Don't Judge a Girl by Her Cover (28 page)

"Did you sleep,
sweetheart?"

I
thought it was an obvious question—a stupid waste of time. But all good
interrogators know to start with the things the subject knows for sure. So I
nodded my head. My mother said, "Good."

She
was sitting on the coffee table in front of me—the very place where every
Sunday night she laid out trays of veggies and bowls of dip. But that morning
she just sat there with her hands in her lap. Was she a mother or a spy then?
I'm not sure. But I knew the one I needed.

"Tell
me," I demanded, not caring who heard—how far our voices carried. I saw
Mr. Solomon by her desk, knew why he was there. "Both of you, start
talking," I said, but Mom was easing toward me.

"Sweetheart, this is not
something—"

"I have the right to
know!"

She
grew harder, still the boss of me and not about to let me forget it.
"Cameron, there is a time and a place for—"

"They
weren't
after
Macey," I said. "They were
never
after Macey. And…you knew."

"Cameron,
this—" But Mom didn't get the chance to finish, because Mr. Solomon was
easing onto the corner of her desk, crossing his arms as he said, "We
didn't know anything more than you, Ms. Morgan. Not for a long time."

"But…"
I started, my mind spinning, "Philadelphia." I thought about the
closed door of my mother's office that next day, my aunt's newfound terror on
the train. A chill like none I'd ever felt ran through me as I said, "What
did Zach tell you in that tunnel, Mr. Solomon?"

My
teacher nodded. He almost smiled. "He'd heard Macey wasn't the target.
That was a possibility all along—we knew that, but Zach has sources—"

"What
kind of sources? Who are they? Where are they? What—"

"That's
all you get, Cammie," Joe Solomon said, and I hated him a little. But then
he shrugged, defeated. "Because that's pretty much all there is."

Mr.
Solomon is a good liar—the best. And I hated him for that too.

"Joe,"
my mom said calmly, as if I weren't ranting and bruised. As if everything in my
life weren't suddenly different. And over. "Could you give us a
minute?"

A
moment later, I heard the door open and close. I knew we were alone.

"Sweetheart,
don't…" She trailed off, unable to finish, until the Gallagher Girl in her
overruled the mother, and she found the strength to carry on. "You're
going to be okay, Cammie. The Gallagher trustees have been notified. The full
strength of the school and The Agency are behind us. You're going to be
okay."

I
love my mother's office. It's the closest thing to home I've had in years. I
sat there for a long time that morning looking at the pictures that used to sit
on her dresser in our apartment in Arlington. Before she was a headmistress.
Before I was a Gallagher Girl. Before we lost Dad.

Before we lost a lot of things.

"What
happens now?" I heard my voice crack and knew that I was almost crying,
almost pleading. My anger was gone, and in its wake rushed a wave of grief and
terror so powerful that I could hardly breathe. I thought of Abby bleeding. I
thought of Macey and Preston. And finally, I saw Zach as he hovered over me, as
my mind whirled down a laundry chute, plummeting in a free fall that I feared
might never end. "It's just…Mom…why?"

My
mother held me. My headmistress smoothed my hair. And the greatest spy I've
ever known whispered, "We'll find out. I promise we will find out."

C
lasses should have ended, but they didn't. Finals week
should have been over, but it was still weeks away. And yet every girl at my
school knew that my roommates and I had already been tested. I thought about
Aunt Abby, and I knew we'd barely passed.

It
took three weeks for it to happen, for Mr. Solomon to knock on the door of
Madame Dabney's tearoom, for my roommates and me to get called downstairs.

Following
our teacher through the hall that day, I didn't let my mind wander—I knew too
many dark places where it might go, so I kept my focus on the footsteps, on the
stairs and on the walls. Until Mr. Solomon opened my mother's office door—

And someone said, "Hey,
squirt."

"Abby!"
Bex and Liz called at the same time, rushing toward her, throwing their arms
around her.

"Girls,"
my mother said, as if to remind them that (at

least in Bex's case) they don't
know their own strength.

My
aunt was paler than I remembered. And thinner, almost frail. Her right arm was
held in a sling. But her eyes were the same—so that's where I looked as I
stepped closer.

"How
are you?" I asked, almost afraid of the answer, but asking the question
anyway.

My
aunt smiled. "Never better." I wondered if she might be lying—or if I
would be a good enough operative to know. "Evidently, Langley needs
someone with a recent gunshot wound to impersonate a known arms dealer in…well…somewhere."
She looked up at the sky and cocked her hip, then held her sling out for us to
see. "Is this the ultimate cover or what?"

But, amazingly, the four of us
didn't agree.

"Do
you really have to go?" Liz glanced at Abby's suitcase. "You could
stay here, couldn't you? You could teach?"

"Awesome!"
Bex exclaimed, but Abby was already shaking her head, pulling her bag onto her
good shoulder. But that didn't stop Bex from saying, "Ooh, you could come
home with me for Christmas. Cam's coming. Mom and Dad would love to see
you."

"Thanks,
Bex," Aunt Abby said, "but I'm afraid I have some…
other
things I've got to do."

For
about the millionth time in the past month I thought about what was happening
outside our walls, but then I remembered not to ask the questions that I didn't
want answered.

"So
I guess I'll see you later." Abby hugged my mother,

who whispered something in her
ear.

As
she stepped toward the door she looked to my roommates and me. "Sorry,
gang, but I don't do good-byes."

But
then she stopped. She dropped her bag and turned. "Oh, what the
heck."

And
I can honestly say that none of the spy training in the world prepared me for
the sight of my aunt grabbing Joe Solomon by the shirt.

And kissing him.

On the mouth.

For eighty-seven seconds.

Liz
gasped. Bex stood there with her jaw on the ground. And me—I just looked at my
mother, who was staring at the two of them as if her world couldn't possibly
get any weirder.

When
it was over, Aunt Abby finally came up for air (Mr. Solomon, I noticed, didn't
do much of anything). My aunt looked at her sister, cocked a hip, and said,
"Well, someone had to do it."

And that was when she walked
away.

Mom
and Mr. Solomon were still pretty dumbfounded, given what had just transpired
and all, but Bex, Macey, Liz, and I chased after her, watching the living legend
who shares my name walk through the Hall of History, past the sword that had
started it all, and then start down the Grand Staircase, away from us.

In
that one final second, everyone I loved was warm and safe.

"Don't
be a ghost this time." My voice sliced through the empty foyer. "Go
do what you have to do, but don't be a ghost, okay?"

Abby
turned to me, then pulled a jacket from the bag on her shoulder. "Here. I
think someone gave this to you."

I
didn't look to see if my aunt's blood still stained Zach's jacket. I didn't let
myself think about that night. Instead, I just took it and tried to think about
why he had given it to me and nothing else.

"Abby."
It was Macey's voice, and by the look on her face, she was as shocked as anyone
to hear it. "I never said…I mean, you should know … I guess what I'm
trying to say is…"

Abby
stopped. Her good hand was on the smooth banister. Her hair fell over one
shoulder as she smiled, slipped on her regulation sunglasses, and said, "I
told you I'd take a bullet for you."

And then she walked away.

I
stood there for a long time, watching her go, because that's all that was left
to do.

Bex
and Macey went into the Grand Hall for lunch. Liz walked to the library. I
stood alone, telling myself that my aunt would come back someday—that the world
needed her outside the walls of my school, and for the time being, I was needed
inside.

That for the time being, all I
could do was wait.

"Seventh
grade!" Patricia Buckingham's voice carried through the foyer as the
newest Gallagher Girls followed behind her, out of the Grand Hall. "We
will proceed in a group to the lab for your examination. Do not enter until I
have given you your—" She stopped suddenly and yelled to the girls at the
front of the pack, "Emily Sampson! I saw that!"

I
wondered if I had ever been that small. I saw the innocence in their eyes, and
I knew somehow that I would never feel that way again. I'd seen too much—I knew
too little. And for reasons I didn't even know at the time, I raced after them.

"Professor
Buckingham," I called, stepping closer to the woman who was both the
oldest member of the Gallagher Academy faculty and also the only member whose
appearance hadn't changed at all since I was in the seventh grade.

"Yes,
Cameron?" Buckingham said, and in that moment she seemed timeless. As if
some great twentieth-century spymaster had carved her out of stone.

"I have a question…about
history."

"History
of Espionage is a course on the spring semester curriculum, Cameron. I expect
you to know that." She ushered another seventh grader down the long hall.
"Right now, as you can see, I am quite busy helping our newest students
acclimate. Sissy!" Buckingham yelled as she pushed them along, farther
from me, while the wind howled louder outside.

"Yes,
ma'am," I said. "I can see that. It's just that I was wondering …
about the Circle of Cavan." When she turned, her blue eyes pierced into
mine.

"I
need to know …" I called after her, my voice cracking under the weight of
the fears that I'd been carrying for weeks. "I need to be ready."

"I'm
sorry, Cameron. It's not something…I'm sorry." She took a step. The voices
of the seventh graders faded away as they turned the corner—disappeared from
sight.

I
turned to stare out the windows, watched the first flakes of winter start to
fall and blow across the grounds. In a few hours, everything would be covered,
as if the earth itself were pulling on its best disguise.

"Perhaps
in the spring." Buckingham's voice cut through the drafty corridor,
chasing after me like a strong wind. I turned to look at her. "Yes,"
she said again, and for a split second—nothing more—she looked like an old
woman. The hallway felt like time itself, and Patricia Buckingham and I were
standing at opposite ends—her looking back on all she'd seen, me wondering what
lay ahead.

Then
Professor Buckingham nodded once more and said softly, "Perhaps in the
spring."

I
watched her disappear down that long corridor while outside the sky turned gray
and the ground turned white and winter settled in.

Zach's
jacket was in my arms, so I put it around my shoulders. It hung there, heavy
and warm, and the cold seemed a little farther away. As I put my hands in the
pockets, I felt something brush against my fingers. I pulled out a small piece
of Evapopaper and studied the handwriting I'd seen twice before:

Have fun in London

-Z

And
then, despite everything, I smiled and looked at the note and knew that spring
would come—it always does. So I stared out that cold window, watching my breath
collect on the glass, trying not to think about my life after the thaw.

Pro: You get to have the most amazing readers in the
world.

Con: Unfortunately, trying to write books worthy of
those readers takes time. I'm incredibly grateful to everyone who has waited so
patiently.

Pro: Working with all of the talented people at
Disney • Hyperion Books is a phenomenal blessing. I owe so much to everyone
there, especially the amazing Jennifer Besser, who took me in when I had no home.
Jen, the best is yet to come!

Con: Writing is a solitary business. I don't know
how I'd make it without the support and encouragement of writers like Maggie
Marr and Jennifer Lynn Barnes, who read this book in its earliest and roughest
form. And, of course, the BOBs.

Pro:
You get to have Kristin Nelson as your agent.