I laugh. “Maybe after you get better you can, but right now, I’m pretty sure you couldn’t even beat me in a fight.”
“Maybe you’re right,” he says.
A few minutes later, when everybody else arrives at the airport, I’m relieved that everybody was able to get packed in enough time. But then again, these guys are probably used to leaving really fast.
“How did you convince your dad to let us come on vacation with you guys?” Sander asks, then smiles. “It doesn’t matter. Just know that you are awesome.”
“Um, thanks,” I say. “So, do you have any idea where we’re going?”
“Nope,” he answers.
We all stand on the runway at the small airport. Well, Gage is in a wheelchair. He’s not going to be up for a little while—doctor’s orders. I hope that he gets better soon. I hate seeing him like this.
Dad looks at his watch and I can tell he’s really impatient. The pilot must be a minute late or something. But right about that time, I see an airplane rolling towards where we are standing. It stops right in front of us.
I still find the whole thing very strange. I mean, who decides, on a whim, to go on vacation at three o’clock in the morning? My dad, apparently.
We all board the plane. I take a window seat and my dad sits beside me. The plane is small, but bigger than the plane Sebastian and I took when we flew to America a few days ago. Apparently, when you run Spy School, you have access to all the private planes you want. I know that Spy School is a huge thing, but I’m still trying to wrap my head around it all. My dad basically runs the whole world and it’s a little scary.
“You should get some sleep. We have a long flight,” Dad says.
“Where are we going?” I ask.
“You’ll see when we get there,” he says.
That is so frustrating.
One thing that has driven me crazy since I met the guys is the number of secrets that are kept from me. I think I should know what’s going on.
“I promise I will give you some answers once we’re there,” Dad says. “Just be patient with me a little while longer.”
And I know he will. I don’t know my father very well, but I do know that if he says he will do something, he will.
“Okay,” I say. Because I can be patient with him. For now. Plus, I am exhausted. I’ve spend the last four days either in a car, or on a plane. And there is the fact that I’m still recovering from my concussion, so I’m exhausted. I close my eyes and drift right off to sleep.
Tuesday, August 29
Not cut out for spy school.
It’s Tuesday when we land.
The flight was nearly a twenty four hour flight. But we also lost a whole day, because we’re literally on the other side of the world—New Zealand. And it’s winter here, which I find very strange. I’m not used to it being cold in August. Not that it’s that cold, about fifty degrees Fahrenheit, but definitely cooler than what I’m used to in Florida.
When we arrive, there is a car waiting for us. I regret not wearing a jacket when we step off the plane, but we get right into the car, which has a heater going.
Everybody is really quiet in the car. I’m not sure if everybody is tired from the plane ride or if they’re all just scared of my dad—maybe a little of both. I’m actually pretty well rested. I slept for most of the flight. I must have been exhausted, to sleep for nearly twenty four hours.
“I have to tell you something,” Dad says to me, after about an hour of complete silence in the car. “I didn’t just bring you to New Zealand because I wanted to take a vacation. There is a lot more to this.”
“Okay,” I say, wanting to hear what this is about.
I still haven’t learned what Protocol Lex Luthor is or what it means. I think I deserve to know.
“I need a safe place to train you,” he says.
“Really?” I ask, my heart accelerating. I mean, I’ve been wanting to train. The guys are awesome at everything. And I am tired of sitting back watching them get to do everything. I want in on it. If I happen to see Nolan again, I want to be able to save myself.
“Don’t be excited,” Dad says. “Training isn’t as glamorous as it seems. I wanted to train you at the school—like I was. Like your mother was.”
His face falls as he says the last part, and I know he still misses her. I wish I had known her better; being at the school made me feel close to her. But we can’t be there right now.
“I get it,” I say. “I’m gonna have to work hard. And I promise I will.”
“You are,” he says. “There are going to be a lot of early mornings and late nights. The training is rigorous. I don’t even want you to train. You’re... I mean... you’re very small.”
“Underweight,” I say. “I know.”
“I... and I guess they,” he says, motioning towards the other guys in the vehicle. “Are going to be training you.”
Hunter, me, Dad, Jaxon, and Brett are all in this car. Behind us in a different car are Bass, Sander, and Gage. It’s probably best that the three with the biggest mouths aren’t in the car for this particular conversation. Maybe Bass would somehow talk my dad out of training me. It seems like something he’d do. And Sander would most likely be saying a ton of sarcastic comments.
“What exactly does the training entail?” I ask.
“Well, building up your strength, for one. You need to gain some weight. Not just weight, but muscle. You’ve got to learn how to fight,” Dad says. “You’ve got to learn how to shoot a gun.”
I cringe at that.
I don’t particularly like shooting guns.
“Don’t be scared of guns,” Dad says. “I’ll teach you properly and you won’t have a reason to fear.”
I nod, but I’m still scared.
“I would like for you to try and learn a second language. If you really insistent on being on the team with the guys, you’ve got to learn Swiss German. The guys primarily stay in Switzerland, which is the only reason I’m even considering letting you join their team. There is no way I’m going to let you go off somewhere else without me.”
I smile, because that is progress. Huge progress.
“There is also accent training, dance...”
“Dance?” I ask, cutting him off.
“We like to train our students in everything. You never know what situation may arise and it’s better to always be prepared,” Dad says.
“And dancing is going to help me—how?” I ask.
“Once, a couple of years ago, we had a two girls undercover in Russia. Their cover was ballet dancers. I mean, who would suspect them, right? But from that, they were able to take down one of the largest sex trafficking rings in the world,” Dad says. “So, dance can be important.”
His words kind of blow my mind.
I knew that Spy School did a lot of good things, but I guess I didn’t realize how good. Maybe I just imagined everybody being these crazy awesome assassins, working to take down evil villains. But it’s more than that. So much more.
“I want to learn everything that I can,” I say. “I promise to work hard.”
Dad smiles. “I know you will. You’re my daughter, after all.”
I only wish I had gotten to know him sooner.
“There is one other thing,” he says, no longer smiling.
“What?”
“How scared are you of heights?”
I look at him, trying to think.
“I don’t know,” I answer. “I mean, I don’t think I’ve ever been scared of heights before. But I’m not sure a situation has come up when I’ve had a reason to be scared.”
“Good. Because you’re going to have to jump out of an airplane.”
My heart stops. “An airplane?”
“It’s part of training. Facing your fears, plus, you never know when you might need to jump out of a plane,” he says. “We make all of our students do it and I can’t bend the rules for you.”
“Right,” I say, wondering just how many
scenarios could make me need to jump out of a plane.
While I don’t think I’m scared of heights, the thought of jumping out of an airplane does frighten me. To be honest, I don’t want to do it, but I can’t tell my dad that. I want him to believe that I can do anything—and I’m certainly going to try.
“Are you guys jumping with me?” I ask, turning around to Jax, Hunter, and Brett.
Brett’s face turns a very pale shade of green.
“You okay, Brett?”
He nods. “I... um... I’ll skydive with you. If you want me to.”
Jax laughs. “Brett is very scared of heights, despite the fact that he’s literally jumped out of a plane fifty times.”
“It’s a Spy School record,” Dad says. “Nobody has ever still been so scared after jumping that many times. We usually would’ve kept going with the training until he wasn’t scared, but he did the jumps. Under pressure, Brett is awesome.”
“Which is why we are on a team together,” Hunter says.
“Our whole team is good under pressure,” Jaxon says.
I wonder what I’m good at. I don’t feel like I’m good at anything. Under pressure, it’s usually somebody else calling the shots. So far, I freak out, and am just dragged along.
It will take a lot of training for me to be more than just an anchor dragging them down. Right now, I’m a liability. And I don’t think I could live with myself if something bad happened to them because of me.
Living.
“Hold on,” I say, taking a seat in the grass.
I’m breathing so hard that it’s actually embarrassing. My heart is racing and I kind of feel like I’m about to pass out.
“How can you not even run half a mile without getting out of breath?” Sebastian asks, obviously annoyed. He looks like he could go on for another few hours. Actually, he looks like he wants to. I hate that I’m holding him back.
“Go without me,” I say, between breaths.
Which makes him roll his eyes.
Dad and the rest of the guys are out doing something. What? I am not sure. But here I am, with Bass, and I’m pretty certain any progress we made while in America was for nothing. He loathes me.
But I don’t focus on that. Instead, I focus on trying to get my heart rate down and my breathing to be steady.
“We have a lot of work to do,” Sebastian says. “You’re going to have to push yourself past your limits if you really want to do this.”
“Do I have a choice?” I ask.
“No, not really,” Bass says, shrugging his shoulders. “Your dad runs Spy School, which makes you a huge target for everybody who hates our organization. You have to learn how to protect yourself. Whether you want to or not, you have to be the best.”
“Or what?”
“You get kidnapped. Or die,” he says, not softening it for me at all.
That’s the thing about Sebastian—he’s always blunt. He tells the truth without holding back. And he follows orders. That is probably why my dad trusts him so much.
“I thought you wanted to learn all this,” Bass says. “You seemed pretty excited about it up until today.”
“I did—do—want to learn,” I say.
“What’s wrong?”
“I just... what if everybody is wrong about me? What if I can’t learn how to do all this? What if I really am just a weak, little girl?” I ask. “Maybe they found the wrong girl. What if I’m not even Serenity Sinclair?”
“Trust me, you are Serenity Sinclair,” Sebastian says. “And you’re not weak. You’re actually the strongest person I know. Everything you went through and endured before coming to Spy School proves that. Just because you’re not strong physically right now doesn’t mean anything.”
His words almost make me smile.
Almost.
“If you really want this, then you’ve got to believe in yourself,” he says.
Believe in myself?
How do I even do that?
“Come on,” Bass says, motioning me to get up. “We’re going back to the house. We can walk. And I’m going to make you a smoothie.”
“A smoothie?” I ask, not getting up yet. I just need a couple of more seconds. My legs feel like noodles.
“You’ve been eating a lot of junk food. Which I get. You've been starved your whole life and everybody wants you to try everything,” Bass says. “But you need healthy food if you’re going to get in shape.”
“Don’t smoothies have, like, ice cream in them?”
“Not the ones I make.”
“It’s Sander’s fault that I eat so unhealthy,” I say.
Bass holds out a hand to help me stand up.
“That’s because my cousin is determined to make you eat every food you’ve never tried,” Sebastian says. “He’s always been impulsive and you are his new project.”
“Project? I was thinking more like... best friend?”
He laughs. “You have a lot of new best friends.”
“My dad hates the fact that they’re all guys,” I say, rolling my eyes.
“But you’re interested in one of them, right? It must be why your dad doesn’t like them so much,” Bass says.
“You mean interested like I want one of them to be my boyfriend?”
He nods.
“No,” I say.
“Really?”
“Really.”
“Huh,” Bass says. “I thought for sure...”
Sebastian doesn't finish his thought, though.
“I've never had a boyfriend,” I said. “Or even a friend. I guess my mom... or my not-mom, was afraid people would figure out that I was kidnapped or something. So, this is all new to me.”
Bass stays quiet for a moment longer, which I’m used to. He’s like Sander in a lot of ways, but he actually thinks before speaking instead of blurting out the first thing that comes to mind. Not that I don’t like that about Sander, I do. But because of that Sebastian seems older. Wiser. Even though, technically, Sander is older than Sebastian.
“Most people, in your situation, wouldn’t be as well adapted to society as you are,” Bass says. “After going through what you did. I mean, I wouldn’t.”
“I guess I’ve just been waiting so long for... this,” I say, pointing between us, “that now that my time has come, I want to enjoy every second of it.”
“What do you mean?” he asks.
“Friends. Family. Life. I’m really living for the first time in seventeen years,” I say. “And it is amazing.”
“Have you ever told your dad that?” Bass asks.
I shake my head.
“You should.”
“It’s just weird,” I say. “If you didn’t notice, my dad is kind of scary. Just because we share DNA doesn’t make him any less scary.”
“Oh, I’ve noticed,” he says.
“Also, I just don’t want to hurt his feelings. He knows some of what happened to me. I mean, it was pretty obvious by how skinny I was that I wasn’t getting food like I should have,” I say. “But he doesn’t know the rest.”
“What rest?” Bass asks.
“There’s a lot,” I say. “Stuff that even the other guys don’t know, and I don’t really want to tell them. Or anybody. I don’t want people to feel sorry for me or look at me like I’m broken. I’m not broken. Just... a little damaged.”
“You should tell somebody everything,” he says.
“Maybe I will, but not now,” I say. “I’m just so happy right now that I don’t want to think about sad things.”
“I’m glad you’re happy,” Bass says. “You look a lot healthier too.”
“I’ve gained five pounds.”
Of which I am super proud.
“The bruise on your head is looking better too,” he says.
It’s now a light yellow color. I’m ready for it to fade completely so I won’t be reminded of what... he... did.
I’m so weak I can’t even think his name. Which is stupid. I guess I just feel so stupid for tr
usting him.
“Do you think I’ll ever see him again?” I ask Bass.
“Who?” he asks.
“You know...” I point at my head.
“Nolan,” he says. “I don’t know. I mean, I kind of thought Nolan liked you. He never really liked many people...”
“Kind of like you,” I say.
“I don’t like people,” Sebastian says. “You should know it’s never good to trust people at Spy School. We’ve been taught to manipulate people and situations. It’s part of training.”
“I trust you.”
“Maybe I should tell you that you shouldn’t trust me, but I can’t. I want you to trust me. Not just want, I need you to,” he says.
“You’re trustworthy,” I say.
“I don’t really feel trustworthy,” he says. “In case you haven’t noticed, I’m not a very likable guy.”
“I like you.”
“You like everybody.”
Which makes me laugh. “Well, kind of, yeah. But you might be my favorite person.”
“More than Sander and Gage?”
“Yes, but if you tell them, I will deny it,” I say.
Bass is quiet for a while. So long that I think he’s not going to respond. But then he does.
“Why do you like me so much? I’ve been really mean to you,” he says.
I stop walking and turn to him. We’re close to the house and I’m not quite ready to be back there yet. “I just... I think you were only mean to me because you didn’t want me to like you. And it works with most people. Maybe it would’ve worked with me, too, but that first day that I met you, in the gym, you looked at my bruises and I don’t think I’ve ever seen somebody so angry in my life. You were ready to kill somebody for me. And I knew that you weren’t really a bad person. Not really. You just pretend to be because you want to push people away.”
“You’re very good at reading people,” Bass says.
“I’ve spent my entire life watching people. What else can you do when you’re not allowed to talk to them?”
“I wanted to not like you,” he says. “I wanted to hate you. And part of me still wants that, because hating people is easier than liking them. I mean, if it wasn’t for you, I’d be back at Spy School right now. That’s comfortable. Easy. And you are anything but easy. I swear I have never met anybody more complicated, in my life.”
Keeping Me (Spy Chronicles Book 2) Page 7
