Jude glanced this way and that, then up to the corners of the room, and finally to his computer, which he frowned at. Magnum could definitely be listening in through his computer.
Jude cleared his throat loudly before announcing, “I’m going to draw blood next, and after that we’ll see how those bullet wounds are healing. Oh wait. I forgot to check your ears first.”
He grabbed an otoscope and flicked on its light, then rolled his stool as far away from the computer as he could get while still being at his workstation. As he pretended to study the inner workings of my ear, he mumbled so faintly I felt myself straining to pick up what he was saying.
“When I take your blood”—he tilted his head this way and that, but it was all for show—“I’m going to roll up your sleeves”—my shirt’s sleeves reached to just below my elbows—“and leave them up.”
Next, apparently for our hidden audience, he said, “Looking good, Joss. Now turn the other way.”
Obediently, I did.
He went on, “I’ll tuck a note in the rolled-up sleeve. Wait till you’re somewhere outside and in private to read it. Where there’ll be no surveillance. That’s really important, okay?”
He rolled his stool back to the counter of his workstation, ejected the scope’s speculum into the trash can beneath the desk, and began gathering an alcohol swab, a tourniquet, a syringe, and vials.
Even as the needle drove into my vein, all I could think about was the note’s content, and whether it would actually offer us any useful information.
Halfway through our collective poking and prodding, Fanny arrived, looking calm, collected, and together. No sign that she’d been in the middle of a takedown of one of their latest kidnap victims. Seeing we were where we were supposed to be, she took off to meet with Magnum, grumbling about how she was going to be so late.
I didn’t dare make eye contact with any of my friends. It seemed we’d finally gotten away with something, after Magnum had continually had the upper hand. Though it wasn’t much, we had one new piece of information no one knew we had. We knew about the earth shaker.
It wasn’t much. It most certainly wasn’t enough.
But it was something. A start.
By the time my crew, Bobo, and I finally walked out of the lab, on our way to the training center, the note my dad—Jude—had tucked into my sleeve was practically all I could think about.
There wouldn’t be any privacy for us for a while still. Not so long as we were in the heart of campus, and certainly not later at the mansion. And Fanny had made it abundantly clear we didn’t want to make our new instructors wait at the training center.
But I just had to tell my friends. I needed to share the secret that seemed to have its own pulse as it beat against my arm.
As soon as we were outside, the sun shining brightly above the hills that surrounded us, I told them, “I know we’re in a hurry, but let’s give Bobo a quick walk. Just back there around those trees for a few. Then we can head to training.”
Without protest, they all followed, and the very moment we were hopefully out of earshot—assuming no one had succeeded in chipping our actual persons as Hunt believed was possible—I whispered, just in case, “Jude said he wants to help and he hid a note on me. I can’t read it till it’s safe.”
As I met the eyes of each of my friends, I found them wide and surprised.
“Shit,” Layla said. “Me too.”
The guys nodded with silentus toos.
Brady whistled. “Damn. Maybe we’ve got a better shot than we thought.”
Yeah, maybe.
Just fucking maybe.
17
Don’t Walk, Run
We entered the training center at 10:10 a.m., our footfalls sounding uncommonly loud in the mostly empty, cavernous building. The very instant we spotted our instructors on the opposite side of the center, Brady mumbled, “Oh fuck,” under his breath, and as one we picked up the pace.
Even with the entire length of the twenty-five-yard pool separating us, I already knew it’d be the last time we’d ever be casual about being late to meet any of them. Even the measly ten minutes was too long when their stares alone seemed capable of committing murder. How, I had no idea. But I still wouldn’t put it past them. A tangible sense of danger wafted off them like heatwaves.
The unease that I’d been carrying only expanded, stretching at the boundaries of my skin, causing it to feel irritatingly taut.
The two men and one woman stood in a line, their legs shoulder-width apart, their arms loose at their sides. Their poses were deceptively relaxed. I could practically feel their muscles coiled and ready to pounce.
