Spy Between the Lines (formerly New World, Old Foe) [Gallagher Girls Fanfiction]

Chapter Nine

I was frozen. Shock had made me go still. All I could say was, "I thought you were dead."

Catherine smirked. "Things are not always what they seem, dear."

The woman who had tortured me my senior summer was here. The mother of my boyfriend. The woman who had set fire to my school and supposedly died was here. In front of me. And I couldn't do anything.

Catherine started circling me like a hungry predator.

"So let me guess my fate; you're here to kill me," I said, staring straight ahead.

"Oh, no. What would be the fun in that?" she laughed. "I'll save that for a later time."

"So what is it?" I muttered. "Going to take me back to Rome?"

"Wrong again, Cammie."

I shuttered. I hated how she used my name like I was an old friend.

"So, tell me. How is Zachary? He never calls." She's still insane.

"He doesn't know you're alive. Even if he did, he would never talk to you." I could feel the blood of the spy in me start to pump again, my mind telling me to attack.

"Remember when I told you that we are sisters, Cammie? We still are, and will al-"

And that's when I struck. I smashed my fingers against her windpipe, closing in for a chokehold. Catherine didn't even have time to react and she slumped unconscious to the ground.

Call me whatever you want, but I couldn't bring myself to kill her. I don't know if it was the fact of our sisterhood, or that I was unable to make myself kill with my bare hands.

I darted into the street and the doors of the hotel before anything else could happen. I took the stairs, two at a time, to the third floor.

I was gasping for breath as I banged on our door. "Bex, Liz! Open up the door! It's me, Cammie!"

Liz opened the door. "Oh my gosh! You're back! What happened to you?"

Aunt Abby, Townsend, Bex and sat on a couch. Jonas was typing on a laptop. They all looked up when I came in and sunk down in a chair.

"Where's Macey, Zach, Grant, and Preston?" I asked, my eyes scanning the room.

"They're still out shopping," Jonas replied, returning to his laptop.

"Someone get them on a phone a tell them to come back right now. Warn them about tails."

Townsend picked up a burn phone and dialed Macey's number.

"What happened, Cammie? I let you take the short route here. You were supposed to be here seven minutes ago."

"Catherine happened."

Townsend dropped the phone. Bex and Aunt Abby's eyes went wide. Liz and Jonas turned away from the laptop's screen.

Abby was the first to recover from the shock. "Catherine? As in Catherine Goode?"

I nodded.

"It can't be. She's dead." Bex stated.

"It is. She's alive and insane."

"What did she try to do?" Townsend asked.

I shrugged. "I don't know. I knocked her unconscious before she could do anything."

Macey burst in the door with the boys carrying the shopping bags behind her. It was actually funny, three hot guys, two with defined muscles and official spy training, holding hot pink and baby blue shopping bags. I would of stopped to take a picture if the situation wasn't so serious.

"We got here without a tail," Grant announced.

"When we got the call, we started over here," Macey said. "When you dropped the phone, the line went dead and we picked up the pace." She leaned against the counter and crossed her arms. "So, what happened?"

"Catherine Goode rose from the dead," Bex grunted.

A dark shadow moved across Zach's face. "She's dead. Killed in the fire at the Academy. Most of us witnessed it."

"According to Cammie, on her way home, Catherine met her and they had a little chat that ended up with your mother being knocked unconscious," Abby stated.

I raised my fingers Girl Scout style. "I swear I did not make this up. I have no reason the lie about the whereabouts of Catherine."

"But how?" Liz asked. "It is scientifically proven that there is no way someone can survive a 1470 degree Fahrenheit house fire without the best gear."

That was a question I hadn't thought to ask yet-but I knew the answer. "Before Zach pulled me out, she and I were talking. At one point she said she was a lot like me because we both liked getting lost in the secret passages of the school. I remember seeing other branches into the room we were in. She must of escaped through one of those."

Zach examined me. "Did she hurt you anywhere?"

A forced smile curved my lips. "Just my victory over my high school enemy."

"Forget about Catherine for a second," Grant said. "What about your tail? Who is he working for? Why tail you?"

Jonas shut his laptop. "She probably wanted to ensure one of you would come down that alley so she could do whatever she wanted to do to you."

"Uhh," Preston held up a burn phone. "Does someone want me to call the CIA or something?"

"No!" we all yelled at him.

He put the phone down and raised his hands. "I'm just trying to help."

"It's just," Macey started, "the CIA, MI6, Interpol, any government agency really, has moles in it. Catherine is a tricky person with many connections and we don't know who to trust."

"So what's the best course of action?" I wondered.

"Well, we should move our location, but that could take a day to get reservations at a hotel and even a safe house," Aunt Abby explained. "The best we can do now is tighten the security on our rooms."

"Do we still have to go to the ball or whatever?" Zach sulked.

"The gala?" Townsend corrected. "Yes, why?"

"I just have a feeling she'll be there."

"She probably will," Townsend sighed. "Just keep your guard up." He picked up several files off the coffee table and passed them out to us. "Meanwhile, we've been given your identities for tomorrow night. Study and memorize them. One little mistake can blow the whole group's cover."