Project Gemini (Mission 2

by Jill Williamson

  “‘The Lord will grant that the enemies who rise up against you will be defeated before you. They will come at you from one direction but flee from you in seven.’”

  Hatred gleamed in those black eyes, but Anya didn’t scream or melt or anything like that. She merely chuckled. “Your Bible verses are cute, but I too have God’s free will.” Pursing her lips, she pointed the blade over my heart and poked it gently into my skin. “Does that hurt?”

  Uh, yeah? I thought about swinging away from her, but with my arms hooked, I’d likely just swing back and stab myself.

  Mary was still at it, but her voice was getting weepy. “‘I have given you authority to trample on snakes and scorpions and to overcome all the power of the enemy—nothing will harm you.’”

  Something clumped overhead. The boat jerked violently to the side, as did Anya’s blade, sending a searing sting across my chest. I yelled. Anya dropped the knife and grabbed the counter to steady herself. I looked down at my chest, adrenaline pulsing. Blood oozed from a six-inch-long gash. I yelled again, more in panic than in pain.

  I’m gonna die. I’m totally gonna die.

  Anya glared at the ceiling. “Bushi!” She jerked her head toward the stairs. Bushi scrambled down from the bed and up the ladder. Anya crouched to pick up the blade and slid it into the kitchen sink where it clattered against the stainless steel. “Who is the first twin, Spencer? I must know!”

  Forget the first twin. Who was going to stop the bleeding? My fingers trembled above. My head whirred. I closed my eyes. Better. I needed Advil. And a big Band Aid. And sleep. I had to be sleeping now.

  “Answer me! … want to know …”

  Someone was talking. Anya was. She slapped my face, a numb sting.

  “… in shock.” Mary sounded like she was speaking through a CB radio. “You … to help him before …”

  “Dōshite … shita no?” One of the twins.

  “I didn’t mean …” Anya.

  A thud echoed through the boat from above. “… is wrong to … watch them. Kozue, I want … with me.”

  The stairs creaked. The boat rocked. I was cold and sweaty. I opened my eyes and noticed I was hanging from my arms again and they were shaking. All of me was shaking. No Anya. Mary was inching toward the counter. I blinked to keep my eyes open, looked down at my chest and the wide stripe of blood dribbling down to my shorts. Shouldn’t that hurt? My eyes lost focus.

  Thuds came from above. The boat rocked from side to side. Keiko was kneeling on the bed, her head poking out through the open skylight. Something tickled my ankle. My feet sprang apart, tingling madly.

  Mary was crouched at my feet. She stood up, holding the knife. Her eyes were brown. Pretty face. She bit one side of her lip, stepped behind me, and started to cut the ropes above my head. “You’ve got to stand up, Spencer,” she whispered.

  I did. But my feet were so dead I couldn’t feel them. Just nubs at the end of my legs. I felt my arms break free from the skylight. Mary untwisted the rope from my wrists. I let my arms fall to my sides, took one step, and collapsed.

  “Nan desu ka?” Keiko’s voice, floating above me.

  I rolled onto my side and curled into a ball. Another shaking fit seized me. I spied my T-shirt under the table and reached for it. Pulled it over my shoulder. Warm.

  “You stay there, you … girl!” Mary yelled. “Spencer, put your feet up. You’re in shock.”

  Shock?

  I vaguely remembered something Mr. S had said about getting a shock victim to elevate his feet. I rolled onto my back and propped my feet on the bottom step that led to the bed. There wasn’t much space where I’d fallen, and it looked like I was sitting on a chair on my back. Keiko was perched on a stair above mine, glaring at Mary, who stood on my other side, clutching the bloody knife. Mary looked like a maniac with her hair frizzing out wildly and her hands covered in blood.

  My blood. I was bleeding.

  I wadded my T-shirt and pressed it over the cut. Dull pain throbbed from the wound. As my head started to clear, the pain got worse.

  An engine revved to life. Then another. The sound brought me back even more. The Jet Skis. What was happening up there? Maybe Mr. Sloan had finally tracked us down.

  Keiko stepped over my torso and to the floor. “My boyfriend can beat Supensa-san,” Keiko said. “Already has twice.”

  I groaned in my defense. Bushi didn’t fight fair. None of them did.

  “He left you,” Mary said. “I think he ran away with Anya. She makes a better girlfriend. She’s American, she’s older, and she has a way better figure than you.”

  “Damare!”

  Keiko lunged at Mary. But Mary held out the knife, and Keiko shrank back. Her feet knocked against my side, so I reached up, grabbed Keiko’s waist, and pulled her down. She screamed as she fell.

  Mary sat on top of her, but Mary weighed so little that Keiko bucked her off. Mary threw herself over Keiko again, trying to hold her down. I got to my knees, my head spinning, and nudged Mary off Keiko. I rolled the sneaky she-devil onto her stomach and straddled her back.

  “Bushi!” Keiko screamed.

  “Find something to tie her with,” I said.

  Mary tossed me the rope my ankles had been bound with. Then she opened drawers until she tossed me a potholder.

  “What’s this for?” I asked.

  Mary pointed. “Her mouth.”

  I shoved the padded fabric through Keiko’s lips and tied her hands behind her back. Mary handed me another piece of rope, and I tied her ankles.

  I rolled her onto her side and wiped my thumb over the mole on her cheek. Pasty brown makeup came off, revealing plain skin.

  So this was really Kozue. And because of the red stamp ink on her nose, I knew that Kozue been with me today at the castle. She’d been the one to lead me to the boat. But which one had kissed me at the birthday party? And which one had Bushi punched?

  I clenched my jaw. Double, Double Toil and Trouble had totally outplayed Jun and me.

  I stood then, a little too fast. I swayed and clutched the table until I felt steady again. My cut was still oozing blood, making me almost panic. The thing looked nasty. I reached into my pocket for my iPhone, but it wasn’t there. Which almost sent me into shock again. “Where’s my phone?”

  “Anya took it,” Mary said. “I think she put it on the counter.”

  I spun to face the counter and spotted My Precious on the back of the sink. She’d turned it off. I powered it back on. I’d missed a handful of texts from Jun that went from curious to freak-out mode. That made me feel better, actually. “No signal out here.” I slipped the phone into my shorts pocket. “Help me move her to the shower.”

  Mary stepped in front of me. “Spencer, wait.”

  But I’d already lifted Kozue under the arms. I dragged her past Mary toward the stern and the shower.

  “Spencer, Grace is in there.”

  What! Grace? I shook my head to try to think clearly. Was everybody tied up here?

  Mary ran past me and pulled open the shower door. Grace was indeed sitting on the floor of the shower, bound and gagged, and glaring at me. Her eyes popped at the sight of the blood, though.

  I dropped Kozue. “What’s she doing here?”

  Mary crouched in the shower and began sawing at Grace’s ropes with Anya’s knife. “She was following you, and I was following Kozue. I saw Kozue steal Mr. Sloan’s keys, and I got suspicious. Then Bushi and Mr. Kimura trapped Mr. Sloan and the Japanese agent in their car, so I figured they were going to go after you next.”

  “I’ve suspected the twins from the start, but you wouldn’t listen,” Grace said, allowing Mary to help her stand. “When Wally told me where you were going, I came after you.”

  Kozue inch-wormed at my feet, heading toward the ladder. I put my foot on her back to hold her still. “Wait. How do you trap someone in a car?”

  Mary came out of the shower and sat at the table. “Kozue stole Mr. Sloan’s keys, and Bushi and some ot
her guy parked cars on either side of their car so they couldn’t get out.”

  “Why didn’t you tell your dad?” I asked.

  “I sent Martha to tell dad, and I followed Kozue. I wanted to be able to tell them where you were.”

  Which was exactly what I’d done to Gabe when Bushi had taken off with Keiko on the motorcycle. I was a bad role model.

  Grace stepped out of the shower. “I ran into Mary on the pier and tried to get her to go back.”

  “But I didn’t listen and we were too loud and they caught us,” Mary said. “But Grace put up such a fight that they shut her in the shower.”

  “You forgot when that guy hit me,” Grace said. “I thought I was going to puke.”

  This back and forth was hurting my head. “Okay, fine. Let’s put Kozue in the shower and get out of here.”

  “I thought that was Keiko,” Mary said.

  “The mole was fake. Makeup. I suspect they’ve been trading places on us all summer.”

  “Wow,” Mary said. “I keep trying to get Martha to do that with me, but she won’t. I wanted her to go to my math class the day of my final, but she said it was cheating.”

  That would so rock to have an identical twin. But I’d corrupted Mary enough for one day. “Martha’s right. That would be cheating. And if you’re serious about basketball, you’ll push all those dumb thoughts way out of your head so you don’t risk getting suspended.”

  “You’re such a hypocrite,” Grace said. “Like you’ve never broken the rules during basketball season.”

  True that.

  “No, it’s a good point,” Mary said. “I didn’t think about that.”

  “Just open the shower door, will you?” I said.

  Grace helped me stuff Kozue in the shower, and I shut the door in the evil princess’s face, which made me feel just a tiny bit better.

  I crept up the ladder. At the top, I paused and peeked through the hole, surprised there were no streetlamps at the pier. I heard Anya cursing in Russian up in the cabin. She looked to be alone and talking into a CB radio. The Jet Skis were gone. Bushi and Keiko must have taken them. I blinked and squinted out over the side. We weren’t at the pier. We were out on the ocean, drifting. What the Kobe Bryant?

  No wonder help hadn’t arrived yet. Or maybe it had, and Bushi and Keiko went to chase it away. But why were we just sitting here? Was Anya waiting for something or someone? Another boat, perhaps?

  I stood there for a moment, freaking out. I noticed a fat inner tube hanging off the back side of the boat, then caught sight of distant lights. The shore was a ways away, though.

  I descended a few rungs and whispered, “Bushi and Kozue are gone, and we’re out at sea. Anya’s up there, but I don’t know if I can fight her like this.” I felt like a wimp to admit it, but my chest hurt bad. “Plus she might have a gun,” I added, to ease my bruised ego. “But there’s an inner tube. I think maybe we should get off.”

  “Are you crazy?” Grace scowled at me. “That’s your plan? Float around in the middle of the ocean?”

  “Don’t you give me the ‘dark eyes,’ chickadee. You have a better idea?”

  Believe it or not, her scowl actually deepened.

  I didn’t have time for drama. “At least I can see the shore from here. But Anya could drive us anywhere. Or she could be waiting for a bigger boat. I think we should get off now, while we can.”

  “I agree,” Mary said, kicking off her flip-flops.

  Grace growled like a cat, the sound deep in her chest. “Fine. But you own me eighty bucks, because that’s how much these shoes cost.” She pointed to her teal and black Adidas.

  “Take them off and tie them around your neck.” I spotted my pile of stuff on the floor under the table and picked up my Lakers cap and shirt. I could live without my flip-flops.

  My Precious, however. How was I going to keep it dry? I put on my cap and tucked my iPhone inside my T-shirt. I grabbed the corner of the hem and the top corner of the opposite sleeve and spun it until it was a long twist of fabric, which I tied around my head like a bandana, centering my iPhone right on top of the brim of my hat.

  Mary opened a cupboard over the sink and pulled out a pink backpack and a black purse. She handed the purse to Grace. “Bushi put our stuff up here. You can put your phone in my pack.”

  “It will get wet,” I said.

  “Not if I put it in the top pocket.”

  “Will you put mine in there?” Grace asked her, removing a cell phone from her purse.

  “Sure. I can take your shoes too.”

  While the girls packed, I crept back up the ladder, grabbed the inner tube, and stepped over the back wall onto the swim platform. I blew out a deep breath and lowered myself into the water, clinging to the edge of the swim platform. As the saltwater entered my cut, I squeezed the edge of the platform in a silent scream.

  Mother of all pus buckets, that hurt!

  Mary appeared next and slid into the water beside me, backpack bulging on her back. I would have traded my iPhone for a lifejacket right then. My heart felt like popping corn in my chest. How deep was the water here? How long could I float on my back, anyway? If I got tired, would the inner tube hold me?

  Mary tugged at the inner tube. I didn’t want to let go of it, so I kept my right arm hooked through the center. Grace climbed into the water then. Mary clung to the other side of the inner tube and swam away from the boat, pulling my arm out with her. I was going to have to let go of the swim platform.

  I hated my life right then.

  So I leaned onto my back, looking up at the starry sky. My shorts felt heavy on my legs. The moon was almost full, hanging in the sky like a fat balloon.

  Grace pushed off the swim platform and grabbed the inner tube. It bobbed beneath the water for a moment, which freaked me out. I kicked and waved my free arm, splashing in the silent night, hoping to get away from the boat. Did I mention that the saltwater was killing my cut?

  A cold, wet hand on my shoulder stopped me. I looked back at Mary.

  “Stop,” she whispered. “Just hold on and let me get us farther out.”

  “Why you?”

  “Because you’re hurt and you’re a sucky swimmer, and I’d like to escape without you drowning. Plus, I can swim without making noise.”

  I wanted to protest, but the girl had, like, four good points.

  We started gliding away from the boat, my back facing the shore. Grace must have been helping Mary because the two of them were facing me. My cut stung like figs and jam. I tried to hoist myself up a little, but I was too heavy and only made the inner tube go underwater.

  Grace shot me the “dark eyes.”

  “Sorry,” I said, panting a little at how bad that blasted cut hurt. I grit my teeth so Grace wouldn’t think I was a wimp, but then something awful occurred to me. “You don’t think sharks will come, do you?”

  Grace snickered.

  But Mary’s eyes widened and she looked at my cut. “Is it still bleeding?”

  “I think so.” And even if it had stopped, wouldn’t the water moisten any forming scabs? I should have tied some fabric around it. Ripped up the bed sheets or something smart like they always did in the movies. What if I bled to death before we got to shore?

  “What happened to you anyway?” Grace said.

  “Anya cut me with her knife.”

  “And all those bruises on your stomach and back? Are those from the day Bushi and his friends attacked you?”

  “I have high hopes for you, Agent Thomas. A glittering career …”

  “Shut up,” Grace said.

  Gladly. We were about ten yards away from the boat when a tiny light focused on us. A slur of Russian and English curses floated over the dark sea to our inner tube.

  “Faster,” I said.

  The girls’ legs must have turned into paddlewheels because we jerked forward. The boat engine sputtered but didn’t start. Maybe something was wrong. Please let there be something wrong!

  �
�We could go faster if you got on top,” Grace said.

  “Yeah, climb up on the inner tube, Spencer,” Mary said, patting the black rubber.

  “I’m not dead,” I said. Plus, I couldn’t let the girls rescue me. I had to maintain some form of masculine behavior.

  “Don’t be dumb,” Grace said.

  “Please, Spencer?” At least Mary’s voice was kind. “You’re dragging down the front like a rudder. It’s like driving a car with the hand brake on.”

  “What do you know about driving a car?” I hated the idea of the girls doing all the work. “How am I supposed to get up there, anyway? In case you haven’t noticed, I’m not graceful without a basketball in my hands.”

  “Climb up on your front and flip over,” Grace said.

  That sounded simple enough. The girls held the tube steady. I reached across with both arms, grabbed the other side of the tube between the girls, and pulled myself up, gasping as my cut slid over the rubber. I pulled a little more, then I flipped myself over. My rear sank into the hole, my back and legs resting on the sides of the tube like it was a pillow.

  Huh.

  Mary smiled. She put one hand on my shoulder and the other on the tube. Grace moved down and grabbed my right leg. Then they started kicking again. Anya still hadn’t managed to start the boat. Could she really be alone on that thing? Maybe we actually stood a chance.

  But the shore still seemed pretty far away. I could barely see lights flickering in the distance. “Is this the right way?”

  “Unless you want to swim for China,” Mary said.

  I looked back to the boat, squinting to look past it for a shore on that side. But I couldn’t see anything in that direction. For a while, the only sound was the splashing and glubbing of the girls kicking and breathing heavily.

  “I’ll catch up, you know,” Mary said softly. “You’re only four years older than me. Three and a half, really. Did you know my dad is seven years older than my mom?”

  Eww.

  “So three and a half years is nothing, really.”

  Grace and I made eye contact, and I looked away from her. “I think your dad would disagree, Mair.”

  “We’ve talked about it, Dad and I,” she said, panting slightly. “I’m not allowed to date until I’m sixteen, and my dad says he has to know the boy too. But he said he won’t consider letting me date you when I’m sixteen until I’m sixteen. He thinks I won’t still like you then.”