She didn’t want to leave him, that was wrong. But he was probably right, she wasn’t going to be any help at all. “Okay.”
“One more thing,” Nolan said, and kissed her, and this time it hit her hard, he was going out there to save her, and she kissed him back with everything she had.
When she came up for air, she was dizzy. “Maybe we should stay here,” she whispered. “Hiding is good. We could do this until the backup shows.”
“They’ll come looking for this guy,” Nolan whispered back, nodding to the minion at his feet. “We’ll do this later.” He looked at her, shook his head, and kissed her again, and she relaxed into him, irrationally happy about the whole mess.
Then he stepped back and she sighed.
“Right. Later,” she said, and followed him down the stairs toward the light.
*
Nolan left her in the first row of shelves nearest the door, just steps away from the lighted part of the warehouse and the way out. “Watch until their backs are turned,” he said. “Then run like hell.”
She nodded, and he disappeared down the row again as her heart pounded.
He would be okay. Nobody killed over toys, even Major MacGuffins. They wouldn’t do anything to him. She was almost sure. She bit her lip and waited, and then her cell phone rang, and she grabbed it and answered it before it could ring again.
“Don’t do that,” she whispered into the phone.
“You didn’t call me,” Courtney said. “You’re fifteen minutes late.”
“Yeah, well there are guys after us,” Trudy whispered.
“What guys?” Courtney said. “What us?”
“Nolan and me. Reese’s got a ring of toy thieves here—”
“Toy thieves? What are you talking about?”
“Call nine-one-one,” Trudy said, and then realized Courtney didn’t know where they were. “We’re—”
Somebody took her cell phone out of her hand, and she screamed and turned.
“Let’s talk,” Reese said, and shut off her phone.
“I’m not giving you the Mac,” Trudy said, holding her bags behind her.
Reese sighed. “Trudy, I don’t know what Nolan’s told you, but I’m positive it’s not the truth.”
“He’s a cop.” Trudy took a step back. “And boy, are you in trouble.”
“He’s a double agent for the Chinese government,” Reese said.
Trudy tightened her grip on her bags. “Whoa. You’ve got a better imagination than he does. He said you were a toy thief.”
Reese looked taken aback. “A toy thief? Who the hell steals toys?”
“The Grinch,” Trudy said. “I don’t know. It sounded plausible when he said it. It still sounds plausible compared to the Chinese-double-agent bit.”
“I am not a toy thief,” Reese said.
“But you don’t have a nephew, either. Because we’re in this warehouse and there are no Mac Twos, which means you had to get me here for some reason.”
“The Chinese spy codes.” Reese nodded toward her bags. “They’re in that MacGuffin box. I’m with the CIA and I need them.”
“Fat chance.” Trudy stepped back again. “I don’t care what alphabet you flash at me, you are not taking this Mac from me.”
“Look on the box, Trudy,” Reese said patiently. “In the lower right-hand corner, there should be a black X.”
“There isn’t,” Trudy said, holding the bag tighter.
“It’s small,” Reese said. “Look for it.”
Trudy hesitated, but he met her eyes without flinching. He’s telling the truth, she thought, and put her bags down. She took the Mac box out of the bag and stepped into the light to look at it.
Sure enough, in the lower right-hand corner on the back was a small black X.
“You put it there,” Trudy said, not wanting to believe Nolan was the bad guy.
“When?” Reese said. “You haven’t let that box out of your hands since you got it.”
“Oh, hell.” Trudy swallowed. “I need this doll, Reese.”
“It’s okay,” Reese said. “I don’t need the doll. I just need the instruction sheet. That’s where the codes are. Deal?”
Trudy bit her lip. Leroy didn’t need the instructions; he probably knew more about the toy by now than the designers did. Toy hijackers and Chinese double agents were both ridiculous; Leroy was real. “Okay.”
Reese held out his hand for the box, and she tightened her grip.
“Just the instructions.” She opened the lid and felt down the back of the box for the paper, but there was nothing there. “Damn.” She held the box into the pool of light cast by the fixture far above her and looked in. “It must have fallen under the doll.” She carefully pulled the doll out, still wired into the cardboard backing that showed explosions, and shook the box upside down.
“Trudy,” Reese said, his voice grim.
“I’m looking.” Trudy dropped the empty box to unwire the MacGuffin to see if the instructions had lodged behind it.
Reese picked up the box and began to dissemble it, checking in all the folds. “It’s not here.”
“It’s not here, either.” Trudy pulled the cardboard background away from the doll and handed it over, holding on to the Mac tightly. “And it was earlier.”