“You’re new here.”

I turn, finding myself staring into the face of an older man. He’s tall and he’s wearing a suit, a few threads of silver color his otherwise dark hair. I want to scold him for sneaking up on me in the deserted hallway, but instead I nod.

“Taylor, right?”

I nod again. I guess this school is small enough that he knew I was starting today. “I was just giving Vera a minute alone with my parents,” I say.

He nods once and extends his hand. “I’m John McAllister.”

I shake his outstretched hand, recognizing his name from the brochures. He’s the founder of the school and head of the corporation.

“Come,” he commands and continues down the hall.

I follow a few steps behind him, not sure what he wants with me, but also pretty sure I can’t just refuse.

“So,” he says over his shoulder, “how did you do it?”

I struggle to match his pace. “How’d I do what?”

“That’s never been done on the test before, you know.”

My heart quickens and my palms begin to sweat. How could he possibly know? He couldn’t. There’s no way they could know about the test. “What?” I say, playing dumb. “Getting a perfect score on a college placement exam?”

He laughs under his breath. “No, that’s been done before actually. No one has ever successfully broken through the testing system’s security before.” He pauses mid-stride to look over his shoulder at me, his eyebrows slightly raised, waiting expectantly.

Shit. “Listen, you obviously know I hacked into the test, so let’s just get this over with. I don’t qualify for the scholarship. I understand.”

One corner of his mouth tugs up. “Taylor, that little stunt you pulled is why you’re here.”

He continues several more feet before pausing to let himself in through a heavy wooden door.

I chew the inside of my cheek as I consider what my parents will do to me when they find out—what it will do to them when I’m expelled. Mr. McAllister pops his head back out the door.

“Taylor, come inside.”

I hurry forward, my brain racing. I have to find a way to make this right. He motions for me to sit in a chair across from his desk.

But I remain standing, trying to keep my panic at bay. “My parents—do they know?”

“No,” he answers as he sits down behind the desk, “and that will stay between us as long as you cooperate.” He looks pointedly at the chair behind me and then at me again, and I sit, the leather squeaking underneath me. “We believe someone with your talents could be quite useful.”

“Useful?” I whisper.

“How much do you know about this place?”

“Practically nothing,” I say, shaking my head slowly. “The website and information packet were generic and vague.” I know the school was founded by the Wil-Tech Corporation as a training center for the gifted. What exactly they do…I have no idea.

He forces a fake smile and nods once. “I suppose they were.” He clears his throat and folds his hands in front of him on the desk. “I run an airtight operation here, one we take very seriously. Everything Vera told your parents is true, but make no mistake, this will be the hardest thing you’ve ever done.”

I keep my face composed like none of this surprises me, but my mind races right back to my original question: what kind of school is this?

“I can promise you there’ll be things about our training methods you won’t like. They are designed to make you uncomfortable, to test your limits.” He pauses to look me over. I shiver. Something about the way he’s overly confident and just assumes he can use me for my skills gives me the creeps. “Once you are ready, I will assign you to field work and you will assist our more experienced agents in solving cases. And once you get out in the field, believe me, you’ll be glad you had that rigorous training.” He raises a hand to stop himself. “I’m getting ahead of myself here. I should tell you that many of those who enter the program don’t last three months. In fact, we have a seventy percent fail rate.”

The way he’s looking at me, I can’t tell if he thinks I’ll be part of the thirty percent that makes it or the majority that doesn’t.

“Go say goodbye to your parents,” he dismisses me with a wave of his hand.

I find Vera and my parents just finishing up inside her office. If it’s possible, they are even more excited than when I left them. I can practically see my dad mentally shopping at the academy’s spirit shop, Wilbrook sweatshirt, coffee mug and bumper sticker—the whole nine. They will be hugely disappointed if I get kicked out, even worse than the time I stole a bottle of rum and my best friend Piper and I got drunk in the basement.

The burning of anxiety in my stomach that has become so familiar in the last month returns at the thought of not seeing Piper every day. Its extinguished only by the relief of not having to see Wes every day. Dealing with self-defense classes and Vera suddenly seems like a small price for not having to see him with another girl at his side where I used to be or watching him laugh with his friends while I struggle to hold my head up high enough to keep from drowning in my misery. I release a heavy exhale and push the heartbreak away. I’m done with all that. If nothing else, a new school couldn’t have come at a better time.

Vera walks us to the door and I hug my parents goodbye. I fight back the tightness spreading through my chest, unable to look at my mother’s face. She gives me one last kiss on the cheek, oblivious to my silent pleas for her not to leave. As she turns to go, I latch onto her arm in a last-ditch attempt at a please-don’t-leave-me-here-hug.

She squeezes my shoulders. “I know it’s not ideal being eight hours from home, honey, but we can’t pass up this opportunity. This will be good for you. Give it a chance, okay?”

I nod, knowing I have little choice in the matter. This was a done deal the moment Wilbrook sent me a letter congratulating me on my test scores. I curse myself again for tampering with the test results.

They head out the door and wave. I stare in disbelief as they walk hand in hand down the stone steps. The door closes behind them with an ominous thud.

“I have your schedule,” Vera says, handing a single sheet to me. “If you’ll follow me, I’ll show you to the girls’ dorm room.”

I inspect the schedule as we head upstairs.

8:00 A.M. – 9:00 A.M.                            PHYSICAL EDUCATION (GIRLS)

9:00 A.M. – 11:00 A.M.                            DEFENSE TECHNIQUES I

11:00 P.M. – 1:00 P.M.                            LUNCH

1:00 P.M. – 3:00 P.M.                                          GLOBAL STUDIES I

3:00 P.M. – 5:00 P.M.                             INDEPENDENT STUDY

“Independent Study?” I ask.

“Yes, Mr. McAllister says yours will be computer programming.”

“Okay,” I say, in shock of how different my new life is from my previous one. Before I had Algebra II, Spanish, English Lit, World History –Now my one academic class is something called Global Studies.

“A two-hour lunch?” I look up and meet her eyes.

“Most use the time to eat, shower, and catch up on assignments.”

In my old school I had exactly thirteen minutes to stuff my face after the time it took to walk from my Spanish class to the other end of the school, wait in the cafeteria line, and find a seat. Then again, I also never went to classes until five. My old school got out at three in the afternoon.

We climb the stairs to the third floor towards the dorms. I expect to finally meet the other students, but the hallway is empty.

Vera pauses at a long and narrow room occupied by eight beds. “This is the girls’ dormitory,” she says as I step up next to her. I recognize my two black suitcases lying on top of the twin-size bed closest to us.  Each of the other beds in the room sport blankets and quilts in various colors and patterns, but the white iron headboards give everything a uniform feel. There are floor to ceiling windows along one wall, and the window in the center opens onto a tiny balcony with a decorative wrought iron railing.