So instead, I opted out of lunch and headed for the gym. I doubled back twice to make sure no one was following me, and then I went into the girls’ locker room, and after jumping through eight million security hoops, I made my way down to the Quad.
It was quiet, more so than I’d ever seen it. Our flat-screen was turned off, and I couldn’t even hear the ghosts of conversations we’d had about training, missions, or who liked who.
“Please tell me you weren’t stupid enough to come down here during the day.”
I turned and found Chloe giving me one of those patented Chloe Larson looks that made me feel so loved and so special and like everything was right with the world.
I snorted. I couldn’t even think that last bit with a straight face.
“Seriously,” Chloe said. “Do you have any idea how idiotic it is to just waltz into the Quad in the middle of the day when you know that your cover has been broken? I mean, are you trying to send out engraved invitations to our secret underground lair, or has your brain just stopped working altogether?”
When she put it that way, she actually had a point.
“I think I know who tagged me,” I said. “And he’s occupied.”
Jack was eating lunch with the others, probably wondering where I was and why I’d abandoned him to suffer through the inanity of an A-list lunch on his own.
“Shouldn’t you be worrying about Amelia?” I asked, trying to distract Chloe from her dogged criticism by mentioningthe reason she was in the Quad during school hours—laying the groundwork for the massive mission she was coordinating that afternoon.
“You know who tagged you, and he’s occupied,” Chloe said, repeating my earlier words and not allowing me to sidetrack her. “He as in who?”
I chose not to answer. My suspicions about Jack were my own. I wasn’t about to let her know that maybe he didn’t like me as much as everyone had thought. I could do without seeing Chloe break into a cheer-dance of victory.
“Because I know you’re not talking about him as in Jack,” Chloe continued.
Was I really that obvious?
“You really arespecial,aren’t you?” Chloe asked. Her tone left absolutely nothing unclear about her meaning. She shook her head, words flying out of her mouth as she did. “I can’t even believe I’m doing this,” she said. “I can’t even believe that I’m … Never mind,” she said.
“What?”
“Just follow me,” she snapped.
Completely bewildered, I actually followed her “suggestion.”
Two minutes later, Chloe deactivated the security on her lab door and threw it open. “No actual penetration of our perimeter,” she said out loud. “Klein just wandered in unannounced.” It took me a moment to realize that she was talking to someone other than me. “Your position holding steady?”
“Affirmative,” came the reply. I tried to identify whereexactly the speakerphone, or communicator or whatever, was, but gave up. Chloe’s lab was a mess of accessories, wires, gadgets, gizmos, and clutter. I wouldn’t even know where to begin looking.
Satisfied that Brooke and Zee were doing fine in the field, Chloe turned back to me. Rolling her eyes for no apparent reason whatsoever, she picked up a sheet of paper and handed it to me. “It’s an analysis of the chip,” she said. “It isn’t the kind that Peyton uses. Trust me—we’ve run into their tech before, and this isn’t it—it isn’t nearly state-of-the-art enough. The good folks at Peyton, Kaufman, and Gray would spit on this chip. It’s practically ancient.”
I breathed in and out, in and out, letting this information sink in and trying not to let any of my myriad of emotions fly across my face. Chloe didn’t need to see how relieved I was that Jack wasn’t a part of this. Scratch that—nobody needed to know how relieved I was that Jack wasn’t a part of this.
“Do you want to know the truth about Jack Peyton?” Chloe asked, her words coming out in a rush. “The truth is this. You’re using him, just like Brooke used him, just like I used him—and just like the two of us, you’re starting to fall for him. The difference is that Jack knew that we were using him—he just thought it was all about popularity for us, but in all of his teen boy wisdom, he’s decided that you’redifferent.” Chloe spat out the word.
She was putting into words everything I’d been afraid of, and everything I’d tried not to hope for. Jack wasn’t using me. Jack liked me. I was using him.
“Do you know why Brooke and Jack broke up?” Chloe asked suddenly.
“Chlo,” Brooke’s voice came over the hidden speakers. “Back off.”
“Because falling for your mark is the last thing you’re supposed to do,” Chloe said. “They started off using each other, and then … boom … there were real feelings involved, and Brooke’s mom pulled the plug.”
“Chloe!”
“And do you know why Jack and I broke up?” Chloe said softly.
I took a wild guess. “Because you fell for him?”
