United We Spy (Gallagher Girls) (19 page)

“We weren’t following you,” Townsend told us. “We were following
her
.” He pointed to the woman tied to the chair, eyelids fluttering.

Finally, Abby released me and moved to examine Catherine.

“What did you do to her?” Abby asked. She picked up the empty syringe, smelled it. “Is that truth serum?” she asked, but Townsend just shook his head.

I could tell he was thinking about his own experience with that particular concoction when he huffed and said, “It’s stronger.”

“Well, isn’t this precious?” Catherine smiled weakly and forced her eyes open, almost like she didn’t dare drift off in the middle of the party.

“Abby, Catherine says the Circle is going to target Princess Amirah next,” Bex said.

“Yes,” Zach’s mother said with a decisive nod. Then, just as quickly, she shrugged. “I think so. No one knows exactly what the Circle leaders will do. They are capable of anything, after all. But I believe that is their next move. So I came here to tell the good guys so that they can save the day. Isn’t that what you do, darling?”

“Shut up! Just shut up!” Zach snapped. “I will never believe anything you say.”

She looked at him and shook her head, smiled a little as she told him, “You are so like your father.”

Then she looked past me and Zach, past Bex and Abby, to where Agent Townsend stood by the door with his arms crossed.

“What do you think, Townsend, darling? Isn’t he like you?” She looked at Zach again. “I think he’s just like you.”

And then she closed her eyes and drifted off to sleep.

T
hings my aunt said:
She lies.


Things my boyfriend said:
She lies.


Things my gut said:
She lies.


Things I couldn’t deny:
She was under the influence of truth
serum.


Things we all had to admit:
She wasn’t lying.


“Zach?” I asked, my voice too quiet in the darkness. The wind was strong and I could hear the waves crashing on the beach. Another storm was blowing in. I could feel it in the air. And as I stepped off the creaking porch and across the yard I tried again. “Zach.” But he didn’t answer.

I saw a dark shadow moving against the waves, leaning into the wind, so I walked down the tiny path, careful not to trip any of the alarms that had been set inside of him. I rubbed my arms and wished I’d brought a sweater, but Zach just stood in the blowing mist, his gray T-shirt growing steadily darker in the damp.

“Townsend is looking for you.”

Zach laughed, a cold, cruel sound. “Well, eighteen years, folks. Glad he finally got around to it.”

“Zach, he didn’t—”

“Did
you
know?” he asked but didn’t turn to face me.

“No, Zach. Of course not. Why would I know that?”

“Did Joe say anything to you? Did your mom?”

“My mom didn’t know, Zach,” I told him. “No one knew.”

I thought about how Zach and Townsend had always reminded me of each other. They had the same posture, the same grin, the same earnest, serious nature. And now I knew why. I wished I’d seen it before then, and I also wished we could go back in time to before we knew. But we couldn’t do either.

“She never told me!” Townsend’s voice echoed from inside. Abby slammed a door, and the whole house shook.

“Has Abby killed him yet?” Zach asked.

I shook my head. “She’ll get over it.”

Then he turned to me, the moonlight slicing across his face. The wetness in the air grew heavier and water clung to his hair as he said, “Maybe I won’t.”

“Zach—”

“He left me. With her.”

“He didn’t know about you, Zach.”

“He should have known! He’s a spy. An operative. It was his job to know.”

I eased forward, reached out to touch his arm.

“You should go talk to him, Zach. He’s a good guy,” I told him. “
You’re
a good guy.”

But Zach just shook his head. He looked like the saddest boy in the world when he told me, “I’m never having kids.”

Let’s get one thing straight. I’m eighteen years old as I write this. Kids? Totally not on my radar. In that moment, living through the next week was pretty much my only goal. But I can’t say that Zach’s words didn’t stop me. That a part of my brain—the part that was trained to see fifty steps ahead—had to wonder what it meant. For me. For us.

“You aren’t?”

“I wouldn’t do that to a child.”

“You’d be a good dad.”

But Zach just laughed. It was a cruel, mocking sound. “Because I had such good parental role models?”

“You had Joe.”

Then Zach turned back to the water and the darkness and the crashing, breaking waves. “I didn’t have anyone.”

I could have said,
You have me.
I could have taken his hand and told him everything was going to be okay—that there was no way the past would repeat itself. Not with us. But I learned a long time ago not to make those kinds of promises. I knew better than anyone that life can change on a dime. That even the best dads sometimes go away forever.

So instead I just asked, “What are we going to do about Amirah?”

“Who?” he asked, like he hadn’t heard his mother at all.

“The princess, Zach. She’s just a little girl. And that little girl is going to die. They’re going to kill her.”

Zach sank down to sit on a rock. He kept his gaze locked on the sea as he told me, “No, they aren’t. We’re not going to let them hurt anyone ever again.”

“C
am.” I felt a kick against my leg. A bright light burned my eyes.

“Get up,” Abby snapped. She stood above me, sunshine from the window spilling across her shoulders.

“What…what time is it?”

“Showtime.”

I pulled my tennis shoes on over bare feet and raced after her down the creaky stairs.

“Where?” I asked, taking a few steps more. “Where are we going?”

Abby smiled. “Home.”

You don’t really appreciate things until they’re gone. I know it’s a cliché, but it’s also true. I’d always known that someday I would leave the Gallagher Academy. We were just months from graduation when my friends and I decided to flee, after all. But even then I didn’t realize how much I’d miss falling asleep in the common room with my classmates, some chick flick playing on the TV. I didn’t know how much I’d miss my classes and my teachers—even homework would have been a welcome change from my new reality. (And don’t even get me started on our chef’s awesome crème brûlée.)

But most of all, I missed the building and the grounds. Some people say the Gallagher Mansion is a house. Some say it’s a school. But for me, in that moment, all that really mattered was that it was my home. And I was coming back to it. But as excited as I was, that didn’t mean I wasn’t nervous.

“Are you sure this is a good idea?” Bex asked. It wasn’t the first time that I had to wonder if she and I might share a brain. “I mean, I’m pretty sure fugitives from justice aren’t supposed to go home.”

“We’re not going to stay long, girls,” my aunt told us. “We’re going to lock
that woman
in the Sublevels.” Abby choked on the words. She refused to utter Catherine’s name. “And then we’re going to pick up Amirah and get her out of there. After that, we hit the road and lay low until this is over. Deal?”

“Deal,” we all said in unison, and I couldn’t resist turning around to eye the car that followed us.

Abby had insisted we split up—boys in Townsend’s car, girls in the van. Maybe she had wanted to give Townsend a chance to bond with Zach. Or maybe she just couldn’t stand the idea of being in the same vehicle as Catherine. (Even if Catherine was locked in the trunk.)

“Abby,” Macey said carefully, “where will Amirah go?”

“Someplace safe, girls.”

“But can’t she stay here?” Liz asked. “The school is one of the most secure buildings in the country.”

“Not until we know your mom and Joe have taken out the last member of the Inner Circle. Even then, she’s still the queen of Caspia. She will need protection for the rest of her life. So the best thing for now is to take her someplace where no one will find her.”

Of course my aunt was right. It was what we had to do. But I thought back to the girl I’d met the first night of the semester. She seemed so young and happy in our halls. I hated that we had to take her away from her school and from her friends. I hated that she was having to grow up so quickly. Largely, I guess, because I totally knew the feeling.

“Patricia!” Aunt Abby yelled, throwing open the front doors. “Dr. Fibs! Madame Dabney, we’re back!”

It wasn’t a terribly covert entrance, but I wasn’t complaining when I saw Madame Dabney appear at the top of the stairs.

“Abby, it’s so good to see you, darling!” She rushed toward us, pulled my aunt into a hug, then turned her gaze past Abby, to my roommates and me. Maybe it was the sun playing tricks on me, but I could have sworn I saw a tear roll down her cheeks. “Welcome home, girls.”

When I turned to the Grand Hall, I saw Professor Buckingham standing in the doorway, frozen. It was like she didn’t want to move—to break up the scene before her.

“Thank God you’re safe.”

But then everything in Buckingham’s countenance shifted. She bristled and stood up straighter. I could have sworn she actually grimaced as Townsend and Zach dragged Catherine through the front doors. But she didn’t flinch at the sight of the woman, even when Catherine smiled in Buckingham’s direction.

“Why, hello, Patricia.” Catherine’s gaze moved easily around the foyer and up the stairs. She wore shackles on her hands and feet and yet she examined the mansion as if she had more right to be there than Gilly herself.

“It is
so good
to be home,” Catherine said, and I had a terrible feeling that Catherine hadn’t lost—we hadn’t captured her. That she was somehow exactly where she had always wanted to be.

“Shut up!” Zach snapped, and jerked on his mother’s chains.

“Zachary,” Buckingham warned. “Take her to Sublevel Two.” Then Buckingham turned her gaze to Catherine. “We have a room all ready for you.”

As soon as Catherine was gone, I expected the mood to lighten, the tension to ease. But it wasn’t just Catherine’s presence that had everyone on edge. It went far deeper than the awkward silence that coursed between Zach and Townsend. Something was wrong, and I felt it.

“What is it?” I asked, inching forward. “What’s wrong? Is it my mom?”

“Your mother is fine, Cameron,” Buckingham told me. “In fact, she and Joseph are very close to tracking down the Maxwell heir, if I’m not mistaken.”

But something was wrong, and I wasn’t going to stop until they told me.

“Then what’s going on? Is it Amirah? Is she okay?”

“That’s an interesting question, Cameron,” Buckingham admitted. “To be perfectly honest, I don’t know.”

She didn’t waver or try to skew the facts in her favor. The truth matters—every spy knows that much. And we needed the whole truth right then.

“Last night after we spoke, we sat Amirah down and told her everything you’d said about her father and the Circle.” She looked at Abby then shook her head as if trying to cast aside her own doubts. “Maybe we should have waited. Her father just died. She’s had so much change and pressure and—”

“What’s wrong?” I asked.

“Well, it seems we cannot find her.” Buckingham stood a little straighter. “It seems that Amirah has disappeared.”

I know this much is true: Bex was right. It is a whole lot easier being the run
ner
than the one left behind.

There were searches of the grounds and of the mansion. My friends and I spread out and covered every secret passageway a seventh grader could have conceivably found in one year. We interviewed her friends and reviewed the security footage. And when that all failed, we walked through the halls and across the grounds calling out her name. But Amirah never answered.

Finally, I found myself sitting on my bed. In our room. It was almost like we’d never left, and yet, at the same time, it was like we’d been gone for years. Books sat exactly where we’d left them among unfinished papers and study guides for untaken tests. It felt like I’d entered some kind of archeological dig site—the dorm rooms of Pompeii, a fleeting glimpse of our lives before the fire.

“We can’t stay,” Bex said.

“I know.”

“The CIA may already know we’re back—they could be sending a grab team for Preston and Zach, and maybe even you, right now.”

“I know. But we can’t leave her, Bex.”

“Think, Cammie,” Bex ordered. She grabbed me by the shoulders, made me face her. “Where is she?”

“How am I supposed to know where she is?”

“No.” Liz shook her head. “Don’t you see, Cam? You don’t have to know where she is. You’re supposed to know how she
feels
.”

Yeah. It’s true. My friends are geniuses. And I was kind of foolish not to have seen it until then.

I turned and looked out the window, at our sweeping grounds and tall fences that more than ever before needed to keep one of us safe. And, beyond that, I saw the black stretch of Highway 10 and the lights of Roseville—the other world that existed just outside our reach.

“Normal,” I whispered. “She’s just learned she’s never going to be normal.”

“Amy?” I asked, but she didn’t turn. It was almost like she’d forgotten the name she’d used at school. Her American nickname. Her code name. Her legend.

The tiny girl with the gleaming black hair just stayed seated in the little gazebo in the Roseville town square. As dusk settled around us, the white lights of the square began to glow. It looked like a movie set. A dream. And I remembered why, once upon a time, I had come there, looking for another life. It was why, when my friends and I had divvied up all the potential places where Amirah might have run, I chose that familiar square. It was as good a place as any to play pretend.

“You’re back,” Amirah told me when I joined her on the bench.

“Yeah,” I said. “I guess I am.”

“That’s good.” Her legs were so short she could swing them where she sat and they didn’t scrape the ground. “We missed you. Tina Walters had a pool going on how long you’d be gone. I bet ten dollars that you’d show up at graduation in a helicopter.”

“I could stay away a little longer if you’d like.”

“No.” Amirah shook her head. “I’m glad you’re back now.”

Prior to that moment I’d had one conversation with her. Just one. That was all. But it’s true what they say about our sisterhood. It bonds us, forges us together. And with one look in that girl’s eyes I knew that we were more bonded than most.

“I’m sorry about your father, Amirah. I tried…” I started, but my voice broke. I couldn’t tell her that I’d been there. That I’d failed. I didn’t think I could stand the idea of her hating me as much as I hated myself. “I believe he was a great man.”

“He was.” She held her head a little higher. She didn’t face me as she wiped her eyes. “He had a duty. A legacy.”

She almost grimaced with the word, and I knew that, like me, Amirah had been born into a most unusual family business.

“His father was hanged in the streets that surrounded our palace. My father was blown up outside the United Nations. But me…I was born in America. Am I an American, Cammie?” She faced me then. “Can I just be an American? Why do these people want to kill me for the sake of a country I’ve never even seen?”

“These people…” I stopped and considered my words. “These people don’t care about you or your country. They just want governments to fall and chaos to rule. They think…they think the world is like a self-cleaning oven and they see you as the best way to turn up the heat.”

Just like I had been the best way to track down a list.

It was clear to me in that moment that everyone was wrong about Amirah. She wasn’t just a princess. She wasn’t just a Gallagher Girl. She was me, at the beginning. She was a girl who had stumbled into something so much larger than herself that she couldn’t possibly carry the weight alone.

“We should get you back to school, Amy. It’s not—”

“Safe. I know.” But she stayed seated, legs swinging in the glow of the Roseville town square twinkle lights. “I’m not safe.”

“Maybe not right now. But you will be soon. My mother and Mr. Solomon…they are tracking down the people who want to hurt you. And they’re getting close, Amy. I think they’re really, really close. And when they’re finished…then everything will be okay.”

“No, Cammie. When these people are dead there will be others. There will always be people who want to hurt the queen of Caspia,” Amirah said, even though, right then, she didn’t look like a queen. She looked like a twelve-year-old girl who didn’t want to go home and start her homework. And I, for one, totally couldn’t blame her.

“You see that pharmacy?” I pointed to the far side of the square, the old-fashioned sign. “Abrams and Son,” I said with a smile. “I used to date the son.”

“Really?” the girl asked, and smiled wide. She might have giggled.

“Yeah. Sophomore year. It was a big scandal.” I thought about Josh. He had been a dream once—a perfectly lovely piece of normal. But that dream was over.

“What happened?” she asked, like she already knew how the story was going to end. And she probably did. She was a Gallagher Girl, after all.

“I don’t know exactly,” I admitted. “We were really different, I guess. And then I met Zach, and a bunch of terrorists started trying to kidnap me, and I got too busy for a boyfriend.” They were all good reasons—any one of them would do. But it wasn’t the whole truth, and I knew it.

“I guess we just had different destinies. And I got tired of trying to outrun mine.”

Amirah nodded slowly, but didn’t say a thing.

“Come on,” I told her. “You’re not safe here.”

She looked down at her hands. Sparkly pink nail polish chipping away. “I’m not safe anywhere.”

And right then I wanted to cry. I wanted to hold her and smooth her hair and tell her everything was going to be okay. I wanted to say all the lies that, for months—for years—I had wanted to hear. And more than anything I wanted to believe that they were true. I wanted to tell her that I was okay—that I was proof that things get better and she wouldn’t feel that way forever.

But before I could say a word she turned her big brown eyes to me and asked, “Are you okay, Cammie?”

I’d been chased, tortured, kidnapped, and almost killed, but I’d survived it. And I knew in my gut that if I could survive spy school, I could survive anything.

“I will be.”

I took Amirah’s hands and pulled her to her feet. She giggled a little, the sound light and free, dancing in the twinkling lights. I looped my arm through hers, and together we started across the square, toward Highway 10 and my third-favorite secret passage.