“I take it by the size of the suitcase you won’t be gone long this time,” I say and walk across the cream carpeting to the dark leather chair in the corner. I sit down, throwing my legs up on the matching ottoman, crossing them in front of me.
“Those boots better be clean, my love,” Mom says, eyeing my boots on the leather ottoman.
“Don’t worry,” I answer, looking at the soles of my feet. “I went tramping through mud and cow manure a week ago. Should have worked its way off the boots and onto all the cream carpeting in the house by now.”
“No need to get smart,” Mom says, doing a double take with my outfit. She’s used to seeing me in PJs or sweats by this time of night. Not a red scoop-neck long-sleeve T-shirt and dark skinny jeans. “Where are you going?”
“Just to Luke’s to study for our AP bio test tomorrow,” I answer, gesturing toward the window that overlooks the Weixels’ home.
“Don’t you think you should stay in tonight?” she asks with a sigh. She likes Luke. But I don’t think she loves how much time we spend together.
“He’s got the notes for a couple of the classes I missed when I was in DC with you guys,” I answer. Pulling out the Black-Angels-make-me-miss-school card usually shuts her down.
“Okay,” Mom responds, semisatisfied.
“So, how long will you be gone this time?” I ask and nod toward the suitcase.
“Not very long,” she answers and returns to her folding. “Couple days is all.”
“Why can’t people need saving when we don’t have plans?” I ask, trying to keep my tone light and this conversation short. Mom looks up from her packing. Her intense eyes are uncharacteristically sad and I know guilt is twisting her stomach into knots. Good, I think, then immediately feel guilty for being glad that she feels guilty. It’s a vicious cycle.
“Sorry we can’t be there Saturday,” she says, leaning her hip on the side of the bed. She looks down at my father’s socks, unfolds them, and then refolds them.
“It’s fine. I understand,” I say and shrug, following the script.
“It’s all part of your cover anyways,” Mom says, waving her hand through the air, brushing it off and with it, any feelings I might have on the subject. “Just go with a friend or something.”
“Yeah. Sure,” I reply with a weak smile. It’s not even a question for them where I’ll be next year. And every time they talk about my future with steadfast certainty, the knot that’s been anchored to my stomach since Philadelphia pulls tighter and tighter.
“I’m also upset we’re going to miss the country club’s fall gala with Harper’s parents,” Mom says without looking up from her packing.
That’s what she’s upset about? I dig my nails into the palms of my hands and take a breath. I close my eyes and try to concentrate on the rise and fall of my chest. Sometimes I want to scream at them. I want to wave my hands around the weapons room and shout “You chose this life.” The moving, the cover stories, the lying, the danger. They weighed out all the pros and cons and chose this. I don’t have that luxury.
My mother lived my dream. She’s absolutely brilliant. Graduated from college at twenty and went to medical school at Johns Hopkins. She was a practicing trauma surgeon for less than a year before she got recruited by the CIA. She was one of the CIA’s top operatives when she was promoted to the Special Activities Division, the most secretive operations force in the United States. That’s where she met my dad. They became partners and eventually fell in love and got married. They both became so well trained and so well respected in the SAD that before I was born, they were asked by the government to go completely underground and become Black Angels, a promotion that is almost unheard of if you aren’t grandfathered in. They’ve been living a double life for almost two decades.
“So, what’s the mission anyways?” I ask after calming my nerves.
“You know I can’t really tell you very much, Reagan,” Mom answers and crosses the room. She opens the top drawer of her dresser and pulls out two simple cotton bras.
“So, tell me what you can,” I say, uncrossing my arms and running the tip of my finger along a deep crease in the armchair’s soft, worn leather. I follow one crease down the length of the arm and then back up again. I look up at my mom. She is pressing her lips together, thinking about how much she should give away.
“Mom, if you guys want me to do this, don’t you think I should know the truth about some of the missions?” I say, my eyes returning to the crease. “It’s only fair I know what I’m getting myself into.”
“I know it is.” My mother’s voice is low. She sounds tired and overwhelmed by what lies ahead of her.
Mom takes a breath and sits down on the bed. “A Colombian drug lord, Santino ‘El Martillo’ Torres, kidnapped five American tourists on Tuesday and is demanding that some of his men that are in federal custody in the US be returned to Colombia. One of the men is his brother. Until they’re freed, he’s refusing to let the hostages go.”
“I’m assuming the US won’t release them.”
“Of course not. They’re convicted drug smugglers. Plus, you know the government won’t negotiate with terrorists, and they certainly aren’t going to negotiate with a thug like Torres. We have to get in there, and soon, because Torres has said if his men aren’t released by Monday morning…” She pauses and swallows the emotion I’m surprised to hear bubbling up her throat. “If the US doesn’t let them go, he plans on executing all the hostages during a live webcast.”
“Holy shit,” I whisper. My mom doesn’t like me to swear, but she lets it go. “You think he’ll actually do it?”
“They don’t call him ‘the hammer’ for nothing. He’s killed plenty of people before.”
“So why are they calling on the Black Angels? Seems like something the Special Activities Division could take care of, right?”
“Probably, but it’s a little tricky,” Mom says, sweeping her blond hair out of her eye. She runs her finger down her jawline and stares past me. “For one, your dad and I were on the team that took down Torres’s drug ring in the US.”
“You put his brother in jail?” I ask.
Mom slowly nods and I immediately think about the janitor. Their enemies have tried to find us before and I’m sure they’d do it again. But before I open my mouth, she continues. “Torres has three brothers. They are his most trusted advisers in the cartel and just as crazy and dangerous as he is, so I’ll sleep a little better with one of them in jail. The other reason we have to go is one of the Americans being held hostage is Senator Taylor’s eighteen-year-old daughter Anna.”
“What?” I exclaim and my stomach drops. “How’d he get his hands on her?”
“She was backpacking through South America with friends. Intelligence is still trying to figure out how Torres tracked her down. They have a few theories. Since Senator Taylor is one of the few officials who actually knows about us, he wanted only the best team out there to save her.”
“Where’s he keeping her?”
“I can’t tell you that information, love.” Mom stands up and goes back to folding clothes. “It’s classified. I’ve probably told you too much already. If everything goes according to plan, we should be in and out of Colombia in a couple days.”
Mom places the last bit of clothing into the suitcase and gets started on the weapons. I crane my neck to see what is on the bed. Knives, pistols, ammunition, zip ties, and earpieces are all perfectly lined up. Seeing them, knowing what they’ll be used for, makes my stomach hurt. I look up at my mother’s face. Her body is here but I know her mind is very far away. When it comes to missions, she’s usually unemotional and detached—she has to be or she’d crumble. But I can tell this one has gotten to her. It’s seeped underneath her skin.
“Why do you do it, Mom?” I ask, my voice barely audible. I watch the muscles in Mom’s neck tighten. She looks up from packing and our eyes truly connect for the first time in a while. Sometimes when she looks at me, I feel like she
’s looking through me. I’m guilty of that too. I don’t always see her. We see each other now.
“Why do I do what?” she asks even though she knows exactly what I’m asking.
“Why do you do all this?” I say and motion toward the weapons on the bed. “You’re risking your … I mean you’ve never even … you don’t know her. You don’t know anyone you rescue. So why do you do it?”
We hold each other’s stare and I wait for her to say something. The silence between us is heavy with the question I’ve always wanted to ask and the answer she wasn’t sure she’d ever have to give.
She clears her throat and finally speaks. “She’s somebody’s daughter. The other people I’ve rescued…” Mom pauses and raises her hand to her chest. “They’re someone’s mother or brother or aunt. They mean something to somebody. And I don’t want them to die like that. I don’t want them to die alone and afraid and begging for their lives. Not if I can do something to save them.”
“Aren’t you scared?” I ask. My voice is thin, like the words aren’t even coming from my body.
“I’d be lying if I said no. But I know more than anything else in my life, this is what I was meant to do. This was my life’s purpose.”
A short and shallow breath fills my lungs. Of course she’d say that. She’ll always pick them. I look away, breaking our connection.
When I finally look back, her face has fallen and I wonder if it’s because she can read the hurt on my own. I know she loves me. I hear it in the way she says good morning and good night; I feel it in her hugs and the way she strokes my hair when I’m upset. It’s love, but it’s a different kind of love; one that has competition. A second-place kind of love.
I clear my throat. “You’re very brave, Mom,” I say, going back to the script.
“So are you,” Mom replies. “To whom much is given, much is expected.”
“Yes. I know,” I say with a nod.
“It’s a calling, Reagan. One few hear and one even fewer have the talent for. You’re one of the lucky ones, aren’t you?” Mom says, picking up her weapons case. She holds my gaze as the words wash over me again and again, knocking me back like a tidal wave. It’s a calling. It’s a calling. My stomach compresses its painful knot.
It’s the closest she’s ever been to asking me if this is what I want. But her tone is rhetorical. She expects a one-word answer. Yes. I open my mouth to reply then close it. She stands there frozen, her arms hugging a black weapons case to her chest, waiting for me to respond.
My phone buzzes loudly and I have never been so thankful for a text in my entire life. I pull my iPhone from my bag. Luke.
On your way?
“Who’s that? Luke?” Mom asks, lowering her eyes as she lays her weapons case back on the bed, tucking her knives and pistols inside.
“Yeah,” I answer and slide the phone back into my bag. “Just wanting to know if I’m coming over.”
“You know I like Luke,” Mom says, quickly glancing up at me and then back down at her weapons. “I just want you to be careful. You guys are from two different worlds and … I just don’t want to see you get hurt. Either of you.”
Me too, my mind whispers but I force a smile.
“We’re just friends,” I say for what feels like the tenth time today. I jump out of my seat and cross the room to where Mom is still packing weapon after deadly weapon. I put my hand on her shoulder. Her robe feels like a cloud on my skin as I lean in and kiss her cool cheek. She puts her hand up to my face and pats the side of my head. I pull away and wait for her eyes to meet mine. They don’t.
“Aunt Sam will be checking in on you,” Mom says, methodically packing rounds of ammunition in her case.
“Okay,” I say and turn around, walking toward the doorway.
“Be careful while we’re gone, okay?” she calls after me.
“You be safe too,” I answer.
As I reach the hallway, I raise my hand to the door frame and look over my shoulder as Mom slips her last remaining round of ammo in its holder. There’s something about her that seems so small tonight, like she could be folded up and fit inside the tiny silver box that holds her wedding rings.
“I love you, Mom,” I say softly, just as I’ve done before every mission. Mom finally lifts her head, her eyes meeting mine, and there’s something about them that makes my bones ache.
“I love you too,” she says, then looks back down at her case. I watch her for one more moment. I take in her faint smile lines and the way her blond hair brushes along her jawline when she moves. I hold on to that image and file it away. I turn back around and walk down the dark hallway, skip down the steps, open the door, and run the fifteen steps to Luke’s house.
SEVEN
The cold air pierces my lungs as I close my front door and bounce down the steps into the mellow October morning. A delicate mist hangs in the air and a cloth of silver dew clings to the blades of grass. The sweet, heavy summer air is long gone, replaced by the smell of earth, clinging desperately to its last precious weeks of life.
Luke stands at the edge of my driveway dressed in athletic shorts and a maroon New Albany High School lacrosse sweatshirt. His full lips separate into a wide smile when he sees me and I can’t stop my own from turning up at him. I never invited him to go running with me. He just kept showing up at the end of my driveway at 5:45. But now I can’t imagine him not striding along next to me, pushing me to go faster.
“I was about to send a search-and-rescue team,” Luke says, tapping on his Fitbit.
“What am I, a whole minute late?” I tease, bumping my hip into his.
“Two minutes late,” he says, extending his arm to show me the time. “Bed feel too good this morning, Mac?”
“Just too comfy,” I lie with a yawn. Little does he know, I’ve already done thirty minutes of Krav Maga and fifteen minutes of target practice.
We take off down Landon Lane, our feet crunching the red leaves that cover the sidewalk like a crimson carpet.
“You ready for the AP bio test?” Luke asks as we run to the end of our street and hit the bike paths that crisscross throughout the neighborhoods and along the golf course.
“As ready as I can be,” I say with a laugh. Harper didn’t stick to her promise and we found ourselves looking through Snapchat and Instagram in between trying to memorize the difference between structural isomers and geometric isomers. “I’m really not in the mood for a test today. Mr. Bajec’s tests are so painful.”
“Would you rather have to take an AP bio test every single day for a year,” Luke says with a sideways smile as he begins our favorite, silly game. “Or scrub the gym locker room toilets with a toothbrush once a week?”
“Oh gosh,” I answer, my voice and breath beginning to strain as we run up a hill. “The test, I think. I don’t know what you boys are doing in that disgusting locker room.”
“Okay, how about this one?” Luke asks as we reach the crest of the hill. “Would you rather have a bear claw as a hand or a mermaid tail as a foot?”
“Bear claw all the way,” I answer and tuck a dark strand of hair that fell out of my ponytail behind my ear. “I’d be so super strong.”
“But you’d be hairy.”
“True enough,” I reply. “I think I’d still take the claw. Hairy hand and all. Okay, how about this one? Would you rather be stuck on a desert island by yourself or with someone you hated?”
“Oh man, I don’t know,” Luke says and shakes his head. His blue eyes smile at me before his lips do. “Can I have your bear claw hand? Just in case I need to kill the person I hate when they get on my nerves.”
“Sure,” I answer with a laugh. Luke and I have probably asked each other about one thousand stupid “would you rather” questions and I never get tired of them.
“Are your parents excited to tour Templeton with you tomorrow?” Luke asks as we run past New Albany Country Club. There are a lot more cars in the parking lot than I expected at this hour but then I remember what da
y it is. Hot Yoga Instructor Friday. Harper may have even pulled her butt out of bed for the gorgeous Australian’s six a.m. class.
I press my lips together and shake my head. “They’re not coming.”
“What do you mean they’re not coming?” Luke asks, his eyes growing wide.
“They got called out on assignment,” I answer and shrug my shoulders two inches too high. “A protest in South America or something.”
“You bummed?”
“Nah, it’s okay. No big deal. Work is work.” I’m lying. To Luke and to myself. I know exactly what I’m doing; trying to pretend like I don’t care so that I can trick myself into actually believing it when really my body is sore from the sting of their dismissal.
“So who’s going up with you tomorrow?” he asks.
“No one. Just me,” I answer, attempting my best chipper, it’s-all-good voice.
“No way,” Luke says, furrowing his brow and shaking his head. “I’m going with you.”
“You don’t have to do that. It’s an hour-and-a-half drive. I’ll be fine,” I reply and push up the sleeves of my sweatshirt. “Besides, you’ve got JROTC stuff on Saturdays.”
“It’s okay. I’ll skip it.”
“Won’t you get in trouble?”
“Maybe a little bit. A few extra chores at the office will fix it.”
“I don’t want you to get in trouble for me.”
“I’d love to get in trouble for you,” Luke says, his voice a little less playful than I was expecting. But when I glance at him, the scarlet apples of his cheeks rise and he smiles.
“Okay,” I say with a nod and look away. I sink my top teeth into the side of my lower lip to keep from smiling. My heart is pounding. I can’t tell if it’s this hill or the rush of endorphins or Luke.
“Come on, race you to the top,” Luke says, grabbing my wrist, his chin nodding toward the top of the hill. “On the count of three: one, two, three.”
Our legs sprint up the hill, our stride in sync. Luke has over six inches on me and his long legs begin to gain ground. I reach out and tug very gently at the bottom of his sweatshirt and he swats me away.
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