The Betrayal of Renegade X (Renegade X, Book 3) (17 page)

“You don’t have to decide right now. Here.” He opens up his desk drawer and pulls out a small envelope, then hands it to me. “It’s an invite to a little event we’re having. You can meet everyone, see what we’re about. And it’s catered. Free food.” He wiggles his eyebrows, like that’s the most tempting thing he could have told me.

I can’t
. That’s what I should say. It’s not what comes out. “I’ll think about it.”

“That’s all I ask.” He picks up his phone and sends off a text. When it chimes that he has a new message, he gets up from behind the desk to show me to the door. “My associates will see you and your sister out. Oh, and one more thing before you go. We’re a fledgling organization, and I would hate for the Truth to be snuffed out before it really got legs. You know the last thing the heroes want is for us to have a voice. So I can trust you not to say anything to anyone, can’t I?”

“Yeah, of course.”

“No one. Absolutely no one. I mean it.”

“What about Mom?”

He rolls his eyes. “God.
Especially
don’t tell your mother.”

I smile at him.

He puts a hand on my shoulder and says, “I love you, Damien. Remember that.”

I
t’s
really
hard not to text Kat as soon as we get out of the laundromat. I even get out my phone, twice, on the way to the bus stop, ready to type,
I’ve found the Truth, ask me how
, or,
You’ll never believe what happened on our mission today.
But I resist. Just barely. Though I’m pretty sure that when Grandpa said to tell “absolutely no one,” he didn’t mean Kat. Right?

I keep expecting Amelia to chew me out for not listening to her about making plans for each scenario. Because, after what just happened, she might decide winging it didn’t work out too well. And she might blame me for that, even though it’s not my fault. Because when I said we didn’t need to plan, I didn’t realize her default move was going to be wandering off and doing something stupid. But other than a quick, “Uh-huh,” when I asked her if she was okay, she doesn’t say anything. She stays a few stomps ahead of me the whole way to our stop, and then marches onto the bus and snags a window seat. She folds her arms and makes a point of staring angrily out the window when I sit next to her.

We’re right by the heater, which is on full blast. I start sweating and unzip my coat. The whole bus smells like damp wool and old sweat. Gross, but somehow comforting.

“Look,” I tell her, “I knew working together wasn’t going to be easy, but if we’re going to survive this semester—literally—we need to lay down some ground rules. For one thing, we—” I glance over at her and stop talking. Her lower lip is quivering, her face is red, and there are tears streaming down her cheeks. “Amelia?”

She puts her face in her hands to muffle a hiccuping sob. “How... how can you be so...” She has trouble talking while crying so hard. “...so calm? After what just happened?!”

Heads turn. An old woman across the aisle glares at me.

I ignore them. “Did they hurt you?” My heart speeds up. Maybe Grandpa was wrong about what his goons would or wouldn’t do to her, even after he called and told them to leave her alone.

She shakes her head. “I thought they were going to kill you!”

“
Me?
They said they wanted me alive.”

“They said they had to bring you
in
alive. Everyone’s seen you on the internet and on TV, and they know who you are and who Dad is, and then they took you, and it was all my fault.”

Wow. She must be really freaked out if she’s admitting she screwed up. I consider, just for a split second, asking her to put that in writing.

Her shoulders shake with another big sob. “I was too scared to try and help you. But I should have
done
something.”

Everyone’s staring at us. “We’re
fine
,” I tell them, making eye contact with the old lady, who’s still glaring at me, like she thinks I’ve done something horrible to make Amelia cry.

I lower my voice, conscious of everyone still probably listening in, if not actively watching us. “Everything turned out all right. So, you know. Cheer up or something.”

“I’m not an idiot. I know we got caught because of me, and that the only reason we got away is because of you.” She looks over at me, checking for confirmation. “So if I’d been there by myself, I still would have gotten caught. But I wouldn’t have gotten back out.” She sniffs really loudly, to keep the snot from dripping out of her nose, and wipes her eyes with the back of her coat sleeve. “And you haven’t even told me what happened. What did they want from you? Was it the Red Bandit? Why did they let us go?”

Yeah, I was kind of hoping she wouldn’t ask about any of that. “They wanted my autograph, obviously.”

“For
reals
. Just tell me, Damien. Because whatever they did to you, it was my fault. So I should know about it.”

“They didn’t do anything to me.” Not that I’d tell her if they did.

Which she must know, because she meets my eyes, looking pretty skeptical. Hers are red from crying, her eyelids puffy. “Don’t lie, okay? It’s just making it worse.”

But I can’t tell her what really happened. I promised Grandpa. And telling Amelia would be like telling the whole school, if not the whole city. “It was someone I knew. Through my mom.”

“What did they want?”

“They chewed me out a little. For turning my back on villainy.” No big deal. Just taking me captive at gunpoint so my grandpa could tell me he thinks I’m ruining my life.

“They didn’t want anything from you?” She frowns. “Who was it?”

I stare at my knees. “Just someone who owed my mom a favor.” Which I’m pretty sure isn’t true, considering that my grandparents have to put up with Xavier and have had him stay the night at their house before. Mom must owe them, like, a million favors from that alone.

Amelia scrubs at her cheeks with her sleeve. “That’s all?”

“They just wanted to scare me. So I’d think about the choices I’m making.”

“Oh.” She exhales, like she finally believes that they weren’t trying to murder me. Then she scowls all of a sudden and smacks my arm really hard.

“
Ow
. What the hell, Amelia?”

The old lady across the aisle tuts disapprovingly.

“Those guys scared me, and it turns out you were fine!”

“You’d rather they hurt me?”

“No. But I was really worried. I thought I’d gotten you in trouble, and...”

“And you never would have forgiven yourself for getting your favorite brother killed? It’s okay—I know the truth. You don’t have to say it.”

She kicks my foot. “Shut up.”

“Even if it was real, Amelia, we would have gotten out of it.” Somehow.

She doesn’t look like she believes that, but she gives it to me anyway, nodding and leaning her head against the window.

“T
HE TRUTH?” KAT SAYS on the phone, and I can practically hear her wrinkling her nose at it. “That sounds
so
pretentious.”

“I think it’s supposed to be pretentious. All activist groups have to sound pretentious. It’s, like, a rule or something.” The floor creaks as I make my way over to my dresser. It’s morning, and I’m usually downstairs by now—to avoid anyone seeing me navigate the stairs, not because I actually like getting up early or anything—but then Kat called me back. Her phone was on silent last night, so she didn’t see that I’d called until she got up.

“So they’re an activist group?”

“Yeah. A secret one. For now, anyway.” I grab my new favorite T-shirt from my drawer. It’s black with a red and white warning sign on it that says,
DANGER. HIGH VOLTAGE.
And as if that wasn’t awesome enough, there’s a glow-in-the-dark lightning bolt on the white part that’s only visible when you turn out the lights. Kat got it for me for Christmas. “Hold on,” I tell her. “I have to put on the best shirt in the world.”

She laughs. I set my phone down while I take off my pajamas and change into the shirt and some jeans.

“An activist group,” Kat repeats after I finish getting dressed. “That stands up for villain rights.”

I sit down on the edge of my bed, wedging my phone between my ear and my shoulder so I can put my socks on. “He wants me to join. It’s... He doesn’t think I have a future. You know, as a hero.”

“Wow.”

“I told him I was marrying you and that you were going places and would be able to keep me in the lifestyle I’m accustomed to. Possibly better than the lifestyle I’m accustomed to.” What with my current living situation involving an attic/deathtrap, where the floor’s one wrong step away from crumbling beneath me. Sure, Amelia’s lived up here for years without falling through, but that just means it’s that much more worn out.

“Your plan for the future is trophy husband?”

“
Your
trophy husband. It’s a perfectly attainable goal, but he acted like it didn’t count.”

“Old people just don’t understand how gender roles are changing for our generation.”

The stairs creak with Amelia’s familiar stomp, and then there’s a knock on the door. “Damien! Mom wants to know why you’re not downstairs yet. We have to go!”

“Go away!” I’d tell her I’m on the phone, but then she might try and steal it from me again.

She makes an outraged
hmph
noise and then stomps off.

“Anyway,” I tell Kat, “he doesn’t think I have a real future. If I stay at Heroesworth and don’t join up with the Truth or whatever.” I try to play it off like it’s stupid and not important, but really I’m hoping she’ll tell me how wrong that is and that of course I have a future. Maybe she’ll even have a suggestion about what that future might be, since I have no idea.

Kat’s quiet for a minute. “You’re thinking about it. About joining up.”

“I didn’t say that.”

“You didn’t have to.”

“I told him no.” I sigh, letting my shoulders slump. “If he’d done this a year ago, then I probably would have jumped at it. But now?”

“Are you going to tell your dad?”

“Geez, Kat. Just because I turned down the offer doesn’t mean I’m insane. Besides, I promised I wouldn’t tell anyone.”

“You’re telling
me
about it right now.”

“That’s different. I trust you. And Gordon would tell the League. That’s exactly what Grandpa doesn’t want.”

“But... Okay, don’t take this the wrong way, but you live with your dad, not your grandpa. You go to hero school. Shouldn’t you maybe warn them? About the Truth?”

There are more footsteps on the stairs. Slower and heavier this time, which means it’s Gordon.

“If the League knew that villains were trying to stand up for their rights, they’d try to stop them. I can’t believe you’re saying I should rat them out.”

“I know. But it isn’t just about heroes versus villains if people you care about might get hurt.”

“No one’s getting—”

Gordon knocks on my door. “Damien?”

“No one’s getting hurt,” I tell Kat, keeping my voice down.

“How do you think they’re going to fight for villain rights?” she says, lowering her voice to match mine, even though she’s not the one in danger of being overheard.

“I... He didn’t mention that part.”

“Damien?” Gordon says again. “It’s time to leave.”

“Just a minute!”

“Can you really picture your grandpa leading some peaceful protest?” Kat asks. “Or starting a letter-writing campaign?”

Nope. “Kat, listen, I, uh, have to go.” I get up from the bed, making my way to the door.

“Uh-huh. Don’t change the subject.”

“I’m not. I’m going to be late for school.”

“Hero school. Full of heroes who don’t know what’s coming to them.”

“Aren’t you supposed to be the villain here?”

“Just— Oh! Liv got coffee for all of us. I have to go.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Just think about what I said, okay?”

I promise her I will, and then we hang up.

When I open my door, Gordon scowls at my high-voltage shirt, like it’s not even a little bit funny, let alone hilarious and awesome. He looks like he really wants to say something about it, but he restrains himself. “Is everything okay?”

“Fine.”

He raises an eyebrow, like he doesn’t believe that, but then lets it go. “Helen and Amelia just left. I said I’d drive you.”

“I can walk. It’s okay.” I don’t need him clocking how long it takes me to get down the stairs and then acting all disappointed that his plan of forcing me to live in the attic hasn’t magically cured me of my fear of heights.

“It’s cold out. And you’re already going to be late.” He looks me over, a worried expression on his face. “You were really quiet last night. You hardly said anything.”

“Amelia said enough for both of us.” All she could talk about was what happened at the laundromat. The way she tells it, you’d think we’d almost died or something. Though her retellings conveniently leave out the part where she got us caught.

“I can tell when something’s off with you. Are you and Kat—”

“We’re fine.”

“Then did something happen yesterday? That you’re not telling us?”

I told them the same thing I told Amelia, that our captor was someone my mom knows, just trying to scare me. “Did I mention that Amelia botched the whole thing?”