The Girl in the Wall (12 page)

Though that doesn’t quite add up because he was having me taken out of the room too. Maybe he was going to hold a gun to my head to force my dad to sign things over? My stomach is cold, like I swallowed too much ice, because I can’t help wondering if a gun to my head would have been enough to get my dad to give up his life’s dream and life’s savings. That’s probably why Marc had to take everyone else hostage too. Having a roomful of kids related to some of my dad’s most important colleagues would certainly put the pressure on, if just my life wasn’t enough. I put my hands on my stomach but it doesn’t help so I stand up and head for my bedroom.

I can’t believe my uncle would actually do this. And the more I think about it, the faster the cold creeps away, replaced by the burn of anger, which I like a lot better. By the time I reach my room I’m pretty much furious and hell-bent on taking Marc down. My guilt at Mike’s death is still burrowed into a soft place at the center of my chest, but now that I know who did it, I can’t let him get away with it. There will be no mansion in Brazil or a private island for Marc, not if I have anything to say about it. And thanks to Sera getting my dad’s phone, I do.

Nico is in my room, pacing as he waits for me. I open the grate as fast and quietly as I can, and he turns as I walk in.

“Do you have it?” I ask.

His somber expression has me worried but then he reaches into his pocket and hands me the precious phone. Something loosens in me as I wrap my fingers around it, its sleek surface full of promise.

“You should go into the tunnels to call, so no one hears you,” he says. His voice is flat.

“Right, I know,” I say, walking back toward the fireplace. But then I stop. It isn’t like him to look so somber, to be so quiet. And he hasn’t smiled at me once. “What’s wrong?”

He is silent for a moment, then shakes his head. “I’m sure it’s nothing. Just something I will follow up on.”

He looks at me and after a moment he smiles. He really does have a beautiful smile. I can’t believe I never noticed it before. Which is an insane thing to be thinking right now.

“Okay, well, be ready for the police to come,” I say quickly, stepping inside the dim space in the wall. I glance back at him. “You should probably hide out somewhere until I can tell the police that you aren’t one of the ones holding us hostage. I don’t want you to get caught up in any of the arrests.”

That smile again. “I will do that. Good luck.”

I hear a noise in the hallway and I pull the grate in behind me, then walk into the tunnels.

The phone is all the luck I need and I focus on that, not my weird reaction to Nico that is probably just sleep deprivation. I walk about ten feet inside the tunnels, hopefully not too deep to lose cell phone reception. I press the phone to life and the silent request for a code lights up the screen. I tap in Swann161 and wait, ready for the menu to open, my fingers itching to dial 911. But what floats up instead are the words “access denied.”

I bite back a scream of frustration. My dad was always saying he needed more than one password but I know this is the one he used for his most important things, the one he hasn’t changed in the past ten years. Yet now, at this most crucial time, he opted to make a change on the one device that would have saved me. The burning in my stomach is creeping up to my throat but I take a deep breath and think. I can figure out his password if I just put my mind to it. He’s not that creative, I know him well enough to crack this.

I close my eyes for a second to focus and then I start typing.

Twenty minutes later the phone flashes a warning that its battery is low and it is about to shut down. I turn it off to save its last bit of juice but there’s no reason to, not really. I can’t figure out my dad’s password. Nothing works and I’ve tried absolutely everything. Once it’s gone dark I slide the useless phone into my pocket and lower my head into my hands. I try to hold onto my fury, at my dad for changing his password and at Marc for starting this whole horror show. But it’s slipping away, lost in the emptiness that is rising up like a windstorm inside me.

How could I not be able to figure out my own father’s password? I know the answer of course. It’s because I barely knew him and that was not my choice, it was his. Yeah, I stopped begging for scraps of his attention years ago when I developed some dignity, but I never stopped wanting it. But my dad always had other things, work things that came first. I told myself he was driven by money, that he was doing it for me and Abby, but the truth was always there, lodged like a splinter I could never tease out. I wasn’t enough, not interesting or smart or good enough for him. If I had somehow been better, I would not be sitting alone in a tunnel, waiting for more of my friends to be shot at my birthday party.

Tears trickle down my face and I realize I am making a sound, a pathetic whimpering that I can’t seem to stop. I press my hands over my mouth to try and keep the sound from traveling. I hate Marc and I hate my dad but most of all I hate that I never, not once, measured up.

I am vaguely aware of a rustling noise, like quiet footsteps, but since I don’t really care what happens to me, I ignore it. But then Nico is there, his voice murmuring softly in Spanish as he pulls me close.

In a small part of my mind it occurs to me that I should pull away, that I don’t want him to see me melt down like this, but I can’t. It feels so good, so safe to be in his arms. So I just sink into him, letting him hold me while I cry and cry.

I am in that glazed place between sleep and awake when Hudson’s whole body goes tense next to me. I fumble to sit up and see what’s caused his reaction, and then my heart smacks sickeningly against my ribs because I realize an agent is bearing down on us. I don’t want to know what he wants because whatever it is, I don’t think I can deal with it. Where are the police? Shouldn’t they be here by now?

But when the agent comes close I realize that it’s Nico. He sits down on the coffee table in front of us, hands on his knees, and leans in close. “There’s a problem,” he says softly. “I need you to come with me. Look scared and move fast because I have no idea what I’m going to say if someone stops us.”

A problem and no excuse if we’re stopped means looking scared is not exactly going to be a stretch. Hudson’s mouth is taut, his hands tightened into fists, and I’m sure I don’t look much calmer as we follow Nico briskly out into the hall.

We are silent as we go up the stairs at a near run, but luck is with us and we don’t pass any agents on our way to Ariel’s room. Nico goes in first, then Hudson, who pauses for a moment just inside the doorway. When I walk in I see why. Ariel is sitting on the ruined sofa, her face red and blotchy, her eyes hopeless.

“The phone doesn’t work,” Hudson guesses flatly.

“It works fine,” Ariel says, her voice gravelly, like her throat is sore. “I just can’t crack the code.”

A rush of sympathy takes me by surprise. It’s been a long time since I felt bad for Ariel but there it is. I know how much it crushed her that her dad never spent time with her and I know she thinks that’s why she can’t crack his password.

“You know, my mom tried for days to guess my dad’s password,” I say. “And she couldn’t do it until he gave her all these hints.”

Her eyes well with tears at my words and I glance at Nico, worried. Ariel is never this vulnerable. But he is looking at her, his face tender.

“So what do we do now?” Hudson asks. He is standing by the mantel over the fireplace drumming his fingers on the wood, his features dark.

That’s when it hits me that we are completely screwed. I was so surprised by Ariel that I lost track of the fact that we can’t call 911. I stagger over to the desk chair next to the sofa and fall into it. This is a disaster.

Ariel leans back as one of the tears spills over and slips down her cheek. “I don’t know,” she says. “But I do know who’s behind this. My uncle Marc.”

Her face is blank but I hear in her voice how much this hurts her. I think back to the few times I’ve met her fun-loving uncle. He bought Ariel a cotton candy machine for her tenth birthday and we got sick on a weekly basis ’til it finally broke. Do guys who buy cotton candy machines really take people hostage and commit murder?

“Are you sure?” I ask.

“As sure as I can be.” Her shoulders slumped defeatedly. “I heard him saying some stuff in the hall.”

“What stuff?” Hudson asks intently.

“What does it matter?’ Ariel sighs. “Nothing that can help us, just enough to know that my own uncle is willing to kill me for money.”

She sounds utterly beaten down but Hudson doesn’t seem to notice. “The agents downstairs are going to kill a lot of us, not just you, if we don’t figure out something to stop them.”

Ariel looks at him, a tiny flicker of fire in her eyes. “Yeah, I know. And one of those people is going to be my six-year-old sister because I can’t do anything to warn my ex-stepmother not to bring her here.”

“Oh, no,” I say.

“Yes,” she says, and this time the pain is carved across her face.

“It gets worse,” Nico says.

It’s the first time he’s spoken and we all turn toward where he is standing near the doorway, though I don’t want to hear what he is going to say. Really, how much worse could this get?

“I got word from someone in the office suite,” he says slowly. “They’ve managed to liquidate all the funds they can, but they can’t leave until they have Ariel.”

“You mean until they kill me,” she says flatly.

“That I am not sure,” Nico says. “But it is safe to assume.”

“So what are they going to do if they don’t find me?”

“They are starting the money transfer into a Swiss bank account. They think it will be done around six
A.M.
and that is when they are going to kill everyone.”

The words crackle like an electric shock through the air.

“Wait, so they’re just going to kill us all?” I ask in a voice that doesn’t sound like me.

“Yes,” Nico says. “They’re going to burn the house down with everyone trapped inside.”

Ariel closes her eyes. “I’ll just turn myself in now. It’s really the only thing to do.”

We all start to speak at once until Hudson raises a hand. “That’s not the answer. After all that’s gone wrong they’d probably burn the house down no matter what, to erase as much of their trail as they can.”

“He’s right,” Nico agrees. “Really that may have been the plan the whole time, to kill everyone in a fire.”

The horror of this seeps into me. We are not going to get out of here alive.

“So, what, we just sit here and wait to be killed?” Ariel asks.

“Obviously not,” Hudson says irritably. “We have to fight back.”

“Are you carrying a stash of machine guns I wasn’t aware of?” Ariel asks bitingly. “Because short of that, I’m not sure how we fight back.”

“I don’t mean we start some kind of epic battle,” Hudson says. “I just mean we put up enough of fight that we can escape.”

I try to find my voice but it’s stuck inside my chest. I can’t get past the thought of being burned alive before the sun rises.

“That sounds easy,” Ariel says sarcastically, starting to sound more and more like herself, or at least herself when she is annoyed.

“So you want to just give up?” Hudson is close to yelling and Nico glances out the door, then gives Hudson a “shut up” look.

Hudson nods, acknowledging but still looking pissed at Ariel.

“Obviously that’s not what I’m saying,” Ariel says with a signature eye roll. “I want to take Marc down more than anyone. I’m just saying we need a plan.”

“Agreed,” Hudson says shortly. “So who has ideas?”

The room is silent. I can’t seem to get my mind to work right, I just keep going over the things we’ve already said, like how Abby is coming and Marc is behind this and we’re all going to be killed. That last part especially.

I look at Ariel. Her blond hair is tangled and even though she has a bit of her spark back she still looks tired and beaten, a lot like she did when she first came back from Mexico. And then something connects.

“In Mexico,” I say. “Those guys who attacked you, do you think maybe it wasn’t just a random attack or rape attempt or whatever?”

Ariel sits up, her body moving slowly. “You mean, is it possible they were trying to kidnap me and hold me hostage?”

“Yeah.”

She is quiet, thinking. I see Hudson and Nico exchange a look but we all wait for Ariel.

“Yeah, I think that is possible,” she says finally. “I bet that was Marc’s first attempt to get my dad to give him everything. After that my dad tightened security for both of us so Marc had to wait for just the right opportunity to try again.”

“And this was it,” I say.

Hudson is looking at Ariel intently. “I know it sucks to think about it but is there anything, anything at all that you remember from it that might help us now?”

She pauses, then shakes her head. “Nothing comes to mind but I’ll think about it.”

It somehow changes things to know that Marc tried this before. I am guessing it makes him all the more determined to see it through this time.

“Okay, so now we need a plan,” Nico says. “I say we keep it simple. We gather any weapons we can, Ariel leaves them somewhere you guys can get them, and we all fight our way out.”

“We fight our way out against a bunch of armed agents?” Hudson asks skeptically.

“Honestly most of these guys would be reluctant to actually kill a bunch of kids,” Nico says. “It’s just the leader who’s kind of trigger happy. Everyone else just wants to get paid and move on.”

“So you think if we catch them by surprise we have a chance?” Hudson asks.

Nico nods. “They’ll hesitate to do real damage and if we have some makeshift weapons, it could be enough to buy us the time we need to escape.”

“What kind of weapons?” Ariel asks.

At the same time Hudson says, “Where will she leave them?”

Clearly they’re sold on the plan and it makes sense to me too.

“There’s a grate in the downstairs bathroom that’s a door to the tunnel,” Ariel says, answering Hudson’s question. “I’ll put stuff there, though I’m not sure what kind of weapons we have just lying around.”