The door opens a few minutes later. A woman wearing a suit and high heels with a binder in one hand and a key card in the other steps out. The woman releases the key card, and a cord pulls it to her waist where a clip holds it in place. Recognizing the opportunity she has been waiting for, Kiara moves towards the woman.
"Excuses-moi, si vous plaise." Kiara quickly blocks her way.
"Comment puis-je vous aider?" the woman stops and smiles at Kiara.
"Où est la toilette ?" Kiara asks for directions to the restroom and steps nearer, being conscious of the camaras position.
"Prends ce couloir." The woman points to the hallway with her free hand and unconsciously moves closer to Kiara. "et avant deux chambres, le toilette est à ton droit."
"Deux chambre par ici?" Kiara asks confirmation and points to the same hallway, moving the woman's attention to it. Meanwhile with her other hand, Kiara quickly snatches the key card with its clip and slips it in her own pocket.
"Oui."
"Mercy beaucoup." Kiara thanks her and moves to the bathroom, taking the directions the woman gave her.
She enters a bathroom stall and takes the card out. It shows the picture of the woman with her name and position on one side. On the other, it has the black band that opens the door. Her name is Juliet Debois and she is a curator.
Kiara imagines Berte wouldn't be stupid enough to put her actual working positions on the cards, but it could be a vague enough description to include her job title in the lab. If the lab is actually here, that is.
In the privacy of the bathroom, Kiara lets her doubts rise for a moment and contemplates the consequences of what they're about to do. Her instincts tell her that she is in the right path, though, and she trusts her instincts.
Kiara hears the bathroom door open and close. Flushing the toilet, she exits the stall. Sasha is waiting for her with arms crossed.
"Do you have it?" she asks impatiently after making sure they are alone.
"Got it."
Kiara shows her the badge. Then, she takes her phone and texts Will.
Do your magic :)
Kiara and Sasha wait on Will. Kiara pictures him locked in a stall in the other bathroom hacking into the security system and tampering with it. Hopefully he won't have any problems. Some minutes later a message arrives on Kiara's phone from Will.
Done (;
They all meet outside the bathrooms and walk back to the restricted door. After checking that the coast is clear, Kiara swipes the card. The door unlocks, and they step inside.
A room with a double height sealing greets them. Rows of metal net walls fill the space in four columns. Hanged on them are hundreds on paintings. Tinted windows decorate the highest parts while illumination comes from flat ceiling lamps.
Kiara walks down one row of paintings, while Will and Sasha take the other two. As she nears the end of the room, she sees a staircase leading down. Once the rows finish, two doors appear on the rest of the wall. The one on the right is open. Kiara approaches it with the rest of her team and peeks inside. In the center, a big desk surrounded by a few cabinets emits light. Luckily there is nobody and Kiara steps back.
The other door is closed and has a sign that says authorized personnel only. It has another keypad on the right side.
"Why would there be a staff area inside another staff area?" Kiara whispers rhetorically having a good feeling about this.
"Let's find out" Will says.
Kiara slides the card in the keypad, and the red light turns green unlocking the door. She cautiously pushes the door open into a small, deserted hallway.
The room then opens into a rectangular shape with the floor removed in the center. This hole is surrounded by glass walls from ceiling to ground. A doorway stands to the left side of the gap and another one on the opposite side.
Before fulling stepping into the room, Kiara checks for security cameras and other people. Weirdly, she finds neither of them. She moves forward and kneels to peek down at the hole. What she sees proves her theory.
A fully equipped lab stands in the floor below. People in coats and protective gear work on tables with tubes and different substances. Boxes like the ones from the shipments are piled on one corner. There are also a few opened bottles of wine in a table being studied. She immediately takes pictures of the place, being careful to stay out of sight.
Sasha and Will do the same, but from different angles further away. When they finish, they meet back at the small hallway.
"This should be enough proof for Carville" Will whispers.
"Did you get a good angle of the contents in the boxes?" Sasha asks.
They both shake their heads.
"We need those photos, or the rest are worthless"
"We found the lab and have proof." Will insists. "Let Carville handle the rest."
"Sasha is right." Kiara interrupts in a whisper. "What if by the time he gets here, the boxes are gone. Then there is nothing to prove that they are making the poison."
"If we walk to the other side of the room, we might have a better angle." Sasha says after studying the area and the crates' position in the floor below.
"We're pushing our luck." Will argues but caves.
They move to where Sasha pointed, being careful to stick as close to the wall as possible to avoid being seen from bellow. Kiara takes more photos where effectively the contents of the boxes can be seen and matched to the ones from Le Havre.
"Okay, now we have it, so let's go." Will says.
Kiara nods and they start to retrace their steps. As they move to the right side of the gap, a door on the floor below opens allowing Berte to step in. Following him is none other than the guy who blocked Kiara earlier in the museum.
Kiara stops in shock. She stood right beside one of his minions and she didn't suspect a thing.
What if he saw me eyeing the door? Kiara thinks mortified, but then she remembers he kept walking without giving her a glance. She was also careful out there. She takes a deep breath to settle her nerves.
Meanwhile, Sasha has her phone out recording what's happening on the lab. Although, they can't hear anything that's being said, Berte looks to be in an argument with one of the chemists below.
"We have all the proof we need" Sasha says as she locks her phone and puts it in her pocket.
Suddenly a firm hand grips Kiara's arm, pulls her aside and turns her forcefully around.
YOU ARE READING
Teen Spy: The Observer
General FictionA few months ago, Kiara Starling started feeling that someone was following her, watching her. Despite it being downplayed by her family and friends, her intuition is proven right when, on her seventeenth birthday, she is kidnapped, and it leads to...
