Top Secret Twenty-One: A Stephanie Plum Novel(37)

We crossed the street to get a better look. Five stories. Black wrought iron filigree on the lower-level windows. The windows on the upper floors were tinted and most likely impact glass. Security cameras scanned the street from the roof.

Ranger called Tank, gave him the consulate’s address, and told him to research the week’s events. Minutes later, Tank texted Ranger the consulate’s schedule.

“There’s a trade show going on this week for Russian vodka,” Ranger said. “This consulate will be hosting a meet-and-greet party at five o’clock. That would be a good time for us to slip in.”

We had some time to kill, so we went back to our high-top table at the Gatewell Hotel. We ordered drinks and received our complimentary bowl of bar nuts. We didn’t touch any of this. We watched the room. There were four men at the bar. Two of them looked like cartoon versions of Russian vodka salesmen. Large red noses, too much flesh, laughing too loud, drinking vodka. And they were speaking Russian.

“You need to introduce yourself to those men,” Ranger said. “It would help break the ice if you gave them more to look at. Something that would compensate for the fact that you don’t speak Russian.”

“What if they don’t speak English?”

“They probably speak enough to get by.”

I went to the ladies’ room and looked at myself in the mirror. I was wearing a black business suit with a silky white shirt under it. My hair was pulled into a ponytail, and I was wearing heels. It was appropriately sexy for a funeral, but not so much for Russian vodka salesmen.

I opened enough buttons on the shirt that I was showing some cleavage. I wasn’t sure if it was enough cleavage to compensate for my lack of Russian, so I stuffed some toilet paper into my bra. The cleavage got better, but I still wasn’t anywhere near Lula cleavage. I walked around a little to make sure the toilet paper didn’t rustle or shift in place, and then I shoved in some more. I was now bulging out of my bra, straining the fabric on my silky shirt, and there was no way I could button my jacket.

I jumped up and down to make sure I wouldn’t unexpectedly have a wardrobe malfunction. I jiggled a little, and my nipples didn’t pop out of my bra, so I figured I was good to go. I gunked up my eyes with a lot more mascara, added some eyeliner, and applied a fresh coat of blood red lipstick. I looked at myself in the full-length ladies’ room mirror and worried that I still might not be compensating enough for my lack of language skills, so I pulled the scrunchie off my ponytail. Whoosh, my hair instantly expanded. I worked at it with water and hairspray until the natural curls were back. I now had a lot of hair, and a lot of it was frizz. This is why I usually wear a ponytail. Still, I thought it might be sexy, if you like the big frizzy-hair look. I mean, you see it in Vogue all the time, right?

I went back to the full-length mirror and took another look. Yikes! Good thing my mother wasn’t here or I’d be grounded. I might have overdone the toilet-paper thing.

Ranger called my cellphone. “Babe,” he said, “you’ve been in there a long time. Is everything okay?”

“Yep. It’s peachy.”

I hurried out of the ladies’ room, took a deep breath, and set out across the room with what I hoped was a confident stride. Stephanie Plum, cunning sexpot, about to embark on a dangerous mission.

“What do you think?” I asked Ranger when I reached the high-top.

“Babe, you don’t want to know what I’m thinking.”

I actually had a pretty good idea what he was thinking, since his pupils were totally dilated. Like maybe we should forget about the two Russians at the bar and get a room. And now that I was slutted up and getting into the role, I was having similar thoughts. Problem was, undressing was going to be awkward.

“You do realize that I have half a roll of toilet paper stuffed into my bra?”

“I wouldn’t share that with the men at the bar,” Ranger said. He gave me a tiny earbud. “You can stay connected to me with this.”

“Will you be able to hear what I’m saying?”

“Yes.”

I stuck the earbud in my ear and sashayed over to the bar. I took the barstool next to one of the Russians and crossed my legs, letting my skirt ride up to a couple inches below my doo-dah, and asked the bartender for a champagne cocktail.

Conversation stopped, and both men looked my way. The man next to me smiled wide, displaying a gold-capped molar. He said something in Russian, and I did a palms-up display of I no speak that language. I accompanied the palms-up with a giggle, and I jiggled around a little. It was like airhead bimbo–meets–ADHD Pomeranian.

“My name Leo Stolchi,” he said. Heavy accent. “I sees you do not speak Russian.”

“Honey, I have enough problems with English.”

This got a big laugh, and his eyes tracked down to my boobs and from there went on to my crotch, which was demurely hidden by a small amount of black skirt fabric.

“You are very pretty,” he said.

“Well, thank you,” I said. “Aren’t you sweet.”

My drink arrived, and Leo told the bartender to put it on his bill.

“And generous,” I said.

Leo looked unsure of “generous.”

“What is ‘generous’?” he asked.

“It’s like … rich. You must be rich.”