Thief: The Scarab Beetle Series: #1 (The Academy)

by Stone, C. L.

  Brandon granted me the grace of being quiet the whole way. By the time I was paying attention to where we were going, he’d pulled off of I-26 and I had no clue where we were, but the chemical smell in the air and the craters in the road made me think we were in North Charleston.

  Brandon pulled onto a narrow street. The homes in this neighborhood were cookie cutter, with broken wire fences, and tiny lawns, where the only differences between them were the angles of the leaning porches and the paint colors in various shades of faded.

  There were a couple of trucks parked outside one of the houses at the end of a cul-de-sac. There was a large construction Dumpster on the front lawn, and this home’s fence had been pulled back to allow room for it. Ladders leaned against the exterior to allowed access to the roof.

  Kevin was on the front lawn, studying a clipboard, a pencil behind his ear. Brandon pulled up against the curb. Kevin took one look at me and frowned.

  I climbed out, but he focused on Brandon. “What’s she doing here?”

  “She’s got to stay with us,” Brandon said.

  “So you brought her here?”

  “Yeah. Why?”

  Kevin frowned. “Take her back to the apartment if you want to play. This is a work zone.”

  “She’s here to work. Marc mentioned she could work here with us.”

  “What? When did he say that?” Kevin asked.

  “The other night while you were out. Again.”

  Kevin brushed his palm against his forehead. “I knew it. He’s going to start fucking up. She’s going to figure out everything.”

  “She already knows half of it.”

  “What?”

  “Come on,” Brandon said. “I’ll fill you in.”

  I sighed, guessing this was something they needed to keep secret for the Academy, and I wasn’t allowed to know. I wondered how much Kevin really worked for their team, because he wasn’t around all that often. It seemed at every moment he could, he ran home to his girlfriend. Did she really need him that much? They didn’t seem perturbed at her like they did Marc’s ex-girlfriend, and she seemed like a clinger.

  Nail guns cracked noisily up on the roof. I made my way to the ladder, not wanting to stay on the ground with Kevin if they were going to come back. I started up.

  I found Axel and Raven on the roof on their knees. They both had nail guns and were starting at opposite ends, nailing the roof tile down. Both had on jeans. Raven wore a black tank shirt, soaked through with sweat and Axel was bare chested, the darker complexion along his body glistening in the sunlight. Raven’s shoulders were wider, but their biceps and their bodies were exquisite. Raven was a powerhouse, a tank, and Axel’s muscles seemed more precise, a little leaner.

  I crouched on the roof, which had a soft slope. I sat on it, watching the guys work.

  I wondered if Brandon was going to ever talk about last night with me. I told myself I wouldn’t start. It was too soon to act like we were a couple of anything like that. He’d said he wanted me to move in. I’d been a mess and terrified, and he comforted me until I could sleep again.

  Now that it was morning, I knew better than to hold him to those same promises made in the night. You can’t cry in front of guys, and make them promise things, and then force them to stick to it after. I wasn’t that manipulative, and I didn’t need to be taken care of in that way.

  Maybe it was best to pretend it never happened.

  I was a thief. I worked alone. Alone was best for me, for someone who didn’t fit in anywhere. It never hurt. It never made promises it didn’t mean. Alone was who I was.

  I had no idea what he saw in me. It was too terrifying to think that last night had been merely a moment of weakness and he didn’t have any intention of making whatever was between us a relationship. I wouldn’t want to make things awkward. If he really wanted me, he’d tell me in broad daylight when our emotions weren’t so stirred up.

  Raven was the first to notice me. He jerked his head back, shooting the last nail into the roof without looking. When it was done, he lifted the nail gun and hit the switch to power it off. “Where have you been?” he asked.

  “Where have you been?” I responded without really expecting an answer. “You didn’t tell me you did construction.”

  “Little thief, I do everything.”

  Axel stopped his nail gun and turned, looking at me. “What are you doing up here?”

  “Brandon brought me.”

  “You’re here to work?”

  “I’m here to talk to Marc, but if you want me to work...”

  Axel waggled a finger at me. “If you start a fight with Marc, I don’t want to be on this roof when it happens.” He shuffled on his knees, putting his nail gun down carefully on the roof. He wiped his brow with the back of his arm. Beads of sweat zigzagged down his chest, following the lines of his body. “So Brandon’s here?”

  “Yeah, he’s down talking with Kevin.”

  He stood up and bent at the knees to start easing his way over to the ladder. “I need to talk to him. Stay up here with Raven.”

  “Want me to nail things?”

  “Sure. Have Raven show you how.” He moved to the ladder and disappeared.

  Raven curled his fingers at me. “Come on.”

  I started to crawl over until the rough tile below my knees started to bite into the cuts from the day before. Raven held his nail gun in his hands and fiddled with the plastic casing.

  I waved a hand at him. “Don’t shoot me.”

  “I’m more worried you’ll shoot me.” He showed me the gun. “This isn’t bullets, but it’s just as bad.”

  He showed me his nail gun, which was mostly gray with a black handle. There was a holder for the nails sticking out of it that looked a lot like a smaller version of the magazine I’d used on the 303 rifle.

  “Shiny,” I said.

  “It’s got a safety.” He flipped the button that powered it up. He aimed it at the roof but left an inch of space between it and the gun. He pulled the trigger but it locked up short and a nail never spit out. “You can’t fuck up. You have to push the nose down into the tile.” He rammed the end of the nail gun at the tile and shoved it until the frame around it pulled back. He pulled the trigger and the nail shot out.

  “So you can’t shoot unless you push down?” I asked. Seemed easy enough.

  He lifted the nail gun up. He used two fingers to pull back on the safety, showing me how it worked. He held the safety back and aimed the gun at the roof like that and let it spit a nail into the tile. “You could hold it back on your own like this, and it’ll shoot. Hurts like a bitch on your fingers after a while though.” He held the nail gun out to me.

  I took it from him, aimed it at the tile and fired a quick shot right next to one of his nails. My arm jerked a bit at the force and my nail went in crooked

  “You’ve got to lock your arm, like shooting a gun,” he said. “Didn’t you learn anything yesterday?”

  “I didn’t get to shoot a pistol,” I said. “Just the rifles.”

  “Remind me to show you a pistol. Shoot it again.”

  I shot two more nails into the tile and when he was satisfied that I wasn’t going to shoot myself in the eye, he took his nail gun back. He planted another tile on the roof and lined it up.

  “How come you didn’t tell me you did construction?” I asked. I sat on my butt next to him, watching him work. “I thought you just did spy stuff.”

  “I do whatever job is on the table,” he said. “This week, we rebuild a roof. Next week, we’re in Europe chasing down someone’s long lost brother. I do whatever Axel tells me to do.”

  With his Russian accent, the way he pronounced “r” rolled off his tongue in a way that made me want to get him to talk more just to hear it. “What if you do have to go to Europe next week?”

  “Are you worried I’m going to leave you behind?” He snapped seven nails in quick order into the tile. “You think I’m going to leave you here to let you reign cha
os over my city while I’m gone? No. You’ll go to Europe with me.”

  He was so full of it. Still, I enjoyed the idea. “I don’t have a passport.”

  “I’ll get you a passport.” He planted another tile into place, and aligned it.

  “I don’t have money for a plane ticket.”

  “I’ll buy you a plane ticket.”

  I smirked. “What if I don’t want to go to Europe?”

  He started firing. “Then we’ll go to Russia,” he shouted over the noise of his nail gun going off. “Or China. Or Africa. Whatever the fuck. I don’t care.” He finished the nails and then started lining up another tile. “Get out of here. You’re distracting.”

  I figured I’d pushed his buttons enough, and he did have a loaded gun. I backed away and claimed Axel’s nail gun that he’d left behind. His was yellow, and older, but it had pretty much the same design. I started lining up the tiles and nailing them in.

  I worked beside Raven for two rows of tiles until my arms started to ache and I was sweating. I powered off my nail gun and set it aside. I laid against the tile and planted a bent elbow over my eyes to block out the sun. There was a small bite to the wind that felt good, but the sun was trying to roast me on the dark tile roof. I hated that it felt like I was wimping out but my sore arm needed a break.

  “Little thief,” Raven called to me over his shooting gun. A moment later I heard it powering down. “What’s wrong with you? Did you eat this morning?”

  “No.”

  He grunted. “Remind me to kick Brandon’s ass. I can’t trust him to even feed you.”

  “I need a Big Mac,” I said without moving my arm. “I need tacos. And a steak. And maybe spaghetti.”

  “Just stay there,” he said. “I’ll go find something.”

  “No problem.” That sounded like an awesome plan. Food being brought to me was always the best sort of food.

  I heard him make his way to the ladder and then it clanged as he made his way down.

  A few minutes after he was gone, I sat up, letting the blood flow down slowly. I picked up the nail gun. I wanted to finish his row of tiles and at least get that done before he got back. It was my way to thank him for reading my mind.

  A shout erupted from the ground somewhere above the noise of the nail gun going off in my hand. I thought for a moment it was Raven maybe asking me what I really wanted to eat since I gave him a big list to choose from.

  I took my nail gun with me and eased myself closer to the ladder where I could see the front lawn.

  Marc stood there, his hands on his hips. He wore a pair of jeans and a blue T-shirt. From the way he stared up at me, with his angled chin pointed upward, I caught the scruff of his unshaven face. “Hey,” he shouted. “Are you up there by yourself?”

  “There you are,” I called down to him. I suddenly hated that I was on the roof now. Made it harder to yell at him. I had to shout louder. “Where have you been?”

  He squinted up at me. His brown hair swept across his eyes against the breeze. He planted his boot on the lowest rung of the ladder, grabbing the end as if he was going to hold it in place. “What?” he asked, shouting up at me.

  “Are we done chasing Coaltar yet?”

  “No.”

  I grunted. “Then what are we doing here? Shouldn’t we be chasing him or something? I can’t stay here forever. Wil—”

  “He’s fine,” Marc said. “You aren’t. Coaltar is looking for you.”

  “But—”

  “Do you want to lead him back to your hotel room? Do you want him to know who you really are? You already fucked up yesterday and we need to get the camera back.”

  “Did you get the camera?”

  “Tonight,” he shouted. “We had to track it down first and someone’s going to be risking his neck an awful lot to retrieve it. Coaltar may already know who you are if they looked at it. You have to stay with us probably forever now.” He smirked at that, like he really didn’t disapprove of the idea. Like he found it funny that my whole life got turned upside down.

  “He knows Brandon! Brandon’s out here doing things. What’s the difference? I don’t need a babysitter.”

  “Brandon sticks with us. There is no difference.”

  I groaned. He was impossible. I aimed the end of the nail gun down at him. “Why are you being a jerk? Just let me call Wil so he’s not freaking out.”

  “No contact,” he said. “You probably shouldn’t even be here. You need to go off the radar for a while.”

  “What am I supposed to do?”

  “Stop pointing the nail gun at me for one.”

  I lifted the gun up, pointing at the air above me. “Tell me why I shouldn’t pop a nail down at you right now.”

  “What?”

  “You told me one job,” I said. “One pickpocketing thing. Now you’re saying I’m stuck with you all until you figure out Coaltar? But you’re not even doing that now. You’re building a roof.”

  Marc shrugged. “He’s not doing anything right now. We’re waiting him out. We’re trying to make sure he forgets about you.”

  “How am I supposed to get a job if I’m supposed to go under the radar?”

  “You can stay with us until we figure this out. Stop yelling at me.” He took a step back. “You shouldn’t be up there by yourself. Why didn’t they give you a hardhat?”

  “Don’t come up here. I might shoot you with this thing.”

  “Try it.”

  I don’t know what came over me. Maybe his attitude and the fact that I was worried about not hearing from Wil. Overnight was one thing. Now that I was hearing it from Marc’s lips that I may be here for a month or even longer, I was terrified for my brother. How would I even know he was okay if I couldn’t hear from him? What if Coaltar had him now?

  Wil would start looking for me if I didn’t contact him soon. He’d think something happened to me. He’d be alone to deal with Jack every night. I’d let them talk me into staying away this long, lured by their promises.

  I aimed the gun down, toward the grass at Marc’s feet. I pulled back on the safety. I just wanted to scare him. And shooting nails felt good.

  “Bambi!” he called in a warning tone. “Don’t you dare.”

  I pulled the trigger.

  The moment I did it, I regretted it. I knew it was wrong, even just to scare him.

  I lost track of where the nail went. Once it popped out of the gun, the wind caught against my eyes and blurred my vision a bit.

  Marc stepped back and then fell on his butt into the grass. He reached forward, putting his hand around his knee in a protective move. “Shit! Bambi!”

  And then I saw the blood.

  My heart stopped. I released the nail gun safety slowly. What did I just do?

  DESOLATE

  An hour later, I was sitting in a hospital waiting room. Axel drove, and the guys left the nail in the leg after calling a doctor to ask what to do. They didn’t want us to just pull it out, in case it was holding an important artery together or something.

  I’d climbed down from the roof, feeling out of place and unsure of what to do. The guilt was heavy on my lungs and made it hard to breathe, hard to focus.

  Marc didn’t say a word to me on the drive over. No one did. I replayed the event in my mind, of how they swarmed on him, and collectively worked together to carry him into the car. Raven, Kevin and Brandon stayed behind to finish what they could, mostly at Marc’s insistence since he said it wasn’t that bad.

  And Marc had lied to them. He said he did it to himself. Accident. He shot himself in the leg and then rushed down the ladder so they didn’t have to carry him down.

  He lied to protect me. And all I did was stare at him in silence. He didn’t even look at me. I wasn’t sure if I should contradict him and confess the truth. I worried the boys would hate me after. And then I felt horrible because Marc lied to his friends, which made the guilt of shooting him in the leg so much worse.

  Axel was the one who addresse
d the emergency room nurses and handled nearly everything. Corey was there and helped, but soon Axel told him to take the car and go back to the work site. Neither of them said anything about me, and I wasn’t sure where they wanted me to go, but Corey left without inviting me along, maybe assuming I wanted to stay. I wasn’t sure if I should, if Marc would want me to stay and then I felt horrible again for wanting to bail when it was my fault he was here in the first place.

  I sat alone. Axel was with Marc somewhere deeper inside the hospital. I think Axel had told me to go with him, but I ignored him. If Marc didn’t invite me, I didn’t feel comfortable going. I didn’t think he wanted me to. Not after what I’d done.

  I sat in a sofa, facing a wide window that looked out across the parking lot and at the buildings across the way in downtown Charleston. There was a television on the wall nearby tuned to CNN. Nurses and visitors walked by occasionally. I ignored it all. I leaned forward, my head in my hands, staring at the floor.

  I told myself I should go. I should get up and walk out. Wouldn’t it be a relief to them if I just disappeared? The hotel room was paid for. I could get a job in another town and wire money to Wil somehow. I had been wrong to think when this Coaltar thing passed, that the boys and I could possibly work together. I wasn’t the sort to work with anyone. I didn’t play well with others.

  Why did I have to be so angry all the time? Was that how I was going to live for the rest of my life? Jumping in head first without thinking? Shooting nail guns at people in a stroke of fury? Axel was right. He shouldn’t have taught me about guns because now I wanted to fire off a bunch of them just to let this burning energy out of my body. And the only thing I wanted to shoot at was myself for being so stupid.

  Walking away seemed easier. They’d done enough for me, and I knew what I was like. Look at the trouble I’d caused already. Brandon was a potential target for Coaltar now, and perhaps Corey, too, since he was with us yesterday. It was obvious now that they were brothers, when that detail may have slipped by them before. I shot Marc in the leg. Would Raven be next? Or Axel?

  Every time I told myself to stand up and walk out, I couldn’t move. I was terrified of who I’d run into next and end up hurting in some way.