“I have to go,” I told them all.
“No,” Zach yelled. “You don’t!”
“He’s right, Ms. Morgan,” Townsend said. “We’ve come this far. There are channels, operations—”
“The same channels that told the Circle they should send an assassin to stake out Joe Solomon’s cabin?” I asked, but Townsend seemed indifferent to the point. “The last time we went through channels, I killed a man.”
“The Circle could be here.” Macey was beside me, pleading. “Did it ever occur to you that they have this place under surveillance just like the cabin was?”
“We’ve been staring down at that building for hours, Macey. Of course it occurred to me.”
“But did you think about why there’s no record of your having been there?” Bex said. “Did you think about—”
“What if it’s still there?” I shouted. “I came to Rome for that—” I pointed to the bank. “I came looking for whatever is in there.…And what if it’s still in there?”
“Ms. Morgan.” Townsend sounded like the cold, calculating operative he was.
“Would you die to stop them, Agent Townsend?”
“Yes.” He didn’t miss a beat.
I pushed up my sleeves, revealing the fading slashes on my arms. “Then think about what I would do.”
“Cam,” Bex said, easing closer.
“You need me,” I said, looking at Townsend and then Zach and Abby. “You never would have known about the embassy or Preston or the bank. You won’t know what I know until I get inside.” I breathed deeply. “You need me.”
“Cam,” Zach said. “You don’t have to take this risk.”
“Rome, Abby.” I ignored him and turned to my aunt. “A month before my father disappeared, he needed you in Rome. Now I need you in Rome.”
“I know.” Abby’s voice was small and fragile, and immediately I wanted to take the words back. But then she straightened and turned to the bank. “Where do we start?”
Chapter Twenty-seven
Covert Operations Report
At approximately 0900 hours on Saturday, October 14, Operative Morgan was given a stern lecture by Agent Townsend, a tracking device by Agent Cameron, and a very scary look from Operative Goode. (She also got a tip that her bra strap was showing from Operative McHenry.)
The Operative then undertook a basic reconnaissance mission inside a potentially hostile location. (But it wasn’t as hostile as Operative Baxter was going to be if everything didn’t go according to plan.)
Walking across the square that morning, I should have been afraid. I looked down at my hands, waiting to see them shake a little, but they were steady; my pulse was even. I don’t know if it was my training or my gut telling me that I was prepared—I was ready. But more likely it had something to do with the voices in my ear, talking over one another, giving orders all the way.
“Very good, Squirt,” Aunt Abby said. “Now, stop at that corner and let us—”
“Keep walking, Ms. Morgan.”
“Townsend,” Abby snapped. “The southwest security camera is blinded.”
“I’ve got eyes on her from the southwest,” Zach said. “She’s clear.” I could see him on the far side of the piazza, reading a paper and staring through the morning crowds, looking right at me. “She looks great.”
“Okay, Squirt, you know what to do,” Abby said, and I walked on.
Agent Townsend was at my back, and Bex’s voice was in my ear. “So far so good, Cam. Just keep walking.” So I did. All the way across the square and through the bank’s heavy doors, into a lobby that I could have sworn I’d never seen before.
The only thing that was familiar was the way Macey walked twenty feet in front of me in her tallest heels, her hand draped through Preston’s arm. Every now and then she’d laugh and lean to rest her head on his shoulder. I wasn’t entirely sure if it was a part of her cover or her natural tendency for really effective flirting (or, perhaps, her cover as a really effective flirt?), but the effect couldn’t be denied.
No one in the lobby was looking at me.
“Okay, Cammie.” Aunt Abby’s voice was clear in my ear, and I heard her draw a deep breath. “What are you seeing?”
She didn’t just sound like a CoveOps teacher—she sounded like the CoveOps teacher. So I took a casual turn around the floor and tried to do what Joe Solomon had been asking me to do for years: see everything.
There were fresh flowers on a table, and the ceilings were at least thirty feet high. The floors were made of stone and looked as old as the city itself. It was the kind of place that was built on wealth and prestige and the ability to keep the masses out. But whether or not I’d made it past those heavy doors before was something I couldn’t say.
Across the room, Preston walked to one of the small tables and said, “I’d like to make a withdrawal, please.” He pulled a wallet from his inner pocket and handed a card to the teller, while Macey leaned against him, smoothing the lapel of his jacket. She looked like a girl in love. Preston looked like a boy about to vomit all over a two-hundred-year-old table. And I kept turning, scanning the room as casually as I could.
“It’s okay, Cam,” Bex said in my ear. “You’re just taking a look around. It’s just a recon.”
“Focus, Ms. Morgan,” Townsend said.
“I am!” I hissed in his direction.
“Cam, think,” Bex urged.