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Her kids cheered, vanished into the kitchen, and returned before Brooke and I could restart our conversation.
“Okay, we’re stealing Adam now.” Paige took a bite out of the slice in her hand.
“Only if Adam agrees, and don’t you want to heat that up first?” Brooke asked.
Bryan shook his head. “Takes too long.”
I gave Brooke’s good leg a gentle squeeze. “I did promise to help Paige with her bike. I’ll be back.”
“Remember he’s doing you a favor. Be nice.” Brooke looked at her kids.
Bryan snorted. “We’re always angels, just like our mom raised us to be.”
Brooke rolled her eyes and waved us outside.
I followed Paige and Bryan, but instead of steering us toward the garage where I thought she did most of her work, they led me to a barn behind the house.
“It’s my understanding this place is off limits.” I didnotwant to be put in the position ofto narc or not to narc.
“Pft.” Bryan glanced over his shoulder at me. “Because Mom is afraid of creepy crawlies.”
“And barns falling on her kids.” Look at me, being an adult and shit.
Paige stopped a few feet from the doors. “The barn is structurally sound, but before we show you what’s inside, you have to promise, swear on your fucking life, to not tell Mom.”
“No can do.” I shook my head.
Paige sighed. “What if I promise you first that it’s not illegal or dangerous? Please? It’s a surprise. We will tell Mom, just not until it’s done.”
How was I supposed to be the wet blanket over a surprise? “My definition might be different than yours. But as long as it’s not going to get anyone hurt or arrested, I won’t tell.”
“Okay.” Paige and Bryan opened the doors enough to let us in, then closed them behind us, encasing us in darkness. “Light,” she said.
A series of bright, bare bulbs flickered on a few feet away, temporarily blinding me. When I blinked away the brightness, I was looking at a tarp over something large. But it was a new tarp, not something that had been sitting back here for decades, and tools were set up on stands around it.
Paige grabbed one side of the tarp and Bryan the other.
“Are you ready for this?” he asked. “You’re not ready, but do you think you’re ready?”
He was right—I didn’t know if I was ready. “Sure.”
They yanked the tarp away to reveal a small, World War I tank. “Holy shit.” I recognized it instantly, because there was an ancient photograph of it tucked away in Deacon’s shop, with the old owner standing proudly next to it. “Pretty suretankfalls under the category ofcould kill you. Why do you have a tank?”
“It came with the house,” Paige said.
Bryan nodded. “And it’s only going to kill you if you put ammo in it. It’s not really big enough to run things over.”
“No more than Deacon’s truck,” Paige added.
It was asmalltank, all things considered. “What are you doing with it? And what about your bike, Paige?”
She ducked her head. “My bike is fine. It was a ruse to get you back here. We need an adult for some things, and also some knowledge I don’t have.”
“I don’t know anything about tanks except that they goboom.”
“But you’ve got an instinct for it, like Paige does,” Bryan said.
Page handed me a clipboard. “I’m fixing it up for a final grade in one of my classes, and I’m going to use it to get an apprenticeship after I graduate. You have to keep it a secret and help us.Please.”
