“I don’t know why I did it,” I said. “Frankie put that stuff in my bag so she could steal it. She gets a rush from it. I wanted to experience that too. To steal, right in front of everybody and get away with it? That rocked.” I grinned big. It had been a thrill to be chased like that, even though I knew stealing was wrong. “Have you ever been chased? Man, that was the best.”
He shook his head. “They’re crazy, Misha. Really, you should stay away from them. They’re trouble. There’s a reason Dakota is so against them. You’ve got to return that stuff.”
“I can’t. I gave the stuff to Frankie.” Was he going to try and dissuade me now? Was he testing me further, to see if I would shy away from them?
It was obvious he was the leader of Madness. Was his active leadership in Madness a way for him to separate himself from the group that would be chosen or was that a group he sent all the exclusions to? I felt like Frankie’s group would be chosen by the kidnappers. Someone looking for groups of eight with specific hair color had to be mad. He would want recruits that were like him or at least close to his craziness. Right? But this second group didn’t meet the hair requirements to be kidnapped. Madness had to be the right group. A dark, angry feeling filled me. I needed to feel peace. I needed to talk this out with someone. I was all messed up. “Ian, they’re just people who want to experience everything. What’s wrong with that?”
He kept shaking his head. “Look, Misha. You’re old enough to choose for yourself. But, I’m telling you to stay away from them, and Dakota would tell you the same if he were here. You better not ever let him know you were just with them. He’d freak.”
“You’re right, Ian. I am old enough to choose for myself, and neither you nor Dakota can tell me what I can and can’t do.”
He held up his hands in surrender. “Just be careful, girl. You’re playing with fire. Make sure when Dakota finds out, and he will, to tell him I told you to stay away from them.” He pulled out of the lot and headed toward my house.
He was telling me to be careful and not let Dakota know. “Maybe I like fire,” I said, just loud enough for him to hear.
He chuckled.
When we got to my house he said, “I’m sorry for lecturing. I want you to stay safe. Even after such a short time, I can tell Dakota would be lost without you, and he’s my best friend.”
I looked at Ian and smiled. “Apology accepted, but I can take care of myself.” I bounded out of the car and into the house so he wouldn’t see the shame on my face. I shut the door and leaned back on it, taking a deep breath. My phone vibrated.
Is everything ok? It was Dakota.
Everything’s fine. Chores. ☹ I texted back.
That sucks. Come when done.
Can’t. Grounded. I wrote. I needed some time to figure some stuff out. I also had to meet with Jeremy to talk this all out.
Tomorrow? He wrote.
Sure.
Then I texted Jeremy, as per our protocol, and set up a meet. I told my parents about what had happened while I waited for my five o’clock meet with Jeremy. They were totally paying attention and interest seemed to spark in their eyes when they realized there might be another group.
“A second daredevil group?” Agent Penrod said.
“There is one hitch,” I said. “They don’t seem to meet the hair requirements. They all have brightly dyed hair—red, blue, and purple.”
Agent Wood sighed, throwing his hands in the air and leaning back in his seat. “Didn’t you read the file? The kidnapper hasn’t taken a group of kids that didn’t follow the hair pattern.”
“Yeah but my gut—”
Agent Wood laughed. “You’re not old enough or ex-perienced enough to even think you can interpret what your gut feels. Forget about them. Do you have anything of substance for us today?”
I stood up and put all my weight on one foot, irritation claiming me. “I’m telling you the Avengers group needs to be looked into. It won’t hurt you to check each person out.”
Wood rolled his eyes. Penrod looked at me sympathetically.
“Whatever,” I said and left the room. “Just look into them.”
I met Jeremy at the abandoned warehouse outside of town later that evening. The sight of him gave me a lot of comfort. I knew he would help me.
“There are two groups that fit what we’re looking for. Two, Jeremy. Actually, one doesn’t match exactly, but my instincts tell me they’re the real group. My mind tells me they can’t be. Which group are the bad guys targeting, and how can I be sure?” I went through my reasoning for thinking it was the more dangerous of the two groups, and he thought my reasons were sound.
“I’ll check the files,” Jeremy said, “and see if there appears to be a pattern with the types of risks the kids have taken. I’ll call the information specialists and have them sift through the information again, adding in the possibility of two groups. I’ve been looking into Ian and Dakota, and it appears that Dakota is the stronger contender for the recruiter. He—”
“That can’t be right,” I said. Jeremy’s face flushed. “It couldn’t be Dakota. Ian practically admitted to me he’s the leader of Madness. The things he said about the Avengers, they all lead me to believe he leads both. He just doesn’t want to be directly linked to the Avengers for some reason.”
“Are you sure you’re not letting your feelings for Dakota get in the way of your good judgment?” He tapped his pen on a metal railing next to us like he was irritated about something. “The holes in his history worry me. Ian doesn’t seem to have any holes.”
“I’m sure,” I said. “Ian’s separation from the hard core group swayed me. He wouldn’t want to be directly associated with the group that got kidnapped. He wouldn’t want the kidnapping to be traced back to him. He’s not adamantly against them like Dakota is. And I don’t have feelings for Dakota.” I felt a blush creep onto my face despite the fact that what I was saying was true. I wasn’t sure why I felt embarrassed that Jeremy thought I had real feelings. I guess I just wanted him to believe I was professional—a real spy.
“Despite your surety, Christy,” Jeremy said. “I’m going to keep digging. Now, we have some work to do.” He pulled out some papers and had me look them over so they would be forever in my brain. The papers had information about the rock climb I would be making Monday. He also brought equipment, and we practiced climbing in the warehouse. I would be meeting him here early in the morning tomorrow, and he would take me to the Callahan Mountains to practice. When he asked what Penrod and Wood had said, I told him the truth.
“I’ll talk to them. I worried this might happen. They aren’t the most progressive of agents.” He rubbed his hand through his hair. “But, they are good at what they do. Really good. The best in a lot of ways.”
“No, you can’t,” I said, grabbing his arm. “I have to solve this problem on my own. I can’t have them thinking I run to you with my problems. It will only reinforce their biased opinion about my youth. I’ll just have to be that much better to rise above their subtle sabotage.”
“You’re probably right, but they should be updating you on any intel they receive. Have they told you anything?”
“Yes.”
“I’ll send them an email and ask what your input was on the information I sent. Maybe that will force them to start up a dialogue with you again and treat you like the agent you are.”
“Good idea.”
“As for the Avengers and Madness, go ahead and play both teams until I can get a lock on which one it most likely is. We should be able to narrow it down. At least I hope we can do it in the time we have.”
“All right. I’ll do my best to figure it out, too.”
With a sore and tired body, I went to bed, knowing I’d need all my strength to go climbing with Jeremy at four a.m.
Something knocked at my window. I jerked my head to look at the clock. Had I somehow slept in and missed my meeting with Jeremy? No. It was only one a.m. I cautiously walked to the window, ready fo
r anything. Frankie stared at me, her face all goofy-looking. I covered my mouth so I wouldn’t laugh out loud. I pushed my window open, and she climbed in.
“We’re going tagging. Wanna come?”
“Tagging? As in spray painting?” I said.
“Uh, yeah,” she laughed. “Don’t tell me you’ve never been.”
“Guilty as charged,” I said, grinning big, hoping it took away from the apparent geekiness I displayed.
“We’ll show you how it’s done,” she said. “Wear black and hurry.” She climbed out of the window, and I pulled the curtain shut so I could change.
Of course, we couldn’t just tag the sound walls along the freeway or someone’s private property. We had to break into the city government offices. We parked several blocks away and walked over. Anna, the blue-haired girl, had disabled the alarm system in about five minutes. She yelled, “Three minutes and counting.” She had explained on the way over that once she turned off the alarm, a secondary alarm would alert the authorities. It took them four minutes to respond. That gave us three to get all the tagging done. I watched as they created pretty cool paintings of wildlife in those three minutes. I got nothing done. I stood and stared, amazed, wondering how much money I should send the city to clean up this mess. Of course, I pressed my tracker.
“Time!” Anna yelled and everyone took off toward the door we’d entered. As per the plan, we were all to split up and meet at the van in ten minutes. I heard sirens and took off. When I turned on the block where the van was, I couldn’t help but notice the police car parked behind it. I turned back around and walked to the next street down. My phone vibrated. The text read,
Old Woolworth Building
I mentally pulled up the city map of Roseburg and headed over. Once we were all there, Lunden hotwired a car, and we piled on top of each other and took off. Maddie drove.
“That was great!” Houston shouted, running his fingers through his longish red and black hair.
“Perfect timing, dude,” Payden said, and he knocked knuckles with Houston.
“Thanks,” Houston said. “Let’s go to my house. I drew up the plans for next week’s raid on mall security—to get Frankie and Misha’s tapes. I thought we better go over it and see if any of you find any flaws in my thinking and also divvy up the jobs.”
“What about your dad?” Lunden said.
“He’ll be snoring his happy, completely wasted snore by now.” I noticed several in the group looked wary.
“We could do it at my house,” Payden offered.
“No need, he’ll be out, you’ll see.”
“He’d better be,” Duncan said. “My knee’s still hating it from the last time he went after us with that baseball bat.”
“He will be,” Houston said, nodding his head. “My dad won’t even know we’re there. I can’t wait to see the footage of Frankie and Misha from yesterday.”
They made all kinds of excited noises as they agreed with him.
Houston’s house stood on the corner, only the city streetlight giving it any light. The front yard was dirt with a smattering of weeds. An old car on blocks sat in the middle of it where I’m sure grass once grew. Shutters hung askew and paint peeled in curls all over the house. If I hadn’t known he lived here, I would have pegged it for abandoned. We entered like thieves through the back door and slinked into his bedroom, every one of us having to pass his father who snored like a freight train. Once in his room, Houston pulled out a laptop from between his mattresses.
We all gathered around as he talked about the plan.
“I don’t know why we hadn’t thought about getting this footage before,” Maddie said, pushing her platinum blonde hair behind her ear.
“We just needed Misha to open our eyes,” Duncan said.
Frankie high-fived me.
Houston had used a complicated design program to map out the mall in 3D and even had all of them, looking eerily like themselves, in the design doing the various tasks he thought they should do.
I couldn’t help myself and said, “Dang, Houston, that’s amazing. You should be an architect.”
Lunden said, “That’s what we’ve been telling him. Once we saw his amazing drawings in art, we found,” he coughed, “him this program, and he’s mastered it.”
“I’m going to design bridges, buildings, whole towns when I graduate from college,” Houston said, beaming as much as a muscle-head could beam.
This was incredible. This group had found Houston and given him hope, direction. I looked at all their faces as Houston began describing their jobs to them. I now saw them differently. They were freaking cool. They had very likely saved Houston from becoming some career criminal. Sure, he was doing crap now, but as an adult, he could rock it. This group supported each other as Dakota’s did, just in a different way that wasn’t readily apparent.
“Maybe I’ll be a safe designer,” he threw out there.
Anna was quick to say, “Hey, that’s my department.”
“You’re the safe cracker, not the safe creator,” Lunden said.
“You’re right, I’m no good with design, but give me any safe and I’ll crack it.”
“That’s right,” Duncan said. “You’ll have your own company testing people’s safes and alarm systems.”
“And I’ll be one rich chick.”
They all swore colorfully as if money and the accu-mulation of it were the whole reason to live.
As they talked about their assignments in retrieving the tapes, I realized they all had important talents to offer the group. These lost kids weren’t lost at all. What could I add?
“I think it all sounds great except for the part that I’m not included,” I interrupted.
“What if you were a lookout?” Duncan asked. “You want to be a second lookout? We can always use a second.”
“I think I like that idea. I could be the lookout that lures the officer away should he return unexpectedly.” I changed my voice to a sassy one and said, “I could wear a short, little skirt, a flirty top, some nice wedge heels, and shiny cherry flavored lip gloss.” I laughed and they did, too.
“Alright,” Duncan said. “Now you have the perfect job. Just change your lip gloss flavor to strawberry and you’ll even have me drooling.”
“I’m starving!” Payden said.
“We can’t eat here,” Houston said. “We ain’t got anything anyway.”
“I’ve got forty bucks in my pocket,” I said. “How about Denny’s?”
“Awesome,” Payden said. “Breakfast on the newbie. Can’t beat that.”
We drove to where we’d left the van. I guessed the officer hadn’t been able to find anything wrong with it and just left it there. Anna hopped in and followed us back to Woolworths where we put the stolen car back where we’d found it. I left some change I had in my pocket on the floorboard to pay for the gas we’d used.
“The owner will never even know,” Maddie said, grinning from ear to ear.
Once at the restaurant, I once again tapped my tracker. Breakfast was filled with normal teen chatter about how parents were so lame and old boyfriends or girlfriends were jerks. I’d never spoken nasty about my parents, but I joined in happily, referencing my agent parents. Frankie was the only one who abstained from talking about hers.
“You’re not in the parent-hating crowd?” I whispered to her.
“Nah. It’s only my mom and me, and she works really hard to keep us afloat. She wants the best for me, just doesn’t have the time to give it to me. With two full-time jobs we barely see each other.”
“What does she do?”
“She’s a bartender.”
“That’s hard work, I bet.”
“Yeah! She comes home totally wasted,” Frankie said. “But I don’t blame her. She has a hard life.”
“You gonna tell Misha about your mom’s second job?” Lunden asked.
“Not necessary, Lunden,” Frankie spat. “Thanks a lot.”
“You don’t have to tell
me if you don’t want to,” I said. “It doesn’t bother me.” I didn’t want to hear about anything else sensational that night.
She sighed. “It’s okay, I’ll tell you. I just can’t stand Lunden’s big mouth.” She slugged him, and it wasn’t a playful slug. It was hard. He grabbed her hand and kissed it.
“Sorry hon,” he said. Then he laughed.
These guys were like brothers and sisters. It was pretty great. I was suddenly really glad these kids had found each other. Who cared if they were doing dangerous things? They had each other. They valued each other.
She never did tell me about her mom. We got pulled into Duncan’s story about spelunking the first time.
During his tale, he must’ve thrown in ten different compliments about kids in the group. That’s when it hit me: he was the one who made this group work. He was the one who led the encouragement. The perfect leader.
It shocked me when they dropped Houston off at his house, and they all blew him a kiss. He blew one back.
“I hate dropping him off there,” Duncan said. “I wish he’d come live with me. It’d be nice to have someone to talk to.”
I guess Duncan’s parents were absentee parents. It further shocked me when they did the blowing-the-kiss thing each time we dropped someone off, including me. They truly cared about each other. They were strength to each other.
By the time they dropped me off, it was almost four in the morning. Jeremy would be here soon to take me rock climbing.
When he did come, I sprawled out on the back seat of Jeremy’s car and slept the whole way to the Callahan Mountains. We drove to the section of the mountains called the Turtles. He woke me with a soft brush of his hand on my cheek. He was so handsome. He stepped back as I sat up. I wondered if I had morning breath and pulled out a stick of gum before getting out of the car.
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