Page 34 of Spies Don’t Fall for Their Best Friend

As we’re walking, my grandpa says to Reese, “So, how are things going at the library? Are kids still coming in convinced that they hate reading, right up until the moment you hand them the perfect book?”

“All the time! It’s one of my favorite moments. They think they’re walking away with a book, but really, they’re walking away believing they’re a reader.”

Reese looks over at me and mouths, I can’t believe he remembered!

I smile. And I don’t miss the way Reese watches my grandparents curiously. Seeing how comfortable they are together, the way they naturally move around each other. The way Grandma straightens Grandpa’s collar and he hands her a water bottle from his bag. Tiny things that show they look out for each other.

When we’re waiting in baggage claim for the luggage to start coming through, we’re next to a young family, so my grandma and I naturally start a conversation with them. They were on the same connecting flight from Boston—they’d been visiting the wife’s mom as she recovered from knee surgery, and were arriving back home after a week away.

As Grandma and I are chatting with the family (and their six-year-old is telling us how good she was at helping her grandma with physical therapy), I hear Reese say to Grandpa, “So that’s where he gets it from!”

My grandpa replies, “Yep. Runs in the family. Those two could strike up a conversation with a fence post and come away knowing where it grew up.”

My phone buzzes, and I pull it out of my pocket to see that it’s work. “Will you excuse me? I need to take this.”

I walk a dozen feet away to a less crowded area, switching fully into work mode as I do, then I answer the call. “Miles.”

It’s my tech op, Nora. “A security camera in Bucharest caught someone who matches a suspected courier from two previous Rooke transactions. We need to decide whether he’s worth mobilizing a surveillance team. Sending you an image.”

I pull my phone away from my ear to look at the text Nora sent. I study it for a moment, then put the phone back to my ear. “You’re still on him remotely?”

“Both Elliot and me.”

“No on-the-ground team yet. If he changes transportation twice, assume he’s working and mobilize. Keep me updated either way.”

We end the call, and I slide the phone back into my pocket as I look back at Reese and my grandparents. Reese is studying me. She’s wearing a curious expression, like she’s sensed something that she can’t quite identify. I swallow. It’s times like this when Reese gets extra perceptive about my secret life that I get nervous.

My grandma, because she’s my grandma, seems to notice both what just happened with me and what is going through Reese’s mind. As if she’s trying to distract Reese from spending too much time along those lines of thought, she pulls something from her luggage, getting Reese’s attention, at about the same time I make it back to Reese’s side.

“I saw this in Prague and thought of you,” she says as she hands something to Reese. It’s about six inches long, narrow and flat, and is wrapped in brown paper. “When I found out you and Miles would be picking us up, I made sure to keep it accessible.”

“This is for me?” Reese unfolds the paper around it. It’s a painted wooden bookmark with bees and beehives carved into it. Reese looks stunned. “You remembered I love bees?”

“Of course,” my grandma says.

Reese is teary-eyed as she gives my grandma a hug. Then she looks at me, still blinking back tears. She’s reacting as if Grandma handed her something far bigger than carved wood.

My grandparents have always accepted Reese as a part of the family. Not a friend of the family. Just seeing their acceptance in action makes me want Reese to actually be a part of the family even more strongly.

I clear my throat and turn to my grandparents. “Prague? I thought you live in Portugal.”

“Yes,” Grandma says. “But Arthur still gets requests for help from various countries, so we get plenty of travel time in. No one else can match his brain.”

“Requests for what?” Reese asks.

Grandma smiles at Grandpa. “Oh, they had a problem that became considerably more expensive every time someone else tried to fix it.” She gives my grandpa’s upper arm a squeeze. “That’s when they called in the big gun.”

My grandpa will always deflect a compliment to my grandma, so he says, “Most recently, we were in Tbilisi, because Elizabeth still gets requests for help, too. No one can match her diplomacy skills.”

“What took you to Tbilisi?” I know I won’t get a solid answer, but I ask anyway.

My grandpa considers the question for a bit, then says, “A room full of very important people agreed that a situation had to change. They disagreed rather enthusiastically on how. They needed someone who could find an outcome they could agree on without any of them believing they’d conceded. They knew your grandma was one of the few people who could do it, so they asked her to come out of retirement for a couple of days.”

Oh, how I wish I could be on comms for one of my grandma’s meetings. Her diplomacy skills are legendary.

The luggage from their flight starts coming through, and I grab the first of their belongings—a hard-sided tube that’s three or four feet in length —and place it on a luggage cart. “So how long will you be staying in town this time?”

“Longer than usual,” my grandpa says and points to the next item, and Reese grabs it. It’s a narrow wooden crate with “Fragile” stickers on it. After that is a birdcage-shaped box.