The Good Thief

She stood, wanting to kiss him on the cheek again, but knowing the gesture would only make him uncomfortable, she left.

Chapter 7

Lindsey resisted the urge to tell the cabdriver once more how urgently she needed to be on time for a meeting at the Place des Nations. Beatrix expected her in five minutes, but they were stuck in traffic on Geneva’s Pont du Mont Blanc. The cabbie couldn’t change that miserable fact.

At 8:00 a.m., a half hour later than planned, she’d hurried aboard the private jet in Florence. In Geneva, she spent another fifteen precious minutes connecting with a taxi. It was now 12:55. If she didn’t make it on time, Beatrix could use that as an excuse to avoid seeing her.

A young girl’s life shouldn’t depend on making transportation connections, Lindsey thought as the taxi burned fuel going nowhere fast.

The bridge spanned the southern tip of Lake Geneva where the lake flowed into the Rhone River. A thick layer of ice created by winds gusting off the lake covered benches on the quay on the north shore in white. The famous Jet d’Eau geyser was, of course, turned off for the winter. Everything seemed pewter-colored, the buildings, the lake, the sky, the peaks of the Savoy Alps beyond Geneva. Despite the warmth of the cab and her black Cossack-style coat and boots, Lindsey shivered. The gray, cold day mirrored her mood.

Her cell phone rang. Beatrix. Lindsey explained the traffic mess and added, “I’ll be no more than ten minutes late if I have to get out and run.”

“You still wouldn’t make it. But I was calling because I must cancel. My lunch appointment is lasting longer than anticipated.”

Lindsey clutched the telephone, her pulse accelerating. Remain calm. “Just tell me where you are, and I’ll meet you there afterward. I only need a few minutes, Beatrix.”

“Do you realize that I could be fired just for being seen with you, if your line of work were discovered?”

Beatrix was overreacting. Probably. “I’ll wait till your lunch meeting is over and—”

“No, Lindsey, I’m sorry. It’s just impossible. I have to prepare for an—”

“Beatrix, when you hear how important this is—”

“Dear girl, I have all the high-priority crises I can handle, thank you very—”

“R-JUV-8.”

The connection between them fell silent. Last year, Lindsey, in a dicey contact, had stumbled onto a shipment of an antiaging serum claiming to be chock-full of human growth hormone but being instead a mix of herbal derivatives and an illegal new, and very dangerous, stimulant. She’d involved Beatrix, who then received credit for the confiscation of six million dollars’ worth of the product. Beatrix owed Lindsey a favor or three. Since Lindsey worked outside of legal channels, Beatrix was extremely nervous about dealing with Lindsey.

“Are you there, Beatrix?”

Beatrix sighed. She gave Lindsey an address in the Paquis district, one of the few interesting areas in this city, which was, for such an international population, pizzazz-challenged. Behind practical gray stone walls, powerful people met and conducted world affairs. World Council of Churches. World Intellectual Property Organization. Eurovision. All those banks. Virtually every major NGO, and, of course, the diplomats. Geneva was unofficially the world capital of bureaucracies. “We can meet there. No one I know eats there and I can return to work quickly.”

The menu outside indicated that the steamy restaurant, Bistro Eidelweiss, offered typical Swiss and French food. The tiny lobby was crowded. Lindsey immediately spotted Beatrix’s brown chignon and on her way to Beatrix’s table she passed hot fondues and soups, onion tarts, crepes with all kinds of fillings. Her stomach growled. All she’d eaten on the jet was a health bar topped off with coffee.

By the time an obviously overworked waiter signaled he’d soon be there to take Lindsey’s order, Beatrix had already listened to Lindsey’s story about the possibility of trafficking in genetically modified human embryos. She checked her BlackBerry, then shook her head.

“Whatever it is, it’s monstrous,” Beatrix said. “I’m sorry I avoided you. I’ll help. We’ll just have to work around your…fascinating connections—even if it means I lose my job.” Her blue eyes sparkled with what looked like determination. “Kestonians are looking to develop human supersoldiers. Their new dictator, Vlados Zelasko, is a nut. The idea is outrageous and impossible. We log the movements and actions of Kestonians wherever they turn up. I can provide you with the names of all the labs we’re watching, but that’s all I have that could be relevant.”

Human supersoldiers. Extra strong. Extra fast. Superhuman eyesight and hearing. Human weapons. Exactly the kind of thing that would bring a huge black-market price. And maybe no longer an impossible idea at all. “That’s exactly what I’m after—”

“Oh, my God!” Beatrix blurted out as she hid her face with her purse.

“What?” Lindsey said.

“The man that just came in, he works with me.”

“Shall I—”

“Just leave, okay?”

Lindsey reached across the table and squeezed Beatrix’s arm. “Done. You take care. And thank you.”

No specific leads. No crepes. No fondue. She rose and made her way back to her coat and hat, her stomach demanding that she eat a mountain of pasta very soon.

Chapter 8

His name was Iacapo Donato, but Lindsey called him Jake. Known publicly as a highly respectable antiquities dealer, his various and nefarious ties extended far beyond the world of thousand-year-old kraters, coins, or marble busts—things that were occasionally reasons for Lindsey to contact him about underground rumblings. Jake had also helped her father find the son of a billionaire Moroccan, kidnapped despite her father’s security team. Jake had learned of a shipment of illegals from Morocco into France. The smugglers of cheap labor also had the boy. NSI had successfully returned the boy to his family.

It was quite possible that Jake may have heard of something involving a kidnapping, maybe even specifically about the high-profile kidnapping of two American girls from Phoenix, Arizona. Checking AA.org, Lindsey saw that Shannon Connor, a former Athena Force student with no love for her alma mater, had also been on international broadcasts of BBC and CNN, continuing her negative spotlight on the Athena Academy.

When Lindsey had called Jake from the jet to make sure he’d be at his private club in Florence tonight, he’d invited her instead to his villa for the evening. “I’ll be showing off my latest acquisitions—and more,” he said in his affected British accent. “Wear that marvelous jade gown.”

So. Formal attire instead of cocktail. The dress was actually sage-green, but definitely the sexiest thing she’d ever owned. Stretch satin and nearly backless, its modest neckline set off a faux emerald necklace while the daring cut of the sides displayed more of her breasts than an unescorted woman in Italy should reveal. The floor-length sheath was slit only to midthigh level, but the back plunge and clinging fabric made underwear impossible.

Dress and heels. Nothing else, except necklace and earrings and her fluffy hunter-green mohair shawl.

Jake’s villa lay sixteen kilometers from Florence. She pushed her Alfa Spider above the speed limit through the village of Malmantile, which had grown around an old Tuscan fortification on the road to Pisa. The villa, perched on the side of a shallow canyon, had been added onto a centuries-old square tower. Five stories tall, its crenellated top had been roofed and glassed in. The four-story front section and the three-story wings featured romantic balconies and rows of narrow arches. The place was architecturally stunning and filled with pricey antiques—all watched over by Jake’s staff and all for sale.

Inside, she checked her shawl, ascended a broad staircase to the second floor, and worked her way through elegantly attired guests toward a buffet table without spotting Jake. He was probably in the gaming room in the back where high-stakes, illegal baccarat and roulette were played. Jake’s payoff from her for his efforts was always two things: five percent of her finder’s fee and that, every time she came to him soliciting information, she spend at least two hours in the back room schmoozing with his gamblers and looking her most alluring.

Before she could select any of the gorgeous morsels on the buffet, a man’s hand clapped her bare back and swept her from the table. Beppo, a glorified fence for stolen goods, whisked her onto a balcony into the shock of cold air and thrust her backward in a motion so smooth and sudden, she had no immediate defense. Smelling of stale tobacco, he leaned on top of her like a tango dancer bending over his partner, and the rail pressed painfully into her spine and kidneys.