Alex woke up the next morning sprawled across the couch. Someone had laid a blanket over him while he slept. He sat up and rubbed his eyes. Where the hell am I? he wondered. Then he remembered the events of the previous night. He had waited for Mrs. Jones to come home, but apparently, he had fallen asleep.
"Good morning, Alex," Mrs. Jones greeted as she came out of her room fully dressed.
"Hello, Mrs. Jones," Alex yawned.
"Camryn told me about what happened last night. I hope you're alright."
"Yeah, I'm fine."
"That's good. Would you like me to drive you home?"
"Yeah, that'd be great. Thanks."
Mrs. Jones drove Alex home. He thought everything was all hunky-dory now, but hell, was he wrong!
"Alexander Rider!" Jack Starbright screamed as soon as she saw Alex. "Where the hell were you?! Do you know how worried I was?!"
"Sorry, Jack," Alex apologized weakly.
Suddenly, Jack's hand lashed out and slapped Alex. Alex was stunned. Jack had never hit him before in his life.
"Where were you?!" she demanded.
"I spent the night at Cam's-"
"You did WHAT?!" Jack fumed.
"Wait! I didn't mean it like that!" Alex explained all of last night's events all the way up to getting a ride home from Mrs. Jones.
Jack pulled on her face. "Oh my God, Alex. As if I don't worry about you enough with your being a spy."
"I'm really sorry, Jack."
"If you're going to run off, I know I can't stop you, but at least leave a note or call me and leave a message."
Alex nodded. Then Jack hugged him hard. Alex thought he was going to suffocate.
"Oh, I love you so much, Alex!" Jack cried,
"Um, yeah, that's great, Jack. I love you too, but I can't breathe!"
"I'll meet you guys in L.A. Just have the extract for me at the lab." Camryn hung up the phone.
"Are you really that hurt that we can't go to Tokyo?" Alex asked.
Camryn shook her head. "I'm just stalling. I'm really not looking forward to working in a morphine lab."
"I really don't like this either. Actually, I hate it."
"I know," Camryn said, putting her arms around Alex's shoulders.
"I wish I could punch Alan Blunt in the face. That would make everything so much better."
Camryn suddenly jumped. "Oh my God…"
"What is it, Cam?" Alex asked, a little concerned.
Camryn bore a serious stare into Alex's eyes. "Did you notice that tomorrow is Christmas?"
Alex blinked, then burst out laughing.
"Alex! What's so funny?"
"I thought you were going to tell me something serious!" Alex said, still laughing.
"I am serious! Tomorrow is Christmas, and I completely forgot about it!"
"Well, then I guess it's a good thing that we're not headed off to Tokyo today."
"Do we have any plans for tomorrow? My mom is going in to work tomorrow."
"You can spend the day with Jack and me. But why is Mrs. Jones working tomorrow?"
"I don't know. She never takes vacations."
"Strange…"
"Yeah. Mr. Blunt is coming in to work too, and he has a family."
Suddenly, Alex was struck by the most amazing idea.
It was Christmas morning before anyone had awakened. The only person working at headquarters was the custodian. He let Alex and Camryn into the building. The two loaded four cardboard boxes into the elevator and went up to Mr. Blunt's office. Camryn took out her laptop and tapped into the MI6 mainframe. She disabled all the security cameras. Alex picked the lock of Mr. Blunt's office and opened the door. Then the two teen spies unloaded the boxes from the stalled elevator. Once inside the office, Alex closed the door.
"Okay, let's get to work," Alex said.