Amanda’s job was to laugh between sips of La Azul Malbec and bat her impossibly long eyelashes at the attentive older man who waited on their table. She wore her shoulder-length hair down and loose. Beatriz wore hers up, pulled back with unseen pins that made her look older, though at twenty-six she was actually the younger of the two. Beatriz did her share of smiling as well, but she left flirting with the waiter to her partner. Under the table, the blonde concentrated on her work, wiggling the face off the heating vent with the tip of her toe.
Parrilla Aires Criollos was an upscale restaurant with gaucho decor, tile floors, and crisp white tablecloths. As the name implied, it served Argentine cuisine and grilled meat with a distinctly Spanish flair. The long tablecloths, aided by Amanda’s entrancing laugh, helped to conceal the tedious work removing the vent cover.
Amanda and Beatriz were dressed in stylish blouses and skirts, each wearing just enough makeup and jewelry to make them attractive but not especially memorable. Classy dress was the norm in Buenos Aires, and dressing down would have garnered more attention. Each woman carried a brown leather briefcase, leading people to think they were lawyers, or perhaps some other brand of young professional women who had decided to grab some dinner before they got an early start at some of the local clubs.
Tonight, they had chosen to arrive exactly at eight p.m. The restaurant was busy enough that all eyes would not be focused on them but not so crowded that they would have trouble finding a table in the area they wanted. They’d come in for a late lunch two days earlier, locating the area where they would have to sit in order to accomplish their mission. The area near the bar, it seemed, was reserved for private functions. But if no such function was scheduled, guests were seated here when all the other tables were filled. A visit to the restrooms during their lunchtime visit took the young women near enough to locate the vent cover and devise their plan.
Either woman was capable of removing a vent or captivating the emotions of all manner of man or woman. They had met Franco, the waiter, on this previous visit. Whether he intended to or not, the man’s extra attention to Amanda’s water glass made it obvious that he was smitten with the beautiful brunette. He took her order first and smiled his thin smile when he gave her his suggestion for just the right pairing of wine and food. Far from being jealous, Beatriz had considered this a happy circumstance and allowed it to dictate their respective duties the following night. She would much rather deal with high explosives than the attentions of an overly attentive waiter with greasy hair.
Tonight, Amanda had caught Franco’s eye across the long and narrow dining room as soon as they came through the door. He rushed forward, still carrying a tray of dirty glasses he’d just cleaned off one of the tables, greeting her effusively. She pointed out the area near the bar and begged to sit there.
Like most instances where women preplanned their dealings with men, it was all too easy.
The scouting visit on the previous evening revealed the heating vents were held in place by friction rather than screws. In theory, this should have made it easier to remove. Beatriz kicked off her shoe as soon as they sat down, going straight to work with her toe. The metal louver appeared to be glued in place at first, but she finally got it to budge a little by pushing the face back and forth rather than trying to simply hook it with her nail and pull it out. Eventually, she was able to wiggle it out. She felt the metal and surrounding boxy collar slide free from the wood panel at the same moment Franco chose to visit their table. Beatriz was just able to catch the piece of metal with her bare foot and wedge it against the wall. The waiter smiled at Amanda, paying Beatriz no attention at all, and placed a platter containing their picada on the table. The girls’ accents gave away the fact that they were not from Argentina, and Franco felt it a duty to explain the bits of baked cheese and sliced meat people from his beloved country ate before a main meal. Beatriz balanced the grate in place, keeping her face passive while the arch of her foot began to spasm and cramp. Amanda noted her friend’s discomfort and asked Franco to suggest another wine for them to try. He scurried off to find “something just right” for the beautiful se?orita who had chosen to return to his restaurant.
Beatriz sighed with relief when she let the grate slip to the floor and come to rest on top of her foot. Franco was a waiter and therefore not trained in the art of espionage or tradecraft—but surely any man with his pudgy physique and halting demeanor would suspect that two attractive women he’d only just met might have ulterior motives.
One of them might, perhaps, be trying to distract him while her friend placed a bomb inside the wall of his restaurant.
Beatriz gave a whispered scoff, shaking her head at Amanda. “Hope. It is every man’s demise.”
Amanda raised her eyebrows, the facial equivalent of a shrug. “And the downfall of most women,” she said.
The bomb itself was small, made from military-grade RDX. A key component of C-4 was cyclotrimethylenetrinitramine. The name was a mouthful, so the British developers simply called it Research Department eXplosive. This particular batch of RDX was manufactured at a munitions plant outside Islamabad. Pakistani operatives were fond of the stuff and had used it to great effect in bombings against India and the West. Motor oil or some other carbon-based product was often mixed with the explosive to mask the material’s origin. Amanda and Beatriz left it plain. They wanted investigators to know the RDX came from Pakistan. Their briefcase device contained half a kilo of the plasticized material, a bit of PETN, and a blasting cap with a detonator attached to an arming device and then a mobile phone—also from Pakistan.
As the two women talked, Beatriz used her foot to lift and push her briefcase into the space behind the vent cover. It took only a moment, and stooping slightly, she was able to replace the cover before Franco returned with a bottle of Schroeder Merlot from Patagonia.
To his shame, Amanda said she preferred the earlier Malbec, and he slunk away with the open bottle.
Fairly giddy with the success of this portion of their mission, the women dug into the contents of the picada. Beatriz absentmindedly twirled a lock of blond hair over her ear as she began to peruse the menus, getting down to the business of deciding what to have for dinner. It turned out that placing a bomb was very good for one’s appetite.
Neither woman noticed the tall, bearded man with the fit-looking blonde. The well-dressed couple stopped just inside the front door, both scanning the now crowded restaurant as if looking for just the perfect table.
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