Spy Ski School by Stuart Gibbs Page A

the real reason I didn’t see him was that I couldn’t take my eyes off Jessica.
    The single picture I’d seen of her before hadn’t done her justice. Either it had been too grainy, or she’d blossomed since it was taken. Probably a bit of both. Whatever the case, she was equally as beautiful as Erica—only, there was something different about her. Erica always had an aura of danger about her that made her alluring but also incredibly intimidating.Meanwhile, Jessica, despite being surrounded by armored vehicles and menacing guards, appeared to be completely the opposite. As opposed to Erica she seemed . . . friendly. I couldn’t explain how, but I immediately got the sense that she’d be extremely kind and good-natured. She had wide, luminous eyes and an endearing little smile, and she was wrapped in a big, fuzzy pink parka that made her look like she was wearing a giant Hostess Sno Ball.
    Jessica quickly slipped around the car-tank and disappeared into the pack of bodyguards before being shunted through the doors of the hotel. My entire glimpse of her had lasted five seconds. If that.
    I kept my eyes locked on the hotel doors, hoping she might exit again.
    â€œOh, great,” Erica muttered. “One look at the target and you already have a crush on her.”
    â€œNo, I don’t,” I said, way too defensively.
    Erica heaved a disdainful sigh. “The moment you saw her, you stopped breathing.”
    â€œIt wasn’t because of her. It was because of the lack of oxygen up here.”
    â€œWell, you’re definitely not getting enough oxygen to your brain. You can’t develop feelings for the target. She’s the enemy. If you bring emotion into this, you’ll screw everything up.”
    â€œI’mnot going to get emotional,” I said heatedly.
    â€œYou’re getting emotional right now,” Erica pointed out.
    I started to argue that I wasn’t, then realized this would be exactly what Erica was talking about. So I fell silent, embarrassed and annoyed.
    The bodyguards in the street in front of us seemed to have received a new message over their radios. They stood down at the same time, allowing the crowd of skiers to cross the street again. Every single person around us was now talking about the Shangs, impressed by their car-tank convoy and wondering who they were. Even in a community as wealthy as Vail, they had just made a very big impression.
    Erica fell in with the flow of tourists and I followed her. As we neared the guards who’d stopped traffic, Erica instantly changed her entire demeanor, shifting from spy surveillance mode to behaving like an actual teenage girl. Even her voice changed, ratcheting up a few octaves. “I am so psyched to hit the slopes tomorrow!” she exclaimed, taking a bite of pizza. “Aren’t you?”
    â€œDefinitely,” I replied, trying my best to play along.
    â€œI hear there’s some major freshies coming in this week,” Erica proclaimed, leading me between the guards and across the street. “Maybe a foot. Twelve inches of pow-pow! How radical is that?”
    â€œEr . . . very radical.” I had no idea what Erica was talkingabout, but suspected it was skier-speak for something to do with snow.
    Erica shot me a peeved glance, as though she was annoyed I wasn’t holding up my end of the charade very well, and then decided to handle everything herself. She launched into a long, purposefully vapid diatribe about how much she loved skiing while we continued our circuit around the hotel.
    A pedestrian walkway cut past the lobby, heading back toward the ice rink again. One of Shang’s guards remained in position at the front doors as we wandered past. Unlike the others, he was Caucasian, with pale skin, bright blue eyes, and a white-blond mullet. He was one of the largest human beings I’d ever seen in my life. His arms were so muscular, he’d