over at the curb, confused. I know the feeling. And that’s when I remember the black cat.
Oh no!
I race across the street, holding up my hand to stop another approaching car, and crunch over broken glass, peering into the boatyard offices. I can’t see! There are too many ambient streetlights making too many shadows. My heart’s in my stomach, thinking about the poor animal. Lucky will be devastated if anything bad has happened to it.
One of the shadows shifts—above. On a tall filing cabinet.
Thank God.
I reach through the broken window and coax it into my open arms, snatching the warm body as it tries to lurch past me in a panic. Claws dig into my shoulders, but I don’t care. “I’ve got you,” I tell it, quickly moving to the side alley where it’s less chaotic. “You’re okay. Let’s call your big brother.”
I’m shaking as I pull out my phone and scroll to Lucky. He answers on the first ring, and I bluntly say, “Come back. Adrian broke the front boatyard window and drove away. Call your parents. I’ll call the police. I’ve got your cat.”
I don’t even have to, though, as I already hear the wail of a siren competing with the shrill boatyard security alarm. I stand numbly in the dark alley, petting the twitchy black cat as scattered people begin jogging toward the dark, gaping hole in the building. And then it’s:
Evie, racing down from the apartment.
Police lights.
Lucky’s Superhawk.
His parents.
My mom.
An ambulance, which isn’t needed, but sticks around—just in case.
A city clean-up crew.
And crowds of gawking people, well past midnight.
Mom opens up the bookstore and makes coffee for the Karrases and the police. Kat is furious. The black cat is relieved to be allowed to retreat into one of the boat-repair bays, away from all the chaos. And for the first time, I learn that it has a name. Saint Boo. Boo for short. The cat with seven lives at this point.
“I was twelve,” Lucky explains when I question his name choice, the only chance I get to talk to him alone amongst the chaos for a few minutes. “And I swear to God, if Boo had been hurt by a flying piece of glass or ran out into traffic, I would’ve killed someone.”
I believe him, and we both know who that someone is.
But now that the shock of it all is fading away, there’s another emotion that’s settling in, especially for Lucky’s father: worry.
“Is it the money?” I ask. “To repair all this?”
He shakes his head. “I think it’s more about being in a fight with Levi Summers. It’s just a window, but a war with him could ruin our business.”
My stomach twists.
It should have been our window.
It should have been our war.
I don’t know what to do, but I’m a little scared, and I think maybe it’s time to reevaluate my part in all this. No way can I let my original mistake cause an entire war that ruins a family business. Everything was so easy when we stepped into town. I had the three-step Los Angeles plan. Graduate from high school before my grandmother comes back from Nepal. Save up money. Prove to my father that I’m worthy of being his apprentice.…
Now I’ve already dipped into my savings to start helping Lucky pay for the window. And I can’t even get up the nerve to email the stupid magazine about the internship because I’m a secret vandal and the nude photo of my mom, and, and—
Tick, tick, tick.
Breathe.
I’m going to figure this out. I will find a way to fix things somehow. But I know one thing. Whatever happens, I will not allow the Karrases to lose their business.
Los Angeles or not …
Mom doesn’t know that I was coming back from Lucky’s house when the boatyard window was broken. But she knows that I was outside the bookshop when Adrian drove up and demanded to talk to Evie. And Mom is pissed. And a little scared.
“If that really was Adrian who did it … ,” she says a day later, when we watch four people installing a new window across the street.
“Of course it was him! Who else would it be?” Who else would hurl a crowbar at a window after drunkenly threatening people with that eye-for-an-eye speech? I don’t understand how the police can’t get fingerprints off it, but apparently they can’t. He must have wiped it before he threw it.
Or someone in the police department is covering for him.…