Free Vision Impossible by Victoria Laurie Page A

up, he smiled and said, “See? Piece of cake.”
    I rolled my eyes but couldn’t help smiling. “Yeah, yeah.” Then I looked down at my outfit and over to my luggage and a small wave of panic hit me. “All the CIA gave me for clothes was stuff like this.”
    Dutch reached into his back pocket and pulled out his wallet, extracting an American Express platinum card and the spare key card Daniel had given him. He handed both to me and said, “Take the elevator down to the parking garage. There’ll be a car in slot one-A with the keys inside. I’ll draw you a map to the shopping district. Get yourself some proper business attire and anything else you think you’ll need to pull off being my personal assistant.”
    “What about my background?” I asked, worried that I’d need some sort of employment history.
    “Leave that to me,” he said. “I have a good friend who runs an employment agency here in Toronto. He owes me a favor. He’ll be able to give you a job history.”
    I held the credit card between my fingertips and considered how much I was about to charge to it. “You gonna clear this with Frost too?”
    “I am,” Dutch assured me, adding, “Tomorrow. I’ll clear it with him tomorrow. Now go shopping, dollface. And that’s an order.”
     
     
    L ater that night I completed the final touches of my new look by tying my long hair into a bun and throwing on a pair of fake prescription glasses. I twirled in front of the mirrored doors located in the spare bedroom on the opposite side of the condo, quite happy with myself, when I heard the elevator doors open. Thinking it was Dutch back early from his rummaging around at Des Vries’s office in downtown Toronto (there’d been a note on the kitchen table telling me where he’d gone), I walked out to show him how assistanty I’d become.
    I stopped dead in my tracks when I discovered a tall, leggy blonde standing in the hallway, wearing skinny jeans, a tight-fitting low-cut sweater, a huge Bottega Veneta purse, and toting two large suitcases. Protruding from her mouth was a familiar white key card. Upon seeing me, she let go of the suitcase handles and pulled out the key card. “Who’re you?” she demanded, her hands finding her hips real fast.
    I lifted my chin and tried to control my surprise. “Abigail Carter. I work for Mr. Des Vries,” I told her, thinking I knew exactly who she might be. Still, I thought it wise to double-check and make sure. “The better question is, who’re you ?”
    “Mandy Mortemeyer,” she told me, taking those hands off her hips to fold across her bosomy chest. “Rick’s girlfriend.”
    “Ah,” I said. The stewardess who was supposed to be in Prague. My mind whirled to figure out how to compute this new twist. “I’m his personal assistant.”
    The girlfriend narrowed her eyes at me. I could feel that she was about to grill me good and I was so ticked off at the CIA for not anticipating her arrival. “Rick doesn’t have a personal assistant,” she snapped.
    I pointed to the new iPad lying on the table in the foyer, which I’d recently acquired. (So, yeah, the Apple Store had been right next to the clothing boutique and I figured the iPad would make me look like a real assistant, ’cause didn’t they walk around with clipboards and checklists and wasn’t the iPad just a fancy clipboard?) “Shall we send Mr. Des Vries an e-mail and ask him if I truly am his newest employee?”
    Grillfriend glared at me. “Where’s he at, anyway?” she demanded. “He hasn’t returned any of my calls.”
    “He’s at his office,” I answered easily, moving to the iPad and touching the screen like I knew exactly how to use it. (Which I didn’t, but she didn’t know that!)
    “Here in Toronto?” she asked, and I saw the surprise in her eyes.
    “Yes,” I answered coolly. “Didn’t you know that?”
    Mandy appeared flustered. She attempted to cover that by rummaging around in her purse and pulling out a plastic bag