Chapter 7

Kit Baxter hopped from the car and moved to open the door for her employer, only to find

that he had stepped out onto the narrow street himself and was scanning the area with the

intensity of the red panda.

She gave her head a little shake.

They were mixing their metaphors here in no mistake.

Back in Toronto, every moment in which her dear old boss appeared as August Fenwick,

he was wearing a carefully constructed persona, a veneer of uselessness that meant few ever

considered him twice, and no one would ever have used the words Fenwick and adventure

in the same sentence.

But since they had got off the plane, things were different.

It helped that they were extremely unlikely to be recognized, she knew, but openly involving

their secret identities in an adventure like this was pretty strictly against the rules.

She wondered if he had been bluffing, when he told El Nemeo that August Fenwick was on a

South American cruise, or if he had an agent planted on the Amazon Star right now.

"'If she had to guess, she supposed it would prove to be the latter,

"'even though she couldn't tell how long it would be

"'before she had a quiet moment to ask him about it.

"'She didn't like bringing this El Nemeer with them, that much she knew.

Something about the man set her teeth on edge.

She watched as he made his way around the car to stand beside the boss.

She smiled to herself as she saw El Nemeer scanning the nearby streets and buildings.

...