Keeping Secrets

Ninety-eight.

Ninety-nine.

One Hundred.

The pebble sails across the sidewalk and lands uneventfully in the grass. Paige gazes down the dark, lonely high school driveway then at the blank screen on her dead cell phone. If only she were a year older and could finally drive.

“If Dad’s not here by the time I kick this next rock a hundred times, I’ll go knock on Mr. Brown’s door,” Paige thinks dejectedly as she turns her gaze to the glow coming from the band director’s window. Dad’s never been this late before.

Paige kicks a chunk of gravel, lamenting her predicament: abandoned in the high school parking lot, sweat from the summer heat dripping between her shoulder blades. At first, the idea of late-night marching band practice sounded fun. But as Paige counts forty-one, forty-two, nothing is fun anymore.

A pair of headlights cut through the night, briefly drowning out the sporadic glow of lightning bugs. Relief washes over Paige. The car comes to a stop where she stands holding her heavy trombone case. So excited that her dad is finally here, she doesn’t notice the slight difference in the body of the black car in front of her.

“It’s about time,” she says as she pulls open the back door and tosses in her trombone. “I’ve been waiting for like forty minutes.” When she opens the front passenger door, Paige stops dead in her tracks. “Mom?”

“Get in, Paige,” her mother orders urgently as she glances in the rearview mirror.

Paige stands, frozen. She blinks and pushes her heavy glasses back up her nose. “You’re supposed to be in Europe,” she sputters through her shock.

“I’m back. Now, get in, honey,” her mom commands as her eyes dart to the rear view mirror.

“But Dad?”

“I’m going to take you to Dad. Please. I need you to get in the car.”

Now leaning across the seat, her mom holds her hand out to Paige. She looks the same as she did the day she left for an overseas job when Paige was in eighth grade. Alice still has the same light blonde hair tied back into a pony tail, but tonight her mahogany brown eyes betray a panic oozing from within.

“Mom, I haven’t seen you in two years. Don’t you get that? You left. You abandoned us!” Paige steps back and crosses her arms. “I’m waiting for Dad.”

“Look, I’m sorry. I’ll explain everything. But I need you to come with me now!”

“No! You can’t come back and start telling me what to do. I’m waiting for Dad!” Paige pouts her lips.

Another pair of headlights cuts across the night. When Paige turns to look for her dad’s car, Alice grabs her arm and yanks her into the car. The door still hanging open and Paige’s feet flailing in the night air, her screams join the sound of the tires on the hot pavement as she and her mom speed away.

“Mom! Stop!” Paige clings to her mom’s arm. “I’m not in the car!”

Paige is quickly realizing that her mom isn’t the same person who disappeared. Two years ago, Alice had been the typical soccer mom and accountant, the kind that limited how much sugar Paige could eat and who insisted that she take music lessons, even when Paige complained about them endlessly.

The Alice before her now is driving like a NASCAR expert as she weaves around a truck and turns abruptly down a side street. The force of the turn thrusts Paige toward her mom hard enough that she’s able to pull her feet into the car just as the door slams shut with a loud crash.

“Put your seatbelt on,” Alice commands as she glances again in the rearview mirror.

“Mom, you’re driving like a maniac,” Paige fights to click the seatbelt. “Where’s Dad?”

“Your dad was kidnapped,” Alice replies tenderly.

“What?” Paige braces herself as Alice screeches through another turn onto a dark street. “Who kidnapped him?”

“I did.”

“What? Why?” Paige screams, adrenaline coursing through her veins.

Alice responds guiltily, “I had to. It was for his own safety. We’ll get him now. I just need your necklace, the Lego brick one I gave you for your birthday.”

“That thing? I don’t know where it is.”

“Your dad said that you wear it every day. We need that necklace!” Alice punctuates her insistence by turning the car sharply, slamming the breaks and bringing the car to an abrupt stop at the curb in front of a park that looks eerily dark.

“I don’t have to do anything for you. I haven’t heard from you in two years, Mom! I don’t owe you anything,” Paige reaches to unclip her seatbelt.

“I didn’t want to leave, Peanut. I had to. There are some things that I can’t fully explain now, but I need that necklace to save your dad, and then I’ll be gone again.” Alice deflates, her head dropping to rest on the steering wheel. “I made a mistake. I need to fix it, and I can’t unless I have that necklace.”

“Mom, what’s going on?” Paige’s anger abates a notch seeing her mother’s desperation.

Alice sits up again and straightens her shirt. “I shouldn’t be telling you this, but I’m not an accountant. Sweetheart, I’m a spy. I’ve been a spy since before you were born.”

Paige sits in silence, letting Alice’s honesty settle around them. “Does Dad know?”

“Yes, he knows. That’s why we left the necklace with you. It has a hidden flash drive, and some very bad people are looking for it. I kidnapped your dad to keep him safe until I could get the necklace. Paige, I need your help.”

Suddenly, Alice looks older than Paige remembers. The creases around her eyes are deeper and her lips are pursed tightly. Alice is telling the truth; Paige knows this for sure.

“It’s in my old playhouse with my Barbies.”

Alice takes a deep breath and slips the car in gear. Silently, they ride through the dark streets. Paige stares blankly out the window, and Alice only moves to regularly check the rearview mirror. Luckily, no one seems to be following them. Once they arrive at the green house with the blue front door, the door Alice painted because it was Paige’s favorite color, Alice looks once more in the rearview mirror.

“Stay close to me, and if anything goes wrong, either take cover or run as fast as you can, okay?” Alice instructs Paige, who doesn’t look at her mom until Alice pulls a gun from an ankle strap under her pantleg.

“Is that really necessary?” Paige asks aghast.

“Bad people, Paige. Really bad people,” Alice replies as she slides out of the car.

Paige reluctantly follows her, trying to cover her fear with teenage angst. In the backyard, Alice looks around rhythmically as they cross to the old playhouse that Paige’s dad built. Alice knows exactly where to look, the big pink plastic bin. She tears off the lid and begins digging.

“Where is it?” Panic grows in her voice.

Worry and dread overtake Paige. “Mom, how bad are these people?”

“Remember that scary movie you watched at Amy’s sleepover in fourth grade?”

“Yeah, I had nightmares for a week.”

Alice stops and looks Paige directly in the eyes. “Multiply that by a hundred,” she says gravely. “Now, where’s the necklace?”

The sound of a rustling in the bushes snaps Alice’s attention to one of the lace-fringed windows. She holds her gun ready to fire. Paige plunges her hand into the bin and pulls out the blue Lego block necklace and drops it around her neck. “Got it,” she says.

“Let’s go,” Alice leads Paige back to the car. She walks with the gun poised, in a stance ready for action. They jump in the car and speed away.

Paige knows these streets well, ones she’s explored on her bike every day after school. She watches the houses of friends and neighbors passing by her window, mentally saying their names. It’s a soothing exercise after the chaos of the last fifteen minutes. Alice whips the car into Mrs. Berger’s driveway. The “for sale” sign in the front yard reminds the neighborhood that she moved into a nursing home last month.

“Come on,” Alice says as she slips from the car, her gun locked in her hands again.

Paige follows close behind, her pulse pounding in her ears. At the front door, Alice holsters her gun and uses her phone to unlock the realtor’s lockbox. She, swiftly takes the house key out of the little metal box, opens the front door, and pulls Paige in with her.

“He’s in here,” she says into the dark living room. Paige follows Alice closely, trying to match her stealth. In the back of the house, Alice pushes open a door to a bathroom and stops short. She doesn’t move, not even to breathe. Dread and panic fill the empty spaces in the room.

“Oh, no,” she whispers. “We have to go, now!” She grabs Paige’s arm again and drags her back through the empty house. They rush to the car, and as Paige is opening the door, she hears a ping from her mom’s phone. Alice looks at the screen. From across the hood of the car, Paige can’t read the message, but she can read the emotions that run across Alice’s face. Confusion. Realization. Terror.

“Get in and buckle up. It’s going to be a long night, kiddo.”



“Where are we going?” Paige breaks the silence after watching the clock tick past 10:00 p.m. as her mother aimlessly drove through town. Her quick glances at the rearview mirror hadn’t produced another reckless race through town.

“I don’t know,” Alice replies. “This wasn’t supposed to happen. None of this was supposed to happen.” She bites at a fingernail.

“Should you call someone?” Paige shifts in her seat hoping that Alice doesn’t notice the gurgling coming from her stomach that is reminding Paige that she hasn’t eaten since lunch. Her dad tried to get her to eat dinner before marching band practice, but Paige had been terrified that the heat would make her puke on the field like Brittney Johnson did last night. High school was hard enough to navigate without having a puking incident hanging over her head.

“I don’t know,” Alice mumbles.

“What about Dad?” Paige huffs. “Where is he? Shouldn’t we go get him?”

“We can’t,” Alice replies, pulling the car to a stop in a parking lot next to the elementary school. She steps out of the car, leaving Paige behind, as she walks to the swings.

Climbing out of the car, Paige rubs the side of her hip that had bashed against the door frame when Alice dragged her in the car. A bruise was growing under her red athletic shorts. The chorus of night insects screeching their songs mixed with the flickers of lightning bugs surrounds her as she follows her mom.

“Mom! Mom?” Paige calls. Alice ignores her, sitting in a swing and pulling out her phone. “For real, Mom, whatever is going on, you have to snap out of this. If you’re a spy, you know how to handle all this, right?”

“I’m an accountant,” Alice shakes her head. “Just an accountant.”

“But you have a gun,” Paige nods at the holster hidden under Alice’s pantleg.

Alice stands, shaking her hands. “You don’t understand, Paige,” she says in exasperation. “I was just an accountant for the CIA. Yes, I was trained to use a gun and outrun someone, but I’ve never had to do it until tonight really. I acted on impulse to run to help you and your dad. Now I think I should have run the other way.”

“Mom,” Paige steps to Alice. “You’ve got to do something. Someone has Dad.” Saying the words made them more real than Paige was ready to accept. Her stomach sank.

“Do you have a phone?”

“Mom, I’m going to be a freshman in high school, of course I have a phone,” Paige says.

“Really? Since when? I mean, when did you get a phone?” Alice’s eyes squint processing this part of Paige’s life that she’s missed.

“Since seventh grade, just after you left,” Paige replies.

“What? Your dad and I agreed that you wouldn’t get a phone until you were in eighth grade, at the earliest,” Alice sighs.

“You weren’t here,” Paige shrugs. These words sting.

“I know, I’m sorry,” Alice shakes her hair. “I have an idea, give me your phone.”

“It’s in my backpack, but it’s dead.”

“We can’t use my phone. It’s been compromised,” Alice chews her lip again. “We need a phone with a VPN connection if possible, something where we can hide our location.” She paces, thinking.

“I know someone who can help,” Paige says.

Alice stops, “Who?”

“Brayden, he’s a sophomore. He’s in the band and is always talking about the computers he works on,” Paige says, her stomach making a tiny flip thinking of the boy with the deep hazel eyes, his thick hair the color of a caramel latte. “He lives near here.”

Alice is oblivious to the slight color rising to Paige’s cheeks. She glances over her shoulder before spinning and striding toward the back door of the school.

“He doesn’t live in the elementary school,” Paige says to Alice’s back.

“Come over here, Paige. Quick,” Alice gestures for Paige to join her. “Look up there.”

Paige’s eyes follow Alice’s gesture at the corner of the building over the door. “Okay, what am I looking at?”

“Security camera,” Alice replies. “It’s on a closed network, only the local police should be able to access the feeds. So, if anyone comes looking for us, here we are. Wave.” Alice lifts Paige’s arm and helps her feebly wave at the camera perched over their heads.

“Now, let’s go find this computer boy,” Alice brushes back stray hairs falling from her ponytail.

Sweat pours down Paige’s back, making her band t-shirt stick to her back. She adjusts her own ponytail and laments that she’s going to see Brayden like this, sweat-soaked with bits of grass from the practice field plastered to her shoes and socks.

“Should we knock on the front door?” Alice cocks her head studying the two-story house where Brayden lives. She’d quickly perked up at the prospect of Brayden’s help.

“His parents are kind of protective. They might not like us showing up so late,” Paige says studying the glow of light coming from a window on the back side of the house, on the second floor. “There, I think that’s his room. He said the other day that there was a tall tree outside his window that he can climb down if he needs.”

“I hope you’re as good at climbing trees as you were when you were little,” Alice winks and slides from the car. Paige stumbles out of the car, catching up to Alice. While Alice slinks across the yard with the stealth of a cat, Paige squeals when she catches her foot on a root under the tall tree.

“Shh,” Alice admonishes her.

Paige huffs, pushing her glasses up her nose again. The unbearable heat hasn’t relented, and sweat makes Paige’s glasses slide.

Leaning in to whisper, Alice says, “We should both be able to get up there from this low branch. You’re as tall as me now, so you should be able to reach it fine.”

Climbing the tree isn’t too difficult for Paige wearing sneakers and exercise clothes. She enjoys the feel of the bark under her palms and only has to stop to pull her t-shirt up and wipe sweat off her face before she knocks lightly on Brayden’s bedroom window.

This was so insane, Paige thinks as she waits for a response from the other side of the window hidden by cheap blinds. When the blinds part to reveal deep hazel eyes on the other side, Paige jumps grasping to keep her balance in the tree.

“Paige?” Brayden asks surprised.

“I need some help with a computer thing?” Paige says.

“Can’t it wait until tomorrow? My parents won’t like a girl climbing in my room late at night.”

“I brought my mom,” Paige points at Alice perched in the tree below her. Alice waves and smiles like she’s bringing cookies to the PTA bake sale.

“Um, okay,” Brayden lifts the blinds and unlocks the window. With practiced agility, he pops out the screen and holds out his hand for Paige to help her make the step across the gap between the thick part of the tree branch and his bedroom window frame.

Brayden’s hand is surprisingly soft in Paige’s, but his grip is tight, and he adeptly helps her into his bedroom. Into his bedroom. Paige’s breath catches. She’s never been in a cute boy’s bedroom before. She doesn’t know what to do, how to act. This is a boy’s bedroom.

“You’re such a gentleman,” Alice says behind Paige, whipping her out of her bewilderment.

“Brayden, this is my mom,” Paige awkwardly says. “Mom, this is Brayden. He plays percussion in the band.”

“Nice to meet you,” Brayden replies questioningly. His gaze shifts between the two women who’ve invaded his room.

“Mom needs help with a computer thing, it’s super important,” Paige says. “Do you have an old phone that she can use?”

“I need one with a VPN, if you have that,” Alice adds.

“Yeah,” Brayden smiles, brushing his thick hair out of his eyes, his common gesture making Paige weak in the knees. He pulls open a drawer on his desk and digs through it. “Would this work? It’s an old iPhone 6. It was my mom’s. I put a VPN on it for my brother so he could download pirated movies, but he upgraded when he left for college last year.”

Brayden holds out the phone in a pink case covered with cartoon cats. With great enthusiasm, Alice grabs the phone. “This is perfect. I have a SIM card in the car that works on these older models.”

“You keep old SIM cards in your car?” Brayden smiles at the novelty.

“It’s for her job,” Paige shrugs.

“While we’re here, can you pull something up on your computer?” Alice’s eyes get suddenly intense.

“Sure, what is it?” Brayden asks, sitting in his desk chair and waking up his computer.

“Give me the necklace,” Alice orders Paige, holding out her hand.

Paige’s stomach rolls as she hands the necklace to Alice.

“Whoa, was that your stomach?” Brayden laughs. “I’ve got some snacks over there if you want,” he gestures at a plastic bin next to his desk.

As Alice stands over Brayden’s shoulder watching him open the files, Paige pops the lid off the plastic bin and hungrily grabs a peanut butter protein bar.

“What. Is. This?” Brayden gapes at his computer screen. “I’ve never seen encryption like this.”

“Give me the keyboard,” Alice drags the computer and types frantically, various pages clearing passwords and moving to more pages and more passwords.

“What kind of work do you do? This level of security is usually only for government computers,” Brayden stares on in awe.

“I’m just an accountant to some very private clients,” Alice shoots a look at Paige.

“There!” Alice shouts. “I’m in.” She studies the screen, scrolling past endless numbers.

“Mom, is there anything in there about Dad?” Paige asks.

“Not exactly,” Alice says. “But it will tell me more about who has him.”

“Has him?” Brayden asks. “Are you in some kind of trouble?” he turns his hazel eyes on Paige.

“Um,” Paige stutters. “I don’t—like we’re okay—but there is—there’s—”

“There’s nothing,” Alice interjects. “It’s just accounting and her father is on a vacation. He didn’t tell us exactly where, so this file has the info on the travel agent who booked his trip.”

Alice nods emphatically at Paige as if her nod could magically turn her lie into a truth.

“And now we need to go,” Alice pulls the flash drive out and drops it around Paige’s neck again. “Come on, Paige, your dad is waiting for us.”

“Did you need anything else?” Brayden follows them to the window.

“Nope, we’re good,” Alice exits into the tree.

“You could have gone out the front door,” Brayden says to Alice and turns to Paige. “Maybe next time you come over, you can use the front door,” he says with a smile.

“You want me to come back?” Paige asks, surprised.

“Well, yeah, you should come over sometime,” Brayden shrugs. “I mean, I’ve been wanting to find time to talk to you more. This would be cool, to have you come over sometime. We could talk, watch a movie, something like that.”

“Okay,” Paige bites her lip, her heart fluttering joyfully. “That would be great.”

“Give me your hand,” Brayden says pulling a Sharpie out of his pocket. “My number,” he scribbles on Paige’s palm, “so you can text me sometime, you know, or something.”

A little electric zing leaps between them. With a goofy smile, Paige makes her way out the window and back to the ground. From the bottom, she waves up at Brayden.

“Mom,” Paige says buckling her seatbelt, “I think Brayden just asked me out on a date.”

“That’s wonderful, Peanut,” Alice replies, distracted by the task of inserting a SIM card into the old iPhone. In the glow of the phone coming to life, Alice turns to Paige. “I know who has your father.”

“Who?”

“In those files I found where some data was different from the files at the CIA,” Alice explains.

“Only one person could have changed it and for only one reason. It looks like my boss isn’t only working for the CIA. She’s also working for Sebastian Miranda, the mob boss I was investigating.”



“Let’s get a burger,” Alice says. “Is Late Night BBQ still open? They have the best fries.”

“You’ve just discovered that your boss is working for an international crime lord and we still haven’t found Dad, and you want to stop for burgers?” Paige questions her eyes wide in the passing street lights.

“I’m hungry,” Alice replies. “And I can’t think straight when I’m hungry. You must be hungry too. It’s after 11:00.”

“Yeah, I’m hungry,” Paige says. “But do you think this is a good idea? Shouldn’t we just stay low?”

“Good point, sweetheart,” Alice glances at Paige with a proud smile. “But we need a place where there will be lots of people, a place where we can eat, and a place where someone can meet up with us.”

“Someone meet up with us?” Paige asks.

“A good someone, Paige,” Alice says. “He’s on our side and can help us connect with my boss. So, is Late Night BBQ still open or not?”

“It’s open until midnight,” Paige melts back into the seat of the car. This has officially become the craziest night of her life. Her mom’s a secret agent who has been double crossed, and her dad has been kidnapped in the middle of it all. “What about Dad? Do you think he’s okay?”

“Knowing Piper, he’s perfectly fine. Maybe a little uncomfortable is all,” Alice says signaling to turn onto Main Street toward Late Night BBQ.

“Is that your way of saying that he’s being tortured?” Paige grimaces at the thought. Her dad is a second-grade teacher, used to managing a group of seven-year-olds. He wouldn’t stand a chance with any kind of torture that didn’t include nose picking and throwing rocks on the playground.

“He’s not being tortured,” Alice says firmly. “Piper would never do that. Not to someone close to me. She is, or was, my friend.”

“Piper? Doesn’t sound like the name of a back-stabbing double agent.”

“Don’t judge a book by its cover,” Alice says pulling the car into the busy parking lot at Late Night BBQ. “Piper Glenn seems sweet, but she’s a pit bull on the inside. She’ll fight with everything she has for what she wants. What she used to want was to put bad guys in prison. I’m not sure what she wants now.”

Paige doesn’t know if it’s because she’s hardly eaten in twelve hours or if it’s because of the adrenaline rush from racing through town to escape the bad guys, but a cheeseburger dripping with BBQ sauce has never tasted better. Paige licks her fingers and dips a fry in the BBQ sauce pooled on her flimsy paper plate. She’s making a mess, but that’s what you do at Late Night BBQ, sitting at the well-worn outdoor picnic tables. The only seating is outdoors. Even in winter, people risk frost bite to eat their burgers fresh from the grill.

Next to her, Alice carefully bites into her burger dripping globs of melted cheese, a slice of pickle falling onto her plate. When her new phone from Brayden chimes, she wipes her hands on a thin paper napkin and unlocks the phone. She sends off a quick reply and lifts her burger to her mouth again.

“Was that about Dad?” Paige asks taking a long swig of root beer.

“A friend is joining us,” Alice replies popping a crispy French fry into her mouth.

“Is this seat taken?” A thin man with thinning gray hair asks holding a tray with a salad and a clear plastic cup of water. Paige looks at him quizzically, she didn’t even know Late Night BBQ offered salads. Seriously, why would someone want a bowl of lettuce when they could fill themselves with the best burgers ever created?

“It’s for you,” Alice nods at the empty space on the bench next to her. Paige knows Alice is attempting nonchalance, trying not to garner any attention. It’s not too difficult, nearly every picnic table is full, and a line at the kitchen window is winding toward the parking lot.

“Good choice,” the man says smiling around him.

“Tom, this is my daughter, Paige,” Alice says. “Paige, this is Tom Kentala. Everyone calls him Tech Guy Tom.”

“Everyone? Like everyone at the CIA?” Paige jabs. “Should I call you Tech Guy Tom too?”

To Paige’s surprise and humiliation, Tom laughs. It’s a full belly laugh. He’s obviously the kind of guy who wears every emotion openly.

“I like her,” Tom waves his plastic fork at Paige. “She has spunk, just like her mom.”

Paige huffs and shoves her last bite of burger in her mouth.

“Well, that spunk has gotten me in some trouble tonight,” Alice says with a frown.

“I know,” Tom smiles. “It’s all over the coms. Piper is about to flip her lid about you going rogue. She says you’ve sided with Sebastian Miranda and kidnapped your daughter to help you run a load of fentanyl. Good thing she stepped in and saved your husband before you dragged him into the new family business.” Sarcasm weighs as heavy in Tom’s meaning as the burger does in Paige’s stomach.

“But it wasn’t Mom,” Paige jumps in. “She was trying to save Dad. She’s keeping me from Piper. Isn’t Piper the one who’s working with this Miranda guy?”

“Sometimes, the story people believe is the one told by those in highest ranks,” Alice drops her head into her hands.

“Your mom’s right,” Tom says dabbing a drop of salad dressing on his chin. “Piper’s behind all this. Alice is trying to save you and your dad and to stop Piper. But that’s not what most of the operatives in the area believe. Luckily for you two, I can see the truth from a mile away.”

“How?” Alice asks. “What do you know?”

Tom shrugs and takes another bite of salad, chewing with a smile. “As soon as I heard the first comm about you, Alice, I did the rational thing and hacked your email. It was obvious from the start that you were clean. After hacking a few more, and not finding anything that made sense of these shenanigans, I hacked into Piper’s secret email and found everything I needed to know that she was dirty.”

“Piper has a secret email?” Paige asks, leaning forward.

“All the higher ups do,” Tom says. “They think we don’t know, but we always do. Tech guys are like modern wizards, you know?”

“You’re the Dumbledore of the CIA?” Paige asks with a smirk.

“Dumbledore? I like that,” Tom nods. “No more Tech Guy Tom. I’m going to demand everyone call me Dumbledore now.”

“What do you suggest we do now, Dumbledore?” Alice asks, her voice ringing with annoyance.

“What you do is above my paygrade,” Toms replies. “How you contact Piper, that’s what I can help you with.”

“Can you tell where she’s keeping Dad?” Paige asks, her heartbeat picking up pace.

“Um,” Tom groans. “It doesn’t work like that. I can work a little magic, get an idea of her location, but we don’t know if she’s got your dad with her.”

“How is this guy supposed to help us, Mom? You said he would, but he doesn’t know anything.”

“Paige, settle down,” Alice shakes her head.

“No,” Paige stands, her feet crunching the gravel covering the eating area. “I will not settle down, Mom. Dad is still missing. We know who has him. We need to go and get him back. Isn’t that what you spies are supposed to do?”

Eyes dart in Paige’s direction as she yells the word “spies.” After a quick glance and evaluation of the situation, Tom breaks into a belly laugh. It’s a full on, knee slapping, snorting laugh that makes the other diners return to their own food and their own conversations.

 “Oh, Paige,” Tom wipes his eyes to complete the effect before lowering his voice and leaning across the table. “You need to watch what you say. You and Alice and your dad are in real danger. Piper could be close by. She could be surveilling us right this minute. You need to keep it together and stop yelling ‘fire’ into crowds.”

The hardness in his eyes sobers Paige in a heartbeat.

“We have to find my dad,” Paige whispers.

“We will,” Tom replies, resting his hand on her shoulder. “Trust me. We’ll find him.”

“How?” Paige hits Tom with a stare.

Tom smiles and shakes his head. “You are so like your mom.”

“She’s right, Tom,” Alice says. “How?”

“I have a few ideas and some gear in my trunk,” Tom winks and stands. He throws away the remains of his salad before ambling to a white SUV parked in a dark corner of the parking lot next to the dumpster. Alice nods in Tom’s direction, and Paige gets the message. They clean up and walk as casually as possible to meet Tom who’s digging through black boxes in his trunk.

He pulls out a laptop covered in concert stickers and flips it open. Using the trunk space as his desk, Tom’s fingers fly across the keyboard.

Paige cocks her head watching him work. “What are you—”

“Shh,” Tom orders, stopping Paige’s words with a quick wave of his hand. He pounds away, switching through screen after screen until he comes to a quick stop. 

“Pizza,” he declares.

“Pizza?” Alice and Paige ask in unison.

Tom’s smile fills his whole face and he nods. “Pizza. I am Dumbledore.” He turns the laptop to face Alice and Paige. “I looked up the work schedules, but the ones from before Piper changed them today and found out who was working with her. She’d never use her own phone, but there’s one thick-necked agent that wouldn’t think twice about ordering pizza delivery from the app on his phone.”

“Kevin,” Alice whispers.

“Yep,” Tom gives a quick nod of triumph and points to a blinking dot on his screen. “Fresh, hot pizza should be delivered to this location in fifteen minutes or it’s free.”

“So, if we intercept the pizza, we can sneak in incognito,” Alice thinks out loud.

“Um, am I the only one who sees the problem with this?” Paige asks looking between the two very adept and well-trained CIA agents. “Wouldn’t they recognize us?”

“Us? Yes,” Tom says to Paige. “You? No.”

“No way,” Alice interjects. “She can’t do this. She can’t.”

“Look, it’s easy,” Tom shrugs and puts down the laptop. “Have her drive my car. We’ll be in the trunk ready to jump out and do our thing.”

“But I don’t have a driver’s license,” Paige bites her lip.

“It’s not that hard,” Tom says. “I’ll get you in place. All you’ll have to do is keep the wheel straight and tap on the gas pedal a little.”

“Do we have time to practice?” Paige asks knowing the answer. A few minutes later, she’s panicking watching Tom drive and listening to his instructions as Alice follows the GPS tracking and navigates them to Paige’s dad. And before she knows it, Paige is sitting in the driver’s seat with the engine rumbling. The pizza guy happily took Tom’s $200, tip abandoned the pizza, and went on his way.

“Just breathe,” Alice says from where she’s hunkered behind Paige, a charcoal-gray blanket pulled over her.

Paige breathes in and taps the gas pedal. The SUV lurches forward making Paige squeal. She slams on the breaks, rocking everyone in the SUV forward and forcing a groan from Tom in the trunk.

“Easier. More gentle, like when you’re playing the piano,” Alice says. “Tap gently. Adagio, Paige. You can do this.”

Flexing her fingers, Paige rests her foot on the gas pedal and presses it gently. The SUV creeps down the abandoned street in the industrial district of town. Nothing surrounds them but abandoned buildings and piles of garbage on the sidewalks. Paige thinks about her dad, his light blue eyes and sandy brown hair that has recently begun to thin. The silly way he still makes happy face pancakes for her. The way he always pulls her into a hug before leaving for school.

She’s so focused on focusing that Paige nearly misses the man in black who steps out from the shadows directly in front of the SUV. Paige screams in surprise and slams on the breaks. The car rocks forward in protest, its frame groaning.

Her heart racing, Paige attempts a friendly smile. She was supposed to be just a pizza delivery driver after all. Her smile disappears the instant the man in black lifts a revolver and points it directly at Paige.

“Mom?” Paige gasps. Alice’s head pops up next to Paige’s shoulder.

“You were right, Roberto,” a woman’s voice comes from the doorway of an abandoned building next to where the SUV has stopped. “I knew Alice would fall for the pizza delivery. She’s always thought she was a real agent, but she’s just an accountant after all.”

Lifting herself up in the seat, Alice opens the car door and steps onto the dirty street. Alice’s words drip heavy with disdain when she says, “Hello, Piper.”



“Piper Glenn is nothing like what Paige could have imagined. This conniving, double agent should be tall and strong, like a bear. But she’s not that at all. Piper Glenn looks more like a chipmunk. She is petite and perfectly styled from her blonde hair to her stiletto heels.

“Hello, Alice,” Piper says, her voice squeaking like a clarinet with a broken reed.

“Just let us all go, and we’ll walk away from this,” Alice says, her hands up in surrender.

“Tom, you can come out too,” Piper walks to the SUV. “Now, you all know the drill. Anyone have weapons? Just hand them over.”

Climbing out of the back seat, Tom pulls a handgun from his waistband. Alice removes hers from her ankle holster. They each pass them to Roberto who shoves them into his suit coat pockets.

“Mom?” Paige asks frozen with her hands at ten and two on the steering wheel.

“Are you kidding me?” Piper opens the front passenger door and smiles at Paige. “I can’t believe you’re here.”

“Leave her out of this,” Alice scowls.

“You actually brought your 14-year-old daughter to a hostage rescue?” Piper laughs, doubling over dramatically. Behind her, his gun still pointed at the car, Roberto chuckles. “I mean, Alice, I knew you weren’t a real agent, but seriously. This is not bring your kid to work day.”

“I’m not a kid, I’m fifteen,” Paige says opening the driver’s side door. In response, Roberto swings his pistol to aim at Paige’s chest. At the same time, Piper pulls a gun from behind the waistband of her cream-colored slacks and aims it at Alice. Two more bulky men in dark suits tumble from the doorway also ready to shoot.

“Stop! Everyone, stop!” Alice screams.

Piper holds up a hand, freezing her men with their fingers still on their triggers. “Get out of the car,” she commands Paige. Pushing the ignition button, Paige silences the SUV.

Fumbling to slip the key fob and her phone in her pocket, Paige carefully steps out.

“Hands up,” Piper adds. Paige complies as a cold shiver zips down her spine.

“Can we just put the guns down?” Paige’s voice wavers, matching her shaking hands.

“No!” Piper yells. “We cannot just put our guns down until I get what I want. And, Alice, you know what that is.”

Alice sighs, looking defeated. “Okay, Piper. You win.”

“Well, I knew that already. I’ve been winning all along. Did you really think that you, your kid, and Tech Guy Tom could beat me?” Piper smiles maniacally, like a tiger ready to pounce.

“Actually, they’re calling me Dumbledore now,” Tom says from behind Alice.

“I could care less,” Piper sneers.

A flash of lights breaks down the street, stealing everyone’s attention. Frozen in positions, they watch the lights turn down the next street and disappear.

“Boss, we should take this inside,” Roberto says, his gravelly voice void of any emotion.

“Great idea. Let’s take this party inside. That’s where we have our special guest,” Piper waves everyone toward the doorway with her gun. Before stepping inside, she looks over her shoulder and smiles, “And it’s not Santa Claus.” Her cackling laughter echoes as she steps inside.

“Move it,” Roberto nods to Paige and drops his gun. Paige is more than happy to run to her mom’s side. They grasp each other’s hand and clench tight.

 As they march inside with Tom on their heels, Paige leans over to Alice. “Is Piper crazy? What was that Santa Claus thing?”

Alice takes a quick breath, biting her lip. “I don’t know anymore, Paige.”

“Yes,” Tom whispers. “She’s fallen off the deep end.”

“Get inside,” Roberto shoves Tom. He falls into Alice nearly knocking them both to the floor.

Ahead of them, Alice’s voice rings through the vast open industrial building. Stacks of wood palates block their view from seeing across the room lit with sporadically placed hanging single light bulbs. The putrid scent of years of dust and layers of rat urine made Paige’s breath catch. She takes quick breaths trying not to imagine what disgusting germs might be getting into her lungs.

“Wakey-wakey, Mr. Melbourne,” Piper sings making Paige’s heart skip.

“Dad?” Paige calls out. “Dad?”

They follow Roberto around a large stack of discarded boxes and Paige sees him. He’s sitting in a chair, his arms tied behind him, and his head is drooped forward.

“Nathan,” Alice gasps. Paige’s dad lifts his head, squinting his eyes.

“Dad!” Paige breaks from the others and runs forward, her sneakers slipping on the dusty cement floor. She ignores the screams of “stop” bouncing around her and falls to her knees at Nathan’s feet. “Dad are you okay?”

“Paige?” he looks at her, confusion in his eyes. “What are you doing here?” He blinks like he’s just woken up from a bad dream. Leaning forward, his arms tied behind the chair backstop his motion. Paige can tell that he’s been drugged.

“Stop! I said to stop!” Piper aims her gun at Alice again. Alice stops in her tracks before she can reach Nathan.

“Just let them go!” Alice yells. “I’ll give you whatever you want. Just let my family go.”

“Then do it,” Piper challenges. “Now. Give me the flash drive.”

Paige tears her gaze from her father’s dirt smeared face to her mom. Alice’s expression is strained. She’s still trying to find a way out of this, Paige can tell.

“Mom?” Paige says. “Shouldn’t we just end this now? She’ll let us go if we give it to her.” Paige turns to Piper. “Right? You’ll let us go, all of us, if we give you the flash drive?”

Her eyes softening and a gentle smile filling her face, Piper coos at Paige, “Of course, I will.” A flash of malice crosses Piper’s face so quick Paige almost misses it. But it’s there. And Paige knows in a heartbeat that she cannot trust Piper, not at all. She rubs her hand over the Lego brick necklace with the hidden flash drive. It hangs from her neck, hidden under her t-shirt. She knows what she has to do.

With a side-glance at Alice, Paige stands. “I have it,” she says. “And I’ll give it to you if you promise to let all of us go. Mom, Dad, me, and tech guy Dumbledore too.”

Piper scoffs. “Okay,” she sighs. “Quit drawing this out and let me have it then.”

Trying to remember everything she’s seen on spy and cop movies, Paige wracks her brain for what she should do next. Unfortunately, her dad hadn’t allowed her to watch rated-R movies yet, so most of what she knew about involved a cop with a dog or a kid with superpowers. That wasn’t helpful here.

“I have it in my pocket,” Paige says taking a deep breath. “I’m going to take it out of my pocket now.”

“Get on with it,” Piper lowers her gun in annoyance.

Lifting her lifeless phone from the pocket of her shorts, Paige holds it out. Piper motions with her chin for Roberto to retrieve the phone. He hurries over and delivers it to Piper.

“Now, untie him,” Paige commands, barely able to hide the quiver of terror in her voice.

“Fine,” Piper says, pushing buttons on the phone. The two guys in suits abandon Alice and Tom and open pocketknives behind Nathan. They quickly saw at the plastic zip ties that bind Nathan’s wrists. As soon as they pop free, Nathan lunges forward, wrapping his arms around Paige. Alice races forward to join their embrace.

“Wait a minute,” Piper says, her voice again ringing with annoyance. “This phone is dead.”

“I know,” Paige says, standing quickly. “It only had a little battery left. We met Tom just in time for him to upload the files on my phone.”

Piper gazes around the room, taking in each person trying to detect if any of them are lying. Her scrutiny makes Paige’s heart race and sweat coat her palms.

“Yeah,” Tom says coming forward. Tension fills the room. Everyone is very close and there are more guns than Paige ever wanted to see her entire life. “She’s right. Alice showed me where it was on the cloud, so I downloaded it to Paige’s phone and purged the cloud data.”

“Come here,” Piper motions to Paige. Legs shaking, Paige crosses the short distance to Piper. “What’s your pass code?”

“One, nine, seven, three,” Paige tries to keep her eyes on Piper, tries to convey that she’s telling the truth.

“I believe you,” Piper whispers leaning forward. “But I also don’t believe you.” Her eyes turn cold.

“Stop playing games with me!” Piper shouts. She kicks a metal trashcan that flies, crashing into a tall stack of palates. She zeroes in on Alice, grabbing her by the arm and lifting Alice to meet Piper’s gaze. Their noses are inches apart, and when Piper speaks, her breath blows Alice’s hair back. “Tell me the truth, and tell me now. Where is the data?”

“It’s on the phone,” Alice spurts. A sheen of sweat glistens across her forehead. “Like Tom said. We put it on the phone.”

Holding her gaze on Alice, Piper studies her. She’s like a dog toying with its prey, drawing out her next move. The others around them wait breathlessly in the silence to see Piper’s next move.

“I might believe her,” Piper points at Paige, “but I do not believe you, Alice.” She shoves Alice back making her collide with Tom. The pair tumbles to the floor.

“Mom!” Paige screams, lunging for Alice, but she’s stopped short when Piper clenches on to her arm. Piper’s sharp fingernails cut into Paige’s skin as she struggles to free herself.

“Paige?” Nathan says, still blinking and trying to stand on shaky legs. He falls back to the chair.

“Roberto, evacuate,” Piper commands. In a flash, Roberto is at her side lifting Paige and throwing her over his shoulder.

“No, put me down!” Paige screams punching and kicking, trying helplessly to break from Roberto’s hold. “Mom! Help!”

“Paige! No! Stop!” Alice scrambles to her feet. She’s stopped short by Piper’s goons and their guns aimed at her heart. “Stop! You can’t do this!”

Slipping through a side exit, Piper disappears with Roberto as Paige’s screams fade outside.

“Don’t move,” commands one of the goons. “Or you’ll never see your daughter again.”

“You can’t do this!” Alice screams.

A horn honks outside, and the two goons rush for the side door. Alice is on their heels and breaks into the night air in time to see the doors slam shut on a bulky, black van. Its tires squeal as it speeds down the street. Paige’s screams are carried with it.

“No!” Alice cries. She doubles over, crying. “This can’t be happening.”

“Alice, we have to go,” Tom says from the doorway where he’s helping Nathan navigate woozy steps.

Her gaze still on the empty street, Alice’s breath is ragged with sobs. “But Paige.”

“She’s gone,” Tom says. “We have to go get her.”

“Paige is gone?” Nathan asks, his voice slurred.

“Let’s get him somewhere safe and then we can make a plan,” Tom says. “Come on, let’s get the car.”

With a final glance at the space where she last saw her daughter, Alice wipes her face and marches past Tom. They work their way back through the warehouse and out to his SUV still stopped on the street. With Nathan buckled in the back seat, Tom and Alice climb in the front. He moves papers from the center console and digs in the cup holders.

“Do you have the keys?” Tom turns to Alice.

“No, Paige had them,” she replies.

“I think she still has them,” Tom says. “And that means I know exactly how to find her.” A smile of triumph fills his face as Alice’s heart clenches with hope.

“Then,” Nathan says from the backseat, the fog in his eyes starting to clear, “let’s go get our girl.” 

“Sandwiched in the back seat of a big van between two hulking guys that smelled like stale cheese wasn’t what Paige expected to be doing during summer vacation. Band camp? Yes, she expected that. Reuniting with her mom to learn that she’s a secret spy and had kidnapped her dad because she was wrapped up in stopping an international drug ring? Nope. Not in all of her fifteen years would Paige have guessed that’s what she’d write on her eventual “what I did this summer” essay when she went back to school in a few weeks.

“Keep going to point Beta,” Piper Glenn orders from the front seat. Driving was her henchman, Roberto. They were both CIA agents turned bad guys, from what Paige’s mom, Alice, had shared. “I need to check in with Sebastian.” The stuffy van fills with the pinging sound of Piper’s phone connected on video chat.

“Sebastian, love,” Piper coos as soon as the chiming stopped.

“Where do we stand?” Sebastian Miranda cuts her off, his voice deep, clipped. Paige can tell he’s no one to mess around with.

“Secure,” Piper replies. “I’ve obtained the files. Soon we’ll have them destroyed, gone forever. Poof.”

“Soon?” Sebastian asks. Paige shifts to the side to see around the front seat. With the way Piper holds her phone lifted high, Paige catches a glimpse of Sebastian. He doesn’t look like an international criminal. He looks more like a love interest on her friend Gabriella’s favorite telenovela. Thick curls of dark hair are styled with a perfection that highlights his heavy eyebrows and chiseled jaw.

“Yes, love,” Piper’s voice pitches higher. “There was a technical hiccup. Nothing big. We just need to get a charger to access the files, confirm their location, and destroy them. We’ll be done in a jiffy. I’m sure of that.”

Sebastian’s gaze hardens. “It better be soon. If not, you know what will happen.”

Piper laughs, her voice strained. “Oh, Sebastian, when have I ever failed you?”

A slight lift of his lips is all Paige sees before Roberto turns hard to the left. She and the two henchmen beside her shift with the force of the turn, squashing Paige between their cheap suit-covered bodies. The scent of rotten cheese strengthens.

“What’s our ETA?” Piper asks Roberto.

“Four minutes,” he replies keeping his focus on the road with another quick turn.

“Make it three,” Piper commands with a glance at Paige.

---

“How are we going to get Paige?” Alice’s chest tightens. “We can’t even drive this car.”

Ignoring her, Tom pulls his phone from his back pocket and taps furiously at the screen. He sits in the driver’s seat of the useless SUV.

“Alice, what’s going on?” Nathan asks from the back seat. His head still droops low from whatever sedative Piper and her goons had pumped into his veins. Studying him she was glad to see though that his eyes were less glassed, more focused on the world around him. It was wearing off.

“Got it!” Tom pumps his fist. “Push the start button,” he orders Alice with a glance at the button next to his steering wheel.

“We don’t have the keys,” Alice disputes.

“Just push it,” Tom smiles.

Pressing her finger against the engine start button, Alice feels the SUV’s engine come to life.

“Remote start, baby,” Tom happy dances in his seat.

Leaning forward Nathan asks, “But you can’t drive using remote start, can you?”

Tom twists in his seat to face Nathan. “You can’t. I can. I am the Dumbledore of tech.”

“Alice,” Nathan’s gaze whips to her, “Seriously, what is going on?”

---

“Come on, Paige,” Piper orders with a smirk. She turns to lead Paige across the tarmac of the small airport outside of town. Heat from the hot pavement radiates over Paige’s feet. With the chirp of crickets and gentle breeze bringing cool night air, Paige is reminded of just how tired she is. Staying up late to binge-watch Netflix seemed like a great idea when all she had to do today was evening band camp. Now, she’s regretting that choice.

Stifling a yawn, Paige follows Piper and Roberto. The two nameless goons take up the rear, their gazes shifting periodically looking out for signs of trouble.

“In here,” Piper pushes open the door on the side of a hangar.

In the hangar sounds echo off the metal walls of the vast building. From her pocket, Tom’s keys jingle, the tiny sound enhanced with its echoes. Paige is immediately overcome with dread. Did she take the only means of escape that her mother had? Does that mean she’s all alone with Piper? And what will Piper do when she discovers that the files she wants are definitely not on her dead phone?

“In the office,” Piper says, her heels clacking on the cement floor. “There’s an android plug in there to charge the phone. Now, Roberto, get the plane ready. We’re taking off ASAP.”

Paige comes to a stop in an empty space between the office door Piper has disappeared behind a large private jet. It has panels of windows down the side showing it can hold maybe 10 people. Streaks of blue travel the underside of the plane and curl around the tail. Above the curls is a series of numbers and letters.

“Oh, Paige, in here,” Piper calls from the office door. “Hurry up!”

Taking her time, Paige’s shoes squeak lightly, and mixed with the jingle of the keys, the rhythm reminds Paige of a piano piece she had to play in third grade. That was when she hated piano with a passion but Alice had insisted. Paige had never told Alice how glad she was that she’d pushed her into music. In that moment, Paige made a plan to thank Alice for music and so many other things as soon as she saw her again. Assuming she saw her again.

Sitting on the edge of a heavy wooden desk, Piper holds her gun pointed at Paige. She nods to a chair at the desk. “Sit,” Piper says. “It should be charged soon, and we can get this all over with.”

 ---

“No, open the other app,” Tom sighs as he slows his SUV at a red light. No other cars are on the road this late, so he could have breezed through, but Alice’s ineptitude with technology has brought him to the end of his rope. “The find my keys app.”

“I was on that app, it said it didn’t work,” Alice shakes her head in frustration.

The SUV shudders with the force of Tom slamming it into park. “Switch,” he says as he climbs out of the front seat. Happily, Alice steps onto the road and rounds the vehicle. As she passes Tom by the rear bumper, she passes him his phone.

Being shorter than Tom, Alice takes time to adjust the seat and mirrors. The traffic light has cycled back to red when Tom let’s out an, “Ah ha!”

“You found her?” Nathan asks from the back seat. He’s drinking another bottle of water from Tom’s stash. It’s having the affect Alice had hoped, helping clear the drugs from his body faster.

“Yes,” Tom smiles. “Keep going north. The signal stopped at the old airport.”

“We found her,” Nathan celebrates with a squeeze to Alice’s shoulder. She smiles at him in the rearview mirror, enjoying being a part of the Melbourne family team again. Many nights since she’d left two years before she wondered if she’d ever see her family again. She knew she’d had to leave. His job had been easy before, but once one of the suspects learned her real identity and sent that threat, she knew she had to leave to protect her family. It had worked until tonight.

“We found her,” Alice repeats.

---

Tap, tap. Flick.

Tap, tap. Flick.

Piper’s heels tap on the floor as she paces and flicks one of her manicured nails against the edge of her gun. She’d been pacing as she waits for Paige’s phone to charge. The noise had nearly driven Paige batty, but the annoyance was overcome with apprehension. Paige completely lied about the data being on her phone. As she fingers the flash drive disguised as a Lego brick necklace hanging against her sternum, Paige tries to create a story that Piper will believe when she discovers the truth.

The trill sounding from Paige’s phone brings Piper to a stop. In a few quick steps, she hovers over Paige’s shoulder. Her closeness and the gun in her hand makes Paige sink lower into the office chair.

“Go ahead, unlock it,” Piper says using her gun to point at the phone sitting on the desk.

Paige wipes the sweat from her hands on her shorts before reaching for her phone. In an instant, it’s unlocked glowing with a picture of her and Nathan dressed up for Halloween from last year. Their goofy pirate costumes are dotted with icons for Paige’s apps.

“I can’t do this with you over my shoulder,” Paige says, her fingers trembling noticeably.

“Oh, give me a break,” Piper huffs and steps away.

With a sigh of relief, Paige hunkers over her phone praying with all her heart that she doesn’t get caught. She opens her texting app and takes a look at the smeared marker on the palm of her hand. She taps in Brayden’s number, balking at the fact that she’s having to use it to send out a distress signal instead of to ask him to hang out like they’d intended. The deep hazel of his eyes and his slightly sideways smile flash through her mind as she types in the distress message. Bobbing her head to the rhythm of Piper’s tap, tap, flick, she taps in the tail number of the plane in the hangar. While waiting for the phone to charge, Paige had been rhythmically chanting it in her mind to the beat of Piper’s pacing.

“Are you kidding me?” Piper rages grabbing for Paige’s phone. “Like seriously, are you kidding me?” Her face is tight with wrath, her mouth a snarl.

Paige scuffles with Piper tucking the phone close, struggling to get her finger to the “send” button. She has to send this text. She has no idea where her mom is or where Piper plans to go next. This is her last shot.

But Piper is furious. Her sharp nails scratch across Paige’s bare forearm as she grasps for the phone. Thin strips of red appear looking like a giant cat scratch.

“No,” Paige cries. “You can’t do this.”

“Boss?” Roberto fills the office doorway.

“Get the phone!” Piper screeches.

With a quick slip of her thumb, Paige hits send and does the only thing she can do next. Leaping from the chair, Paige raises her arm high and throws her phone against the cement floor as hard as she can. The sound of plastic and glass breaking fills her with a short-lived joy.

“You!” Piper screams. “I’m going to kill you!” By the look in Piper’s eyes as she lunges for Paige, Paige knows she means it.

All her senses sparking and her survival instincts commanding her to run, Paige gets two steps from Piper before she’s seized around her waist. Piper might be small, but she’s as strong as an ox. She drags Paige into the hanger screaming out commands to her team to get the plane ready for flight.

Everyone is moving quickly. Roberto has scooped up the remains of Paige’s phone and is on his way to the plane’s cockpit. The two nameless goons are unlocking the large hangar door. Fighting to no avail against Piper’s grasp, tears have begun to stream down Paige’s face.

With a roar, the engines on the plane come to life making Paige’s heart race faster. She knows she can’t get on the plane, that she’ll never leave it alive if she does.

The hangar door trembles as it locks into its open position. This is it. It’s now or never. Paige digs her teeth into Piper’s arm. With a yelp, her grip loosens on Paige, who’s now squirming to break free.

A flash of headlights fills the hangar. Blocking their exit is a white SUV. Squinting into the light, Paige can’t see who’s driving. Her heart drops thinking it might be one of Piper’s friends. But then she hears Alice’s voice, faint over the roaring engines.

“Let her go now!”

Thoughts flicker across Piper’s face as she looks between the airplane and the SUV. But she doesn’t let go of Paige.



Paige feels every breath Piper takes. Crushed against the double-crossing CIA agent, the scent of her department store perfume mixes with the pungent smell of gun powder from the handgun Piper presses to Paige’s jaw.

“Mom?” Paige cries, her voice weak from fear.

“Let her go,” Alice commands again, this time speaking lower, steadier.

“You have got to be kidding me,” Piper sighs, digging the barrel of the gun into Paige’s cheek.

“Piper,” Alice softens her voice more, “let’s talk. Just the two of us and work this out.”

“There is nothing to work out, Alice!” Piper yells. “You have something I want, and you will give it to me or you will all die!”

“Okay, let’s do that. Let me give you what you want,” Alice says. “Tom, you go back to the car with Nathan. I’m sure I’ll be out soon.”

Piper’s grip on Paige lightened helping lower the pounding in Paige’s ears. She’s able to take a short breath thinking she can walk away, go to the car with Tom and her dad. This could finally all be over. But Piper doesn’t let go, doesn’t drop her gun.

“I’m keeping her as collateral,” Piper says leaning her head against Paige’s. The oddity of Piper’s cheek resting against her hair sends a shiver down Paige’s spine. This woman is messed up in so many ways. Paige can’t help but question how Piper ever became a CIA agent.

Alice takes a slow breath before speaking over her shoulder to Tom. “Go ahead, take the car around to the side. I’m sure that both of us will be out soon.”

“Are you sure this is a good idea?” Tom asks with a look of dread.

“It’ll be fine,” Alice says then turns her gaze to Nathan and repeats. “It’ll be fine. I’m sure of it. Piper wouldn’t ever do anything to hurt my daughter.”

With hesitation, Tom slides back into his SUV, the engine still running. Nathan hesitates. His gaze stays on Paige until she smiles, a tight smile, but one to tell her dad that she’s really okay, even if it’s a lie. After Nathan climbs into the SUV, Tom steers it slowly around the side of the hangar.

“Now your turn,” Alice points to Roberto and the other goons.

“Beat it,” Piper nods her head toward the hangar door.

“But boss?” Roberto questions Piper.

“Just go,” Piper huffs. “She’s just an accountant and a 14-year-old kid. I’ll be fine.”

“I’m fifteen,” Paige whispers under her breath as Piper loosens her grip on Paige but not on the gun. But Piper doesn’t acknowledge her, just pulls her arm leading Paige toward the office.

Stepping through the doorway, Alice’s gaze darts from the pieces of broken glass and plastic on the floor from Paige’s destroyed phone. And Paige thinks she sees a quick look of admiration flash through Alice’s eyes.

“Shall we sit?” Alice nods to the desk and pulls up a rickety metal folding chair from the corner. Piper shoves Paige into the chair next to the desk and drops into the rolling office chair.

“And how about we put down the gun?” Alice asks, more of a command than a question. Paige can’t help looking at Alice’s ankle, looking for the bulge of the gun Alice had pulled out earlier that night. That was when she’d showed up totally unexpected after Paige’s summer marching band practice and the whole night had taken a wild turn.

“It’s late, and this has taken too long,” Piper says setting her gun on the desk between her and Paige. “Let’s just get this done. Where are the files?”

As Piper settles back in her chair, Paige looks at the gun on the desk. It’s not far away. She could reach out and grab it if she really wanted. Flashes of lessons from the hunter safety class in seventh grade fill her mind. Looking closely, she sees the small lever near the trigger, the safety. It’s just a little switch that swivels to the side. Paige is relieved to see it’s in the safe position.

“Okay,” Alice begins with a sigh. “I do still have the files. I just can’t get to them now. That’s what I was trying to do earlier.”

“I know, Alice, like when you stopped at that boy’s house,” Piper says. A flicker of fear fills Paige. That was Brayden’s house, the guy she’s been crushing on. Paige never imagined that Piper knew about that when she texted him the tail number of Piper’s plane. What kind of trouble had she just made for Brayden?

But Alice doesn’t falter with this knowledge that Piper has been surveilling her. She continues, her voice steady and calm. The only sign of her apprehension is in the twitch of her left pinky finger.

“Yes, of course you know about that,” Alice says. “I’ve got the files in a safe place. Don’t worry, I haven’t blown into a conch shell to rally the cavalry.”

“What?” Piper squints in confusion at Alice.

But Paige knows exactly what she’s saying. The woman she’d studied in fifth grade history, Nancy Hart and written “The Conch and the Cavalry” essay. Her and Alice had laughed when she made that the title of her paper. And when Paige glanced at the gun on the table, she clearly saw Alice nod in agreement.

“It’s an old phrase from around here,” Alice brushes Piper off. “Basically, I haven’t uploaded the original files to the server or anything. They’re all safely on a flash drive in a very secure location.”

“Then tell me the location!” Piper leans forward, her breath blowing back stray strands of Alice’s hair. Paige leans to the side and reaches for the gun, pulling it inches closer to herself. Her lungs don’t work for the moment it takes her, her heart stopping in her chest. If they get caught, Paige has no idea how they’ll talk their way out of it.

“It’s safe, okay?” Alice shrugs. Her nonchalance is tainted by that twitching pinky and tap of her foot. She won’t be able to drag this out long, Paige knows that. She reaches for the gun again and slides it another inch.

With a quick turn of her head, Piper’s gaze lands on Paige. For a moment, Paige thinks she’s been caught. Pushing her glasses up her nose to hide her roaming hand, Paige sinks into the chair wishing she could disappear from all this.

“Piper, I promise,” Alice says recapturing Piper’s gaze. “It’s safe. And I’ll give it to you if you give me what I want.”

“What is that?” Piper asks.

“Out,” Alice replies as Paige reaches for the gun again. “I want out of the CIA. I want to go back to my family. The only way I can do that is if you set us up in witness protection.” Paige’s heart drops, but not because of Piper, because of Alice. Witness protection? That’d mean moving, a new school, new friends, never talking to her friends or Brayden ever again.

“What’s the catch?” Piper tents her fingers in front of her mouth.

“I want a big house in a good school district with a very, very well-paying job,” Alice says, her gaze darting to the gun. Paige slides it another inch closer. “And nowhere too cold either.”

Another slide. Paige is relishing reliving Nancy Hart’s story, the subject of her report. How Nancy Hart welcomed the English soldiers into her home, had her daughter blow the conch shell to rally the neighbors, and how she’d gotten the solders so drunk on her homemade liquor that they didn’t notice her moving their guns a few inches every time she passed by to fill their glasses again. Eventually, Nancy Hart took the upper hand and overtook the soldiers with their own guns.

Nancy Hart took back her life, Paige thinks as her mother describes giving their lives away. She hates hearing Alice add details to the new life she wants Piper to give them, but she loves that Piper hadn’t noticed her… yet.

“What else? A ride on the next rocket to space?” Piper sneers. “Geez, Alice, you know we can’t do all that.”

“Yes, we can,” Alice leans forward, closer to Piper but also closer to Paige. “I’ve seen the receipts, the tax records. We’ve done it before. And we’ll do it again or you won’t get your precious little flash drive so you can hide the fact that you’re aiding a known drug and antiquities smuggler.”

Even though her pinky finger is still twitching, Paige has never seen Alice look more in control. Before she’d disappeared to work for the CIA, Alice would have never talked to someone like she is to Piper now.

Biting her lip as she thinks, Piper turns to look out the office door and Alice jumps into action. She leaps for the gun that is only six inches from Paige on the table, but not quickly enough. Piper thrusts herself between Alice and the gun, tumbling into Alice and taking them both to the floor.

Paige squeals, raising her hands to protect herself from the flailing women. On the hard cement floor Alice struggles against Piper’s strength. Piper is quick and slippery like a fish. She’s on her feet before Paige can decide what she should be doing. But seeing Piper’s eyes squinted in determination, her hair disheveled and wild as she lunges for the gun, Paige knows what to do.

Thrusting herself up from the chair, Paige uses her body to block Piper as she reaches for the gun. The cold metal feels wrong in her hands. It’s too heavy, too awkward. But her fingers still wrap around the grip before Piper can grab it.

Paige whips around and ducks low to avoid Piper’s grasp. She catches Alice’s gaze and tosses the gun. The world stops. Paige watches the gun float through the air and land in Alice’s hands. Alice lifts the gun and points it directly at Piper’s chest.

“Finally, this ends now,” Alice says flicking off the safety. Paige stumbles as she runs for cover behind her mother.

Frozen, Piper’s gaze is locked on Alice. Paige watches the wheels turning in the woman’s eyes as they flicker between Alice and the gun in Alice’s hands.

There’s no sound except Paige’s quick breaths as she waits to see what Piper will do next. Alice keeps the gun steady on her former boss and friend, her finger no longer twitching. It feels like years have passed before Piper raises her hands in defeat.

Before she can say anything though, the sound of a siren cuts through the night. Alice, Piper, and Paige look out the office door. Red and blue flashing lights flicker into the hangar. And in the flash of lights a new expression invades Piper’s face. She lifts her hands in surrender as her eyes widen. When the first police officer steps out of his cruiser just inside the hangar Piper begins to yell, “Help! Help! They’re trying to hurt me!”

The look on Piper’s face is pathetic, she’s acting the part of the victim so well that all the cops’ guns turn to target Alice and Paige.

“This didn’t go how I thought it would,” Alice sighs as she lowers the gun to the floor and raises her hands. “Put your hands up, Paige. We’re about to be arrested.”



“This stinks,” Paige says resting the side of her head against the window of the police cruiser. Shifting, she tries in vain to release the pressure of the handcuffs from digging into her wrists.

“I’m so sorry,” Alice replies, tears streaming down her face. With her head drooped forward in defeat, the tears fall to her lap leaving dark circles on her slacks.

Paige and Alice, mom and daughter, ride in silence the rest of the way to the police station. Alice had already instructed Paige not to say a word about their evening. Her eyes are so intense that Paige knew she was deadly serious. The only saving grace was that when the police cruiser passed Tech Guy Tom’s white SUV, Paige could clearly see the silhouette of two men in the front seats watching as the car slipped by.

“We’re here,” a gruff officer says from the driver’s seat. He and his partner, a middle-aged woman with gray hairs escaping her tight bun, climb out of the car and adjust the various items on their belts before opening the doors for Paige and Alice to climb out.

“She’s my daughter,” Alice says, “so we should be kept together.”

The policeman huffs, his face soured by years of dealing with criminals. “That’s up to the chief.” He ushers Alice and Paige into the quiet police station. Not surprisingly to Paige, there aren’t many criminals or police lingering in the station at 2:00 a.m.

As Paige is stifling a yawn, Alice leans over and whispers, “Don’t forget your one phone call.”

“Who am I going to call?” Paige asks with a pointed glance at Alice. “Grandma won’t hear the phone without her hearing aids, and I think that Dad is off the table for now too.”

“Her hearing is that bad now?” Alice frowns. “I know she was going downhill a few years ago, but…”

“Mom,” Paige starts, “you’ve been gone two years. What did you expect?”

Alice bites her lip, which makes Paige want to wrap her arms around Alice in a huge hug. Wearing handcuffs makes this impossible, so she leans into her mom, resting her chin on Alice’s shoulder.

“No touching!” the lady cop commands. At this, the guy cop comes out of an office, his face even further soured. “Put them in interrogation room 3.”

The lady cop leads Alice and Paige into a stark room with only a table, two chairs, and a big mirror. Paige is stifling another yawn when she catches sight of her reflection. Her hair is fried, flying in all directions. Circles are darkening under her eyes, and she has a ketchup stain on her shirt. It’s been the longest night of her life and it’s not over yet.

“Don’t say anything,” Alice says sinking into one of the chairs. “Let me do all the talking.”

 Paige nods and leans against the wall, the cold cinder blocks against her arms helping to stimulate her senses and keep her away. But after a few minutes, a new cop with lots of decoration on his uniform comes in, introduces himself as Captain Graves, and starts throwing questions at Alice.     

Each of her replies are either “I can’t comment on that” or “I don’t have knowledge of that.” The back and forth between Alice and Captain Graves continues forever. Without a clock on the wall or a phone in her hand, Paige has no idea what time it is. But with her arms stiff from the handcuffs and her eyes drying from exhaustion, Paige knows she needs a change of location ASAP. If not, she’s sure she’ll fall over dead asleep on the floor in the next two minutes.

“I want to make my phone call,” Paige says from the corner of the room.

Captain Graves shifts his gaze to Paige with a quirked eyebrow. Swiveling in her chair, Alice’s eyes ask questions that Paige can’t answer.

“And I really have to pee,” Paige adds. “It’s been forever, and I just really have to go now.”

Paige has no idea what she’s doing, she hasn’t all night long. Getting out of this room is the biggest goal she has now and she’ll take any chance she can get to make that happen.

“Officer Fisher!” the captain yells at the door. When the lady cop opens it, he instructs her to take Paige to the restroom. As she leads Paige down the hallway, the squeak of Piper Glen’s voice bounces through the halls from another interrogation room. As they pass, Paige leans for the door trying in vain to hear what lies Piper is making up now. Just the sound of her mouse-like voice makes Paige’s blood run cold.

Standing in the tiny, tiled bathroom with the scent of industrial cleaners stinging her nose, Paige turns to Officer Fisher. “Can these come off?” She nods at her hands still cuffed behind her. “It’s kind of hard to do this without my hands.”

Officer Fisher’s eyes tighten as she looks Paige over from head to toe. “Okay,” she says reaching for her keys. “But make it quick. I’ll be standing right here, so don’t try anything.”

“Okay,” Paige shrugs. With the click of two tiny locks, Paige is released from the handcuffs. She immediately rubs her wrists. Red lines cover them from where the metal had dug into her skin for the past few hours. She stretches her fingers relishing their freedom.

“Hurry up,” Officer Fisher nods at the stall door.

Going quickly, but not too fast, Paige takes care of her business and goes to wash her hands. As she squirts thick pink soap into her palm, she sees the numbers still scrawled there. They’re faded, but she can clearly make out Brayden’s phone number. The idea hits like a ton of bricks. Brayden. Her last phone call. She can’t do anything to save herself now, but she can call Brayden to apologize for getting him wrapped up in this mess.

And she can make sure that he’s okay, that Piper’s henchmen haven’t gotten to him.

Turning around and holding her hands out in front of herself, Paige tells Officer Fisher, “I’m ready for my phone call.”

To her great relief, Officer Fisher cuffs her hands in her front before leading her out. “Sit down,” Officer Fisher points to a chair next to a desk. It’s covered in cheap vinyl, cracks splitting and digging at the back of Paige’s legs where her shorts don’t cover. But Paige quickly dismisses the comfort when Officer Fisher passes her the phone from her desk.

Her fingers trembling with anticipation, Paige dials Brayden’s number. It rings but goes to voicemail making Paige’s heart quicken. She can’t do this over voicemail. No one uses voicemail anymore anyway. Her gaze jumps to Officer Fisher.

“He didn’t answer,” she says. “Probably because it’s so late. I guess it is, I don’t know what time it is now.” Paige looks around the room searching for a clock.

With a quick glance at her computer screen, Officer Fisher says, “It’s 3:50 a.m.”

“Oh, wow,” Paige says surprised. This is the latest she’s ever been up. Even at slumber parties, she is always the first person to fall asleep. “Can I just try the number again?”

“Sure,” Officer Fisher says wrapping her arms over her chest and yawning widely.

The line connects and the phone rings. Paige holds her breath counting the rings. One. Two. Three. Four. Fiv—.

“Hello?” Bryden’s sleep-filled voice cracks over the phone.

“Brayden!” Paige jumps as she shouts his name with excitement. She presses the phone harder against her ear.

“Who is this?” Brayden asks to the sound of him shifting in his bed.

“Paige. It’s Paige,” she replies feeling hopeful to hear his voice but also dreading all she has to tell him in a short amount of time. “Did you get my text earlier?”

“Paige?” His volume rises as he wakens. “Are you okay? After that weird text message, I didn’t know what to do. Did you get my texts? You never replied.”

“No, I didn’t get them,” Paige blurted, her words falling like a waterfall. “I had to destroy my phone. Was that you who called the police? Because I’m kind of in some trouble now and I was worried you were in trouble too.”

“Yeah, I called the police,” Brayden says. “They didn’t believe me at first. Then this one guy called back right after I hung up. He said he was with the CIA. Paige, what is going on?”

A look at Officer Fisher assured Paige that she was eavesdropping. Watching her words, Paige replies, “Look, I just need to know that you’re okay.”

“Yeah, I’m fine,” Brayden says. “Are you okay?”

Searching for the right words, Paige licks her lips. “Yeah, I’m fine. Things are weird, but I’m fine.”

“What can I do to help?” Brayden asks.

“Nothing. Just forget everything tonight,” Paige says. “Everything is going to work itself out, that’s what my mom said. So, I’m sure it’ll be fine.” Smiling as she talks, Paige hopes with all her heart that Brayden believes her. Her speech teacher last year had said to smile when you talk to win over your audience. Paige doesn’t know if that works over the phone, but she keeps the smile plastered anyway.

“Okay,” Brayden sighs. “So you’re okay?”

“Yeah, I wanted to thank you for calling the police,” Paige replies sinking into her chair. Across the room, two men in dark suits stride down the hall like they’re on a mission. When they stop at the interrogation room where Alice is still talking to the captain, Paige freezes.

“Paige? You still there?” Brayden’s voice is tight, strained. Does he feel the tension filling every cell of Paige’s body?

“Yeah, I’m here,” Paige forces out. “Thanks. And sorry to call so late. My phone is broken. And I just wanted to make sure everything was good there.”

The two suits knock quickly, then enter the interrogation room. The stern looks on their faces and the briskness of their movements makes Paige sit up taller.

“I’m fine here, just stayed up too late playing Fortnight with the guys.” A faint knocking sound comes over the line. “Hold on,” Brayden says.

“What is it?” Paige asks.

“Time’s up,” Officer Fisher informs her reaching for the phone.

Paige grabs the phone and presses it against her chest. “Just give me another minute,” Paige says. “Brayden, are you still there?”

“Come on, kid,” Officer Fisher rolls her eyes.

“There’s someone here. That’s weird,” Brayden says.

“Who is it?” Paige asks avoiding Officer Fisher’s hands reaching for the phone.

“Kid, cut it out,” Officer Fisher warns. “Give me the phone.”

“My mom is talking to them, probably no one,” Brayden says sending a wave of relief over Paige. He’s home. He’s safe. Nothing will happen to him. “Hold on. I gotta go. Mom says I need to go down and talk to someone.”

Every alarm bell in Paige’s body goes off at once. “No! Don’t!” she yells into the phone, but the line is dead. Brayden is gone. Paige doesn’t try to deflect when Officer Fisher grabs the phone from her hands.

“Officer,” a booming voice comes from across the room. Outside the interrogation room, one of the suits is motioning to Officer Fisher.

“Let’s go,” Officer Fisher lifts Paige under the arm and pulls her to standing. As she directs Paige’s feet toward the suit, Paige feels every nerve in her body screaming to run, to get away.

The suit, a Latin man with thick hair and a thin beard, stands in the doorway. His face is neutral, like a gambler. It says nothing. And that nothing is crazy scary to Paige. He looks over his shoulder and with another nod, the other suit leads Alice out of the room. This guy is blonde and tanned, looking like a surfer in a sharp suit.

“Ladies,” he says, “come with us.” Alice gives Paige a deflated nod. What is happening? Paige falls in line behind Alice and the surfer suit guy. The Latin suit guy follows behind.

“Mom?” Paige whispers.

“No talking,” commands the surfer suit guy.

They follow in silence down the hall and outside to where a big, black SUV waits. After the night she’s had, Paige bucks at the SUV.

“No way,” she says as the Latin suit guy behind her presses her toward the back door.

“Sweetheart,” Alice pins Paige with a glance. “Go. It’s okay.” Her gaze drifts to the suit guy’s side, to the noticeable bulge that Paige knows is a gun.

Paige groans as she climbs into the back of the SUV. Not again. Not more guns. Will this ever end?

When the SUV squeals turning out of the parking lot, Paige is thrown against Alice in the wide backseat. After a few miles of quick turns and more sliding around, the SUV comes to an abrupt stop in front of a darkened grocery store.

“ETA one minute,” surfer suit guy says, removing his fingertips from his ear and back to the steering wheel.

“Are these the good guys?” Paige whispers to her mom.

Before answering, Alice looks to see if the suits are listening. “I think so,” she replies.

“You think?” Paige gasps.

“There they are,” Latin suit guy points out the front window to another dark SUV zipping into the parking lot.

When the suits get out of the car, Paige tries the door handle. It’s locked from the outside. She’s looking around the SUV, trying to find a way to escape when the door next to her swings open, and two cops shove someone into the backseat with Paige and Alice.

A body crashes against Paige, shoving her closer to Alice. “Hey, watch it,” Paige cries. The surfer suit guy smiles and slams the door shut.

That’s when the new person lifts his head. Thick hair. His hazel eyes wide with fear find Paige.



“Brayden?” Paige gasps. She whips to face Alice. “Mom, these are not the good guys.”

The SUV’s tires squeal speeding away from the empty parking lot. Crickets sing into the night as a twinge of dawn creeps toward the horizon they’re racing toward. No one in the SUV speaks as they zip past the few early morning commuters on the road with bleary eyes and giant mugs of coffee. Paige watches their lights pass wishing that one of them, just one of them would look at the SUV and see that she, her mom, and Brayden were being held against their will. Just one person to make this night finally end.



But no one does.

A nudge from Alice’s elbow captures Paige’s attention. Her mom is more composed now. The tears are gone, but she still looks like a wreck with her hair loose from her ponytail and thin streaks of mascara trailing down her cheeks from her tears earlier. With her hands tied behind her back still, Alice can’t do anything about it. She nods at Brayden’s foot that rests next to Paige’s.

Paige hadn’t noticed before but Brayden’s toe taps rapidly on the floor of the SUV. Besides the whisking sound of cars passing, the tapping is the only noise in the vehicle. A glance at Brayden’s face is all Paige needs to know that he’s scared to death. Paige bitterly thinks that Brayden is doing well for his first kidnapping. She’d already been pulled or tossed into a car a handful of times tonight.

“Brayden,” Paige whispers as she rests her foot on his toes to still them. His gaze darts to Paige with eyes wide with fear. The mixture of greens and browns that Paige had fawned over during many band practices are overshadowed. He’d always been the guy Paige had looked for in the full band room. He was always nice to her and friendly, so it broke part of Paige’s heart to see him like this now.

“I’m sorry,” Paige mouths. When the surfer suit guy and the Latin suit guy in the front seats are distracted by a crackling sound coming through the speakers in their ears Paige adds, “We’re going to get out of this.”

“What’s going on? What do they want with me?” Brayden asks.

“They want me,” Alice whispers across Paige. “You helped me and they’re cleaning up loose ends.”

“Loose ends?” Brayden’s eyes widen further. His chest rises and falls with rapidity as panic takes over.

“Breathe,” Alice says gently sounding like a mom again and not a CIA agent. “Just breathe, Brayden. Bend forward and put your head between your knees. And just breathe.”

With his head between his knees, Brayden’s breaths come more slowly. Without thought, Paige rests her handcuffed hands on his back and rubs slow circles. It was something her mom had done when she was upset. The last time Alice had comforted Paige like this was the night before she’d left for her new job. Paige had been upset because girls in her class had been making fun of her for some silly reason Paige couldn’t remember now. But as she brushed her hand over Brayden’s back feeling the bones of his ribs and spine she remembers clearly her mom’s hands tracing the same pattern. That was when Alice had promised she’d be home after two weeks. Those two weeks had been extended and extended again and again until Paige stopped asking when her mom would come home. Two years later, those feelings of abandonment boil in her gut as she remembers how brokenhearted she’d been.

“Brayden, it’s okay,” Paige says. “We’ll get out of this. I know we will.”

“This is next-level chaos, Paige,” Brayden shudders taking a deep breath.

“Trust me, I know,” Paige huffs.

“Quiet back there,” the Latin suit guy orders, a hint of an accent in his words.

Paige looks to Alice for guidance. A quick nod tells Paige that she needs to follow their commands. Maybe it’s because she’s been up all night, maybe it’s because she’s just not used to all the kidnapping and evil guys in suits. Whatever it is, Paige is done with all the deception.

“Or what?” Paige asks, her voice loud in the small space.

The Latin guy in a suit turns in his seat to glare at Paige.

“Seriously, or what?” Paige raises her voice louder.

“Paige,” Alice scolds.

“Mom, for real. What are they planning on doing? I mean if they want to kill us all, why can’t we have a little chat in the back of the bad guy’s SUV?” Paige’s heart skips a beat as her mind races through old feelings of hurt and new feelings of fear. They’re mixing with her exhaustion and making her mind a mess, a puddle of nonsense and recklessness.

“Maybe you’re right,” the Latin suit guy says. “Maybe you’re wrong. Do you want to find out?”

“What if I do?” Paige challenges, a tsunami of fear rushing over her. But she holds her gaze and doesn’t blink.

The Latin suit guy stares her down, his dark brown eyes boring into her. A smile tugs at the side of his mouth as he slaps the surfer suit guy’s arm.

“I like her,” the Latin suit guy says with a chuckle. “We might need to keep her around. She’s tough.”

“Whatever you say, boss,” the surfer suit guy says. This earns him another slap on the shoulder from the Latin suit guy, but not the playful kind. He’s being chastised.

“Turn there,” the Latin suit guy says. He brushes his thick black curls out of his face as he points. The movement accentuates his chiseled jaw, a chiseled jaw that Paige remembers seeing on Piper’s mobile phone screen.

“Mom,” Paige whispers elbowing Alice in the side with more force than she’d expected.

“Paige,” Alice replies recoiling from Paige’s elbows. “What?”

Brayden leans forward trying to capture what Paige is telling Alice. “That’s him,” Paige says, her heart in her throat. “That’s the guy. The bad guy.”

“I thought we’d already established they were bad guys,” Brayden nods at the front seat.

Glaring at Brayden in frustration, Paige leans into Alice. “Not bad guys. Bad guy. What was his name? I can’t remember, something like it was from a movie.”

Her eyes widening with realization, Alice speaks with her full voice. “Sebastian Miranda.”

The Latin suit guy turns to face Alice. With a debonair smile, he says, “Nice to meet you.”

“Wait,” Brayden looks between Alice and Sebastian. “Who is this guy?”

Her gaze cold and locked on Sebastian Miranda, Alice answers, “Sebastian Miranda. One of the FBI’s top ten wanted criminals. He smuggles and sells anything that will make him money. Art. Drugs. People.”

“I see my reputation proceeds me,” Sebastian Miranda says his smile still plastered on his face. “But I also like long walks on the beach and puppies, but no one in the FBI or CIA likes to talk about my better qualities.”

“What are your plans with us?” Alice’s jaw tightens.

“I’m going to finish what Piper couldn’t,” Sebastian Miranda replies. “I’m going to get those files, for real, and destroy them. Without that evidence, no one can bring charges against me. And I’ll be free to do as I please.”

Paige can’t resist glancing at the necklace that hangs around her neck. The flash drive is still hidden in the Lego brick disguise. There’s no way that Sebastian Miranda could know that the files he wants are literally within his grasp now. Paige hopes with all her heart that he never finds out.

“We don’t have the files with us. I told Piper that but she didn’t believe us,” Alice lies.

Shaking his head and tsking his tongue, Sebastian Miranda leans closer to Alice. “That can’t be true. Piper may have done some things wrong tonight but she did a lot of things right. She’s already cleared your personal belongings and your storage clouds. She didn’t find the files. That can mean only one thing. They are somewhere in your possession. And now you’re going to tell me where they are.”

The SUV skids to a stop, gravel spitting from the tires. Both men in the front seats climb out and open the back doors. Alice is pulled out from Paige’s left as Brayden is pulled out from her right. Sebastian Miranda reaches for Paige, but she skids backward across the seat. Her escape attempt is cut short when surfer suit guy tightens his grip around her arms and yanks her from the SUV.

Off-kilter and stumbling, Paige falls to the grass. “Keep your hands off her,” Alice commands, stepping between Paige and the surfer suit guy. He sneers in response and steps back. The first lights of dawn break into the night. It lights the dirt road in front of them. Paige adjusts her glasses and squints looking closer at the road. It’s surrounded by dense forest that has been cleared for at least 20 feet on each side. Down the road, a red light flashes on and off.

“This is your last chance to do this the easy way,” Sebastian Miranda says shoving Brayden next to Alice. “Tell me now and this will all end. String me along more and I won’t play so nicely.”

Standing, Paige bites her lip. She wants to tell them that all the information they want is hanging from her neck. But she can’t. Alice had made that clear. This is one really bad guy and he needs to be put away for a very long time. As if confirming that they’re keeping their silence, Alice stands straighter and keeps her mouth shut.

“Look, I don’t know anything about this,” Brayden says, his voice quivering.

“Doesn’t matter,” Sebastian Miranda says holding his hand out to the surfer suit guy. Overhead the hum of an engine breaks through the morning birds singing in the trees. Paige realizes that the road isn’t a road, it’s a landing strip. Sebastian’s glance at the sky confirms it.

Pulling something from the back of the SUV, the surfer suit guy drops it into Sebastian’s hand. In the early morning dimness, Paige can’t tell what it is until Sebastian lifts it and points it at Brayden.

“You’re a part of this now whether you want to be or not,” Sebastian says leveling a gun at Brayden’s chest.

“No!” Paige screams as she lunges between Brayden and Sebastian. In response, Alice reaches for Paige, clawing to pull her back.

When the gun goes off, Paige feels a ripping sting in her shoulder. She screams out in pain as she falls to the ground. Her eyes are swimming, the world around her looking blurry. Squinting in concentration, Paige looks at her burning shoulder and sees a thin tube sticking out. As Sebastian turns the gun on Alice and Brayden, Paige realizes that she hasn’t been shot with a bullet. It’s a tranquilizer that’s making her head foggy and her eyelids feel like they’re weighted with all the bricks in the world.

“Mom,” Paige mutters trying to lift her hand for Alice. But Alice is limp next to her. A tranquilizer tube sticks out of her thigh. Paige blinks and blinks again, each time finding it more difficult to open her eyes. She forces herself to roll on her back and turns her head to Brayden. He blinks heavily at her, his eyes focused on nothing.

With the last of her strength, Paige reaches for Brayden’s hand. Her final thought before drifting into unconsciousness is how warm Brayden’s fingers are.

Shifting her shoulders rough carpet scratches against Paige’s cheek. It itches but lifting her hand to scratch her cheek takes more effort than it should. To Paige, it feels like she’s weighted down, under a hundred heavy blankets. There’s a deep rumbling sound and something warm against her back. Her eyes don’t help her figure out her new surroundings. As she scratches her cheek she reaches to push her glasses up and finds them gone. Blinking doesn’t sharpen the world around her neither does squinting. She has no idea where she is.

A quick gasp escapes as panic brews deep in Paige’s gut.

“Paige?” Alice whispers. “Stay quiet.”

The voice comes from behind her, so Paige forces her body to roll to her back from the small space she’s wedged into. It takes all her effort to make her unhelpful body shift. But doing so reveals that the warm thing pressed against her back is Brayden. He’s so close Paige can see his face clearly without her glasses. It looks like he’s sleeping, but Paige remembers the tranquilizer darts shot into each of them. Before she shifts her gaze to find her mom, Paige watches Brayden’s chest rise and lower. He's breathing at least, she thinks.

“Are you okay?” Alice’s hushed whisper comes from a long white couch attached to the wall. She’s splayed on her side, her arm hanging over the edge so her hand rests on Brayden’s back. Paige guesses she was checking his breathing too.

Nodding, Paige asks, “Where are we?” She squints at the strange round windows over Alice’s shoulder. Bright sunlight pours in making the space look almost welcoming.

“Airplane,” Alice whispers pointing toward her feet.

With effort, Paige lifts her head and squints down the long tube. Soft, leather-covered armchairs are bolted to the floor ahead of them. The white leather is clean, looking new and expensive. Beyond is a short, dark hallway with a doorway cracked. Paige can make out blurry flickers of lights that must be the control panels in the cockpit. Next to her is another couch attached to the wall.

With her questioning glance at the empty couch, Alice says, “You rolled off a minute ago. I think that woke you up.”

“Where are they taking us?” Paige asks.

“Shh,” Alice whispers. “Don’t let them hear us. See? Sebastian Miranda is asleep.”

“See?” Paige whispers. “I can’t see anything. Where are my glasses?”

“I don’t know, sweetheart.” Alice sighs. “They knocked me out too. Your glasses must have fallen off when they put us on the plane.”

“Mom,” Paige bites her lip to keep her voice down, “I need my glasses.”

“I know. I know,” Alice says, her face dropping. “I never should have pulled you into this.”

“There’s still a way out, right?” Paige asks. Feeling more life coming back to her limbs as the tranquilizers slowly fade. She shifts against the solid couch at her back. Brayden is plastered against her, and feeling so much of herself pressed against him fills her with an awkward feeling. Sure, she’d daydreamed about kissing him all last school year. But she’d never imagined she’d find herself pressed against him, their bodies compressed together from shoulders to toes.

“Paige, this may not end well,” Alice whispers. “You need to be prepared for that.”

“Mom,” Paige whines, “how do I ever prepare for that?”

“Wherever we land, you have to break away.” Alice’s face is hardened. This isn’t like when she warned Paige to always look both ways before crossing the street or to wear her helmet when she was on her bike. This level of seriousness exudes from Alice so strongly that Paige can feel the air between them shift. “Do whatever you can to get away. Get to the police. Get to anyone who will help you. Just get away.”

“Mom?” Paige whimpers, fear creeping across her body. “I don’t know if I can do that.”

“Yes, you can,” Alice smiles. “You didn’t freak out like Brayden. I know you’ve been scared. But you’ve kept a level head all night. I couldn’t be more proud.”

When Paige bites her lip this time it’s to keep the tears pooling in her eyes from running down her face. “Mom,” she says reaching across Brayden who continues to breathe softly between them without stirring.

Alice’s fingers wrap around Paige’s, the feel of her hand more than Paige can take. The tears fall in slow rivulets. Alice can’t hold back any longer either. Her own tears fall to the soft leather of the couch and she doesn’t wipe them away.

“My glasses,” Paige starts.

“We can do this without your glasses,” Alice interrupts. “I know you can.”

“No, it’s not that.” Paige presses her fingers tighter against Alice’s. “Those were the glasses you helped me pick out before you left.”

Alice’s mouth opens but no words come out. Paige can see her wheels turning, flipping through memories. To Alice, it was probably just a quick trip to replace Paige’s glasses that had been broken in a softball incident in P.E. but Paige remembered it as the last time they’d spent time together.

“Remember?” Paige asks. “You talked me out of those giant green frames and said that the purple ones with the little flowers on the arms were going to look best on me. We went for ice cream afterward and you asked me way too many questions about school. It was the last time we hung out before you left.”

“Oh, Paige,” Alice releases a breath looking like she’d been holding it in for the two years she’d been gone. “I didn’t realize.”

“I know,” Paige nods. “It’s just that Dad tried to get me to choose new glasses a few times, but I always kept those. They were what you picked for me, a little something of you I could keep with me.”

“You know I never meant to be gone so long,” Alice says.  “I was only sent as a consultant, but when I discovered some discrepancies in an account that other agents hadn’t caught, Piper convinced me to stay for one more case, then another and another. Eventually, I’d been gone so long that I didn’t know how to come back home.”

“Señor?” a voice from the front of the cabin stops Alice. Paige can make out a man in a suit and wearing a captain’s hat leaning over one of the plush seats near the cockpit. In the seat next to it, surfer suit guy pops up ready for action.

“Sí?” Sebastian shifts in his seat, slowly lifting his head to look at the captain. The captain continues in Spanish, the words lost to Paige. Wishing she’d taken Spanish instead of French, she strains her ears for anything familiar from Spanish she’d learned randomly.

After a brief conversation, the captain returns to the cockpit and surfer suit guy relaxes back into his seat. But Sebastian’s head turns to the back of the plane making Alice and Paige drop their heads and close their eyes in a flash.

Paige counts in her head refusing to open her eyes until she gets to one hundred. Her heart pounds in protest but she forces herself to stay still. Before she can make it to 70, the plane shifts. The tiny lifting feeling tells Paige that they’re dropping in altitude.

“We’ll land soon,” Alice whispers. Paige opens her eyes and finds Alice’s gaze on her. “You have to know that I’ve missed you every day, every minute I was gone. And I’ll never stop regretting leaving you and your dad.”

Paige lifts her hand from where she’d dropped it across Brayden. Reaching for Alice’s grasp, Paige presses her fingers tight against her mom’s. “I missed you so much, but I know Dad missed you more,” Paige says. “He checked his email for updates from you all day long.”

“I know,” Alice nods, tears pooling in her eyes again. “I’ll need to make it right with him too.”

“Oh, you’re not done making it right with me yet, you know that, right?” Paige asks.

“I’ll do anything,” Alice replies, heartache written in the lines around her eyes.

“Ice cream,” Paige smiles feeling tears well again but okay with letting them fall freely now. “Well, first get us out of this mess, and then ice cream. Like every day, anytime I ask for it. And a new iPhone too.”

Holding in a chuckle, Alice makes a snorting sound. They both look up to see if Sebastian or his men have noticed. Happily, Paige sees no one move.

“Um,” Brayden stammers between them. “What’s going on? Why are you both crying?”

“Shh,” Alice whispers forcefully. But Brayden’s voice is too loud, even over the rumble of the plane engines.

Sebastian’s head turns to the back of the plane slowly, meticulously. Standing against the force of the airplane’s descent, he has to hold on to the back of his seat for balance. “You’re awake,” he smiles. “Good. We’ll be home soon.”

“Señor,” the captain calls from the cockpit and follows with quick, stern words.

A glance at the cockpit turns Sebastian’s smile into a tight grimace. Paige may not know much about all the bad things Sebastian Miranda has done, but she can tell from that quick change how much he hates being commanded. He sits again and pulls the dangling seatbelt across his lap.

A dip in altitude makes Paige’s stomach flip.

“Oh, no,” Brayden says, his expression a mixture of confusion and fear. “What do we do? Did they hurt you already? Is that why you’re crying?”

“We’re fine,” Alice says reassuringly and turns to Paige. “He’s waking up faster than you did. That’s good.”

“What’s good?” Brayden asks shifting against Paige’s weight plastered against him.

The thrust of the engine muffles their conversation giving Alice a moment to fill him in. She finishes with the same command she gave Paige. “Run. Get away. Do whatever you can.” But she adds something more. “And the two of you stay together. Don’t let anyone separate you, not until you absolutely know you’re safe.”

The plane shifts against a wind gust as it descends. Paige squints out the window but from the floor can see nothing but blue skies peppered with wisps of clouds. The wheels hitting the ground jolts the plane and the engines roar with their reverse thrust to slow it down. Once the plane is rolling at a reasonably controlled speed, Alice sits up and looks out the window over her shoulder.

“Where are we?” Paige asks shifting to sit up. She hadn’t realized how narrow the space was for her and Brayden until she was free of it. A feeling of longing to be safe against him again fills her heart.

“Palm trees,” Alice says. “And a lake, no… it’s the ocean.”

Forcing her still-heavy body up to the couch opposite Alice’s, Paige looks out the window. She silently curses her bad vision. All the colors outside blur together as the plane taxis. But from what she can make out, it looks tropical.

With the plane coming to a stop, Sebastian releases his seatbelt and stands. He takes measured strides toward Alice, Paige, and Brayden. A strange smile pulls at his lips.

“Welcome,” he says lifting his hands, “to my home.”

Paige glances at Alice looking for guidance as Brayden slides onto the couch next to her.

“Welcome,” Sebastian continues, “to Puerto Rico.”



“Puerto Rico?” Paige whispers squinting as she, Alice, and Brayden follow Sebastian off the plane. “How long were we unconscious?”

Hot, humid summer air and the scent of salt in the air blow against Paige as she steps carefully down the stairs that have descended from the side of the jet. Absentmindedly, she pushes her finger up her nose to adjust her glasses, forgetting for the moment that they were gone. Likely, they were crushed in the field where the jet had picked them up, having fallen off her face after she, her mom, and Brayden had been drugged.

A man in dark pants with his sleeves rolled up descends on Sebastian from a vehicle at the edge of the runway. Alice nudges Paige and points in the distance, somewhere farther down the landing strip that is a blurry mess to Paige’s naked eyes.

“It’s no good here, we’ll have to find somewhere with more people,” Alice says under her breath.

“Somewhere for what?” Brayden asks blinking in the sun. Whatever drugs they were given were taking longer to wear off for Brayden. The small smattering of freckles across his nose was more noticeable against his very pale skin and his larger pupils darkened the color of his eyes.

“To escape,” Alice hisses, her eyes chastising them for not paying attention to her plan.

“I can’t escape,” Paige says. “I can’t see anything, Mom.”

Alice’s gaze flicks quickly between Paige and Brayden. “Hold her hand,” she commands Brayden. “And look for a chance to get away. But make sure you wait for the right time when you can run fast enough and far enough to not be caught.”

“My friends,” Sebastian smiles at the trio as he returns to where they huddle at the bottom of the plane’s stairs. “Come with me.”

“Where are we?” Paige blurts. A tarmac reflects the heat of the sun against their feet, but she thinks that she can see palm trees beyond a tall fence.

“San Juan,” Sebastian says with a telenovela smile. A telenovela villain smile. “It didn’t work to do business in your hometown. Maybe in mine, you’ll be more willing to give me what I’ve asked for.”

“I already told you. We uploaded the files to the cloud then deleted them,” Alice steps between Sebastian and Paige. “We don’t have them, okay?”

The smile in Sebastian’s eyes disappears in a flash and is replaced with a devious scowl. He steps toward Alice. Paige shifts, wanting to protect her mother. But she’s stopped when Brayden grabs her hand and holds her back.

“No, it’s not okay,” Sebastian says, drawing out his words. He’s like a snake slithering around its prey, taunting it. “I don’t believe you. We’re going to get to the bottom of this here and now.”

Alice’s head remains steady, and even though she’s standing behind her mom, Paige knows the unblinking look she’s giving Sebastian. It was the same one she gave Paige when Paige asked to dye her hair blue in third grade. The same one she gave Paige when Paige swore she’d never get braces. Alice’s stare could cut diamonds with its sharpness. But Sebastian’s was sharper.

“Vamanos,” Sebastian nods his head toward a gold-colored SUV.

The surfer suit guy nudges Paige in the back. Having not noticed him come up behind her, the surprise touch makes her jump. Her fingers tighten around Brayden’s and they follow Alice to climb into the back seat of the SUV.

“Not another SUV,” Paige groans to Alice, trying to make her mother’s tense face relax even in a smile. It doesn’t work. Alice sits unflinching.

Sebastian taps and swipes through the SUV’s control panels. By the time they’re zooming down a busy road, cold air is blasting from the air conditioning vents and Bad Bunny is blasting from the speakers.

Sitting between Alice and Brayden, Paige tightens her grip on Brayden’s hand. San Juan passes by so quickly out the windows that Paige knows she wouldn’t really be able to see it whether she had her glasses on or not. They whiz from one lane to the next to get around average-speed cars that honk in their wake. Between the motion and the residual tranquilizers still in her system, Paige’s stomach starts to roll in protest. When the driver zips in front of a tall building and slams on the brakes, Paige groans trying to keep it together.

Sebastian barks something to the driver over the blaring music and climbs out. As soon as his door closes, the door locks click into place. Paige still catches Alice pulling at the handle. It doesn’t budge. Besides, there’s nowhere for them to run out her door except a busy street full of quickly passing cars. They’d likely be hit before they’d taken two steps.

After a few minutes, Sebastian returns carrying a large envelope and the driver weaves back into traffic. It continues like this for what feels like hours. Zooming car. Slamming breaks. Sebastian leaves. He returns with another envelope. And off they go again. Through it all Paige’s stomach fights the motion and the fear that builds until she’s sure her face is green.

“Put your head between your knees,” Alice whispers after one of the stops after Sebastian jumps out of the SUV. “It’ll help.”

“This is never going to end,” Paige moans as she drops her head.

“Yes, it will,” Alice rubs Paige’s back. “We just need to find our window.”

The new position helps quell Paige’s roiling stomach. She stays this way until finally Sebastian jumps out of the car but the doors don’t lock. Instead, he pulls open Brayden’s door and motions to the building behind him saying, “We’re here.”

Brayden hesitates before climbing out of the SUV. When Paige joins him on the sidewalk, he threads his fingers between hers. The gesture sends a delightful shockwave up Paige’s spine.

Sandwiched between Alice ahead of her and Brayden behind her, Paige follows Sebastian weaving through the busy restaurant. Surprisingly busy for a Saturday afternoon, Paige guesses it’s so popular because of the savory scents floating across the main dining area. Her stomach growls in protest. Her late-night burger feels like a lifetime ago. She almost protests when they walk through a doorway to an outdoor patio and the aroma is replaced with saltwater and sand.

Paige’s eyes go wide when she sees the view. A bright blue sky hangs over a deep blue ocean. They meet each other on the horizon. She’s never seen the ocean before, and being on the patio built on a cliff top over the Atlantic Ocean is mesmerizing. Waves crash against the rocks 20 feet below them in a calming rhythm.

“Have a seat.” Sebastian points to three empty chairs at a round table. He sits across from Alice leaving two seats empty. Sebastian drops into quick, clipped Spanish to the hostess who’d led them to the table. She switches from nodding to shaking her head as he asks questions pointing to the chairs. All the while the hostess keeps a placid half-smile on her face as though she’s dealt with men like Sebastian Miranda her whole life. When she turns to leave, the flip of her ponytail perfectly punctuates her annoyance.

Sebastian sits with a huff, stretching his neck to look around the packed restaurant. When the waitress drops off glasses of water and a basket of some kind of fried food, he waves her away like a pesky fly.

The scent of the fried circles in the basket hits Paige’s nose. She can’t hold back. Slipping her hand from Brayden’s she takes the discs in both hands and shoves them in her mouth. They burst with flavors she’s never experienced. Brayden joins her. As quickly as their basket is emptied, the waitress delivers another. Alice keeps her hands in her lap, her eyes slowly surveying the restaurant.

She’s the only one who notices when two people walk up to their table. One is a man who looks like a 50-something copy of Sebastian with a thick middle. The other is a short woman with blonde hair and a squeaky voice no one could forget.

“So, we meet again,” Piper Glen says with a smirk. 

Paige’s head whips up to meet Piper’s gaze. With her mouth full, she can’t say the curse words that dance through her mind.

Having stepped to the side, Sebastian cowers under the gaze of the older man who must be his father. The older Miranda scolds his son with sharp, quick flicks of Spanish that hit as hard as a slap across the face.

“Piper, how?” Alice asks stumbling for words. Her hand has found Paige’s. So has Brayden’s. They sit in solidarity, a trio of hostages.

“You literally took off without me,” Piper squeaks as she lifts her sunglasses and drops them with a clank on the table. “I had to find my own ride. Sebastian won’t be happy that I called his father, but I knew Miguel would finally end this.”

She raises her fingers to her lips and lets out a sharp whistle. When the waitress shuffles to Piper’s side, Piper says with a smile, “Piña colada with Don Q.”

“Hello, my friends,” Miguel says as he approaches the table. “I must apologize for my son.” He sits like a man used to having total control of every situation he’s ever been in. Paige blinks at Miguel, her blood running cold under his gaze.

“You see,” Miguel continues. “Sebastian enjoys his theatrics. I prefer to just get the job done.” Sitting silently, he lets his words land. Paige tightens her fingers on the two hands she holds. The greasy food rolls in her stomach.

“I’m willing to do whatever you need,” Alice says. She keeps her eyes on Miguel, ignoring Sebastian who sits sulking next to his father.

“I told you I had this handled,” Sebastian spits.

A simple lift of Miguel’s hand stops Sebastian. He huffs and turns his gaze to the ocean.

“Please continue,” Miguel says to Alice. Next to him, Piper sips her drink nonchalantly.

“Whatever you want. I’ll do it,” Alice sits straighter.

Alice doesn’t flinch.

Miguel doesn’t flinch.

Paige reaches for more food.

Finally, Miguel’s gaze drifts away from Alice and lands on Paige. “I see you like the tostones,” he says with a wide grin. “Fried plantains, a special Puerto Rican treat.”

“You know,” Miguel continues. “Señora Melbourne, this has gone on far too long. In fact, I have a feeling that you are dragging out this charade for one of two reasons. Either you are telling the truth and my son’s incriminating financial documents have been destroyed. Or, Miguel rests his arms on the table and leans toward Alice, “you lie. The documents are still in your possession.”

“I’m not lying,” Alice says, but her faltering voice gives her away.

Unrolling the utensils from a linen napkin, Miguel holds the sharp steak knife up and turns it in the sunlight. “I don’t believe you.”

Brayden’s hand tightens on Paige’s with a death grip. Paige’s stomach launches a total rebellion against the fried tostones. Her free hand flies to her mouth as all the muscles in her guts lurch.

“Mom,” she whispers through clenched teeth feeling the blood drain from her face.

“Wait, baby,” Alice keeps her eyes on Miguel.

“But Mom, now,” Paige complains as the reflection of the sun off the knife flashes across her face.

“Not yet,” Alice’s gaze flickers to Paige but not really to Paige. It’s over her head at a group of loud people laughing at a table near the door that leads back into the restaurant.

“Mom,” Paige grunts losing control of her stomach.

“Not yet,” Alice’s attention doesn’t waver.

“Oh, no,” Paige says standing. Her entire body heaves but she fights it, barely able to keep the tostones at bay.

The others around the table jump from their seats, trying to get away from Paige’s possible explosion. Piper dances away from her spilled drink dripping onto her feet.

Paige pulls herself upright trying to draw in a breath when Alice screams, “Now!”

In a flurry of confusion, Alice grabs the edge of the table and flips it toward Miguel, Sebastian, and Piper. Before all the drinks crash to the patio deck, Alice locks her arm around Paige’s and is racing toward the restaurant. She drags Paige who’s dragging Brayden. His grip’s so tight on Paige’s fingers that she’s worried he’ll break the bones.

Screams and gasps follow in their wake as Alice rushes them out of the restaurant and onto the busy sidewalk outside. She pauses to glance up and down the street. With a busy four-lane road full of fast-moving cars ahead of them, they can only escape down the sidewalk.

“Come on,” Alice pulls Paige again. They race past the restaurant toward clusters of palm trees.

Looking over her shoulder Alice commands again, “Keep running. Don’t stop. And don’t let go of each other.”

Paige mimics Alice and glances behind them. Squinting at the busy sidewalk of stunned people one thing catches her eye. It sends a cold shock through all her nerve endings.

Sebastian races for them pushing past people on the sidewalk, the look of murder on his face. Behind him, Piper pulls something from the back of her waistband and levels it directly at Paige. The glint of the sun on the barrel reminds Paige that Piper isn’t here to play games.

“Mom!” Paige screams. “Duck!”

With a quick look over her shoulder, Alice sees Piper too. She instinctively pulls Paige and Brayden toward the ground by palming the backs of their heads. It’s like what Paige has seen secret service agents do in movies.

Paige barely keeps her feet underneath her.

A squeal proceeds a loud pop. A man who had been kissing a woman with long, raven-colored hair crumples, falling to the ground at the woman’s feet. A thick needle sticks out from his shoulder, just like the ones shot into Paige and her mom before they were kidnapped.

“Keep running,” Alice orders pulling Paige down the sidewalk as a cluster of people surround the unconscious man. They block Sebastian’s path.

“What happened?” Paige asks.

“Piper and those stupid stiletto heels,” Alice smiles and sucks in another breath. “She tripped on a crack. Her shot went wild. Keep running.”

“Where are we going?” Brayden asks as the trio presses past a group of people waiting to get into a packed restaurant.

“Just keep running until we lose them,” Alice answers.

Brayden’s grip tightens on Paige’s fingers. He’s gotten a few steps ahead so that he’s even with Alice and they’re dragging Paige along. It feels a little like when she was little and her parents would hold her hands and swing her until her feet flew into the air. The memory hits Paige hard. She has no idea if she’ll ever see her dad again. At least he was safe. Tech Guy Tom had him. Dad was safe. She repeated the three words in her mind as she pushed her legs harder and her sneaker-clad feet raced down a Puerto Rican sidewalk.

Paige is beginning to wonder if they’ll ever stop running when her mom says, “Here. Come in here.” They duck into a tiny ice cream shop where a Latin woman with a kind smile greets them with a wave.

“Hola,” the woman says. “Ice cream. Homemade.” She waves her hand over the ice cream case like she’s displaying a wonderful prize on a game show.

“Thank you,” Alice replies. “Look at the ice cream, kids. Let’s catch our breath and make a plan.”

“Are they still following us?” Paige asks with a glance at the door as a woman comes in leading a line of children in matching T-shirts.

“We’re safe for now,” Alice replies. “We lost them. Do you still have the flash drive?”

With her hand finding the Lego brick necklace hanging on a chain around her neck, Paige nods.

“Good,” Alice smiles. “Now we need to find somewhere to send a message.”

“We passed a bunch of cell phone stores,” Brayden says. He still holds Paige’s hand, and Paige is totally okay with that. She likes the reminder that he’s with her. If he’s with her, he’s safe. And she likes holding the hand of the boy she’s been crushing on for over a year too.

“No, no cell phones.” Alice takes a breath. “We don’t have any money. We need a safe location. A government office or something like that. There’s a shared network. If I can log in, I can send a secured message.”

“Where can we find that?” Paige asks.

“I don’t know,” Alice says shaking her head. “I need a moment to think.”

“What about an Army base?” Brayden asks.

“Yes,” Alice perks up. “That would be great. Perfect actually.”

“Senora,” Brayden waves at the woman. “Hables inglés?”

“Sí, yes,” the woman smiles.

“Great,” Brayden leans across the glass case. “Where is Fort Buchanan from here?”

“From here?” The woman frowns. “Far. Five miles, más o menos. You need taxi.”

“Fort Buchanan? That’s brilliant,” Alice says.

“Thanks,” Brayden’s color rises in his cheeks. “My dad was stationed there before I was born.”

“But I don’t have my credentials,” Alice’s shoulders drop.

“You go to other fort,” the woman points to a collage of posters stacked upon posters on an old cork board hung behind them.

Alice steps closer pulling Paige and Brayden with her. “A fort. A national park. That might work.”

Paige reads the header of the poster. Castillo San Felipe del Morro. San Juan National Historic Site. Open daily.

“Yep, that might work,” Alice repeats.

“A la derecha,” the woman points toward the right. “Not too far. Very nice.”

“Gracias!” Brayden yells over his shoulder as Alice pulls them back out to the sidewalk.

As her feet pound, a drip of sweat trails down Paige’s face. With her hands still in Alice’s and Brayden’s she can’t wipe it away. The ocean breeze is lighter being farther from the beaches and doesn’t cool Paige like before.

People cover the narrow sidewalk slipping in and out of shops which makes running while holding hands nearly impossible. But they all stay connected as they weave and dodge ambling families and ogling tourists.

Following directional signs posted for the fort, the trio breaks free of the tightly built buildings onto a stone plaza with a long flight of descending stairs. Across the street at the bottom is a wide grassy lawn leading to the 500-year-old Spanish fort positioned on the cliffside. Sun glitters off the ocean, waves dotted with thin whitecaps.

“We’re going to be in the open,” Alice says pulling her hair down from its ponytail, “so act like a tourist.”

Paige and Brayden’s gazes find each other. They smile, and Paige enjoys that, sweaty as her palms are in the San Juan heat, Brayden hasn’t let go of her hand. They follow Alice down the stairs where they squeeze between vendors selling kites and bottles of water. Paige’s mouth tingles at the sight of cold bottles sweating in the heat.

“Excuse me,” Alice says as she bumps into a sunglasses stand. Paige gapes when five steps later Alice drops a pair of dark sunglasses over her eyes. “Mom,” Paige says, “did you steal that?”

“No,” Alice replies, “I’ll return them later. I need to blend in better.”

Crossing the street, they find themselves in a large grassy area covered with people flying kites of all colors in the strong Caribbean winds. Alice’s gaze keeps flicking side to side, and Paige can’t ignore the tension in her mother’s shoulders.

“Wait here against the wall,” Alice says leaning against a tall wall near the entrance to the fort. Joining her Paige melts against the cool stone. Shaded, the stones have stayed cool in the summer heat.

“Aren’t we going in?” Brayden asks nodding to a man taking tickets.

“The office is inside the fort, right there next to the gift shop,” Alice says. “We need to get inside, but without money, we’re going to have to get creative.”

People bustle around there. Parents chasing children, seniors in cozy shoes taking pictures, grumpy teens with their faces glued to their phones. A girl with blue-streaked hair whines to her dad as they pass Paige. It makes Paige ache to see her dad again. Has it really been less than 24 hours since she’d clipped a quick “bye” when he’d dropped her off for marching band practice?

A man’s voice catches Paige’s attention. A tall man with a booming voice leads a group of tourists all in a cluster. He speaks into a portable microphone, the speaker bouncing against his hip with each step. His guttural sounds and heavy words are obviously German.

“Mom,” Paige nods at the group. Alice studies them, lifting her sunglasses. With a smile, Paige knows her mom is in on the plan.

With the gawking German tourists passing in front of them, Alice, Paige, and Brayden push off the wall and merge into their gaggle. The Germans are so busy taking photos and pointing at guidebooks, that they don’t notice their new friends. Staying in the middle of the pack, Alice, Paige, and Brayden are waved through the ticket line designated for tour groups as a park ranger clicks a people counter in his palm. The only difficulty is when the ranger stops three people at the end of the line. He holds up his clicker and argues with the tour guide.

Alice uses the distraction to pull Paige and Brayden from the group and into the gift shop. A small fan on the top of a shelf oscillates but merely stirs the hot air without providing any relief. Pretending to look at a stand full of postcards and novelty pens by the door, Alice keeps her eyes on the office door. When a ranger steps out of the office, she darts in and sticks a pen in the crack to keep the door from closing.

Seeing her mom wave her over, Paige drops the fake pirate’s treasure map she’d been pretending to peruse. She and Brayden scurry to Alice and slip in the office door behind her.

The office is dark, heavy curtains covering the windows. Mixed with the sound of tourists outside is the puff and hiss of a window air conditioner. Blinking, Paige wills her eyes to adjust to the lack of light. Alice has quickly found a computer on a desk.

“Need any help? I’m pretty good with computers,” Brayden offers moving to look over Alice’s shoulder at the glowing screen.

“It was left unlocked,” Alice smiles. “I just need to see if I can access the secure system from here. Tom showed me how to do it once, but that was two years ago.”

“It might be in the folder options to show hidden folders,” Brayden leans closer, squinting at the screen.

“Can I do anything?” Paige asks feeling helpless.

“Keep lookout,” Alice replies without looking up from the screen. “Lock the door and don’t let anyone in.”

After turning the deadbolt, Paige pulls back the edge of the curtain covering a window next to the door. As Alice and Brayden talk in hushed tones behind her, Paige studies the people outside.

“No, it’s got to be this folder,” Alice says with rising frustration.

“But if you’re wrong, you’re going to sever the internet connection,” Brayden’s shoulders droop.

Alice sighs looking between Paige and Brayden. Taking her eyes off the window, Paige watches her mom think. Alice runs her hands through her hair and shakes her head. “We have to try,” she says reaching for the computer and typing in a quick command. Everyone holds their breath.

“We’re in! Yes!” Alice high-fives Brayden then attacks the keyboard, typing faster than before.

A commotion outside captures Paige’s attention. “Mom, we’ve got trouble.”

Just a few feet beyond the window Paige watches a blonde woman limp up to one of the rangers and berate him while flashing her ID.

“Give me a second. I hit a wall,” Alice whispers. “Brayden can you see what this is?”

As Brayden and Alice click and type, Paige keeps her eyes on Piper Glenn. Her hair is limp and her cheeks reddened by the heat. She’s yelling above all the other noises making passersby stop to watch her meltdown.

“I know they’re here. They have to be here. We tracked them here,” Piper yells at the ranger.

“Mom? Should we get out of here?”

“That’s our only exit, sweetheart,” Alice says. “I’m almost through. Give me one more minute.”

Piper’s voice rises. “Mom?” Paige asks.

“One more minute,” Alice says through clenched teeth.

A key jingles in the deadbolt lock. “Mom!” Paige steps back leaning against the window.

“Ten more seconds,” Alice replies.

Blasting sunlight invades the office when a ranger opens the door and ushers Piper inside. Paige can’t hold in her squeal of surprise. When Piper’s eyes land on hers Paige can tell that Piper has won. The game is over.

Or is it?

With a hard yank on the curtain, it breaks free from its rod. Paige lunges at Piper and throws the thick fabric over her. Piper shrieks as she fights the invasion. In the scuffle, the ranger races outside yelling something in Spanish.

Paige grabs for Piper, their arms tangling with the curtain in their struggle.

“Paige! No!” Alice screams grabbing for Paige and pulling her behind the desk with Brayden.

When Piper tosses the curtain off her head and levels her eyes on Alice, Paige knows it’s over. They lost.

“Now! I have had enough of this ridiculousness,” Piper limps closer to Alice. “You’re coming with me.” Piper pulls her gun from her waistband and aims it at Alice’s heart. “All of you. Let’s go.”

The three fall in line. As they follow Piper’s directions and walk single file through the fort, Piper doesn’t hide her gun from the public. Squeals, gasps, and racing feet retreat behind them back toward the entrance.

She leads them through a walkway to an outdoor area and up a ramp to where they are at a high point overlooking the sea. Piper orders them to stop as she pulls her phone from her pants pocket and taps the screen. Paige recognizes that holding hands with Brayden from a point where they can see miles across the open ocean might have been romantic under different circumstances. But with Piper’s gun trained on them and Alice, the magic is lost.

“There,” Piper nods. “My chariot is on its way. Sebastian is coming for me. And we’re going to fly off into the sunset. Finally.”

A small helicopter flies down the coastline straight for the fort.

“Only one last thing to clean up,” Piper smirks. “I’m going to need you to climb up on the ledge.”

Paige’s heart skips a beat. The thick stone ledge is at least four feet tall and keeps visitors from plunging 30 feet to a walkway below on the fort’s lower level.

“Move!” Piper screams. All control has disappeared as the helicopter comes closer. “Climb up. You can jump or I can push you. Doesn’t matter. I just need all of you gone.”

“Piper, please,” Alice pleads. “Don’t do this to the kids.”

“Move.” One word. And one steely look of death. That’s all it takes to set them in motion.

“It’s time to pay the piper,” Piper laughs.

“That’s a terrible pun,” Paige sneers.

“Paige,” Alice warns. She’s climbed up to crouch on the ledge. “Do what she says.”

“Jump to my death?” Paige huffs, her feet still on the ground. “To support her espionage. I mean, this is espionage, right?”

“Climb up,” Piper groans stepping closer to Paige, her gun trained on Paige’s heart.

The deep flutter of the helicopter’s blade has grown louder than the crash of waves far below. It’s getting closer. Paige keeps her feet rooted on the thick stone tiles.

“Paige, come on,” Brayden urges. His feet dangle over the edge, all color draining from his face.

Following Piper’s quick glance, Paige looks over her shoulder. The helicopter is close enough that the wind from its blade blows her hair so it dances around her shoulders.

“Don’t jump,” Paige tells Brayden and her mom unable to hide the quiver in her voice. Her heart beats against her chest to the thump of the whirling helicopter blade.

Piper steps closer, the tip of her gun touching Paige’s sternum and grazing the Lego brick necklace. The necklace with the hidden USB file drive. Paige gasps.

“Put the gun down,” a voice booms from the helicopter. Seeing the look of shock on Piper’s face, Paige whips her head around and freezes.



The person sitting in the helicopter with a broad smile plastered across his face is definitely not Sebastian Miranda.