Page 24

 

  "Josh," I corrected Zach for about the millionth time, but he didnt smile, and somehow I knew that the joke was long since over. "No," I said, meaning it. "Im just…here. "

  I didnt look for him, but somehow I knew that Josh was standing with a group of friends ten feet away. Zach was right in front of me. There I was, caught between two boys who couldnt have been more different. If Id been another girl with another cover, I dont know what I would have done; but right then, only one thing mattered.

  "Why were you in Boston, Zach?" The air was crisp and cool around us. Soft music started on the loudspeaker as the homecoming court made their way to the center of the field. I felt more than a new season blowing in the breeze, so maybe thats why I looked at the boy I hadnt really seen in months and said, "Why are you here, Zach?"

  I stepped closer to him, waiting for him to reach out, to tease, to smile. And more than anything, I wanted him to say I am here for you.

  The space between us shrank, but as I took another step forward, Zach took a step back. Last spring, hed teased me, hed flirted with me—Id been the one who was hard to get. But standing under those bright lights, I could see that somehow, in the last few months, Zach and I had changed places. I didnt like the game from that side of the field.

  "Come on," he said, taking my hand (but not in a nice, romantic way). "Were taking Macey home. "

  "Were not doing anything. "

  "Fine," he said, starting away. "Ill go find Solomon, get his opinion. "

  "Zach," I started, cutting him off, but he wheeled on me.

  "Do you even know whos out there?" he snapped louder now, and then just as quickly he stepped closer. "Do you even care?"

  "The Circle of Cavan is after my sisterhood, Zach. Not yours. Theyre hunting my friends. Theyre sending Gallagher Girls down laundry chutes, so dont show up here and lecture me about whats at stake. " He drew a breath as if to speak, but I knew better than to let him. "If Joseph Cavans followers want to settle the score with Gillian Gallaghers great-great-grand- daughter, then theyre going to deal with all of us, and that doesnt necessarily include you. "

  The announcer was talking over the loudspeaker, saying something about the homecoming queen and her deep love of puppies or something, but I just looked at Zach, trying to shake the feeling that I hadnt really seen him in months. If ever. "Why do I feel like I cant trust you anymore?"

  I wanted him to lash out. I wanted him to fight, to protest, to argue—to do anything but look deeper into my eyes and say, "Because the Gallagher Academy doesnt admit fools. "

  Hundreds of people filled the stands around us. They were teachers and accountants, stay-at-home moms and men who worked at the toilet paper factory—regular people doing their best to live regular lives. They couldnt have been farther from Macey McHenry (both the spy and the girl) if theyd tried.

  And yet she was right there beside them.

  Beside us.

  And shed heard everything wed said.

  "The family tie to Roseville," Macey softly repeated what the man on the street had said.

  "Macey," I said, stepping closer.

  "Does this mean …" she started, and I knew there were a dozen ways that sentence could have ended. If I had just discovered that I was related to Gillian Gallagher, I would have been ecstatic. Bex would have thought it was the coolest thing ever. Liz might have decided to conduct some serious DNA experiments to determine if covertness was hereditary.

  But it didnt matter what we would have done. What really mattered was what Macey did.

  "You knew about this?" she asked me. Her voice was cracking. Her lip was shaking. "How long have you known about this?"

  I could have lied, I guess. But I didnt. Maybe because Macey had lived with me for over a year and would see through it. Maybe because we hadnt covered lying to a trained operative yet in CoveOps. Or maybe I just thought Macey had the right to know that of the thousands of Gallagher Girls in the world, she was the only one who carried Gillys blood in her veins.

  "Yeah, my mom told us last—"

  "Us!" Macey snapped. "Does the whole school know?"

  "No! Just Bex and Liz and me. Mom explained all that after you got accepted. She—"

  "So Im Gillian Gallaghers descendant?" The fire seemed to be fading from her, so I reached out, still half afraid that when I touched her she would turn to ash. "So thats why they let me in. "

  "Macey, its not—"

  "True?" she said, staring at me, but for once in my life I couldnt lie—couldnt hide. I could only watch as she pushed away without another word, through the red-clad members of the Pride of Roseville Marching Band, who were exiting the field.

  "Macey!" I called after her, but then Zachs hand was in mine.

  "Cam—" he started.

  "Not now, Zach. " I jerked away. Maybe I wanted to find Macey. Or maybe I just wanted to be anywhere but there.

  I set off through the crowd, pushing through the band and out into open space—seeing potential threats everywhere I turned.

  Twenty feet to my right and up three rows, there was a guy in a red cap who jumped to his feet to cheer a split second too late, as if his attention had been elsewhere. On the track between the cheerleaders and the bleachers, two women stood together scanning the crowd while wearing

  shoes that no small-town housewife would be caught dead in.

  I wanted to scream into my comms unit and call for backup, but I had no comms. There was no backup. And Macey was already gone.

  Chapter Twenty-four

  The road from Roseville had never felt so long. In the hours that passed, the mansion had never felt so big. And I had never felt so stupid as when Bex and Liz and I went room to room, floor to floor, searching for Macey.

  Covert Operations Report 0500 hours

  Operatives Morgan, Baxter, and Sutton conducted a detailed search of the Gallagher Mansion, following the textbook grid pattern of detection. (They were sure about this because Operative Sutton brought along the actual textbook. )

  "I know she made it back," I said for what must have been the hundredth time, but I had to keep saying the words. It didnt matter that neither Bex nor Liz needed to hear

  them. "I tracked her footprints down the tunnel…She came back that way—Im sure of it. She left her wig by the door with the rest of her disguise, so I dropped mine there too and went looking for her. …" I looked at Bex and Liz, not even trying to hide my panic as I begged them to believe me. "I know she made it back!"

  I wanted Liz to cite the incredible odds in our favor that Macey was fine. I expected Bex to tell me that everything was going to be okay, but instead she just stared at me and asked, "Scale of one to ten, how mad was she?"

  We were in the library, but there were no girls among the stacks. The clock in my head was telling me it was almost five in the morning. The fire in the fireplace was nothing but a pile of smoldering embers—the only light in the room. I thought about Bexs question, slowly realizing that mad wasnt the word. Mad could be handled by challenging Bex to a good sparring match in the P&E barn. Mad goes away with a good nights sleep.

  "Not mad," I said, shaking my head. "It was more like she was—"

  "Heartbroken. " Lizs voice was so soft I barely heard it, and even now Im not sure if she knew shed said the word aloud. Wed been looking for Macey for hours, but something in the way she sank onto the spiraling staircase made me realize that, somewhere along the way, Liz had gone missing too.

  "When Macey found out, she was heartbroken," Liz said again, and I knew she was right.

  "Yeah," I said, turning to her. "Heartbroken. "

  "Oh, Ill break something when we find her…" Bexs accent was coming back in waves. "Shes gonna get herself snatched right up if she keeps acting this bloody stupid. Running about the country on her own …"

  "You dont get it, do you?" It was the first time Id ever heard Liz raise her voice, the first time Id seen her skin so deathly white. Even Bex stopped a
nd stared. "I mean, look at you—look at both of you! You dont know what its like. You…belong," Liz said, as if Bex and I were at the core of an ancient secret and didnt realize it. And I guess, in a way, we were.

  "You. " Liz turned to Bex. "You go all over the world with your mom and dad, tracking down arms dealers and staking out terrorists during summer break. "

  Bex started to protest until she realized that what Liz was saying wasnt an insult and, furthermore, it was absolutely true.

  "And you," Liz said, spinning on me. "Cam, your mom is the headmistress…Your aunts a living legend…" For some reason I felt my cheeks flush red. "You guys dont have any idea what its like to be…normal. And then one day someone tells you that the toughest, most elite, most amazing school in the world is in Roseville, Virginia"—Lizs voice had taken on a very dreamy quality, but as she settled her gaze on us, her words turned to steel—"and they want you. "

  I thought about what shed said and realized that thered never been a moment in my life when Id doubted whether or not I could become a Gallagher Girl. For Bex, the toughest barrier was geography.

  "Yeah," Liz said, reading our expressions. "Id always been pretty good at school. " It was probably the understatement of the century, but I didnt dare interrupt. "People always told me I was smart—people always said that I was special. But Macey…" Lizs voice cracked. My eyes were going blurry, and even Bex looked as if she were about to cry. "What have people always told her?"

  I didnt want to think about the answer to that question—not then. Not ever. So the three of us sat surrounded by books and secrets and the light of a dying fire, finally realizing that we were the only people in Maceys life who knew not to judge a girl by her cover.

  "Weve got to find her," Bex said, starting for the door. "Now. "

  But I was already way ahead of her, pushing forward, riding a wave of exhaustion and terror; instinct driving me forward as I prayed that I was wrong.

  I could hear them following behind me, their footsteps echoing on the old stone floors while Bex called, "Weve looked down there already. "

  But I just ran faster through the abandoned halls, past empty classrooms and dark windows and, finally, down the stairs that led to the long basement corridor—to the place where, in a way, it had all begun.

  There were no windows there. The corridor was dark, the stone floors were rough, but still I ran toward the place where my mother had brought us more than a year ago and told us the truth about Macey.

  As I stopped in front of the tapestry that showed the entire Gallagher Family tree, I tried to imagine how many times Id disappeared behind it, but I knew that our trip that night had been the most important journey that that passageway had ever witnessed.

  I was breathing heavily, almost afraid of what Id find, as Bex and Liz appeared beside me.

  "Shes here somewhere," Liz said. "Shes got to be. Shes…"