The man said, “Do you think we could have a chat?”
“No,” Henry replied. “I do not think we can.” He reached for his phone in his back pocket before remembering, partway through, that he was not wearing trousers. He glanced up at the windows of the house. He was looking not for help – no one inside knew enough about Henry’s mother to even suspect the kind of peril he was in, even if they were looking right at it – but for any cracked windows that might allow RoboBee to come to him.
The man made a great show of displaying his palms so Henry could see he didn’t have any weapons. As if that made a difference. “I assure you we have the same goals.”
“My goal was to finish watching the walkthrough for EndWarden II. I can’t believe I’ve finally found someone who shares my vision.”
The man regarded him. He seemed to be considering options. “Word has come to me that something is moving here in Henrietta. I do not like people moving things around in Henrietta. I assumed you, too, preferred to not have people milling about in your life.”
“And yet,” Henry said lightly, “here we are.”
“Are you going to do this the easy way? Save me the trouble.”
Henry shook his head.
The man sighed. Before Henry had time to react, he closed the distance between the two of them, embraced Henry in a less than friendly way, and perfunctorily performed a manoeuvre that made Henry emit a soft squeak and stagger back holding his shoulder. Some people might have screamed, but Henry was as committed as the man to keeping secrets.
“Do not waste my time,” the man said, “when I began this in a very civil way.”
RoboBee, Henry thought. Come find me.
There had to be a window cracked somewhere in the house; Mrs Woo always turned the heat on too high.
“If you are trying to get a secret out of me,” Henry replied, touching his shoulder gingerly, “you’re wasting your own time.”
“For God’s sake,” the man said. He leaned to pull his pistol out of his ankle holster. “Any other time I’d find this really honourable. But now just get in my car before I shoot you.”
The gun won, as it usually does. Henry cast a last glance at the house before making his way to the car across the road. He recognized the white car, though he didn’t understand what that meant. He began to get into the back.
“The passenger seat is fine,” the man said. “I told you, this is a chat.”
Henry did as he was told, glancing back at the house a third time as the man settled behind the wheel and pulled away from the kerb. The man turned down the radio (they sang Yes, I’m a lover not a fighter) and said, “I just want to know who to expect and if they’re going to be trouble. I have no interest in ever interacting with you again.”
In the passenger seat, Henry looked out the window before buckling the seat belt. He pulled up his knees and put his arms around his bare legs. He was starting to shiver a little. The man turned up the heater.
“Where are you taking me?” Henry asked.
“We’re circling the block like reasonable people do when they are trying to have a conversation.”
Henry thought about a hole in the ground.
“I have never had a reasonable conversation with someone with a pistol.” He looked out the window again, craning his neck to look behind him. It was dark apart from the streetlights. He would be too far away from the RoboBee to communicate with it soon, but he sent out a last plea: Tell someone who can make this stop.
It wasn’t a request that made sense in words, but it made sense in Henry’s thoughts, and that was all that mattered to the bee.
“Look,” said the man. “I regret your shoulder. That was habit.”
A metallic clink sounded at the top of the windshield. As the man craned his neck to see what had hit the car, Henry sat up attentively. Leaning forward, he saw three slender black lines at the edge of the window.
A phone rang.
The man made a noise before flipping the phone over in the centre console. Whoever it was earned his attention, because he picked it up and wedged it on his shoulder in order to allow himself to still use the stick shift. To the phone, he said, “That’s a very strange question to ask.”
Henry took the opportunity to roll down his window an inch. RoboBee immediately whirred off the windshield and through the crack.
“Hey —” the man said.
The bee flew into Henry’s palm. He cupped it gladly to his chest. The weight of it felt like security.
The man frowned at him, and then said to the phone, “I haven’t kidnapped anyone in years, but I do have a student in my car right now.” A pause. “Both of those statements are accurate. I was trying to get some clarification on some rumours. Would you like to talk to him?”
Henry’s eyebrows shot up.
The man handed Henry his phone.
“Hello?” Henry said.
“Well,” Gansey said on the other side of the phone, “I hear you’ve met Mr Gray.”