I had almost forgotten how Sublevel One looked. I’d almost forgotten how smooth and clean and straight-forward everything was. How it felt like your secrets were exposed with the first step into the room. That night, I wanted to be in class—wanted to return to Sublevel One and sit at one of those slim silver tables and have Charlotte Woods tell me what to do.
I could hear him crying. It was quiet—nearly undetectable—but there are only a few sounds that don’t show up on my radar and, evidently, the shaky sobs of heartbroken boys don’t make the list.
Will was stuffed up in a little closet, just big enough for another one of those tables and a few chairs. He must have heard me coming, because his tears were gone, leaving behind nothing more than the redness in his eyes. “Heya, Cap.”
Something tore in my chest and I knew that he felt it too. That was what they both called me. Both of them. “Hey, Will.”
His words were dry as he spoke and I knew that he was exhausted. That was what happened to the people who were left behind—they became exhausted. After spending so much time worrying or crying or trying to solve the unsolvable, there’s just not enough energy to go around. Something’s got to give and I knew from experience that sanity was the first to go. “S’pose you’ve heard by now,” he said, swiping the back of his hand across his nose.
Watching him, I finally understood why everyone had been looking at me for the past year like I was a bomb. That’s what he looked like, sitting there. Not a boy—a bomb. A countdown just waiting to explode.
I was careful as I approached him, not wanting to set anything off. When I finally took a seat, I was met by his sparkling eyes. He almost looked amused just then, his contagious smile hiding somewhere along his lips, but I knew better. An agent’s best weapon is their cover and that afternoon, Will was taking as much cover as he could.
“How are you?” I asked. It was a stupid question, but it was all I could say.
“Sad.”
Sad. Yeah. Understatement of the century.
There was silence again. Neither of us knew how to fill it or maybe neither of us wanted to. Maybe it was just enough to sit there with each other and wonder. To sit beside someone who was asking the same questions. I tried to get a read on him. I wanted to know just how bad he was feeling, but then I remembered that I didn’t. I didn’t want to know that kind of pain. I didn’t even want to know that kind of pain could exist in reality.
But as I watched him, I couldn’t help feeling that I was the one being watched. That I was on the wrong end of the questions. That Will knew something I didn’t. “They interviewed me today,” he said, snapping his eyes away from me. “Told me they’ve got agents working on the case.”
“That’s good,” I said, but he just waved his hand at me, casting my words aside. “Is that… not good?”
This time, Will actually laughed, but it wasn’t out of amusement. It was out of self-preservation. If he didn’t laugh, he would cry. If he didn’t laugh, he might just drop dead right there. One thing was for sure—William Kidd was a mess. “How many agents did they have on your mom?”
Everyone. Everyone had been on Mom’s case. Everyone had scoured the globe for Cameron Goode, but the truth that remained was that if Cameron Goode didn’t want to be found, there wasn’t a camera or an operative on this planet that could find her. Not until she wanted to be seen. Not until she flew her plane over London. “That’s different,” I insisted. “My mom was on a mission. She has enemies—she has a whole list of people who want to kill her. This is different. None of that has nothing to do with Bill.”
“No?”
One word. One little word that can be said so many ways with so many different meanings and right then, Will had made it a question. A question that made a very purposeful and very dangerous implication. “What are you keeping from me, Will?” I asked him, slow and careful, still very aware of his ticking heart. “What do you know?”
But he just stared at me, blank and lifeless. Without Bill at his side he was just… there. He merely existed. Nothing more, nothing less. He just sat there, looking at me like I was easier to read than a magazine. Like if I were a book, I’d be the kind that only had pictures. “You’re a bleeding heart, Cap,” he said. “A goddamn bleeding heart.”
“What?”
“What do you think it’s like?” He leaned forward, suddenly intrigued by whatever conversation we were having. I jumped, but then remembered that Will wasn’t a threat, despite how he looked in that thin light of the Sublevel.
“What are you talking about?”
“Death.” It just rolled off of his tongue. It was like he had been thinking about it for ages. Like it was the only word running through his head, day or night, all the time. Death, death, death, over and over. “What happens to us after death?”
It was a big question. One that everyone asks. One that drives people into insanity. People have spent entire lifetimes trying to answer that question, only to die before they could figure it out. I guess, in the end, they did find out, but that was going to happen anyways. The answer to that question was inevitable, so I couldn’t understand why so many people insisted on worrying about it along the way. “I don’t know.”
It was exactly the answer he had been expecting. “Me neither,” he admitted, either to me or to himself. He leaned back in his chair again, looking down at the table and carrying on with a light nod. Up and down, up and down—he wasn’t aware of himself. He didn’t know how he was moving. Whatever debate taking place in his head, it consumed everything. “What do you think about heaven?”
I didn’t have an answer to that either. I usually don’t think about that stuff—in fact, I usually make a conscious effort to ignore those sorts of questions. But now was not the time for a theological debate. “It’s sounds nice.”
“Cut the crap, Maggie.”
I couldn’t remember the last time Will had called me Maggie. Probably never. It was Cap. Ever since we’d first met in that tree, it had always been Cap.
I don’t know what he wanted me to hear, so I figured the truth was the next best thing. “I don’t know if I buy into it,” I told him. I thought of my mother, wondering where she was right then, and added, “But I don’t know if I want to give up on it either.”
This stopped him, his eyes snapping up to me. Straight at me. I could see the shadows in his eyes. The brown in them seemed just a little bit darker than usual. “Do you think you’d like it there?” he wondered.
I couldn’t read him. Usually Will was so easy to read, but I couldn’t do it this time around. It was like his life depended on my cluelessness. Or maybe it was Bill’s life. “I think that’s the point,” I said, cautious.
He hesitated before he asked. “Do you think I would?”
“Will, what are you—?”
“Answer me.”
“I don’t know, Will—listen to me.” I leaned forward over the table, begging him to pay attention. Praying that I could get through to him. “I don’t know, okay? No one knows.”
I watched the words hit him. Watched as he processed what I said. He started his nodding again, this time closer to rocking. He was falling apart. Like he was being torn from two opposite sides. “Do you think—?” He cleared his throat and looked down again. “Do you think a person can do terrible things and still get in?”
“I’m hardly the person to ask, Will—”
“Just answer the question.”
His words were sharp. Fierce. Angry, or more likely, desperate. I answered him the only way I could. “My mom always said that as long as a person is truly sorry, nothing’s bad enough to keep them out.”
“Sorry?” he repeated. “That’s it?” He wasn’t asking. He was begging. Pleading for answers. He needed answers more than he needed air right then—maybe even more than he needed Bill. “Doesn’t that seem a little easy to you?”
And maybe he was right. Maybe a little remorse wasn’t enough to earn you a spot in eternal paradise, but it was all I knew, and so I just said, “I don’t think it’s supposed to be hard.”
I didn’t know if he liked my answer. I couldn’t tell what he was thinking. He just kept looking at me, gears turning inside his head as he made decisions I may never even know about. I tried to read him and soon I found that I was the more desperate of the two of us. Suddenly, I was the one filled with worry and dread.
“I think I know where Bill is,” he said finally. Carefully.
It took me a moment to process. To comprehend what he was saying. When I finally did, I stood up, slapping my hands on the table. “You what?” I said. “That’s great!”
But Will just shook his head. He closed his eyes. I could barely hear him when he said, “No, Cap. It’s really not.”
A new voice echoed through that tiny room, joining in on the conversation he wasn’t meant to hear. “I’m going to go ahead and guess that you didn’t tell that to the agents who interviewed you this morning.”
That’s how I learned that no matter how far I ran, Dad would always be one step behind. That, for all the running he did, his first choice would always be chasing after me.
He stood up against the doorframe, arms crossed over his chest. I didn’t know how long he’d been listening, but it didn’t really matter. He’d heard Will’s confession and that was all that he needed.
Will jumped at the voice, obviously unaware (as most people usually are) of my father’s sudden appearance. “No sir.”
“And why’s that?” Dad asked, taking a few steps closer to me.
Will looked down at the floor and shrugged. “Dunno, sir. I wasn’t sure I was right.”
Dad sat down in the chair just next to me. When he sat, he leaned back. It could’ve looked like he was relaxing. Stretching out after a long day at work. But I knew better. This was an interrogation, through and through. “You’re lying to me, Mr. Kidd,” he said. “Any lead is a good lead, even if you’re not sure about it. I know it, you know it. So how about you tell me why you withheld the information.”
Slowly, Will lifted his head to make eye contact. It was painful to watch. I had been on the receiving end of my father’s merciless glare plenty of times in my life, but to be on the opposite side of Zachary Goode? Well, I didn’t even want to imagine how much worse that would be.
“No one was supposed to know,” he whispered. I could practically see the cracks starting to form in his argument. Soon enough, the whole dam was going to collapse. “You weren’t supposed to hear that—no one was supposed to know!”
Will was losing it, but Dad just leaned forward, keeping his cool. I knew that it wasn’t the time to admire how good a spy my father was, but man. I was doing some serious admiring anyways. “Know about what?”
“Someone told me—in a message,” Will blurted. “I got a message, telling me where Bill was. It told me the price for getting him back.”
“Ransom?” Dad pressed on. I could hear the shock in his voice. “They want ransom?”
Will glanced at me for a moment, then back at Dad. “Yes,” he said. “Ransom, I guess—but I was told that if anyone found out then—” He stopped midsentence and just like that, he started sobbing. Gross, pained sobbing. He finally broke and now the water was flowing. “They said they’d kill him.”
The dad part of him looked like he wanted to back off, but the rest of my father knew that he had to keep going. Roll with the information. Get as much as you can while you can still get it. Hughes had taught us that over the summer. “Who?” Dad snapped. “Who said it?”
“I don’t know,” Will said hopelessly.
“Mr. Kidd…”
“I don’t know, okay?” Will screamed. “I wish I knew what to do. I wish I knew who I was supposed to kill, but I don’t.” He looked up at Dad, his heart splayed out in a million pieces across that silvery table. “I don’t know what to do.”
Will shoved his head into his hands, clenching at fists of hair. His cries had gotten quieter, but they were still very much there, filling up that small room. My father looked up to me and threw his head in Will's direction. I nodded and went to join my friend, taking one of his hands and lacing my fingers through his.
Will looked up, his crying reduced to sniffling. He swiped at his eyes as he looked at me. There was something in his expression that I couldn’t recognize at the time. I know now that it was dread. Pure, unadulterated dread.
He squeezed my hand, almost like he never wanted to let go. Like he would’ve kept me there forever if it were up to him.
“I’ll tell you what,” Dad said. “I’ll form a team of the best I know and you lead us to Bill.”
Will was slow in making up his mind, dragging his sleeve against his nose. Pulling his finger under his eye. “I can’t—” he began, holding my hand tighter. “I can’t go without Maggie.”
Dad’s eyes shot straight to me and even thought I knew what he would say, my hope still soared. Maybe this would be an exception. “Maggie’s grounded.” Or maybe not.
“Dad,” I pleaded, not really expecting any change, but unable to keep myself from fighting.
“Mr. Goode,” Will protested. “I need her. I can’t—” His eyes danced across the tabletop, searching for words until he finally found them and looked right at Dad. “I can’t do this op without her.”
I looked to my father, but there was no sign of change. He shook his head and said, “I’m afraid a team of highly trained operatives is all I can offer you, Mr. Kidd.”
“You don’t understand!” Will screamed, tearing his hand from mine and bolting out of his chair.
Dad mirrored him, but somehow, he looked way scarier than Will did. Sounded scarier, too. “Try me,” he dared.
Will looked like he wanted to back down, but he was better than that. Even if he didn’t know it. Still, he spoke much softer with his reply. “I can’t just go run a mission with your team. I need someone in the field with me. Someone I can trust.”
Dad wore the look of a challenger. “You don’t trust me, Mr. Kidd?”
Will stood resolute. Never in my life did I think I’d see someone look at Zachary Goode the way that he was just then. “I trust exactly two people in the world, sir,” he said. “And one of them is almost dead.”
This may not mean anything to you, but the only other time I’ve seen Dad look the way he looked just then is when he’s with Aunt Bex. He was sizing Will up, not sure if he wanted a fight or if he wanted to take him out for a cup of coffee, all while trying to combat an oncoming smile. I don’t know what it was, but I think Dad might have decided that he liked William Kidd a whole lot more in that moment.
But then the look was gone and we were back to square one. “Morgan is grounded. She can’t leave this mansion or else she faces serious consequences.” The message was just as much for me as it was for Will. Or, well, probably more for me, actually. “I see your point though. If it would make you feel better, I’ll put someone else with your identical training on the team. I hear Luke Collins is between missions right now.”
“Sir, I—”
“That’s,” he said, starting towards the door. “All you get, Mr. Kidd. We leave tomorrow morning.”
And just like that, he was gone, off to collect some of the best minds he could in order to collect William Kasey. At first, I thought that was the end of it. We had lost. It was a simple as that. At least, that’s what I thought until Will grabbed me by the shoulders.
There was panic in his eyes. Just panic. “I need you there,” he hissed. “You can’t—I just need you there. Dock twelve, Widewater Park, just off of the Potomic.”
“Will, listen,” I said, doubt filling my every word. “I don’t think—”
“Please, Cap,” he begged. His eyes seemed so much bigger than usual, his heart so much fuller. This was it, I realized. This was the worst possible scenario for him. He didn’t care about what happened to his parents. He didn’t have siblings in Romania to worry about. It was Bill. Bill’s loss was the worst possible thing that could happen to this boy and he needed me to help him stop it from happening. Who was I to say no?
“Okay,” I breathed. “Okay, I’ll be there.”
And this, somehow, made him look like he wanted to cry even harder. “Thank you,” he sighed, letting his hands fall with his head. “Thank you.”
I nodded, but he didn’t see. Which was fine, I guess. Nothing I did was going to take away the pain. Not until he had Bill back. “Are you staying here tonight?” I asked him.
He swiped snot from his nose and nodded. “Yeah, um.” He threw his thumb over his shoulders towards the guest quarters that were housed in Sublevel One. “Yeah.”
He didn’t make eye contact with me. I was sort of relieved. He looked like shit. “That’s good,” I said. “Try to get some sleep, then. You look like you haven’t slept in days.”
“That’s because I haven’t,” he told me, which I guess I should have expected.
“Right. Listen,” I said. “I’m going to make my arrangements for tomorrow, okay? But you know where to find me if you need me.”
Now, he did look at me. Right at me. “Cap?” he said. “You know you’re a good person, right?”
He wasn’t making any sense, but then again, disappearances and deaths do funny things to people. I would know. “I like to think so.”
He shook his head. “No, Maggie,” he said. There he went with the name again. “You are a good person, okay? You’re one of the good guys.”
I could tell that he wasn’t going to take anything less than my acceptance of this statement and so I just said, “Thank you, Will. Now go take a nap. Let the rest of us think about Bill for a little bit.”
He nodded and even managed a little bit of a laugh. “Will do, Cap,” he said with a lazy salute. I had to laugh a little too and I finally felt comfortable leaving him to his thoughts. “And, Maggie?”
I looked over my shoulder. “Yeah?”
“It’s going to be me.”
Looking back on that moment, I know that I should have asked him what he was talking about. I know that I should have asked what would be him, but he was tired and I was still a little shocked. Neither one of us were in the position to make any sense, so I just said, “Sure, Will.”
It felt weird going back upstairs. It was like returning to a world that was supposed to be familiar, but wasn’t. Not even at all. The last time I had been through these halls, I had thought Bill was safe at Blackthorne. Now look at me, trudging through the Hall of History and through the East Wing, trying to devise a plan. Trying to figure out how I was supposed to get out of these halls—preferably without anyone knowing.
It didn’t even register when I pushed the door to my suite open. I didn’t even realize that I had laid on my bed. I was just lost in thought—lost in plotting. Lost. It wasn’t until Alice whacked me in the face with a pillow that I noticed where I was.
“Ouch!” I whined, rubbing at my nose.
“I could deal with D.C.,” she said, holding the pillow over her shoulder and ready to swing again at any given moment. “But now Romania? Romania? It’s like you think it’s acceptable to run ops without me, which, let me tell you, it most”—thwap—“certainly”—thwap—“is not.” Thwap, thwap.
“Alice!” I yelled. “Would you quit hitting me?”
Thwap. “Give me one good reason why I should.” Thwap, Thwap, Thwap.
“I have an op!” I said in between hits. She gave me a very brief moment to explain, so I didn’t wait. “I have an op and I need your help.”