I didn’t even know who Marty Bregman was.
“That’s the point,” Zee said, lifting the thought from my head. “You don’t know who Marty is. If he mattered, you would, hence Chloe politely declining.”
Somehow, I seriously doubted that Chloe’s decline was anywhere near polite. She had a chip on her shoulder, andthe fact that Brooke had an A-list date couldn’t have been sitting well with her.
“Who are you going with?” I wasn’t exactly an expert at girl talk, but I was pretty sure that according to Girl Law, this was the question I was supposed to ask the Gossip Queen next.
“Aaron Lykeman,” Zee said.
That name I knew—vaguely. He was a football player and one of the Chiplings.
“Any other gossip?” I asked. To me, rumor was still a four-letter word, but as long as Zee was talking about other people, I didn’t have to worry about her going all Freud on me.
“Not really,” Zee said. Apparently, there was a first time for everything. “I actually wanted to talk to you about Brooke.”
Say what?
“I know she can seem kind of intense,” Zee said, “and I know you think she’s bossy, but Brooke’s under a lot of pressure right now.”
The last time Zee had pulled me over for a heart-to-heart, it was about Chloe. This time, it was Brooke. I was starting to wonder if our resident profiler’s mission in life was to make me understand the psychological complexities of bitchiness.
“Pressure?” I tried to sort it out in my own mind before Zee could throw herself into full-on wisdom-imparting mode. “Well, there was an explosion,” I mused. “And it sounds like the Big Guys Upstairs are kind of breathing down her neck about it.”
“And,” Zee added, “homecoming’s this weekend.”
As if I needed reminding.
“As far as Brooke’s concerned, she can’t afford to lose this case, and she can’t afford to lose that crown.” Zee gave me a look, willing me to understand her.
I tried to oblige. Apparently, Brooke was stressing about whether or not she’d win a title everyone already knew was hers. And this was supposed to make me feel sorry for her how?
“As far as Brooke’s mother is concerned, losing out on queen and losing a case to the Big Guys are equally unacceptable outcomes.” Zee paused. “She’s really leaning on Brooke right now.”
Ahhhh … the infamous Mrs. Camden. All I knew about her was that she’d trained Brooke for the Squad program from the cradle. From the tone in Zee’s voice, it sounded like she was pretty hard-core about it, even now.
“Brooke’s mom can be … intense.”
At this point, I was used to Brooke being Brooke. A few weeks ago, I probably would have told her to stick her pom-poms where the sun don’t shine if she’d even thought about pulling me off a case, however briefly. All things considered, my response to Brooke’s “request” was looking downright reasonable, and Zee’s info-dumping seemed less than necessary.
“Anything else to share, O Wise One?” I asked.
“Actually,” Zee said. “Now it’s your turn to share.”
I stared at her dumbly.
“You’re tough, Toby, but you also saw somebody die today.” Zee carefully measured my response. “That’s a hard pill for anyone to swallow.”
“Technically, I didn’t see him die.” I shrugged the words off, even as I said them. “I was sort of unconscious at the time.”
“Uh-huh.” Zee was less than persuaded by my response.
“It doesn’t seem real.” I tried for honesty over technicalities this time. “This whole thing—what we do, who we are—it’s all just so surreal that I can’t quite wrap my mind around the fact that today actually happened.”
“Believe it or not,” Zee said, “that might be a good thing.”
And here I’d thought denial was a psychological no-no.
“What we doissurreal,” Zee said. “It’s unbelievable, and there would probably be something wrong with you if you didn’t have a hard time processing this. I just need to know—are you having second thoughts?”
