“She either didn’t do it—”
“Or she did it so well it didn’t send up any flares?” Bex guessed.
Abby nodded. “Exactly.” She turned to me. “So I don’t think you did it.”
“Maybe she did,” Macey said, leaping to protect my honor. “Cammie could rob a bank.”
“Yes, she could,” Abby agreed.
I just sat there, craving gelato.
“But not that bank,” Townsend said, stepping closer to my aunt and giving her a knowing nod.
The building across the way looked like a church or a beautiful old mansion. I’d been staring at it long enough to know it also looked like a fortress.
Preston inched forward, as if part of him knew that he’d stumbled (or been dragged) into a conversation that was about ten times beyond the clearance level of an ambassador’s son.
“Like I told you yesterday and”—he looked at the group and then at me—“you last summer, my dad banks there. That bank is popular with a lot of diplomats. Foreign dignitaries…”
“Spies,” Aunt Abby finished for him.
“Your mom? Does your mom bank there?” I asked Zach, crossing the distance between us in three short strides. “Does she?”
He turned and stared into the distance. “I don’t know. It seems like her sort of place.” Then he turned back to me in a flash. “Which is why it’s time to let the CIA take over.” He cut his eyes at Townsend. “And MI6 if they want in.”
“Oh,” Townsend said slowly, “MI6 does.”
“But—” I started, and Zach cut me off.
“But now we get you out of here.” He reached for me.
“No,” I said, jerking away.
I looked to my best friends for backup, but Bex just shook her head. “I agree with Zach.”
“Big surprise,” I huffed.
“You don’t know what you’re walking into, Cam,” she told me. “You don’t know why or how or even if you’ve walked in there before.”
“I have to go,” I told them all.
“No,” Zach yelled. “You don’t!”
“He’s right, Ms. Morgan,” Townsend said. “We’ve come this far. There are channels, operations—”
“The same channels that told the Circle they should send an assassin to stake out Joe Solomon’s cabin?” I asked, but Townsend seemed indifferent to the point. “The last time we went through channels, I killed a man.”
“The Circle could be here.” Macey was beside me, pleading. “Did it ever occur to you that they have this place under surveillance just like the cabin was?”
“We’ve been staring down at that building for hours, Macey. Of course it occurred to me.”
“But did you think about why there’s no record of your having been there?” Bex said. “Did you think about—”
“What if it’s still there?” I shouted. “I came to Rome for that—” I pointed to the bank. “I came looking for whatever is in there.…And what if it’s still in there?”
“Ms. Morgan.” Townsend sounded like the cold, calculating operative he was.
“Would you die to stop them, Agent Townsend?”