Chaos in Disguise

Prologue

GRAYSON

Seventeen years ago…

Astrong wind gust flaps out the bottom of my bomber jacket as I walk down an almost deserted street, and nearly drowns out my girlfriend’s shocked gasp. Cameron’s picture-perfect face and glowing strawberry-blonde locks are a stark contrast to the chaos I left behind at St. Eugene’s.

The stolen car with which I tore through the football field, where this year’s hopeful reigning cheats play, quickly becomes a distant memory when I meet Cameron’s wide gaze.

She’s concealed beneath the awning of the retro milkshake bar half a mile up from her “once” high school, staring like a cat eyeing an overloaded milk dish.

She’s the unruly half of our duo, the one who leads me to trouble and then sidesteps it like she didn’t instigate it.

Don’t misread what I’m saying. I am far from innocent. Mischievous is my middle name, but in my defense, Cameron arrived for our date in a stolen car. I merely disposed of it when she announced the reason she kicked out its owner on a bustling freeway.

As the overpopulated mess of a metropolis filters into my nose, I slip my hand over Cameron’s. Diesel from a bus mingles with the earthy smell left by rain on the pavement.

I grip Cameron’s hand firmly when we merge further into the darkness of a late night. She’s a bundle of trouble, but if I have it my way, she will always be my trouble.

“I really did that, didn’t I?” I talk through the adrenaline flowing in my veins. Sirens are already echoing in the distance, making me panic that our escape is mere seconds from being foiled.

The hem of Cameron’s miniskirt flaps up when she twirls before walking backward, her pace slower than expected. “You sure did. And it was amazing.”

While guiding our escape, I try to act unaffected, like I didn’t just tear up St. Eugene’s grounds with its star quarterback’s Mustang. To be honest, I’m on edge. Every creak makes me jump, and every shadow seems to hide a threat.

Cameron, however, is relaxed, walking confidently and carefree.

She can act nonchalantly. Her father isn’t the golden boy of the FBI. Well, I assume he isn’t. I am unaware of how her parents earn a living. We’ve been together for three months, but she seldom talks about her friends, and she never brings up her family.

They must have money. St. Eugene’s is a highly exclusive one-hundred-thousand-dollars-a-year private school.

Still, I’ve never gotten spoiled-rich-girl-snob vibes from Cameron.

I know a snob when I see one. All my brothers are younger than me, but the Rogers men have drawn female admirers for centuries.

A rigorous hairline and a stacked appendage have opened doors for us for years longer than my father’s many awards for bravery.

Not that he would ever admit that.

I love my dad. Honestly, I do. I just wish he weren’t such a stiff in a suit. His rules have me willing to push any button to spark a reaction from him.

Cameron abruptly halts, squeezing my hand tighter. “Did you hear that?”

I prick up my ears but only notice the distant murmur of the city and the sirens we’re endeavoring to get away from. “Hear what?”

Even though I hear nothing, I guide us further under the sidewalk’s awning. Something is off. Not just now. For the whole night. An unusual sensation impinges on the air, and no matter how many times I try to swallow the brick in my throat, it refuses to budge.

A strange smell hits my nose as a van screeches to a stop at the crosswalk next to us. The doors burst open, and men in dark clothes and balaclavas jump out.

Before I can comprehend what’s happening, they grab Cameron and yank her away from me. I try to get her back on my side of the footpath, but I’m outnumbered four to one.

“Grayson!” Cameron screams, her voice trembling with unfamiliar fear.

With inhumane strength, I pluck her away from one man before I slow the charge of another with a closed-fist whack to the sternum. He hunches over, his reddening face visible even with a lint-free balaclava covering most of his features.

Over the next several minutes, I continue fighting to save my girlfriend from her attackers. I’m half the age of the men surrounding me—the creases in the corners of their eyes telling—but I maintain my ground and nearly secure an advantage.

I have Cameron back with me on the sidewalk when a man with biceps as large as a watermelon exits the van. He shunts me back three places with a boot to the chest before he snatches up Cameron’s wrist, which I recently freed.

I collide with the shopfront, groaning upon impact. The air in my lungs exits in a hurry when the beast shoves a hessian bag over Cameron’s glossy locks a split second before he tugs her into the idling van.

“No!” I shout as I unsteadily race for the van.

A second after the van’s sliding door slams shut, it speeds off, leaving me grappling for a sense of normality on an empty street. As my fingers tangle in my shoulder-length hair, I fall to my knees. My breaths are barely a quiver compared to the thundering beats of my heart.

Time seems to vanish as I sit in the dark, the world a blur. I need to find Cameron and bring her back. Tonight’s plan was to defend her, not cause more harm. I scrub at my eyes until determination replaces the despair wetting them, and then I pull my phone out of my pocket.

Things get worse when I try to turn on my phone. The battery isn’t dead. I put it in Cameron’s purse for safekeeping before our date.

I didn’t want my father to track me if he found my empty room.

I’ve never felt more foolish about a wish to be anonymous.

Pushing off my feet, I whisper to the night air, “Hang on, Cameron. I’m coming for you.”

My lungs hunt for air as I sprint through empty streets, praying like fuck my intuition will guide me the right way. Each step feels weighted, and I struggle to breathe.

Panic tightens my chest as thoughts of Cameron roll through my head. Her beautiful face always got me out of the trouble she got me in, but this time, she’s the one in trouble, and I have no idea how to save her.

Why would someone take her? What do they want? Was this a random abduction, or was Cameron specifically targeted? The questions swirl in my head, but there are no answers.

Sweat trickles down my cheeks when I reach the outskirts of the city.

The suburbs give way to skyscrapers and treeless streets.

The starless sky is oppressive, and the silence is deafening.

A chill traces my spine, but I set my fear aside.

I have to keep going. I need to locate Cameron or at least someone who can help me.

As my eyes drift to an old payphone, I recall all the times we’ve been in trouble before. The night we snuck into an abandoned house on the edge of her hometown, and how we once “borrowed” my dad’s car and drove to the beach at midnight. The memories bring a smile to my face.

We’re constantly creating mischief, but not like this. We were always on the same team, but now Cameron’s out there somewhere, alone and afraid.

I snatch up the receiver, insert a handful of quarters, then freeze when a distant noise rings louder than the payphone’s dial tone. Although faint, it stops me in my tracks. It is hushed whispers and… an admission of guilt?

My heart pounds as I race toward the noise. As I run, the voices intensify and become clearer.

“… shouldn’t have agreed to their terms…”

“… boss’s orders…”

“… what do we do now?”

At the corner, I duck low, staying hidden in the darkness of an overhead bridge. Four men stand near a white van, their faces lit up by flickering flames. The van is burning, and a motionless human-sized figure is on its right.

The contents of my stomach rise to my throat. I try to soothe the burn with spit, to calm my racing thoughts, but since it’s too dark to take in any features of the unmoving lump, my mind runs away on me.

Too angry to think rationally, I pluck a steel rod from underneath a holey tarp and race toward the van. I move so fast that before they hear me coming, I strike one man across the back of his knees, buckling them out from under him, and hit a second man across the temple.

As I twist toward the third and fourth men, I brace for a fight. Loaded guns are more dangerous than the steel rod a homeless man used to pitch a tarp as a tent, but I won’t give up. I hold the bar high, prepared to swing if they don’t answer my question within a second of me asking it.

“Where is she?”

The goon’s eyes narrow, and although his gun is aimed at my head, finger on the trigger, he looks puzzled. “Who?”

“My girlfriend!” I clench my teeth as anger envelops me. “The person you pulled into that van”—I gesture toward the van—“a mile from St. Eugene’s.”

His eyes light up with recognition as he shifts his gun from my head to my chest. “Grayson?”

Before I can respond, a shout comes from behind me. “Don’t shoot.”

Even with my pulse pounding in my ears, I recognize the voice.

It belongs to my father.

Relief washes over me as his suit cuff brushes my wrist, but panic soon takes its place. He only ever arrives on scene when things are bad.

“They took her. They took Cameron.” The steel rod clatters against the asphalt when my father yanks it out of my loose grasp and dumps it next to the burning van and the body-like structure, which now seems more the remains of a homeless camp than a person.

“We were walking back from St. Eugene’s, and they grabbed her.

They pulled her into a van. Into this van. ”

My father places himself between me and the two men still wary of my intentions, before asking, “When?”

“Around twenty minutes ago…” I choke on my words when I glance at his watch.

It’s a classic timepiece my grandfather handed down to him when he joined the bureau.

The exact timepiece his father had handed him when he enrolled in the same academy.

It shows that more time has passed than I believed, and that the men I assaulted are agents not civilians.

Guilt chops up my words. “I tried to call you, but I took out my phone’s battery when I snuck out and placed it in Cameron’s purse so you couldn’t track me.”

As my watering eyes drift to the charred remains of the van, I bite back a groan. The flames haven’t yet fully engulfed the cockpit. Though the air is smoky, the contents spilled from Cameron’s fringe purse remain unhidden. Her favorite lip gloss sits to the left of my cell phone battery.

I wish that were all the evidence my eyes stumbled upon.

There’s also blood. A lot of blood.

“Is that…?” I swallow, unable to finish my sentence.

My father steps into my path again. His eyes, which share the same icy-blue hue as mine, convey an equal amount of determination.

“I need you to listen to me very carefully.” I shake my head when he tries to place miles between Cameron’s last known location and me.

“You need to go home.” He grabs me by the shirt, his rough handling unusual.

He has rules for rules, but he’s stern with words so he doesn’t have to use his hands like his father did.

“This is not negotiable, Grayson. Go home, tell your mother what happened, and then don’t talk to anyone until I’ve returned with a lawyer. ”

I dance my eyes between a pair identical to mine in every way, disorientated and confused. “I didn’t do this—”

“Not a word, Grayson. Do you understand?” Fear clouds his eyes. He isn’t worried about himself. He’s terrified about what this could do to me.

His concern almost folds me in two, but I can’t forget my objections. “Cameron…”

His grip on my shirt shifts from anarchy to remorse. “I will find out what happened to her. I promise you that. But I need you to go home so I can do my job.”

Although I want to refuse and keep fighting, I trust my father, so I allow him to transfer my care to a junior agent.

I’ve never been more stupid.