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“This is a warehouse for . . . books?”

“Yes. Banned, I gather . . . I've yet to recognize any.”

“Why?” Blake asked, his mouth full. “What's in 'em?”

“Lots of things.” Peck sighed. “But it's hard to tell which really happened and which were made up.”

“Listen. About last night,” Blake said, unable to let go of the guilty feeling that was nagging him. “I know I should have pounced earlier . . . I know I shouldn't have waited for school to start. I tried to do it the weekend before . . . like we planned . . . I just . . . he was doing that sweep thing he does around the house, and I . . . I chickened out. I failed. I'm . . . I'm sorry . . .”

Peck was quiet for a moment. His expression was calm. “Back up,” he said patiently. “Tell me everything you've learned since we last met.”

“Not much,” Blake said, shamefaced.

“What about the girl?” Peck pressed. “All I know of her is what I found left behind on the playground early this morning. Though that told me quite a bit.”

“She's from Beacon,” Blake said. “She just moved here.”

Peck frowned at the thought. “What's a Beacon girl doing in Spokie?” he asked.

“I overheard something she said about her father being transferred. She doesn't wanna be here.”

“What's her father do?” Peck asked.

“I don't know.”

“It's my assumption that he works for DOME. Is that plausible, from what you heard?”

“I dunno. I guess. It was hard to hear; I was using a cup against a wall.”

“Okay,” Peck said. “But I'm thinking her dad may have been transferred here because of me. Jon? Trenton? The investigation? We knew they had their knives out. But is DOME really so worried they'd send a Beacon man after me? I want to know what you think.”

“Maybe,” Blake said. “That would make sense.”

“The girl knew too much about last night going into it . . . came too prepared. The only way to explain that is if she knew about Meg's case. I don't think any of those details've been released outside of DOME. So that means this girl must have a connection to the Department.”

“Like I said, her dad being an agent would make sense.”

Peck nodded.

“So what now? What do we do about Logan? He's a threat.”

“Yes. He's a threat. But he's not unstoppable. We have to regroup. Keep on him—”

“That's the thing, Peck. I . . . I don't think I'm your guy.”

“You're wrong,” Peck said. “You are. You brought us Meg, right?”

“Yeah, but—” Blake protested.

“You warned me about Trenton, didn't you?”

“Yeah, but, Peck—”

“You're good at this, Blake. I can't have you getting cold feet.”

“What about Jo?”

“What about her? She's busy with her own tasks.”

Blake thought for a moment. “Look, I'm not getting cold feet. I can trail this new girl maybe a little bit, but—”

“Don't lose sight of the goal. I don't care about
her
,” Peck said. “I care about her as she pertains to
Logan
. I care about
everyone
as they pertain to Logan. He's our biggest concern right now; he was even before all this happened—”

“And I can't keep spying on him, Peck, I'm sorry, but I can't. He's seen me. Twice. I've been careless.”

“Stop apologizing.”

“It's not just the risk of eyeing his house anymore—that kid sees me
anywhere
and he's calling the cops. Then they get to me, and they use me to get to you, and it's all over. Right?”

“That's right,” Peck said. “You're right. That's all I needed to hear. Our next steps, then, have been decided for us.”

“Eddie? Tyler?”

“No. I don't trust them,” Peck said. “Not for something like this.”

“But the goal is still—”

“Yes. The goal is the same.”

“I don't know what to tell you, Peck. He's too suspicious now. And with that girl by his side, he's too aggressive. We needed a precise amount of fear for him to do as we said. Like Meg. We had it with Logan. I really think we did. But it's gone now.”

“You're exactly right, Blake. It's gone.” Peck put his hand on Blake's shoulder. “You've done great,” he said. “I want you to lie low for a while. Keep an eye on Meg. I hear she's . . . restless.”

“Okay,” Blake said. “But what about Logan? The clock's ticking. Soon as November comes around—”

“Oh, I know,” Peck said. He took the plate from Blake's lap and rested it on the podium behind him. “So we move to Plan B. Logan is simply too important to let go. Jo made a new contact for me last year, to help keep tabs on our other target.”

“
Another
target? Who?”

Peck hesitated, weighing whether or not to tell him. Finally he decided. “It's a boy named Dane. He's what you might call . . . a cyberpunk. Has a rock band. He's a rebel.”

“You think we need to pounce on him too?”

“I do. Yes.”

“He seem worried yet?”

“No,” Peck said, rubbing his eyes. “But he should be.”

“Well, who's the contact?”

“Don't worry yourself with that,” Peck said. “The important thing is Logan. It appears, now, that our contact will need to track him too. Which is fine,” he added before Blake could apologize again. “I can arrange that. And anyway, this person, while not as experienced as you, does have a distinct . . .
advantage
. . . in our particular situation.”

“What's that?” Blake asked.

“Logan's trust.”

Blake frowned. “I don't follow.”

“Fear is a powerful manipulator. It's been our strategy all along. But when you can get it . . .
if
you can get it . . . trust works even better. Best, in fact.” Peck paused, thinking. “Our contact is a student at Spokie Middle, even shares a few classes with Logan.

Has for years.”

“And you got this person working for us?”

“That's right,” Peck said.

“Logan's own classmate, spying on him at school? Leading him right into our hands? Without him even
knowing
it?”

“Now that we need this person to, yes.” Peck shrugged. “Plan B.”

Blake smiled.

And Peck returned to reading his book.

SEVEN
DUST ON THE LAM

1

I
GOT IT WORKING. WE'RE IN BUSINESS,”
Erin practically shouted over the tablet connection.

Logan had been asleep, but the excitement woke him quickly. “Got what? What are you up to?” Logan asked it with a sigh, knowing he wouldn't like the answer. He was more than exhausted—he was ashamed and reeling. For him, the night had ended in a huge fight with his dad—the biggest they'd ever had. Late for dinner for the third night in a row, and deliberately dodging his dad's call this time, Logan had come home to find that he was standing on very thin ice. He'd always had a strong relationship with his dad, but in the last few days, he felt like he'd destroyed it almost completely. His dad seemed to be chalking his behavior up to teenage hormones, and Logan didn't know which was worse—that his dad thought he was turning into a moody, lying teenager, or that his dad had no idea just how much danger Logan was really in.

“The Fulmart. Where those kids were this afternoon.”

“What about it?”

“I hacked into the Spokie power grid—”

“Erin!”

“Let me finish. I hacked into the Spokie power grid and fronted some juice to the Fulmart's old security system. Remember all those cameras on the ceiling?”

“Nope.”

“Well, there were cameras on the ceiling; they just weren't on. So I got them going again.
And
I tapped into the data stream. I can see everything happening in there, right from my tablet.”

“Well . . . that doesn't sound any
more
illegal, necessarily, than everything else you've been up to the last couple of nights.”

“It isn't,” Erin assured him.

Logan sighed and shook his head for her to see over the shaky video connection of his tablet.

“Well, don't you want to know what I've seen on this thing?”

“Yes, absolutely,” Logan said.

“They're packing up. They're packing up shop!”

“What are you talking about?”

“They're leaving! The kids are gathering their stuff. They're moving on!”

“Isn't that bad news? They're fleeing. If they ever did represent a trail for us, it's about to disappear.”

“True.” Erin frowned. “But it as good as proves they're in cahoots with Peck.”

“You think?”

“Are you
kidding
? Two strangers mention
a name
to them and a couple hours later these misers are leaving their
home
? Yeah, Logan. I'd say that's a pretty sure sign of a guilty conscience. Sprinkled with plenty of paranoia. We have them running scared!”

“This is all moving too fast,” Logan said. “I think you were right today about us needing to be a little more careful.”

“What? No! We can't slow down now. The tables have turned! Logan, wherever these pikers are going, it's gonna lead us straight to Peck!”

“But they're leaving right now. We're gonna lose them.”

“
I'm
not,” Erin said. She pointed the camera of her tablet away from her face, revealing her rollerstick and a blur of Spokie streets rushing past. “
I'm
almost there.”

2

Erin raced through the town at a blinding speed. There hadn't been time to go to Logan's and convince him to come along. He just would have argued—and slowed her down.

Grab this thing by the horns. Get it done. Pull your family back together. Make it back to Beacon
.

Of course, for all its people and flashing lights and noise and busy streets, Beacon never actually had this much excitement.

Now that she thought about it, Beacon didn't exactly have Logan either.

Whatever. He's just a boy. And he's mostly not even that good-looking. Or funny. Or cool. And he definitely doesn't like you much. Doesn't like you at all, Erin. He's made that pretty clear
.

He's just a stupid boy, and Beacon is home. Focus on the mission
.

And with that, Erin pushed all thoughts of Logan away.

She arrived at the Fulmart parking lot several minutes later and ducked into the shadows to watch the video feed on her tablet. The night was dark. Perfect for a stakeout.

The scene in Fulmart was unfolding quickly. Below the camera and amid the static of the weak connection, Erin could see the three kids running frantically, stuffing store items into bags, which they'd also taken from off the shelves. They were stocking up. They weren't coming back.

A fourth kid entered the scene too. A second girl, it seemed, different from the others. Every once in a while she'd hit one of them, not playfully—hard—and at one point she seemed to try climbing up to the ceiling to get out of the other three's reach. Finally the larger girl put an end to it with a swift knock to her head.

Throughout the chaos, the two boys of the group continued to roughhouse. They'd chase one another around the aisles, throw things, wrestle. Something about these kids was deranged. It was clearly a group that stuck together, but everything about its members seemed just a little . . . off.

A good crowd for Peck to hang around with, Erin decided.

She watched the scene inside for a good fifteen minutes before her concentration received a startling interruption.

“This was not the plan. This was
not
the plan!”

“
Man
, Logan, you just about scared me to death!”

Logan was out of breath and wheezing. “Good! How could you be so careless? Do you have any idea where you are right now? This is Slog Row at
midnight
, Erin! What are you
thinking
?”

Erin was dismissive. “Relax. I wouldn't have come if this wasn't important.”

“Important to who?”

“Important to
you
! I'm trying to help you, you idiot!”

“Important to
me
?
You're
important to me, Erin. Don't you get that?”

Erin looked quickly down at her tablet, pretending to watch the security video feed. She didn't know what to say.

“And don't act like you're doing this for me. We both know you're just trying to get back to Beacon.”

Erin cleared her throat. “Anyway, now that you're here, you can be of some use. By the looks of it, the beggars are fleeing out back. Smart choice, not to expose themselves in the parking lot.”

Logan sighed. “And what exactly are we planning once they exit?”

“We're going to follow them. I think we should approach from different angles. If they split up, so do we. I don't think we can take the rollerstick. It's quiet, but not as quiet as we'll need to be. Anyway, by the looks of them, they won't be travelling too fast. Do you see how squirrelly these two boys are? And they've bound one of the girls. She didn't seem to wanna work with
any
of 'em.”