“Oh-kay,” he said. “You’re here to work on a project. Got it. This isn’t weird or creepy at all, by the way.”
“Can we go to your bedroom? And work on our project?”
Jesse led us upstairs into his room, which seemed a lot more normal than the rest of the house. “There’s a dog,” Roux said, coming to a full stop in the doorway. “Dogs don’t like me, and, believe me, it’s mutual.”
I grabbed her arm and dragged her into the room before shutting the door. “Start forging a peace accord,” I told her, “because Max isn’t leaving and neither are you.”
Roux eyed Max warily. “This is my dance space, this is your dance space,” she told him as she planted herself next to Jesse’s dresser. As if the dog even cared.
“Will someone please tell me what the hell’s going on?” Jesse said. He was wearing pajama pants and an old T-shirt and there was a history textbook on his bed next to his laptop.
“I’m really sorry,” I started to say.
“Oh my God, you are breaking up with me.” He sighed, and the sadness in his voice nearly broke my heart. “Why did you bring Roux with you?”
“Excuse me?” Roux was offended.
“I’m not breaking up with you,” I interrupted them. “Here, why don’t you sit down?”
Jesse hesitated. “No one tells you to sit down when it’s good news.”
“That’s true,” I admitted. “Okay, stand or sit, do whatever you want.”
Jesse crossed his arms over his chest and right then I would have given everything to be back in Gramercy Park with him. “I have something to tell you,” I began, “but you might not believe it. Roux can tell you it’s true, though.”
“It’s true,” Roux said.
Jesse looked from her to me. “Okay, what is it?”
My mouth was trembling but I wasn’t crying. “You were my assignment,” I whispered.
“I was your what?”
“My assignment. My parents and I are spies and your dad’s going to publish an article about us. My job was—is—to stop it.”
Jesse started to laugh. “Are you nuts?” he said. “You scared the shit out of me!” He came forward and wrapped his arms around me, kissing the top of my head. “You’re crazy, you know that?”
As much as it killed me to do it, I stepped away from him, taking his hands and holding him at arm’s length. “It’s true,” I told him. “I crack safes and open locks. That’s what I do. And if I don’t find out where that article is, my family and our whole operation will be exposed.”
The smile started to fade from Jesse’s face. “What are you talking about?”
“Last night, when you were telling me about how your dad was upset about that one article? I think that’s the article I need to stop.”
“Wait, so …” Jesse dropped my hands and backed away from me. “You’re a spy? I don’t believe it. You go to school, you can’t be a spy! You take calculus!”
“Do the passport thing,” Roux piped up. “That’s really effective.”
I went to my purse and started pulling out the passports again. “See these?” I said. “These are all mine. All twelve of them.” I fanned them out on the bed and Jesse picked one up, looking at it with a mixture of disgust and amazement. “Jess, I need your help,” I told him. “I really do.”
“I told you things!” he suddenly exploded. “Do you even care what you do to people?”
He looked so upset that I thought he was going to throw something, but instead he just sank down on the bed next to Max. “I can’t believe I thought you were for real,” he said.
“I was—I am—for real!” I protested. “When we were out together, ice skating and talking and sitting in the park, that was all me. I wasn’t lying about that!”
“But you were still lying!”
“You know what?” Roux said. “I’m just going to go use the restroom.”
We both waited for her to leave before even daring to look at each other. “Maggie, what the hell?”
“I didn’t know how this was gonna end,” I said. I wanted to sit next to him, touch his hand, his hair, something to bring him back to me, but I didn’t dare. “You were just an assignment in the beginning. I didn’t realize that I would like you so much.”
“So this whole thing? This whole time? The party, the date, everything?”
I gave him a rundown of the whole assignment, starting from my first morning in New York and leading up to the morning after our first date. “So you broke into my dad’s safe?” he asked at the end, incredulous.
“Yes,” I admitted. “That’s why I was here.”
He cursed under his breath, then stood up and ran his hands through his hair. “I think you need to leave,” he said. “Like, right now.”
But I stayed sitting. “Jesse, I know you don’t believe me and I get it. I do, I swear. And the last thing I want to do is hurt you. But if I don’t stop this article, then everyone in my family will be in jeopardy and our lives ruined. We think it’s going to name names.” I took a deep breath and shoved my hair behind my ears. “And if the Collective thinks that your dad’s going to run this story and I can’t stop it, they’re just going to send someone else to do the job.”