Free Thief of Lies by Brenda Drake

clenched teeth. “I was pretending to talk to you to throw him off.”
    “Man,” he whispered. “Ever since Freaky Friday, it just keeps getting weirder, doesn’t it?”
    “Seriously, tell me about it. Arik keeps implying I’m not human.”
    “You’re human, Gia. Haven’t you been to doctors? If you weren’t, you’d be cut open in some lab on a gurney, with men in white jackets examining your insides.”
    “Not funny. I’m scared.” Not just because of the men watching Arik, but also from having no idea what I was or how my life might change. Would they expect me to become like them? Maybe I spoke some Italian and jumped us through some gateway, and a few times I conjured that ball of light, but I had none of the abilities of the teens fighting that hound in Paris.
    The train squealed to a gradual stop beside the platform, and the doors swished open. Everyone crowded together, squeezing through the compartment doors and into the belly of the car. Arik went to one side, Nick and I shuffled to the other, and the two men stayed in the middle.
    “Just stay calm,” Nick said.
    For the next fifteen minutes, we swayed back and forth until the train slowed into the Park Street station. Outside the window, people rushed along the platform. The crowd squeezed toward the doors, waiting for them to open.
    A self-assured girl with long black hair darted along the platform. Lei? And behind her came Demos and the other two Sentinels, dressed in regular street clothes.
    “Come on.” Nick clutched my arm, and I let him lead me off the train. We moved up the steps with the crowd, and the moment we came out the doors, I pulled back on Nick’s lead. “What are we doing? We have to help them.”
    “No. Arik said not to stop…to keep going until we reach the library.”
    “But—”
    I turned toward the station’s doors, and Nick yanked me back. “But nothing, Gia, you have to listen to me. They’re tracking me, and I doubt your kickboxing skills are a match for them.”
    “They can’t sense you with Arik’s clothes on.”
    “You always half listen. Arik said if I wore his clothes, it would confuse them. It won’t eliminate my scent.”
    I glanced at the doors and then back at Nick and sighed. He was right. There wasn’t much I could do to aid them, and I might be more hindrance than help. “Yeah, okay. Let’s go.”
    Afton stood outside the doors of the Athenæum, nibbling at her cuticle. Her wrinkled pink dress shirt and loose black pants looked as if she’d slept in them, and she wore ballet flats instead of high heels. The outfit was completely unlike her.
    “She’s a mess,” I whispered to Nick.
    “Yeah… She looks terrified.”
    When Nick reached her, Afton flung her arms around his neck. “I was so worried,” she said into his shoulder.
    Nick patted her back. “You don’t have to worry. We’re okay.”
    She pulled away from him. “If anything happened to you guys… What are you wearing?”
    “I was going to ask you the same thing,” Nick said. “I’m wearing Arik’s clothes. It’s to cover up my smell.”
    “I’m wearing my mom’s dirty clothes for the same reason.”
    “Why were you worried about us?” I asked. “You’re the one who’s alone.”
    “I’m not alone.” She inclined her head in the direction of the library. “I have my own personal warrior for protection.”
    A man somewhere near forty stood up from his seat on the steps. His eyes struck me first, soft green and soulful. Waves of tea-colored hair brushed his forehead. For his age, he was extremely fit and muscular. He wore a black leather trench coat, and when he bolted down the steps, it flapped open, exposing the ornate handle of a sword strapped to his waist.
    The man stopped in front of us. “Blimey, you resemble your ma,” he said in a thick Irish accent.
    “What?” My voice cracked. “Who are you?”
    “I’m your da.”
    I barely remembered how I got to the café or when I sat down and ordered the