Chapter 21

Joe

I'd seen a fair amount of wide eyes in my lifetime. They were mostly delivered by girls my age with high-pitch screams that sounded more like sirens. It was a predictable reaction to the classic pranks that never got old—smuggled snakes, sticky gum meets pretty blonde hair, spiders, worms, and other backyard monsters. Wide eyes and squeamish screams were my thing back in middle school—they turned me on.

So I was used to horrified looks. They were the normal reaction to ninety-nine percent of everything I said and did. But when I told Nancy that we had to jump out the window, she looked at me with blue sapphires so huge and shocked, they put my other victims' expressions to shame. I couldn't stop and relish the reaction, though. We had t-minus five seconds to jump out the third-story window and I wasn't leaving her behind, no matter how much she protested. I pulled her up onto the windowsill, into my arms, and took the leap. Literally. And no, I felt nothing like Superman rescuing Lois Lane.

Everything went down exactly as I'd imagined. My converse hit the tile roof of the neighboring building and gravity did the rest of the work, dragging us down to the edge of the roof and dumping us on the top landing of the emergency exit stairs. Nancy gripped the collar of my shirt and unromantically clawed at my shoulder the entire time.

I didn't let her stop for a breath once we landed. I assessed that she was okay and dragged her down the flight of stairs, out of sight. Once Fango got back into his office, he'd be looking everywhere—including out the window—to find the hooligans who'd broken in. As soon as we were in the shadow of the surrounding buildings and well hidden from sight, I slowed to a stop and caught my breath. Nancy did the same, pressing her palm to her sternum and gasping for air.

"How did you…" she paused, still trying to get her breath back. "How did you know those emergency exit stairs were there?"

I shrugged, leaning against the wall. "I didn't know. I just guessed. You can't really pass for an international spy without making some wild guesses sometimes, right?"

The following look from Nancy was so disbelieving it hurt. She wasn't buying my cons anymore. It was sad.

"Yeah, you're right." I smiled a little, redemptively. "I knew the stairs were here before. I make it a habit to map out emergency exits, in case I ever need to escape from someone."

Nancy nodded. "Someone like Il Capitano?"

"No. Someone like you."

She rolled her eyes (for about the seventeenth time that hour) and walked away, resisting the urge to smack me on her way passed. I could tell that she wanted to—I could practically see her fingers twitching with the temptation. I followed her along the edge of the courtyard and out of Campo dei Frari.

The clouds were beginning to hover, slowing down and crowding into a thick layer of future rain. It was cold without the sun, but I barely felt it through my t-shirt as I followed Nancy along the side of the river. She was ahead of me, and still rushing. But I was aching to know what she found on the computer back there, so I couldn't stand the single-file deal any longer.

"Hey," I said, reaching out and grabbing her elbow to stop her. "Wait up. Fango can't run that fast."

She exhaled a laugh, pressing her fingertips to her forehead. "Sorry. Just…nervous."

"What did you find on his computer?" I asked, side-stepping out of someone's way on the narrow sidewalk.

"A conversation," she said, "between Fango and Gina. She wanted to send the information to him physically, through a dead drop. But he insisted that she tell him, and she did. The information was this: she said that the transfer of the inventory happened the night before this message was sent. It's been taken to 'Il Dottore's storage,' wherever that is."

I felt my brow lower slightly. "And when was this message sent?"

"February fourth."

The fourth. I thought about it for a minute. February fourth was the day after I'd arrived in Venice. News of Nico's capture had been spreading through the local papers, and Sophia had just inserted me into the club at Casa dei Giochi. That night was the second stakeout, when I ran into Nancy on the rooftop and overheard Gina, Fango, and Tazza talking in the shadows.

I felt a swallow slip down my throat as I remembered Gina's voice, whispering words I could barely make out the first time I'd heard them: "Security? And you thought that was prudent? On a night like this?"

I hadn't understood it then, but I understood it perfectly now. The GdiF thought something big was going to happen that night at the Palazzo Orpello—something was going to be stolen. That's what they assumed, but they were wrong. Something big was going to happen that night—but not at the Palazzo Orpello. While everyone was distracted with a potential theft, the crime ring was transferring stolen goods across the city—and possibly even out of the country.

The realization hit me at almost the same time it hit Nancy. She looked up at me, eyes back to being super wide. "That would make perfect sense. They wanted us to be distracted with the stakeout—so that we wouldn't catch them transferring the stolen art. Dang it!"

"It's the GdiF's fault," I said. "And mine. I'm the one who gave them the clue about the Palazzo Orpello."

Nancy shook her head. "You didn't know any better, though. Nobody knew better."

"True."

Nancy ran one hand through her long waves of hair. She would want to get away and think for a while, by herself—she was introverted like that—which meant that I was going to lose her, for at least a few hours.

"Hey," I caught up to her pace, cutting off a few pedestrians and not caring. "Has Sophia called you at all?"

"No. Has she called you?"

I shook my head. "It's so weird. I don't get it."

Nancy shrugged one shoulder. "I do, sort of. She's on some kind of a power trip. She wants to be on top, and doesn't mind making some not-too-legal moves to get there."

"You really think so?" I asked. "She seems like the type who'd be a stickler for the rules."

"She seems so, but I don't think she is. I think she just hates the fact that she isn't the boss." Nancy started to slow to a stop, and I realized that the doorway we were approaching was the entrance to the Ca. "The way she practically 'fired' me, for instance—"

"She fired you?"

"Well not officially, but she just stopped consulting me and…stopped calling me." Nancy blew out a sigh, letting her fingers trail across the terra cotta wall. "I don't understand what I ever did to lose her trust."

There was a moment's pause, where I tried to focus enough to respond, but couldn't. It was something about her hand, touching the wall. I wanted to hold it. So bad.

"I guess we just have to focus on what's important now," I said, trying to take my own advice in a totally different context. "Sophia isn't the problem. We need to figure out where Il Dottore's storage is, to find the stolen art."

Nancy nodded, seeming absent. Finally she lifted her gaze to mine and relented to a little smile, as if caught off guard. "Yeah. I guess I'll catch up with you later."

"When?"

She smiled one of those little, confused smiles. "Well, where are you staying?"

I felt the urge to be an idiot. "Nowhere in particular."

She dropped her shoulders. "Come on."

I shrugged. "Park benches. And other confidential areas."

"Seriously…"

"The Argon building."

Her eyebrows shot halfway up her forehead. "You're kidding."

"Nope," I shook my head. "My room's the one right across from Fango. Which is very comforting. Maybe tonight I'll go over and politely ask if I can have my pocketknife back."

Nancy laughed—one of her genuine laughs, the kind that told me the thing I just said was actually funny and not lame. It was a beautiful thing to behold.

We traded some kind of a "see you later," but I didn't unfreeze myself from the patio entrance until the front door shut and Nancy was out of sight. For a minute I just stood there, trying to ignore the way my heartbeat was losing its rhythm in her wake. Why was I letting a girl mess me up like this?

As I turned to leave, I heard something that made my blood freeze in my veins.

Nancy's scream.

FlightFeathers: Haha yes! It kind of does qualify as suicide if you are probably going to die but maybe there's a small chance you won't... *starts thinking deeply with you lol* EEP THANK YOU I really love writing their banter...like more than anything ever hahaa xD I hope you liked this chapter!