“I suppose you should hear it from me that I have met your mother.” He smiled a little sadly. “Well…when I say met, I mean one time I tried to kill her.”
There was a charge in the air. Maybe it was the plush carpet beneath our feet, but I could have sworn I felt a spark.
“Do me a favor.” Zach’s voice was low and dark and dangerous. “Next time, don’t just try.”
Townsend smiled, and for a moment the two of them looked like long-lost friends.
“Boys,” Bex said, dropping into the chair at the head of the table.
Abby rolled her eyes. “Exactly.”
“Excuse me, Abigail, but whose shift did she get away during?” Townsend asked with a glare.
“Excuse me, Townsend, but who was supposed to booby-trap the doors?”
“I’m an agent of Her Majesty’s Secret Service,” Townsend said, indignant. “I do not do booby traps.”
“Well, maybe you should start,” Bex warned. “If you haven’t heard, Cammie is pretty good at running away.”
“I didn’t run away,” I snapped. Everyone stared. “I didn’t. This time I sleepwalked away. And I came here.”
“Why?” Abby asked me.
It was an excellent question—and lucky for me, that’s when the one person in the world who might have been able to answer it opened the door at the rear of the room.
“So what brings you back to Rome, Cammie?” Preston said. He closed the door, and the smile slid from his face. “Why are you really here?”
If there was any way to lie, I could have done it. I had the training. The skills. But there comes a time—even for a Gallagher Girl—when the best weapon in your arsenal is the truth.
“Well, it’s about last summer,” I said slowly, and Preston turned to Macey.
“Do you know what this is about?” he asked, and Macey looked at Abby, who nodded Go ahead.
Macey opened her mouth, started to speak, but there’s a feeling that comes when two halves of a girl’s world collide. I could see it happening to Macey. The politician’s son was meant to know her as the senator’s daughter. He was never supposed to meet the Gallagher Girl.
It must have been harder than it sounds for Macey to look at him and say, “You know how I go to that boarding school? Well, it’s—”
“A training academy for spies,” Preston said as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. “I know,” he said. “Cammie told me.”
Then it was my turn to get the crazy glares.
“Indeed,” Townsend said. He sounded like a man who had always suspected we Gallagher Girls must be easy to break.
“I had my reasons,” I said. “I don’t remember my reasons, but I’m sure I must have had them.”
“When?” Abby asked, stepping toward Preston, hand on hip.
“Hey, I know you. You’re the Secret Service agent who—”
“Got shot,” Bex finished for him. “She got shot for Macey. She almost died for Macey. And now she’s willing to die…for her.” Bex pointed at me. “We’re all willing to die for her. So answer the woman’s question!”
“July.” Preston looked afraid again. And he was right to. “She showed up on the Fourth of July. I remember because I’d been wishing there were fireworks.” He looked at me. “Then you came and…well…I guess I got them.”
“She came here—to this embassy—in July?” Abby asked.
“No.” Preston shook his head. “She came to me.”
The room was cold and still. Outside, the sun was beaming. It was going to be a gorgeous fall day, and I tried to imagine Rome in summer.