UnBound - Neal Shusterman Page 0,86

for a building holding so many hidden kids, it’s unnaturally quiet.

She’s ready to ask her question, the one she asks all the AWOLs she finds, but Bryce pushes the hood off his head and leans closer to her.

“You trust these people?” he asks.

“Of course I do!”

“Even the guy with the beard?”

Miracolina looks at Bryce closely. “Why?”

Bryce shrugs. “Just asking.” Then he holds up his bowl, which is empty again. “Could you get me some more?”

Miracolina goes over to the stove and fills his bowl again. “You should pace yourself,” she says. “Eat too much, too fast and—”

But she never finishes the thought. Because when she turns back, Bryce is gone.

6 • Bryce

It might be nothing. It might be just the paranoia that infiltrates every AWOL’s thoughts. But it’s a protective paranoia—it’s there for a reason—and more often than not, when Bryce has had a bad feeling about something, caution has saved his life.

The guy with the beard might not be the same guy.

And even if it is the same guy, it might not be what Bryce thinks. What he saw in the alley last week might have nothing to do with AWOLs. For all Bryce knows, the guy is a tobacco dealer, selling cigs on the side to earn some spare cash. Who knows, maybe the money the guy makes dealing goes right into their AWOL-saving operation.

Or maybe not.

Bryce has a pretty sweet setup. There’s an alley a few blocks from the “exterminators” behind a row of bars and pawnshops. There are three Dumpsters back there. Two are still in use, but the third one is in such bad shape, the lid has rusted shut—but there’s a huge hole in the back, large enough for a person to climb through. He’s filled it with pillows and sofa cushions and even has a sleeping bag he scarfed from a donation bin. So far no one’s found his personal safe house.

He squeezes behind the Dumpster and climbs inside, belly bursting from all he’s eaten, and peers out through one of many bullet holes in the old trash bin. No activity in the alley this early at night. Later there’ll be things going on, though. It can be a regular entertainment zone out there. Mostly Bryce ignores it. The scum of the world doesn’t bother him in his private domain, and he has no interest in bothering them. But once in a while he does see things. Like the time he was turning into the alley, and he passed two men in some sort of clandestine deal.

A lot of guys look like that, he tells himself. It wasn’t him. And if it was, why should I care? It’s not my problem.

But it becomes his problem again ten seconds later when someone climbs through the hole in the trash bin, invading his personal domain.

7 • Miracolina

“Don’t be so surprised,” says Miracolina, shining her phone light in his face. “You’re not exactly a stealthy AWOL.”

“Be quiet!” Bryce snaps. “No one knows about this spot—and if someone out there hears you . . .”

She lowers her voice to a whisper. “Why did you run?”

“I have my reasons.”

“Something scared you, didn’t it?”

“Will you lower your voice?”

Miracolina takes a deep breath, returns her voice to the faintest of whispers, and lowers her phone so it’s not in his face anymore. “I need to know what spooked you.”

Bryce doesn’t say anything for a moment. Then he finally tells her “I saw someone who looked like Griffin taking money in this alley last week.”

“Money for what?”

“I don’t know.”

Miracolina leans back against the rough trash bin wall. Could Griffin be selling them out to parts pirates? It seems unthinkable, and yet they know there is a leak. It has to be someone on the inside. Miracolina knows what she has to do.

“They’re transporting all the kids in a few hours. So if he’s making deals in this alley, then he’ll be back tonight.” She thinks about it and nods. “I’ll wait here with you.” She already called her parents, telling them she’s staying overnight at the church to help in the shelter. They trust the nuns to take care of her. Tonight she’s just compounding lie upon lie.

In the oblique light of her sideways phone she catches Bryce giving her a faint grin. “You don’t mind being in a Dumpster with an AWOL?”

Miracolina thinks back to the time she was trapped in the tiny luggage compartment of a bus traveling cross-country with Lev. They barely had room to breathe, and Lev