Run Girl: Ingrid Skyberg FBI Thrillers Prequel Novella (4 page)

“And you think the girl’s been abducted?”

Sol Franklin glanced at Angelis. “No, not abducted. It seems Rachel Whitticker deliberately slipped away from her bodyguard some time yesterday evening.”

“She did what?”

“Quite determined young thing, it would appear.” Angelis ran a hand through his thick quiff. And shook his head. “The tragedy is, Fortnum’s has an office in Paris, we could have coordinated the whole thing. If only the Secretary of State had known about us—we wouldn’t have let her granddaughter get away.” Angelis threw an accusatory stare in Sol Franklin’s general direction.

“The French security company was recommended by the Bureau’s Chief of Mission in Paris. It’s on a list of approved suppliers. We’ve used their operatives in the past very successfully. That’s why we’re taking responsibility for—”

“Clearing up the mess?” Angelis said.

Ingrid felt as if she were watching a private fight between the two men. It was unseemly at best and downright unprofessional at worst. She considered wading in and breaking it up, like some teaching assistant in a kindergarten playground. Instead she decided to remind them she was still in the room. “When exactly did all this happen?”

Angelis managed to tear his gaze away from Sol Franklin and finally turned to her. “She gave her incompetent minder the slip shortly before ten p.m. last night.”

“How?”

“The bodyguard hasn’t been that forthcoming with the details so far,” Franklin said. The Regional Security Officer at the embassy in Paris has been questioning her himself. She’s injured—slipped off a roof while she was giving chase.”

“You’re telling me Rachel Whitticker escaped across Parisian rooftops?” Ingrid pictured the architecture of the Paris skyline she remembered from films and postcards.

“It seems the young lady is athletic as well as smart,” Franklin said.

“To be fair, it was just the one roof and a series of fire escapes,” Angelis added. “But nevertheless, it does seem young Rachel is really quite resourceful.”

“I still don’t understand what my role is in all this,” Ingrid said. “You want me to go France to help the police track her down? Is that even a job for the FBI?”

“It’s a little complicated,” Sol Franklin said.

“Doesn’t the Legal Attaché program have a Bureau agent in the embassy in Paris who can deal with it?”

Sol Franklin held up his hands. “I haven’t told you the whole story.”

Ingrid uncrossed her legs and leaned forward in her seat, willing him to do just that.

“We’re pretty sure she’s left France. We believe she’s here in the UK.”

“She is?”

“It seems she took a Eurostar train out of Paris Gare Du Nord. She arrived at St Pancras International just after eight a.m. this morning.”

“If she lost her bodyguard at ten p.m. last night, what has she been doing for the last ten hours?”

“Covering her tracks. We now have CCTV footage confirming her presence at a number of suburban train stations just outside Paris. She left Paris initially on a train headed for Boulogne. Got off first stop she could, then criss-crossed her way back again. Meanwhile, everyone’s expecting her to arrive at the Channel to catch a ferry.”

“So surely UK Border Control were alerted last night.” Ingrid stared at Sol Franklin. He avoided eye contact by looking down at the file in front of him. “I don’t understand. Why didn’t they just pick her up as soon as her passport was checked this morning?”

“They weren’t alerted last night. The French security company thought they could contain the situation. They didn’t admit that they’d lost the girl until this morning. After Rachel Whitticker’s arrival here.”

“That’s just crazy. Surely as soon as the Secretary of State was informed of the situation her security detail would have taken over—close relative or not.” Ingrid glanced at Angelis. He just stared back at her and said nothing. She got the distinct impression there was a vital fact they weren’t sharing with her.

“I need to explain how you can help us in all this.” Franklin said.

“Diplomatic Security should be taking control of the situation. I don’t even understand why the Bureau has gotten involved.”

He grimaced. “The Diplomatic Security Service really have no role to play. Trust me on that.”

“Then why not let the UK cops handle it?”

“We’d actually really like to keep the whole situation contained as much as possible. If this thing leaked out to the press… well you can forget about brokering a peace deal in central Africa. All hell would break loose.”

“OK… then use whichever agents you have assigned to dealing with this kind of thing, here in London.”

Sol Franklin pulled a pack of cigarettes from his shirt pocket and started to push it around his desk like a child playing with a toy car. “As I said before… it’s complicated.”

“The Bureau agents here are all men and you need a woman to act as chaperone once she’s found?” Ingrid couldn’t think of another possible explanation for her involvement.

“Not exactly.” He slipped the cigarettes back in his pocket. “The FBI has a single dedicated post here at the embassy for dealing with criminal matters. An errant granddaughter on the lam? That’s not something for counterterrorism or counterintelligence agents to get involved with. Politically, that would be… inappropriate. So…” He glanced toward Angelis for assistance. Franklin looked like a man in need of saving.

“The agent who previously had the job here is no longer in post. I gather he left in rather a hurry,” Angelis said.

“So you want me to do his job until the girl is located?”

Sol Franklin smiled broadly at her. “Precisely.”

“Wouldn’t it just be easier to bring in some trusted members of the UK security forces? MI5?” She threw Angelis a glowering look. She still didn’t understand why an operative from a private security company was so closely involved in the operation. “MI5 wouldn’t go running to the press.”

“It’s not an official matter. We don’t want to escalate it to the level of an international incident. Getting MI5 involved would do exactly that,” Franklin said and looked at Angelis again. “Which is why we’re utilizing the services of Nick’s company.”

Ingrid sat very still for a few moments and considered everything she’d been told. There still seemed to be a piece of the puzzle missing. “If this girl is smart, resourceful, and clearly determined to pursue her own agenda here in Europe… what’s the problem? She’ll do whatever it is she came here for then return to Paris, won’t she? Why do we have to track her down at all?”

Sol Franklin shifted uncomfortably in his seat. “We can’t wait around for her to just turn up. We absolutely must find Rachel Whitticker before the Secretary of State completes today’s round of negotiations in Strasbourg—at midnight tonight.”

A moment later it dawned on Ingrid what they had been keeping from her.

Sweet Jesus
.

She stared first at Angelis then Sol Franklin. “The Secretary of State doesn’t even know her granddaughter is missing, does she?”

8

For a moment, all Ingrid could do was stare into space as she calculated the possible ramifications of not informing the Secretary of State and then not being able to locate the girl. She stopped when her imagination conjured up so much crap hitting the fan they’d need waterproofs and waders.

“You can’t keep this from her,” Ingrid said. “She has a right to know.”

“The Secretary of State is in the middle of very delicate negotiations. We can’t risk her being distracted by something this… this…” Sol Franklin was having trouble finding the right word.

“Her eighteen-year-old granddaughter has disappeared—please don’t tell me you were going to say
trivial
.” Ingrid wondered whether they’d be treading on such sensitive eggshells if the Secretary of State had been a man. Didn’t they think Jayne Whitticker could cope with a family crisis and still do her job? Ingrid decided to keep that observation to herself. It wouldn’t help the situation.

“You’ve got to understand our position here. It’s one hell of a judgment call.”

“What about the girl’s parents? Surely you have to tell them?”

“At the moment,” Angelis interjected, “this is all about containment. We need to keep this information as secure as we can.”

“Her parents are hardly likely to leak the news to the media,” Ingrid said, then immediately realized how wrong she was. Of course they’d go to the papers and the TV stations—anything to get their daughter back. Angelis was about to speak, but Ingrid held up her hand. “It’s OK—I know what you’re going to say. So—we tell no one. I get that. But what happens when the Secretary of State finally does find out about it?”

“We’ll cross that bridge when we have to,” Franklin said. “There’s a bigger picture here. We have a moral duty to ensure the peace talks continue without interruption.”

“After all, as you’ve already suggested, Rachel Whitticker might be perfectly safe holed up in a five star hotel somewhere, having a lovely time,” Angelis said.

“What’s she doing for money?” Ingrid asked. “Any recent transactions on her credit card?”

Angelis moved from his spot leaning against the file cabinet to stand beside Sol Franklin. “According to the French bodyguard, the girl was flashing her plastic around with gay abandon in the upmarket Parisian fashion boutiques. She actually used the guard to carry her shopping for her. We’ve checked with the stores—it seems she used a credit card registered to Jayne Whitticker.”

“Her grandmother gave her a card?”

Angelis shrugged.

“You’re not suggesting she stole it?”

“Not at all. The Secretary of State just wanted to keep her granddaughter occupied, one supposes.”

“And she used the card to pay for her train ticket to London?” Ingrid asked.

“No. The transactions stop after a large withdrawal of cash from an ATM. She’s smart enough not to leave a trail.”

“So she’ll be using that cash in the UK?”

“That’s the assumption we’re making.”

“Same goes for her cell phone—I guess she’s not using that either?” Ingrid asked.

“Not a peep from it since last night.” Angelis turned around and separated two wooden slats on the window shade. He peered outside. “We really should get going. We have a lot to do.”

“When you say ‘we’ who exactly are you referring to?” Ingrid asked Franklin.

“Nick’s company have pretty much come to our rescue. They can provide support on the ground and the intel we need. We can’t risk going through Bureau channels to gather intelligence about the girl—it’d raise too many flags right across all the security services.

“I still don’t understand why you need me. It sounds as if Mr Angelis’ company have things pretty much under control.”

“Nick needs a US government agent to work with on the ground. You are the best candidate for the job. If you refuse to help us, well… not to put too fine a point on it…”

“We’re a tad screwed.” Angelis helpfully finished Franklin’s sentence.

“Really?”

“If things go tits up and it’s just me and my associates on the case, the fallout—not just for my company, you understand, for the US government too—would be catastrophic. Relying entirely on an outside agency? Our role has to remain completely unofficial throughout.”

“Wait a minute.” Ingrid wriggled forward on her chair. “Are you saying you want me involved to carry the can if things go wrong?”

Franklin glared at Angelis. “Not at all.” He continued to stare at Angelis until the private spook slunk away, back to his original position. “When we find Rachel we need a US government representative present. To act as a chaperone.” He smiled resignedly at her. “As one Federal agent to another, I’m asking for your help here.”

Ingrid thought about the alternative—returning to the training session in an airless conference room at New Scotland Yard. She pictured all the bored detectives who clearly wanted to be some place else. A thought occurred to her. “If she left Paris last night, how come the Secretary of State didn’t miss her? Wouldn’t they have spoken on the phone?”

“The negotiations went on well into the early hours. Then resumed at eight a.m. the following morning. The Secretary of State didn’t have a chance to miss her,” Sol Franklin said.

“Do you have any idea why Rachel Whitticker has come to the UK? Why not hang out in Paris instead?”

“With a babysitter?”

“OK—once she’d shaken off the unwanted companion—she could have gone to Berlin, or Milan, or a half dozen other fabulous European cities. Why London?”

“We’ve been checking her social media accounts. She’s been having a lot of online chats with a particular individual studying at Imperial College in London.”

“You’ve spoken to him?”

“We would if we could. It seems he’s disappeared too. Some time last night. None of his college chums has a clue where he might have gone. His mobile phone has been inactive since ten p.m. last night.”

Sol Franklin leaned his elbows on his desk. “Can I assume from your questions that you will accept this mission?” He stared her in the eye, long and hard.

Ingrid had to look away. She didn’t want to let the Bureau down. But equally, she wasn’t keen to spend any more time with Nick Angelis.

“Come on, Agent Skyberg,” Franklin said, “you can save the girl and help bring peace to a war-torn region.”

Ingrid blinked. The room was suddenly deathly quiet except for the hum and clank of the heating pipes. Even Angelis had wisely decided to hold his tongue. After Franklin had put the mission in such stark terms, how could she refuse?

“OK,” she said, “but for God’s sake let’s not waste any more time.”

9

Sol Franklin jumped out of his chair, enclosed Ingrid’s right hand in both of his and pumped her arm. “Great to have you on board, Ingrid.”

“It certainly is.” Angelis, for once, stayed back. “Shall we?” He pointed toward the door.

“Wait a second,” Franklin said. He opened a drawer beneath his desk and retrieved Ingrid’s cell phone. “You might need this.”

Ingrid slipped the phone into her purse and got as far as the door when she stopped. “Should I be armed for this mission?”

“UK Home Office don’t like us running around with guns,” Franklin told her. “There shouldn’t be any need for a sidearm anyway. She is just a teenager.”