Cassidy Jones and the Secret Formula (25 page)

Rodrigo stepped back.

“We’re leaving now,” Emery stated. “Do you have a problem with that?”

“S-sure, sure, no pro-blem,” Dixon agreed in pain.

Emery released him.

Without looking at Emery, Dixon carefully stretched out his arm. Glaring at his toadies, he commanded, “Tobe, Rod, let’s go.” Stepping past Emery, he stalked down the sidewalk, rubbing his shoulder. Glancing at Emery in awe, the toadies quickly caught up with Dixon’s angry stride.

“Cassidy and Miriam, let’s go,” Emery said calmly, beginning to walk. Under his composure, I recognized the stir of adrenaline he was controlling.

Glancing at one another, Miriam and I caught up with him.

“Thank you,” Miriam said guiltily, glancing up at Emery. “…and I’m sorry.”

“Why?” Emery asked with an easy grin. “He is mean, spineless, and totally lame.”

Though my nerves were a jumble, I laughed to hear something so adolescent come out of Emery’s mouth.

“Well, I couldn’t have
lived
with myself if you’d been hurt,” Miriam stated dramatically. “Where did you learn to do that, anyway?”

“My dad.”

His dad?

~~~

On the rest of the walk home, Miriam relentlessly attempted to elicit personal information from Emery. For the most part, his answers were vague and cryptic, except for silly questions like what was his favorite color or flavor of ice cream. I think Miriam tossed in those questions to be playful or to craftily throw him off enough so he might accidentally reply to a more serious question. Basically, the interaction became a game for both.

Letting them play, I mulled over what had happened when Emery humbled Dixon. He had made his fancy martial arts move quickly, faster than the eye could register, except for the mutant’s eye. From the moment Emery’s right hand lifted to the moment Dixon’s elbow was hiked up, I saw each movement like individual snapshots. In my mind’s eye, I could pull up any one of those snapshots, seeing it clearly. Strangely, I believed I could now perform the same move.

As we reached the front gate to Miriam’s Victorian home, she stopped, gazing up at Emery with gooey admiration. “Thank you for being my hero today.”

I choked down laughter.

Briefly stupefied, Emery came up with a witty response. “Today? Do you need daily heroes?”

Miriam laughed. “No, I don’t usually get into this much trouble, but now I know who to call when I do.” Giving him a captivating smile, she added, “Why don’t you leave me your phone number just in case?”

Not having a clue how to respond, Emery laughed, shaking his head.

Miriam looked at him like he was the first Harlequin Romance escapee. “I’ll see you tomorrow, Emery.”

“He won’t be at school tomorrow,” I said quickly.

Miriam’s eyes sparkled. “I’ll
still
see him tomorrow. Bye, Emery.” With that, she traipsed up her front walk.

Watching her ascend the porch steps, Emery called, “It was nice meeting you, Miriam.”

Her shoulders shook in laughter. On her porch, she turned to us, brilliantly smiling at Emery. “You are adorable. I’ll see you tomorrow. See ya, Cass.”

“See ya,” I called.

After one last smile, she closed her front door behind her.

As we resumed walking, I teased, “Now, she’s an interesting character study for you, isn’t she?”

Grinning, he shook his head. “I don’t believe I’m up to it.”

I laughed. “Not many are.” Pausing, my mood became thoughtful. “Emery, I’d like to try something.” I set my backpack on the sidewalk. “I want you to grab my shoulder.”

Looking at me curiously, he reached for my shoulder. Before his hand made contact, I had him in an elbow lock.

“Ow. Easy.” He stared into my face, stunned.

“Oh.” I released him, feeling sheepish. “Sorry.”

Still staring at me, he rolled his shoulder.

“Uh, is your arm all right?”

Not answering, he narrowed his eyes on my face. “Tell me how you processed that move.”

“Do you mean, how did I learn it?”

“Yes. I want every detail.”

After I described the experience, he asked me, “You’re able to recall the event frame-by-frame, as you put it?”

Nodding, I explained, “It’s like a video has been stuck in my head, and I have a fast forward, rewind, and pause option. Does that make sense? I just don’t know how else to describe it.”

“Yes, it does,” he replied thoughtfully. “Your example is a good visual.”

“What do you think happened? How did I do that?” I asked in a quick breath.

“Let me think about it for a while,” he requested, picking up my backpack and handing it to me.

Falling into silence and deep thought, we continued home.

Sixteen

While Emery was upstairs attempting to break into Selma’s computer files, I did homework at the kitchen island. Mom milled around the kitchen, scrubbing and baking chocolate chip cookies. The school hadn’t called her about my absence from third period, not yet, anyway.

As I finished up homework, Chazz tromped into the kitchen, climbing up on the stool next to me. “Cassy,
Clone Wars
is over. Now I’m getting a cookie.” He took a cookie off the cooling rack in front of us. Chazz had a funny way of informing about the obvious.

Flipping my binder shut, I asked, “Want me to get you a glass of milk?”

“Yes, please.” Melted chocolate already lined his lips like lipstick.

As I placed a glass of milk in front of Chazz, Emery came into the kitchen. His expression was inscrutable.

“Finish up your emails?” I asked, watching him closely.

He looked into my eyes. “Yes.”

He broke into the files
, I understood, staring back at him,
and he isn’t happy about what he found
.

Nate burst through the front door then, shouting, “Cassidy, you brute, where are you?”

Still staring at Emery, my eyes widened with dread.

Bounding into the kitchen, Nate exclaimed, beaming at me, “I can’t believe you did it.”

I stuffed a whole cookie in my mouth.

He glanced at Emery. “That you
both
did it.”

Alarmed, Mom’s head bobbed between Emery and me. “What is going on?” she demanded to know. I had conveniently forgotten to mention Robin and Dixon when she had asked earlier how the day went.

Grinning ear-to-ear, Nate answered, “First, my sister broke Robin Newton’s nose—”

Mom gasped.

“Second, Emery kicked Pilchowski’s—”

“I only put him in an elbow lock,” Emery corrected quickly.

Nate considered this. “Still cool. I should have figured Miriam exaggerated. Man, she is totally hyper. When I walked by her house, she practically tackled me, all eager to tell someone about her ‘hero.’” Nate grinned, rolling his eyes. “It was insane how she went on about you, dude. ‘Emery is so brave, so strong, so handsome.’” He imitated Miriam. “And blah, blah, blah, blah, blah…Man, you are in so much troub—”

Cutting him off, Mom, who hadn’t heard a thing beyond “broken nose,” blurted at me, “Cassidy Claire, how did you break that girl’s nose?”

“It was an
accident,
” I clarified. “We were playing dodgeball in P.E. I threw a ball, and it hit Robin in the face. Her nose bled, but I don’t think it was broken.”

“Oh, yeah, it’s broken,” Nate butted in. “And that’s not how
I
heard it, even though I have my doubts about the accuracy, but Jared is a reliable—”

“Jared? What did he say?” I asked in a quick breath.

Surprised, Nate observed my face for a moment. Then his lips turned up into a knowing smile. “Oh, you’re wondering what
Jared
said about
you
?
Jared
told me he had never seen anyone move like you did today. He said you took him out before he even realized you had a ball, and then you caught a ball that Robin pitched at Bobby, and with that same ball, you busted her nose.” Pausing to watch my reaction, he added, “
Jared
said you were awesome. A total animal.”

“Animal?” I repeated, nauseated.

Nate grinned like I’d received a wonderful compliment.

Dropping my head to the island top, I moaned, “I’m going to be sick.”

With my head down, Mom wrapped her arm around me, speaking encouraging words I couldn’t comprehend. All I heard were my own thoughts.
Jared called me an
animal? I thought I was a little more subtle, like I had suddenly just become really, really athletic.
“Animal” implied inhuman, mutant—not athletic.

Sticky fingers massaged my cheek. “Don’t be sad, Cassy,” Chazz said. “You didn’t mean to hurt her.”

Lifting my head, I looked at him. With milk dripping from his chin and cookie smeared around his mouth, he flashed me a smile. His teeth were coated in chocolate.

“Feel better?” Mom asked, squeezing my shoulders.

I cocked my head to her. “Yeah, thanks, Mom. What you said helped.”

Smiling, she squeezed me one more time before walking over to the sink, probably to get a sponge. Chazz’s cookie wasn’t smeared only on his face.

“So, Emery, how much karate do you know?” Nate asked.

Twisting around, I looked at Nate and Emery.

“A lot. I’ll teach you some moves if you like.” He glanced at me. “Is there an open place I can demonstrate?”

I stared at him in surprise.
He wants to do karate at a time like this? Why?
I wondered. It struck me then that his martial arts offer had to do with what he had found on Selma’s files. What, though, I hadn’t a clue.

“Our attic,” Nate said eagerly.

“
Wa-hoo
,” Chazz cheered, leaping off the stool.

Emery looked at me. “Come on, Cassidy.”

Flow with him
, I said to myself, following the boys out of the kitchen.
Emery has his reasons
. If I had learned anything about the guy thus far, it was that Emery didn’t do anything without a reason.

~~~

Nestled under our home’s pitched roof, our attic had been transformed during the remodel. The wall studs had been covered in drywall, textured, and painted wheat, and two large skylights had been added on the slanting roof to bring in more light. During bad weather, the attic replaced the outdoors for us. Berber carpet covered the floors to help with the acoustics because we tended to become rambunctious. Stairs coming up from the second floor cut the room in two. One side, intended for more restful activities, featured a sleeper sofa surrounded by floor pillows, and shelves filled with board games, books, and DVDs for the television against the wall. The other side simply had a treadmill, several large yoga balls, and an extra-large tumbling mat, perfect for karate demonstrations.