Thief (13 page)

I planted my palms on my hips for a moment. “What?”

He blinked hard and shook his head, his eyes finally zeroing in on my face. “Sorry. I just wanted to ask you ... your brother takes a lot of high level math classes, and he’s got this one computer course he’s working on that’s an AP course for college. I was wondering if he was interested in computer science.”

I stammered for a moment, “How’d you know?”

“I... uh...”

I squinted at him, folding my arms. “You’ve got a copy of his transcripts?”

His eyebrows raised. “Don’t be mad.”

I wanted to yell at him, but something in that face of his stopped me. He was a computer hacker. I got that. What I wanted to know was why he was still poking around my life? And then really, it was Wil, so my instinct was to be more protective. However, was it really menacing or was he trying to find something? When the spark of anger faded, it simmered into curiosity. “Can you show me?”

“What?”

“I didn’t know he was in a computer science class. Can I see?”

He nodded, motioning for me to follow him. I trailed behind him to the computers set up in the dining room. He went to the one he was working on, sitting down in the chair. He used the mouse to bring up a document that listed Wil Winchester’s high school transcripts. He scrolled down, and then pointed at the screen. “There. He took a computer science last year and trigonometry. Now he’s in a follow-up computer class and trig two.”

I leaned over Corey, dropped my hands on his shoulders to hold myself up as I leaned over his head. I scanned the screen. Wil’s transcript was a little confusing to decode because all the information seemed clustered together. Trig and computer classes topped the list. “He didn’t tell me about this. Is he doing okay?”

“Best in his class. He’d be valedictorian except that there’s this one little twelve-year-old girl who is taking some sort of specialized physics class. Technically I think he’s earned it, but they’re making exceptions for her being a little girl graduating so early.”

I couldn’t believe my ears. I knew he was doing well but I didn’t know he was amazing. “I can’t believe he didn’t tell me. He only said he was taking what everyone else was taking.”

Corey shifted forward so he could turn and look at me. “I was going to say, he could technically graduate right now unless he really wanted to stay and graduate with his class. If he is interested in computer science, I could talk to a professor friend of mine and the dean at the local university. If he’d be willing to work in the science lab, maybe even starting now, he’d be able to get into some early classes that start up in January.”

I blinked at him. “You’re not serious.”

“What?”

“He could get into college now? But there’s fees. And I mean there’s an application process and the cost of classes.”

Corey’s cheeks tinted. “Well, he’d have to put some work in. I know a few people that could help.”

My mouth fell open. I couldn’t even begin to imagine this was even a possibility. “You don’t even know him. You’d do that?”

Corey’s face lit up. “I just thought it’d be easier on you both if he got in as soon as possible. He’d be able to stay in the dorms if that’s where he wanted to be. I don’t know for sure if that’s what he was planning to take in college, it just seemed like he was heading that direction. I thought—”

I stretched out, and took Corey’s face in my palms. “Tell me you’re not messing with me. I swear to god, I’ll kick your ass...”

“No one’s kicking anyone’s ass.” Raven materialized next to me. “What are you doing? What’s with this shirt? And let my boy go. I do the ass kicking around here.”

I slapped his bicep, right on a tribal tattoo. “He said he’d get Wil into college in January.”

“Yeah?” Raven said. He popped me on the arm. “So?”

I squared off my shoulders at him, holding up my fists and ready to hit him in the chest or face or wherever I could reach. Maybe I was crazy, but I kind of liked that he fought back. Most guys played too easy, too soft. Raven was ready to go head to head to me and I respected him for it. “So none of you guys know me or him. Forgive me if I don’t want to get Wil all excited by the suggestion if he’s all talk and it won’t really happen.”

Raven cupped his palms around my fists. It made me realize how much bigger his hands were compared to mine. Not to mention the way his biceps flexed. If he’d really wanted to, he could probably take me down in one hit. He held my fists together in his hands. “If Corey says he’ll do it, he’ll do it.”

“Yeah,” Corey said. “I don’t mind. I did the same thing when I graduated high school and got in an early semester. It interrupts his current classes, but when I did it, the school let me take the final exams early. So unless he really wanted to graduate with his current classmates, he’d be able to start now.”

“But,” I said, unsure how to put it. “I mean, I haven’t even done anything for you yet. Why would you?”

Corey blinked at me, like he didn’t understand. “I don’t need a reason. I just didn’t know about him before. But now I do, and if it’s like you said, you’re trying to get him into college, this will get him in quicker. He’d still have to go in and talk to them.”

I yanked my hands from Raven’s grasp and leaned forward, wrapping my arms around Corey’s shoulders and drawing him into a hug, almost falling on top of him. “Can you? I’ll pickpocket all the people you want. I’ll even put the wallets back. I’ll do whatever you want.”

“Make her not hit me back any more,” Raven said. “I get to hit her and she can’t hit me back. Make her have to get sodas from the fridge for a month. No wait, I want—”

“You don’t have to do anything,” Corey said. He planted his arms down on the chair, trying to hold himself up while I was hanging around his neck. “I don’t mind.”

I cupped his cheek in my palm, drawing his head over until I could plant a kiss on the opposite cheek. “Please, please, please?” I begged. I don’t know why I was still asking. I think I just wanted to play. I was so excited, and I didn’t know how to say thank you for this.

“I said yes.”

“Please?”

Corey laughed, and patted at my arm around his neck. I leaned heavily into him and the chair swayed underneath us. “Stop it, I’m going to fall over in this thing.”

I was about to release him when I felt thick arms wrapping around my shoulders, and leaning against my body. “Please,” Raven mimicked my light tone of my voice. “Please, Corey. Please?”

Corey started to teeter in his chair. I was trying to push back to let go, but Raven leaned too far forward and I ended up pushing on Corey.

Corey fell backward in the chair, and I landed on top of him, sprawled out awkwardly, with the shirt riding up my hips and exposing my underwear. Raven landed on top of me on top of Corey. My face landed smack into Corey’s chest.

I started laughing, too caught up in their promises to be angry. Wil? In school? It was a struggle before to think of him getting into college in the summer. Now it could happen as soon as a few months from now. It was unbelievable. If it were for myself, I’d have said not to worry about it. For Wil, though, I’d do anything to help him get going to a better life than what we’d had. If it meant swallowing my pride so Corey could do me a favor, I’d do it. If I had to sink deeper into this strange group to get it to happen, I’d do it.

Corey chuckled underneath me. “You okay?”

“Yeah,” I said.

He dropped a hand on top of my head. “Don’t hit me,” he said. “I’m just trying to...” He wriggled underneath me, and held on to my arm a bit, as if trying to make sure I was okay.

“I won’t hit you,” I said. I tried to push myself up off of his chest but Raven sunk his full weight onto my body, crushing me against Corey. “Ugh. You jerk, get off of me.” I reached around, slapping at Raven’s arm.

Raven shifted above me, and a hard spank landed on my thigh close to my butt. “Girl, I swear...”

I whimpered, rubbing at the spot where he hit me. It didn’t really hurt that bad, I was going to pout and then pop him back when his guard was down.

“Hey,” Marc’s voice barked behind us. “I leave you guys for five minutes. What the hell are you doing to her?”

“Raven did it!” I cried out, reaching around to point at his head. I had a brother. I knew how to win this, and it was whoever planted the blame first.

Marc chuckled over us. “Why are you in your underwear?”

“Raven ... Axel ... I don’t know. Long story. It’s their fault.”

Raven planted a palm on my back, shoving himself up while squashing me back into Corey. He hopped up. “Don’t look at me. If I’d taken her clothes off, there wouldn’t be any left.”

I crawled up until I was on my knees on the carpet, and felt my cheeks catch some heat as Marc and Brandon stood over us, gawking. I huffed, and rose from the floor, stretching the shirt over my hips. “Can we get this stupid party thing over with before one of them kills me, please?”

––––––––

A
ll of the guys gathered around the coffee table for pizza, while Marc went over the plan again. The only one missing was Kevin. Mostly it looked like Marc was informing me, because his eyes stayed on mine. Everyone else looked like they’d heard this before. I guessed for them it might be a review.

I was only half listening. All I could think about, when food was in front of me, was eating. I inhaled three large pepperoni slices before I finally slowed enough that I could pay attention.

“We should only be gone for thirty minutes,” Marc said. “We need to make sure he doesn’t notice his wallet’s missing during that time.”

“I could plant a second wallet,” I said. “Like what Dr. Roberts did to me.”

“Can you?” he asked. “Have you tried it?”

“I never stuck around long enough,” I said. “But it’s a good idea. I wish I’d thought of it before.”

Axel perked up, pointing a long finger at me. “No, miss sticky fingers. No more pickpocketing if you’re going to be connected at all with us.”

“Don’t give me that high moral ground lecture,” I said. “You’re wanting to steal a peek at this guy’s office. You’re not telling me what you’re doing with what you find.”

“We’re just looking at it,” Corey said.

“Yeah, you’ve said that.” I took another bite and talked while I chewed. “You’re committing a felony breaking and entering just because you’re curious.”

Marc’s differently colored eyes slid over to Axel. The guys stared quietly at each other, as if silently debating how much they were willing to tell me about what they were really up to. That was really all they needed to do to confirm my suspicions. This wasn’t simply someone’s curiosity.

“Who do you work for?” I asked.

Mouths stopped chewing and glances were exchanged across the pizza boxes. They only did it for a second before they resumed, but again, it confirmed my suspicions.

I dropped my pizza on my plate and snapped my fingers at Marc. “If you aren’t doing it to steal drugs for yourself, or to make money in some way, you’re an investigation team. You said it could be drugs, but you don’t know. Corey can hack into a high school’s computer files. Dr. Roberts could switch his wallet from my hands for a newspaper. You planted people at the mall knowing I’d be there.”

“I didn’t know it was you,” Marc said. “We didn’t know who it was. We were asked a favor to flush out a thief. It just happened to be you.”

“That’s what’s confusing me,” I said. “That’s a mall security job. That’s maybe local police. Local police don’t need to swipe a security card to break into anywhere. They just grab a warrant and go. Neither does the FBI. Not on American soil. So you’re either Homeland Security that’s above all the need for a warrant... I’d say CIA perhaps, because you’re looking at drugs and that could be an international operation. I want to say either of those, but for some reason I don’t think that’s it.”

Corey stared at me, open mouthed, pizza in his hand. Brandon had curious eyes. Marc was grinning, his arms folded at his chest and sitting back. Axel was smirking, his head in his palm, his elbow planted on his knee, simply watching.

Raven pointed a finger at my face, looking back at the others. “Who wanted to hire the smart girl? I told you this was a bad idea.”

Brandon kicked Raven under the coffee table. “Shut up.” Brandon waved a finger at me. “And you, just do your job. It doesn’t matter—”

“No,” Axel said. He crumpled a napkin and tossed it at his plate. He sat back and lifted his foot, crossing it over his knee, rocking his ankle back and forth. “Let her keep going.”

I flitted eyes between each of them, trying to pull pieces out of the air to fit together. “I want to say CIA or Homeland Security, but if that were the case, you wouldn’t be working security at a mall in the middle of South Carolina. You also wouldn’t need someone like me stealing a key card. You’d have some special hacking gadget for that sort of thing. So you’re either lying to me about this not being for profit, or there’s some private security informant division you’re working for. The Academy?” I sucked in a breath, snapping and pointing a finger at Axel. “You mentioned that. What’s this Academy?”

Marc looked me in the eye. “It’s a school,” he said.

I stared directly at him. His face was stern, but there was amusement in his eyes still. “That trains you to do this kind of thing? Where Raven is training people with guns? They pay you and let you do your own thing, but ask you to do these special investigation jobs?”

“How do you figure they let us do our own thing?” Marc asked. “You don’t even know anything about us.”

“It’s Axel’s glowing fish,” I said. “That requires a high-tech lab, and time to alter DNA on that level. Did you see his room? All those notebooks? Either he’s stealing them, or if they’re his alone, he’s been writing since the age of negative a hundred and four. And Corey’s computer science friends at the college even though you’re only... what? Nineteen?”

Corey glanced at the others, as if unsure whether to confirm or deny this.

“We turn nineteen next month,” Brandon said, and his mouth went slack again as he stared at me.

“And he was talking about taking perhaps some classes or at least attending lectures later. So it can’t be a full time gig if he’s expected to get to class.” I planted my palms on the coffee table, drawing myself up on my knees and leaning forward. “You’re an investigation team of some kind, but not on an official level. I want to know what this is. So either you guys tell me what’s really going on, or I’m going to go find this supposed bad guy and tell him someone wants to sniff around his basement and steal his stuff. I’m not getting arrested for a felony when I stood a better chance getting a slap on the wrist for pickpocketing at the mall.”