‘Like me,’ he conceded reluctantly. ‘But her father is very big in Night School. He runs security for huge corporations, advises governments … He’s an insider, Allie.’
‘I know that. Rachel told me her dad was some bigwig on the board,’ she said. ‘But Rachel isn’t in Night School, is she?’
‘No, and that is unusual.’
‘So it’s possible she’s not an insider like her dad,’ she said.
‘Yes. But you just took a pretty big chance on “possible”,’ he said.
She knew he had a point. ‘You’re right. I’m sorry. I’ll be more careful.’
Mollified, he sat thinking for a moment.
‘What did she say when you told her?’ he asked.
‘She didn’t know what to think. But she was quite certain she’d heard her dad talking about some bloke named Nathaniel and complaining that he was causing trouble.’ She looked over at him cautiously. ‘She wondered if she should ask him about it.’
‘What?’ Carter nearly shouted the word and Allie ducked.
‘She’s not going to do it,’ she hastily reassured him. ‘She just wanted us to talk about the possibility. She thinks we can trust him.’
‘Oh bloody hell.’ Carter buried his head in his hands.
‘What?’ Allie asked innocently.
‘This is how you keep a secret Allie? Seriously?’
‘No … I mean, yes.’ She shot him a look. ‘I’ve only told one person, Carter. I think you’re overreacting.’
‘Al, we could get in a lot of trouble.’
‘I know that,’ she said defensively.
‘Well then?’ he said. ‘Should we maybe try not telling people our secrets?’
She narrowed her eyes. ‘So I guess you want me to tell Rachel you’d rather she didn’t tell her father?’
‘Yes, Allie. That’s what I want.’
‘Fine,’ she said icily.
‘Great.’
They sat in silence for a long minute.
‘Did we just have our first fight?’ Carter asked, looking up at her with that half-smile that always made her melt.
‘No,’ Allie said. ‘I’m pretty sure we fought a lot before we got together.’
‘True,’ he said.
‘Anyway,’ she said, ‘whether you like it or not, we now have somebody else to help us if and when we need help. And she happens to be very clever.’
‘That could come in handy,’ he conceded grudgingly.
‘Yeah,’ she said. ‘That’s what I thought.’
He lightly punched her shoulder. She tickled him back and before long they were both laughing. Draping his arm across her shoulder he kissed her temple.
‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘I shouldn’t be so pissed off. It’ll be fine.’
‘It will be fine,’ she agreed, ‘if we make it fine. Somehow.’
‘Which reminds me, I wanted to tell you what I learned today,’ he said.
Even though he sounded serious, she found it hard to focus on his words when she looked into those big dark eyes.
‘OK,’ she said, thinking dreamily: He’s really mine. Voluntarily!
‘Allie, this is important.’
‘Sorry.’ She untangled herself from him and sat up straight. ‘Hit me.’
‘Night School is starting late-night drills again.’
She frowned. ‘What does that mean?’
‘It means we’ve been given really weird instructions. We’ll be patrolling the grounds in shifts all night, every night. Taking turns, so everybody gets some kip.’ He looked off at the trees. ‘We’ve patrolled the grounds before for training purposes but this is different. It’s very intense. They’re telling us it’s a new training project to teach us what they call “protect and defend”. They’re going to stage fake attacks that we have to fend off. They’ve even told us we can take time off from morning classes the day after our night shifts. This has literally never happened before. It starts tonight, and they’ve got us doing training all weekend.’
Watching his face, Allie could see the worry in his eyes.
‘They’re getting ready for Nathaniel to do something,’ she said.
He nodded.
‘I guess there’s no way they’d call the police and ask for help?’
‘Hah.’
‘So … No more sneaking out at night?’ she guessed.
‘Absolutely not,’ he said. ‘The security is about to get intense around here.’
‘OK,’ she said quietly. ‘So he’s coming.’
‘Oh yes.’ Carter’s eyes scanned the horizon. ‘He’s coming.’
TWENTY-SIX
For Allie, that weekend seemed to drag on for ever, slowed by a toxic mix of dread and loneliness. Carter and Lucas were both tied up in Night School, and Katie’s anti-Allie campaign was still underway.
For the first time, she realised how much she’d come to rely on Carter. She rarely saw him, and even when she did there was only time for a quick hug. When she asked him how it was going out there, he said only: ‘It’s intense.’ But his eyes told her everything she needed to know – he was tired. And worried.
She dealt with it all by not dealing with it. She spent most of her time in the library. Next week was the end of the summer term and she had essays to finish and exams to prepare for. In all the excitement of the last couple of weeks, she’d let herself get behind. After all she’d been through this summer, she did not intend to get poor marks.
Rachel was there all day every day so Allie always had someone to work with.
‘Study buddies,’ Rachel liked to say with inappropriate cheer.
But the seeds of doubt Carter planted still lived in Allie’s mind. Did Rachel spread rumours about me? Can I trust her?
Rachel was so supportive and so open and honest about things, it seemed impossible. But Allie knew nothing was impossible.
The librarian’s desk was manned by student volunteers, a fact Rachel observed with raised eyebrows.
‘I guess Eloise is off playing war games,’ she muttered, after the volunteers brought her the wrong book for the third time. ‘I wish she could save it until the term is over.’
‘Did you know Eloise was in …’ Allie gestured vaguely.
Rachel nodded. ‘She’s an old friend of my dad’s. I think he was one of her trainers or something when she was a student. Anyway, Eloise has no secrets from me.’ Closing her book she added, ‘I think, anyway. Who knows any more?’
‘That’s how I feel about everything.’ Allie didn’t meet her eyes.
Rachel glanced at her watch. ‘It’s noon – want to take a break and get something to eat?’
Leaving their notebooks open on the table to reserve their place, they headed to the dining room. It was unusually quiet – many students were taking their sandwiches outside to the late summer sun. They chose a table in a quiet corner where they could talk without being overheard.
‘Any news from Carter?’ Rachel asked.
Allie shrugged. ‘A little. He says it’s all really intense, and they never get a break. What does Lucas say?’
‘The same.’
Rachel bit into her sandwich, frowning. Allie could tell there was something on her mind but she waited until she was ready to talk.
‘What are you going to do for your hols, Allie?’ she asked at last. ‘I know you and your parents have “issues”.’ She made air quotes around the last word. ‘But are you going to go home?’
The question took Allie by surprise. With all that had been going on she really hadn’t thought about what to do. She wasn’t ready to go home to the uncomfortable silences and suspicious faces. The ticking clock and unspoken regret. But what else could she do?
‘I’ll go home, I guess,’ she sighed. ‘You know, I haven’t talked to my parents since I got here. I was so angry at them for sending me here. Then I was angry at them for lying to me. I wanted them to notice I didn’t call and to call me. Just to make sure I was OK.’ She peeled the crust off her s
andwich. ‘They didn’t call.’
Rachel leaned towards her. ‘Here’s the thing – if you can’t face it, you’re welcome to come stay at mine. I spoke with Mum about it yesterday – I’ve told her all about you. She said for me to tell you you’re welcome anytime, and you can stay as long as you like. We’ve got lots of room.’
That proves it, Allie thought. She is genuinely my friend. She wouldn’t invite me to her house otherwise, would she? That’s what real friends do.
But her paranoid subconscious had a counter argument: What a great way to spy on me.
Still, the idea was tempting. Spending a couple of weeks on a sprawling country estate with Rachel versus going home to her miserable parents to hash out family problems in their poky London house? It was really no contest.
But.
‘Rachel, thank you so much. Can I think about it?’ she said. ‘I know I need to deal with my parents sometime. But right now I don’t see the point.’
‘I know.’ Rachel’s eyes were sympathetic. ‘It’s got to be hard.’
‘Your family seems so wonderful,’ Allie said. ‘I think you won the family lottery.’
Rachel looked unconvinced. ‘You’ve never met my dad. He wants me to go into his business. He’s been harassing me to join Night School since I got here. It drives him crazy that I won’t do it. And he is so not thrilled about me studying medicine. He hates doctors. Calls it “quackery”. We row about it all the time.’ She finished her sandwich. ‘So, see? Nobody’s family’s perfect.’
Allie wasn’t buying it. ‘Yeah, but there’s imperfect and then there’s my family. We’re imperfect like a ticking nuclear bomb is imperfect.’
Rachel laughed. ‘You have a point. Clan Sheridan clearly does not have it together right now.’
‘Allie Sheridan?’ A younger student Allie didn’t remember ever seeing before stood at their table looking at Rachel.
‘Her.’ Rachel pointed at Allie.
‘Me,’ Allie said, looking at him curiously.
‘Isabelle asked could you come to her office, please?’
She couldn’t hide her surprise. ‘What? Why?’
He stared at her blankly.
‘Allie …’ Rachel was trying not to laugh. ‘What have you done now?’
Allie shrugged. ‘She probably just wants to tell me how amazing I am. Again.’
‘Uh-huh,’ Rachel said. ‘Well I’ll be in the library all afternoon – come find me when you’re free. If she doesn’t throw you in the dungeon or something.’
‘Thanks for that,’ Allie said, gathering her things. ‘I’ve got to say, at this point? If I found out there were a dungeon here, it really wouldn’t surprise me.’
Isabelle’s office was empty when Allie arrived, but the door stood open, so she sat in one of the chairs. As she waited she glanced around nervously as if even now she’d find that she and Carter had left something out of place that could give them away.
Isabelle strode in a few minutes later looking distracted, her glasses pushed up on top of her head.
‘Would you like a cup of tea?’ she asked, turning on a kettle on top of a small refrigerator in a corner. ‘I could really do with one myself.’
‘Sure,’ Allie said politely, although she didn’t feel like tea.
The kettle rumbled to life as Isabelle rummaged about for an extra cup, then made sure it was clean. When it was ready, the headmistress handed her a cup, carefully turning the handle so that she wouldn’t burn herself, then sank down in a chair next to her.
‘That’s better.’ She sipped her tea reflectively, then focused her gaze on Allie. ‘There is nothing wrong in the world that isn’t made better by a good cup of tea. Thank you for coming, Allie. I don’t want to take you away from your studies for too long. But with the term ending on Friday, I wanted to spend some time with you to find out how you are. You’ve now been with us for six weeks so you’ve had time to settle in. I know this has been an unusual term and I wondered if you wanted to talk about anything.’
For a moment, Allie was speechless.
Is she joking?
Isabelle was looking at her expectantly, and she knew she had to say something.
What should I say? ‘Well, the murder was a little upsetting, and the fire did worry me a bit. I was nearly date-raped and my ex best friend is crazy. But, hey, at least I’m getting an A in History’?
‘OK …’ she said, cautiously.
She tried to think of something less sarcastic to say, but her head was full of things she couldn’t talk about – things she wasn’t supposed to know. And she knew Isabelle wasn’t interested in how she was doing in biology, or why she was late with her essay last week.
As her silence stretched on, Isabelle raised an eyebrow and offered her a lifeline. ‘You haven’t had a panic attack in a while, I hear. I think that’s progress.’
Until that moment, Allie hadn’t noticed the stretch of time since her last attack. But it had been more than two weeks. And, actually, now that she thought about it, she hadn’t been counting things much either.
‘That’s true,’ she admitted. ‘I guess I’m not … freaking out as much as I used to.’
Isabelle smiled. ‘Well, things have been stressful here, but it seems to me you’re handling stress better now. And I’m pleased to see that.’ She set down her tea. ‘Now, you and Jo …’
Allie winced. This was not a conversation she wanted to have.
‘I’ve noticed that you’re less close than you were, why is that?’
Hesitantly, Allie told her in basic terms what had happened. Dismayed, Isabelle closed her golden-brown eyes as she listened.
‘I’ll speak with Jo,’ she said when Allie’d finished. ‘She is going through a difficult time too. So you may have to be patient with her. But I know your friendship is important to her.’
‘Was important,’ Allie muttered, emphasising the first word.
‘And will be again,’ Isabelle said with confidence. ‘If you’re patient.’
She set down her teacup. ‘Katie’s little campaign is another issue I’m dealing with. I know Jules has talked to you – and I’m sorry I haven’t had a chance to before now. I’ve been so busy. But I want you to know Jules has been updating me about this every single day, and she has been fighting your corner with Katie.
‘You have been remarkably patient in dealing with her but I think we’re at the point where I will have to consider suspending her if she doesn’t stop,’ Isabelle said. ‘She knows The Rules perfectly well, as do her parents. I’ve written to them about this and they have not responded. So I’m giving her a final warning today. I very much appreciate your restraint.’
‘Be careful!’ Allie spoke before she could stop herself.
The headmistress looked at her curiously; Allie’s voice faltered. ‘I mean … Aren’t her parents on the board? I think they’re super-powerful; she’s always bragging about it. They’d be … you know. Bad enemies … I think. If they’re like her.’
Isabelle leaned forward. ‘You’re very sweet to worry about me, Allie. Don’t worry – I’ll be careful.’
Moving onto safer ground, they talked for a few minutes about her classwork. Isabelle praised her dedication and pointed out that all of her grades had steadily improved. Even Zelazny had praised her essay on the Civil War.
‘So, actually, my only concern is what happens now,’ she said finally.
‘What do you mean?’ Allie asked, puzzled.
‘During the time you’ve been here I’ve spoken to your mother many times. She’s worried about you. They both miss you.’
Immediately tears burned Allie’s eyes, and she fought them back. She was surprised how much this hurt. She’d avoided contacting her parents because she was so angry at them. But she didn’t know why they hadn’t got in touch with her.
At the same time, she felt betrayed by what she’d found in her student file. Isabelle knew her mother well and had never told her. If her parents had betrayed her b
y not telling her the truth, hadn’t Isabelle betrayed her too? In fact, hadn’t they all lied?
Maybe now was time for truth telling.
‘Do you know my parents well?’ Allie asked.
Isabelle’s expression changed instantly. She physically tensed.
‘Why do you ask that question?’ Her tone was cautious.
‘Something my mother said when she brought me here has been bugging me,’ Allie lied. ‘She called you “Izzy” by mistake, and then corrected herself. As if she knew you. And then Katie and Jo both said something about everybody here being legacy. That made me wonder what I was doing here if I wasn’t legacy.’
She stared hard at the headmistress. ‘Am I legacy, Isabelle?’
Emotion flashed across Isabelle’s face as she hesitated a second too long, but in the end her answer was simple.
‘Yes, Allie. You are very much legacy.’
TWENTY-SEVEN
After leaving Isabelle’s office, Allie stopped to splash cold water on her face before returning to the library. When she sat down, Rachel glanced at her enquiringly.
‘What? Was the dungeon occupied or something?’ she asked with a teasing smile. But when she noticed Allie’s reddened face her expression changed to concern. ‘Hey, what’s the matter?’
Allie smiled wanly. ‘It’s nothing, really. It just turned into an unexpected therapy session.’
‘I hate it when therapy jumps out and surprises you like that,’ Rachel said, but her eyes were still concerned. ‘Want to take a break and talk about it?’
Her sympathy made Allie feel tearful again, and she nodded. She didn’t want to cry in front of everyone.
Rachel led her to a quiet nook down the hall from the library, then went off in search of tissues, returning with a big box and two cups of tea.
‘Tell me everything,’ she said, settling down. ‘Or at least everything you want to tell me.’
Allie started to speak, but then stopped. If today is a truth-telling day, then why stop with Isabelle?
She couldn’t think of a good reason.
‘Before I tell you, I need to ask you a question,’ she said. ‘It might hurt your feelings. But I hope you’ll understand why I need to ask this.’