“Do you speak different languages?”
“Four. Wait…” He looks up like he’s counting in his head. “Five.”
My mouth drops. “You speak five different languages?” I whistle and sit up a little more, not even trying to hide how impressed I am. “Have you ever escaped from a foreign prison or some kind of captivity?”
“Twice.”
“Twice? Sheesh! Have you ever been shot?”
“Three times.”
“Seriously?” I scan my eyes over his body as if I can magically tell where the bullets hit him.
He just shrugs like the things he’s done in his life are so mundane. And I’m quickly learning that I’ve underestimated Park. It sounds like he’s more than capable of getting us out of this mess.
“Have you ever worn a mask of someone else’s face that looks super real and then snuck into a party and secretly killed the bad guy just before he’s about to strike a deal with another bad guy and then taken the mask off and surprised everyone?”
“Lacee, are you just naming everything you’ve seen inMission: Impossiblemovies?”
“No!” I puff out a laugh.
Okay, maybe I am.
“But you’ve…” I don’t know why it’s so hard for me to spit it out. “You know…killeda bunch of people before?” He looks at me, and I know. IknowI’ve asked a dumb question. There were dead guys at the bar just yesterday. “Right. I guess that comes with the job.” I tap my fingers on the side of the door, trying not to ask my next question, but I can’t help myself. I have to ask it. Don’t I? “How many people have you killed? Like, what’s your number?”
“Nope.” He shakes his head. “That’s like a man telling his girlfriend how many women he’s kissed. It’s never a good idea.”
“Oh, come on!” I complain. “You can tell me. Is it more than twenty?”
He shakes his head again, showing me he’s a locked vault.
“Fifty? It’s fifty, isn’t it?”
More head shaking with sealed lips.
“One hundred!” My eyes go wide. “I can’t believe you’ve killed one hundred people!”
He frowns. “I never said I killed one hundred people.”
“But you didn’t say you didn’t.”
Park rolls his eyes as if that’s an answer I’d be satisfied with.
I cross my legs under me. “Who is thisagencyyou keep talking about? The CIA?”
“Kind of.” He bobs his head back and forth. “Basically a branch of the CIA. I can’t really talk about it.”
“How does a person get involved in such a secret government agency?”
He glances at me as if he’s thinking about whether or not he wants to tell me. His eyes shift back to the road, and he sighs with resignation. “I was recruited by the government when I was a teenager. They were looking for someone who didn’t have a family. They found me in the foster care system when I was fifteen.”
“And you just agreed to go with them?”
“I didn’t have anything better to do. Besides, they promised I’d get to see the world, and to a boy who hadn’t been anywhere or seen anything, that sounded pretty good. Plus, I had all the skills they were looking for. I was athletic, a quick learner, daring, and smart. They loved me.” He shrugs. “I’d never been loved by anyone or anything before.”
“So Mary Bradshaw is not really your mom?”
“No.” He shakes his head. “That was an unexpected coincidence.”
