"Do I want to know how you got in here?" I asked.
He shook his head. "I only broke a few laws." He held his fingers a half inch apart. "Little ones"
Dim chandeliers hung from an ornate ceiling. Our feet were quiet against the polished parquet floors. Almost a year ago we'd stood in this very spot while Madame Dabney ordered us to dance, but Zach didn't reach for me this time. I didn't feel like swaying anymore.
"Does the Circle really have him?" I asked.
"Yes." Zach's voice was flat as he ran his hand through his hair and dropped onto one of Madame Dabney's silk-covered fainting couches. He looked entirely out of place.
"Why? I mean, if he isn't working with them -"
"They weren't exactly doing him a favor. A cozy little CIA prison is probably looking pretty good to him right about now."
I walked to the tall windows and stared out over the grounds. Zach's reflection stared back at me in the dark window. Somehow it was easier not to face him.
"People don't leave the Circle easily, Gallagher Girl."
"I know."
"Anyone who knows how they work or where they work - anyone who knows anything . . ." As he trailed off, there was something new in his voice. He sounded tired in a way that had nothing to do with the hour.
"I know."
"They're tying up loose ends."
I tried to focus my eyes on the forest outside, the way the sun was just starting to color the sky. "Is that what I am?"
Zach stood and moved to my side at the window. Tears stung my eyes, and I kept my gaze on anything but him.
"Gallagher Girl," he said softly, reaching for me. "I don't know. But I promise we will find out."
A feeling swept through me when I thought back on the last year: Zach on a train racing through the Pennsylvania countryside; Zach lying beneath the bleachers in Ohio. And finally Zach gripping my hand, leading me away from a white van on a dark street in Washington, D.C. Zach standing between me and an attacker's gun, the attacker looking at the boy beside me and saying, "You?"
"You should be dead, Zach." I looked down and saw the way my shadow stretch across the floor between us. "That night - in D.C. - he had a clear shot. I should be gone and you should be dead."
"Gallagher Girl . . ."
"Why didn't he shoot you?"
"Everything that night happened so fast, Gallagher Girl."
"My name is Cammie!" I didn't think about all the people I could have woken, all the alarms that might have gone off. I just snapped, "How did you know about Boston? Why are you working with Mr. Solomon now? Are you my friend or are you my enemy, Zach?
Or, wait, let me guess, you can't tell me."
"I don't know why they want you. And for the rest . . . it's better if you don't know."
Need-to-know basis is a real thing. It exists for real reasons. But that doesn't mean I have to like it - and, coming from Zach, it sounded a whole lot different than it did coming from my mother.
"Why do you get to know?"
"What's the matter, Gallagher Girl? Jealous?"
"Yeah," I yelled, even though I'm pretty sure he'd be kidding. "I am."
"Cammie -"
"Time's up, Zach," I said. "Tell me when you know or -"
"Or what?" he reached for me. "You're not going to hurt me."
"I won't," I said, then risked a glance toward the door at the three angriest Gallagher Girls I had ever seen. "But they might."
Chapter Thirty-Five
PROS AND CONS OF HAVING REALLY CUTE
BOYS SNEAK INTO YOUR SCHOOL TO SEE YOU
CON: it's a little creepy.
PRO: When someone else sneaks in, you get a lot more sleep than when you have to sneak out.
CON: Impromptu visits by boys significantly increase the chance that they'll see you in your least cute pajamas.
PRO: Almost everyone looks good in moonlight.
CON: Five hours of very deep sleep is almost guaranteed to do very unfortunate things to your hair.
PRO: Waking up in the middle of the night means . . . well . . . waking up.
CON: Eventually, whether you like it or not, your roommates are going to find out about it.
_____________
"Hello, Zachary," Macey said, striding in. "You're looking well."
"Hey, Macey." Zach turned to the shortest and blondest of us and tipped an imaginary hat. "Liz." And then finally, he looked back at Bex. "Rebecca."
If the use of Bex's full name was supposed to make her angry, it was entirely too late. She stood by the door, leaning against the frame with her arms crossed. Someone who didn't know her might have thought she was still tired, but I knew better. She was guarding the exit.
"We were talking about Mr. Solomon, I said.
Macey raised her eyebrows. "Oh, is that what you were doing?"
Bex kept her eyes on Zach. "What have you heard?" She asked.
Zach shook his head. "Not much more than you have. The Circle broke him out. The CIA is saying its because he's with the Circle, but really -"
"It's because he's against them," Bex finished.
Zach nodded. "In almost two hundred years no one has come closer to bringing down the Circle than Mr. Solomon." Zach cut his eyes at me. "And your dad." He waited, as if I might burst into tears or something, but I didn't. "The Circle needs to know what Joe knows, and what he's told others."
"Like me?" I guessed.
Zach nodded slowly. "I'm willing to bet they're going to have a lot of questions about you."
"Good," Bex said. "That means they'll keep him alive."