The Becoming of Noah Shaw (The Shaw Confessions #1)(29)

“Oh, I cannot wait for this,” Jamie says.

Goose’s face is wiped blank, pretending at neutral. But I know him. He’s more than unsettled, but would die before admitting it. And nothing I’m about to say is going to make it better—only worse.

“Simply put,” I say, unable to help the curve at the corner of my mouth as I do, “Superheroes are real, and . . . we’re some of them.”

A raucous laugh explodes from Mara’s throat. “Superheroes?”

Jamie slow-claps. “Five stars.”

Stella turns to Goose. “I can hear people’s thoughts,” she says. “And Jamie can persuade anyone to do what he wants.”

Jamie crosses his arms. “I feel like I’ve just been outed.”

“You have been,” Mara says.

Stella ignores them. “Noah can heal, himself and others.”

Goose and Leo turn to Mara and Daniel.

“Daniel isn’t Gifted,” Stella says.

Leo’s gaze lands on Mara like a fly before darting back to Stella. “And her?”

Stella looks even paler than when we first sat down. She’s quiet, but her dark eyes are narrowed and blazing. She looks just as angry as Mara did upon seeing her, but it’s mixed with something else—what, I can’t tell.

“Noah?” Goose asks.

I ignore him, turn on Leo instead. “What is it, precisely, that you can do?”

“My Gift,” Leo says, “my business.”

Jamie slaps both of his knees. “Or! I could make you tell us. Since Stella didn’t show us the same courtesy.”

Which is when I realise that Stella’s reading our thoughts. Now. She shouldn’t be able to, not like this. None of us—myself excepted—have been able to use our abilities on each other before, not for more than a few seconds, at least.

In answer, Stella tips her head in Goose’s direction. “He’s why our Gifts are working on each other. It’s him. He’s doing it.”

Goose shakes his head once. “I don’t know what she’s on about.”

“How old are you?” Daniel asks him.

All eyes on Goose. “Eighteen.”

“Have you noticed anything . . . different in the past couple of years? Any changes?”

“You mean, hair in places there hadn’t been before, spots . . . ? The teachers covered most of that in year six.”

“Ever get sick?” Jamie asks.

“Ill, you mean? Of course, who hasn’t?”

“No, like, seriously sick.”

“Mono at the end of upper fifth.”

“Freshman year,” I explain to everyone. Could Goose have manifested without knowing it? “How bad was it?”

“Wretched. They thought it might be meningitis for a while, the kind you don’t heal from.”

I watch Daniel file that away. He can come at Goose later, he knows, but Leo—could be a now-or-never situation. I want to ask about the suicide, but Daniel knows why I’m here. He’ll either kick the ball my way or he won’t, but I trust him on this. He can see the forest for the trees like no one else. Especially not me. Or Mara.

Daniel turns to Leo next. “How did you know about your Gift?” Using his lexicon, asking questions we need answered and acting familiar so he’ll feel familiar. Fair play to you, Daniel.

Leo glances at Stella, and she nods. Cozy pair, those two. “You can make people do what you want them to do,” he says to Jamie. “I can make people see what I want them to see.”

The address. Fucking finally.

“Why were you there on the platform that night?” he asks me, skipping ahead. He wants to get right at it too.

“We’d just had dinner,” Daniel answers instead, to Leo’s annoyance. “And we were getting the train together.”

“That’s it?”

Daniel shrugs. “That’s it.”

Leo looks to Stella for confirmation. “He’s telling the truth.”

“But you,” I say to him. “You were there. And unlike us, you were watching the girl who killed herself.”

“We—” He catches himself. “We knew you’d be there.”

“How?” Jamie takes a turn at the interrogation. Poorly, as he answers his own question: “Stella?”

“She heard your thoughts,” Leo says.

“From how far away?” Daniel asks, cutting in. “Where were you?”

She hesitates. “I don’t—”

“Your friend—Goose, is it?” Leo asks.

“As much as you’ll get, it is.”

“He’s turning out to be quite useful.”

Goosey turns to me. “And here I thought you invited me to the States to eat, drink, and be merry.”

“For tomorrow we die?” Mara asks. A deeply uncomfortable silence ensues.

Daniel’s the one to pick things back up. “But Gifts don’t work on each other without an . . .” He looks to Stella.

“Amplifier.”

Wonder where she got that from. Wonder if she and this lot have been studying up.

“So where were you?” Daniel asks Stella again, but turns to Mara before she can answer. “Did you see her that night?”