Brad Meltzer - The Millionaires

As the message faded, he hit Delete , slapped the phone shut, and put his foot on the gas. He was trying to stay away as long as he could, but like he always said back at the bank, some things required a personal touch.

“Whattya want?” Gallo asked as he picked up his cell phone.

“Agent Gallo, this is Officer Jim Evans with the Florida Highway Patrol – we just got a hit on that blue Volkswagen you were looking for. Apparently, it’s registered to a Martin Duckworth-”

“I told you it was registered to Duckworth.”

There was a pause on the other line. “You want the info or not, sir ?” Evans challenged.

This time, Gallo was the one who stayed silent. “Tell me what you got,” he finally said as he and DeSanctis raced up the Turnpike. He could hear Evans’s quiet gloating on the other line.

“We put the name in SunPass, just to take a look,” Evans began. “Apparently, about forty minutes ago, a pass registered to a Martin Duckworth went through at Cypress Creek.”

“Which direction?”

“Headed north,” the officer said. “If you want, I can send a few cars out-”

“Don’t touch ’em!” Gallo shouted. “Understand? They’re CIs – confidential informants-”

“I know what a CI is.”

“Then you know I want ’em left alone!”

“Do what you want,” Evans blasted. “Just remember you’re the ones who contacted us.” With a click, the line went dead.

Next to Gallo, DeSanctis shook his head. “I still don’t think you should’ve called that one in.”

“It was worth it.”

“Why? Just to confirm she was going north?”

“No, to confirm she wasn’t going south.”

Nodding to himself, DeSanctis rubbed the back of his head, where a thin white bandage covered the still throbbing cut Gillian had given him earlier. “You really think she’s turning on us?”

“It’s definitely a possibility…”

“What about you-know-who?”

“Don’t even say it,” Gallo interrupted. “She said he flew in this morning.”

“And you believe her?”

“I don’t believe anyone,” Gallo said. “Not after all this – I mean, how does he put her in the house and not even tell us? What the hell is that?”

“I have no idea – I just want to make sure we still get our cash.”

“Don’t worry… when all’s said and done and it’s time to split the baby, I guarantee we’ll be taking a few extra arms and legs.”

“This one?” Joey asked, pointing to the middle computer.

“No, to the left,” the woman behind the reference desk answered.

“Your left or mine?”

The librarian stopped a moment. “Yours,” she answered.

On the fifth floor of the Broward County Library, Joey walked past the row of computers and approached the one on the far end. The one that – according to the sign-up sheet – had just recently been used by a Mr. Sonny Rollins. From the three chairs that were gathered in front of the desk, Joey knew which one it was as soon as she walked in, but that didn’t mean she shouldn’t double-check. Just to be safe.

“There you go – that’s it,” the librarian called out.

Pushing the two other chairs aside, Joey took a seat in the center one. Onscreen was the homepage for the Broward County Library – “Broward’s Information Gateway” it said in black letters. Wasting no time, she moved the cursor to the button marked History , the computer equivalent of looking at an itemized long-distance telephone bill. She gave it a quick click and watched as a full list loaded in front of her. It had every website the computer visited in the last twenty days, including the last page viewed by Charlie and Oliver. Starting at the top, she clicked on the most recent.

Mickey and Pluto popped onscreen. Disney.com – Where the Magic Lives Online .

“What the hell is this?” she thought to herself.

She clicked the next on the list and found more of the same. About Disney.com … Executive Bios … Executive Bios for Arthur Stoughton …

Arthur Stoughton?

A high-pitched ring erupted and Joey reached for her cell phone. Every person on the fifth floor turned her way. “Sorry – my bad,” she waved to the onlookers as she stuffed her earpiece in place.

“You still at the library?” Noreen asked in her ear.

“What do you think?” Joey whispered.

“Well, get ready to shout, because I just got off the phone with your friend Fudge, who just got off the phone with some woman named Gladys, who just happens to be friends with another woman who is absolutely less than satisfied with the way her boss talks down to her at the Florida Highway Patrol.”

“This better be good,” Joey said.

“Oh, it’s good. Let me put it to you like this: For a mere five hundred bucks, Gladys’s friend happily put the word Duckworth into their computer system…”

“And…?”

“And she quickly found out that a SunPass registered to Martin Duckworth was last used going north on the Florida Turnpike.”

“North?” Directly in front of her, Joey stared at the official website for Disney, the number one tourist attraction in Orlando. North on the Turnpike.

Springing out of her seat, Joey made a mad dash for the elevator.

“What’re you doing now?” Noreen asked, hearing the noise.

“Noreen… I’m going to Disney World.”

It’s the sign that does it to me. Not the green-and-white highway signs that take us off the Turnpike and onto I-4, or the brown-and-white directional signs that twist and turn us along World Drive. All this time, Charlie, Gillian, and I have been relatively calm. Small talk in the car, hunting for stations on the radio, staring out the window for our first glimpse of the park. It’s just a typical trip to Disney World. But as the pink, purple, and blue sign rises in the distance… as the enormous blue letters arch across the eight lanes of perfectly paved road… as the stylized words “Magic Kingdom” come into focus and the car passes directly under them, all three of us crane our necks skyward and stay deadman silent. Gillian’s mouth gapes open. Charlie’s huff-and-puff breathing gets loud enough for me to notice. And the tightened excitement in my own chest feels like an elephant stepping on my heart.

I look back at Charlie just to make sure he’s okay. He puts on a smile I know is fake. I give him one right back. We did the exact same thing the first time we were here, when he was excited to puke on the Mad Hatter’s teacup ride, and I was scared of meeting Captain Hook. Sixteen years later, I’m tired of being scared.

We’re stalking Snow White. Watching the way she moves and who she talks to. I lean back against the wall. Gillian’s next to me, pretending to make chitchat. Charlie, more nervous than usual, flutters in and out around the crowd. But all we do is stare… study… make our mental notes. Naturally, Snow White has no idea we’re there – and as we stick to the shadows behind Cinderella’s Castle, neither do the autograph-seeking kids and photograph-snapping parents who currently surround her. Right now, the swarming crowd is six kids deep, which makes her hard to miss.

From the moment we entered the park, we were hunting for characters. Up Main Street, through the castle, and straight into Fantasyland. But it wasn’t until we heard the six-year-old shriek behind us – “Mom, look !” – that we spun around and saw the instacrowd. There she was at the center of the storm: Snow White, the fairest of them all. To the kids, she appeared out of nowhere. To us, well… that’s the whole point. If you want to find the employee tunnel, you have to start with the employees.