He walked with a noticeable limp, though exaggerated. Alex didn’t buy it as a legitimate injury.
“Please tell me you didn’t tear up your knee playing lacrosse,” she said in a whisper. “I’m warning you that you’re too old to be playing those kinds of sports.”
Samuels eyed her closely. “Are you okay?”
“I have a cold and lost my voice earlier this week. I hope you can still understand me.”
“Understand you? Yes. Hear you? Maybe.”
“I’ll try to amplify my voice as much as I can without it hurting,” she said.
“Thank you.”
Alex pushed an index card toward Samuels and sighed.
“What’s this?” Samuels asked.
He flipped it over and read the message: They are listening but can’t hear us when we whisper. Samuels nodded and eased the note back in her direction.
“So, what is the nature of this meeting?” he asked, his voice barely audible.
“Good,” she said softly. “Really good, in fact. I was just wondering how your family was doing.”
“They’re fine. No big family drama to speak of.”
“And what about your plans for Tuesday?” she said as her eyebrows shot upward.
“Same as they’ve been for quite a while. Nothing new there.”
“I just need to know where you are planning on going? Madrid? London? Paris? Berlin?”
“You already know everything you’re supposed to know.”
“I have a diplomatic trip planned to Europe for next week and—”
Samuels eyed her closely. “I’m beginning to wonder if you can actually hear me. You know everything you’re supposed to know.”
“But if I go to a place that I shouldn’t—”
“Nothing’s changed from the original plan.”
Alex sighed. “Your favorite aunt needs to know if she’s going to have a good experience during her upcoming travels. I’m not concerned with my husband. But I am worried about myself.”
Samuels took a deep breath as he scanned the area. “Look, just stay away from the airports in Madrid, London, Lisbon, and Paris.”
“What about Florence and Rome?”
“You shouldn’t experience any discomfort in either of those cities.”
“See,” Alex said, still in a whisper, “was that so difficult?”
He shook his head and gazed off into the distance. “I hope you have a plan.”
“For the future?” she asked.
He shrugged. “For that—and everything else. The world is unstable right now. I’d hate for you to get stuck somewhere else and caught up in the fray.”
“Of course I have a plan,” Alex said. “This life isn’t new to me.”
“Does your plan include your husband?”
She shook her head, resulting in a slight smile from Samuels.
“You always were my favorite aunt,” Samuels said.
She chuckled and leaned forward. The micro tracker in her open hand was barely visible and even less so while tucked away in her palm. Without him noticing, she slipped the device into the cuff of his pants as she patted him on the leg.
“Did you have anything else you wanted to discuss?” Samuels asked. “You made the nature of this meeting sound very urgent.”
“It was,” she said, her eyes bugging out. “I needed to make sure I wasn’t walking into a dangerous situation next week.”
“You’ll be fine,” Samuels said. “Have a nice trip.”
“Thank you,” Alex mouthed to him. He smiled and nodded before sauntering toward the park’s exit.
“Let’s grab him,” Hawk suggested. “I’d love to interrogate the little punk.”
“You had your chance in Dubai and failed,” Alex said. “Besides, we got everything we needed out of him. Now he’s going to lead us straight to his employer.”
CHAPTER 19
THE TEAM CONVENED at the Phoenix Foundation headquarters, setting up in the conference room to monitor all of Shane Samuels’s movements. Blunt wheeled his executive desk chair to join the festivities. He leaned back in his chair and propped his feet up on the table, intently watching Alex’s laptop mirrored onto the large flat screen affixed to the far wall.
“This must be quality entertainment for you,” Alex said while peeping over the top of her computer.
“Beats watching network television,” Blunt said.
“You’ve got a standing invitation to come over and browse through our Bollywood DVD collection for some more engaging movies,” she said.
Blunt chuckled and rolled his eyes. “I can also play solitaire on my phone for two hours and even that would be more entertaining than one of those silly foreign films.”
“Don’t knock it till you’ve tried it,” Hawk said.
Blunt sighed. “I already know what I’d be getting, and this is definitely better than an Indian film.”
“That depends,” Hawk said.
“On what?” Blunt asked.
Hawk cocked his head to one side. “If Samuels does anything of interest. He could just be sitting around all day and counting his money for all we know.”
“And that’d still be more entertaining than reading the terrible translated lines of bad actors,” Blunt said.
Alex shook her head and smiled. “You just don’t know what you’re missing.”
Blunt pointed at the monitor. “It looks like you’re about to miss Samuels leaving his apartment.”
They all watched the dot on her computer program drift from one room to the other and finally come to a stop near the front door.
“Looks like he’s about to leave,” Blunt said. “We need to know where he’s going.”
“False alarm,” Alex said. “He’s staying put for the time being.”
“What was that all about?” Blunt asked. “He looked like he was ready to hit the road.”
“Patience,” Black said. “A stakeout can’t be rushed. And believe you me, if I could rush it, I would.”
For the next two hours, the team watched the dot representing Samuels’s tracker on Alex’s screen. There was very little movement around the house. After a while, Blunt cracked that Samuels was taking a nap.
“Maybe he’s watching a riveting Bollywood movie,” Black said.
Alex shot him a sideways glance. “I detected a little sarcasm in that comment.”
“That’s why you’re a super spy, Alex,” Black said. “Nothing gets by you.”
Blunt sighed as he stood and pushed his chair backward. “I’m going back to my office. I
