Cassidy Jones and the Secret Formula (26 page)

Heading up the narrow attic stairs, Chazz announced, “I’ll be right there. I got to put something on.” With that, he darted away, slamming the attic’s door behind him.

When we reached the top of stairs, Emery looked around approvingly. “This is perfect,” he commented.

Flow with him,
I reminded myself.

As we unfolded the tumbling mat, Chazz reappeared, wearing Nate’s Halloween ninja costume from two years ago. The black robe hung to his knees, and the legs bunched up around his ankles. I have no idea how he kept the pants up. So he could see out of the long, horizontal eyehole, he had bunched the top of the hood with a black hair band. It looked like a large egg on his head. We all smiled when he told us to call him “Ninja.”

Nate and I were in awe during Emery’s demonstration. He definitely knew the practice of martial arts, and he knew it well. His “classified,” “accountant,” unreachable father must have been a good teacher. Emery used Nate to illustrate different moves while Chazz and I watched. Though observing for me was interesting, especially the way my mutant eyes saw the action, Chazz soon lost interest. With sudden inspiration, he darted down the stairs, yelling, “I’ve got to change. Someone else is coming to see you.” That “someone else” never came back.

An hour into the instruction, Mom called up the attic stairs, “Nate, come down and do your homework.”

“Okay.” Nate called back. “Darn. Emery, this is so cool. Will you show me more later?”

“Sure,” Emery replied. Glancing at me, he wore a pleased expression. “I’ll bring up my laptop and show you some great fight videos I have stored.” He added to Nate, “Come up when you’re finished. The participants are ranked among the best. The matches are intense.”

“Real brutal?” Nate asked with a grin.

“Extremely.” Emery smiled back at him. At the top of the stairs, he looked at me. “I’ll be right back.”

As they tromped down the stairs, I lay on the tumbling mat, frowning.
Why would he think I’d want to see a couple of extremely brutal guys knocking the
living daylights out of each other? What in the heck was in those computer files?

When I heard Emery coming up the stairs, I flipped up into a sitting position. My mouth dropped open as his head appeared. A single element missing from him created such a dramatic transformation, that if I had to come up with one word to describe him, it would have been
Wow!
Without glasses, Emery went from tall, dark, and handsome to tall, dark, and dashing. Those Clark Kent glasses really were an effective disguise.

Staring at his familiar, yet totally unfamiliar face, I asked awkwardly, “How can you see without your glasses?”

Setting the laptop on the sofa, he answered casually, “I’m wearing contacts. I just prefer the glasses.”

As he walked toward me, I shamelessly gaped.

He smiled. “Cassidy, you’re looking at me like I’m from another planet.”

“Well, you kind
of are. I mean, I’ve never seen anyone look so different when they take their glasses off.” My eyes squinted. “You look really, really different.”

“You’re going to give me a complex,” he teased. “Now, get up. I want to try something.”

My eyes narrowed on him. “What did you find in Selma’s computer files?”

“This first.”

Flow with him
.

As I jumped to my feet, he asked, “When you observed the demonstration, did the moves register and process in the same way as they did earlier?”

“Yes, they seemed to stick.”

Smiling, his black eyes sparkled. “Good. Let’s go out to the center of the mat.”

Fight videos. No glasses. Center of the mat. I saw where this was going. “I don’t know if this
is such a good idea.”

Emery rolled up a sleeve. “Of course it is.” He rolled the other sleeve. “Just don’t hurt me.”

I shook my head.

“Cassidy, if this proves out, then I can explain to you why you were able to observe the move I made on Dixon and learn it. Now, come on.” He walked past me, stopping dead center.

Reluctantly, I joined him.

“Now, all I want you to do is block me…Remember, be careful.”

I gulped.

He threw a punch.

My hand flew up and blocked it.

“Good.” He smiled. “Now, I’m going to do a series of punches.”

Easily, automatically, I blocked those and the kicks that followed, and the combination of kicks and punches after that. With each series, Emery became more aggressive and fast, but cautious. He really didn’t want to get hurt. Though my adrenaline spiked, I seemed to have better control over the strength than I had in P.E., maybe because I knew what to expect this time, or maybe because this wasn’t laced with emotions. This
was only two friends, casually sparring.

Like the kids playing dodgeball, Emery appeared to move in slow motion. Maybe that was why I considered this casual. Seeing punches and kicks slowed down wasn’t terrifying. Because the motions appeared so slow, I must admit, I became bored blocking. It got to the point that I could anticipate his moves and defeat them before he really had a chance to make them.

“Okay,” Emery panted, bending over, resting his hands on his thighs. Sweat dripped from his forehead, splashing on the mat. “I can’t do anymore.”

“You’re tired?” I asked lamely. I wasn’t even close to breaking a sweat.

His face lifted to me; his expression was incredulous. “You’re not even out of breath. Incredible. Absolutely incredible.”

Now Emery looked at me like I was from another planet or like I was a new toy he’d just been given. Standing up, he wiped his brow with his forearm. “Let’s sit down and talk.”

“You’re really good,” I said, following him to the sofa.

He laughed. “That’s a compliment, coming from you.”

“Why would it be? You’re natural. I’m not.”

Picking up the laptop, his only response was a slight smile. “Go ahead and sit.” He motioned to the sofa.

I sat next to him. “Okay, I give up. What did you find in those files?”

“This first,” he said again.

“All right, ‘this first,’” I agreed in frustration.

“For lack of a better word, I’m going to call what you are doing ‘imprinting.’ Basically, you observe a physical event, and like a stamp adhered to an envelope, your mind fixes that event to memory. Instantaneously, it is imprinted, and you can perform it. Add your other abilities, and you’re not only able to perform what you observe, but you’re able to perform exceedingly well.”

This explained the strange occurrence “exceedingly well.” It made sense. “Okay, I get it. Now what?”

He opened his laptop screen. “Now we train you. First, I’ll have you watch fight matches involving a variety of martial arts forms. Later, we’ll move on to something more combative.” He smiled at this.

“You’re boggling my mind. Why do you want to train me?”

“Because it may be useful.”

“Useful for
what
?”

He looked me steadily in the eyes. “I’ve broken the encryption on two files. One file had surveillance photos of my mom and me. Apparently, whoever Heart is working for has been watching us for a while. The other file contained copies of email correspondence between two undisclosed individuals. The communications were in code. However, I did decipher that an assassin was the subject of the correspondence and King Pharmaceutical was mentioned.”

“Is that like a drug company?”

Emery nodded. “Company headquarters are here in Seattle. You and I will go there tonight.”

“And you want me to learn to fight in case we run into trouble,” I concluded.

“Exactly.”

I turned my wide-eyed gaze to the laptop. “Show me what you have so I can start imprinting.”

He played the first video.

Concentrating on the screen, I slowed the images with my mind, imprinting the moves between the fighters. Eager to cram as much as possible into my head, I encouraged Emery to speed them up on the laptop until the video was moving in fast-forward. My eyes caught everything, stamping the moves into my memory.

About half an hour into this, Nate joined us, forcing Emery to play the videos at normal speed. Irritated, I focused on the images that appeared to be moving through Jell-O. It was excruciating.

Musing, I likened myself to the laptop, thinking it ironic that the computer had downloaded
me
with its “software.” Musing further, I viewed my body as a machine able to physically perform the downloads, as Emery said, exceedingly well, and I had to be able to fight exceedingly well. Anything involving an assassin couldn’t be good.

In the midst of musing, a mental radar went off in my head, warning me that something was wrong. I had no idea what alerted me to danger, but all at once, my senses instinctively sharpened. My ears picked up the disturbance first.

Two car doors slammed. Four sets of feet tromped up our front walk, two sets of them heavier, either because of body weight or footwear. Dispatch transmitted over their portable radios.

I gasped.

Emery grabbed my forearm. “Careful,” he whispered, studying my anxious face.

A fist pounded on the door.

“We need to go,” I said, jumping up. Heeding his intuitive warning, I descended the stairs at human speed. Emery and Nate followed.

The front door opened as I sprinted down the hall.

“May I help you?” Mom asked with fear in her voice.

“Mrs. Jones, I’m Detective Bob Conlin. I’m a friend of Drake’s.”

Dashing down the stairs, I saw Detective Conlin’s solemn face over Mom’s shoulder.

“I’m sorry, Mrs. Jones…I have bad news.”

Seventeen

With Chazz on her lap, Mom sat centered on the living room sofa. Pressing close to her, Nate and I sat on either side. Detective Conlin and his partner, Detective Drammeh, sat across from us in the wingback chairs, solemn-faced, yet matter-of-fact. Emery stood off to the side, leaning his back against the room’s entryway molding. His expression was unreadable as he looked on the dire scene. Beyond him, a police officer stood in the foyer, standing guard. Another officer was posted at the back door.

Determined to keep a cool head, I battled inexplicable rage as Detective Conlin began the bleak account. “At approximately three-thirty this afternoon, two men pulled Drake into a white van near Pike Place Market. According to Ben, the vehicle pulled up to the curb where Drake was standing, and before he and other witnesses could intervene, the van sped away. The two men and driver wore nylon masks. A witness took down the vehicle plate numbers. We ran them. The van was reported stolen three days ago.”

“What’s happening?” Chazz asked quietly.

Her eyes wide with terror, Mom pulled his head to her shoulder and whispered, “Somebody has taken Daddy. But don’t be afraid, sweetheart, he’ll be okay.”

Detective Conlin watched Chazz somberly. “I understand this is a shock for all of you. But we are doing everything we can to find Drake.”