Only I didn’t want to be associated with him, let alone belong to him. He made me hate myself. He made me feel I needed to somehow prove my love for the only real family member I had—my sister. Keira and I were not “half” anything. We were sisters, the kind who would travel around the world to rescue each other and the kind who would do anything to protect one another. It was our parents who put us in danger. So if the mom and dad who raised us really were alive, I wasn’t sure I ever wanted to see them, because that would mean facing a betrayal so profound it would scrub every happy memory Keira and I had. At least when they were dead, we were comforted with the knowledge that they’d loved us. If they were alive, and willingly abandoned us, it would all be gone. Everything. Who they were, who we were. What kind of people would we be after that?
I choked back a dark wave of emotion as I placed a hand on Marcus’s arm, seeing in his eyes the same betrayal that only comes from being lied to by a parent.
“I’m so sorry,” I said, offering whatever comfort I could but knowing words wouldn’t fix this.
Then Antonio let out a disgustingly wet burp that quickly undercut the severity of the conversation. “It’s not as bad as you think.” He wiped his mouth. “Si, what happened to your sister was horrible. It is why I left. And your parents were bad people, lo siento,” he apologized, though I wasn’t sure for what. “But me, Mom, and Pop, it’s not like that.”
“What’s it like?” Marcus’s head shot up.
“Mom and Pop know about Department D, but they do not work for them. Not really. Their time is spent in the lab, biomedical research. This is true. Their connection is that their contracts, their jobs, are gotten through—how you say?—back channels. Department D does a job for the Prime Minister of France, and in return, France gives Dresden a new biomedical research grant.”
“So they’re not spies?” Marcus straightened his shoulders.
Antonio shook his head, giving him hope, dangling it like a shiny toy. If he ripped it away, if it turned out he was lying (which given his profession was very likely), it would only devastate Marcus more, make him feel stupid, and make him feel more betrayed. I warred with an urge to protect him mixed with a desire to not badmouth his parents and ruin any relationship we might ever have. I wasn’t a girl saying I didn’t like his mother’s pot roast; I was a girl thinking his mother might deserve a life sentence in prison. There were boundaries I wasn’t sure I wanted to cross.
“No, of course they’re not spies.” Antonio smiled like a salesman. “They know about the other side, but they do not touch it.”
Marcus nodded, face lifting, as an eyelash-fluttering waitress brought Antonio a fresh beer. He gave her a dimpled grin, overtly staring at the cleavage in her tight T-shirt. She blushed, practically glowing from the attention. Then he watched her butt as she walked away, gulping half his pint in a single sip.
“I thought you said your parents recruited you?” I carefully picked at his words in a way that wouldn’t make Marcus too defensive.
“Sí, my parents recruited me, but I was no spy,” Antonio explained. “They called me a…a…fixer. With technology, old missions from long ago were coming back. You call them cold cases, verdad?”
Marcus and I nodded.
“I made this new evidence go away. I made the cases cold again.”
“So…in your work…did people ever get…hurt?” I squirmed as I said it, not meeting Marcus’s stare.
Seriously, was there a tactful way to ask someone if he was an assassin? I wasn’t sure, but this would have to do. After everything we’d gone through in Italy, I couldn’t not ask the question. My own parents were dangerous criminals.
“I do not hurt people,” Antonio responded, using my word, but looking like he knew exactly what I was implying. “Burglary, bribery, evidence tampering. I was down here.” He held his palm low to the sticky wooden table. “Randolph Urban, he is up here.” He lifted his hand toward the rustic beams wound with white Christmas lights that lined the Tudor ceiling. “That is where the big stuff happens.”
“And Mom and Pop?” Marcus asked.
Antonio waved his hands around aimlessly. “They are nowhere.” He gestured toward the scattering of crowded high-top tables behind him. “They are back in a hospital. Totally separate.”
Marcus’s whole demeanor changed. His breath evened, his smile returned; it was as if a tidal wave of relief swept in and flushed away his doubts. I could read his mind: This isn’t so bad. My family’s okay. And that made sense, for him. Only I didn’t grow up with a lifetime of trusting Antonio. He didn’t teach me how to ride a motorcycle or pick up girls (it was clear where Marcus learned how to work those dimples). To me, Antonio was a spy who worked for the same company as my parents, the same people who kidnapped my sister.
“What are your plans now?” Marcus clapped his hands once, like it was time to catch up on lost time now that the tough questions were over. “Because you need to call Mom and Pop. They’re worried.”
“I can’t. I do not want to work there anymore, and I know they will not understand.” Antonio emptied his pint glass, then gestured to the waitress for another. Despite the packed house, it seemed the blond barkeep was dancing on her toes, waiting for him to look her way again. People loved this guy. I didn’t need to know him to see that. He was the guy everyone wanted at their party. Only I couldn’t shake the feeling he was too charming, his answers too perfect.
“You said they don’t work with the criminal stuff,” Marcus reiterated, his eyes pleading with his brother to confirm it again. And again. And again.
“But they benefit from it,” Antonio went on before turning to me. “And ever since what happened to your sister started making its way around the organization, people are nervous; loyalties are divided. A lot of staff loved your parents, so if they are alive…”
“How do you know about that?” My eyes narrowed. I’d found out in Venice, from Craig Bernard, somewhere between kicking his jaw and dislocating his knee.
“Everyone knows. Half the company went to your sister’s memorial, to your parents’ memorial. Now Urban is in hiding somewhere, the whole company is in chaos, and our parents are trying to rescue what is left of Dresden Chemical. It is a mess.” The waitress placed another pint in front of him, biting her lip and shifting her chest his way. Antonio licked his lips, openly enjoying the view. Judging by the smirk on Marcus’s face, he’d seen this type of interaction a lot. I had a feeling the Rey brothers might have quite a reputation in Madrid, if not the world, and I wasn’t sure how I felt about that. My brow furrowed. We never really talked about ex-girlfriends, partly because I had no exes to speak of. But Marcus…
“So where are you going now?” Marcus asked, chuckling at the flirtatious scene. “What’s your plan?”
“Yo no se.” Antonio shrugged, eyes still on the waitress. “I don’t make plans.”
“You should come back with us.” Marcus smiled like this was the greatest idea ever.
“What?” I snapped, my tone was so severe the waitress cut me a sidelong look and left the table, like she knew this was about to get ugly. I didn’t mean to insult his family, or at least, I didn’t mean to be so obvious about it. But the last thing our band of misfits needed was a secret agent with an identity crisis. I just got my sister back. For all I knew, Craig Bernard was Antonio’s best friend. Maybe they went to Department D spy school together. Did Marcus really expect me to ignore all of that?
“I know what you’re thinking.” Marcus rested his hand on my forearm. “But por favor, this is different. Trust me.”
It wasn’t Marcus I didn’t trust.
I pulled at the tense muscles on my neck and stared at the wood grain in the table. Of course, I knew Marcus would do this for me. He had done this for me. He’d risked his life for my sister. Was I really going to turn away his brother?
But what if Antonio was lying? What if he still worked for them? What if he was a bad guy? Marcus had to realize that this was a bl
imp-sized fear I couldn’t overlook.
“Marcus.” I wriggled, not wanting to say it, so I let my voice trail off, “What if…”
“What if I’m lying?” Antonio finished my thought. “I’m not, but I guess that’s hard to prove, no? If you don’t want me around, hermano, I can find somewhere else to go. Not sure where, but…”
Seriously? A guilt trip? How was I supposed to compete with that?
Marcus turned to me once more, his chocolate eyes pleading. I had to say yes. If I didn’t, I’d be a complete hypocrite. Besides, Charlotte and Julian were cyber gods, so maybe they could dig up dirt on Antonio. Even if they couldn’t, it wasn’t like we planned to stay in London forever. Keira and I were in some quasi-version of witness protection—we had fake passports issued by the CIA, but we tried to have as little contact with the government as possible so as not to accidentally lead them to our presumed-alive parents. Because even if all this were true, and even with an epic-sized case of resentment for our mom and dad, we still didn’t want to be the ones responsible for sending them to a supermax prison.
My secret plan was to find Marcus’s brother, then go off the grid with my sister. Keira and I would relocate with new identities that we wouldn’t share with anyone—not Randolph Urban, Department D, the CIA, or even our friends. If no one knew where we were, then no one could track us down. We could have normal lives. Keira could get a job at a hospital. I could go to college. We could leave this entire nightmare behind us.
Now I was staring at Antonio, and he was safe. Nothing was keeping me tied to Department D anymore.
Nothing except for Marcus.
I flicked my finger against the full pint glass in front of me. The idea of leaving him was like leaving a vital organ. He not only kept me sane, he kept me alive. With him I got to be a girl with a crush on a boy. I could be myself. How could I ever have that with anyone else? If we ran, I’d be lying about who I was, where I was from, what I was running from, and even my own name. No one Keira and I met from that day forward would ever truly know us. No one would make me feel like he did. No one would look at me the way he looked at me.
“Okay,” I agreed, turning to Antonio. “You’re Marcus’s brother, so of course, you should come back to London with us, until you figure out your own situation. And, obviously, don’t tell anyone where we are. I don’t want Department D showing up at our door.”
Antonio nodded. “Perfecto. Your secret’s safe.” Then his dimpled grin lit up the bar. “Let’s drink! My little brother tried to rescue me today! This calls for shots!” He shouted an order of Irish whiskey to the adoring waitress, then switched to Spanish and began rattling with Marcus about cities seen, girls met, and parties attended. Antonio kept playfully swatting his little bro upside the head as the two of them laughed louder and harder than I’d ever heard Marcus laugh before. Mostly because we didn’t have much cause for giggles; we’d been in survival mode since the day we met. Now, Marcus had his brother back, and it was like I was meeting him for the first time. This was the real him, the one who existed before I sucked him into the land of bloody tubs and deadly threats.
The brothers chugged beers and downed shots with half the pub as the waitress periodically sat on Antonio’s lap, and Marcus routinely nudged my shoulder encouraging me to drink up, join the party.
Only I didn’t. I couldn’t. We were in a bar in Europe, amidst a festival of bonfires honoring an infamous traitor, drinking pints with an admitted former employee of our sworn enemy.
I was the wrong Phoenix sister for this situation. If Keira were here, she would have been dancing on the tables with a torch in her hand, screaming, “Remember, remember the fifth of November!” Instead, I was sulking in a wooden booth that I couldn’t help notice looked like a confessional pew at a church, worrying that my pseudo boyfriend seemed happier with his brother than he ever had with me, while simultaneously realizing I may not have many more days to be happy with him.
Maybe Marcus was right earlier—this was all ending. Between all of us.
And it would start the moment we got back to London.
Chapter Three
London might be famous for its candy apple double-decker buses, but “Minding the Gap” on the Tube was a much faster way to get around. The next day, I found myself zipping underground beside Marcus and Antonio as they rattled in Spanish, and I tried not to eavesdrop on every word. I knew what it felt like to want a private reunion with a sibling. That train ride out of Venice with my sister would go down as one of the greatest experiences of my life—Keira was alive, seated next to me, holding my hand, and I could finally tell her everything I’d wanted to tell her since the day she disappeared. I could tell her I was sorry for being such a brat after our parents' funeral. I could tell her how much I respected her for what she’d sacrificed, both professionally and personally, to make sure I didn’t end up in foster care. I could tell her I loved her, something I not only didn’t tell our parents before they left, but something I never said before, ever.
So I tried to drown out Marcus and Antonio by singing a Coldplay song in my head and alternating my gaze between ads for male pattern baldness and retro patterns on the subway’s cushioned seats that looked a lot like dad sweaters from the 1980s. I rested my head against the rumbling window behind me, a travel bag tucked between my legs and a cobalt blue pole.
We were headed to Julian’s flat. With Antonio. A guy who worked for Department D and was recruited by his parents, Marcus’s parents. And I had to pretend I was okay with that, because any word otherwise would make me a complete hypocrite. My biological father was currently in hiding from the U.S. government because he created Department D and kidnapped my sister; his philanthropic entrepreneur cover was officially blown. And the parents who raised me helped him start the criminal espionage organization, and they might still be alive. Really, did I have any right to judge someone else’s family?
All I could do now was try to protect the people I cared about, and I could only think of one way to do that.
Keira and I had to stop looking for our parents.
They were the prize everyone wanted—the CIA, Randolph Urban, maybe even Antonio. We were pawns meant to lead them to the hidden palace of the king and queen. But if we stopped moving in their direction, if we stopped looking for them, then no one could use us, follow us, trick us, or trap us. Maybe if we went back to being boring citizens, under assumed names, with no one knowing our location, acting utterly oblivious to criminal underbellies, then we would simply be normal again. We’d all get what we wanted. Keira and I would get to have lives free from crimes that were thrust upon us. Our parents would get to stay gone, without us being responsible for their cells on death row or their tombstones in the ground. And maybe we wouldn’t even have to face them. Maybe that was the kindest thing for everyone. Because if I were being really honest with my darkest thoughts, I wasn’t sure my sister and I could look them in the eyes and walk away. They were our parents. Back from the dead. If they were alive, betrayal or not, there would always be a part of us hoping for the golden retriever and the picket fence. We’d be hoping for that right up until it got us killed.
I bit my lip as I watched the happily reunited brothers. Antonio was twisting his muscular forearm, displaying a new tattoo near his elbow. Marcus was examining it, dimples flaring. He loved his brother, and I loved that about him; it was how I felt about Keira. (Most days. Some days I still wanted to attack her for using all the hot water.) I wasn’t sure I could cut ties with him, if it were even possible. Even if we moved, even if I put an ocean between us, my heart would still be with him. Could I live a life like that?
I pressed at my temples, pulling the skin around my eyes. There was no easy answer. Our parents took away our choices; now they were taking away our friends—Marcus, Charlotte, Julian, Tyson, Regina, and all of Keira’s friends back in Boston. We’d lose everyone if we went into hiding.
I stared at the reflections of the passengers in the subway glass a
cross from me, all reading, sleeping, chatting. Mindless. Then my eyes caught on a woman. She was staring at Antonio. When she noticed my gaze, she glanced away, snapping her focus to a book in her lap. Her long blond bangs fell to her high Slovak cheeks, though I could tell she wasn’t reading; she kept peering at me from of the corners of her eyes. Then she looked back at Antonio. Given his instant connection with the waitress at the pub, it could have been flirtatious, but something felt off. There was no seduction in her movements—no licking of lips or batting of lashes. Not even a hair flip. Instead, she looked like she knew him, like she was trying to get his attention, only her blue eyes were cold.
I’m reading too much into this. I’ve been running and chasing and fighting so long, the paranoia has set in. I think every flirty blonde on a train is a secret agent…
I kept staring, glaring at the distinct strawberry birthmark near her forehead, right at the part in her hairline. Despite my gawking, she refused to glance my way. It took effort to ignore someone this much, but she did it. And so did Antonio. He didn’t acknowledge our interaction at all, even though my gaze flicked between the two of them. This from a guy who had the waitress showing her cleavage before he even got his second drink last night. He knew exactly how to tell if a woman was flirting, and he reveled in it, but right now, he was focused on Marcus, completely oblivious.
At least, he pretended to be.
…
Julian’s flat looked exactly how one might imagine a billionaire’s bachelor pad in London to look: shiny, glass, and modern with décor that would impress the Beckhams. It was located in the South Bank, near the Tate Modern, and its design of crisscrossed red beams up the gleaming exterior intentionally contrasted with the Zen garden in the courtyard in a way that fit the modern-art theme of its neighbors. An added bonus was that many of its residents were foreign, which made the presence of Marcus, Charlotte, and I barely noticeable, except to the doorman. He smiled at me when I returned like there was no one else in the world he’d rather see. (I often bought him Starbucks. Even in England, people enjoy a nice caramel macchiato.)
Lies That Bind Page 3
