Without knowing what else to do, I called Paris. He came over and helped me clean everything up.

"It's got to be associated with National Resources," Paris said. "You said this chick mentioned them. Who else would it be?"

I picked up the last spoon from the kitchen floor. Man, those were some nice spoons. I didn't even remember where I got them, but they were really nice.

"Dak."

"Oh, sorry." I shoved the flatware into the drawer. "I'm still a little dizzy from the two blows on the head."

"I think we need to tell the Council about everything."

I looked up sharply. "What? No! They'll insist I kill Leonie. I can't do that."

"May I remind you that you've had three attacks-two in your own home? It isn't safe to bring Louis back here until we close out this deal."

My perfect posture slumped. "I didn't think about that."

"And it looks like the NR guys have more resources than we thought. Maybe we just can't get them all by ourselves."

Leonie or Louis. That was what it came down to. "I can't do it." I shook my head. "I can't sic the Council on Leonie."

Paris put his hand on my shoulder. "Maybe they won't go after her. I mean, they gave Gin a reprieve. After what they put you through last time, maybe they'll let her off the hook?"

I looked at my cousin for a long time. He'd never hurt me. And I had to take care of Louis. It was a long shot, but I had to try.

Paris stood up and pulled his cell phone out. "I'll do it. You go clean yourself up."

I nodded, grateful to have him handle things. Paris definitely had a cooler head. If anyone could manage to pull this off, it would be him.

Of course, no one was answering the bat phone on Santa Muerta. It was two a.m.

here, which would make it . . . Oh, hell, my head hurt too much to calculate the time difference. Paris sent me to bed and insisted on sleeping on my couch, just in case. Good man. He was always someone you could really depend on. A dependable assassin.

I woke midafternoon to find Paris in the kitchen making eggs and bacon. What a guy!

"Any news?" I asked, not really wanting an answer.

"I talked to Dela this morning. She was going to call an emergency Council meetingfor"-he paused and looked at his watch-"right about now." He pushed a plate of scrambled eggs, hash browns, and bacon toward me. "Might as well eat."

The food was excellent. I didn't realize Paris could cook. We said nothing as we ate. Both of us were probably thinking the same thing, coming up with no answers. I finished quickly and decided on a shower.

While I felt clean and full afterward, I also felt numb. Leonie's breakup had devastated me more than the attack last night. And now Louis was in jeopardy. I toweled off, feeling nothing but despair, and pulled on a pair of jeans and a black T-shirt.

I walked into the living room just in time to see Paris ending a conversation on his cell.

My heart lurched. The moment of truth.

Paris winced as he hung up his cell. "Well, I guess you are off the hook on this dilemma."

"Is the Council calling off the hit on Leonie?

That's great! Now I just have to find her and convince her everything's going to be all right!" I jumped up and hugged my cousin.

But Paris pushed me away. "No. That's not it. Grandma doesn't want you to have to hunt the woman who made you grow up. She still feels bad about almost killing you last year."

I frowned. "That's good news, isn't it?"

"They still want her dead."

His words sank slowly into my skin, ending in a pool of ooze around my ankles. "Oh, no,"

I whispered. "No." I said more forcefully, using the anger that welled up in my throat. "That's not going to work. I can't let them do that."

Paris nodded, as if he'd known this was going to be my reaction all along. "All right.

I'm in this with you. Let's go get her."

"Really? You'd come with me?" I couldn't believe it.

He grinned. "Hey, if there's no hope for you to have a chance at true love, then I'm screwed."

I slapped him on the back. Maybe he drank sissy drinks and wrote poetry. Maybe he was anal-retentive and wore silly pajamas. But he was still my wingman.

"How do we find her?" I asked.

Paris thought for a few moments, then smiled. "Why don't we call Missi?"

Chapter Thirty-two.

"We've got a blind date with Destiny-and it looks like she's ordered the lobster."

-the Shoveler, Mystery Men Mystery Men

It turned out that Missi was at a technology convention in Vegas. She agreed to meet with us, so Paris and I made plans to hop a redeye, meeting her in her room about one a.m.

"What are you doing?" Louis had his arms folded over his chest as he watched me pack.

"What are you doing up? You have school!"

"I'm going with you." He added a frown to his stance, appearing very menacing for a six-year-old.

I sat down next to him, ignoring Paris, who was tapping his wristwatch to tell me we had to leave.

"You can't go with me. It's going to be very dangerous. Remember when I told you what we do for a living? Well, there are some dangerous people out there chasing Leonie. Parisand I are going to find her and bring her back."

"You promised you wouldn't leave without me!" This time he stamped his little foot.

"Louis, I know I promised that. But taking you would mean putting you in danger. And I just can't do that. You are too important to me. I need you to stay here with Gin and Diego until I get back."

My son didn't look convinced. But there was no way I was taking him with me. Losing Leonie would be devastating. Losing Louis would kill me.

"I'm an awful father for breaking this promise, I know. But I love you so much it hurts.

And if anything happened to you I would never, ever forgive myself. You are my son, and I need you to stay here." I put on what I thought was a very convincing stern-father face.

Louis exploded into tears and threw himself into my arms. I held him while he cried, trying desperately not to sob myself. After a few minutes I took him by the shoulders.

"You need to stay here and help Gin take care of everyone. Okay? I'll be back. I promise. And I'll never leave you again-unless you want me to."

Louis sniffled and wiped his eyes on hissleeve. "Okay, Dad. But you'd better come back."

I nodded, and Paris and I left. I spent the next two hours on the plane fighting back the tears.

We found Missi as soon as we landed. It took only about half an hour to fill her in on everything.

"Let's see what we've got." Missi pulled out the weirdest-looking laptop I'd ever seen and began to turn it on.

"What is that?"

Missi grinned like a kid in a chocolate playroom. "Do you like it? It's my latest thing."

Paris and I looked at each other, then turned back to the computer. It was about the size of any other notebook, but it had all kinds of weird attachments and wires sticking out of it. Closed, it resembled the kind of sandwich a robot would eat. Once it was opened I could see that the monitor was really four small screens, and the keyboard had ten rows of keys instead of the usual six.

"Holy cow." Paris whistled under his breath.

"How does it work?" I asked a little louder.

Missi smiled. "I guess you could say it works like a laptop. It's just tricked out to my specs. With four screens I can multitask more efficiently. This puppy has infrared capability, satellite feeds to U.S., European, and Asian government space programs, and the best GPS system I could put together."

She touched the keyboard and the thing quivered to life. "I added some special touches to the keyboard to make work easier. Each monitor is color-coded, and I just switch back and forth between them using the touchpad."

I held my hand up to interrupt. "Okay, it's totally cool. But let's just get to the part about how we can find Leonie before Doc Savage, National Resources, or the Council does."

Missi had the good grace not to look crushed that I interrupted. I figured Paris would ask her more about it later, but Leonie's life hung in the balance.

"Sorry. I just get carried away sometimes,"

she said. "I can't take stuff like this to the convention."

"My bad, Missi. I'm being insensitive." This caused her to jerk her head toward me in surprise. Apparently I wasn't shocking just my immediate family with my personality makeover these days.

"Wow," she said. "No, no, you're right. We have to find your girlfriend before anyone else does." She began typing on the weird keyboard. "Give me everything you know about her."

I told her that her family ran a funeral home in Oregon, and it didn't take long to find the Doubtfire Funeral Home in Portland.

Missi plugged a green wire from the keyboard into the monitor as the funeral home came up on screen number one. When I raised my eyebrow she told me she'd hacked into their security system. I filled her in on everything I knew about Leonie, from Crummy's to current and former addresses to physical description.

Missi kept working, plugging wires in and tapping on the keyboard, until all four screens showed different aspects from Leonie's life.

"Here"-Missi pointed at the first screen-"I'm tapping into her family's home and work phone lines. I can actually get recordings of conversations past and present. No future ones though. But I'm working on it."

How the hell could she do that?

"This monitor shows her current home and cell phone lines. I can tap into those too. I can access them as far as three days ago.

That should give us some info on where she's planning to hide out.

"And this"-she grinned broadly-"is a GPS tracking program. I've typed in her name, description, phone numbers, and Social Security number. I should have her located in no time."

I slumped to the bed, my head whirling.

Paris looked like he'd been hit with a Taser.

"Does the Council know you have this technology?" he asked weakly.

"Hell, no. Nobody knows-not even Mom. I think Monty and Jack suspect something, though, because once when they said they were at the library I tracked them to this kegger in Belize-"

"Missi!" I shouted.

Her face went from dazed back to the present. "Oh. Right. Anyway, I just want you to know that I understand what you're going through, so that's why you now know about Lulu."

"Lulu?" I asked, afraid of the answer.

"That's what I named her. Oh!" A buzzing noise emanated from Lulu, and she turned toward it. "Found her! Well, that's weird."

Hearing Missi say that something was weird was truly a strange experience.

"She's here. In Vegas. Huh," Missi said distractedly.

"Are you serious?" That was was weird. "Where is she? And is anyone following her?" weird. "Where is she? And is anyone following her?"

She pulled up another screen. "It looks like she's"-Missi looked at us with an odd expression-"in the room next door. On the left."

I ran to the door that adjoined that room to Missi's. Knocking was out of the question.

Leonie would just run away again. So I scrambled through my pockets to find some way to pick the lock.

Missi appeared beside me, rolling her eyes.