Eventually, the sky overhead began to shift from black to navy to sapphire, a progression she was intimately familiar with. The window was facing north, so she had no hope of seeing the sunrise, but she sensed it in the gradual lightening of the clouds and the way shadows began to stretch long down the street, and how all at once the windows of the library began to glimmer with morning light.
At eight o’clock sharp, the CLOSED sign in the window was flipped over to OPEN. Nova couldn’t see who had turned it—Narcissa, or Gene Cronin himself?
Nine minutes later, the first patron arrived, an elderly woman carrying a basket full of thick paperbacks, her head tucked beneath a plastic hood, even though there were no rainclouds in the sky.
Nova climbed down from the desk and nudged Adrian with her toe. “Hey, Sketch.”
It was Ruby who woke first, startling when she found herself restrained by Oscar’s arm across her waist. She moved it off of her and sat up, brushing her black-and-white hair aside. Oscar and Adrian woke up moments later—Adrian jolting upward the moment he spotted Nova and remembered where they were.
“Did something happen?” he said, his hand fumbling across the floor until it landed on his glasses. He unfolded them and slipped them back onto his face, blinking up at Nova. “Did you see something?”
“Yeah,” she said, leaning against the desk. “The library opened. An old woman just went in carrying a bunch of books, but … I have a feeling she might have been hiding a machine gun under her jacket.”
Adrian blinked up at her and she noticed he had a speck of white caught in the lashes of his left eye—what her mother had used to refer to as “sleep dust.” Nova had the most peculiar urge to lift up his glasses and run her thumb across the lashes to clear it away.
“She’s being sarcastic, right?” said Oscar, rolling a kink from his shoulder.
Nova glanced at him. “Yes.”
A cacophony of giggles from outside drew them all to the window. On the street below a crowd of young children had just arrived via three minivans and were being paraded into the library. Perhaps a day-care retreat or a school field trip.
They stared until the last of the children and their teachers had disappeared through the large main doors.
“Well,” said Ruby, slapping her hands together. “We didn’t really expect to catch anything on our first night, did we? I mean, who knows how often his illegal dealings go down.”
Nova shifted her attention between the three Renegades. “Is this really our plan? To stake this place out every night for all eternity? What if we never catch anyone? What if his black-market clients don’t use the alleyway, but go in through some other entrance? He could have a secret underground tunnel for all we know. Or—just a thought—what if he’s not actually dealing in black-market guns and this is a waste of time?”
“It’s too early to determine any of that,” said Adrian.
“So how long do we keep doing this before we try something else?” Nova pressed.
Adrian opened his mouth, but hesitated.
“Well,” started Ruby, “longer than one night, at least.”
Nova gestured at the window. “Look, I know I’m the new guy here, and maybe I don’t have all the information to be making this call, but I really don’t think we’re going to learn anything from an abandoned office building, staring at a closed public library every night. I think the only way we’ll know if illegal activity is happening in there is to actually go inside.”
Adrian shook his head. “The Council was very specific. We can’t do a search without first having some evidence of criminal activity.”
“So let’s go inside and get some evidence. It’s a library. It’s open to the public. It’s not breaking any rules if we go…”
She trailed off, her eye catching on a lone figure on the street below. Her breath hitched.
She quickly pulled her attention away, but it was too late. Adrian followed the look, his lips parting in surprise.
“Jackpot,” he whispered.
“What? What is it?” said Ruby as she and Oscar pressed closer to see.
“See that woman down there?” said Adrian, his eyes tracking her as she crossed the street and ducked into the shadow of the library. “I’m almost positive that’s Ingrid Thompson. The Detonator.”
Nova swallowed, staring at Ingrid as she paused on the front stoop of the library and looked back, in what was probably intended to give the Renegades a good look at her, but that also served to make her look extra suspicious as she slipped inside.