Espionage? Teenage spy? Sounds bonkers. That kind of thing only happens in movies.
Normal teenagers wake up every morning and go to school, come home, do homework, do their chores, go to sleep - then wake up and do it all over again.
Ariella Alder...
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𝚎𝚕𝚎𝚟𝚎𝚗 | 𝚕𝚘𝚜𝚝 𝚜𝚘𝚞𝚕𝚜 𝚊𝚗𝚍 𝚎𝚟𝚒𝚕 𝚝𝚑𝚘𝚞𝚐𝚑𝚝𝚜
Archer looks worse now than he did a few days ago. He's been searching through his apartment nonstop for days. He didn't bother going to class the last two days, and he even skipped out on his daily meetings with the police. My watch still dinged every time he was meant to be somewhere, but instead he's with me.
I haven't left his side in days, except for going back to my apartment to sleep. Grayson believes that I'm onto a new lead. Which technically isn't a lie. If my codename as a secret agent means something relevant to Maya Hawthorne, then it's my job to figure it out.
She may be in on her own abduction. She could be a psychopathic murderer. She could be the mastermind who orchestrated all of this madness. She could be the reason why my parents are dead in the first place.
I need answers. I refused to be taken back from this mission.
"I need to get out of here," Archer huffed. He's been pacing around his mom's office for the last two hours. I stood off to the side, doing my own search.
A few weeks ago, I came to a conclusion that was one of my worst ideas.
This latest idea may trump all bad ideas I've ever had in my life.
"Let's go, Archer!" I demanded. "You need a change of scenery."
The two of us walked further down into the Lower East Side. Archer is about to realize that the term coincidence holds a much deeper meaning.
Archer Hawthorne lives only about a mile away from Grayson, Thea, and I. We never knew this. The name Archer Hawthorne never came into my life until a few months ago. Learning that his parents could have been a lead in my parents' murder, that was the first I ever heard of the Hawthorne family name.
When I started doing surveillance on the Hawthorne's I never thought that there would be this much overlap between them and my parents. The twists and turns of this mission have become more convoluted over the past few months.
I cleared out my bedroom of all the evidence that involves Archer and his parents. Hiding everything in my investigation room is the best idea. That place is locked down tighter than the PEOC in the White House. No one gets in that room without my knowledge. Actually, scratch that, no one knows about that room unless I want them too.
"Where are we going?" Archer asked.
"Somewhere we haven't been yet," I said.
I'm an idiot.
However, it's Tuesday.
Archer and I can be in and out before Thea and Grayson come back from their date night.
I snuck him into the penthouse when the doormen were changing shifts. None of them have ever seen me enter this building with someone other than Grayson, Thea, or Celia. No one knows what I do for a living, but this building has been a part of our protection all my life. My parents went through a great deal in order for these people to be kept in the dark.
