Fathom L. Standage (books for 8th graders .TXT) 📖

There was a pause. I leaned closer, hoping one of them would slip out the “secret.”

“We can discuss it with Cordelia,” Eamon continued. “She’ll meet us at the pier at midnight.”

One of the bedroom doors opened. I jumped. I got up to hurry back to my bedroom, but I was too late and came abruptly face to face with Calder Brydon in the hallway. I gasped.

He wore a rugby tee shirt with striped pajama pants, his hair rumpled from sleeping. As soon as our eyes met, he blanched. I opened my mouth to apologize—though I was sorrier I had gotten caught than I was for the actual snooping—but he shouldered past me and headed down the stairs.

I hurried to my room and shut the door. Only when I heard Calder’s door close again did I dare to venture out to look for the bathroom. This time, I didn’t run into him, though with some twisted kind of recklessness I couldn’t explain, I sort of wished I had.

I lay on my side, facing the wall, when the bedroom door opened a while later. The glow from the hallway spilled into the room.

“Shh…I think she’s asleep,” whispered Natasha.

“Should I wake her up?”

“No. Get some rest. We’ll tell her in the morning.”

The door closed and I could hear heavy luggage drag on the floor between our beds. I turned over.

“Tell me what?”

“Oh!” Samantha startled, dropping one of her bags. “You scared me. I thought you were asleep.”

“Sorry.” I propped myself up on my elbow. “What did you need to tell me? What’s going on?”

Samantha hesitated, her face subdued and frightened.

“We got chased.”

I sat up. “Chased?”

“We’re all right. We made it back without them following us.”

“Who’s ‘them’?”

“That Linnaeus guy’s men.”

“Are you sure? What happened?”

“We got to your aunt’s house okay. We got the luggage loaded, but when I went back to lock up the house, a car came around the corner. I didn’t think anything of it at first, but Natasha told me to hide. She jumped into the car and drove off.”

“She just left you?”

“She had to,” said Sam. “The men in the car went after her. I was fine. She came back after a few minutes, but when we got back on the road, they found us again. Natasha drove like a total lunatic, but we shook them off long enough to switch cars. That was the only way we could get home okay.”

“Why did you switch cars?”

“To throw off the bad guys. That Uther guy has a couple cars stowed away in different parts of the city in case something like this happens.”

“Wow. Did Natasha tell you anything else?”

“Other than teasing me for having so much luggage, no.”

I groaned in frustration. “Eamon and Walter were talking earlier. I kept hoping they’d come out and say what the big secret is all about.”

“When was this?” Sam asked as she sat on her bed.

“Not long ago. I was…sort of eavesdropping. Walter said the both of us deserve to know the truth, but Eamon said they should just send us home.”

“Really?”

“He also mentioned some lady named Cordelia he was going to meet at the pier tonight at midnight. He said he’d discuss it with her. Maybe she’s the boss of this operation.”

Sam sighed. “I’ll be glad when this is over.”

“Me too. Definitely.”

We sat in silence for a moment. The clock on Sam’s cell phone read 11:54. I thought about Eamon and Walter’s discussion an hour ago about the meeting at the pier with the unknown Cordelia. I tapped my fingers on my knee, then looked at Samantha. She met my eye.

“Ready to go find out?” she asked.

“Yep.”

We jumped up at the same time and crept out the bedroom door.

Sneaking around was quickly becoming my thing. I felt little fear and my frustrations drowned out my guilt as Samantha and I left the bedroom and crept down the stairs. The dark, quiet house kept still, hushed and waiting. No scowling Scottish guy impeded us. This would be an easy one.

I looked out the back window of the family room. Eamon and Walter had just left. I could see them walking in the sand by the light of the moon, heading down the beach to the right of the house. They both carried a small bundle.

“Let’s go out the front door and circle around,” I said. “I don’t want them to hear us.” Sam followed me through the front door and around the house. We kept to the shadows of the neighboring house, which had large boulders surrounding its back deck. Eamon and Walter walked several yards ahead toward a long pier not far off. With the low roar of the surf, I didn’t worry about them hearing us. I hurried to the next hiding place—the neighbor’s wooden deck stairs.

We darted from hiding place to hiding place: another staircase, a lifeguard’s tower, and a sand dune, until Eamon and Walter stopped at the tall, thick poles beneath the pier. At the edge of the rolling shoreline, they waited. We hunkered behind the hill, spying like two crabs in the sand.

Several minutes passed. A cramp clenched in my neck from checking either side of the empty beach for anyone approaching.

“What are they waiting for?” Sam whispered. “There’s nobody here.”

I turned around to check behind us, then looked back at Eamon and Walter.

“There’s gotta be—” I stopped. My mouth fell open. “Sam…” I breathed, leaning forward.

“What is that?”

A head emerged out of the ocean. Then a torso.

A person. A man.

From the water.

“Olivia, how did he…?”

“Where did he come from?” There weren’t any boats nearby and the pier was empty.

The man trudged out of the water, unsteady on his feet. He held something like a wet towel wrapped around his waist. The moonlight shone on his sodden hair. He approached Eamon and Walter, who shook hands with him.

The man looked back at the water and waved one arm at something. I looked to the silvery swells, confused because there were