She frowned. “An-mei is the one who’s missing.”
He nodded. “And for some reason someone tried to run you down last night and took the time to bug your apartment. Unless you’re involved with the Chinese mafia or some other illicit activity, is it safe to say that sort of thing might be related to your inquiries about your sister?”
Her lips pressed into a tight line and her cheeks flushed pink with either embarrassment or anger. Considering the spark in her eyes, he’d guess both. And damn it, he didn’t like it.
He looked to his team. Every one of their faces was carefully blank. They’d never voice their disagreement in front of a client. They respected him too much to undermine his authority. But the carefully neutral expressions they’d all put into place told him enough. He was being too much of a hard-ass.
He really hated these heart-string contracts. They always ended up a complicated mess.
“Look, it’s the best lead we have, and it’ll take the entire team to sweep the apartment.” See? He could be reasonable. Nice even. “We stand the best chance of getting good intel the sooner we go.”
Maylin nodded, a determined look taking the place of her earlier embarrassment. “Let’s go.”
Chapter Five
“All right,” Marc began. “We know there’s audio surveillance in the apartment. What we need is to confirm whether there’s video. We also need one or more samples of those devices.”
The team was stuffed into an SUV, which normally would be comfortable for a group of four plus Maylin, but somehow seemed a tight fit for Gabe’s group. It wasn’t as if they had a lot of gear or that anyone was particularly bulky in build. Each of them had a strong personality and carried an indefinable sense of pent-up energy. Gabe was driving, while Lizzy had shotgun and Marc and Victoria rode in the back. They’d insisted Maylin ride in the middle row, making her a part of the conversation. She was grateful for it. They didn’t have to but it went a long way toward easing her nerves.
“I didn’t see signs of video surveillance in the usual places,” Gabe interjected. “But there was only me looking.”
“What would it look like?” Maylin thought Gabe had taken a long time looking through her apartment, but she’d been tired at the time and confused about what he’d been doing.
“There’s all sorts of possibilities,” Marc answered. “It’s close to impossible for a single person to do this sort of sweep and find even most of the devices present, much less all of them. That’s why our whole fire team is going in to look. Even if we only acquire one or two samples, we want to take note of the placement of every one we can find. Do you have a sound system, Maylin?”
“I have a small set of speakers in the kitchen and the bedroom.” Startled, Maylin fumbled for her phone. “I hook them up to my phone for music.”
Marc nodded. “When we go in, Maylin, once it’s clear I’d like you to come in too and turn on some music. Not anything superdynamic with loud booms and quiet lulls, but music you play normally with a steady amount of sound. It’ll allow us to have quiet communication without them being able to make out what we’re saying.”
“Hand me your phone, love.” Victoria held out her hand. “I’ll look through your playlists and pull some songs together that would be suitable.”
Maylin passed her phone to Victoria gladly. “But if there’s video surveillance, won’t they know we’re all there?”
“Yes. Not optimal, but you’ve been gone long enough they have to know you found somebody to stay with overnight.” Marc nodded. His lips pressed in a thin line. “But we’ll go in taking measures to hide our own conversation. They might have most of us identified from when they tried to run you down anyway. We were all there. It’s not giving them that much more information to see our faces on video surveillance. It’ll be even more frustrating if they can’t figure out what we’re saying.”
Made sense.
Most of them wore baseball caps, though Victoria had opted for a fedora. Studying them for a minute, Maylin realized their faces would be hard to see from most security cameras set at ceiling level. Their hats went with their casual attire, so it didn’t seem all that out of place in a public area.
If anything, she stood out from the rest of them. When they all got out of the car, they kept her between them and she decided a hat was going to be the least of her worries. She matched their pace and walked with confidence. This was her parking garage and her apartment building. She belonged here, knew exactly where she was going, and there was no reason to be afraid.
Or every reason to refuse to show how nervous she was.