“Seriously?” Marc snagged the sandwich out of Maylin’s hand. “I’m starving.”
Maylin quickly grabbed another wrapped sandwich and handed it to Victoria, who accepted it with a smile. Two more went up front to Lizzy and Gabe. Once everyone had a sandwich, Maylin took out one for herself, unwrapped it halfway and took a bite.
Savory, salty flavor burst across her tongue as she chewed. The olive salad had just the right punch and she loved the combination of the Italian meats. It wasn’t just a sandwich, it was a meal, and every bite should be packed with flavor and interesting.
Immediately, the atmosphere in the car edged away from icy tension to more relaxed.
Gabe paused in eating his sandwich. “Lizzy. Status?”
“Minor. Just a graze.” Lizzy took a minute to chew and swallow. “Shots came in a low spread across the kitchen. I’m thinking they saw vague movement through the curtains and took a chance they’d hit to injure.”
“Looks like they’re trying to wound our genius cook here, rather than kill her,” Marc said around a mouthful of bread and olives.
“Don’t get me wrong, I’m glad whoever it is isn’t trying to kill me, but why?” Maylin took smaller bites in case something one of them said might make her choke. It’d been that kind of day.
“Couple of reasons come to mind.” Victoria licked olive oil from her bottom lip. “If you’re injured and an ambulance is called, it’d be easy to intercept and snag you before you ever made it to the hospital. No one at your apartment would think to look for you at the hospital for quite a while, am I correct?”
Victoria was right. Maylin swallowed hard. “Everyone would assume family or friends would meet me at the hospital. None of my neighbors know me well enough to know An-mei’s missing or that she’s the only family I’m in touch with.”
“Easy way to catch you off guard and whisk you away, then.” Victoria took a hearty bite of the sandwich. “This really is delicious, dear.”
Maylin smiled.
It was a kind of relief to know someone wasn’t trying to kill her. Only a marginal one, though, because being kidnapped was a close second on the scale of things that freaked her out.
“Well, we’ve learned a couple of other things about our mystery friends.” Marc took the napkin Maylin held out for him with a nod. He’d inhaled the sandwich. “Those devices are completely enclosed, tiny, and custom made. Probably limited range, so we’re okay now that we’ve put a few miles between us and their receiving device. But I won’t feel completely good about it until I can take what we’ve got apart and disconnect whatever power source they’ve got. I’ll try to do that while we’re on the move, before we get back to our base of operations. I’ll know more about any signature the maker might have once I take them apart, but those details alone are telling.”
Gabe looked up into the rearview mirror so he could see Marc. “Lay it out for us.”
“First, the clean and enclosed packaging means whoever did this had these ready for this specific purpose or for regular use. Either way, the maker put a lot of tech into tiny devices, which says to me some deep financial pockets. That kind of work isn’t cheap.”
Maylin put her half-eaten sandwich down. She wasn’t sure how she was going to counter adversaries with such money at their disposal.
“The smaller a device is, the shorter range it has, so the listeners had to be close.” Marc cleared his throat. “They were close enough to have eyes on the apartment, and even with the curtains drawn they could see enough shapes to take a shot at someone in the kitchen. I’m going to propose they thought it was our Maylin here, since anyone who’s observed her for more than a few hours knows she tends to hang out in there.”
A grunt came from Gabe up front. “Go on.”
“Once we get back to Centurion Corporation facilities, I’ll take these apart. I’ll be able to tell us more about their make. Power supply design, battery type, parts and mode of assembly should give us a few leads. One or two of the parts might even be 3D printed.” Marc sounded excited to dig in and find out more.
“Anything else?” Gabe’s words were still short, but there was a hint of amusement there. Or maybe Maylin was imagining it.
Marc didn’t comment on it. “Didn’t find any video devices. Not surprising, because it’s a crazy effort to rig the place for both audio and video when they already had such a clear view of the apartment. Those were some big windows. Not too many places hidden from view if the curtains were left open.”
And obviously, they could see at least shadows with the windows closed in the late afternoon to evening. Maylin shuddered.
“Was that big cooler just for these sandwiches?” Lizzy spoke up.
“I brought more.” Maylin dove back into the cooler and came out with small mason jars of layered graham cracker, cheesecake and fresh fruit. “Dessert?”