Now, in addition to our teachers and our chef, the Gallagher Academy has a pretty extensive staff, but it's not the kind of place that advertises in the want ads (well… you know…except for coded messages). There are two types of people who come here—students looking to get into the AlphaNet (CIA, FBI, NSA, etc.), and staff members looking to get out. So when two men built like refrigerators show up with long metal poles and vise grips, it's fairly likely that those have been the tools of their trade for a while now—just in a very different context.
That's why we didn't ask any questions that night. We just pointed to a corner and then the three of us made a beeline for the second floor.
"Come in, girls," my mother yelled as soon as we entered the Hall of History—long before she could have seen us. Even though I'd grown up with her, sometimes her superspy instincts scared me. She walked to the door. "I've been expecting you."
I'd been working on a doozy of a speech, let me tell you, but as soon as I saw my mother silhouetted in the door frame I forgot it. Luckily, Bex never has that problem.
"Excuse me, ma'am," she said, "but do you know why the maintenance department has delivered an extra bed to our room?"
Anyone else asking that question in that tone might have seen the wrath of Rachel Morgan, but all my mom did was cross her arms and match Bex's scholarly inflections.
"Why, yes, Rebecca. I do know."
"Is that information you can share with us, ma'am? Or is it need-to-know?" (If anyone had a need—it was us. We were the ones losing our beanbag corner over the deal!)
But Mom just took a step and gestured for us to follow. "Let's take a walk."
Something was wrong, I realized. It had to be, so I was on her heels, following her down the grand staircase, saying, "What? Is it blackmail? Does the senator have something on—"
"Cameron," Mom said, trying to cut me off.
"Is he on the House Armed Services Committee? Is it a funding thing, because we could start charging tuition, you—"
"Cammie, just walk," Mom commanded.
I did as I was told, but I still didn't shut up. "She won't last. We can get rid of—"
"Cameron Ann Morgan," Mom said, playing the middle-name card that all moms keep in their back pockets for just such an occasion. "That's enough." I froze as she handed the large manila envelope she'd been carrying to Bex and said, "Those are your new roommate's test scores."
Okay, I'll admit it—they were good. Not Liz-good, or anything, but they were far better than Macey McHenry's 2.0 GPA would indicate.
We turned down an old stone corridor, our feet echoing through the cold hall.
"So she tests well," I said. "So—"
Mom stopped short, and all three of us nearly ran into her. "I don't run decisions past you, do I, Cammie?" Shame started brewing inside me, but Mom had already shifted her attention toward Bex. "And I do make controversial decisions from time to time, don't I, Rebecca?" At this, we all remembered how Bex came to us, and even she shut up. "And, Liz." Mom shifted her gaze one last time. "Do you think we should only admit girls who come from spy families?"
That was it—she had us.
Mom crossed her arms and said, "Macey McHenry will bring a much-needed level of diversity to the Gallagher Academy. She has family connections that will allow entry into some very closed societies. She has an underutilized intellect. And…" Mom seemed to be pondering this next bit. "…she has a quality about her."
Quality? Yeah, right. Snobbery is a quality, so is elitism, fascism, and anorexicism. I started to tell my mom about the eight-hundred-calorie-a-day thing, or the B-word thing, or to point out that Code Reds were fake interviews, not real ones. But then I looked at the woman who had raised me and who, rumor has it, once sweet-talked a Russian dignitary into dressing in drag and carrying a beach ball full of liquid nitrogen under his shirt like a pregnant lady, and I knew I was sufficiently outgunned, even with Bex and Liz beside me.
"And if that isn't enough for you …" Mom turned to look at an old velvet tapestry that hung in the center of the long stone wall.
Of course I'd seen it before. If a girl wanted to stand there long enough, she could trace the Gallagher family tree that branched across the tapestry through nine generations before Gilly, and two generations after. If a girl had better things to do, she could reach behind the tapestry, to the Gallagher family crest imbedded in the stone, and turn the little sword around, then slip through the secret door that pops open. (Let's just say I'm the second type of girl.)
"What does this have to do with …" I started, but Liz's "Oh my gosh" cut me off.
I followed my friend's thin finger to the line at the bottom of the tapestry. I'd never known that Gilly had gotten married. I'd never known she'd had a child. I'd never dreamed that child's last name was "McHenry."
And all this time I thought I was a Gallagher legacy.
"If Macey McHenry wants to come here," Mom said, "we'll find a place for her."
She turned and started to leave, but Liz called after her, "But, ma'am, how's she gonna…you know … catch up?"
Mom considered this to be a fair question, because she folded her hands and said, "I admit that, academically, Ms. McHenry will be behind the rest of the sophomore class. For that reason, she will be taking many of her courses with our younger students."
Bex grinned at me, but even the thought of Macey's supermodel legs stretching her high above a class full of newbies couldn't change the fact that two guys with bald heads (that may or may not have prices on them) were at that very moment making room for her in our suite. The question on my mother's face was whether we would make room for her in our lives.
I looked at my best friends, knowing that our mission, should we choose to accept it, was to befriend Macey McHenry. The good girl inside of me knew that I should at least try to help her fit in. The spy in me knew I'd been given an assignment, and if I ever wanted to see Sublevel Two, I'd better grin and say "Yes, ma'am." The daughter in me knew there wasn't any choosing involved here.
"When does she start?" I asked.
"Monday."
That Sunday night I met Mom in her office for Tater Tots and chicken nuggets. We had one hard-and-fast rule about Sunday night suppers—Mom had to make them herself, which is nice and all, but not exactly good for my digestion. (Dad always said the most lethal thing about her was her cooking.) Directly beneath us, my friends were dining on the finest foods a five-star chef could offer, but as my mom walked around in an old sweatshirt of my dad's, looking like a teenager herself, I wouldn't have traded places with them for all the crème brûlée in the world.
When I first came to the Gallagher Academy, I felt guilty about being able to see my mother every day when my classmates had to go months on end without their parents. Eventually, I stopped feeling bad about it. After all, Mom and I don't have summers together. But mostly, we don't have Dad.
"So how's school?" She always asked as if she didn't know—and maybe she didn't. Maybe, just like every good operative, she wanted to hear all sides of the story before making up her mind.
I dipped a Tater Tot in some honey mustard dressing and said, "Fine."
"How's CoveOps?" the mother asked, but I knew the headmistress was in there somewhere, and she wanted to know if her newest staff member was making the grade.
"He knows about Dad."
I don't know where the sentence came from or why I spoke it. I'd spent six days dreading Macey McHenry's arrival into our little society, but that was what I said when I finally had my mother alone? I studied her, wishing Mr. Solomon would have covered Reading Body Language that week instead of Basic Surveillance.