The girls all stared at the outfits on the beds in front of them, they took pride in their appearance and this was not on. They had brown long sleeved top, black cargo trousers with too many pockets and canvas brown trainers which made Bex gag. They had all spent 5 minutes trying to work out anyway to make them decent and had eventually given up as they were that disgusting. Macey's face had been so pale with horror that Cammie and Liz had been worried she would actually faint!
"We need to think sideways. Other ways of looking at it..." Bex grumbled, almost to herself, "Liz?"
"Ummm... I... I... Ummmm..."
"GOT IT!" Macey had suddenly yelled pulling out her phone violently and began pacing while messaging somebody, Bex had reminded her five times that they were hiding and that she needed to not go on the phone but Macey just batted her away. Instead darting out the room and speaking to Joe, before fervently dialing somebody.
Cammie glanced up and saw the boys outside silhouetted against the dim sky, all the only definable by their shapes. A tall stocky guy with short spikey hair in a military cut was laughing and punching the boy next to him, Grant. The mid-height lanky boy who had his face buried in a phone, Jonas. A boy who looked like he had been through the stretcher but had actually attempted to tame his hair, Preston.
But Cammie's eyes lingered on the final boy, slightly shorter than Grant, wild hair and muscular build. He was just staring out at the lake, occasionally glancing at the boys either side of him. He didnt seem linked to the others, but at the same time was right next to them, his brothers.
He was like her in a lot of ways.
The maddeningly sensible, cocky, two sided boy who in Cammie's words was, kind of hot, and in Macey's words was, totally damn 100% gorgeous. Bex however had refused to give any response to the boys in general only Grant, Macey had winked at Cammie at this point while mouthing GEX!
"Done." Macey put her phone away with a small click and turned to smile at the others, "Outfits sorted, the boys are gonna love them!"
"How?"
"Well my father is in England and able to buy a whole load of stuff for us then send it with my second cousin who is leaving in 1 and a half hours to fly to France where I am getting a taxi to pick up the bags from Lyon airport to take them to the local town hall where I will send Joe to go get them and if he doesn't, I will." Macey looked up and saw all the girls with their mouths hanging open, "What? You try being a multimillionaire with her face on Vogue three seasons ago with 439 contacts on my phone and over 100000 followers on Facebook. I tend to get my way. I think about 2 and a half hours before they are here."
"Macey McHenry!" Professor Buckingham called up the stairs as she moved paperwork around in a bag, "I heard all of that! Be aware we are technically in hiding, but that is a brilliant thought pattern." The girls all looked at each other and held back grins until they knew she was out of earshot when they all burst out laughing. Cammie noticed how her cheeks hurt after just a second or two and the laughter faded from her. It scared her that laughter felt so alien while the others were all still laughing. So she just fake grinned until the others giggled into silence.
"You will end up laughing I promise. It will come back." A male voice whispered in her ear, Cammie jumped and lashed out but the boy's reflexes were superb and he caught her wrist inches in front of his face. Cammie looked under the top bunk to see Zach's dark eyes sparkling with mischievous delight. He hung off the top bars of the above bunk and swung to sit next to Cammie, not letting her wrist go.
Cammie twisted away her wrist away a light smile on her face, but realised after a few seconds she had been staring into his eyes a bit too long. She blushed slightly and looked away, Zach smirked to himself.
"How did you move so fast?" Cammie raised her eyebrows, still not looking at him, instead staring at the ceiling. Zach chuckled and Cammie flicked down to look at him, him laughing was 1000x hotter. But he tapped the side of his nose smirking,
"Spy." He muttered, so only she could hear him. They both smiled faintly.
"We need to assign beds as we have lost 34 minutes and have…" Macey was talking to all the teens like a teacher in front of a class.
"1 hour and 26 minutes... Wait, sorry Mace." Liz blushed and looked down, Grant and Jonas exchanged a glance. Well more Grant sent Jonas a look of, 'Why are you waiting!' and Jonas glared back.
"… saved me the loathsome addition and subtraction thanks Liz. Well, until our outfits arrive. I have everything ready, I checked the 'jobs' we are going to train for and adapted the outfits I ordered at the local store. I also got us some down time clothes and I thought cause they had 50% off on anything over £200…"
"BLUMIN' HELL MACEY!" Bex's jaw dropped in horror at pure amounts of money she was throwing around.
"What!? Dad gave me some money to play with, well as I was saying I also got the boys some stuff and us some dresses and casual."
"Care to explain why you got us stuff?" Preston's eyes were wide, "How do you know our sizes?" He stared down at his stomach and turned slightly red in embarrasment. The others all looked confused too.
"Well I have seen the tags on yours and Grant's, I have guessed for the other two. But I think it's probably right cause I have a seen a few models similar sizes to you and I know their sizes. Jonas you're a small/long? And Zach I reckon you are one of the models cause I swear you are an exact size M. You could get away with being one of them." Macey sent Cammie a sideways glance and then grinned at the smirking Zach. Both of the boys muttered thanks but Zach continued to million dollar smile at the girls, particually between Macey and Cammie.
A moment of silence was broken by an innocent statement.
"Well, I will go on the bottom." Jonas muttered.
"TOP!" Grant called.
"ME TOO!" Bex yelled even louder, they glanced at each other and wrestled each other for the closet to the balcony. Cammie just grabbed her jacket off the bed and walked to the bottom bunk nearest the balcony. Bex had beaten Grant and was sitting over her head pulling faces at him across the meter wide gap. Cammie ignored this and looked out the window. Zach wandered over to the bunk under Grant and unloaded his pockets onto it, the gun, three packets of drugs for a recent injury and a few biscuit crumbs. Zach sighed and started to brush them off. Cammie turned round at the exasperated sigh and noticed the gun, her heart started to get faster and she tried to control her breathing but it got faster and faster. She tried to look away but her head couldn't move. Why was she so scared? It was just a gun!
It was sleek and black, just like the one Catherine had. Her panic started swelling up uncontrollably now, the image of her mum defiantly staring up at the horrific woman. The bang and the blood oozing...
"Cammie? Cammie!" Zach whispered, quiet enough that nobody else heard. Jumping over his bed he crouched down and looked into her face, but she didn't see him. Her eyes were blurry and her recently dry face was stained by another tear. He glanced around and spotted the gun. "Oh, rookie mistake Zach you stupid man..."
He kicked it off the bed and looked back at her. Another tear. The gun wasnt the problem. What was? Another tear. The issue was inside her own head, she was battling with her demons. Closing his eyes he muttered a small prayer and elbowed her in the temple. She collapsed into his arms neatly and Zach made a fake shocked noise. And started to 'diagnose' her.
"Is she okay Zach?" Preston looked over.
"Fainted, it's okay I can carry her Grant, I have done already today." This caught the girls attention. Bex glowered at Zach and started forward, but Liz stopped her.
"OMG Cammie!" Macey rushed forward, dodging Liz's arm, to knock Zach out the way, but he put a hand out to stop her. She froze. Something about Zach oozed power and there was something almost menacing about his glower towards her.
"Zachary move your butt!" She tried halfheartedly, but Zach shook his head, putting one arm under Cammie's knees and the other under her shoulders he picked her up, readjusting her head against his shoulder.
"Just need some water and ice, and probably air." Jonas frowned, "Looks like she banged her head from that bruise."
"Maybe on the way down." Zach covered flawlessly. "I'll get her outside."
Zach caught up some Paracetemol and kicked open the balcony door. Laying her on the floor just as Liz came battering onto the balcony and passed Zach the required stuff he wanted and walked off again as Zach sent her a look.
He found two small stones and jammed them in the doors to stop the doors opening easily. Then walked back to Cammie, he put the ice on the bit of her head he elbowed and held it there with one hand while checking her pulse and breathing with the other.
He saw Macey come to the door with Bex and Grant but none of them tried to push the doors and Zach was glad, he needed to talk to Cammie alone. They seemed to be satisfied with his care.
Exactly 3 minutes 54 seconds later the girl stretched and tried to rub her eyes. But winced as she caught her bruise with her hand. Zach leant back to give her space to wake up, also in case she flipped at him. He stayed away until she was awake and then waited for the explosion. It took a second and then,
"GUN!" She shot upright, readying herself to get up but the world started to spin and Zach lent forward to catch her, "Zach has a gun… He… He has a gun like Catherines…" Cammie didn't seem to be able to see the boy a foot away from her, her eyes were cloudy and more tears came down her cheeks. The idea of Catherines gun has obviously freaked her.
"Cammie, can I explain?" He muttered from his seat.
"Zach? Where is…" Cammie reached out her hand and Zach took it in his own, she wrapped her fingers around his. Zach was slightly surprised by the sudden sign of affection. She jumped slightly and finally realised Zach was sitting next to her. She began to breath heavily but didn't let go of his hand.
"All four of us boys have one, we were ready for everything, including resistance." Zach saw Cammie was starting to become more normal again, "Sorry I knocked you out, easiest way to get you out onto the balcony so I could talk to you. You couldn't move, you froze."
They spent a good few moments just looking at eachother, both analysing eachother in detail to find lies and deception.
"Zach, why do you even care?" Cammie was now able to sit up herself and dragged herself so she was leaning against the stone edge instead, she tried to glare at Zach but a small amount of distrust snuck through. Nobody had really personally cared before, they all wanted her safe but Zach seemed different, she didn't understand why.
"Cause I read your file, it kinda shocked me, but don't tell Grant. I don't really want you to… urmm… get hurt again. It was a bit too similar to my story for my liking and… urmm… yeh." Zach realised he was blushing and looked down, since when was he EVER like this! He was able to flirt with girls and not give a single care! Something about Cammie put him under a permenant bright spotlight. But her reasons and mystery intrigued him, almost attracted him.
"Well anyway, thanks for helping me." Cammie climbed up the wall and wobbled. Zach shot up to help her and she clutched onto his arms. He was surprised how strong she was, but that was eclipsed when instead of letting go of him she pulled him into a hug.
Cammie grinned into his shoulder, she had outsmarted the spy who she was definately intrigued and attracted to, he was hot, yes. But she also had an undefinable feeling of safety from him. Maybe it was fact he could have killed her many times by now, instead he saved her.
She felt Zach's arms around her back and for the first time in nearly year she knew she was safe for a moment. She pulled away and saw Zach's face had split into a massive grin, and she realised she was grinning too. The hug lasted a few seconds longer than just new friends should, what the hell!?
"How long we been out here? Cause I can imagine Macey will be going mental now." Cammie glanced at the doors to see everyone inside talking intensly.
"Only about 10 minutes, and you spent about 2 min in a gah gah state. So we still have 1 hour…"
"…14 minutes. Keep up Zachary!" Cammie smirked and went over to the doors, looking down she rolled her eyes kicked the stone out and opened the doors.
"Cammie, how did you realise th... " Zach marvelled at her observational skills and secretly felt little abashed that he had been that unsubtle. What was wrong with him!?
"Spy." She tapped her nose and walked inside, her brown hair flicking behind her. Zach just suppressed his grin and walked in after. He kept forgetting these weren't normal civi's.
The large clock rang out for the second time, Bex lay faintly asleep on her bed, the lights were out and if it wasn't for the footsteps on the stairs Cammie would probably be asleep too.
The door creaked open ever so slightly and a line of light fell across Preston and Macey's sleeping faces. Cammie sat up, glaring at the man's profile in the door, he was holding four HUGE bags and seemed to be sagging under the weight. Cammie stood up slowly and virtually silently made her way over to the man, he smiled a dazzling white smile at Cammie and she helped him with two of the bags. One was marked 'M' and the other 'C', Cammie put the bags at the end of the beds. Joe then disappeared out the door and Cammie followed,
"Boys bags at the bottom of the stairs, they are all smaller but couldn't manage 8 bags at a time. Patricia carried them from the town." He muttered to her. Cammie grabbed two bags again and slipped up the stairs, placing them at the end of their relative beds she climbed back into her own. Joe walked over silently, "Try to sleep Cammie. I know that you are scared of the dreams but you are safe here, I'm next door, Bex is nearby you and…"
"Zach is next to me, I know." She interrupted him, he looked slightly shocked but hid it well.
"Zach? No I wasn't expecting you to say that." Joe smiled again, "I knew you two would hit it off well. One thing though, I would trust all of them, even Mr… Zach."
"I know who is mum is, he told me when he first met me." Cammie looked up from her pillow into her step-dad's delighted face, "Why are you so happy!?"
"Cause I really hope you can sort each other out." Joe Solomon grinned his trademark grin again before disappearing off though the doors. Cammie curled up and closed her eyes, breathing deeply she remembered the feeling hugging Zach had given her.
Why have I got an attachement to this man?!
Maybe because he is the first person who has cared fully?
Oh I don't know...
She had no nightmares that night.
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Lots of love, Charlie x