So Many Boys (8 page)

“Sorry, Joel,” I said. “It’s a secret.”

He smiled deviously, and his offset tooth looked extra-adorable under his curved lip. “Secret, huh?” he whispered, leaning closer to me. “You know that only makes me want to know more, right?”

Hm. He had a good point. “It’s not important,” I said, in an attempt to dismiss it. But when he rubbed his palms together excitedly, I knew I’d said too much.

“Okay.” I took his arm to pull him closer. “But you can’t say anything. Not a word.”

“Um…” He looked around the hallway, swinging his head back and forth dramatically. “Cross my heart and hope to die, stick a needle in my eye.” He paused, crinkling his nose. “Not really. Not the needle thing—it sounds much too painful.”

I stared at him for a second, then laughed. Even though Joel and I hadn’t known each other that long, I liked him. He seemed completely trustworthy. And right now, I couldn’t say that about a lot of people.

“So Principal Pelli called me into his office,” I whispered.

“Troublemaker,” Joel teased.

I gave him a mock glare before continuing. “He…” I swallowed hard. “He wants me to take back the captainship of the Smitten Kittens.”

Joel straightened up and ran his hand through his brown hair. “Whoa. That’s bad.”

“I know. Kira would die. I have no idea how to tell—”

“Hey!” Kira called, jogging down the hall, her cheer skirt flopping up as she came to stand next to Joel. She hooked her arm in his. “I’ve been looking everywhere for you,” she said to him, smiling.

“Right. Sorry.” Joel stared at the ground, looking worried. I regretted telling him anything, because it would surely put him in an awkward position. He looked at me. “I was…helping Tessa with something.”

Kira glanced between me and Joel. She furrowed her brow. “With what?”

“K, I need to talk to you,” I said firmly. I didn’t want Joel to be the one to tell her first. Once Kira heard that the principal and coach didn’t believe in her cheerleading ability, her self-esteem would be blown. But I had to say something. Right? I mean, how else would it look if I started coming to all the practices and telling her what to do?

Joel cleared his throat and shook his head slightly. “I have to go,” he said loudly. “But Tessa, I’ll get in touch with you later about that
physics
assignment.”

“Ugh,” Kira said. “I hate fortune-tellers.”

Both Joel and I turned to her and then back to each other. He smiled. “Don’t start on it without me, okay?” he asked.

Obviously he didn’t want me to tell Kira about the squad stuff, and maybe he was right. I was ready to take any excuse to get out of what would be an uncomfortable conversation with Kira. And besides, I had bigger pom-poms to shake.

“Okay,” I agreed.

Joel mimed wiping sweat from his forehead and then leaned down to give Kira a quick kiss on the nose. “I’ll catch up with you after school,” he said, untangling his arm from hers.

“But I thought…” Kira looked confused, a pout pulling at her well-glossed lips. “Never mind. I’ll see you then.”

Joel gave her hand a quick squeeze before walking away and down the hall. When I looked back at Kira, she was crying.

I widened my eyes and reached out to touch her arm. “Weeping willow, K! What’s wrong?”

“I think he’s breaking up with me,” she sobbed. “You know what I realized, Tess? He said space, as in
needing
space! He doesn’t like me anymore.”

“My word, no!” I immediately wrapped my arm around her in a hug, her blonde curls tickling my face. I couldn’t believe she was thinking so negatively. “Hey,” I said, pressing my lips into a smile as I pulled back to look her in the eyes. “He’s totally smitten with you, K. He practically told me so earlier.”

“Earlier?” she squeaked, blinking quickly. She dabbed at her black mascara, which had begun to pool under her eyes. “What did he say?”

I rotated my torso a few times as I spoke, stretching out my back. “I saw him in the hall after the meeting and mentioned the space thing. Sorry, K. It just slipped out. Anyway, he said that he thought maybe you wanted a break, but I assured him that you didn’t. And he was completely relieved.” I smiled, but Kira didn’t look happy.

“You guys were talking about our relationship?”

“Not really, we just…” I exhaled. I’d really thought it would cheer her up, knowing that he still adored her. But now she was getting upset instead. “Look, he loves you, K. That was all he said.”

Her jaw clenched just a little before she finally smiled. Kira had been stressed lately, and I didn’t need to make it worse by bringing up her boyfriend or mentioning cheerleading. No, I would have to go about this differently. Carefully.

Just as I was about to apologize again, Leona came running down the hall with Izzie in tow. “Bathroom,” she called. “Now!”

My stomach twisted at the urgency in her voice. Kira and I darted ahead of them into the girls’ room, exchanging a nervous glance.

Then the bathroom door swung open, banging against the wall with a loud clang. Leona was standing there with her cell phone in hand, her brown hair wild around her face.

“Holy crap, where have you two been?” she demanded, letting go of Izzie’s sleeve.

“I was looking for Joel,” Kira said, splashing cold water on her face. “And Tessa…was talking to him. To Joel, I mean.” She paused, water dripping down her cheeks before she reached over to crank out a paper towel.

“Look,” I said toward the girls, making my tone very serious. “Before you say anything, I need to tell you . . . I heard something awful in the hallway.”

Leona narrowed her eyes and looked me over. “What kind of awful? Spill.”

I took a deep breath. “I overheard Robert Bullard talking about SOS. He knew the name.” My heart was pounding in my chest, but Leona didn’t look nearly as stunned as I’d thought she should. “Did you hear me?” I asked.

“Tell her,” Izzie said, nudging Leona with her elbow. My breath caught in my chest. The floral smell in the bathroom mixed with my newly perspiring underarms was making me nauseous.

“Don’t get your bloomers in a bunch,” Leona warned. “But you have to look at this.” She held out her cell, and I leaned over its tiny display. I squinted. It showed a new message from the SOS e-mail account.

“They have a blog?” Well, it wasn’t a website, but close enough. And just as bad.

Kira pushed in next to me. “Really? That’s awesome. Why didn’t we think of that?”

“Because we were top secret, stupid,” Leona snapped.

“Or maybe you didn’t know how to set up a blog,” Kira shot back.

Leona scoffed, brushing her bangs away from her face. “Please, blogs are so easy to set up, even you could do it. And we both know how hopeless you are with technology. Hello, Facebook disaster of sophomore year.”

“I’ve been working on it!” Kira shouted back.

My brain was going fuzzy with tension overload when the bathroom door swung open, nailing Leona on the shoulder.

“What the hell?” she screamed. The culprit behind the swinging door was Chloe Ferril.

Chloe’s red mouth spread into a sarcastic grin as she looked from face to face. “Did they relocate cheer practice to the bathroom now?” She laughed to herself and waltzed in, her boots echoing through the tiled room. “Probably a good idea, since your routines are shit.”

Kira growled under her breath as Chloe elbowed past us into the handicapped stall and closed the door. Leona came to stand next to me, rubbing her shoulder. “Are you setting up the surveillance?” she whispered in my ear, nodding toward the closed metal door. “I just know it’s her. Bitch hit me with a door.”

“And my routines rock,” Kira hissed quietly, biting at her nail and sidling up next to me. “We just need more practice. God, I hate her. You should totally fight her again, Tess. Only this time, kick
her
ass.”

I darted a glance at her. I felt a hand on my shoulder as Izzie joined us. “I can’t believe she’s using the handicap stall,” she whispered. “That’s so tacky. She’s not even disabled.”

The toilet flushed with a loud
whoosh
, and we scattered to our respective sinks, as though we hadn’t been loitering.

“Ready for homecoming?” Chloe asked, stepping up behind Kira and me to run her hands under the water.

“I’m not a cheerleader, remember?” I answered, holding her stare.

She turned off the faucet before shaking out her hands into the sink. “That’s right.” She winked. “Forgot.”

She moved back, studying her reflection as she brushed her hands through her long blonde hair—the only evidence of the old Chloe, the schemer who’d tried to steal Aiden. She sighed. “Well, good luck with that,” she said, shooting a glance at Kira.

“Thanks, wench,” Kira returned, turning away from her.

I half expected Leona to trip Chloe as she walked out, but instead she held open the door for her. Once Chloe was gone, Leona pushed the door closed and turned back to us, her mouth hanging open.

“Did you see that?” she asked.

“Yeah,” Kira said, bending toward the mirror to reapply her lip gloss. “Black is so not her color.”

“Not that,” Leona said. “She didn’t even use soap to wash her hands! That’s completely unsanitary.”

“And totally nasty,” Izzie echoed.

Although I fully agreed that hygiene was important, we needed to focus. I’d been hoping that Robert had been mistaken about SOS breaking into someone’s house to wipe their computer files. I mean, SOS had hacked plenty of computers, but to clear the hard drive? That was harsh. Still it was obvious after the latest message—and now the news of the blog—that this faux Kitten meant business.

I rested my shaking hands on the cold porcelain of the sink. I’d never thought the copy-Kitten’s ruse would get this far.
Saying
you’re the Society of Smitten Kittens was one thing, but actually
performing missions
? That was appalling!

“I meant to tell you,” Izzie said, looking at me wide-eyed. “While Sam and I were arguing last night, my grandpa clicked in to tell me that someone had broken into his garage. He didn’t think anything was stolen, but my bet is that some of our equipment is gone.”

“Figured that,” Leona said. “I don’t blame them. I had an impressive spy gear collection.” She looked at Izzie. “And sorry about the arguing with Sam.”

Izzie waved it off with her hand. “It was nothing. No bigs.”

I wanted to crawl into a pint of Ben and Jerry’s ice cream. This copy-Kitten had rep-assassinated us
and
stolen our goods. Would the horror never end?

I let the voices of the squad fade to background noise for a minute as I concentrated hard. I rubbed my eyes and, when I finally opened them, I stared at my reflection. Blotchy. Scared.

“I have to go,” I said suddenly, spinning to face them. I had an assignment to complete.

“Now?” Leona asked. “You look like you’re going to puke, Tess. Maybe you should sit down.”

“Ew, on the toilet?” Kira asked, scrunching her nose in the direction of the stall.

“Maybe we can go to the mall?” Izzie interjected, obviously still itching to use her plastic.

Leona and Kira seemed to consider this, but I interrupted. “No,” I said. “You girls need to practice, get your cheers in order. I have other business to handle. Business involving a certain pouty blonde with an affection for the unholy.”

“Black is still not her color,” Kira added.

“Totally,” I agreed, keeping my voice authoritative. (It helped inspire confidence.) “Now, I’ll run my surveillance and call to set up a rendezvous point for later. Agreed?”

The Kittens stared back at me, looking a bit stunned.

“Whoa,” Leona said, a smile tugging at the corners of her dark lips. “You sounded like the old Tessa just now.”

“It was pretty cool.” Izzie giggled.

“Well…good.” I straightened my posture. The old Tessa would have totally kicked spying tush right about now.

The bell overhead rang and Kira groaned. “I’ve got to jet. Practice immediately after school,” she said, holding up her finger in warning to the girls. “Spread the word.”

“Yes, captain,” Leona said with an eye roll and a salute.

Kira glanced at me. “Good luck, Tess.” She smiled supportively and I nodded, watching as she left.

After Leona and Izzie followed her, I waited and turned to examine my reflection once again. Did I still know how to spy? Investigating someone like Chloe, someone I was clearly connected with, was a conflict of interest. Would I be able to objectively collect information?

The skin under my eyes looked puffy, and I sighed heavily. Then with only the sound of my shoes echoing on the tile floor, I walked up to the bathroom door, yanked it open, and headed out.

It was time to get back to basics. It was time to channel the skirt.

Riley and Jenn were sitting together in a vinyl booth at Mel’s Pizza sharing a slice as the operative observed them. Both seemed a little distracted, but every so often, Riley leaned in to give Jenn a quick kiss. The operative squinted, trying to understand.

Both Riley and Jenn were starting relationships with other people—or so it seemed. How could they so boldly flaunt their infidelity, then act affectionate in public, as though nothing were wrong?

The operative adjusted her black baseball cap downward before reaching for the straw of her cherry Coke, all the while peering from beneath the cap’s bill. She’d never seen a case like this. It would require a serious cheater case study.

Just then, the door to the pizza shop jangled open. The operative glanced over and nearly choked on her carbonated beverage. It was Megan Wright…and she looked stunned.

Riley had been resting his head on Jenn’s shoulder, laughing easily when Megan walked in. Living life, unaware that his sins were about to confront him. When he saw her, he immediately straightened up, but the hurt on Megan’s face was plain. Even as she bravely tried to smile.