by C. L. Stone
I would do whatever it took to expose the Academy if I found anything that would prove what they were up to. I’d take any means necessary. God help them if they did have Wil.
Because I’d burn it all down.
PRETENDING TO CARE
I walked around the main floor of the hotel for a bit and I had to take time out in a downstairs bathroom, trying to calm myself and prepare to pretend nothing was wrong. Walking in with my temper flaring wasn’t going to get me into the Academy. I had flashes of Corey’s smile, of Brandon’s kiss, of Marc’s concern, Axel’s commands… Raven washing dishes for a grandmother. Despite thinking I’d been blocking myself off from them, now I realized how deep I’d been getting with them. It was all a lie. I shouldn’t care so much.
Why, then, did I feel like my world was crashing?
When I’d collected myself enough, I retrieved the phone from the exercise room and then quickly detoured outside to get some sand on my feet. If they asked too much, I could always say I ended up going out to the beach anyway.
By the time I returned to the hotel room, I knocked to be let in. I sucked in a breath and held it, waiting.
Raven opened the door. He looked out at me quickly and then left the door open, going back into the room.
I entered slowly, as if waiting for someone to be behind the door and jump me.
Corey was now propped up on the bed with the laptop. His shoes were off and one of his socks, too. Raven went to the bed, and then bent over Corey’s foot, reaching for a Sharpie that Corey was holding up.
Corey’s foot had marker all over it, but I couldn’t figure out what it was. Was he done with doing math in the bathroom?
Corey looked up as I walked in, and then smiled, waving a little. “Did you find the beach? Is it looking good out there?”
It was a strange moment. I was sure somehow that they’d heard the whole conversation I’d just had with Blake. It was impossible, of course, but I couldn’t help but stop and stare, waiting for them to tell me they knew everything.
Part of me hoped they did. I wanted to get it out in the open. I could accuse them, and they could tell me the truth about it all. Smothering my anger at them not telling me these things, the possibility that this had all been a lie, it was torture to try to keep my tongue contained.
I stood next to the other bed, examining them for a moment as Raven continued to draw on Corey’s foot. “What are you doing?” I asked.
Raven cocked his head up for a moment before returning his eyes to his work. “Trying to convince Corey to get a tattoo. He said he wanted one around his foot.”
“I said ankle,” Corey said.
“That’s your foot.”
Corey rolled his eyes.
“Are we not going to go find this little girl?” I asked. “I thought that’s why we were still here.” Now that I had a new mission of my own, as much as I sympathized with a missing girl, I still didn’t know her and I was eager to get back to Charleston and start digging up clues about the Academy. I didn’t want to waste a minute here on something the police could handle.
Or maybe I should keep them down here. It would give Doyle time to find Wil if he could.
“We have to wait here for Axel,” Corey said. He pointed to the laptop. “I’m doing a little background check on Fred, but orders are to stay here until they get here.”
I eased myself closer to the bed. Raven was drawing a sailing ship on the water, the sun setting on the horizon, and birds flying around. It was pretty intricate, with the flags billowing, the water looking like it was lapping against the sides of the boat. “Not bad,” I said.
“You want one?” Raven asked, touching up one of the flying birds. He finished and then sat up. He moved over on the bed, propping up one of the pillows against the headboard next to Corey. He patted the spot between them. “Come sit.”
My first instinct was to say no, to stay as far away from them as possible. I shook off those thoughts. If I wanted to get into the Academy, I had to listen to them and pretend everything was fine. I may even have to get closer to them.
I lifted my feet quickly, dusting off sand. I got on the bed, crawling over. My heart was pounding the whole time, as if at any moment they could read my thoughts and know I was lying. Inside, I was hoping they weren’t going to make me disappear as they had that school vice principal.
I nestled between them. Raven took my hand, pressing my palm to his knee to keep it steady.
“I get a tattoo on my hand?” I asked.
“You want it somewhere else?” he asked. “I know American girls like getting ones on their asses.”
“It’s the lower back,” Corey said.
“It’s on the ass,” Raven said. “I’ve seen them.”
“There’s a difference between lower back and butt,” Corey said.
“What difference?”
Corey opened his mouth like he wanted to say something and then stopped, shaking his head. He sighed and looked at me.
“I don’t want one on my butt,” I said.
Corey laughed and went back to his work. When his foot seemed to dry enough for him, he moved over to the table again, plugging in his laptop while he was working on it.
Raven kept my hand in his lap, drawing over my skin. With the way he was bent over, though, I couldn’t see what he was doing.
A silence fell for a bit. I welcomed it, trying to smother my feelings and blend in again. I glanced over at Corey, studying his face. Would he stand behind a secret group that would invade a high school? Would he lie to me about Wil?
I was trying not to focus on how gentle Raven was with my hand. He smoothed his fingertips over the surface, often. At times, he was holding my hand by the palm while he drew.
After a period of quiet drawing, he lifted his head and then held my hand, up, angling it toward me.
He had drawn a beetle. The arms were up, stretched toward my fingers, and there were wings spread out. It almost looked real.
Ick. “You’re drawing bugs on me?” I asked.
“It’s a scarab beetle,” he said. “Thief.”
For a moment, I thought he was just flat out calling me a thief like he did before. “But why a beetle? Why don’t I get a ship or a tiger or something?”
He traced the pen tip along his drawing, broadening some of the lines. “Pickpocket,” he said. “Scarab beetles are the marks of pickpockets.”
“Oh.”
“It’s a Russian thing,” Corey said without looking up from his work. “There’s a meaning behind his tattoos. … I mean, maybe everyone has a meaning or story behind their tattoos, but in Russia, there’s history as to what your tattoos mean.”
I nudged Raven with my elbow. “What do your tattoos mean?” I asked.
He stopped drawing for a moment and pointed to the rose. “Ruined youth.”
I thought about that. Ruined? Because he was bad or did someone ruin it for him? “What about the bear?”
He grunted. “No.”
He didn’t want to answer. I turned to Corey, nodding my head toward Raven and asking silently how to get him to answer questions like this.
Corey nodded, and lifted the corner of his mouth. “Hey,” he said. Raven looked up, meeting his eyes. Corey flashed him a sweet smile. “You can tell her. She’s with us.”
Raven’s eyebrows furrowed, and he started to shake his head. “It’s bad.”
“She’ll understand,” Corey said. “I mean, none of us are perfect.”
I looked between them. If a bug meant thief, then a bear… The thought of those fierce eyes and that wide, snarling mouth forced me to imagine all sorts of scenarios. Assault charges were all I could think about. “Does it mean you fight like a bear?” I asked.
Raven’s lips twisted into a smirk. “Safe cracker.”
Safe cracker? He broke into safes? Maybe with explosives? It was strange to associate the bear with safes. This drew me in. If that’s what the bear meant, he was admitting he’d stolen things? I
eased, slowly, closer to him. “You were a safe cracker?” I asked quietly, trying to look interested and sympathetic.
He shifted a little like he thought I wanted room and started to move. I placed a hand on his arm. He looked up, meeting my eyes and then sighed. “I did bad things in Russia,” he said, and then pursed his lips.
He didn’t want to go any deeper. He’d mentioned before he’d been bad in Russia. He swore he was different here.
Would he tell me if he wasn’t?
“What’s this one mean?” Corey asked, pointing to his foot. “The sailboat?”
“Assistant thief. For helping Kayli with that last job.”
I nudged Raven. I wanted to know more about these tattoos. “What does the one on your stomach mean? The towers?”
He frowned. “Prison.”
“The towers are prisons?”
“Each tower represents a year in prison.”
For a long moment, I paused. I forced my jaw open, feigning a little surprise to hear this. “Here?” I asked in a quiet voice, trying to sound curious and pretend I didn’t know any better.
He focused on my hand, touching up the beetle. “In Russia.”
To encourage him to talk, I leaned into him a little, until he lifted his head, meeting my eyes. “Really? Was it for the…the safe cracking?” I asked, continuing to ask softly.
“Yes,” he said quietly. He leaned back into me, releasing my hand, and started drawing on himself with the Sharpie.
I tried to recall the towers. There were three of them, one tower for each year he was in prison. His tattoos were a living journal on his skin, a walking confession of all the things he’s ever done. Slowly, I reached over with my clean hand, tracing one of the vines of the roses on his arm. He didn’t have to tell me what he did, because it was all right there on the surface.
He stopped what he was doing for a moment, looking at my hand. Was he nervous telling me about this? Was he waiting for me to say something negative? He was difficult to read.
I didn’t want to discourage him. I wanted to know what all the tattoos meant. “What do the words say?” I asked. “The ones on your chest?”
“Нашла́ коса́ на ка́мень. Means diamond cut diamond. You’ve met your match.” He took my hand again, starting to draw again.
“I like the scarab beetle,” Corey said. He stood up, stretched and then walked over to the bed, sitting near me. He crossed an arm over my legs as he propped himself up and watched Raven working on my hand. “You’ve got it looking all Egyptian. They’ve got pictures of scarab beetles pushing the sun across the sky in hieroglyphs.”
I leaned over Raven’s shoulder, trying to see what he was drawing. In front of the scarab beetle, he was adding in a spade instead of a sun. “Does the spade mean something?”
Raven shrugged. “Mark of the thief.”
Corey leaned over, pushing his body against my legs a little. It was a cozy gesture, like he was comfortable with me. I tried not to stiffen, feeling the weight of secrets and lies instead of just Corey. He focused on the drawing. “The spade is cool. From here, looks like an upside down heart, sitting on top of a... stick.”
“No,” Raven said. He took my wrist and turned it toward us so we could see. “A spade is an ass sitting on a cock.”
“No it’s...” Corey blinked, tilting his head. “Oh wait, yeah. It does look like that.”
I scoffed and snatched my hand back, just to smack Raven on the arm. “You’re drawing asses on me.”
“It’s a spade,” Raven said, and he popped me on the hand, although not so hard. “Just looks like an ass. Now give your hand back. Let me finish it.”
I grunted, but since we weren’t doing anything anyway, I let him continue to draw. I had to admit, I did like it now. I probably wouldn’t keep it on my hand, but even with the marker, it looked really cool.
When Raven finished, Corey continued to work on his laptop. He said he’d done most of what he could for now, but wanted to wait on Axel and the others to show up before going into the details. Raven turned on the television and sat up near the headboard, while I sprawled out sideways on the bed.
Watching TV quietly with the guys let me readjust a little and collect my thoughts. If Corey and Raven didn’t suspect anything, then I was probably okay. My problem was, now that I was here, what was I going to do?
Corey had mentioned getting me into the Academy. He wanted to wait until we got home, though. Maybe if I helped them with this new job and got it done quicker, they’d let me in sooner.
I’d have to talk to the other guys. Marc and Brandon may be more difficult. Brandon, especially, wanted more from me than I was willing to give, especially considering all that I knew. I didn’t know if his interest in me was a lie. I was making assumptions, and that wasn’t good, but there was a lot he hadn’t told me, and it was all so unbelievable, that these really hot guys would be at all interested in a poor thief.
He had been a thief, though. In his own way. Wasn’t he taken in for fraud?
I didn’t want to hold his past against him, but how could he not tell me something so important?
And then there was Axel. There was a soft spot in my heart for him, for teaching me to shoot, for showing me glowing fish and for other things. He was aloof, too, which drew me in. I wanted to appeal to him before. Now, I wasn’t sure how I felt.
His mug shots still haunted me.
After about two hours of Sponge Bob, there was a knock at the door.
I was sprawled out on my stomach sideways on the bed, head propped up by a pillow. Corey was sitting back against the headboard. Raven was next to him. At the knocking, we all turned and looked at each other, as if expecting the other to get it.
Then I had a sudden thought it might be Blake again. Maybe he had changed his mind and was coming to fetch me and ruin it all by telling the guys what I was up to. I jumped up like a shot. “I’ll get it.”
I opened the door, ready to shove myself out into the hallway in case it was Blake and beat him for being an idiot.
Instead Marc, Axel and Brandon were standing together in the hallway. They had two bags each, either over a shoulder or held in their hands.
I blinked at them for a moment. “How’d you get here so fast?” I asked.
Axel started forward, forcing me to back up as he entered the room. “Private plane,” he said.
“The Academy has a private plane?”
Axel tilted his head, his eyebrow lifted. “You can hire a private jet at the airport pretty quickly. Anyone can take one if they’re willing to pay.”
“Oh.” I retreated back to the bed where I’d been with Raven and Corey while they took over the front living room area, putting down their bags.
Marc came further into the room and dropped his shoulder bag onto the empty bed. He wore a distressed blue shirt, jeans, brown belt, work boots. It was like they pulled him off a job to come here. The hair longer in the front was swept over to the side of his face. His mismatched eyes went from me to Raven and Corey and then back to me on the bed. “Comfortable?” he asked.
“Sponge Bob,” Raven said. He pointed to the television. I wasn’t sure if he understood Marc’s question.
“Oh man,” Marc said. “He’s got you watching Sponge Bob?”
“Good show,” Raven said. “Patrick’s funny.”
“What’s wrong with Sponge Bob?” I asked.
“Not Marc’s favorite. Raven loves it,” Corey said. “I think it’s how he learned English.”
“Only a few words,” Raven said.
Brandon showed up behind Marc. His shirt had a few grease stains and his jeans had holes. He collapsed on top of the bed we were on, sitting close to me. I scooted over, trying to keep my distance a bit, but I think he took it as my making room for him, because he moved in closer anyway, rolling onto his side. “I hate flying,” he said.
With four of us on the bed, it was crowded. I inched back a bit, bumping into Corey’s legs. Corey pressed
his knees together and shoved his toes under my butt. “Sit back, if you want,” he said.
He was being nice and cute. Normal. If this had been before Blake had talked to me, I may have really enjoyed it.
I sat back against Corey’s legs, and he beamed. Too cute.
Brandon picked up my wrist, checking out the art. “Are you marking on her?”
“She’s going to get a tattoo,” Raven said.
“I don’t know if I’ll get one,” I said.
“Don’t get a tattoo,” Brandon said. He smoothed his thumb over the beetle. He licked his fingers and then rubbed the marks, but his saliva did nothing. “Makes you identifiable.”
“Am I trying to not be identified?” I asked. “As in, if you dump my body somewhere, not having a tattoo would make it harder to identify the body?”
The boys laughed. I was only half joking, but that they laughed made me not know how to respond, so I ended up staring at the fake tattoo.
“You picked pockets,” Brandon said. “You didn’t want to stand out too much, right? Be forgettable? We have to do the same.”
“How does Raven get away with it?”
He shrugged. “Sometimes blending in means having a tattoo. It’s inconvenient if you want to do a wide variety of jobs, though. Raven’s actually limited on how many jobs he can do.”
“Didn’t stop him from visiting the old lady.”
“Stopped him from helping us when we went looking for you,” Brandon said. “If he was part of the group when we first found you at the mall, it would have been harder for you to trust us. Not that you did, but we were trying.”
“She probably wouldn’t have run off the first time if I was there,” Raven said.
“She’s slippery,” Marc said. He wedged himself on the group bed, sitting on the corner, the only space there was left. “There were already five of us and she got by us all. Scared the shit out of her though.” He reached over Brandon, poking at my leg.
“Huh,” I said.
Axel walked over. He put an overnight bag on the bed. He had his glasses on, his longer black hair hanging around his chin. With the tan skin, he had a Mediterranean look. Perhaps something else. American Indian? He had on work khakis that had a lot of pockets, and an olive drab camo shirt with the sleeves rolled up. He took one look at us on the bed and then the TV and frowned. “Are we on vacation? I thought a little girl was missing.”