Piers.
His voice still held a hint of his childhood. Underneath the polished and refined demeanor I’m sure he portrayed to the rest of the world, part of him remained a young boy living on the streets of London. I’d worked hard to erase all traces of my early life. Now, only when I got upset could the tiniest bit of a British accent be heard.
I pulled out a stack of papers and pretended to be reading through them, but what I was really doing was listening to the conversation in the next office. Piers had been unsuccessful in locating Benjamin, but that wasn’t a surprise. Or at least it wasn’t to me. If the Organization didn’t want you to be found, you wouldn’t be.
I continued eavesdropping for a minute longer, but when they lowered their voices, I stood up and closed my office door. Out of sight, out of mind. Or so they said. At the moment, I wanted to blend into the background. There would be a time and place to allow Piers to see me, but it wasn’t right now, and it wasn’t here. At the moment, I was glad no one could see me. Certainly, the Organization would be disappointed at how I reacted to hearing Piers talk.
Fortunately, there was no reason for them to ever know. I’d keep it my little secret.
Or at least, that’s what I told myself as I sat back down in my chair. My hands trembled, and I hated it because it was a sign of weakness. I closed my eyes for a second and allowed the memory of the last time I heard his voice sweep over me.
It had been just another normal school day to us. Having recently turning thirteen, Piers was a year ahead of me in school, so we didn’t have any classes together. Our only time together during the day was lunch, and we ate together without fail.
That particular day, I told him I had a meeting after school and would be late leaving. I added that he didn’t have to wait for me, but he gave me a smile and said he’d see about that.
A few years ago, the recollection of that memory had gutted me. Now it only strengthened my resolve. We’d see about something; that was for damn sure.
I heard Tenor enter Mia’s office. From what Mia had told me about how the relationship between the two men deteriorated following the Atlanta trip, I could only assume how seriously Tenor took the current situation. I had a feeling nothing less than a potential catastrophe would make him share the same breathing space with Piers.
My hands no longer trembled. I could do this. I could do what was required. It’s what I’d been living for the past years. I shut off my emotions and mentally went over the next steps I needed to take.
I took the burner phone from my purse and called the number I’d long ago memorized.
“Brigitta,” he said instead of hello almost immediately. “Tell me your status.”
“Target has contacted Bachelor International about the bank account,” I reported.
“You know what to do,” the man said and hung up.
I sent a text to Mia, telling her I had left the office and would work from home for the rest of the day. Autopilot had kicked in. I could have been a robot, I worked so efficiently. I put my laptop and papers into my work tote. The desk in the small office was all neat and tidy, right down to the Back Tomorrow note I put on the desktop.
On the way out, I took a quick glance at the office next to mine. Mia’s door was still closed. Good. That meant she was still meeting with Piers and Tenor. Fingers crossed, that wouldn’t change for at least the next five minutes, because I needed to get into place.
I left the Bachelor International offices and rode the elevator down to the lobby. Even though it was the middle of the workday, there was always a plethora of people milling about around the lobby and surrounding area. I slipped behind a tall planted tree and pulled out my phone. In doing so, I could be anyone from anywhere or no one at all.
I’d scoped out the position on one of my first days at Bachelor International exactly for this reason. It allowed me to stand inconspicuously while still providing a direct line of sight to the elevator.
Once I noted Piers stepping out of the elevator, I slid my phone back into my purse and moved into the flow of people, timing it perfectly to fall in behind Piers as he exited the building. My current task was to get as much information on him as I could before making contact.
I ran through what little we’d been able to glean so far. In a nutshell, though he portrayed a persona of a respectable attorney, he allowed his personal details to be known by only a few. His exact address wasn’t known because he held so much property in the city. For all we knew, Piers bounced from place to place. The only thing we knew for a fact was that he didn’t live at the address listed as his residence on his license and other official documents.
My objective today was to pinpoint where he currently stayed. It was possible he’d driven to the matchmaking office for his meeting today, and in that case, I’d be out of luck. But I hoped that somehow fortune would smile on me and I would learn something useful.
It was ridiculously easy to follow him out of the building, drawing no attention to myself. Of course, it helped that we were in a large city and I appeared as one of many unanimous pedestrians. And the sad but true fact remained that the vast majority of people were too caught up in themselves and their own lives to pay any attention to what was happening around them.
Tailing someone was a skill I’d learned early in my childhood, and in the years that followed, I honed it to near perfection. Only once had I ever been caught. And that one time was enough to ensure it never happened again.
The farther I followed Piers, the less and less I was impressed with him. The Piers I remembered would have picked up on a tail long before now. Granted, we’d only walked a few blocks, but that would have been sufficient for the Piers of years past. I found it difficult to believe he’d allowed himself to become so soft. From the way things were starting out, it appeared this job would be much easier than I’d expected. Especially when he went through so much work to keep his residence unknown.
He’d probably grown complacent over the years. I’d seen it happen a few times. People who were at the top of their game getting blindsided because they dropped their guard. Those who thought they were too good to get caught. Trust me, no one is that good.
I tipped over an uneven break in the sidewalk, and the action caused me to look around. Speaking of not paying attention to what was happening around you, I suddenly realized I didn’t know where I was.
Shit.
I scoped the area out, desperately trying to locate a street sign or a landmark of some sort, but there was nothing I saw that looked familiar. It made little sense. How was it possible the streets weren’t marked? None of the buildings we passed had any visible numbers either. While we were far from being alone, the press of the crowd had lessened. Dread filled my stomach with bile, and I took a deep breath, telling myself I would not throw up.
Unlike normal people who had normal reactions to anxiety and nerves, my body’s knee-jerk response was to vomit. Over the years, I’d learned how to control and eventually to stop it altogether. Except, I quickly realized, when faced with the knowledge that I’d been played by my target.
Piers had disproven my earlier assumption. He was neither soft nor complacent. He’d known exactly what he was doing, somehow switching things around, all the while lulling me into complacency. He was much better than I’d given him credit for. I’d underestimated him, and it’d been a mistake to do so. I wouldn’t make that mistake twice.