“Oh. Carry on,” Beatrix said. “Except know they just entered you guys into the security log—they’re coming after you on . . . well. On golf carts.”
Slow golf carts, I thought.
A crash ahead of us—it was Archimedes bounding out of the woods. There were leaves stuck in his—and his passengers’—hair, but they were all grinning wickedly. I slammed on the brakes, skidding to a stop inches from the other cart.
The collection went wild with laughter.
“Wow. We’re in so much trouble.” Archimedes celebrated, punching his fist into the air.
“Did you guys see us go over the hill? How much air did we get?” Jeffery asked.
“It was, like, three feet. At least,” one of the girls—Merry, right?—answered.
“I’m thinking five, personally,” Walter joined in, high-fiving Archimedes. They jostled Walter and clapped their hands on his shoulders, and for a moment I felt left out—till they hauled me toward the center of the circle and did the same. I laughed, tried not to enjoy it—but wow, it was nice fitting in, being the hero for something as stupid as making a golf cart go faster.
“Security! Go, go!” Archimedes shouted, pointing through the trees. Cutting through the path of downed weeds we’d created was a golf cart with a piddly little blue light on its top. The driver shouted at us in French and then jumped out.
The other four kids took off running and, to my relief, the officer followed them.
“Come on!” Aria said hurriedly. “They’ll send someone else, I bet. I know where we can go.” Then she took off into the trees so fast that I almost missed what direction she’d gone in. Luckily, Jeffery was familiar—we followed him, and eventually, the four of us emerged into a little picnic area that I supposed was meant for the horseback riders to relax in. There were umbrellas and tables and even a little water trough for horses.
“Wow,” Aria said, slumping onto a chair. “That was fantastic. You guys are great.”
Jeffery laughed and shoved her familiarly. “See if you’re saying that once you’re grounded forever. Aria’s dad thinks she’s like a statue or something. She might shatter at any moment.”
“He’s just afraid I’ll wind up being one of those heiress party girls,” Aria said, but she didn’t sound very convincingly defensive. “Though he won’t let me get a pet iguana, which I really, really want, and how nonheiress-party-girl is that? It’s not like I’m asking for a little purse dog.”
“You’re weird. Iguanas are weird,” Jeffery said.
“Your dad keeps a white tiger as a pet. At least the iguana won’t eat me,” Aria said, and stuck her tongue out.
I sat down, catching my breath. Sweat was making my white shirt nearly transparent, but there wasn’t much to be done about that, so I tried to ignore it. Come on, Hale, conversation, steer the conversation—“So, that’s it, though? You’ll get grounded?”
“I’m sure. But then he’ll go out of town on business and he won’t know the difference anyhow. It’s not so bad,” she said, and grinned. “Besides, that was the most fun I’ve had all summer. Maybe I should turn to a life of crime, stealing golf carts. A criminal mastermind. Think I’d make a good thief?”
“Sure. That’s just it—being ready to jump up and do something rather than overthink it is the key to being a mastermind or thief or spy—”
Whoa. What was I doing? These were marks, not friends. I was casing them for information, not having a real conversation. Even if Aria and the others were a lot more like me than I thought. We were all trapped in a world we didn’t create or control or ask for—
No. Keep moving.
Thankfully, Aria asked at that exact moment, “What about you guys? What’s the punishment? I mean, you’ve done this before, I’m guessing?”
Walter laughed. “Oh yeah. This isn’t so bad. Probably get our phones taken away or something like that.”
Finally—an in. I trod carefully; I couldn’t mess this up.
I said, “Remember when we stole that Jet Ski and it ran out of gas on that little island? Man. I thought we’d have to find the Runanko books to make them forgive us for that.”
Walter nodded. Jeffery lifted an eyebrow. “The Runanko books? What are those?”
I rolled my eyes, like even explaining it all irritated me. “My parents collect art, and they’re forever looking for these fancy books. They’re all covered in gemstones and . . . I dunno. They’re fancy, I guess.”
“Jeweled books?” Aria said, frowning. “Who would put jewels on books?” Before I could answer, Jeffery cut in—
“My parents are so not into art. Our house is all modern and white and plastic. It’s gross,” he said.
“Crossing the Alabaster family off the list, in that case,” Beatrix said quietly in my ear.
“What about Archimedes?” I said, pretending to joke. “Should’ve seen if his family has them. We could’ve raced for them, and if we’d won, we’d be out of trouble for the rest of our lives.”
“Ha—if his family had something like that, they’d sell it. I heard they’re broke,” Jeffery said haughtily.
“And there goes the St. Claire family,” Beatrix said.
Aria gave Jeffery a disgusted look. “Seriously, Jeffery? Archie is our friend. Don’t go around airing his family’s dirty laundry.”
Jeffery rolled his eyes. “What? These guys are our friends too.”
“We don’t even know their last names,” Aria argued, and then the truth of what she’d just said seemed to occur to her. She turned to me and Walter. “What are your last names, George and Ringo?”
“Kessel,” Walter said confidently.
“Oh! Wait—hang on. Kessel?” Aria said.
“I thought the Kessels were . . . Victor and . . . What was the other’s name? They were here a few weeks ago. You guys . . .” Jeffery’s eyes went wide. “You’re totally not the Kessel brothers.”
Walter looked like he might faint. I felt my stomach flip, but I kept my cool—I mean, these were two kids my age. I’d been interrogated by the SRS director just a few months ago. I could handle that—I could handle this. I just needed an excuse that wouldn’t get these two worried about us.
I sighed. “All right, fine—we’re not the Kessel brothers.”
Aria looked stunned—impressed but stunned. “Who are you? Do your parents even belong here?”
“George and Ringo, remember?” I said, grinning. “And no, they don’t—though they are art collectors. And they do like the Beatles. But no, they don’t belong here—we just snuck in for fun.”
“You snuck into the country club for fun?” Jeffery said, and now his eyes were a mixture of horrified and delighted. “And convinced us to steal a car with you?”
“You are criminal masterminds!” Aria said.
“We stole a golf cart, not the Mona Lisa,” I reminded her. Through the trees, we heard voices—backup security, I guess. I looked over at Jeffery and Aria. We were almost out of time, and we still hadn’t ruled out Aria’s family. The voices were getting closer . . . It wasn’t the end of the world to be caught by country club security, but our photos would almost definitely be taken, in that case, which was never a good idea—SRS had plenty of face-recognition software at their disposal, after all.
“What’s your name, really?” Aria asked, crossing her arms. She looked . . . amused? Curious? Maybe a little angry? It was hard to pinpoint.
I sighed, held out my hands. “It’s Michael Hendrickson. But everything else we said was true, I swear. So if you’ve got those Runanko books, now would be a good time to sell them to me, because we’re so grounded forever when those security guys get here.”
Aria frowned and looked at the woods and then back to where the security officers were making their way down to us. “I don’t know what your book things are, but you won’t need them.”
“Why not?” Walter asked.
Aria smiled at us. “Because you were never here.”
Walter cocked his head
. “Huh?”
I grabbed his arm and looked over at Aria, then at Jeffery, who looked pretty overwhelmed by the last hour of his life. “Aria Stoneman: Criminal Mastermind. I think it does have a nice ring to it,” I said, and then dragged Walter into the woods.
I heard Aria’s laugh, bright and loud above the trees— “Call me if you decide to go on another adventure—hey, wait! How did you know my last name?”
But Walter and I were already out of sight.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Beatrix sent Clatterbuck to pick us up. He arrived driving a taxi and wearing a woman’s wig and bright-red lipstick. It was pretty much one of the most horrifying things I’d ever seen. Stan Clatterbuck made one ugly woman. It didn’t help that the wig was too small; every time we went through a roundabout, he had to clutch it to keep it affixed to his head. By the time we got back to the poney farm, his lipstick was smudged, and a strip of false eyelashes was stuck to his hand.
“I bet Kennedy and Ben had more luck than we did,” I said as the three of us made our way inside. As soon as we opened the door, though, I realized this wasn’t the case—Kennedy, Beatrix, Ben, and Otter were gathered around the kitchen table, looking defeated.
“No luck?” I asked unnecessarily. They shook their heads. Kennedy looked especially apologetic, and I knew she thought she’d let me down. I pulled on one of her red pigtails as I joined them at the table and she smiled but still looked sad.
Ben said, “They don’t have the books, Hale, and I don’t think they ever had them. They had nice houses, but they didn’t have I-stole-and-sold-priceless-jeweled-books houses.”
I took a breath. “Okay, then, what about the names Hastings gave us that weren’t at the country club? That princess, for example?”
“I ruled her out while you guys were gone,” Beatrix said. “And the upcountry Deans too. They’re broke, and Princess Ygritte is afraid of paper, so I can’t imagine she stole some books. It’s called papyrophobia. It’s a real thing, I swear.”
“Well. Who do we have left then?” I asked.
I regretted asking immediately. Everyone’s eyes dropped to the floor—except Otter’s. He gave me a serious look and said, “SRS. Specifically, your parents.”
I yanked out one of the chairs and sat down; the riding pants rode up uncomfortably, but I ignored them. “We’ve already gone over this, Otter. My parents aren’t thieves,” I said, looking over at my sister. Kennedy nodded along sort of meekly and then pulled her knees up to her chest and yanked them under her shirt.
“Your parents were SRS agents. They were whatever SRS told them to be,” Otter said, stepping toward me. He wasn’t much taller than me, but since I was sitting, it gave him a chance to tower a bit. “Jordan, I entertained this chase for a day, but if we’re going to continue this mission, it’s time we get serious about it. The odds are SRS—and your parents—took the books.”
“Serious? You think I’m not serious just because your idea is ridiculous?” I said, and I felt my heart bounce around my chest. I tried to douse it—letting Otter see he’d gotten to me wouldn’t help anything.
Luckily, Walter cut in while I got my emotions back under control. He stepped between me and Otter, holding his hands up. “Wait, wait—we didn’t just go on a chase today. It’s good that we cleared the rest of the house guests and staff, Agent Otter—”
“Director Otter,” Otter corrected.
“Uh, right, Director, whatever. Well, it’s good we cleared the staff and the country club families.” Walter turned to me now and gave me a long look. “But maybe . . . Hale, maybe we just look into the possibility that SRS stole the books.”
“You’re believing Otter over me now?” I said.
Otter threw his arms out. “Why would I lie about this? Your parents were art thieves! Beatrix, hack into SRS and show him the old mission logs—”
“Uh, they’ve really locked their system up, so—” Beatrix began, but I cut her off.
“Not everything in the world goes back to SRS! And not everything is my parents’ fault, no matter how much you hate them!” I snapped, slamming my hands on the table. I took a breath and tried to calm myself down, but my heart was pounding. I didn’t even know why, to be honest. Of course spies were sometimes thieves. They were sometimes assassins and kidnappers and con artists too.
But not my parents. They couldn’t be. They were good people . . . even if they weren’t here with me and Kennedy . . . because of SRS.
I sighed. Maybe I was lying to myself. Maybe everything in the world really did go back to the Sub Rosa Society.
“How about this?” Ben said, very, very tentatively, like he thought I might explode if he spoke too loudly. “I was thinking while I was out today. These books are old, right? Really old. And remember how at Hastings’s place, they were in that fancy sort of glass case? Well, that’s because they have to be stored in a noble gas.”
“A what?” Otter asked impatiently. I could tell he really wanted to get into a yelling match with me. I sort of wanted that too.
“A noble gas,” Ben repeated. “They’re unreactive, so they’re good for things like storing mummies and inflating blimps. Or keeping really old, fancy books in perfect shape.”
“So you’re saying they might have disintegrated?” Kennedy asked, her eyebrows knitted together like this might break her.
Ben shook his head. “No, I’m saying that whoever has the books has to have a really pure, high-quality noble gas delivered on a regular basis. Not that many individuals do, I bet. So if we just find out who’s getting noble gas delivered, we have a whole new list of suspects to look into—people who might have the books now, which is really more important than who stole them in the first place, right?”
Everyone mumbled in agreement; Ben and Beatrix exchanged relieved looks. Beatrix placed her fingers over her Right Hand, letting them hover there the way a musician does over a piano. “Noble gas orders?”
“Let’s start locally, then branch out. My money’s on helium, if you can narrow it—”
“Oh, Bennett,” Beatrix said mockingly. “If I can narrow it down. If!”
Clatterbuck laughed proudly, and Otter, still looking grumpy, leaned over Beatrix’s shoulder until she shooed him back to the other side of the table.
“Come on, Kennedy,” Walter said to my sister. “Let’s practice that stunt. The one where you backflip?”
“Okay,” Kennedy said, her face brightening a little, and followed him outside.
I wanted to stay to see what results Beatrix could come up with, but I didn’t much want to be in the same room as Otter at the moment. Kennedy looked surprised to see me step outside behind them—I wasn’t usually eager to watch cheerleading, because . . . well, cheerleading. Useful as the occasional lift was, it still wasn’t really my style.
“You have to promise not to freak out if you’re going to watch us,” Kennedy said, looking cautious.
“I swear.”
I swore in a different way when Walter basically threw my sister into a backflip, then caught her foot so she was standing on his hands. Kennedy had her hands over her head in a high V, one leg back like a ballerina, and looked pleased.
“Isn’t it cool?” she asked. Walter wobbled side to side to keep her balanced above him, his elbows locked out.
“How did you two learn to do that?” I asked.
“There’s this video, we saw, and—” She stopped, flipped backward, and landed neatly back in Walter’s arms and then did a walkover back to the ground. “It’s called a rewind arabesque!”
“Is it . . . uh . . . safe?” I asked.
“So long as I don’t miss her on the backflip,” Walter said, wiping his hands on his pants.
“We practice it at home over the mats,” Kennedy said.
“It looks great. And it looks like Kennedy is a lot easier to throw than I am,” I said, smiling and thinking about Walter heaving me over a fence a few weeks prior. Kennedy continued to look pleased, and even though Walte
r liked to pretend he wasn’t into the cheerleading thing, he looked pretty happy too.
Which was a relief, because it meant they hadn’t seen my face falter when Kennedy said the word “home.” See, when I hear that word, I think about apartment 300 at SRS. I think about the baby-chick-yellow living room, and the secret ice cream compartment in the freezer, and my bedroom with the dinosaur sheets that I always covered when friends came over but actually liked way better than my more grown-up blue-striped sheets.
I didn’t think of League headquarters, like Kennedy must. But then, Kennedy had a bedroom full of stuffed animals and cheerleading posters and glitter pens at League headquarters. I had a white bedroom with nothing in it. I wondered where all the stuff I left behind was now. Did SRS stick it in storage? Did they comb through it? Did they burn everything?
I wondered where Mom and Dad were living. Had they made a new home somewhere, like Kennedy, or were they like me? I wasn’t sure which one I wanted for them. It was hard to think of them relaxing in some strange living room, eating out of some strange fridge, putting pictures on strange walls. Did they tell jokes and eat ice cream and talk about me and Kennedy, or did they sort of avoid the subject, like Kennedy and I did about them some days? Were they happy even though we weren’t with them?
I didn’t think they could be happy without me and my sister, but then . . . I didn’t think they would just leave us behind, either.
I felt bad immediately for thinking that—I mean, what choice did they have? But still . . . I wondered what my life would be like if my parents weren’t heroes.
If they were just art thieves.
CHAPTER TWELVE
I went to bed early because I knew I’d never be able to fall asleep after Ben started snoring. That was probably why at about four in the morning I woke up suddenly. I stared at the bunk above me for a while, then tried to count to a million, then tried to clear my mind, but in the end nothing worked. I kicked my legs over the side of the bed, straightened up my pajama pants, and then slipped out of the room to get a glass of water.