United We Spy (Gallagher Girls) (18 page)

S
urely that wasn’t the longest night of my life, but it felt like it.

Not one of us protested when Liz insisted we stop and clean our wounds in the bathroom of a gas station outside the city. They were inconsequential, really. Scrapes and bruises. I had a pretty nasty cut on my shoulder, but nothing any worse than any of us had had before. We’d been on the perimeter of the blast radius. Ten feet closer to the king, and we wouldn’t have been so lucky.

Once we were back in the van, I risked a glance at Zach. No one had tended to his scrapes and burns. No one had tried to. He just kept staring out the window, looking for what, exactly, I didn’t really know.

Maybe a way out.

Maybe a chance to turn back time.

We kept the radio of the van turned low. News of the king’s assassination swept across the globe. Riots were spreading throughout Caspia and beyond, crossing borders, a whole region on fire. Chaos was the new norm. The world was a powder keg, and I rubbed my sore body, afraid I’d just felt the spark.

We drove all night, heading south along the coastline until I was almost convinced Zach was going to drive us out to sea.

Finally there was a dock with a small ferry that you had to push with a long pole, like it was still 1850. At last there was an island and an overgrown pathway and a house surrounded by tall trees filled with Spanish moss, a massive wraparound porch and a scene befitting Scarlett O’Hara.

“What is this place, Zach?” I asked, but he didn’t answer. He just kicked the front door; but it didn’t put up a fight, splintering easily, swinging open. Liz carried her computers protectively like there might be an alligator or a monster after her hard drive. But Zach said nothing. He just kept looking at the staircase as if waiting for a ghost to descend from the second floor.

It had been a grand old house once, a mansion. But everything about it had fallen into rubble from decades of disuse and neglect.

“Is this one of Joe’s houses?” I waited, but Zach was speechless. “If it’s Joe’s house, Zach, we probably shouldn’t stay. Someone may track us here.”

“Not Joe.” Zach shook his head.

“But you know it.” It wasn’t really a question, not a guess. I inched slowly closer. “Whose house is it, Zach?”

“It’s safe.” He turned. “We’ll be safe.”

“Zach…” I reached for him, but he pulled away and walked to the corner of the room, measuring his footsteps carefully, listening until one step sounded slightly different from the others. Then he knelt to the floor and removed one of the boards and reached inside to pull out six birthday candles and a G.I. Joe, a rumpled five-dollar bill and an assortment of broken crayons—and only then did I know where Zach had brought us. After all, that wasn’t the covert stash of an operative; it was the hiding place of a child.

“This was your mother’s safe house,” I whispered.

But Zach just looked around the big, dusty rooms that must have been so grand, once upon a time. “No. It was her
house
,” he said.

Spies aren’t like normal people. No one expects us to have houses and mortgages, tire swings and barbecues on the Fourth of July. But every spy is somebody’s child, and I stepped across those dusty floorboards, wondering what kind of place had given birth to the woman we called Catherine.

“This was my room.” He looked into the small space. “There were bedrooms upstairs, of course, but I didn’t like being alone. I was scared of the dark and the wind and the storms.… There were such bad storms.”

“Can it be traced to you, Zach? To her?”

“There’s natural gas on the property, and the rooms are still lit with gaslight. I think there might be a generator. A water well, but no phone. The whole house is off the grid.” Zach gave a gruff laugh. “It doesn’t even know there is a grid.”

“When was the last time you were here?”

“I don’t know. Ten years ago? Maybe longer. She used to talk about fixing it up—making it like it was in its prime. But I don’t know how it was. I just know this.”

He motioned around the derelict rooms, and I don’t know if he meant it or not, but it sounded like he was saying he didn’t know anything other than a vagabond way of life. “This is all I know.”

“Maybe we shouldn’t stay here, Zach,” I tried. “We could keep driving.”

“You don’t get it, Gallagher Girl.” He shook his head slowly. “The king is dead. There’s nowhere else to go.”

I grew up in an old mansion. I know the chill that creeps through stone walls, the sounds a roof can make in a hard wind. But that night was different. Everything creaked and moaned. When the rain started, it fell in heavy waves, beating against the house and dripping through the ceiling. There was a steady, even ping as fat drops fell on the keys of the old piano. And the longer the storm pounded outside, the more I expected the house might blow right off its foundation and out into the waves.

There must have been debris in the chimney, because when we built a fire, smoke backed into the house, filling it with an eerie haze. We propped open the front door, and for a while the smoke mixed with the wet wind while Preston and Macey surveyed the contents of the kitchen. Liz was unpacking equipment, and Zach stoked the fire.

But I just sat at the bottom of the stairs, rubbing my palms against my jeans, dried blood smearing onto dark denim, wondering,
Is that it? Is it really over?

“What happens now?” I looked up to find Bex leaning against the banister, looming over me. It was like she’d read my mind.

“You should get some sleep, Bex. We’ll probably need to change your bandages and—”

“I’m not talking about my bloody bandages,” she said, then grinned. “No pun intended.”

“Look, Bex…” I started. Suddenly, I felt so tired, so worn.

“No,
you
look. This isn’t the end,” she told me. “You think I got shot…for
this
?” Bex snapped. “I’m a spy, Cam. I was born to do this—to be this. It’s in my blood. And I will do it until the day I die. It’s who I am,” my best friend said, then leveled a glare at me. “The thing I don’t think you realize is…it’s who you are too.”

“I know.”

“No.” Bex shook her head. “You don’t. If you did, you never would have spent half of our sophomore year dating Josh. You wouldn’t be freaked out at the thought of graduation. You would know what life after spy school means. It means this, Cam.
This.
And you are better at it than anyone that I have ever known. Now, get up. And tell us what comes next.”

But I didn’t move.

“Okay. Let’s have it.” She held out her hand, waggled her fingers.

“What?”

“You know what,” my best friend told me. “Hand it over.”

I didn’t ask again. I just reached into my pocket and pulled out the list I’d been carrying around for weeks.

“There.” Bex pointed at the paper. “William Smith. Gideon Maxwell. Two names, Cam. There are only two names left!”

“I know, but…”

“But what?” Bex demanded.

“But the king is dead, Bex.” I felt silly pointing it out, almost disrespectful saying the words aloud. “We didn’t stop the assassination. We couldn’t—”

But Bex didn’t wait for me to finish. She spun and yelled across the room.

“Liz, has it started yet?” Bex asked. “Have the Iranians invaded Caspia?”

Liz sat at her computers. She didn’t say a word; she just shook her head. No.

“Then there’s time to bloody well stop it!”

I knew she was right. Of course she was. Bex was always right. She knew me better than I knew myself. But then again, isn’t that a best friend’s job?

“So tell me what comes next,” Bex demanded.

I looked up at her for a long time, thinking, praying. My voice was scratchy and distant. It wasn’t like my own when I stood and started to speak.

“Liz, when we get a secure line let me know. I’ve got to try to contact Mom and Abby.” Macey and Preston came in from the kitchen, and I looked around the group. “As for the rest of us, we’re going to try to get some sleep. Regroup. And first thing tomorrow morning, we’re going to figure out what happens next.”

I meant it in that moment. I really did. I thought we would sleep for a few hours and wake up to a new day filled with new possibilities. I thought the morning would bring change. But I should have known that it doesn’t take that long for change to happen—it takes a second. A moment. In a single breath, reality as you know it can simply fall away.

When I heard a sound on the porch I thought it was the wind rattling the shutters. It felt like the world and its troubles were blowing straight to our door, so I looked at my friends in turn and said, “Okay, everybody, get some sleep, and tomorrow we’ll figure out how to stop the Circle.”

“Oh.” A laugh filled the room. “Maybe I can help with that.”

I spun to look at the woman who stood silhouetted in the door. Wind gusted around her, and bits of hair blew across her face, framing her dark eyes as she looked at Zach and said, “Hello, sweetheart. Sorry to disturb you, but I believe you have a walk-in.”

M
aybe you’ve never heard the term “walk-in.” If you’re reading this, though, you probably have. You probably know that it’s the term spy agencies use for when rival operatives come in out of the cold. It’s a phrase that brings to mind hope and fear in equal measures.
This could be big,
you think.
This
could be nothing,
you know. But whatever the case, it is never, ever something that you ignore or disregard.

And that’s why we all sat staring at the door, every one of us gaping at the woman who stood there.

In a flash, Zach was moving toward her, but Catherine held her hands up in surrender.

“I come in peace,” Catherine said.

None of us believed her.

Zach was almost to his mother, who reached out as if to hug him or touch his face.

“I missed you, darling,” Catherine told him. “You’ve grown into such a handsome young—”

But his mother didn’t finish because, just then, I rushed past Zach, toward the woman who had captured me—kidnapped me. I didn’t think as I pulled back my fist and punched with all my might. I felt pain and satisfaction in equal measure as I watched Catherine crumble, unconscious, to the ground.

R
EASONS
I T
OTALLY
, C
OMPLETELY
, A
BSOLUTELY
W
AS
N
OT
G
OING TO
S
LEEP THAT
N
IGHT
(N
O
M
ATTER
H
OW
M
UCH
E
VERYBODY
T
OLD
M
E
I H
AD TO
):

(A list by Cameron Morgan)

• Despite popular belief, hitting someone with a closed fist actually hurts the hit
  ter
  almost as much as the hit
  tee
  .
  
• One of the little bones in my hand was technically broken.
  
• It’s really hard to sleep when your ice pack keeps leaking all over your pillow.
  
• The only thing worse than getting injured is Liz’s becoming your self-appointed nurse and, consequently, hurting you many, many more times while changing your bandages.
  
• The look in Zach’s eyes when he saw his mother.
  
• The look in Zach’s mother’s eyes when she saw me.
  
• Knowing that an assault on a walk-in was in violation of at least three rules of the Geneva convention.
  
• Remembering that I totally and completely didn’t care.
  

“What is she doing here?” I heard Liz’s voice as soon as the sun came up. Creeping toward the stairs, I saw her below, pacing like a tiny blond blur. The rain must have stopped and the chimney must have cleared, because the air was warm and dry—almost cozy—as I walked down the stairs.

“What does she want? Presumably not to kill us…because we’re not dead.” Liz was rattling off the facts at ninety miles per hour. “Let’s say we’re looking at a double-agent situation. She’s come to infiltrate us and send our plans back to her bosses.”

“She doesn’t have bosses,” Bex said, but Liz rattled on.

“Maybe she really is a walk-in. Maybe she has information for us and we can—”

“We can’t listen to her, Liz,” Bex said.

“But—” Liz started, until Zach cut her off.

“She’s just as dangerous in here as she is out there. You got that?” he asked. He looked at Bex and Liz in turn. “Do you understand?”

Macey took a deep breath and crossed her arms. “Well, I vote we bind her hands and feet and kick her out of a fast moving vehicle in front of the gates of Langley.”

“We can’t do that,” I said.

“Why not?” Zach asked, like he was seriously considering the idea.

“Because the enemy of my enemy is my friend.” I started for the small room where we’d tied Catherine up the night before, but Zach lunged in front of me, blocking my way.

“I can’t let you question her, Gallagher Girl,” he told me.

“Isn’t that why she’s here—to talk?” I asked.

Zach shook his head. “She’s here to
lie
.”

“She’ll talk to me.”

“No, Cam,” Zach said. “It’s not a good idea.”

“Maybe it’s our only idea,” I said back.

“Well…” I heard a tiny voice behind me and turned to see Liz standing there, a truly guilty look on her face. “Maybe not our
only
idea…”

Catherine sat in her chair, hands and feet bound, yet she looked like she was waiting on a train, like she’d wait forever if she had to.

“Hello, Catherine,” I said, easing closer. She was across the room, but like a snake, I could feel her coiled, constantly ready to strike.

“You don’t have to do this, Cammie,” Zach said.

“Hello, darling,” Catherine told him, but it was as if she’d never spoken at all.

“Gallagher Girl,” he started again, but I couldn’t take my eyes off of his mother.

“Liz,” I said, and then my smallest roommate walked forward. She didn’t tremble or shake, but I knew she must have been terrified as she pulled up the sleeve of Catherine’s shirt and injected a clear liquid into the woman’s arm.

“Truth serum, girls?” Catherine said. She sounded so disappointed. “Isn’t that a tad cliché?”

“It’s stronger,” Liz said, then stepped quickly back. Zach moved between Liz and his mother until Liz was safely out of range of the woman tied to the chair.

“Really?” Catherine asked as Liz’s concoction entered her bloodstream. It was like she was growing drunk and sleepy. Her eyelids were heavy, and when she told Zach, “You’ve gotten so tall,” her words were slurred.

“Why are you hunting down the leaders of the Circle?” I asked, and Catherine looked at me for a long time, the tiniest of smiles playing at the corners of her mouth.

“It’s good to see you, Cammie, dear. It’s been too long.”

“Are you sure we shouldn’t hit her again?” Bex said from over my shoulder. “Because I totally think we should hit her.”

I crouched on the floor, looked her in the eye. “You can talk to me, Catherine. Or you can talk to the CIA. Maybe the moles the Circle leaders have within the agency won’t find you. But maybe they will.”

“They’re all dead, you know. The leaders. We just have one left.”

“We?” I asked.

“Your mother and Joseph and I,” Catherine said.

“She’s lying,” Zach said. “Joe would never work with her.”

“Oh. Of course he would,” Catherine told him. “He’d never admit it, but we want the same thing. We’ve always wanted the same thing. We just have different…
methods
.”

“Like torture,” I said.

Catherine looked right at me. “I didn’t want to hurt you, Cammie. I really didn’t. But it was the only way. I had to stop them, don’t you know? I had to stop this. You had to help me. And you did help me. And now we’re down to one.… Gideon Maxwell had one son and no grandchildren. His line stops there. There were no other heirs. So it’s possible that there is no Maxwell descendant in the Circle now. Maybe there are just six Inner Circle members instead of seven. Maybe we’re finished. But I doubt it. It doesn’t
feel
finished.”

Catherine seemed to think on that for a moment, and I had to admit that I agreed. Something in my bones told me it was still a long way from over.

“Maybe Maxwell appointed someone else to take his place before he died. But I honestly don’t know.” Catherine’s gaze shifted onto Preston. “Why don’t you ask him?”

Her hands were bound, and still Preston flinched, almost like he’d been slapped. I expected Macey to lash out at Catherine, but instead she turned to the boy beside her.

“Pres?” she asked. “Do you know?”

“No!” Preston’s voice cracked and he shook his head. “I’ve never heard of Gordon Maxwell.”

“Gideon Maxwell,” Liz corrected.

“I don’t know him! I don’t know any of my dad’s friends. Or…I don’t know which of his friends might be in the Inner Circle.” Preston seemed sad when he said it, as if he too had been living a lie. It was just that no one had bothered to tell him. “I don’t know anything.”

“Why are you doing this?” I turned back to Catherine. “Why did you betray the Circle’s leadership?”

“I’m in the betrayal business.” Catherine laughed. “Besides, I like the world the way it is. A world war is a highly inconvenient thing. I prefer my destruction on a much smaller scale.”

“What do they want? What are the Circle leaders planning?” I asked.

“You know what they’re planning,” Catherine countered. She sounded almost bored, like we were wasting her time. She looked around Zach, to where Liz stood. “It was
her
plan, after all.”

Liz shuddered but didn’t speak or cringe or cry. I couldn’t shake the feeling that our little roommate was growing up. We all were.

“Who is the mole at the Gallagher Academy?” I asked, but Catherine only looked at me as if I were crazy. “How did the Circle get Liz’s test?”

“Oh, that.” She shrugged. “The school has to file all of its admittance tests with the CIA. From there, it was easy enough for the Circle to acquire them just to see if there were any students we wanted to recruit…” She looked at Liz. “Evil plans we wanted to steal.”

“Why?” Zach asked. “World war…what’s in it for them?” He leaned down to his mother’s level. “What do they want?”

Then Catherine looked at her son as if he were the most naive boy in the world. “They want
everything
,” she said, and then she cackled. She was insane—there was no denying it. But she was also oddly lucid as she said, “The government is so big—so powerful. Cavan wanted the Union to fail—that’s why he tried to kill Lincoln. It’s the same agenda. They want what they’ve always wanted. Chaos. Fracture. Pieces so disorganized that no single player can ever have too much power.” Then she laughed. “Of course, what they really mean but never say is that they don’t want anyone to have more power
than they
have
. Personally, I like power. It’s one of many reasons I want to see them fail.”

“Tell me what they’re planning,” Zach said.

“You know what they’re planning,” she countered. She was staring at Liz. “Don’t you, Liz?”

“They want war,” Liz said, her voice surprisingly strong.

“But is there war?” Catherine asked.

No.
The answer swept over us all.
Not yet.

“King Najeeb was a charismatic leader, but he was a grown man in a dangerous business. He still had enemies. His death, while sad, was not that tragic in the bigger scheme of things. And besides…it’s not like he doesn’t have
an heir
.”

“The princess,” I said, and Catherine nodded.

“A grown man blown to bits is sad. A small girl killed just days after her father.… An entire line wiped out.… That will cause the world to burn. The Iranians will have to break the treaty. And when the Iranians invade Caspia, Turkey will invade, and…boom.”

“We have to find her,” I said, turning to Zach.

“No.” Catherine shook her head slowly. I don’t know if Liz’s drugs were finally becoming too much, but her voice had a hazy quality as she looked at me. “No. You don’t.”

“But we…” I started, then something in her eyes made me stop. She shook her head.

“You know where she is, Gallagher Girl.” The words sounded different when Zach’s mother said them. Haunting and dangerous and cruel.

“Amirah.” I whispered the princess’s name and thought about my first night back at school, about the tiny seventh grader with the big brown eyes and utterly royal countenance. “Amy. She goes to the Gallagher Academy, doesn’t she?”

A dreamy smile spread across Catherine’s lips. “Good girl,” she told me. “It is a school fit for a queen. Now, go. Stop them.”

“Step away from the psychopath!”

I knew the voice as soon as I heard it, but still part of me was almost afraid to turn around.

My aunt Abby’s eyes were on fire, and she crossed the room in two long strides, grabbing my arm and physically pulling me farther from Zach’s mother.

“Abby!”

At first, I was terrified—afraid my friends and I had been caught playing hooky. But then my fear turned to relief as I realized Abby and Townsend had found us. We didn’t have to be on our own anymore.

“Abby, you’re here! How did you find us? Did you get my messages? Were you—”