Perfect Cover

by Jennifer Lynn Barnes

  “Tiffany,” I said, my voice dangerously pleasant, “I want my clothes back, and I want them back now.”

  There was a long silence.

  “Tiffany!”

  Then finally, she began speaking again. “You know how sometimes in spy movies, they’ll send someone a note and it will be all ‘this message will self-destruct in ten seconds’? Well, your shirt…”

  “Self-destructed?” I asked through clenched teeth.

  “It was more like assisted suicide.”

  I wrapped the towel tighter around my body, threw the curtain back, and leapt at Tiffany.

  She held her hands out in front of her body. “Stage Six!” she shrieked. “We’ve been authorized for a Stage Six makeover!”

  I was about to show her six stages of pain, but when Brittany came sauntering over with something that looked suspiciously like lingerie and a teeny-tiny jean skirt, I realized I had bigger problems than pink sparkles.

  “I don’t do skirts.”

  Brittany was less than intimidated at the threat of impending violence in my voice. “You’re the hacker. We do fashion.” She held up the jean skirt. “Today, the entire school finds out you made the squad, and unless you want to blow your cover the first day on the job, you have got to get a sense of style.” She leaned forward. “Stat.”

  I’m not proud to admit this, but five minutes later, I was sitting in first period wearing a pink sparkly shirt, a skirt so mini it might not have qualified as such, and my combat boots, which I’d managed to get back from the twins before they had them incinerated. I had come to the conclusion that Brittany needed to die. The verdict was still out on Tiffany.

  “That’s her?”

  I heard the whispered question, but didn’t tune in. Instead, I adjusted my highly uncomfortable strapless bra and played around with the idea of stuffing one of those “special” socks into Britt’s over-glossed mouth.

  “That’s her. I heard she transferred here from Europe.”

  “Well, I heard that her dad is like this way-famous movie star, and she came here and changed her name because she’s totally not talking to him right now.”

  They were speaking loudly enough that it was hard not to listen to them, but the teacher was busy reading some romance novel and didn’t notice that the vast majority of the class wasn’t exactly working out geometric proofs in our spare time.

  “What’s her name, anyway?”

  “Toby Klein.”

  And that’s when I realized they were talking about me. Silence fell over the classroom, and in one coordinated motion, everyone and their dog leaned toward me, Toby Klein, newly appointed member of the God Squad. They awaited my words with bated breath.

  I narrowed my eyes at the whole lot of them, but they just stared curiously back at me. “Boo,” I said, trying to dispel their interest.

  One of the girls tossed her hair over her shoulder. “That’s European for hot,” she said loudly, and the entire class looked at me with newfound respect. For the first time in my life, I found myself wishing that a teacher would regain control of her class, but everyone was just way too far gone.

  “Toby, you look like totally boo today.”

  Mortified, I glanced back down at my pink sparkly shirt and renewed my vow to terminate the twin fashionazis.

  “Talk about boo, where did you get those shoes?”

  And now my oversized, clunky, unfashionable boots, the one article of clothing that I’d managed to retain, were being called boo. It was beyond all tolerance.

  “I am in hell.”

  The girl who’d asked me about my boots tilted her head to the side. “Is that in the mall?”

  By lunchtime, I’d given up on the idea of homicide. I’d moved on to genocide. I would personally rid the school—nay, the world—of cheerleaders.

  “Toby, sit with us.”

  “Look, there she is!”

  “Her? They picked her?”

  “Toby Klein? Who’s Toby Klein?”

  “I hear she’s related to Calvin.”

  “Well, I heard that at her last school, she was like megapopular, but then her boyfriend died, and she swore off popularity forever, but the God Squad, they know these things, and…”

  It was almost more than I could take. How anyone could think I was related to Calvin Klein was completely beyond me.

  “I have died and gone to heaven.”

  This voice I recognized, and I turned my mutinous glare on Noah. “Don’t start,” I said, turning to face him and inadvertently giving him a good look at my oh-so-prissy ensemble.

  Noah’s mouth dropped open. “My sister’s a girl,” he whispered with faux shock.

  “Noah…”

  He recovered quickly. “And not only a girl, but a popular girl.” The smile was back with a vengeance.

  “I swear, Noah, one more word, and I’ll…”

  I cut off my threat when I overheard someone else I’d never met inviting me to sit at their lunch table.

  A loopy expression spread across Noah’s face. “All hail Toby, queen of the cafeteria!”

  I grabbed his arm and twisted it behind his back.

  “You do not want to mess with me right now,” I said in a low voice.

  “Point taken,” he replied with a grimace, and then, despite the hold I had him in, he grinned again. “You’re a cheerleader,” he said, deliriously happy. “You can have cheerleader slumber parties. You guys can have naked pillow fights in our living room, and…”

  The rest of the school might have done an instant one-eighty in their opinions of me, but Noah never changed. I didn’t know whether to be comforted or pissed. I let go of his arm. “Get lost,” I told him, pushing down the urge to ruffle his hair. Once an older sister, always an older sister.

  “She told me to get lost,” Noah said, letting his eyes get big. “Toby Klein told me to get lost! She spoke to me! She…”

  I rolled my eyes and shoved him away. Once a little brother, always a little brother. He ambled over to his own table, a god among hopeless freshman boys. I watched him, and when Hayley Hoffman sauntered up to me, I devoutly wished I could change places with Noah. Goofy freshman boys versus evil junior-varsity cheerleaders? I’d take the boys any day.

  “You may have everyone else fooled with your little act, but you can’t fool me,” Hayley hissed, dispelling any fear I might have had that she, like everyone else, would be wowed by my newly awesome status. “You aren’t from Europe!”

  I rolled my eyes so far back in my head that I could practically see my own brain cells and didn’t bother to answer Hayley, whose you-are-beneath-me tone hadn’t undergone any alterations in the past twenty-four hours.

  “In fact,” she continued, “you haven’t changed at all. Different clothes, same skanky little reject who likes to pretend she’s better than the rest of us.”

  I forced myself to unroll my eyes and look back at Hayley. “But I am better than you,” I said evenly. “Or didn’t you get that memo?”

  She tossed her hair over her shoulder, and I elaborated in terms she would understand. “Me God Squad, you lame.”

  I’m ashamed to admit it, but I enjoyed flinging it in her face. It was almost even worth admitting the fact that I was (technically) a cheerleader.

  “I don’t know what’s going on with the varsity squad,” Hayley said, “but believe me when I say I’m going to find out, and when I do, everyone will realize that you’re still exactly what you’ve always been: nothing.”

  “Toby!” Lucy appeared out of nowhere and bounded over to where I stood. “We’ve been looking all over for you. Our table’s over there. I just know you’ll love it.” She flung an arm around my shoulder. “Don’t you just adore Toby?” she asked my evil companion.

  Hayley forced a smile onto her face. “Who doesn’t?” she said. I for one knew the answer to that question. In fact, it was probably a pretty long list, but Hayley, Mr. Corkin, and a linebacker I’d kicked in the crotch last semester were probably all up
there at the top.

  “Come on, Toby,” Lucy said again. “This is going to be so much fun!” And then she shrieked, high-pitched, girly shrieking that made me want to gore out my eardrums with a dull cafeteria knife.

  “Bye, Hallie,” Lucy called over her shoulder as she dragged me off. Hayley stared after us, smoke coming out of her ears and a giant sign saying dismissed flashing above her head.

  I bit back a grin. “Her name’s Hayley,” I told Lucy under my breath.

  The perky weapons guru nodded. “I know,” she said, her voice never losing its cheerfulness.

  She’d called Hayley the wrong name on purpose, just to get under her skin. Was it wrong that I found that kind of mind game suddenly endearing?

  “Situation averted?” Brooke arched a single eyebrow at me with the question.

  Lucy nodded. “Totally.”

  Brooke looked at me and then looked at an empty seat at their table. I could almost imagine the chair the way it would have appeared in a Hollywood movie: shining and bursting with light, the equivalent of a social throne. In the movie, there’d probably be some sort of majestic music playing in the background.

  The thought of it all made me sick. I refused to be that girl. You know the one—the dorky girl with glasses who’s secretly beautiful and gets adopted by the popular people and turned into a shiny, sparkly person just like they are. Excuse me while I hurl.

  So when I reluctantly took my seat, I stared at my shoes, reminding myself that this was who I was. I wasn’t glittery tube tops. I was Salvation Army combat boots, and I liked it that way.

  “Chip, this is Toby. Toby, this is Chip.”

  I didn’t even look up to see who had made the introduction. I knew who Chip was. He was a rich-boy football player who was also our student body president (to Lucy’s vice president, if that tells you anything). He was the guy in the movie who would fall for the newly It-ed It Girl.

  “Heya, Chip,” I said, slouching down in my chair.

  Brooke kicked my shin hard under the table.

  “Do you want to ruin everything?” her voice asked in my ear.

  I noticed immediately that her lips hadn’t visibly moved and that no one else had heard her.

  “Earpiece.” Her in-my-ears voice answered the unasked question. “It’s in your hair ribbon. I have the microphone in my tongue ring.”

  The fact that she had a tongue ring took me by surprise. She struck me as more of the belly-button type.

  “Look, I’m turning this thing off so I can eat, but for the love of Gucci, flirt with Chip. You have to be above suspicion, and that means you have to be just like the rest of us. Or do you want to blow our whole operation and compromise the safety of the free world?”

  That seemed a little melodramatic to me, but all things said and done, I was still dealing with cheerleaders here, so I figured I’d probably need to get used to the drama.

  “Toby totally has a thing for jocks.” Chloe, shooting me the evil eye, flirted with Chip on my behalf.

  Yeah, I thought. I have a thing for kicking them where it hurts.

  “Does she now?” Another male slid into the seat next to me. I didn’t recognize his voice, but something about his presence felt familiar.

  “Oh, you know me,” I said, prompted by another under-the-table shin kick.

  “No,” the boy said blandly. “I don’t. Should I?”

  He was exactly the kind of arrogant, pompous, gorgeous ass I normally tried to avoid. Heavy on the gorgeous.

  “Everyone knows Toby,” Zee said, tossing her shiny black hair over her shoulder. Watching the hair toss, it was hard to believe that the psychological profiler and the school’s numero uno “exotic hottie” were one and the same person.

  Then again, it was hard to believe that I was one “Go Lions” away from being the school’s most boo combat-boot-wearing, European, Hollywood offspring of Calvin Klein. I rolled with the punches.

  “Everyone knows me.” I repeated Zee’s words, and then couldn’t resist pulling Mr. Gorgeous’s chain. “Who the hell are you?”

  This time, I dodged the shin kick with a microsecond to spare.

  “Well, Everyone-Knows-Toby,” the boy said, addressing me. “I guess you’ll just have to find out.”

  Inwardly, I smiled a wicked little grin. I would find out who he was, and with the help of the state-of-the-art Quad facilities, with any luck, I’d also find some grade-A blackmail material to wipe that self-important smirk off his perfectly crafted face. All I had to do was make it to seventh period first.

  “Well, I heard that she totally dated a prince.”

  “No!”

  “Yes!”

  “No!”

  “That is so boo!”

  Unless I found a way to tune out the rumors flying at warp speed through the halls, getting to seventh was going to be harder than I had anticipated.

  CHAPTER 9

  Code Word: Like, You Know?

  By seventh period, I was exhausted. Actively hating your newfound popularity with a fiery passion can really take a lot out of you. And seriously, I was beginning to think that everything sucks more if you’re wearing a miniskirt. As I opened the door to the practice gym, all I wanted to do was escape. And lose the miniskirt. And forget about the fact that Brooke had assigned the twins to Project Give-Toby-a-Makeover. Talk about mission impossible.

  I’d like to say that I walked into the gym with my head held high, completely devoid of any fear. But a day of being “completely boo” had taken its toll on my morale, and truthfully, I would like to believe that the phrase Stage Six makeover could put fear into the heart of even the most stalwart social misfit.

  “Toby! Hi!”

  I didn’t know whether to be glad that Brittany and Tiffany weren’t waiting for me, or to groan at the fact that Lucy was. Don’t get me wrong. I didn’t completely despise Lucy for being the perky, happy soul that she was. I’m not entirely heartless, and especially after the way she’d put Hayley in her place at lunch, I even had what might vaguely pass as a fondness for the bouncy little weapons expert. It was just a very particular kind of fondness—the kind where I didn’t want to spend any more time in her presence than was absolutely necessary.

  “Toby! Hi!” Lucy tried again. I had a sinking suspicion that ignoring her wouldn’t make her any less friendly, and I wasn’t sure I could take “Toby! Hi!” on repeat indefinitely.

  “Hey, Lucy.”

  “So how was your day? Probably pretty long, I guess. But good? It was good, wasn’t it?”

  I could only conclude that the speed with which Lucy was speaking was the result of some kind of highly classified government enhancement of her tongue muscles, because otherwise, it shouldn’t have been possible.

  When I didn’t respond to her question, Lucy frowned. “So your day wasn’t good?” Her voice fell, and I felt a little bit like I’d just slain the Easter bunny in front of a Sunday school class full of orphaned children. I tried to decide whether the fact that she’d wanted me to have a good day that badly was strangely endearing or exponentially creepy. In either case, it felt somehow wrong to sit there, letting the Happiest Girl in the World frown.

  “My day wasn’t that bad,” I told her.

  It was, you know, only horrendous.

  Lucy gave me a tentative half smile. “It will get better,” she promised me. “Things will settle down. Like with all the rumors and stuff? It won’t last forever, and you’ll get used to it, and hey, it could be worse, right?”

  I didn’t have the heart to tell her that in the mind of Toby Klein, things couldn’t get much worse than standing in the cheerleaders’ practice gym, waiting like an inmate on death row for the makeover that was headed my way.

  “Anyway,” Lucy said. “The twins are prepping the salon, and the others are getting ready to debrief April, but Tara and Brooke thought you might still be a little confused about the way things work and stuff?”

  I could tell from the tone of her voice that the words
that had just tumbled out of her mouth were supposed to be a question, but they sure sounded like a run-on sentence to me.

  “So I thought I’d show you my lab, and give you a rundown on Squad history and stuff.”

  Her lab? As in the lab where the girl who added and stuff or you know onto the end of every sentence fooled around with explosives and weaponry? Still, it beat the hell out of getting a makeover.

  Lucy was oddly quiet as she took me down to her lab (no trampoline this time—apparently there were like fifty billion entrances to the Quad, and only one of them involved belly flopping the way down)—and then, without warning, she launched into a surprisingly cogent and articulate explanation of Squad History.

  “The Squad program has been around, in various incarnations, for about fifty years,” Lucy said, sounding strangely professional. “Originally, the program was geared toward recruitment and training. Playing on cheerleaders’ natural abilities for subterfuge and athleticism…”

  Subterfuge? Seriously?

  “…the program was designed to allow a select number of young women to complete the training necessary to become CIA operatives upon their high school graduation. The cheerleader mystique ensured that the program remained sufficiently covert.”

  “Riiiiiiight,” I said. “Covert. Because no one in their right minds would suspect that the government was training cheerleaders for the CIA.”

  Lucy rewarded me with the perkiest of grins, either ignoring or failing to notice the sarcasm in my tone. “Exactly.”

  “By the late eighties,” Lucy continued, “most of the remaining Squad programs had been disbanded due to various budget cuts, but ours remained operational. Over time, the Bayport High Squad Program evolved to be less and less about training and more about helping the government keep an eye on a very specific group of people.”

  “In other words,” I started to say, and before I’d finished the sentence, Lucy was nodding.

  “In other words,” she said, “we’re like totally special.”

  I would say that she’d stolen the words out of my mouth, but the totally special comment bore no resemblance whatsoever to what I’d intended to say.