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I pressed my lips together. I reached over to him and then whispered near his ear. “I’ve got a lot to tell you about. I wasn’t sure the others should hear.”
He lifted his head, checked the others out and then nodded. “Do you want to leave early?” he asked.
“Leave school early?” I asked.
“You’ve got biology next, don’t you?” he asked. “And then Dr. Green and gym?”
I nodded.
“Do you have a test in biology? Do you have to be there?”
I bit my lip. “She likes to give a quiz on Mondays.”
“Then go to biology, and I’ll meet you outside of class after. Unless it can’t wait.”
It could, I just didn’t want it to. The knot in my chest was tight. We were supposed to be inconspicuous and blend in, and Mr. Hendricks always knew when I was skipping classes. “I guess so.”
“Then we can take off before school ends. That’ll be better anyway. McCoy will be waiting for you to leave after school. If we leave early, it’ll be easier to lose him. ... Maybe we can go check out that car Gabriel likes.”
I still didn’t know what it was. I lifted my phone and then thought of Luke with Gabriel right now. “Luke could find out for us?”
He nodded. “Try.”
Would Gabriel even talk about it? “Could I borrow your cell phone? I don’t want Gabriel to get his phone back and find out too soon.”
North nodded and passed his cell phone over to me, lit up to a message ready to send to Luke. Looked like he sent texts to Luke a lot, usually asking where he was.
I used his phone to text Luke.
North: Hey, this is Sang. Find out from Gabriel, subtly, what car he was looking to buy? I heard he wanted a specific one.
Luke: Why?
North : We might buy it for him until he can actually afford it. So it doesn’t get bought before he gets his hands on it.
North: I was going to try to get North to buy it for his birthday, but he might not want us to buy it for him.
Luke: You should get him an art kit.
North: We’ll get him one of those, too. I don’t want his car to be sold before he gets to it. He seems to have one specific in mind. Please?
Luke took a while to respond. I’d finished my food and shared a bottle of water with Silas before he responded.
Luke: He wants some old car. Someone’s selling it in Hannahan.
He gave us a street name. That was all he could get from him without Gabriel confronting him.
Gabriel wasn’t mad enough at Luke to not talk to him. My heart iced along the edges. So was he only mad at me?
I thanked him and showed North the messages.
North sighed. “That kid. I’m telling you. It’s some clunker of a car.”
“It’s what he wants,” I said.
“You're right, though. We should buy it before anyone else does. Maybe we can talk to the owner and get him to keep it so Gabriel can feel like he bought it on his own later.”
That solved one problem. “So then we get him an art kit for his birthday, and later he’ll be able to buy his car.”
“Maybe I’ll get him seatbelts for his new clunker.”
I smiled. “But how do we find it?”
“We’ll go to that street,” he said. “More than likely, it’s sitting on a lawn somewhere with a for sale sign on it.”
That sounded like a plan. It was also a random place to go after school, so we’d fulfill two jobs at once.
“Then tonight we’ll go to a hotel?” I asked. “Can Gabriel go?”
“I don’t know what will happen,” North said. “If McCoy follows Gabriel with the phone, then we know it’s your phone he’s following. I bet it is.”
I didn’t like that thought, that he could follow my phone signal. I knew it was possible, but if Victor put in a preventative somehow to bounce the signals, then how was he able to bypass it?
“I might have to go without a cell phone,” I said.
“It might be the solution for all of us,” he said. “At least while we’re still working this case. All this tech is our weakness. Too vulnerable.”
The bell rang. Silas picked up my book bag. I stood to follow him.
North tugged at my elbow before I could continue. “Hey,” he said. “Really. If you need to leave now to talk to me, we can do that.”
I thought about it and shook my head. “I can sit through one more class. There’s just a lot going on.” It was enough to know that soon I could talk to him. One more class wouldn’t hurt.
He nodded. “I’ll clear it with Dr. Green about missing his class. For gym, Nathan can take an excuse in for you and say you’re sick. We’ll sort it out.”
I was glad for that. I would be skipping school. I still wasn’t used to it, even when Mr. Blackbourne or Dr. Green gave me permission to do so. Maybe because they weren’t real teachers and we were all breaking the rules.
WHAT THE TEAM WANTS
Silas sat behind me when we got to class. My eyes stayed glued to the clock from the moment we settled in. Class was going to take forever.
Silas nudged me. “I get to hang out in the hotel room tonight with you, right?” he asked.
I smiled. “I guess,” I said. If I got a chance to talk with North prior to us going, I didn’t see it being a problem. I hoped a few of them might join us. It’d be safer if it were more than just two of us. I glanced around though, worried someone else would overhear hotel room and make assumptions. “Let’s not talk about it here.”
He beamed. “You’re my girlfriend. I’m allowed.” But he winked at me and then whispered. “Sorry.”
I smiled and then winked back. Girlfriend. I glanced at the other students, as if they could hear what I was thinking. I’d kissed Gabriel yesterday. And Victor. And this morning with Dr. Green…Sean…
I turned my head to hide my anguish. I let things happen with them because I’d been told to just let it happen. Mr. Blackbourne had encouraged it. In some way, I assumed they all knew this and that they all knew what they wanted.
I’d been so naïve. Maybe he already knew the path we were going on and was quietly urging me to just let it happen.
Should that change now? Should I tell Silas?
Joining their team depended on what Silas and the others wanted. I couldn’t control feelings, but I could get to know them more. Relationships started with becoming familiar with what people liked and disliked. You do nice things for the other person. If Mr. Blackbourne wanted me to work on my relationships with the boys, I’d have to be nice. To learn what they wanted. I’d have to become very aware of these things.
Kind of like discovering what kind of car Gabriel liked. If Mr. Blackbourne had a job in the Academy, and Kota was in charge of the team, maybe I could make myself in charge
of figuring out what the team wanted, whether it was about me joining the Academy, or just in general.
When the bell rang and class started, ideas flowed. Could this be my job for the team? It was like Gabriel’s car. He wanted it, even if there was a chance he couldn’t get it in a normal situation. If I stepped in, I’d work with North to make arrangements to make sure Gabriel would get it and in the way he wanted.
I’d also make sure to know what they wanted from me, where they wanted me to be.
It excited me to think of it this way. I might have a purpose among them after all. It seemed the right thing to do. Mr. Blackbourne and the others thought about what they needed. They all had a job of some sort, didn’t they?
As I tried to work out the details, again I found it hard to concentrate on the quiz we were given and then the following lecture. This time for different reasons. I kept glancing at the clock. I wanted to get to North, to talk to Gabriel. Maybe Gabriel would cheer up after a good birthday. Maybe he’d get his car, we’d buy him an art set, and he’d be back to his regular self again.
If it worked out, I could move on to the others. If I discovered what they wanted, they’d be on my side.
I’d even ask Silas what he wanted. It seemed like a good place to test out what I was thinking.
Luckily, the teacher had everyone partnering up for answering questions out of the textbook. The classroom became loud as people found partners and then moved chairs around to begin.
I turned in my seat, sitting on my knees in the chair to face Silas.
He had his book open and flipped it around to me. “Read them to me,” he said.
I read the first question quickly. He wrote it down and then followed up with an answer. He didn’t need to look it up. He simply answered it. I watched him for two questions and read him a third before I started. “How come I’m the one reading them and you always write them?”
“It’s just faster,” he said. “I can read fine, but not as fast in English. And I know the material. It’s better if you read, and I write it out. Might not be the best penmanship, but it’ll get done sooner.”
