Spy Ski School (28 page)

“So then you're the reason I was almost killed today.”

“No, no, no. The reason you were almost killed today is that you can't stop poking your nose into other people's business. You know the risks with the spy game. I'd try to convince you that it's much safer to be a bad guy, but frankly, I've given up trying to recruit you. You've burned that bridge. Or, more to the point, you prevented us from burning some bridges. And totally ruined our plans to cause chaos in Manhattan.”

I glanced toward the restaurant door again.

This time Murray noticed. “Looking for your friends?” He grinned knowingly. “They should be along any moment. Ah! Here they are!”

Now the door swung open and my friends emerged. Only, they weren't coming to my aid by attacking Murray. Instead, they filed out with their hands up: Zoe, Warren, and Woodchuck. To my relief, Mike wasn't with them. The others were all followed by a girl about Murray's age. She had long brown hair tied in a ponytail, giant lavender earmuffs, a nose ring, and a gun, which was trained on my friends.

“You don't think I'd come here without backup, do you?” Murray asked me slyly. “Ben, this is Jenny Lake, my cohort in crime . . . and my girlfriend.” He waggled his eyebrows as he said this. “Jenny, this is Ben Ripley.”

“Oh, hey!” Jenny said, seeming genuinely friendly and excited. “It's nice to meet you! Murray's told me so much about you.”

“Nice to meet you too,” I said. Not because it really was nice to meet her, but because it was kind of a reflex.

Zoe shot me an annoyed look. “Ben, she's a bad guy.”

“Sorry,” I apologized. “It just seemed polite.”

Murray grinned at the others, basking in the moment. “Now, now, Zoe. Just because we're enemies doesn't mean we can't have manners. I'm pleased to see you've been activated. You've worked hard for this. And, Woodchuck, once I heard the CIA was in town, I figured you might be here, since you're Mr. Outdoorsy and all. Though, Warren, you're a bit of a surprise. I really thought you'd have washed out of spy school by now.”

“Do you have any pickles on you?” Warren asked. “I am really jonesing for a pickle.”

Murray leaned in to me and whispered, “Is it just me, or has Warren gotten weirder?”

“He banged his head on a tree pretty hard earlier,” I replied. “Knocked himself silly.”

“Ah,”
Murray said. “That'd explain it.”

It occurred to me why Mike wasn't with the others. Murray had no idea who Mike was. And thus Jenny wouldn't have known to look for him either. I wasn't sure exactly how Mike had slipped away, but there was no way to ask anyone what had happened. At the very least, though, I was relieved to know he was safe. Maybe he was even calling the police.

Of course, I couldn't guarantee that. For all I knew, Mike was in the restaurant bathroom, completely unaware that the rest of us had been captured. Or maybe he'd been knocked unconscious himself. If he
hadn't
called the police, the only other way I could think of to get out of this jam was to hope Erica would regain consciousness and kick Murray's butt. Either way, I needed to keep stalling.

I turned to Jenny Lake and asked, nice and friendly, “So, how long have you and Murray been dating?”

“Only a few weeks,” she replied. She seemed surprisingly sweet for a villain. “Shang recruited both of us to work this job and we met the first day. The moment we saw each other, we just connected, you know? It was amazing. And ever since then, I've been his little pookie-wookie and he's been my fuzzy-wuzzy bear.”

“Awww.” Warren sighed. “That's adorable.”

Meanwhile, Zoe mimed throwing up.

“Jenny,” Murray said. “Now that the gang's all here, we
really ought to take care of these guys. Woodchuck, could you be a pal and carry Erica for me? I'd do it myself, but I tweaked my back doing push-ups the other day.” This was obviously a lie to impress Jenny; Murray had always avoided physical exertion like the plague.

Woodchuck obediently picked Erica up and slung her over his shoulder. I'd been hoping that Erica was only faking being unconscious so she could get the jump on Murray. But now she flopped about limply. I was pretty sure this was actual limp flopping and not an incredible act by Erica, meaning she wasn't going to be any help.

“Where are you taking us?” Zoe demanded.

“Oh, not too far.” Murray motioned for us to start walking across the snowy parking lot, toward the base of the closest mountain. “Over there should do. I just want to get you away from the restaurant and any witnesses before we take care of you.” He looked to Jenny. “The problem with Ben is, you have to get rid of him quickly. If we let him hang around too long, he'll figure our plans out.”

“Oh, I've already figured them out,” I said.

Murray shot me a skeptical glance. “No, you haven't.”

“You're going to set off a nuclear bomb to irradiate the Climax Mine so Shang can corner the world market in molybdenum.”

Murray gaped at me in genuine surprise. “You have got
to be kidding me! You did it again! Man, you're good! Pookie, didn't I tell you he was good?”

“You did,” Jenny agreed.

“I thought we really had you this time,” Murray told me. “How'd you figure it out?”

“It wasn't that hard.” I stopped walking, hoping Murray and Jenny would be too distracted to notice. “I know Dane Brammage used to work for this scumbag arms dealer named Paul Lee who hooked SPYDER up with some nukes before. Then I saw the case for something like a nuke in Leo Shang's hotel room. And I know Shang has been doing some sort of reconnaissance in these mountains all week instead of heli-skiing. So when I realized the Climax Mine was close and that he owns the only other major supply of molybdenum in the world, it all just kind of made sense.”

“Really?” Murray asked. “Because it seems like a pretty big jump to assume Shang's going to nuke the molybdenum to corner the market.”

“Well, there was one more thing,” I admitted. “The name of the operation is ‘Golden Fist.' And what you're doing is basically the same scheme as in
Goldfinger
.”

Murray suddenly looked as rattled as I'd ever seen him. “I don't know what you're talking about,” he said.

“
Goldfinger
, the greatest James Bond movie of all time,” I
explained. “Auric Goldfinger plans to corner the world's gold market by nuking Fort Knox. You're doing the same thing with molybdenum.”

Jenny gaped at Murray in astonishment. “Murray! You told me—and Shang—this was your original idea! Did you steal it from a movie?”

Murray turned bright red. “No,” he said defensively. “I've never even heard of this
Goldfinger
.”

“Yes, you have,” Warren told him. “You used to watch it all the time at spy school. Back before you were evil.”

“I can't believe you!” Jenny exclaimed. “Shang paid you to come up with a way to take out the competition and you just stole the plot of a movie?”

“I didn't
steal
it,” Murray said defensively. “I
modified
it.”

“Sounds like stealing to me,” Jenny huffed, looking annoyed.

“So what's the big deal?” Murray sighed. “We're bad guys.”

“We're only supposed to commit crimes,” Jenny pointed out. “Not lie to each other.”

“We're about to set off a nuclear bomb!” Murray exclaimed. “And you're upset at me for a little plagiarism?”

“This is about trust,” Jenny said curtly.

The two of them were quite distracted now. They seemed to have completely forgotten about marching us across the
parking lot to our deaths. I glanced toward Erica, hoping to see her awake. If there was ever a good time to catch the enemy by surprise, this was it.

Only, Erica still lay limply across Woodchuck's shoulder.

“Trust is important to me,” Jenny told Murray. “I need to know that when you say something, you mean it.”

“Of course you can trust me,” Murray said. “I never lie.”

“You lied to us all the time!” Zoe pointed out. “When you were a mole at school, you did
nothing
but lie to us.”

“That was different,” Murray argued. “That was business.” He turned to Jenny. “You deceive people all the time for business!”

“Don't try to make this about me,” Jenny said.

Murray groaned. “Do we have to have this conversation right now? In front of the hostages?”

“Why don't we talk about the fact that you're setting off a nuclear device just to make money?” Zoe said angrily. “Innocent people are going to
die
in this scheme!”

“Well, we are
evil
,” Murray told her. “That's how these things work. You don't corner the world market in molybdenum by giving everyone a free puppy. And speaking of killing people . . .” He glanced at his watch. “Where the heck are those guys?”

“What guys?” Warren asked.

“The guys who are going to kill you,” Murray replied.

This caught me off guard. I did a bad job hiding it, and Murray noticed. Normally, he might have taken some joy in this, but he had grown quite testy during his argument with Jenny. “I'm not as dumb as you think,” he told me. “I know what you've been up to this whole time, trying to distract me so that I don't kill you right away, giving Erica a chance to wake up and rescue you. Well, it just so happens that
I'm
the one who's been distracting
you
. I've been waiting for the real thugs to get here so they can take care of you once and for all.”

I grimaced, feeling like an idiot now. “So, you were never going to kill us yourself?”

Murray looked hurt. “I may be evil, but I'm not a psychopath. I don't like shooting people. My psychiatrist says I have moral issues. Unlike
him
.” He pointed across the parking lot.

Dane Brammage had arrived. Not only was he still alive, but he looked as if getting blown off a cliff and caught in an avalanche had only made him angrier.

“Crud muffins,” Zoe cursed. “What does it take to kill that guy?”

Thankfully, Dane was a good distance away, and it appeared that he had lost his gun in the avalanche. But it still wasn't going to be too long before he reached us, borrowed Murray's gun, and took us out.

I gave Erica one final, hopeful glance, praying her condition had changed—but she remained stubbornly lifeless over Woodchuck's shoulder.

Murray clucked his tongue as though he was disappointed in me. “She's not going to save you this time,” he taunted. “Sorry, Ben. Looks like your luck has finally run out.”

The roar of an engine suddenly cut through the winter air. A snowmobile rocketed out from behind a truck and slammed into Murray. With a yelp, Murray went flying and plopped into a snowdrift. His gun skidded across the parking lot.

“Fuzzy Bear!” Jenny gasped, forgetting to keep her own gun trained on us.

Zoe decked her with one punch. Jenny rocked on her heels and landed flat on her back, unconscious.

The snowmobile driver flipped up the visor of his helmet, revealing his identity: Mike Brezinski. “That guy was bad, right?” he asked. “Tell me I didn't flatten an innocent person.”

“He was bad,” I confirmed. “Thanks.”

In the distance, Dane Brammage had seen what had happened. He roared angrily and started running toward us.

“Looks like we better split,” Mike said. He tossed two sets of keys to Woodchuck and Zoe, then pointed to two
other snowmobiles parked nearby. “Take those! They each hold two people!”

Zoe and Warren scrambled for one while Woodchuck lugged Erica to the other. I raced across the parking lot to grab Murray's gun.

As I did, Murray lunged for it. Luckily for me, Murray had the speed and reflexes of a koala bear. He didn't come anywhere close to the gun. I snatched it up and aimed it at him.

He raised his hands in fear. “You wouldn't shoot a friend, would you?”

“You're not my friend,” I told him. Luckily for Murray, though, I wasn't much for shooting people myself. I was more of a handcuff-the-bad-guys type of person. Only, I didn't have any handcuffs—or anything else to restrain Murray and Jenny—and I didn't have any time, either. Dane was barreling toward me now.

And then the rest of Shang's men showed up.

One of the car-tanks spun into the parking lot, coming our way.

The other two snowmobiles revved to life. Zoe and Warren zoomed out of the parking lot on one while Woodchuck followed with Erica.

I ran back to Mike's snowmobile and hopped on behind him. “Let's go!” I shouted.

Mike hit the gas.

As we raced out of the parking lot, I could hear Murray yelling behind us. “This isn't over, Ben! You haven't seen the last of Murray Hill!”

I didn't even look back.