A Spy Like Me Read Online Free Page B

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excrement made me feel positively sick.
    Aimee nudged me. “It is about to start.”
    A light sweat formed on my body as our time
to plummet towards the cement floor drew near. I checked and
rechecked my cables and attachments. A cold draft sent goose bumps
down my legs. Maybe I’d end up in a hospital next to Malcolm. Or
the morgue.
    Aimee whispered, “You can do this.”
    “Doesn’t mean I want to.”
    Gray gave us a stern look to stop
talking.
    As soon as Dad strode through the side door,
his boots echoing on the cement, everyone quieted. Kind of like
when God created the earth, I imagined. Dad evoked this kind of
scary presence when he was in full Spy Games mode. By his long
stride and the swish of his leather pants, the sway of his
shoulders and his slicked-back hair, they would never know that six
months ago he sold herbal remedies to constipated old ladies.
Unfortunately, his dramatic efforts worked on everyone but me. That
was because I’d seen him in his sweats, singing to Barry Manilow,
while he burned our instant mac and cheese.
    Dad took full advantage of everyone’s gawking
stares. He glanced around as if a hundred men in black suits with
ear buds were about to burst through the door. It was all part of
the act.
    “We have a serious situation.” His deep
booming voice bounced off the walls and echoed between the rafters.
“A high profile executive has been taken for ransom. It’s your job
to follow the clues and save him. Before it’s too late.”
    The warehouse door screeched open, and
everyone looked. Malcolm entered.
    Malcolm? He was alive! Joy burst through my
veins and flooded my body. A zillion-ton weight lifted off me, and
I felt like I could float off the beam if I let go. We needed to
throw confetti and drink lemonade because I wasn’t a murderer after
all.
    Malcolm strode across the room and I drank in
the sight of him, his moving limbs, his chest rising up and down as
he breathed! He settled into the back of the crowd, cool and
composed.
    The instantaneous burst of joy over the fact
I wasn’t a murderer faded, and my blood went from simmering to
boiling. All this time, I believed he could’ve been dead. He
could’ve called, texted, or thrown pebbles at my window. Anything!
He probably didn’t show up to work at Les Pouffant’s just to
torture me.
    I leaned slightly forward to catch a look at
his guilty face. I felt a spinning sensation before I realized I
was falling forward. I desperately reached for Aimee, swinging my
arms wildly. She caught the edge of my shirt, but gravity ripped it
from her hands. Air whooshed around me and I forgot all proper form
in free falling. My stomach dropped. Images of me going splat on
the cement floor flashed through my mind.
    My whole body jerked, and it felt like my
arms were going to be ripped from their sockets. I stopped,
suspended in the air about ten feet from my rafter, high above the
heads of the wannabes who were so into my dad they didn’t notice a
thing. I swung back and forth, dangling from a wire. Gray held the
line, and I silently pled with him to pull me back up. Clearly, he
needed to develop his skills of telepathy.
    Sweat tickled my armpits and dotted my
forehead as the cement and the heads of the people swung back and
forth in my vision. Malcolm became a blur. I was stuck until it was
time to drop. I’d look like a loser, but I didn’t care. Solid
ground. Nice, hard cement under my feet. That was all I cared
about.
    Dad continued with his speech, obviously not
aware that with one slip of Gray’s hands, his one and only daughter
could become a floor decoration. “You’ll have to work together or
it will be very hard for your team to succeed—”
    I blocked the rest out. I just wanted to stop
swinging like a monkey.
    “And here’s the staff to help you with your
spy mission today. Give a hand to Nancy!”
    Crap.
    Nancy swooped past me to the cheering of the
crowd. Dad boomed out their names as they dropped down.