“What objections?” Bubbles asked. I swear, she came out of nowhere.
“Nothing,” I said, shooting Tara a warning look.
“Nothing,” Tara agreed.
“How were things here?” I asked, changing the subject before Bubbles could ask any more questions.
Bubbles didn’t answer. I elaborated. “Party planning? Banner painting? Whatnot?”
Bubbles bit her bottom lip.
“Bubbles?” Tara prodded. “What’s going on?”
“We were working on some stuff for the party,” Bubbles said, “and our line of communication with Brooke and Zee went dead.”
Tara took off then, running toward the Quad.
I turned my attention back to Bubbles, to grill her for more specifics, but she was gone. That girl was stealth incarnate.
When Tara came back five minutes later, I was more than ready for some answers. Whether or not I wanted to be, I was part of this now. This was my squad, my team. Something was going on, and someone was going to tell me what it was, or things were going to get ugly.
“Tara?” I didn’t say anything more than her name.
“The line of communication with Brooke and Zee went dead shortly after they arrived in Al Jawf,” Tara said. “Approximately half an hour ago.”
“And that’s bad?” I guessed.
Tara sat down to put on her athletic shoes. “It wouldn’t be horrible,” she said, her voice eerily devoid of emotion. “Sometimes the satellite signal fails; sometimes if you end up underground, the signal doesn’t reach.”
“Okay,” I said. Tara stared down at her shoes, her face perfectly calm. It was that look that made me ask more. I was noticing more and more that when Tara was perfectly anything, it was a surefire sign that she was hiding something. Perfection was tricky that way.
“It wouldn’t be horrible,” I said, repeating her words. “But?”
“It wouldn’t be horrible, but right before we lost the signal, April and Bubbles heard gunfire.”
“Gunfire?”
“Shots were exchanged.” Tara finished lacing up her shoes. “You’d better put yours on,” she said, handing me an identical pair.
“Shots were exchanged?” I asked. “SHOTS were EXCHANGED?”
Tara moved quickly, and before I could prepare myself, she had me pressed up against the locker banks, her face close to mine. “Keep your voice down,” she said.
I hadn’t realized that my posh partner could sound quite like that. I could have fought her, and I almost did, but after the past forty-eight hours, I couldn’t bring myself to do it. Yet.
“Shots were exchanged?” I whispered.
She nodded, eased the pressure off my body, and gestured with her head to the shoes. “You’d better put your shoes on,” she said for a second time.
I looked down at the shoes, but didn’t move to put them on. “Brooke and Zee were shot at, and we haven’t heard from them since?”
Tara nodded.
“And you want me to put on my shoes so that we can go practice our halftime routine?”
Tara nodded again.
Around me, all of the others were suiting up, preparing themselves to Go, Fight, Win!
