Killer Spirit (The Squad 2)

Some thanks. I practically built her entire web page for her, and she was afraid that her new BFF would find out that she’d talked to me. Then again, I vastly preferred her course of action to her mother’s reaction to everything, which was to go all touchy-feely and start talking about what a precious time this was in my life. I was, to say the least, grateful that such actions weren’t hereditary.

“Ummm…Toby?”

I narrowed my eyes at her. “Hayley and I aren’t really on speaking terms. Your secret is safe with me.”

“Cool.” She paused another beat. “So you know what you were saying at lunch about the tumbling requirements for varsity?”

I was officially never helping anyone ever again. I kept my brother from being beaten up, and he dedicated his life to torturing me. I helped a JV cheerleader build a mother-daughter book club website, and she took that as an invitation to grill me about her chances of making varsity. I kissed Jack, and he had the gall to come up with a password I couldn’t figure out on my own.

Okay, maybe that last one was stretching it just a bit.

“Toby?” Kiki prodded. “About the—”

“Hey Keeks,” Jack cut her off, leaning back in his chair to get a better view of the girl in question.

Kiki got really obviously flustered at the attention. Unlike most cheerleaders I’d met, concealing her emotions really wasn’t her strong suit.

“Yes?” she squeaked. Despite her squeaking, she made a masterful attempt at batting her eyelashes at my homecoming date.

“I like your sweater.”

Jack’s compliment left Kiki speechless. Five seconds later, a new message popped up on my IM.

JackOfDiamonds: You’re welcome.

Apparently, I was supposed to thank him for flirting with another girl. Then again, I thought as I logged into my brother’s email account and began messing around with his settings, aforementioned flirtation had distracted Kiki from talking to me, which just confirmed my suspicion that Jack Peyton was the kind of guy who always knew exactly what to give a girl. Some girls liked diamonds. Some girls liked pearls. I liked having someone running interference between the rest of the student body and me.

And, as much as I really, truly, deeply hated to admit it, I liked Jack.

TaeKleinDo: Shut up.

JackOfDiamonds: Yeah, Ev. Love you, too.

When the bell rang a moment later, I wasn’t sure whether I was thankful or disappointed. In fact, the only thing I knew for certain was that I’d wreaked enough havoc on Noah’s email account that he wouldn’t be sending out messages of any kind for a very, very long time.

CHAPTER 17

Code Word: Blend

By the time I got to the Quad, everyone else was already there.

“Hello, Toby.”

One look at the half smile on Tara’s face had me preparing myself for her trademarked understated form of teasing, but Tara didn’t get the chance to say whatever she’d planned to, because the others beat her to it.

“I hear that you love puppies.” Brittany stole Tara’s thunder.

“Yup, Toby just wuvs cute wittle bitty—”

“Shut up, Tiffany. Don’t you guys have something to glitter?” It occurred to me a second after I spoke that encouraging the twins to apply any sort of cosmetic product to anything was seldom a good idea—especially since there was at least a ninety percent chance they’d choose to apply it to me.

“What’s wrong with puppies?” Bubbles asked, mystified. Of all of the girls, Bubbles was the only one whose inner depths I’d never discovered. I was pretty sure that she didn’t actually have depths. She’d joined the Squad because of a freakish ability to contort herself into odd, but useful positions. It was an incredibly handy skill, and Bubbles was probably the single stealthiest person I’d ever met in my life, but she wasn’t exactly a rocket scientist.

“There’s nothing wrong with puppies,” I told Bubbles, shooting daggers at the twins with my eyes and daring them to say something else. “I’d just prefer it if the puppies of the world weren’t endorsing my candidacy for homecoming queen.”

Bubbles frowned. “The puppies are voting for you?”

She sounded equal parts confused and offended. Oh, Bubbles.

“Noah just sent this email thing around,” Lucy explained. “It had the cutest picture of a puppy in it. I think it’s sweet that he’s trying to help you, Toby.”

“He’s trying to drive me nuts,” I corrected her. “And it’s not sweet. It’s pathological. And in the future, please do not use the words Noah and sweet in the same sentence.”

Lucy chose to pretend I hadn’t spoken at all, forcing me to wonder what was going on in that cheerful little mind of hers. Was she actually into Noah?

Like I was actually into Jack….

“Are we going to get ready for our missions or what?” I cut off my own train of thought with a question. If I could just flip into spy mode, then I wouldn’t have to worry about anything that existed within the walls of this high school. I could concentrate on terrorists, biological weapons, and reconnaissance, which was a definite step up from boys, brothers, and homecoming.

“I agree with Toby.” At Brooke’s words, the world stopped spinning on its axis. “We may just be tailing the TCIs, but this mission is important. If we want Washington to deal us in on the action when things go down, we need to nail this.” She paused. “That means following orders. Don’t let the TCIs out of your sight, but don’t engage them. Get as much video and audio feed on them as you can, but don’t let them see you. The night shift will take over at 2100 hours, but until then, the TCIs are ours.”

The “don’t screw it up” on the end of Brooke’s sentence went just barely unstated.

“We’ll be working in three groups. Group one will be following Anthony Connors-Wright. Chloe and April, you’ll be working with Bubbles and Lucy on this one. Strategy is up to you, but we want as many angles of surveillance as possible. Same goes for team number two. Britt, Tiff, Tara, and Zee, you’ll be tailing Amelia Juarez.”

“What about me?” I narrowed my eyes at the captain. Tara was my partner. We worked as a team. So why had Brooke assigned Tara and Zee to work together? Shouldn’t Zee have been working with her partner?

“You’ll be with me.” Brooke’s words reminded me just who Zee’s partner normally was. “I want Zee in the field. The closer we can get her to the TCIs, the better she’ll be able to read their body language. You and I will be stationed near Peyton, Kaufman, and Gray, so that we can keep an eye out for anything there. As bad as having a biological weapon in Bayport is, it would be much worse if the firm got a hold of it. If we see something suspicious, the Big Guys will be sending a team in, but if they can’t get there fast enough, it may be up to us to make sure nothing goes down.”