CHAPTER 25 Code Word Stud
Code Word: Stud
By the time Chloe pulled a sharp right into a parking spot in front of the school, I had only two thoughts on my mind.
The first was that miraculously, we’d all survived.
The second was that if I could get twenty minutes alone with the laptop, I might be able to figure something out before we handed the data off.
Unfortunately, Chloe had other plans. Without my realizing it, she had managed to lift the laptop from the backseat. All that lovely encryption was now in her possession, not mine.
Double unfortunately, however, what with the sizeable drive to and from Infotech, the amount of time it had taken the twins to pull off the Doublemint, the time I’d spent hacking, and the half hour that I had been informed it would take to redo my nails, it didn’t look like I was going to be getting much rest in before lunch.
I half expected the others to go their separate ways when we got back, but instead, Bubbles and Lucy followed me to the twins’ salon, chattering happily away about some topic of conversation that I couldn’t quite follow.
Chloe didn’t join us—she was too busy orchestrating a drop-off of the information on the laptop and coordinating our afternoon mission, which Lucy randomly decided to name “Operation Playboy.”
“Why is it that evil guys are always so hot?” Tiffany wondered out loud as she focused on the index finger on my right hand.
“Tell me about it,” Brittany said, buffing one of the nails on my left hand. “Heath Shannon? Hot. That guy we had to take out who’d stolen that nuclear laser thing? So hot.”
“And Jack Peyton?” Tiffany continued.
“Hot.” I surprised myself by finishing Tiffany’s train of thought. Had I really just said that out loud? More importantly, since when had I become the type of girl who gossiped about the hotness of boys?
And was Jack Peyton, he of the ironically detached smirk, really evil?
“Jack isn’t evil per se,” Tara said, coming into the room just in time to answer my unasked question, and save me from the mortification of the others commenting on my slip of tongue. “He can hardly help who his father is.”
“Okay,” Brittany agreed affably. “So maybe he isn’t evil, but he could be evil someday. And he is hot. Even Toby thinks so.”
And that was my cue to leave. Except, unfortunately, each twin had me by one hand, and neither of them was done with the buff, polish, repair routine they had their hearts set on.
I had no choice but to change the subject—and fast. “How goes the party planning?” I asked April and Tara. It wasn’t exactly a deep question, but it worked.
“We managed to get Rocksha to DJ, and April found a great caterer,” Tara said.
“Caterer? DJ?”
April shrugged. “Major party.”
“So no cheap beer in sketchy kegs?” I asked.
Tara leaned over and tweaked my ponytail. “Toby, it’s a high school party. There’s always beer in sketchy kegs. It will probably just be very expensive beer.”
Lucy wrinkled her nose.
“Not a fan of beer?” I asked her.
“No,” she said. “It doesn’t ignite as well as vodka.”
It didn’t surprise me that when Lucy thought about alcohol, her main concern was flammability. For some reason, I couldn’t see her as much of a drinker of anything stronger than orange soda.
“Done!”
“Done!”
The twins finished one after another, and finally, my hands were my own again.
“Lunch?” Tara asked, looking at her watch.
I nodded. “Lunch.”
“Lunch!” the others chorused in unison. I rolled my eyes, but somehow, a smile found its way onto my face. It was amazing what a high-stakes hacking adventure with other people could do for team bonding. On principle, I refused to give any of the credit to our girl talk in the salon.
The moment we walked into the cafeteria, I was treated to three sights.
The first was almost an exact replica of what had happened when we’d walked into the caf that morning.
All eyes swung our way, and the sea of people parted for the seven of us.
The second thing I noticed was that Jack Peyton was already sitting at the central table, his eyes locked on mine.
The third thing I noticed was that my younger brother had just sat down with a bunch of senior girls, all of whom were staring at him like he was some kind of alien species.
Maybe they were right.
Even from this distance, I could tell that Noah’s mouth was moving, and my sisterly instinct (and my unfortunate familiarity with his favorite pickup lines) cued me in to the fact that he was, in all likelihood, saying something along the lines of “Hey, baby, you’re looking a little lonely, but don’t worry, there’s enough Noah to go around. ”
And then, right on cue, an enormous football player walked up to the table, slammed his tray down, and reached for Noah’s shoulder.
Here we go again, I thought. I took a step forward, but before I could so much as take a flying leap at the buffoon who was about to decapitate my brother with a fist roughly the size and shape of a cinder block, the rest of the girls beat me to it.
Granted, there wasn’t actually any pummeling involved.
“Hi, Marcy! Hi, Jeff!” Lucy bounded over to the table, the rest of the girls on her heels. “Hi, Noah.” Lucy smiled at him. Noah, ever the one to take the least bit of encouragement in any shape or form as a come-on, turned his “charm” on Lucy.
“Well, hello there,” he said, his voice pitched lower than usual in an attempt to seem more manly.
While Lucy distracted Noah and pulled his attention away from the girl he’d been trying to hit on, the others worked on defusing the threat that was Cinder-Blocks-for-Fists Jeff.
And somehow, they did it without a single menacing look, punch to the gut, or kick to the groin.
In fact, as far as I could tell, they didn’t do anything but flutter their eyelashes.
The girls lured Noah away from the senior table and deposited him back among the other freshman boys, who then stared at my brother with reverent awe. Noah looked at the cheerleaders, looked at the boys, and then arched one eyebrow freakishly high, a devilish look on his face, and took a bow.
“I’ll see you later,” he told Lucy.
Lucy actually giggled, and then, in one coordinated motion, all of the girls headed for our table, leaving my brother to milk the experience for all it was worth among his freshman cohorts.
Note to self, I thought. Tell Lucy not to encourage him.
I joined the other girls with every intention of telling them just that—and asking them why in the world they’d felt compelled to move my little brother out of harm’s way—but when I got there, the twins had matching wicked smiles on their faces.
“You know, Toby,” Brittany said, “your brother is awfully cute.”
I think it’s safe to say that hearing the words leave her mouth had a catastrophic physical effect on my being. I shuddered and almost lost my lunch—even though I hadn’t eaten it yet.
Tiffany poked me in the side. “Yeah,” she said. “He’s adorable.”
I frowned at them.
“They’re just teasing you,” Tara whispered.
“What? You don’t like it when we talk about your brother?” Tiffany asked innocently. “But what if we wanted to ask him out? He’s such a stud.”
Okay, that was taking it way, way too far. If Noah heard any part of this conversation, he would become unbearable. He already thought he was a ladies’ man. He didn’t need the twins giving him ideas.
“Stay away from my brother,” I growled.
The twins just laughed, and as we sat down at our table—a safe distance away from Noah’s—everyone else joined in.
“What’s so funny?” Jack asked, never taking his eyes off my face.
“Nothing,” I said, giving the twins a look that promised serious repercussions if they said anything else about my brother, the “stud.”
“We still on for tonight, Ev?” Jack asked me, an amused smile playing around the corners of his lips at the look I was shooting the twins.
Before I had a chance to formulate a properly sarcastic response, the others answered on my behalf.
“Yes,” Tara said.
“You are,” Lucy finished.
I opened my mouth to object, but one of the twins grinned at me, and I got the distinct feeling that if I said so much as another word, they’d launch into a long, traumatizing, and detailed account of how much they’d just love fooling around with my younger brother.
Needless to say, I kept my mouth closed.