The Lies That Bind (13 page)

Taylor caught me staring and laughed. “Don’t worry about the windows. They’re tinted. No one is ever able to see in.”

I coughed, embarrassed at my transparency. Of course the windows were treated with some million-dollar invisible glass tint. The Wrights probably had an electric fence hidden around the house’s perimeter as well.

“I am going to change.” She gestured at her Pemberly Brown uniform. “Not exactly getaway gear.”

As soon as I heard the bathroom door click shut, I pushed a few buttons on the wall, attempting to lower the shades. It didn’t matter how many times she mentioned tinted windows, I still heard my mom bitching and moaning that if I didn’t close the shades to my room, the entire neighborhood would see me. The overhead light turned on, a fan, some music, but no shades. I walked back to the window, praying that I was just being paranoid about someone being out there.

Someone watching.

Instead, I tried to enjoy the view. Hundreds of towering trees hugged the property, and if I looked hard enough I could see shining water, a creek that cut the woods in half. I even saw a family of deer gathered around something that still managed to be green in the dead of winter. Taylor must have loved looking out that window. It was so peaceful and quiet, like a page from
National
Geographic
. The only things that were out there belonged.

But then I saw one of the deer lift its head, the others following suit and standing stock-still. I tried to remember what preyed on deer, but all I could think of were cars and hunters. It’s not like we had wolves roaming the woods in Cleveland. At least I hoped not. I wasn’t in the mood to see some sort of deer ambush.

But then I caught movement. A hand reaching out to move away brush.

Then the flash of skin, a face maybe.

My arms and legs went numb and jittery with adrenaline. We weren’t alone. People were out there watching and I didn’t think they were hunters. I scrambled down the length of the window, hitting the wood floor hard and flattening out on my belly to watch. The forms huddled close together and then broke apart, bending close to the ground every few steps in unison. They wore dark clothes, blending into trees.

The Brotherhood.

“Taylor!” I whisper-shouted, my voice cracking in the middle. But it was useless. I could hear the water running in the bathroom. I needed to call the police. My phone was on the bed where I’d left it, and Taylor’s cordless was farther off on the nightstand, but I lay transfixed at the window, unable to take my eyes off the shadowy figures in the woods.

Their movements were picking up now, closing in, and I thought back to Maddie’s humiliation. The Brotherhood was taking this too far. Pemberly Brown’s campus was one thing, but Taylor’s personal property? As I watched them circle, I wondered what it all meant. Who were they sacrificing this time?

But I already knew. Bethany.

“Taylor!” I shouted again, louder this time. Nothing.

The harder I stared, the harder they were to see. The sunlight was playing tricks on my eyes, so I looked slightly to one figure’s right, hoping that would help. There were two, closing in on Taylor’s house with each step. The wind bent the trees, blowing harder this time, rustling what was left of the leaves and blowing back the hood one of the Brothers had pulled over his head. And before he reached up to replace it, I caught a glimpse of unmistakable red hair.

What the hell was Seth doing at Taylor’s house? I smacked my forehead against the glass when I noticed his partner in crime. The better question was what the hell was my boyfriend doing with him?

By the time Taylor disarmed the security system and pulled the heavy front doors open, Seth was standing in front of the gate, bent in half, hands on his knees, chest heaving, back rising and falling like he’d just finished some sort of street race. And behind him stood Liam.

“What the hell are you guys doing here?” I called, narrowing my eyes just to be sure I was seeing who I thought I was seeing. Not only was it surreal to be spending time with Taylor Wright, but now my worlds were colliding.

“I found him running down Courtland,” Liam said, nodding toward the semi-main road. “I was afraid he’d get hit by a car or something.”

“I couldn’t”—
heave, heave
—“take the van”—
gasp
—“my mom’s at the store.”

A sheen of sweat covered Seth’s pale skin despite the cold, and I noticed that he’d taken extra care in selecting some Under Armour lounge clothes that matched his running shoes. I would have thought biking or even taking a bus would have been a better option, but that was kind of irrelevant at this point. “When you weren’t on the bus, I was worried. I used the GPS on your phone to track you here.”

“You installed a GPS tracker on my phone? Seriously?” I was equal parts impressed and horrified. Apparently Seth’s obsession with my whereabouts knew no bounds.

“You’re always running off and getting trapped in dangerous situations. I installed it when we drove Maddie home the other night.” Seth’s voice cracked, and his face was roughly the same color as his red sweatshirt.

“Good lord, just get it off my phone, okay? The last thing I need is you following me around.”

Seth looked wounded and I immediately felt guilty. The thing about Seth was that in spite of his early attempts to convince me to make out with him, he’d turned into a really amazing friend. And as sketchy as the GPS tracker might have been, he did sort of have a point.

Just as I was about to apologize and send the boys packing, Taylor shoved past me and yanked them both into the house. She slammed the door behind her and pressed a button to arm the security system.

Welcome to the house party of awkward.

“Actually we could use your help.” I looked over at Taylor in confusion after she said the words. She was kidding. She had to be kidding. Taylor, of course, was dead serious. Seth stopped mid-turn.

“We’re not here to help. We’re here to bring Kate home. Whatever you’ve got her involved in, she wants no part of it.” Liam had kept completely quiet up until this point, and he managed to keep his tone light, but there was nothing light about the way the tendons in his neck strained against the collar of his fleece.

“Kate is fine right where she is.” Jesus, now he had me talking in the third person. “Why don’t you go plan another humiliation ceremony?”

Taylor ignored me completely and addressed Liam. “What have you heard?”

Liam’s eyes were on fire and seemed to be aimed primarily at me. “What the hell? I told you. I had no idea they were going to do that to Maddie. I just got this stupid text to show up at the auditorium, and after you ran out of open, I figured something was up so I showed up and…”

Taylor reduced the space between them in record time. I was starting to think that there was a ninja underneath all that pretty blond hair. Her face stopped just an inch from his. “You are one of them now? Where is she? What did you do to her?”

Liam jerked away, stumbling under his feet. The circular entry table wobbled as Liam bumped into it, a gigantic arrangement of flowers vibrating beneath the movement. A few petals rained down. I threw my arms into the air like some sort of deranged crossing guard and screamed.

“
Stop!
”

It worked.

Despite looking like he could take off at any second, Liam was still, every muscle in his body tensed and ready for a fight. Taylor looked like she was ready to pounce, but she’d twisted her head around. I could see the veins in her neck pulsating from where I stood. Seth, who had magically produced a bag of Cheetos, presumably from somewhere in his coat, stood with his mouth hanging open, a fresh Cheeto poised near his lips.

“He”—I nodded at Liam—“is not a member of the Brotherhood. I followed Maddie out of the house that night because I thought she might know something, but instead the Brotherhood held some sort of humiliation ceremony in her honor. I was pissed because Liam was there.” As the words came out, I realized how angry I still was. Yeah, he wasn’t in the Brotherhood, but he had been there. It was almost worse.

“Kate, I tried to tell you. I had no idea what was going on. I just got a text and showed up.” He tossed his too-long hair out of his eyes and snorted. “If anyone should be pissed it’s me. I mean what were
you
doing there? I thought you were done with this. With
her
.” He jerked an arm angrily in Taylor’s direction.

Ah, the classic defense mechanism. Liam loved deflecting the blame, especially when it had to do with me investigating anything involving the ’hoods.

I opened my mouth to defend myself, but Taylor beat me to it.

“As riveting as your relationship issues are, I would like to get back to my missing best friend.” Her voice started out steely but cracked on the word “missing.” It felt strange to hear her say it out loud, especially with other people in the room. I guess we were officially letting Seth and Liam in.

“Wait. What?” Seth held up five cheese-covered fingers.

“Bethany is missing. The Brotherhood took her. It happened the night of Obsideo.” Taylor sounded exasperated already. I didn’t have the heart to tell her how much patience was usually required when dealing with Seth.

“How do you know?” Liam asked quietly.

“What do you mean?” Taylor smoothed a nonexistent tangle from her hair.

“I mean, how do you know they took her? How do you even know she’s missing?”

“Huh. Liam has a point. Her mom sent in a note about Bethany being out a week to study her chakras. They’re even giving her extra credit in Anthropology.” Seth’s job working in the school office had many redeeming qualities when it came to investigating Pemberly Brown.

Hope flared in my chest. Maybe this was all just some huge misunderstanding. The thought of Beefany in the downward-facing-dog pose on a commune somewhere made me a little giddy. My shoulders sagged when I saw the look on Taylor’s face, and I remembered the mess at Bethany’s house, the police station, and of course the text with her picture.

“She’s gone, okay? I heard her scream.” Taylor’s voice took on a hysterical edge. “How do you explain this?”

She pulled up Bethany’s picture on her phone.

The boys squinted at the phone, and Seth grabbed it out of Taylor’s hands and started manipulating the image with Cheeto-stained fingers. “Do you recognize where she is? Looks like a paneled room of some sort. A basement perhaps. Have you confirmed it’s the Brotherhood and not that serial killer who talks girls into getting into his van to help him with a baby?”

“Pretty sure, Chester the Cheetah,” Taylor snipped, eyeing the orange fingerprints Seth had left behind on her phone. Seth turned bright red.

“Lay off him, T.” Taylor had no idea how lucky we were to have Seth on her side, and I wasn’t going to let her make him feel like a jackass. “Besides, the real reason we’re here is this.” I handed over the paper from the headmaster’s office.

“Who wrote this? How did you get it?” Liam had entered full-on protector mode.

“Ben Montrose. I recognize the handwriting.”

“Chem Ben?” Liam sounded skeptical.

“Yeah. Chem Ben.” Liam and I had nicknames for all the random people at Pemberly Brown. It was our thing, or at least it had been before.

“Well, there’s really only one option then, right?” Seth licked his orange fingers and started walking toward the door.

“And what might that be?” Something told me Taylor was going to regret asking that question.

“Operation Save Bethany launches at nineteen hundred hours.” Seth replied, licking the remaining Cheeto cheese from his fingers. “Now get me Ben’s cell number.”

“You think calling him is a good idea? You must be kidding.” Taylor looked like she was literally going to disembowel Seth, which would have been kind of awesome if Seth wasn’t one of my best friends.

I immediately inserted myself between them. “No way you’re calling Ben. We already have a plan. We’re going to his house, and I’m going to ring the doorbell with some fake lab work for Chemistry, and then Taylor is going to set off his car alarm while I tear through his room looking for evidence.”

“Wow. Great plan, Kate. Just out of curiosity, what exactly are you planning on doing when he comes back to his room to find you knee-deep in his secret Brotherhood bullshit?” Liam spat his words at me like nails.

“Oh, I’m sorry. Do you have a better idea? Ooh, I know. Maybe you could just call your brother and have him light his garage on fire or something.” I knew as soon as I said the words that I’d taken it a step too far, and the hurt on Liam’s face confirmed it. Arson was kind of a hot-button issue for the Gilmour family.

“Enough fighting, you guys.” It was Seth’s turn to step in and play peacemaker. “I’ve already got a plan and it’s genius. I just need his number and a laptop.”

Seth proceeded to pull up an Internet site guaranteed to deliver completely anonymous text messages. He typed in three lines that pretty much made him a poet, in my mind.

Station 10 at 9. Bring the Bethany file..

We all stood there huddled around Taylor’s laptop until Seth submitted the form that would send the text. The second it sent, he snapped the MacBook shut and stood up. “Now, go grab me some bedsheets and some beef jerky. We’ve got a missing girl to find.”

“Pull your hood tighter. I still see blue.” Taylor yanked the hood of my makeshift black robe closer around my face.

“Last time I checked, the Brotherhood doesn’t have any blue-haired members,” Seth chortled. His hood was hiding his face, but I would have bet my imaginary trust fund that his lips were pursed into his ridiculous I’m-the-red-headed-Jerry-Seinfeld smile.

“Really? Last time I checked they also don’t have any members under 5-foot-1 either.”

“Whoa. Uncalled for, Kate. Totally uncalled for. Not to mention the fact that I was 5-foot-4 at my annual checkup last week.”

Liam inserted himself between Seth and me and grabbed my shoulders. “You—put the hair in a ponytail. Now.” After my earlier comment, I wasn’t exactly in a position to argue with him, and before I had a chance to say something that might make things okay between us, he’d turned to Seth. “And you—there’s no way you’re 5-foot-4. If you’re going to round up, at least go for something realistic, like 5-foot-2.” Seth sagged a little in his robe, and Liam quickly added, “But the robe totally lengthens you, man. You should think about wearing one more often.”

“I hate to break up whatever it is you are doing over there, but I think I heard someone,” Taylor hissed from behind her hood.

Sure enough, Ben was getting out of his BMW and heading toward Farrow’s Arches. Operation Save Bethany was clearly a success. Cheesy code names aside, a couple things seemed clear:

1. The Brotherhood was involved, and

2. Ben was doing their dirty work.

The only thing we couldn’t quite determine was a motive.

And that was exactly what we were going to figure out tonight. Oh, and get the information on Bethany. In my imagination, Ben handed over a detailed map to her whereabouts so we could go about bringing her home. Case closed.

“So, Kate. You know the plan?” Seth began, and I felt Liam stiffen next to me.

“She’s just standing there, Seth. There is no plan,” Liam said.

“We’ve been over this a million times already. It’s going to be fine. I’m just going to be there as backup in case Taylor drops the file…or something.”

Liam grunted, and without seeing his face, it was impossible to tell if it was an I’ve-got-your-back grunt or an I-hate-my-dumb-ass-soon-to-be-ex-girlfriend grunt.

“I am
not
going to drop the file.” I knew from the tone of her voice that Taylor was rolling her eyes. “The Brotherhood always travels in groups. It is more believable if there are four of us there. Liam does all the talking.” She turned to him. “You remember the Latin?”

“Of course.
Vir
prudens
non
contra
ventum
mingit
.” I couldn’t see his face because of the hood, but I could tell by the tone of his voice that he was completely serious. Or at least trying to be. I wrinkled my forehead as I attempted to translate.

“Wait a second,” Seth said, pulling back his hood to demonstrate his utter confusion. “I thought their greeting was
Non
ducor, duco
. ‘I am not led, I lead.’”

Liam’s shoulders began shaking just as I finished my rough translation. “A wise man does not urinate against the wind?” I pulled down my hood and looked at Liam. He winked at me, and it was pretty much the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen in my life. Normally, I’m very anti-wink when it comes to guys, but in this case it was a wink of absolution. It was a wink that meant Liam and I were actually going to be okay.

“You’ve been planning that all night, haven’t you?” I reached over and squeezed his arm. It was the first time I’d touched him in at least twenty-four hours, and his strong forearm felt so good beneath my fingertips. When he grabbed my hand and quickly brought my palm to his lips, I felt all the air leave my body. As much as I hated to admit it, for fear of sounding like a ridiculous, boy-crazy damsel in distress, it felt good to have my boyfriend back.

Taylor whipped back her hood, her blue eyes icy. “I’m glad this is such a joke to you,” she spat, clearly not in the mood for games.

Liam dropped my hand and sat up a little straighter. “Sorry, T., I’ve got it.
Non
ducor, duco
. Don’t worry.”

She replaced her hood, gently tucking back a stray piece of her blond hair, while the rest of us followed suit. I couldn’t resist shooting Liam a smile before I covered my face, though. With the way Taylor had had him practicing the simple Latin for the past two hours, it was pretty funny.

“Liam greets, I get the file, and then we all get out of there,” Taylor finished.

“He’s punching in the code.” Seth’s voice cracked with excitement and we all froze, knowing that if we missed our window into the tunnels, all of our plans would disintegrate.

Ben crouched underneath the arches in some sort of velour sweatsuit, enough product in his hair to style the entire
Jersey
Shore
cast, and flung open the door to the tunnels. He took a quick look around the gardens and stepped into the hole in the ground and finally disappeared, closing the hatch behind him.

Taylor counted underneath her breath. “Five, four, three, two…
now!
”

We all ran for the hatch, but Liam got there first and swung it open just before the lock clicked.

He motioned for all of us to remain completely silent as we filed down the stairs, led by flickering gas lamps affixed to the walls. As usual, the walls seemed to inch together the lower we descended, my lungs constricting right along with them. The only thing worse than being underground was being underground alone, I reminded myself. I had my friends. I had backup. I needed to focus.

Ben stood alone at the bottom of the steps, clutching a thick manila folder to his chest. I lowered my chin, hopeful that the black sheet was effectively concealing my identity.

“
Non
ducor, duco
,” Liam said, the Latin sounding strange on his lips.

Ben just bowed his head and cowered in response.

“Is that the file?” Liam wasn’t wasting any time.

Ben nodded his overly gelled head and held out the folder, his hand shaking. The folder was thick and heavy, and his nerves forced the contents to the edge. Taylor must have noticed, because her hand shot out to grab the folder, but it was too late. Ben dropped the folder, and suddenly hundreds of photographs, folded notes, and even some personal items like lip gloss and pressed flowers littered the damp bricks of the tunnel floor.

I dove to the ground and started grabbing whatever I could get my hands on. I didn’t think about anything except the photographs of Bethany. We finally had all the evidence we needed to find her. I could practically taste it.

I could also feel the frigid air on my bare cheeks. I heard the gust of cool air as Taylor swished past me in her robes. My hand flew to my head a second too late.

I looked up to see Ben staring at me, his normally squinty eyes as big as quarters. “Kate? What the hell are you doing here?”