Free May Contain Spies: A Spy Thriller (Meet Abby Banks Book 1) by J.A. Cipriano

is to get out of here with the package intact. There’s an entire army trying to get in here right now. I need you to do something to ensure they—” Chloe’s voice was suddenly drowned out by the sound of an explosion.
    It was so loud that it left my ears ringing. The room shook, walls swaying as bits of plaster fell from the ceiling. Stephen tensed before throwing himself further on top of me in an attempt to better shield me from whatever was coming.
    “That should buy us a few minutes,” Marco said.
    “Did you really just blow up the store?” Chloe asked.
    “Yes.”
    “You what?” I yelled, pushing Stephen off of me with both hands. He glanced at me before very slowly moving off of me and helping me to my feet.
    “The delightful Ms. Devereux said we were being invaded by an army. There’s only one army in town, and they are after a young girl. You are a young girl. Ipso facto, I blew up the store.” Marco glanced at me in a way that said ‘deal with it’ and crossed his arms over his sky-blue sweater.
    “Do you have a way out of here?” Stephen asked, glancing at the only door in the room. We had come straight down a hallway that led only to this room. If Marco had really blown up the store, there was no way we could go back the way we came. Even if there wasn’t an army of mercenaries out there waiting to gut me like a trout.
    “Do I have a way out?” Marco exclaimed, flinging his arms out in front of himself in exasperation. “Do I have a way out of my own super-secret bunker when there’s only one obvious entrance inside? When I just blew up that entrance?” Marco narrowed his dark brown eyes at Stephen and raised his left hand to point at him. “Where did they find you? Did you just fall off the turnip truck? Of course, I have a way out.”
    Marco turned toward the large stainless steel desk behind him and snatched the laptop off its surface. He spun back around, holding the laptop in one hand and gesturing at its screen with his other hand. “You see this red dot. That’s the package,” he pointed at me, then back at the screen. “These two blue dots are Chloe and you ,” he added, spitting the last word out like a piece of sour candy. “See anything else interesting?”
    The screen itself was an overview that reminded me of those maps you see at the mall. There was a small rectangle in the center with two blue dots, a red dot, and a green dot. But, from the looks of the screen, there was another passageway directly behind Marco.
    “So there’s a trap door behind you?” I blurted out.
    Marco glanced at me once more before narrowing his eyes at Stephen. “Which one of you is the secret agent? Because it sure seems like the package is the brains of the operation.” He threw his hands up in the air, flinging the laptop back on the desk as he did so. “Why that idiot son of mine sent you to protect the package is beyond me.”
    “Wait… are you saying what I think you’re saying?” I asked, looking over at Stephen.
    “Yeah, he is,” Stephen said through clenched teeth. “That’s Donovan’s dad.”
    “I’ll thank you to not compare me to my son,” Marco said as he punched a command into his keyboard. “If you’re the kind of person he sends to thwart Gabriella de la Mancha, then I never should have gotten him that job as handler.”
    “Look, sir. You don’t have to like me, but I’m very good at what I do. I’ve never failed a case before,” Stephen said, moving just a little closer to Marco.
    “You’re, like, twelve. You’ve had all of one other case. You couldn’t even save one girl without falling in love, and after months of therapy, my idiot son decides your first case back should be to guard another young girl.” Marco pounded his fist on the keyboard, and a door opened up in front of him with a whoosh.
    Stephen turned bright red and a tremor ran down his spine, visibly shaking him. If I hadn’t been staring at him, I probably wouldn’t have seen it. That