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by wire. This thing was an electronic device. In his pocket. Someone had planted it on him. But why? Was it a bug? A GPS monitor? The world’s tiniest bomb?
    He sat down hard on the bed, staring at the now ominous stick of wood in his hand. If it was a bug, who’d have set it? His driver hadn’t gotten close enough, nor had the concierge at the hotel or front doorman at La Banque. Penard had tugged on his arm.
    But the waitress had rested in his arms like a lover.
    Grim certainty had him closing his fist around the tiny shards. It must have been her. She was the one who’d been closest to him for the longest amount of time. Distracting him. Slipping her arms around his waist. She must have been waiting for him, outside that private room. Listening in, too. He should have seen through it, but when he’d had her in his arms, all he could think about was how nice it felt to finally be someone’s savior.
    He cursed and squeezed his fist, wanting to crush the wretched gadget she’d slipped into his pocket. Just because he hadn’t been with a woman in years didn’t mean he needed to lose his head the first time a doe-eyed girl fell into his arms. He kicked the desk chair, sending it flying across the room and into the wall with a shocking clatter.
    Damn it all! This was how people got themselves killed.
    Who was she? He started with what he knew: she was an apparently American waitress with access to well-disguised spy tech. Working at La Banque could be her cover job if she worked clandestine intelligence. He strode to the floor-to-ceiling window, considering the scenario. She could be CIA. She could have slipped the toothpick into his pocket to listen to his conversations or track his movements.
    Intriguing little play on the part of the Yanks, if that’s what this was. What in the hell did they want with him? As far as SOCA knew, the CIA tracked Kral’s activities but didn’t bother monitoring the traffic of weapons and drugs into the UK.Such minutiae, as they saw it, wasn’t their problem. A man like McCrea, who exclusively ran goods into Britain, shouldn’t be of interest to them.
    So why did she care enough to plaster him with what was probably an expensive little bit of technology? Had the Americans finally decided to get tough on Lukas Kral, and now that McCrea was after him, too, did he merit their attention?
    He didn’t know, but it didn’t matter. American involvement, official and acknowledged or otherwise, could only screw up the op. He wasn’t going to let her—or whoever had planted this thing on him—get any closer.
    He carefully eased the two pieces of the toothpick back together, getting the wire completely re-encased inside. Then he walked down the hall and tossed it into an underused stairwell. If he hadn’t broken the connections, it’d keep on transmitting data, although none of it would be specific to him. They’d know he was in the hotel, but nothing more. With it resting casually in the dust, broken in a manner that suggested a passing heel strike, they couldn’t be certain that he’d found it. If they thought their surveillance was still undiscovered, they might just overplay their hand, letting him see who they were, and what they wanted from him.
    Let them come. He’d rather know whom he faced than run from a ghost.
    He went back to his room and placed a call. “I need information on a waitress at La Banque.”
    “Name?” replied a thin male voice with a polished English accent.
    “Didn’t catch it.”
    “Useful. Picture?”
    “Get it from a security camera. Slim. Very short, no more than five two. Long, dark, curly hair. American, wearing a black skirt and white shirt. Might be CIA. I think she dropped a toothpick bug into my pocket.”
    “Girls are getting aggressive with you, are they?”
    McCrea clenched his teeth, in no mood for levity. “Just figure out who she is, Lamb. We’re too close to the end to screw around.”
    “That’s exactly what I was thinking. On