Page 18 of Sweet Little Spies

Kenzie wasn’t good with simple explanations. “I don’tunderstand.”

“Okay, let’s see if I remember this language,” her mothersaid. “Someone set up TJ to be close to an arms dealer, likely so it wouldeither hurt TJ or your uncle and aunt. But the arms dealer has this othervaluable connection, and they think TJ either knows who the bombmaker is or canget them to the arms dealer who does.”

Kala’s eyes went wide, and she leaned toward her sister. “Ithink Aunt Grace might know too much.”

Her mom’s eyes rolled. “Oh, child, I know far too much, butthis is just me speaking spy.” She shifted her gaze to Tasha. “Was it your oldfiancé? The dead one?”

It was Tash’s turn to be surprised. “Uh, yes. He set up along-term kind of revenge on me. He thought it would look bad if TJ wasconnected to this guy, and no one turned it off when he died. In this case hisorganizational skills kind of bit us all in the ass.”

“Then why would they try to kill TJ?” Carys didn’t think thetwins’ explanation made sense. “They need information out of him. It would feellike it would be better to kidnap him.”

Kala waved her off. “They already tried to kidnap him.”

“Hey,” Kenzie said. “Classified.”

“Aidan had to examine him after you came back from…whereverit is you went since you couldn’t say.” They’d both known something had gonewrong. TJ had been okay, but Aidan had told her about the cattle prod burns onhis body. “It’s not a hard leap to get to he got kidnapped and tortured forinformation. You see doctors have to put together many puzzles. Patients lie alot. Out of shame or to hide something, and in this case out of the informationbeing highly classified. I get it. But this happened here. It happened to meand Aidan. We have a right to know. Maybe not legally, but I have walked intoenough sketchy shit to know legal isn’t always the family way.”

“How about we wait for the inevitable debrief,” her motheradvised.

“Because I don’t usually get invited to debriefs.” It waswell known in their family that if you found yourself sitting in the conferenceroom at McKay-Taggart, you were in serious trouble and likely to find yourselfin some form of lockdown.

If they got sent to Sanctum and locked in, Aidan would misshis once in a lifetime chance to meet with surgeons who could help his career.He was the youngest invitee to the conference, and it was a huge opportunityfor him. She couldn’t let him lose it.

“I’ll make sure you get an invite to this one,” her motherpromised.

It would be best to avoid getting involved further. She knewhow her uncle handled these things. It could be hours, and she would have tosit there with Tris the whole time. “I think I’ll pass. This seems to not beabout me and Aidan, so it’s likely best to stay away. It makes it way easier onyou guys.”

Tasha joined her sisters, all of them staring at her withsuspicion. “Not what you said mere moments before. I thought you deserved to bein on everything.”

Kala nodded. “She totally did.”

“And then Kenz pointed out all the problems with being in oneverything, and here we are,” she said, hoping she sounded confident. Shehadn’t exactly mentioned her honeymoon plans beyond they were going to bespending some time in Canada.

Her parents might not like knowing their “honeymoon” wasmore like a work trip. They didn’t understand the needs of a resident.

She didn’t mind. She was actually looking forward to it, buther parents would say it was one more reason to put the wedding off. One moreway they thought she was screwing this up.

She hadn’t needed to screw anything up. Tristan fuckedthings up for all of them.

Lou looked at her, blinking, likely because she wasn’t usedto wearing contacts. She’d insisted on them, though Carys had told Lou hernormal glasses looked great with the dress. “She’s hiding something.”

“Ooo, I love a mystery,” Kenzie said with a smile and a clapof her hands.

Sometimes Kenzie’s weird positivity was scarier thanKala’s…well, scariness. “Not hiding anything. I simply don’t want to getinvolved in something that isn’t my business.”

“Or you want to avoid Tristan since he’s apparently back.”Tasha frowned. “I thought he was in DC meeting with Drake and Taylor. He didn’tcall any of you?”

“He didn’t want any of us to know he was going to beskeeving on the wedding,” Kala replied with a shrug. “Which is weird becausethat’s something you’re supposed to do when you weren’t invited to be an actualpart of the vows and shit.” She held off her sister’s admonition. “I’m onlybeing honest. The dude could literally be enjoying his honeymoon right now ifhe’d wanted to.”

“Oh, I forgot about the honeymoon. Carys has been a littlesecretive about it,” her mom said. “All she’ll say is it’s a surprise andshe’ll send pictures. I’ll be honest. I hoped she was so quiet because Tristanwas going to join them.”

“No, he’s not.” She hadn’t considered her mom might thinkshe was keeping a secret. She wasn’t really. More like trying to avoid a minorargument.

“I thought they were going to Bermuda or something. Don’tthey have like a whole beach house rented?” Kenzie replied.

Kala shook her head. “No. They were going to the Caribbeanwhen Tris was joining them in newlywed bliss.”

Lou gasped and put a hand to her heart as though she’d heardsomething horrifying. “He took back their honeymoon? Like I know why he did therest, but taking back a beautiful honeymoon seems rude.”

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