Spy Out Of Water

Chapter 9

"How's that?" Norman had his hand under Toby's shirt.

"Well it's not poking me anymore," Toby tells him.

"Perfect," Norman starts to pull his hand out from his shirt, but not before I saw him try to cop a feel.

"Dude!" Toby's face turned bright red as Jax started snickering.

"What?" Norman gave him an innocent look. "Nice abs," he winked.

"Alright, I think you've embarrassed him enough," I pull Norman away.

"Oh come on Finny. You know he would have enjoyed that if it was your hand under his shirt," Norman told me.

"That's true," Jax started laughing harder at Toby's expense.

"So the wires in place?" I change the subject quickly, getting us back on track.

"Yup. It's in his shirt button, like the camera," Norman nods.

"We'll be able to monitor the conversation on these," Jax shows us the wireless earbud he and Norman both have in their ears.  "And the entire conversation is being backed up on the main hard drive."

"Okay, everyone know the plan?" Norman asked as we all piled into the car.

"I get Bailey alone to try to find out what she's hiding," I tell him.

"And I do the same with Leila," Toby adds on.

"Flirt with her, ask her out on a date, whatever you have to do," Jax pats his shoulder.

Toby looks over at me and I felt myself stiffen before I forced myself to relax. "Yup," I forced out. "Whatever you have to do."

Toby's mouth turned down in a frown, but before he could say anything, we had arrived at school.

I quickly stepped out of the car to avoid any more conversation and started towards the school. It only took Toby a couple steps to catch up to me.

"Fin," he grabbed my hand. I should have pulled it away but it felt right.

"Do you think we could hang out sometime?"

"We literally just spent all night at the house," I told him, completely avoiding what he was actually asking.

"No, I mean outside of...spy stuff. Like for real and not for the mission or whatever," Toby looked nervous, rubbing his thumb along the back of my hand. It made me feel all warm inside.

I wanted to say yes. And I was about to but I saw Leila start to walk towards the school out of the corner of my eye. It was like getting a slap in the face and I quickly pulled my hand out of Toby's, trying to ignore the hurt look on his face.

"Until this mission is over, that's what we need to focus on. The mission. Not..." I looked over to see Leila getting even closer.

Toby looked at me with a hopeful look. "So after this is all over we can...?"

I knew when this was all over, I'd go back to my academy and he'd go back to his. We'd probably never see each other again. Instead of pointing this out, I looked around to make sure nobody was watching before I gave him a quick kiss on the cheek.

"Leila's over there. You should go talk to her. I'm gonna find Bailey."

I walked into the school without looking back.

Norman was waiting for me inside. "Fin, you okay?"

"Yeah?" I looked at him confused. "Why would I-You listened in on our conversation! Ever heard of privacy?" I was fuming at this point.