I wasn’t about to admit how relieved I was to not have to dodge bullets using the cartwheel skills I’d learned from my one gymnastics class, but I was very relieved for that and other reasons. But as soon as I came inside, my relief turned back to fear because there, with a gun to Ivan’s back, was a man in jeans and a hooded sweatshirt.
The gunman motioned for Beattie and me to walk ahead of him and Ivan, and the three of us made a slow procession down a short hallway and into what had obviously been a classroom at some time in the past. There, Adaire, Frank, Boone, and Aaran sat in a row, all with their hands tied in their laps.
A tall, thin man with silver hair and skin so pale I thought he might be a ghost was standing off to the side of the room, staring at our friends. When we walke
