The Unwanted Spy

by Scarlett Haven

  “What’s going on?” I ask, pushing myself off the ground, I wipe the dust off my butt.

  “You stay here with Ian,” Kal says. “Alek and I are going to go gather things to set up camp.”

  “Maybe you guys should stay with Ian,” I protest. “You had to carry Ian today. You’re probably exhausted.”

  Alek rolls his eyes. “Sit down, pretty girl. We’ve got this.”

  Seriously?

  Before I can protest, the two of them stroll off.

  I let out a long breath, annoyed.

  “Roxy, they’re fine. Trust me,” Ian says.

  I sit back on the ground by him. “They’re stubborn.”

  He snorts. “So are you.”

  I can’t argue that.

  Ian looks and me, and I’m curious about what he’s thinking right now.

  West explained to me why he voted for me. And even though he said it’s because I’m resilient and hardworking, I can’t help but think he did vote for me a little bit because he liked the way I look, so I wonder why Ian voted for me.

  “Hey, Ian?” I ask.

  “What?”

  “I was wondering something.” I chew nervously on my bottom lip. “Why did you vote for me? Out of all the agents you could have voted for, why me?”

  He opens his mouth, then closes it. I stay quiet beside him while he tries to figure out his thoughts.

  “This is going to probably sound weird,” he starts. “But I hacked into everybody’s computer at Spy School. And I watched to see what everybody did. You were the most interesting to watch. The things you did baffled me. Like... you never went on Spy Connect. I don’t even think you have an account.”

  I shake my head, confirming.

  I definitely don’t have a Spy Connect account. I’m just not interested in social media.

  Spy Connect is exactly what the name implies—a place where Spy School agents can connect with other agents. It’s basically where everybody brags about their achievements or shares pictures of what they’re eating for dinner. I’ve always thought it was stupid.

  “You were focused on all things Spy School. You worked hard and you only used your computer for homework or research.” A grin plays at the corner of his lips. “And then one night, after you took this big test, you hacked into your grade at, like, one in the morning. I knew it was because you were worried and couldn’t sleep until you knew your grade—you got an A. And that is when I knew it had to be you.”

  That makes me feel good. The way Ian sees me is way cooler than I actually am.

  “I’m really glad I voted for you,” he confesses. “Nobody could’ve been a more perfect fit for all of us.”

  I don’t know about that, but I’m glad he voted for me, too. I’m glad they all did.

  “Are you just sucking up to me so I’ll bring you food and stuff while you recover?” I joke, because obviously I’ll be doing that anyway.

  He laughs. “Nah, I’m sucking up cause you’re the prettiest team member. I have to stay on your good side.”

  He’s sweet.

  I lean in and whisper, “Don’t let Kal hear you call me the prettiest one on the team.”

  He laughs even harder. Even West turns to look at us.

  Maybe being trapped in the woods with these guys isn’t so bad. I just wish Ian hadn’t broken his leg. If he hadn’t, this might almost be fun.

  Sleeping in a forest.

  A little bit later, the five of us sit around a campfire that Alek lit. West cooked the fish he caught—not a lot, but enough for us all to not starve through the night. And now we’re all sitting close to the fire, trying to absorb some of the warmth.

  Tonight, we have to sleep on the ground of the forest. I am a little anxious about it. I don’t like the idea of sleeping on the ground and am hoping some animal doesn’t try to come eat my face off while I’m sleeping.

  As if the forest knows what I’m thinking, I hear leaves shuffling in the distance. I tense up at the noise. It’s probably just a squirrel, but what if it’s something bigger? Or what if it’s a rabid squirrel coming to eat my face off? Squirrels are just giant rats with fluffy tails.

  Alek puts his arm around my shoulder. “Don’t worry, Roxy. I will protect you.”

  I laugh, but I don’t push his arm away. “I can’t believe we’re stuck in a stupid forest right now. I could be home on my comfortable bed asleep right now.”

  “But now you get to sleep by me,” Alek says. “Isn’t sleeping by me so much better than sleeping alone?”

  I shake my head at him, but I can’t stop grinning.

  Alek is different than the man I thought he was when we first met. I can’t believe I ever referred to him as ‘the angry one’ in my head. Alek is the opposite of angry. Well, most of the time. He does have mood swings like anybody else, but he’s a lot nicer than I first thought.

  Ian snores lightly as he lies on the ground beside me. I’m glad he’s asleep. He’s been in so much pain today, I’m glad he can relax for the night. I hate seeing him like this. It makes my chest ache and my stomach feel like it has a huge pit in it.

  I realize I’ve grown to care for these boys a lot more than I ever thought possible.

  “We should sleep, but somebody should keep watch,” West says, but he’s barely able to keep his eyes open as he’s sitting up. I highly doubt he’ll be able to stay awake long enough to keep watch.

  “I’ll take first watch.” I go to push myself up, but Alek grabs my arm.

  “No, you should sleep,” he says.

  Kal quickly jumps up. “I’ll take first watch.”

  I turn to Kal. “Fine, but wake me up when it’s my turn. I should help keep watch, too.”

  He nods.

  I lie down on the large patch of moss by Ian, using my arm as a pillow. Alek lies beside me, and he grabs onto my free hand, holding on it. He doesn’t say anything, he just lies there beside me and it’s really nice.

  Today has been a really hard day for me—between all the fights and Ian breaking his leg, I feel like I’m one step away from having a complete emotional breakdown in the middle of this stupid forest. I know things are looking up now, but I just want to go home. I want to be in my bed. I want Ian to see a doctor and get a cast and some painkillers. I just want this nightmare to be over.

  I guess today has proven that I’m not as strong as I thought I was.

  A tear falls down my cheek, but I don’t dare move to wipe it away. I don’t want to alert Alek to the fact that I’m being emotional right now.

  Alek must see me anyway, though, because he pulls me into his arms and he gently stokes my back. He doesn’t say anything. He just lets me use his chest as a pillow as I steal the warmth from his body. A few more tears roll down my face, but the weight on my chest doesn’t feel as heavy.

  He wipes the tears from under my eyes with his thumb. He does it so gently. I never really thought of Alek as ‘gentle,’ but right now, he is.

  I still say I misjudged him.

  He doesn’t say anything about my tears though, and I’m thankful he doesn’t. It’s embarrassing enough as it is.

  I bury my head in his chest further.

  Crying makes me feel so weak. I know in theory that crying doesn’t make somebody weak, but after being taught by my mom that it is a weakness, it’s not something I can just get over.

  Somehow, being in Alek’s arms makes me feel so much comfort.

  When I was a kid and I skinned my knees and cried, my mom would just tell me to ‘suck it up’ and ‘stop being a baby.’ She never tried to comfort me. I imagine she was one of those parents who would let me cry in my crib as a baby for hours, just so she wouldn’t have to deal with me, but I don’t know for sure. I just can’t imagine my mother ever having a maternal bone in her body. She probably forced my dad to take care of me.

  I feel Alek’s lips on my forehead as he kisses me.

  “Go to sleep,” he whispers.

  Going to sleep on the ground in the middle
of a forest seems impossible. I should be jumpy or scared, but right now I feel safe, especially in Alek’s arms. He won’t let anything happen to me. And Kal is keeping watch. He will protect me, too. I find my eyes getting heavier, so I close them, letting the sound of Alek’s heart beating lull me to sleep.

  Wednesday, November 1

  A psychopath.

  I wake up on Wednesday morning with my head on somebody’s chest. I think I’m probably sleeping on Alek still until I look up and see Kal’s sleeping face instead.

  Nobody woke me up to keep watch last night. I know they probably thought they were protecting me by not letting me take my shift, but I am a little disappointed that they didn’t trust me enough to let me take a shift. That is something we’re going to have to talk about, but not right now. We’ve done enough fighting and right now we need to focus on getting out of the woods.

  I carefully get up, trying not to stir Kal as I do. He’s snoring lightly. I know he took the first shift last night, so he was probably up late.

  First thing this morning, I find a tree to pee behind and I pray to the forest gods that I don’t get poison ivy—that would be miserable. I do look to make sure there aren’t any poison ivy plants around before I pull my pants down, but I’m still worried about it.

  After I finish my business, I go down to the stream to try and clean up a little. I don’t have any soap and the water is freezing, but I take off my jacket, hoodie, and pants, trying to clean up as much as I can. The stream is so cold I almost change my mind, but I can’t stand the thought of not cleaning up. I can’t stand to be dirty. I wish I had a shower. I desperately want to wash my hair. Instead, I fish one of the ponytail holders from the pocket of my jeans. I finger comb my hair and put it into a very messy bun on top of my head.

  I stand by the edge of the stream, hugging my arms to myself while I wait for my skin to dry and then put the rest of my clothes on.

  Alek walks from behind the trees and into the clearing and he stops when he sees me.

  “Were you just… showering in freezing cold water, or…” His voice trails off.

  “Maybe you should consider a cold bath yourself.” I slip my hoodie over my head. “I’m pretty sure we all smell after yesterday’s hike.”

  “Yeah, that’s not happening. I’d rather stink.” He laughs.

  West must’ve taken watch earlier this morning, because he’s cooking fish over the flame. It looks like he caught a lot more this morning. I don’t even like fish, but I’m not complaining because I am starving. I will take calories in any way that I can get them this morning.

  I put my jeans back on and slip my jacket over my hoodie. I make a beeline for the campfire, warming my hands over the flame.

  “I can’t believe you’re worried about showering when it’s negative fifteen,” West says.

  I roll my eyes. “It’s like forty. Don’t be such a baby.”

  It is already warmer today than it was yesterday. After we get walking, I doubt I’ll need my jacket.

  I take a seat on the ground by Ian.

  “How are you feeling?”

  He shrugs. “Okay, as long as I don’t move.”

  I pull the aspirin from my coat pocket and offer him a few. He takes them, probably desperate for a little bit of relief. I feel really bad that he’s been in such horrible pain.

  Kal wakes up about the time that West finishes cooking the fish. We eat our breakfast and the guys put out our campfire before we begin to walk downstream. We are slow moving because the guys still have to take turns carrying Ian. We stop often to take a break, too, but at least we have water today.

  As we’re walking, I stop to take a drink from my canister when I see something off to the side that catches my attention. The guys all stop walking when they notice that I’m looking at something.

  “What is that?” Kal squints his eyes as he looks off in the distance.

  “I think it’s a shipping container,” West says.

  I turn to him. “Why would somebody have a shipping container in the middle of the forest?”

  Alek and Kal set Ian down on a patch of grass, and Ian lets out a breath of relief.

  Being carried like that has got to be miserable.

  “Do you think it’s somebody’s drug lab or something?” Kal asks.

  I didn’t even think about that, but he’s probably right. They talk about that kind of stuff all the time on the news. It’s harder to find these drug labs in the middle of the woods, so it’s the perfect place to hide.

  “We should check it out,” West says after a long pause.

  He’s right.

  It’s our duty. We’re Spy School agents. If we didn’t at least see, I would feel guilty. I hope that it’s nothing.

  West looks between all of us, his eyebrows scrunched together. “Kal, stay with Ian. Alek, Princess, and I are going to check that out.”

  Kal frowns, but he doesn’t say anything.

  I’m surprised West is even letting me go with them. I figured he’d want me to stay behind with Ian, but maybe he thinks Kal would be able to protect Ian better than I could, if somebody comes up. He’s absolutely right.

  West grabs my hand as we walk as quietly as we can toward the shipping container. It’s farther away than it looked from the stream, but I’m glad it is. I don’t want whoever is in there to accidentally come across Ian and Kal. Ian is too injured to protect himself right now.

  The shipping container is locked with a deadbolt, so there is no way we can get inside, not without bolt cutters, and we don’t have anything.

  I glance over at Alek and I see his knife. He keeps it in his hands, vigilantly looking around. We walk around to the side of the shipping container and there is a door that somebody installed in the side. West twists the knob and it pops open. He motions for me to stand behind him, and Alek to stand behind me. He slowly opens the door and it creaks loudly as he does. West is just sticking his head in the door when I hear a loud bang. It takes me a second to realize it didn’t come from within, but from behind us. A lunatic waving a shotgun comes running out of the woods, headed toward us. I didn’t even have a chance to get a look at the guy before West and Alek both grab my hand, pulling me as fast as my legs will move away from the shipping container. The guy chases us for a little bit, but he gives up, heading back to his shipping container.

  West, Alek, and I stop. I bend over, putting my hands on my knees as I pant from the long sprint. I normally wouldn’t be so out of breath, but I’m not used to running in the cold. It burns my lungs. The guys are also breathing heavily, so I don’t feel as bad about my own panting.

  “What are we going to do?” I ask between breaths. “We can’t just leave that guy there.”

  West shakes his head. “No. But we can’t take care of him when Ian is injured either.”

  “We should head back to where we left Ian and Kal,” Alek says. “We can hide Ian and go after that scum.”

  “What was in the building anyway?” I ask.

  West frowns. “It was a drug lab. Dang it.” He rubs a hand over his face. “We can’t just leave it there. We have to do something about it.”

  Alek and I wait for West to make the call. He is the team leader. No matter what he decides, we have to go along with it.

  The main reason every team at Spy School has a ‘leader’ is for situations like this. Obviously, Alek, West, and I are very different from one another. So, we would probably all have different ideas on what we should do, and we might even fight. But having a leader means that in high pressure situations, we trust the leader’s judgment.

  I definitely trust West. I defied him on our last mission and it got Kal shot. I won’t do that again.

  West takes a breath. “Alek is right. I think we should go move Ian somewhere safe and we will go after that guy. We can’t just leave him out here.”

  I grin. “Let’s do it.”

  I knew that West would make the right decision. Maybe going after this guy without weapons isn�
�t smart, since he has a gun, but what is one gun against four highly trained Spy School agents? We’ve got this.

  Part of the job.

  We move Ian somewhere safe, but West isn’t comfortable leaving Ian alone when he’s defenseless. Truthfully, I’m not either, but who is going to stay behind with him?

  West looks between the three of us, trying to decide who should stay behind.

  “Roxy could come in handy,” Alek says.

  Me?

  How?

  I’m about to ask when Kal speaks.

  “I can stay while you guys go,” he offers, then holds up a huge stick he found. “I can beat anybody who tries to approach.”

  West rolls his eyes, but sighs. “Fine. I want to keep Roxy close anyway.”

  I should be offended by that, but now is not the time to express my emotions. Right now, we have a psycho to go after.

  We sneak back toward the shipping container. We carried Ian about half a mile upstream, so it’s quite the journey, but we wanted to make sure the psycho with a gun wouldn’t come across them by accident. I doubt the guy will walk that far away. He didn’t chase us for very long. We outran him anyway.

  I didn’t get a good look at the guy, but I could tell he was really scrawny with a long, scraggily beard. It was hard to tell how old he was—he could be anywhere from his mid-twenties to mid-fifties. Judging from how scrawny he was, I’d say he’s probably on drugs, which makes him unpredictable and dangerous. We’re lucky he has a bad aim.

  We step carefully as we walk toward the building, not wanting to make any noise, and we stop just before the clearing to take a good look around. The psycho is nowhere to be seen, which means he’s probably inside the building.

  I hear a twig snap behind me, but before I can turn to see what the noise was, a hard barrel is pressed against the side of my head and I hear the distinct clicking sound of somebody pulling back the hammer on a revolver.

  Alek and West instantly tense as they turn to look at me, their eyes wide with horror as they assess the situation that we’re in.