed out. “Maybe he sent her to make sure you got over the border.”
“It’s still creepy,” Amy said.
“Speaking of creepy, she probably knows where you are right now,” Evan said. “I’ve been looking at the manuals for the Vesper phone. I’m guessing that there’s a GPS embedded in it, too.”
Amy shivered as she glanced at the few pedestrians walking by. Was Cheyenne watching them right now? Was Casper?
“Can we dismantle it?” she asked.
“You don’t want them to know that you know it’s there. But you can learn how to turn it off and on. You’ve got to be careful – it’s got to look like satellite disturbance.”
“Let Dan do it,” Amy said. “He’s better at these things than I am.”
She handed Dan the Vesper phone. Dan tossed his apple core into the bushes. He pried off the back of the Vesper phone and listened to Evan.
“Yeah, yeah, I got it. Then what do I … oh, gotcha. Cool. Awesome! Take that, V-One!”
“Can we turn it off for a bit?” Amy asked.
“I think you can get away with it,” Sinead said. “Just get to Lucerne as soon as you can. There’s an auction at three. That can give you cover.”
“Got it.” Amy snapped the phone shut. She almost wished she didn’t know about the GPS.
That meant that Vesper One could get to them anywhere. Anytime.
Lucerne, Switzerland
Milos Vanek was tired. He was always tired. He relied on coffee to keep awake. Coffee and duty. He sat in the cafe on an upscale street in Lucerne. He’d chosen it for its large windows. He watched the crowd. You never knew when you could get lucky.
Tracing criminals … sometimes it was like a seed stuck in a tooth. Something that nagged him, some small detail that wouldn’t go away. A crime would occur, a suspect identified, a search begun. Some were routine. And some were a seed in a tooth.
This brother and sister – Amy and Dan Cahill. He couldn’t figure them out, and that was bothering him. Rich brats out for kicks? Most likely. Yet he dug a little bit and discovered that although they were fantastically wealthy they attended a public school, had not exhibited discipline problems, were not featured in the tabloids, did not give interviews, did not appear in a reality TV program … none of the things he expected.
Yet suddenly they had dropped out of school and headed for Europe. There was a small item in a Boston paper about a fuel truck and a school bus and a possible attempted kidnapping. It was the lack of detail that bothered him. Small article, then nothing. Schoolchildren had been endangered. Usually, Americans went crazy over things like that.
And within a few days these two kids had stolen a priceless painting from the Uffizi. A theft so cool and daring it must have been done by professionals.
But it had been done by children.
Then there was the strange accusation from an American student that Dan and Amy Cahill had stolen the first edition of Marco Polo’s manuscript … a manuscript that didn’t even exist. The accusation had been buried in a file, but Vanek had found it, because he didn’t sleep much and he had a seed in his tooth.
They’d been on the Zurich train, he was sure of it. That’s why he had the train stopped at the border. Somewhere between there and Lucerne, they had gotten off. But where did they get off? And how did they get off?
Kids could disappear more easily than adults. People didn’t notice kids. And these kids were so … neutral. So bland in that American way.
His partner came out of the ladies’ room. Most women when they exited a bathroom appeared with newly brushed hair, a fresh swipe of lipstick. Not Luna Amato. She went in looking like a slightly rumpled Italian grandmother and came out looking like a slightly rumpled Italian grandmother. Gray hair curling around her face. Black dress, flat shoes, unfashionable jacket with a coffee stain on the sleeve. Sharp brown eyes that could look vacant, kind, or merciless, depending on the situation.
He’d never worked with her before, but he needed someone who could blend in. Someone who could approach the kids and not scare them. He knew they’d been close to their grandmother, Grace Cahill. He’d been betting that they’d be suckers for someone her age.
Amato sat down and fished an ice cube out of her water glass. She plopped it in her coffee. He’d worked with her for three days now and the only thing he knew about her was that coffee was always too hot for her taste.