Only the Good Spy Young (Gallagher Girls) (11 page)

S
pies need covert operations. I know it sounds crazy, but it’s true. Because even though our brains are ... you know ... brain-sized, every undercover operative knows that a mind is totally big enough to get lost inside—to go crazy if you’re left with too much time and too much room to let your biggest fears run free.

So, yeah. Spies
need
covert operations. And as I sat next to Bex in the Gallagher Academy van that was carrying us through the tall, metal gates that had stood between me and the world outside, I had to ask, “Do you hear that?”

“What?” she asked. “A little voice telling you you’d be better off staying where you bloody well were?”

“Nope.” I smiled. “Freedom.”

She looked at me like I might have been crazier than usual, but I didn’t care.

I was riding in a van! (And in an actual seat this time, which, let me tell you, you really don’t miss till it’s gone.)

I was outside of school!

I was going on a mission!

I was going to...

Then I glanced out the window and realized I didn’t have a clue where we were going.

And that totally made it better.

For two hours we rode in silence; the only sound was the hum of the van and the occasional snore (yes, actual
snoreage
) as Townsend slumped in the front seat, sleeping.

As the road stretched out before us and the trip got longer and longer, I’m pretty sure I wasn’t the only Gallagher Girl in that van to feel acutely aware of three important facts. 1) We were missing lunch. 2) It’s kinda hard to look like a super-tough, super-skilled superagent when your stomach’s growling. And 3) We hadn’t had a real Covert Operations lesson in months.

I stretched my arms out in front of me and thought I felt a creak. Rusty didn’t even begin to cover it.

And then the van made a hard right turn, and Townsend bolted upright.

“Good,” he said, without even a glance out the window. “We’re here.”

In case I haven’t mentioned it before, I go to a
boarding school
. With gates. And walls. Plaid skirts and strict teachers. So while my classmates and I might be used to spending all of our time in a place that is exciting and semi-dangerous and full of incredibly delicious food, I couldn’t remember a single time when I’d been in a place like
this
.

“Oh my gosh,” Tina Walters said, summing up the reaction
of probably every single girl in the van at that particular moment. “Is that . . .”

But before she could finish, Agent Townsend threw open the doors and Tina’s words got lost in the deafening roar of a roller coaster barreling along its tracks and people screaming at the top of their lungs as the ride quickly plunged, then rose again.

Somehow, sitting in the back of the van, I sort of knew exactly how they felt.

“All right,” our teacher said ten minutes later in the manner of a man who just wanted to get it over with and go back to sleep, “everybody gets a target. Everybody gets a goal. Everybody gets an hour.”

While he spoke, his gaze swept around the entrance of the amusement park as if no place filled with that many tourists and empty calories could ever leave him
amused
.

“These are decent people, I suppose. But the world is full of decent people with useful information, and to them we must lie—from them we must steal. If anybody has a problem with that . . . well, if you’ve got a problem with that, you would be well advised to choose another occupation.”

He was right, of course. There’s no softer way to put it. We get close to secretaries so we can bug their bosses’ offices. We befriend widows so we can conduct surveillance on their neighbors’ backyards. We are in the human intelligence business, and most of the people that we need to do our jobs are just people who happen to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

So we tell lies and pick pockets and, most of all, we
use
.

“You,” Agent Townsend said, pointing at Mack. “There’s a forty-year-old man behind you with a blue ball cap.”

“Yes, sir,” Mack said, but she didn’t turn to look in the man’s direction.

“Do you see him?” Agent Townsend asked, frustrated.

“Yes, sir. Blue cap, green polo, navy backpack.” Mack pointed at the reflection of the man that gleamed in the window behind our teacher’s head. He glanced back and saw it, and for a split second—nothing more—I thought he might have been impressed. Maybe.

“Okay,” Agent Townsend said slowly, “that man just put a piece of paper in the outer pocket of the bag. I don’t care how you do it, but you need to find out what’s written on that piece of paper.”

Mack didn’t need to be told twice. She turned on her heel and set off through the crowd, while I turned to study the man she was tailing.

“Wow, he really fits in,” I admitted. “I never would have guessed he’s CIA.”

“He’s not,” Townsend said simply, still scanning the people who filled the park. “There, Ms. Walters,” he said, pointing at an older lady riding an electric scooter.

“Is
she
from Langley?” Tina asked.

“I have no idea where she’s from.” Our teacher shrugged. “What I do know is that she just put her credit card in her purse, and it’s your job to get me that number.”

“But she’s not an operative. . . .” Tina hesitated. “She doesn’t know it’s an assignment. . . . So if I get caught . . .”

Townsend stared at her. “Then don’t get caught.”

It was still a game, I knew, but for the first time in the history of our exceptional education, the players on the other side didn’t know we were playing. One by one, our classmates got their assignments until Bex and I were alone with our teacher.

“Baxter,” Agent Townsend said, turning to Bex, “do you think you can find out the serial numbers of the five-dollar bill the man working the Tilt-A-Whirl just put into that lockbox?”

The look on her face said that yes, she
did
think she could find out, and yet she didn’t turn to walk away. She waited as our teacher’s gaze landed on me.

“And I guess that leaves us with Cammie Morgan.” He slowly scanned the crowd. “I think maybe we’ll find something especially fitting for you.”

I didn’t know what to say, so I stood quietly, waiting.

“There.” He pointed toward a man in an official theme-park jumpsuit. “The keys on his belt—bring me an impression of at least three of them.”

He smiled like he was so smart. I shrugged like it was so easy. Then, with my best friend beside me, I turned and started through the crowd.

Although it pains me to admit it, for his very first lesson, Agent Townsend had managed to bring us to one of the most challenging places a spy could ever be. After all, Mr. Solomon had spent the last year and a half training us to see everything, hear everything, notice everything. And as I walked through the park, it was almost too much for my highly trained senses to take.

“Ooh!” I exclaimed, craning my neck as we walked past a stand selling some kind of deep-fried delicious on a stick. “I want one of those!”

“We don’t have any money, Cam.”

“Ooh, I want to ride that!”

“We only have an hour.”

“I want—”

“I want you to take this seriously, okay?” Bex said, whirling on me.

“You sound like your mother,” I said.

She practically glowed. “Thank you.”

“Bex . . .” I said slowly. “I’m fine.”

“You say that—”

“Bex.” I cut her off and stopped in the center of the main avenue that snaked through the entire park. “Weren’t you supposed to be following that guy?” I pointed to the attendant pushing a cart full of lockboxes in the opposite direction.

“I’m good where I am,” she said.

“Bex...”

“Cammie...”

“Spot the surveillance,” I told her.

“What?”

I thought back to the way her parents had led us all around London—the game we hadn’t played in weeks.
“Spot the surveillance.”

“Man selling balloons by the bumper cars,” she said, not even blinking.

“The woman with the cotton candy,” I added, pointing at just one of the guards that surrounded me at every turn.

It was her turn, but I couldn’t shake the feeling that the game was over. We’d stopped keeping score on a bridge overlooking the Thames.

“By my count, there are thirteen operatives tailing me right now. And those are just the ones I’ve made. There are cameras every hundred yards, and if I’m not mistaken, a Blackhawk helicopter just did a flyby.”

“
Two
Blackhawks,” Bex corrected. “In a rotation.”

“See? I’m fine,” I said, and for the first time in a long time I meant it. I really did. It was as if the walls of my school had been picked up and transported here. It was like my school, but with cotton candy. No wonder I couldn’t hold back a smile as I asked, “Do you think my mom would let Townsend bring me here if this place wasn’t the Fort Knox of family fun?” Bex opened her mouth to speak, but I didn’t give her the chance. “Go,” I said.

For a moment she just stood there, watching. Waiting. Then my best friend turned away without another word.

For the next twenty minutes I walked alone in the busy park—past lines of people waiting to ride the Ferris wheel and buy cotton candy, through the crowd that had gathered around Eva Alvarez as she shot ninety-seven little mechanical ducks in a row. Roller coasters roared overhead with their screaming masses and screeching tracks. Wheels spun, fountains splashed, and the smell of people and junk food and heat wafted all around me until I wondered if I might be sick, overdosed on freedom.

So when the man with the clipboard walked off the main thoroughfare, I didn’t mind.

Even though a girl in a private school uniform should probably stand out in a busy, public place, I was still the Chameleon, and I followed at the same easy pace and comfortable distance that had been bred into my DNA (a fact that Liz had once tried to verify in the lab, which led to the “no more blood samples this semester” rule of sophomore year).

When I wanted to stop to watch the jugglers, I watched. When I wanted to make faces at myself in the funhouse mirrors, I did. When I wanted to try something called a Waffle Burger, I cursed myself for not keeping an emergency twenty in my sock, like Grandma Morgan always taught me, and just kept walking. The man in the jumpsuit remained a constant figure in the corner of my eye.

I should probably point out that in all that time, the man never turned around. Not once did he check his tail. I was starting to think that this was the easiest covert operations lesson ever, when he slipped through a small gate in the fence that ran behind the merry-go-round, but I didn’t hesitate. I didn’t wait. I just did what I was born to do: I followed, knowing that whatever guards were following
me
would be quick to do the same.

It was quieter there, behind the barricades. A large man-made lake stretched out beside me. The smells of corn dogs and popcorn were lost beneath the scent of oil and grease. The bright lights and spinning wheels of the park were gone, replaced by a maze of carefully placed trees and perfectly engineered scaffolding that stretched high into the sky, blocking out the sun.

I thought of all the things I might say if someone saw me: I was there to meet my boyfriend. My classmates had sent me on a dare. I’d seen a stray animal come this way and it had appeared to be hurt.

So I wasn’t afraid when the man stopped and opened the door of a long building that sat hidden in the midst of the park. I waited ten seconds, then followed, praying the door’s hinges wouldn’t squeak as I pulled it slowly open and stepped inside.

Christmas decorations lined one wall, and Fourth of July sparklers and banners covered the other. There were broken, faded bumper cars and log ride relics, and a statue of a clown. It was like a graveyard—where amusement came to die.

And that was the thought that filled my mind as I eased down the center aisle—soaking in the sights and smells and sounds that filled the air around me. Every fiber in my training and my gut wound together to tell me that the workman was gone—lost, out of sight.

But then I heard the faint scruff of heavy shoes on concrete and knew I was anything but alone.

“You
really
shouldn’t be here.”

J
oe Solomon had had far more practice telling lies than I’ve had trying to detect them, but I could see the truth in his eyes.

“It
is
true, isn’t it?” I asked, even though, deep down, I knew it wasn’t really a question. Even though
I knew
.

“I’m sorry, Cammie.” He ran his hand through his hair. “Cammie, I’m so—”

“No,” I said numbly. I felt myself backing away, my left hand tracing the cinder-block wall of the building. I scanned the room, looking for a piece of pipe or a tool—a weapon of any kind.

“Cammie, listen to me. I’ll explain everything, but if my sources are right, then you’re not safe here. You have to come with me.”

“I’m not going anywhere with
you
!”

I wasn’t thinking about the guards, who, moments before, I had been sure were watching my every move. I didn’t reach for the panic button that I wore around my wrist like a watch, or call into my comms unit for help. I
wasn’t
thinking as I brought my hand up along the side of his face—hard.

It was just a slap—nothing special. Hardly something they would ever teach in P&E. And yet I felt like doing it again. And again.

“I’m not going anywhere with you!” I said, striking out. “I’m not. I’m not. I’m . . .” I stopped and stared at him. “How could you?”

“I was young, Cammie.”

“You were
my
age! And then you grew up and . . .” I didn’t want to cry, and so I screamed. “You killed him!”

I expected him to lash back, strike me down where I stood. He was bigger, stronger, and more experienced, but rage is a force of its own. I watched him stumble back as if he knew that—as if I scared him.

“He’s dead because of you!” I yelled, stepping forward, but Mr. Solomon didn’t brace to block the blow.

Instead, he leaned against the wall, his eyes deeper and darker and sadder than anything I’ve ever seen, as my father’s best friend stared at me, voice cracking, and whispered, “I know.”

What happened next was a scene I’ve played and replayed in my mind a thousand times. I’ll probably play it a thousand more. All I know for certain is that one second, a man I had revered, trusted, loved, and hated (in that order) was in front of me, crumbling. And in the next moment, time seemed to freeze as the door to the building swung open and a long shadow sliced across the concrete floor, and I heard a woman say, “He said we’d find you here.”

I remember everything about my trip to Boston last summer— the sight of the balloons, the sounds of the crowds, and most of all, the way a masked woman and two men walked toward me through the spinning shadows of a helicopter’s blades.

“No,” I said, as if that simple word could stop it from happening again.

The woman looked so calm as she stood in the open doorway, as if nothing could go wrong this time. As if it were over.

I reached for my watch, punched the button again and again, not daring to calculate the odds of beating the Circle for a third time—not willing to waste one second more.

“No!” I yelled. It didn’t matter that she was older and taller and probably far more experienced—I charged toward her, knowing that my only hope lay on the other side of that open door.

But then I stopped, because the woman was no longer alone. Agent Townsend was there. Agent Townsend was looking at Joe Solomon and me as if Christmas had come early.

“You were right,” the woman told Agent Townsend with a smile. “This was almost too easy.”

I looked from the woman I could have sworn had been in Boston, to my new teacher. It didn’t make sense, but sense was the last thing in the world that I could worry about, because Joe Solomon was rushing past me, flying through the open door. In one fluid motion, he knocked Townsend and the woman to the ground.

I rushed outside and saw the three of them rolling down a hill, fighting through the dirt and the weeds. Dust swirled around me, and standing there, I realized I had no idea whom to trust. All I really knew for certain is that sometimes all an operative gets is one second—nothing more.

And I had already started to run.