“Teddy just texted and said someone grabbed your mom.”
“Yeah, I really need your help, can you come?”
She gave a short growl. “We’ll try. We usually sneak out after Mom’s asleep, but she’s up now and practically sitting in front of the door. But we’ll figure out how to get past her.”
Anna had a radical proposition. “Maybe if you just told her what’s happening—”
“And tell her everything else? I don’t know that I’m ready for that.”
“What is it?” Suzanne said.
Anna realized she was going to have to tell her grandmother everything. “Okay—Teia and Lew, they’re … they’ve got powers, too. We … we’ve all been practicing together, and we have to figure out how to convince their mom to let them go—”
“Anna, let me talk to Teia,” Suzanne said, holding her hand out for the phone.
Confused and caught too off guard to argue, Anna said, “Teia, my grandma wants to talk to you.” And she handed the phone over.
“Teia? This is Suzanne, is your mother there? May I talk to her? Just tell her Suzanne wants to talk to her.” A few moments ticked by, then she said, “Hello, Analise. Yes, this is Suzanne West. How are you? Not great, I’m afraid … Celia’s missing. That’s right. Can you help?”
Anna would have given anything for five minutes of superhearing, to be able to follow both sides of this conversation.
“Frankly, I don’t much care about that,” Suzanne said, hand on hip. “But will you please let Teia and Lew come over? Anna very much wants their help on this … Yes, Anna, too, they’re all in on it together … I know, but what did you expect? Yes, Arthur and I will be there looking out for them. So will Mark Paulson … That’s fine, just get over as soon as you can. Thank you.”
She clicked off and handed the phone back to Anna.
“What was that about?” Anna said, baffled. Ms. Baker knew about them? About everything? But how …
“You kids think you’re the only ones keeping secrets. Let’s go downstairs and meet your friends.”
&nb
sp; “What secret is Ms. Baker keeping?”
“Not mine to tell. Bethy, are you going to be okay?”
“Yeah,” the younger girl said. “I’ve tapped into a couple of video feeds around Horizon Tower. I think I can tell you what’s going on, at least on the street. I’m trying to see if I can hack into any cameras on the inside.”
“Good girl. We’ll be back soon. Anna, I assume you have a suit or costume of some kind? Grab it before we leave.”
“Okay.”
“Grandma, Anna—be careful.” Bethy’s voice was stark, and Anna pursed her lips.
“Yeah. We will.”
On the elevator ride down, Suzanne snapped her fingers a few times. When she did, sparks flashed above her hand, and on the last snap a torchlike flame burst to life and burned for a moment before fading away.
“I’m really out of practice,” she admitted. “I may not be much help if this gets rough.”
“I’m really glad you’re here,” Anna said. “Thanks.”
“Family tradition. Your grandfather would be loving this.”
“Loving that Mom got kidnapped?”
“Maybe not that part. But he always loved showing her kidnappers exactly how he felt about it.” Her smile was almost gleeful.
Anna fielded a couple more calls by the time they reached the lobby. Sam was driving Teddy over, and Teia and Lew were on the way—with their mother. Teia wouldn’t say how she felt about that. Probably because Ms. Baker was driving the car. Anna didn’t have a chance to ask or find out about their side of that conversation. Time enough to discuss that later.