Fireworks (4 page)

“Got any burgers?” Ham asked, and Dan led him to the sliders bar, where there were mini burgers with every kind of topping — ketchup, ranch dressing, even Cheetos. Dan had made sure, during the insane hour when they’d made all the calls, that the party wasn’t going to be all frou-frou stuff. His appetite was back with a vengeance.

“These truffles are actually quite passable,” Natalie whispered to Ian.

“Natalie, follow me,” Amy said, grabbing her hand. Sinead had insisted on a trunk of clothes brought up from the Champs-Élysées.

“Let’s see, here’s a tux for Ian,” Amy said, pushing hangers on the cart. “Black-and-white tracksuit for Ham, T-shirt that
looks
like a tux for Dan, leather suit for Jonah, and, voilà, ball gowns for us.”

As Amy came out of the bathroom, wearing a red velvet gown, Natalie’s calm-cool expression morphed into one of pure shock. “You look quite nice!” Natalie said. “I hardly recognized you!”

“Don’t act so surprised,” Amy said, swatting at her with gloves.

“Well,
anything
is an improvement,” Natalie allowed.

When they reappeared outside, everyone else already neatly changed, Ian was talking to Nellie, but he stopped midsentence when he saw Amy in her party dress, his jaw hanging slightly open. She smiled at him, and he nodded back approvingly.

At the deejay booth, Jonah spun records beneath a mirrored disco ball that was timed to drop at midnight. The look on his face was pure magic — the pop star forgetting his fame and just rocking out to headphones, like no one was there.

Ham was locked into the Wii they’d taken with them at the last minute — bowling up a storm for a new high score. “Super Soakers and firecrackers for everyone,” Dan said, breaking out a box of the special delivery he’d ordered back in Attleboro. Amy gave a sigh of relief. Dan was still bruised up, but clearly he was regaining his old self.

“Yes, and crossword puzzles and board games for our ride back!” Amy chirped in. “And Polaroids to remember this night. And scrapbooks for the vault.”

Suddenly, it was all too much. Amy didn’t know how all of this, how all of them, had come together, but she could barely contain her emotion. She raised a glass of sparkling cider.

“Ahem,” she said softly, and everyone stopped to listen. Public speaking would never be her strong suit, but right now she’d give it a shot. “I know you’ve all been through a lot,” she said, searching each of their faces. “You’ve risked your lives.” There was Sinead, silently nodding. “Your closeness to your parents.” Ham caught her eye. “Your reputation.” Jonah regarded her gravely. “Your legacy.” Natalie and Ian lifted their chins. And then, to Dan, “And your chance to be a normal kid.” Amy hoped she could make it through without crying.

“I don’t know what I’m doing half the time.”

“You don’t say?” Dan grinned.

“We have so much to look out for. A lot hangs in the balance. But, tonight, we look out for the most important ones. Tonight” — she paused, almost through, lifting her glass a final time before she could finally kick back — “tonight, we look out for each other. Because what’s the point of being the world’s most powerful family if you don’t get to enjoy it once in a while? Am I right?”

“To the spoils of our riches,” Ian said.

“And the new year,” Natalie echoed, looking around.

“Next year,” Jonah vowed, “I’ll be around more. I promise. Resolution time, y’all.”

“I’ll make each of you special decryptors, so you can know what’s going on,” Sinead said.

“I will bench three Cahills at once,” Ham broke in.

“We’ll be nicer to poor people,” Natalie promised, “like all of you.”

“I will collect more baseball cards,” Dan cried.

“My resolution?” Amy said. “To try and not always go it alone.” She looked around at the beautiful night, the Seine lit up below them, her cousins decked out in fancy and funny clothes, the ridiculously lavish food and lights and music and games. She looked at her brother, whom she had almost lost the night before.

They were an impossible group, no denying it, and they would test her over and over in the years to come. But they were her family.

Six hours later, as the Cahills watched the sun rise above the Eiffel Tower, midnight struck at the Rosenbloom house back in Boston. Far away from slider bars and cheery toasts, Professor Mark Rosenbloom sat staring at the television screen as the New Year’s ball dropped in Times Square. His ten-year-old son, Atticus, was asleep on the shoulder of Mark’s older son, Jake. Atticus couldn’t sleep by himself lately; he kept having nightmares about losing his mother and waking up to the horrible knowledge that those nightmares were true. Nobody said a word at dinners — they just stared into plates of food other people had dropped off. As if anyone felt like eating, anyway.

“Happy New Year,” Mark whispered to Jake.

“Whatever,” Jake replied.

While the Cahills were off gallivanting in the City of Light, the Rosenbloom house was cloaked in darkness. In the shadows, a figure slid away from the house, scheming his next move. It would be swift and deadly, just as it had been for the mother of Jake and Atticus. Looking back in at the grieving figures in the Rosenbloom living room, the man chuckled to himself.

He had executed his plan flawlessly.

The Guardian was dead. It was a tricky piece of work, but the man had administered the poison to Astrid himself. A steady dusting of undetectable, lethal powder in the pages of the library book only she was studying. Now she was gone and no one suspected a thing, certainly not her two motherless sons or her bereaved husband. The man started to turn away, but a movement inside the house caught his eye.

It was Mark, carrying a sleeping Atticus upstairs. The man on the sidewalk made a decision, and then smiled.
Guardians may be cute when they’re little
, the man thought,
but they grow up to be such nuisances
. The man would eliminate Atticus as well, but that could wait. He had other things in mind right now — the Cahills laughing it up halfway across the globe. The real games were about to begin.

Vesper One’s New Year’s resolution: World Domination.

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Copyright © 2011 by Scholastic Inc.

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.
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Clifford Riley would like to acknowledge Jackie Reitzes.

Cover design by Keirsten Geise; Rapid Fire logo design by Charice Silverman

First edition, December 2011

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e-ISBN 978-0-545-45203-8