Authors: Natalie Whipple
Once Lee Seol gets the tin for me, I slip it into my mouth and we head into the chilly night. I’m not entirely sure where we’re going, but now that we’re on the move I don’t dare talk. This feels like it could be any other mission for my dad’s syndicate. But this time no one is controlling me. I’m back in this world because I chose to be.
It better be worth it.
After we cross the street into the older section of Madison, I assume we’re headed to where my boyfriend and closest friends live. We definitely need eyes in this area. They are major targets, both for their abilities and their relationships with me.
Lee Seol is incredibly good at sliding from shadow to shadow, crouching in small places, and not making a single sound. I feel like I’m trying to follow a ninja, and I’d be doing a horrible job at it if I weren’t invisible. She picks a wall of bushes and waves me over.
“I need you to mark a few things for me,” she whispers.
“How?” The word sounds funny with the needle box lodged in my cheek.
It’s hard to see in the middle-of-the-night darkness, but she pulls something from her pocket. “These are clear stickers. We should be able to find them though they aren’t conspicuous, and it’ll give me an idea of how many cameras I need to get. Give me your hand.”
“Here.” I put my palm on her knee, and she puts stickers on me.
“You need to get that stop sign under the street light, the mailbox on the corner, and that car on cinder blocks in the driveway across the street.”
I squeeze her knee instead of talking, and then I’m off. I don’t like how the stickers are slightly reflective in comparison to me, but even if anyone is out at this hour chances are low that they’ll see them. The stop sign is my first mark, since I want to get the one in lamplight over with. The other two spots are easy in comparison.
We do this one more time before we’re right in front of Seth’s house, where lights are still on. Please be his dad and not him. Not that he looks through walls all the time, but who knows when his eyes will glitch out lately?
Lee Seol settles behind a trash can and begins to talk, but I cover her mouth. Her eyes pop open in surprise, so I whisper right into her ear, “Hector’s been going without his ear plugs a lot. He might be able to hear us.”
She nods, and I step away from her. We’ll have to be mind-readers from here on out.
When she points at the basketball hoop above the garage behind us, I jump up as quietly as I can. Then she creeps to another location and we begin a strange charade—I can’t figure out what she wants, and I’m about to tell her that when headlights round the corner and shine on me.
I instinctively duck down, as if the tiny clear sticker on my hand will give me away. The car slows to a stop in front of Seth’s house, and I hold my breath as two men get out. In the dark I can’t tell who they are, but based on the last time Seth saw someone in his house so late it has to be a couple of Juan’s guys.
They walk up the path and open the door like this is totally normal. I, on the other hand, am freaking out. Rushing back to Lee Seol, I whisper, “Do you have any kind of phone on you?”
Her eyes narrow. “Why?”
“Because two thugs just walked into my boyfriend’s house and I’m worried they’re gonna hurt him. You heard what The Phantom said when I went back to school.”
She sighs as she pulls out her super phone. “I can make it look like it’s coming from your cell.”
“Perfect.”
With a few codes entered, Lee Seol hands over her phone. Seth picks up after three rings. “Fiona? Is everything okay?”
“I’m fine, but a couple of Juan’s guys are in your house right now.”
“What?” He sounds much more awake now. There’s a pause, in which I imagine him looking through a few walls. “How the hell did you know that? Where are you?”
“Shh,” I say. “They might hear you.”
“Fiona.” His voice is quieter, but that doesn’t mean it lacks intensity. “Are you outside my house?”
I really don’t want to answer that question, and then Lee Seol’s grabbing her super phone from me anyway. She puts it to her ear. “Seth, try to listen to their conversation for us, okay? We need to move before the chance is lost.”
She hangs up and waves frantically at me. “C’mon, we gotta get in that car!”
“
What?
”
“They’ll go back to base eventually.” Lee Seol springs up like a baby tiger and bolts for the beat-up Buick. I follow behind, my heart pounding at the thought of throwing ourselves right into The Phantom’s den. But what else am I supposed to do? We need to find his hide-out—I won’t get a better opportunity.
She tugs on the car door handle, and to my surprise it opens. Maybe they don’t expect anyone in this town to dare steal their car? Lee Seol climbs into the back and lies on the floor. I assume she means for me to take the large back seat, since they won’t see me there. So I crawl in and shut the door as quietly as possible. This is insane, but I can’t help thinking at least it’s a little warmer in here. I can hardly feel my feet.
I’m not sure how much time passes. We don’t speak or move. Who knows what Lee Seol is thinking, but I sure hope Seth hasn’t tried to look for me. He’ll kill me if he sees me in this car.
Finally I hear muffled voices and footsteps. The two men hop into the front seats, and the driver starts the car. Sure enough, they have the trademark tattoos. Other than that I don’t recognize them. As they speak to each other in Spanish, I try to catch what I can. Too bad my five months of Spanish 1 aren’t enough to get more than bits and pieces of their rushed speech. Something about a building…? And maybe girls. Or one girl. The guy in the passenger seat said he has to pee. I understood that no problem.
Why doesn’t Senorita teach us useful vocabulary about spying and murder and theft? I have a feeling I’d understand a lot more that way.
The car slows to a stop, and lights shine brightly through the windows. I risk a peek—ugh, just the gas station. I highly doubt The Phantom is running his operation from here. He’s got too big a crew.
The guy who has to pee gets out. While he’s gone the driver sings to the song on the radio and pulls out a cigarette. He paws at the console between the seats, I assume looking for a lighter. Then, to my horror, he puts his hand right on Lee Seol’s hip. He whips around without hesitation and grabs her by the arm.
She doesn’t scream, only tries to free herself.
“What do we have here?” the man says. “A spy?”
Leo Seol tries to head butt him, but he dodges.
“Diego!” he cries from the open window, but his buddy is already inside. There’s only one thing to do, so I spit out the needle box and grab the first one I see. Sure hope it isn’t a killing one.
The man catches sight of it just before I shove it into his forearm. His eyes go wide as understanding registers. Maybe he can’t see me, but he knows there’s only one person who could have gone unseen. I pull it out—the tip is purple under the faint layer of blood—and he slumps in his seat.
Lee Seol scrambles for the door, and I’m right behind her. The moment we’re out, someone yells from behind us, “Hey! What’re you doing?”
It’s the other guy, Diego.
We bolt, but he’s right on our tails.
Lee Seol is faster than I expect her to be, but not quick enough in comparison to the guy running after us. Even I can’t run fast enough—he has to have some kind of mutation that makes him quicker. He closes in on us after just a block, grabbing Lee Seol around the waist and dragging her behind the nearest building.
“Get off me!” she screams, and I wonder if she thinks I’ve left her. I just wanted to get off the main road in case there are more of Juan’s guys patrolling.
“Who are you?” Diego yells back as he tries to pull off her mask.
She steps on his foot, but he’s so much bigger than her that it doesn’t do much good. I slip the box back out of my mouth and grab a knock-out needle. For a moment I think a killing needle would be smarter—fewer people to identify us—but I push back the thought. That’s exactly what my dad wanted me to be, and I refuse to go that far.
Creeping up to him, I stick the needle in his neck and he drops to the ground. Lee Seol whirls around, looking for me. “Took you long enough.”
“Better to leave a body in an alley than on the street.” I kneel down next to the guy, deciding I should search him for anything useful. We already lost our chance to find The Phantom’s base, but maybe he’ll have something that’ll make this night not a total loss. I find a cell phone in his pocket. “Can you do anything with this?”
Lee Seol grabs it. “It’s password locked, but I can get around that easily. We probably shouldn’t do it here, though.”
“You think?”
She tries to point the phone at me, but misses by several degrees. “Don’t get smart with me.”
“We better go before they wake up and rat us out.” That’s the biggest problem. We got away, sure, but these guys aren’t drunk—they’ll remember that I had something to do with it, and I’m not stupid enough to think The Phantom won’t retaliate. Just wish I knew
how.
We head for the house as quickly as we can, which isn’t very quick with all the creeping and fatigue. I need two weeks of sleep after all this crap. But when I see the lights on at home, I kiss any hope of sleep goodbye.
Miles is lying on the couch watching some infomercial when we get inside. He doesn’t look at Lee Seol, and he seems pissed. “Welcome home, honey.”
“Did you make me cookies?” She sits on the couch next to him and pulls out the cell phone we got. “You know how much I love cookies after causing trouble.”
Miles clenches his jaw. “Because you weren’t already in enough?”
“How’d you know we were gone?” I ask. Miles can sleep through just about anything, so I have a hard time believing he just randomly woke up.
He shoots a glare in my direction. “Seth called me.”
“Snitch,” I mutter.
“He mentioned something about you guys following some of Juan’s people?”
Lee Seol rolls her eyes. “It wasn’t a big deal. We just hopped in their car so we could find The Phantom’s base, but they found us first, Fiona knocked them out, and we got this cell phone as a prize. Cool, huh?”
“So they saw you?” Miles’ voice goes up an octave, and I worry he might actually explode. “If they figure out you’re here…”
“Relax, baby. They probably thought I was Bea—we’re about the same size.” She plugs her super phone into the regular one, I assume to better hack it. “I had my mask on, anyway. Stop treating me like I’m stupid. If you haven’t noticed, I’m pretty good at what I do.”
“That doesn’t make you a god!” Miles stands and points at me. “And now you’re encouraging my sister to do even more dangerous stuff than she’s already doing?”
“Miles, don’t blame her,” I say, grabbing a blanket from the couch to wrap around my shivering self. “I would have—”
“Don’t,” he cuts me off, fuming. “I gave up my freedom for you. I put my girlfriend’s neck on the line to get you out. Now I’ll never have a normal life, and you’re throwing away everything I did like it means nothing!”
The tiniest bit of guilt creeps in, thinking about how trapped Miles is now. Being number one on any syndicate’s list is not much of a life at all. He did so much for us, but… “So because you got us out of the syndicate, you get to decide what I do with the rest of my life?”
That question makes him hesitate. “No…though I think I’m allowed to be worried about your safety.”
I shake my head in disbelief. “You know who you sound like? Graham.”
Miles stares at me, speechless.
“Don’t be too hard on him, Fi,” Lee Seol says nonchalantly as she continues her work on the phone. “He’s just annoyed because he has to hide out instead of doing useful things. Guys don’t like to be protected, especially by girls.”
“That’s not…” Miles slumps back onto the couch. “Okay, maybe that’s a little bit true.”
Lee Seol smirks. “You know I don’t love you because you can protect me, right?”
“Why do you again?”
“Because you’re you, and you make me happy.” She puts her hand over his. “Also, you’re hot. And usually, you don’t ask me to be anyone but myself.”
Miles leans his head on her shoulder. “Oh yeah. Just promise me you won’t take on more than you can handle, okay? I do hate that I can’t help.”
Lee Seol smiles. “I promise. It’s just simple surveillance, plus trying to find their den of evil. That’s only like two things.”
“Yes. Two teeny tiny things.” Miles laughs.
So they’re disgustingly cute together. I decide not to say this, but instead to sit next to Lee Seol. “You find anything on this cell yet?”
She nods. “Broke through the password, downloaded all texts and messages on the memory, but it’s connected to a majorly protected network. This thing will probably take me a few days to crack.”
My heart speeds up at the thought. “Does that mean it’s probably a syndicate network?”
“That’s my bet. The Phantom probably has more tech than we think, with what he seems to know and how quick. He’d need a super secure network to stay in touch with Juan and other leaders in the syndicate.”