Knowing what we knew about the Circle’s network of moles within the world’s intelligence community, I started to agree. Maybe it would work. Maybe we wouldn’t have to be alone in the search anymore. But Macey just crossed her arms and huffed.
“You mean the Inner Circle and their families?” she asked.
“Preston needed to be questioned, ladies,” Agent Townsend said as if he expected that to be the end of it.
“But…” Liz spoke then. Her voice cracked. “He’s just a kid.”
“You don’t get it, do you?” Abby leaned forward, staring at the four of us as if she were about to give us the most important lesson of our covert lives. “You should stop and listen to yourselves sometime. ‘We’re practically adults, let us run wild.’ ‘We’re only kids, leave us alone.’” I watched my aunt lean closer, emphasize every word. “You can’t have it both ways.”
“When is Preston’s birthday, Macey?” Townsend asked.
“December fifth,” Macey said.
“Then he just turned eighteen, did he not?”
“So what?”
“So he’s an adult now, by our standards. And the Circle’s.” Townsend looked at us all as if part of him truly hated what he had to say. “So no matter what we know about his father’s dealings, at this moment, there is a good possibility that Preston knows more.”
Macey was shaking her head. “No. No. He didn’t know a thing.”
“Didn’t he?” Townsend asked. “Abby is right. You want to be treated like grown-ups? Well, that includes both the good and the bad. And the possibility exists, ladies, that Preston Winters might be very bad indeed.”
My roommates and I fell into silence. I didn’t say a thing because, like it or not, the adults in my life were right far more often than they were wrong.
The Circle had always been a step or two ahead—and right then, I didn’t like where those steps were going.
Chapter Eleven
It was dark when the jet finally landed. I’m sure I must have slept on the long ride over the Atlantic, but I didn’t really remember. I just remember staring out the window: watching, thinking, waiting for something, but what, I didn’t know.
On the Tarmac, Agent Townsend whispered something to Abby, then squeezed her hand and kissed her softly when he didn’t think we were watching. But we’re Gallagher Girls. To tell you the truth, we are always watching.
Abby let him go, her eyes a little misty. And I couldn’t help myself—I thought about Zach. He was out in the world somewhere. And a part of me worried that I might never see him again.
“Go to bed, girls,” Abby told us when we walked through the doors. The lights were out. Our school was sleeping, and in the stillness I could feel how far we’d gone, and how far we still had to go.
“But—”
“I’m not going to tell you again,” Abby snapped, and started down the hall that led to the stairs to the teachers’ quarters. “Now go to bed.”
And maybe we would have done exactly that, except when we reached the top of the Grand Stairs, I saw the light seeping from underneath my mother’s office door, and that was all the invitation I needed. I raced down the Hall of History and never looked back.
“Mom!” I yelled. “Mom, I’m—” I said, bursting through the door; but then I stopped cold because Joe Solomon was lying on the leather couch in my mother’s office. And, oh yeah, his shirt was totally off.
“Uh…” I said. I might have physically stumbled. But what else was I supposed to do at the sight of my teacher—and my mom’s new sort-of boyfriend—with his shirt off?
It was epic. It was awkward. It was epically awkward.
And judging from the traffic jam of girls who were plowing into me from behind, I totally wasn’t the only one who thought so.
“Uh…” Liz echoed me but couldn’t find the words to finish, either.
“I’m fine,” Mr. Solomon said, and then he tried to sit upright. I could see the bruises that covered his chest, spreading across his ribs. When he shifted on the sofa, I saw the massive gash in his side, and I felt the cold feeling of dread that maybe he wasn’t the only one who’d gotten hurt.
“Where’s Zach?” I blurted.
“He’s fine,” Mr. Solomon said, even though, technically, he hadn’t answered my question.