The room was small. Really small. Government-budget-for-a-low-priority-mission small. It couldn’t have been more than ten feet from door to window, and most of the space was taken up by a bed. So, yeah. It was already pretty cramped, but it felt so, so much smaller when Collins and I were the only two in there.
The silence didn’t seem to bother him in the slightest. He was perfectly content as he sat reading that newspaper with the headline I couldn’t read. I watched as his eyes skimmed over the words. As he licked his finger before turning to the next page. He was completely at ease and I wondered exactly how much time Collins had spent with the silence. Probably just as much as I’ve spent with the shadows.
“What is it, Goode?” he said, not looking up from the paper. The words made me jump and for the first time in my life, I realized why it was referred to as breaking a silence. “You’re staring and it’s freaking me out.”
Staring? Had I been staring? Definitely not. Observing, maybe, but definitely not staring.
I scrambled for something to say, spitting out the first question on my mind. It had been sitting with me for a while and I was going to wait until Matt got back to ask it, but Matt wasn’t back yet and I was running out of time for pre-mission questions. “My file says that I’m attending the ball with the nephew-in-law of the American Ambassador to Adria.”
He popped a grape in his mouth, bored. “Is there a problem with that?”
I pulled his paper down, slamming it on the table with a satisfying rip. He didn’t get to talk to me like I was a nuisance. If he wasn’t going to listen to me, then I was going to make him. “Aren’t people going to notice that the American nephew and the Adrian countess look suspiciously similar?”
He squinted, a crease carved into the center of his forehead. “What are you talking about?”
He started to pull his paper back up, already bored with this conversation, but I pinned it down to the table again. Collins glanced at my hand, then up at me. He must’ve gotten the message because he let go of the paper and crossed his arms over his chest. “I’m talking about,” I said. “The fact that Matt and I look like brother and sister.”
“Well then it’s a good thing no one’s going to see you together then, isn’t it?” he bit back, leaning over that tiny table as if trying to intimidate me. Too bad for him, I don’t scare easy.
“What do you mean?” I asked, cautious. I tried to get a read on him, but it wasn’t easy. He did the same thing that Grandpa Joe always did. It’s a specific kind of poker face that makes you feel like you’re the one on trial. It turns your own accusation against you and all of a sudden, the reader becomes the readee, making you feel like you have to explain yourself. “Matt’s my date.”
This time, Collins smiled. Once side of his grin was wider than the other, giving off the general sense of lopsided smugness. Was there anything about him that wasn’t arrogant? “It’s cute that you think that, Goode. Real cute.”
I froze. In a spy’s life, you’re trained to see possibilities not as the options that are gone, but rather, as the options that remain. With Matt out of the picture, there was only one option left. “Whatever you’re about to say next,” I warned. “Don’t.”
This time, his smile stretched all the way across his lips, because when it came to Luke Collins, nothing was more satisfying than watching me squirm. “I’m your date to the Ambassadors’ Ball.”
I slammed my hand on the table—a big sound in a little room. “Nope,” I said, rejecting the statement with all my will.
Collins sat back in his chair, popping another grape in his mouth. “What’s the matter, Goode?” he said with a satisfied crunch. “Don’t trust me?”
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Dropping Like Spies - A Gallagher Girls Story
FanfictionBOOK 3 - It started with her mother, but it certainly didn't end there. A series of strange disappearances sends the Goode family scrambling. Who will be next on the list?
