Frustration burned in her, tempered only by the knowledge that she had her own secrets—like the sphere. Really, they hadn't even known each other that long. Maybe she was blowing their whole relationship out of proportion.
Luke sat under a tree and scowled at her. "If you can't share it with the whole class, you shouldn't be sharing at all."
Lucy rolled her eyes. "Grow up, Luke."
She walked back to their camp, sore from the sparring, but in a good way, and irritated at Hunter and herself. She stopped short when Hunter packed up his backpack and headed toward the forest.
"I'm going to go look for a way out. You two still need to rest. I'll be back late."
He was gone before Lucy could protest. Talk about mood swings!
She shot Luke a questioning glance, and he shrugged. "No idea. Maybe he just needed some alone time. But hey, at least that gives us a chance to hang."
And another mood swing. Luke looked entirely too happy to have Hunter gone.
***
Hanging involved all sorts of fun. They ate berries and found giant spongy mushrooms that made great trampolines. They laughed and talked about nothing important, and Lucy tried not to think about Mr. K or how she'd betrayed his trust by using her powers on him. Using Luke as a distraction helped.
As the sun set, they lay side-by-side on a mushroom and watched the sky turn dark.
Silence settled gently between them, but broke apart like ice when Luke sighed. "Hunter told me about the lizard, which I assume was giant from the claw marks on your back. He said he killed it. How?"
They'd avoided talking about Hunter all day. Lucy didn't want to reveal anything about his powers, but the number of secrets she had kept from her twin weighed on her. "With his sword. It's high-tech."
Luke pursed his lips. "Yeah, that's not normal. He's definitely not telling us something, Luce. I don't trust him."
This was exactly why she didn't want to talk about Hunter. Luke couldn't see straight when it came to him. She'd hoped the sparring match would have helped them bond. Guess not. "What is there to tell?"
Luke shrugged. "Who made that sword? Why does he have it? Why'd he get so tired after he brought you back?"
Lucy felt bad about that. Hunter's exhaustion was her fault, but she couldn't admit it to Luke. More secrets. More lies. "You'd be tired too if you fought that lizard. And the sword is probably some high-ranking IPI tech. Maybe he's like James Bond and has his own Q."
"Maybe. But he doesn't strike me as the James Bond type. And besides, we're on their top-priority mission right now, and I didn't get a fancy sword."
"Maybe they ran out." She didn't keep the bite from her response.
"Maybe they're hiding things from us, Luce."
"Or maybe, since we're not actually agents, they don't tell us everything. Why would they?"
He continued talking as though she hadn't spoken. "Think about it. IPI. International Paranormal Investigations. What paranormals? Us? If they've known about us for a while, why didn't they do anything?"
"Maybe they couldn't. Most of the kids at Rent-A-Kid would have died to defend it a year ago—you among them."
"Or maybe IPI isn't so different from Rent-A-Kid."
"What?"
He sounded like Beleth with talk of experiments and hidden agendas. She wondered if she should tell Luke more about that night.
No, not now. He's already too agitated. "They haven't done anything to make me doubt them. And Hunter's done nothing but help us."
"Oh, well, I know you like him."
"No... well, yeah, maybe, but it's not just that. He saved me, Luke. If it wasn't for Hunter, I'd be dead."
Luke swallowed and nodded, clearly thinking about life without Lucy.
A shrub rustled and.... Speak of the devil. Lucy's heart did a little dance as Hunter emerged from the forest, and she slid off the mushroom, trying to look less excited than she felt.
Hunter didn't notice her, though. He walked straight toward Mr. K.
She caught up with him and grabbed his arm. "Did you find a way out?"
Hunter shrugged her off, the heat of his anger practically burning a hole in her hand. "There is no way out. Cliffs surround this entire goddamned area!" He plodded into the enclave to yell at Mr. K. "Liar! You didn't want to tell us the way out, because there is none."
The bark of the tree peeled open to reveal Mr. K's eyes. "I didn't want to tell you the way out because you wouldn't be able to manage it, boy. I felt you kill that lizard, felt the earth shudder as a life slipped away. You had no consideration, no prayer for the creature before you. You were just a machine doing its work, a switch going off, an instinct taking over—your instinct to kill."
Hunter's muscles tensed and his face turned to stone. Lucy stepped forward, prepared to calm him if he snapped, but he relaxed his shoulder, turned away and nodded to Lucy. "If I'm a killer, then why's she alive?"