City Spies: Chapters 11–16

She’d altered her appearance with makeup and possibly surgery, but she couldn’t hide her mannerisms. He recognized the way she adjusted her glasses and her tendency to hold each hand in a fist, a habit she developed as a child to keep from biting her nails.

Maybe she didn’t enroll but visited as a prospective student.

The statue’s head had apparently been blown off in the explosion and now sat upside down in a nearby flower bed. There was still some residual smoke emanating from Mrs. Hobart’s neck.

There was still some residual smoke emanating from Mrs. Hobart’s neck.

The aura of effortless perfection that Dr. Cooper had conveyed up until that point began to falter.

She trembled and seemed on the verge of erupting when she was struck by inspiration.

“You desecrated the statue of Mrs. Hobart, and you’re going to pay for it.”

“A group of frogs is called an army, not a swarm,” Olivia answered with a smug smile.

“If you don’t have a family, how can you afford to go to a fancy school like that?”
“It was stipulated in my grandmother’s will,” she said.

“That’s the drawback with being an anonymous vigilante for justice,” she admitted. “You don’t get to explain your intentions, and sometimes the general public misses your true artistry.”

Dr. Cooper didn’t think she ‘had the right look’ for such a prominent role.

“That was in response to Dr. Cooper canceling the Robotics and Engineering Club and then using the money to create a school pageant,” she said, shaking her head. “A bloody beauty pageant with girls in sportswear answering questions about saving the planet. I was beyond livid. So, I did my little car trick and put a note on the windshield that said, ‘Bet you’d like an engineer now, wouldn’t you?’”

“The school’s systematic mistreatment of aboriginal students,” she replied. “We’ve got a handful of girls who come from indigenous tribes. Not that you’d ever see one in a brochure or in a picture on the wall in her office. And every time these girls try to do something that embraces their culture, like sponsor a native dance demonstration or celebrate Harmony Day, Dr. Cooper stops it.”

Brooklyn used her forearm to shield herself from their bright glare as she sat up and got her bearings.

“Magic tricks?”
“They use confidence, deception, and audience manipulation. Just like spycraft,” he said.

“Of course, it used to be rather small, but then MI6 expanded it and added some new features.”
This was an understatement.
The door swung open to reveal a room roughly twenty by twenty with high-tech gear everywhere.

“Are you kidding?” answered Brooklyn, who stood virtually motionless, mesmerized by the machine.

“Did we get official approval?”
“Yes,” Mother answered, eliciting enthusiastic reactions from around the table.

“We also discussed our unique position with regard to the current situation, and we were given the all-clear to implement Operation Willy Wonka.”

“Nearly fifty thousand young people from around the world are expected to descend on the city for four days of rallies and a scientific symposium,” Monty said, seamlessly taking over the briefing.

“Undercover agents hate media and despise scrutiny,” said Mother.

These showed shattered computers and broken furniture strewn across the room.

“Meet Leyland Carmichael, an environmental extremist who attacked multiple tech companies in the US and Canada.”

“The Fulgora Storm Three, a lithium ion battery prototype being developed for a next generation electric car, was stolen, and a purple thumbprint was left at the scene.”

“You are going to hack Charlotte?” Rio asked, disbelieving. “No offense, but that’s easier said than done.”
“He’s right,” said Paris. “She’s a computer virtuoso.”

She wore the Kinloch Abbey uniform of burgundy blazer and tartan skirt as she rode in Coach A, seat 22B on the train to Aisling.

Her dark brown eyes and full, round cheeks perpetually looked like they were on the verge of a smile.

It was a laptop belonging to an accountant from Edinburgh sitting in 4B who had the latest firewall installed. But Charlotte still managed to breach it just as the train reached the platform at Aisling.

If there was any awkwardness about coming back to the FARM for the first time since she’d left, it was offset by the sense of familiarity that greeted her as she followed the footpath from the station.

Brooklyn had watched as she approached the house and timed it down to the last second, taking a bite of cookie right before answering the door to make it seem like she was goofy and friendly rather than cool and calculating.

Then, with as much New York City attitude as she could muster, she added, “They call me Charlotte 2.0.”

Brooklyn had Charlotte right where she wanted her, all distracted and discombobulated. She was not her normal, sharp self.

The scientists inside the highly secure facility had to wear futuristic-looking BSL-4-positive pressure “spacesuits,” because they worked exclusively with the deadliest viruses on the planet.

It was closely followed by a chase car with two agents from the DGSI, the French intelligence agency in charge of counterterrorism.

Sometimes she’ll say something rude, but she doesn’t mean it that way. And sometimes she’ll do something you think is totally mad only to find out later it’s really quite lovely. Like her caper with the chocolate bars.

If Monty was uncharacteristically gruff, it was because the team found itself facing unprecedented scrutiny. Everything changed the moment the French secret agents were murdered.

“You live here?” she asked incredulously, looking around at the sparse furnishings. Other than the air traffic control equipment, there was little more than a metal cot, an electric teakettle, and a bookcase filled with old paperbacks.

Windows wrapped around the entire room, giving it a 360-degree panoramic vista that stretched from the North Sea in the east to the sun setting over the highlands in the west.

She wasn’t sure how to broach this subject, so she just dived right in.

“Even though it’s a loan company, it’s never made any loans. Not one. It just borrows money from one bank and pays it back to another. That’s all it does. Borrow and pay back.”
“So that tells me that Alton Slater’s a substandard businessman,” he replied. “But it doesn’t mean he’s a villain.”