"And where did you disappear to last night?" asked Alice as she fell into step beside me. She shoved her Encryption textbook into her backpack, scrunching a handful of papers to the bottom of her bag in the process. "You had a doctor's appointment and then you disappeared for, like, six hours."
"I was working out," I told her, sliding my own textbook into my bag, the homework for the night stuck in between various pages. "And it was two hours."
Alice rolled her eyes. "Faith said it was six."
"Faith hasn't looked up from her computers in ten years," I reminded her. "Did you really think it was a good idea to rely on her for the time? Maybe if you had gotten in at a decent time last night, then you would know that Faith was wrong—speaking of getting in late, where were you last night?"
She cut me a sly look that was nearly identical to the one that she had worn when she tried to sneak through our door at such an absurd hour the night before. "Let's just call it a... late-night rendezvous."
There was a giggle hiding behind her smile and a light in her eye that told me this rendezvous was anything but spy-related. No sir, this escapade was entirely girl-related. "What's his name?" I asked.
She cut a glance up at me, narrowly avoiding a crowd of frantic eighth-graders with a crossbow. "Did you happen to write down the homework for Encryption? I don't think I caught the assignment."
"No, no, no," I told her, because Gallagher Girls never forgot the homework. This was evasion if ever I'd seen it. "I, as your best friend, demand to know his name—unless it's not a boy." I took a breath in. "Is it a girl? Because, you know, I might be more open to that idea than you think."
But Alice stopped in her tracks, the cold, sterile smell of hospital hitting both of us at the same time, and I knew that this was not the time to ask about the many relationships of Alice Anderson.
I saw Aunt Liz through the doorway, fussing with the piles of bandages that held Ellie together. Alice looked at me like this was her stop and she needed to get off the train, no matter how much she didn't want to. "Good luck," I said.
She nodded. "You too."
Right. Me too. I'd need some of that.
Alice turned into Ellie's room and I continued down the ICU without my best friend at my side. It was a much harder walk without her there, but I knew that it was a path that had to be traveled. I couldn't avoid him forever and, to be honest, I wasn't sure that I wanted to.
I needed someone who was going to listen to me. Maybe I just needed someone else who knew. Knew what it felt like to be so tired all the time.
Bill didn't have anyone sitting at his bedside.
Of course, he knew who was supposed to be there, because that was the name he kept calling out. Over and over. Sometimes at night and sometimes during the day. When he was crashing and when he was stable. Always. It was like everything was leaving him—everything was surrendering to the sleep, and he was determined to remember that single word above it all. "Will."
No one could tell me if Bill knew that his best friend was gone. No one knew if he was anticipating waking up to a world without his soulmate. But I did know that, whether he knew or not, Bill missed Will. Bill was going to be missing Will for a very long time.
Bill was set up in a private room, but it wasn't any sort of perk. They wanted him isolated. Alone. Lucky son of a bitch.
He was handcuffed to the bed, even though he hadn't moved in over a month, but that didn't matter. Bill was the lead suspect in a crime against Morgan Goode, so not only did he have the world's strongest agents working against him, but the world's strongest family was against him, too. For now, they would keep him handcuffed because for now, he was the enemy. Guilty until proven innocent.
When had everything become so backwards?
"Will."
It was freaky hearing him talk. Like a ghost in a boy's body. Every time he let the word out, something sprang to life in my chest, hoping that maybe he'd keep going, but then the monitor would beep again, slow, steady, and far too loud, reminding me that hope is the most dangerous ghost of all.
I slid a fistful of flowers into the vase just beside him, figuring that the room deserved something that was alive. Ellie's room had gotten flowers within hours of her arrival, but mine were the first that had made it to Bill's room.
Information. That was the only reason they were keeping him alive. He had been Will's closest confidant and they needed answers. Only a few people in the world would have cared about the actual death of William Kasey instead of just the loss of information that came along with it and, to be honest, I wasn't sure that I was one of them. I'd like to say that I still cared for him. That the betrayal of his best friend in no way affected the way I cared for him. But that would be a lie, because some part of me demanded answers. Some part of me couldn't stop thinking that if Will knew something, then Bill knew it too, and neither of them had told me to run.
But the rest of me—or maybe just the rebel in me—still wanted to care for him. So I did. Until Bill woke up to defend himself, I would do it. Innocent until proven guilty. That was how this whole thing was supposed to work anyways.
There was a window in his room, slim and made up of stained glass. Maybe some people found it comforting, as if an angel were looking down, casting its mystical glow over whoever had the misfortune of occupying the bed. It didn't do that for me. All I could do was settle down in a hard, plastic chair and find where the glass stained his skin, remembering the last time I'd seen a boy drowning in so much red.
I can't tell you how long I sat there for. I just remember watching the light inch across the room, thinking that not even the stained glass held any competition to the colors that were streaked across Bills body. He had deep, rich reds chipping away at his lips and at an eyebrow. Some of his bruises were turning yellow and green, but others, like the one along his hairline, were still dark purple. I wondered if it still hurt, even all these weeks later. Probably not, the doctors had said. That was why his body had been asleep for so long. Bodies sleep so that they can block out pain.
So then how on earth was I still awake?
"Will," he said again, lightly. Absently. His lips were so chapped that a layer of skin was flaking off in thin white chips, but he still said the name.
Half of me wanted to break down and cry, but the other half couldn't remember how. Half of me wanted to reach across the room and pull the plug on the boy myself, but the rest of me would cut off the hand that dared try. Conflict was alive and well within me, swelling up until I could feel it pressing against my insides, threatening to burst.
So I just sat there, not daring to move, listening to the chimes of my friend's voice as he called out for the person he loved. It was like clockwork, over and over and over. Maybe that was why I was so shocked when he eventually said, "Maggie."
That was when I knew that I didn't hate Bill. Not really. When you hate someone, your heart doesn't do a flip when they call your name. When you hate someone, you don't feel overcome with relief at the thought of them waking up. I didn't hate Bill. I couldn't. Even if I was supposed to.
I sprung from my seat, not even thinking as I grabbed the hand without a cast. "Hey. Hey, buddy, I'm here."
His eyes stayed closed, the monitors at my back keeping the same, steady pace as before. I searched for some sign of life, waiting for his eyes to flutter open or for him to lick his lips. Even just the squeeze of his hand would have been enough for me, but he didn't do any of that. He just laid there, exactly the same way as before, except now, I was there too.
I shook his hand, thinking that maybe it would do the trick. That some of the best doctors in the world were just skipping over that one simple solution. "Bill, hey. I'm here."
The world started to shake, but then I realized that it was just my legs. I dropped to my knees before I could fall. "Wake up," I told him. "Just. wake. up."
One thing you've got to know about Bill is that he's loyal. He was loyal to me and he had been loyal to Will for much longer. When he found someone he loved, he'd follow their command—the best young soldier that the Blackthorne Military Academy for Boys could ever hope to produce. But he didn't follow orders that day and I had to wonder just how bad of shape he was in to allow that to happen.
I looked to the boy in front of me, too still. Too stiff. I wondered how my name had made it onto his lips. Maybe he had heard me. Sensed me. Maybe there was something that had forced me into his injury-induced dreams and if that was the case, then had something been forcing Will into his dreams, too? Did Bill sense Will in a way that none of us could even imagine?
Or maybe some part of him just thought that Will was still around.
The stained glass shone in my eyes and, as I kneeled there, I wondered if there would ever be a better time to confess the fact that I knew all too well. "He's not here," I said. I didn't know if he could hear me, but to tell you the truth, I didn't care. I needed to admit it to myself more than I needed to admit it to him, so I said it again. "Will's not here."
There had been a time when I swore I wouldn't break the news to Bill. When I swore that no one would—not until he was healthy. Not until he was finished fighting and was safely awake again. There had been a time when I swore that no one would give William Kasey a reason to stop fighting.
But that wasn't quite fair, was it? If it were me lying in that bed, waiting to find out if Alice was alive, I'd want to know. I would want to know if the fight was worth it or if I was about to face life without her at my side. Even just the walk here had been hard enough without her. I couldn't even imagine an entire lifetime.
Bill had a right to know. He had a right to choose, and even if he couldn't hear me through that sleep of his, I had a right to tell him. I needed to tell someone. "I miss him so much," I admitted. "I miss him so much and you're the only one that understands. You're the only one who knows how bad it hurts and"—I had to swallow the swell in my throat—"I don't even know if you can hear me."
There was nothing but the steady, certain sound of machinery, echoing off of the stone walls and tiled floors. It was nice to go uninterrupted. To get the chance to think. I could never trust the voices in my head anymore and so it was nice to finally have the chance to think out loud, but even still, I so desperately wanted him to wake up. To give me that grin of his and tell me to stop being such a wuss.
He didn't do that. He might never do that again, I realized, and that, more than anything else, triggered the tears. "The night before Dock Twelve, he asked me about heaven," I said. "All kinds of weird questions, but I didn't think anything of it. You were gone and he was... terrified—talking about death and angels. I thought he was talking about you."
Silver and chrome slashed through my mind as I recalled the look of heartbreak on William Kidd's face. He had been screaming at my father and asking me all the wrong questions. There had been so many red flags. So many slip ups, and I hadn't seen a single one. I had been blinded by all the things I'd been bred to believe in—trust, friendship, backup. I guess, in a way, all of those things betrayed me too.
Will had said it himself. I was a bleeding heart. A goddamn bleeding heart.
"I thought he was talking about you," I said again, a single sob swallowing my words. I shoved my cheeks into the blankets, not willing to risk the chance that Bill could hear me crying. "I thought he was scared for youand wanted to know what would happen to you. He was supposed to be talking about you."
But his questions hadn't been about Bill. Will had wanted to know which of us he was damning to which fate. He had been debating our deaths—deciding which of us would have to go.
"He told me to come," I said, trying to piece the morning together. "He told me to come to Dock Twelve, but there was something... wrong. I could feel it, but I just thought he was tired. I just thought he needed some sleep or—"
"Will."
"I know, buddy. I know."
I brought my hand up to his hair. It was getting long for a Blackthorne Boy and was just starting to tangle at the ends. No one was putting much effort into keeping it tidy. "Something went wrong." As I tucked his curls behind his ear, I found another bruise, this one like the one on his forehead. Dark. Deep. Swollen. "But I guess you already knew that, didn't you?"
Not for the first time, I wondered where Bill had been on that cold morning. I wondered how Dad's team had found him and exactly how bad of shape he had been in. Then I remembered that I probably didn't want to know. "You probably have more answers than I do," I admitted. "I can't seem to figure any of this out."
I pulled my hand back, swiping tears away before they could fall. Bill would probably punch me if he could see me. Or wrap a blanket around me. It was always a tossup with those two.
With him. It was always a tossup with him.
Oh god. Will was gone.
I let my head fall onto the sheets, too tired to hold it up anymore, but I didn't close my eyes. I didn't dare look away. "If you want to stop fighting, I won't blame you," I told him. It felt like some great big secret, which was probably why I lowered my voice. "Sometimes I wish I had the opportunity to stop fighting."
My memories of the dock came in flashes. Bold reds and out-of-place sunrises. The cries of my father and Will's slick smile. I hardly ever had time to remember what actually happened. I never quite made it through the whole timeline. Sometimes I even managed to forget that Will had tried to kill me, but I had no problem remembering anything from that morning as I looked at Bill, wondering why I was here.
Sometimes I wished that I was the one who got to be at peace—that if one of us had to go, then it should have been me. Then I wouldn't have to live on without either of them.
But that was what Will had thought, too. He had seen a world without Bill or me in it, and he had decided that he wanted no part. William Kidd had been selfish, and he had left the two people he loved behind. "He wanted me to kill him," I said. "He told me to do it right there—told me to snap his neck. I think it's because they had you. He told us that they threatened you if he told anyone, so I think he saw death as his only way out."
It was certainly the easier way out.
"But there's one thing I can't figure out," I told him, maybe hoping that he'd wake up and hand me all of the answers. "Will must've been ordered to kill me on that dock. That's the whole point, right? If they hurt you, they could manipulate Will and if they got to Will..."
I tried not to linger on the thought, but it came anyways. If they got to Will, then they could get to me, pretty much any way that they wanted. It made me sick to think how close we had gotten. To think about how many times butterflies flew free in my stomach when he smiled at me. To think about just how much I had loved William Kidd.
"They told him to kill me," I said, certain. "Or else they would kill you. But he wasn't going to let anything happen to either of us—you know how he was. And he couldn't run, otherwise you'd die by default, so he decided that death was the only way out." A shiver rose up my back, making my scratch buzz. "But he couldn't do it himself. I bet they told him you'd die that way, too—so he needed to put on a show. He needed to make it look like he tried."
Which meant that Will's guys had been there. Whoever had been targeting me had seen us on the dock—had looked on as the knife had struck me. They would have seen it if I had won the fight. If I had killed William Kidd like he had asked. Then they would have had to let Bill go. He wouldn't have been of any use to them anymore. It was a trick as old as time—the best way to invalidate leverage was to take the weight from one side.
Except, the weight had been there, right up until the end. Will hadn't died until someone shot him.
Someone shot him.
Someone shot him.
"Why am I still alive?" I asked him. It wasn't any sort of plea for death. I wasn't trying to tempt fate. It was an honest question. Something that had been driving me to insanity—maybe literally. "Dad keeps telling me that one of Will's guys was holding the sniper. That's what everyone says happened, but it doesn't make any sense. Why would one of his guys waste a bullet on him when they could have just killed me right then—Bill. Why. am I. alive?"
Another flash struck me harder than steel and hotter than lightning. I saw the sniper in the tree line. I saw the woman on the other side of the river and, most importantly, I saw the way she looked at me. "It was her," I said, so quietly that Bill wouldn't have even heard me if he were conscious. "My mom saved me."
"Will."
"Yeah," I said, because I knew what he was thinking. I had been thinking the same thing for weeks. "My mom killed Will. My mom killed Will and I—I don't know what to do about that."
Mom had saved me. I was pretty sure that I was supposed to be grateful for that, but what had she saved me for? For this? For breaking down in front of my friend who was halfway to death? For feeling so completely inadequate that most of the time I just wanted to disappear? There was nothing worth saving about this life. Of that, I was sure.
So, no. I wasn't grateful. I was angry. "And if it was her, then why isn't she here?" I asked. "She should be here. With me and Matt and Dad. She should be here and so should Will. I just—I wish things would go back to the way they were. Back before... I don't know. Before now."
I was going to say before my mother went missing, but it occurred to me that the last time I had officially seen my mother, I hadn't even met Will and Bill yet. Then again, maybe it would have been better that way. If we had never met, Will wouldn't be dead and Bill wouldn't be crumbling away, handcuffed to a bed. Maybe that was the price we Goodes paid. Maybe that was the cost of legacy and legend. Maybe it was a curse that followed us—befriend a Goode, prepare to die. And then the Goodes got to watch as everyone they loved, burned.
A list formed in my mind, filled to the brim with people I loved. I crossed them off, one by one, trying to imagine who the easiest targets would be. Trying to decide who would be next. It was the sort of thing that could drive a spy crazy—wondering who was next. Wondering if they would wake up tomorrow and find out that someone they cared about had been torn from their life. The best spies in the world had been telling me not to think about it for years, but I couldn't help myself. I thought about all the people I loved and I cried. I cried for a long time.
"Hughes."
I tore my head back up, the new name hitting harder than a slap to the face. I tried to think about what the boy in front of me was dreaming—tried to piece together his thoughts. That was when I realized that Bill had a list of his own. That Bill had a list of people he loved, too.
"That's a new one," said another voice, deep and rough and tired beyond measure.
I pulled myself away from the bed, hurrying to wipe my eyes and praying that they weren't to red. Maybe I should have tried to reply, but I knew that, with him, the words weren't going to come.
My father took a few careful steps into the room. He was always so careful—ever since we'd had that fight about Mom. Ever since I'd mentioned my attacks. Ever since he'd seen the nightmares take over in the dead of night. "He's been saying Will's name nonstop," he told me. "Yours a few times, too."
I was surprised to find out that my name had come up more than the single time I had heard it, but I didn't have the energy to respond. I didn't dare let the shock show, because once one thing was out, it was all going to come tumbling down. I was a well-trained, absurdly dangerous game of high-stakes emotional Jenga.
"But Hughes is one I hadn't heard yet," he finished, his tone taking on that sticky quality that it so often did when he was solving a case. When it came to the mysterious case of William Kidd, Dad was always talking like there was a case to be solved.
But there was no mystery here. Not today. Just a lot of tears and a boy who missed the people he loved.
Dad was waiting for me to say something. Out of everyone I knew, he had always been the one that waited the longest, but this was different. He must've heard that I was talking again. Of course he had. He and Macey were probably in cahoots.
The words were harsh and strained, but eventually I got them out. "What are you doing here, Dad?"
I hadn't meant for it to sound like an accusation, but it did, and I couldn't bring myself to regret that fact. After all, Dad hadn't come to Bill's room. Agent Zachary Goode had.
But he didn't sound at all wounded when he said, "It's Friday. Thought I'd bring dinner to you tonight. Grandma gave us her suite for the evening and I've got popcorn."
I wiped my eyes one last time. "Are you going to make better popcorn than Grandma does?"
"Honey," he said. "No one can make worse popcorn than Grandma does."
And, despite myself, I had to laugh. "Yeah," I said eventually. "I think I'd like that."
I turned, looking at him for the first time in a long time. He was smiling. It was that smile that he reserved for the women in his life and I knew that it had been a long time coming. That he probably had a hundred of those smiles stocked up inside of him, each one just begging for an excuse to get out.
But his hands were in his pockets and his head was hung low and I knew that, no matter how many smiles he had, a part of him still knew I was broken—still wasn't sure how much he could get away with. He tossed his head towards the door. "Let's go."
"Right now?" I said. "But it's not—"
But then I realized that the glass shadow was gone. That there was no light on the other side of the window and that the fresh flowers in the vase were starting to crisp along the edge of each petal.
It was, I realized. It was dinner time.
"What was that?" Dad asked.
But I just shook my head. It felt like classes had ended ten minutes ago. It felt like I had just gotten here. Something was wrong with the clock in my head and I refused to tell him. Refused to give him another excuse to call me crazy. Instead, I just let him lead me out as he kept a careful pace at my back. I suppose that of all the people I wanted watching my back, Dad was among the first on the list.
"Thanks, Macey," he said as we passed a bench that, to my surprise, Macey was lounging across, reading the latest issue of Scientific American. I hadn't even known she was there and I realized that she had meant for it to be that way. That she knew exactly where the line was supposed to be drawn and she took the responsibility of respect just as seriously as the rest of her duties. "I've got it from here."
She nodded at Dad, then locked her gaze on me. It should have been hard to look into those crystal clear blue eyes, but it wasn't. Not really. Because I knew that as far as Macey McHenry was concerned, the two of us were equals.
And then Dad led me along the hallway, away from the monitors and the stained glass. Away from the perpetual hover of my bodyguard. Away from the questions and the obsession and the mission at hand. Away. Just away. And I couldn't have asked for anything more.