Now You See Them, Now You Don't

by Gordon Korman

  Please, God, don’t let it be a trap! Meg thought.

  It seemed legit enough. The posters were in quite a few other places — bus shelters, store windows, telephone poles.

  That makes sense, right? If the rehab center wants to identify him, they’d splash his picture all over town.

  Her brother sat beside her, the city map spread out on his lap. The bus routes were superimposed, color coded, on top of the street grid. The whole thing looked like a circuit diagram of a nuclear trigger. Einstein himself would probably go cross-eyed trying to figure it out.

  Meg curled her lip. That meant Aiden was going to love it. He could build a working toaster from scrap for a science fair project, but he couldn’t brown a slice of bread without setting off the smoke alarm.

  He finished plotting their course, then folded up the map. Perfectly. He was the only person Meg knew who could do that, too.

  “Okay,” he told her. “We take this bus to Washington Avenue, get on the V-14 eastbound, and transfer to the C-3 into Culver City.”

  “If you say so.” She yawned. Another thing about the bus — it was so boring! It was like watching grass grow — or like watching Aiden make up his mind about something — whichever was slower.

  You look at the passengers; nothing to see. You look out the window; nothing to —

  With a gasp, she hit the floor, pulling Aiden down with her. Two rows behind them, a middle-aged woman clucked disapprovingly.

  “Meg — what the — ”

  His sister led him to the seat across the aisle and peered over the top of it through the smeared glass. “Look!” she squeaked. “But don’t let him see you!”

  The bus was waiting at a stoplight. There on a busy corner stood Zapp, deep in conversation with another teenager.

  “Big deal,” said Aiden. “He wants us to stay away from the spot where he does business, but that can’t mean we’re banned from the whole city of LA.”

  “Look who he’s with!” she insisted.

  Aiden wouldn’t have recognized him at all had it not been for the Dodgers jersey. The Falconers stared at him, taking in the two black eyes, bandaged nose, neck brace, and the cast on his left arm.

  This was the boy who had tried to stab Bo on Venice Beach. He was still alive, but Bo’s “statement” was very much in evidence.

  “What’s Zapp doing with that guy?”

  Aiden and Meg watched stealthily as the IC member and the battered Fury exchanged an elaborate handshake followed by a backslapping hug.

  The bus pulled away, leaving the siblings open-mouthed.

  Aiden reseated himself, holding his head. “I don’t think I can take any more surprises today.”

  “Bad enough he’s a criminal,” Meg seethed. “Now he’s a traitor, too! When that Furies kid tried to stab Bo — it was a setup! And Zapp was behind it!”

  Aiden nodded gravely. “Remember what he said in the car yesterday? ‘Bo won’t be running things forever.’ I guess he meant it.”

  “He wants to get rid of Bo so he can turn the IC into counterfeiters,” Meg said bitterly. “Well, he won’t get away with it. Wait till we tell Bo!”

  Aiden was alarmed. “Hold on, Meg. This is none of our business.”

  She stared at him. “Are you crazy? This isn’t some schoolyard argument! These people play for keeps! If we let this go, Bo could wind up dead!”

  Aiden sighed wearily. “You saw that guy — Bo plays for keeps, too. Yes, he’s been good to us. But this is the life he chose. He knows things like this happen sometimes.”

  She was distraught. “Listen to yourself, Aiden! You’re talking about people getting murdered.”

  “I’m glad you appreciate how serious it is,” he said sternly. “You and I are babies in diapers compared to these LA gangs. In a million years we couldn’t hope to understand how things work with them. If we do nothing, Bo might get hurt. But if we warn him, did you ever think about what that means for Zapp? We could turn an argument into an all-out war between the Furies and the IC! What’s the body count then?”

  Meg was almost in tears. “So we do nothing.” Her tone was hollow.

  “Wrong. We do something. We find Frank Lindenauer. We might have found him already.”

  He was right, as usual. Justice for their parents could be less than twenty-four hours away, in a rehab center in West Hollywood. Starting trouble with the IC could only put their goal at risk.

  Eyes on the prize, Meg, she reminded herself. Nothing’s more important than helping Mom and Dad.

  But it hurt a lot to stand idle while fate crept up on a friend.

  The International Crew sat in the small living room, their eyes focused on the TV they’d inherited with the house. The cable had been off for months, and the screen showed nothing but static.

  Aiden stood over the set, a picture of concentration, wrapping aluminum foil around a makeshift antenna of interlocking coat hangers.

  “This isn’t going to work,” announced Viv. “How could it work?”

  All at once, the snowy image resolved itself into the wilderness and the tents of Survivor.

  The applause was deafening.

  “Where’d you learn that trick?” rumbled Zapp.

  Aiden shrugged. The fact was, he had learned it in juvenile prison at Sunnydale Farm. There had been only one ancient TV for eighteen boys, and getting reception in rural Nebraska had been raised to the level of fine art.

  Bo favored him with a goatee-framed grin. “That’s the second time you’ve saved my life, Gary.”

  The compliment stung. Saving Bo’s life again, really, was within Aiden’s grasp.

  And I can’t do it.

  One look at Meg’s long face told him she was feeling it, too.

  “This show rocks,” enthused Teebs. “You form alliances, act like everything’s cool, and then you stab the other guy in the back!”

  Meg stood up and headed for the stairs, her face averted.

  “Are you okay?” called Viv.

  Aiden could see Bo’s eyebrows rising as Meg left the room. “I think she’s just tired,” he said, making a lame excuse for his sister. “I’ll talk to her.” He followed her up.

  In their room, Aiden faced her seriously. “Come on, don’t blow it. Everything you feel is written on your face.”

  “It’s just hard, that’s all,” his sister murmured, “to sit there smiling when people’s lives are on the line.”

  “Meg, we’ve been through this.” He fell silent. Someone was climbing the stairs.

  Anxiously, she whispered the name that was on both their minds. “Zapp?” If he had somehow spotted them on the bus earlier, they would be in grave danger.

  But when the door swung wide, it was Bo who stood there. He stepped inside.

  “I know what’s eating you.”

  Aiden took a step back. “You do?” Could the gang leader already know about Zapp’s plan? Was he about to accuse them of selling him out by their silence?

  From his pocket, Bo produced a folded newspaper clipping and spread it in front of them.

  Aiden saw the pictures first, their now-famous mug shots from Sunnydale. The headline read:

  TRAITORS’ KIDS IN LA, SAY FEDS

  “That’s you, right? Aiden and Margaret?”

  She hung her head. “Meg.”

  Bo whistled through his teeth. “See, I always knew there was something up with you two. But this — man, the Falconers! The whole world heard about your folks.”

  Meg was belligerent. “Well, this is something you didn’t hear: They’re innocent. And we’re going to prove it.”

  “You’ve got a lot of cops after you,” Bo observed. “Feds. Juvie. LAPD says you escaped from a full airport lockdown. You must be tougher than you look.”

  “What we are is desperate,” Aiden admitted. “If we can’t stay free, we can’t clear our parents.”

  “It’s going to get harder,” Bo informed them solemnly. “The feds put a twenty-five-thousand-dollar bounty on your head
s.” He pointed to the third paragraph. “ ‘For any information leading to the apprehension of Aiden and/or Margaret Falconer,’ yada, yada, yada. Standard cop lingo.”

  Aiden and Meg exchanged an agonized glance. By offering a twenty-five-thousand-dollar reward, Agent Harris had just made the entire population of Los Angeles his deputies. Now they weren’t safe with anybody, anywhere.

  For all we know, we’re not even safe with Bo, Aiden thought.

  The gang leader read his mind. “No, man, you don’t have to worry about me. I meant what I said about you saving my life. I’ve got your back.”

  “Thanks, Bo.” Aiden could feel his sister’s eyes on him. Tell him, they pleaded. Warn him about Zapp. He turned away, unable to face her.

  “Don’t let anybody know who you really are,” Bo went on. “You hear me? Not even the crew. Not even Viv. They like you, but twenty-five K is a lot of cash. You’re lucky — you’ve got a place to lie low for a couple of weeks.”

  “We can’t!” blurted Meg. “We have to be somewhere tomorrow!”

  “There’s too much heat,” Bo insisted. “This article is from today’s paper. Give waste management a chance to get your picture off people’s coffee tables.”

  Aiden struggled to explain. “There’s a guy we have to see. He might be able to help our parents. But he’s in — a place. We have to go to him. He can’t come to us.”

  Bo looked suspicious. “Are you sure this isn’t some kind of cop trick? It doesn’t sound kosher to me.”

  Aiden smiled weakly. “We’re not sure of anything except this: We have to go.”

  * * *

  Directly below the open bedroom window, Zapp leaned against the stucco wall, smoking a cigarette.

  He was smiling a twenty-five-thousand-dollar smile.

  * * *

  It was after three a.m. when Agent Emmanuel Harris entered the police station.

  “This better not be a false alarm,” he growled.

  “Sorry to get you out of bed,” the night lieutenant apologized as he escorted the FBI agent to the interrogation room, “but I think this guy’s for real. He knew that your kids are going by the name Graham. That wasn’t in the papers.”

  Harris increased his pace, and the lieutenant had to scramble to keep up. “What did he say about them? Are they okay?”

  “Just that he knows where they are, not another word. He’s a real piece of work, this one. Even for around here.”

  “Criminal record?”

  “Not yet. But it’s in the mail, that’s for sure.” He opened the door to reveal a slight, greasy-haired youth in the logo-clad gold chain uniform of a West Coast gang member. “Meet Maurice Zapp, one of Pocatello, Idaho’s, most prominent citizens.”

  Harris thought he saw recognition in Zapp’s cold eyes. Did that mean that this lowlife — and possibly the Falconers — had been close by and watching him?

  Zapp got right to the point. “When do I see the cash?”

  Harris had been alive for more than forty years, and never had he taken the kind of instant dislike to anyone that he had to this scruffy teen. “When I see Aiden and Margaret Falconer,” he said with distaste. “Where are they?”

  “Relax, jumbo,” Zapp advised. “They’re in a safe place. Give me your cell number. I’ll call to tell you when and where to grab them up.”

  Harris leaned over menacingly. “That’s not acceptable. I don’t have to let you walk out of here, you know. Wasting a peace officer’s time is public mischief.”

  Zapp was not intimidated. He smiled sweetly up at the hulking FBI agent. “You want those kids or what?”

  Meg peered out the grimy window as the bus lumbered east through Beverly Hills en route to West Hollywood.

  Wilshire Boulevard … Rodeo Drive …

  These were famous streets. Tourists came here from all over the world. The Falconers had planned a family vacation in California. Dad had even bought airline tickets.

  And then an FBI battering ram had come smashing through the front door.

  Plans, she thought bitterly. Other families got to make plans. They tooled through these neighborhoods in rented convertibles, following maps of movie stars’ homes, oohing and aahing over dreamland mansions.

  While we pass by it all on a smelly bus, scared out of our wits, not knowing if today’s the day we save our parents or the day we get caught.

  She took in the sights through the scratchy lenses of her cheap sunglasses. That was the disguise of the day — sunglasses and Lakers caps, farewell gifts from Bo. The crew leader had been up with the sun to present them. “It’s not the time to be waving your faces all over town,” he had told them.

  The poor guy doesn’t even know he’s in as much danger as we are.

  Aiden’s attention was riveted to the oncoming street signs, his face carved from granite beneath his shades. His cautious nature usually got on Meg’s nerves. But right now she was comforted to note that her brother was taking this with dead seriousness. It was their first shot at Frank Lindenauer. Possibly the only one they’d ever get.

  Aiden pressed the tape, signaling their stop. “This is us.”

  The bus lurched to a halt. Aiden and Meg stepped into the California sun in a daze. It wasn’t the uncertainty or even the danger that shook them. It was the sheer importance of this trip.

  “Playing for all the marbles” was one of their father’s favorite expressions.

  Well, Dad, we’re shooting for the marble mother lode today.

  They headed south on foot until they spied a redbrick building that stood out among the pastel colors of its neighbors. It reminded Meg of a smaller version of her elementary school — low and rectangular, practical but boring. A sign declared it to be the West Hollywood Rehabilitation Center.

  Could the answer to their prayers be waiting for them inside those dreary walls?

  * * *

  Bo paced a groove in the already worn carpet of the living room. This was stupid. Why was he stressing out on behalf of two kids he didn’t really know and who had refused his advice? It wasn’t as if he didn’t have anything else to occupy his mind. This dispute with the Furies — he had almost gotten knifed over it. And it wasn’t going to get any better until both sides started talking.

  And yet his mind kept slipping back to the Falconers. Poor kids. Bo had always known they were runaways. But their true identity, what had happened to their family —

  There were a lot of hard-luck stories on the streets of LA, but theirs was in a league of its own. It didn’t make any difference whether the parents really were innocent. Who wouldn’t root for Aiden and Meg, knowing what they were up against and how far they’d come? Busting out of Juvie, outsmarting airport security, making the feds look like monkeys …

  It was the stuff of street legend. There was only one problem: The street was no place for a couple of clean-cut kids.

  His eyes fell on the elaborate contraption Aiden had rigged as a TV antenna so they could watch the evening news tonight. Bo wished he wasn’t so sure Aiden and Meg were going to be on it, captured or worse.

  I should have gone with them, he thought.

  They probably would have said no. They wouldn’t even tell him where they were going or who they were meeting there.

  Viv came down the stairs, unfolding a large piece of paper. “What do you make of this? Gary and Erica must have left it.”

  The two spread the poster on the coffee table in front of them. It was a close-up photograph of a bearded red-haired adult, captioned do you know this man? He vaguely remembered seeing these around town, although he had paid them little attention. He didn’t recognize the guy.

  Was this the person the Falconers had gone to meet?

  Frowning, Bo flipped open his cell phone and dialed the number. A male voice answered almost immediately. “West Hollywood Rehab Center.”

  “I’m calling about your poster,” said Bo. “I think I might know the dude.”

  There was a pause. Then, “Thank you very muc
h. The man’s family has already been located.” Click.

  It was a brush-off, no question about it. He dialed information. “West Hollywood Rehab Center, please.” Bo listened to the number. It did not match the one on the poster.

  Aiden and Meg were walking into a trap.

  “Get your shoes on,” he told Viv. “The kids need our help.”

  “What’s wrong?”

  “That’s what we have to find out.” He marched into the kitchen where Teebs and Zapp were scraping smoldering lumps of blackened Bisquick batter from the frying pan.

  “We never should have let the squirt leave,” Teebs was complaining. “She’s the only one who can get it right.”

  “Where’s West Hollywood Rehab?” Bo cut in.

  “Isn’t that on Cascadden, just off Wilshire?” asked Teebs.

  “We’ve got to get over there,” the leader ordered. “Now.”

  Zapp regarded him questioningly. “Gary and Erica?”

  “They’re jammed up,” said Bo. “And I owe them.”

  Teebs and Zapp abandoned the ruined pan. “I’ll take my own car,” Zapp tossed over his shoulder. “Meet you there.”

  As he stepped through the front door, he was already dialing his cell phone.

  The West Hollywood Rehabilitation Center wasn’t crawling with cops, and there were no police cruisers parked outside or circling the block. Taking a page from Zapp’s book, Aiden even checked for full-size domestic sedans. Nothing. The coast was clear.

  Still, he was nervous. The problem with traps is that you don’t know they’re traps until it’s too late.

  There was a reception desk. No security guard. It was a busy place, like a miniature hospital. Doctors, nurses, staffers, patients, and visitors bustled in all directions.

  “Okay,” Aiden told Meg, “just walk right in like you know where you’re going.”

  “Shouldn’t we just ask to see the guy on the posters?” asked Meg.

  “Then they’ll know it’s us,” Aiden told her. “If it’s a trap, that’s as good as knocking on Agent Harris’s office door. The place isn’t huge — how many rooms can it have? Maybe we can catch a glimpse of the guy.”