The Crims #2 Page 15

  “Oh, don’t worry, I get it,” said Imogen. “Big Nana always makes us exaggerate in our evil monologues. We have to practice them in front of the mirror.”

  “Oh my God! Same!” said Ava.

  Imogen smiled at Ava. She actually seems to like me, Imogen thought. Perhaps I can manipulate her into freeing me and my family—and then throw her down a well or something. But then she realized, she didn’t actually want to throw Ava down a well. She liked her, too. If they had met in different, less murder-y circumstances, they might actually have become friends.

  Ava looked at Imogen curiously. “I’ve never met someone who grew up in a family like mine.”

  “Nor have I,” said Imogen. “Everyone else is all ‘My dad is always away for business, it’s so annoying,’ and I’m like ‘My grandmother faked her own death, and my mother preferred the guy disguised as my father to my actual father because he was better at stealing diamonds.’”

  “Really?” said Ava, fascinated. “My mom killed my dad because he stole her a sapphire necklace for their anniversary instead of an emerald necklace, and it didn’t quite match her dress.”

  “I’m so sorry,” said Imogen.

  “Don’t be,” Ava said dismissively. “He always called me Ivan because he wished I was a boy, and he threw darts at me at breakfast time to toughen up my skin. I still can’t see a bowl of cereal without flinching.”

  Imogen and Ava smiled at each other shyly.

  “We have to pretend we’re still enemies,” said Ava.

  “Does that mean we’re not?”

  “We’re not. So I probably won’t kill you.”

  “I’d appreciate that.” Imogen smiled. It would be impossible to describe the relief that flooded through her at that moment. If you’ve ever been spared from a violent death at the very last minute, you’ll know how she felt. “I don’t suppose you’d untie me, would you?” she asked.

  Ava looked at her. “Okay,” she said. “But don’t try anything funny.”

  “I won’t,” said Imogen. “I’m not very funny.”

  Ava used her knife to cut Imogen’s hands and ankles free. Imogen rubbed her wrists and sat up, clearing a space for herself among all the dynamite. “Do you know what’s going to happen to the rest of my family?”

  Ava shook her head. “The Kruks are a totally top-down organization. They just tell me what I need to complete my mission. Only my mom really knows what’s going on.”

  “Your mom?”

  “Elsa. She’s crazy. My brothers actually tried to run away to Siberia to get away from her, but there was some passport thing, so . . .”

  Imogen felt as though a cold weight had dropped into her stomach. Ava was Elsa’s daughter. Which meant the blond woman in the NICELADY car was almost certainly Elsa. “I have a question,” she said. “Why is Elsa so interested in our family anyway? She doesn’t just want to control Blandington, does she? It’s a bit . . . boring.”

  “I KNOW!” said Ava. “I have to put on a mask and steal bananas from the supermarket just to keep myself awake.”

  “You’re the Masked Banana Bandit!” cried Imogen. “You’re the most wanted criminal in town!”

  Ava laughed, shaking her head. “That is tragic. You guys really need to step it up.”

  “Tell me about it,” said Imogen. “Listen—I don’t suppose you could do me a favor?” She realized she was pushing her luck at this point, but she had to ask. “Could you just—you know—set my family free? It’s not like they’re any kind of threat to you. . . .”

  “I’m sorry,” said Ava. “Mom would kill me. Did you hear about that whole grizzly bear–shark thing? She’s developing a new animal-based murder technique, involving a giant squid and a bald eagle, and I really don’t want her to test it out on me. It’s going to be hard enough to explain why you’re not dead—”

  “Thanks anyway,” Imogen said quickly, before Ava could change her mind about the Imogen-not-being-dead thing.

  Ava smiled apologetically. “I could go down into the dungeon and take them some cheese and crackers?” she offered.

  “That would be great,” said Imogen. “Otherwise, they’ll start eating one another, and you really don’t want to have to clean up after that.”

  “Ew. No, I don’t. Cannibalism is so suburban.” She pushed herself off the workbench and helped Imogen down, too. “Shall we get out of here?”

  Imogen grinned. “Yes, please,” she said. “Just one more question: How come there’s no record of you anywhere? I Googled you and looked on Instagram and Facebook and in all the official Kruk biographies, and the unofficial biographies, and the Kruk Reddit—”

  Ava pulled a face. “They’re brutal on there.”

  “—but there’s nothing about you anywhere.”

  Ava rolled her eyes. “That’s because Mom and the other senior Kruks are grooming me to be leader someday. They want me out of the spotlight till then. So I don’t even get to perform in my end-of-term ballet shows, which is so unfair.”

  “No way!” said Imogen. “Big Nana wants me to be the leader of the Crims, too!”

  “Shut up!” said Ava, and high-fived her.

  “It’s a shame we’ll be mortal enemies one day.”

  “Yeah, well. We have a while before that happens.”

  “Tell you what,” Imogen said as they walked toward the woodshop door. “I’ve had an idea to explain the whole me-being-alive thing.”

  Ava crossed her arms. “I’m listening.”

  “We set off some of the dynamite and tell everyone that the Masked Banana Bandit was trying to blow up the school. You can say that you tracked me down to murder me, but found me wrestling with the Masked Banana Bandit—and then the school newspaper turned up and took loads of photos of us together, so you’d have been the prime suspect if I’d gone missing. So you helped me overpower the Masked Banana Bandit instead.”

  “I like it.” Ava nodded slowly. “Plus, the school newspaper really is going to love this story.”

  “Are you kidding? It’ll be the most exciting thing that has ever happened in Blandington.”

  “Since I turned up,” said Ava, flicking her ponytail.

  “And we’ll both be the most popular girls in school when everyone hears about what heroes we are.”

  “Just one problem,” said Ava. “We have dynamite, but we don’t have any matches.”

  “I do,” said Imogen, producing them from her sleeve.

  Ava shook her head. “You are good,” she said. “Let’s do this.”

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  BY THE TIME Imogen got home from blowing up part of the school, Big Nana was nowhere to be seen—not by Imogen, not even by a wood pigeon with particularly good eyesight who was hanging around in the tree outside.

  “Hello?” Imogen called, walking through the eerily empty hall.

  Nothing.

  Please don’t let them have taken Big Nana too. . . .

  “Hello? Big Nana?” she called, opening the kitchen door.

  Nothing there either.

  “Barney?” she called. But he didn’t come running.

  Imogen went outside—the black sedan was parked outside, so Big Nana must have come home after the failed kidnapping. So where was she? And where was Barney? He wasn’t in the back of the car where they’d left him. Had he been taken too?

  And then Imogen remembered: Crim House was full of secret passages.

  She ran back inside and pressed on the picture of Great-Uncle Umbrage, and the door to the tunnel swung open. Imogen ran down it and explored every turn, but she couldn’t find Big Nana anywhere.

  She must be in another passage, thought Imogen. If I were Big Nana, which thankfully I’m not because she has much worse dental hygiene than me, where would I dig a secret tunnel?

  I’d want the tunnel to be as close to my bed as possible, in case the Kruks turned up in the middle of the night.

  Imogen ran up to Big Nana’s room. She hadn’t been in there for years, but it ha
dn’t changed at all. The walls were still papered with a pattern that looked like a harmless, chintzy floral print from a distance but from close up, turned out to be a twisting pattern of deadly nightshade and barbed wire; there were little porcelain figurines on the mantelpiece—a pickpocket, a serial killer, and a small child throttling a lamb. The only thing that was different were the framed photographs; Big Nana had added to them over the years as the children had grown up. There were Nick and Nate, stealing first prize in the Blandington Talent Contest from the tap-dancing poodle that had won; there was Isabella, riding her first stolen tricycle; and there was Delia, all dressed up for the Blandington Spring Fling, her reluctant date—one of the members of No Direction, a really, really awful local band—handcuffed to her wrist. Imogen felt a pang. At least I know where they are and that they’re alive. All I have to do is find Big Nana and get them all back. . . .

  Imogen knocked on walls and levered up loose floorboards, searching for the passage. She emptied Big Nana’s closet, tossing aside caftans and seventies trousers and one extremely horrible, pink, ruffled dress—and there, at the back, she found a patch of wall that was a slightly different color from the wall around it.

  Imogen pressed on the wall, and a hidden door sprang open. She noted with disappointment that it didn’t lead to a secret passage; it opened a small, secret enclosure. Inside was the large toy hippo that Imogen had found in the Kruks’ Loot Room—the toy hippo that Big Nana had loved as a child. And next to it was a children’s picture book that Imogen hadn’t seen since she was very, very young: Ten Little Mice in the Woods. Big Nana used to read this to her when she was babysitting!

  The cover showed ten terrified-looking mice cowering in an ominous, bird-shaped shadow. She opened the book and started reading. The story started innocently enough: Once upon a moonlit night . . . But then an owl turned up and started stealing the mice with its sharp, owl-y talons, taking them back to its horrible, twiggy nest. And then, on the final page . . . the owl ate all the mice.

  What kind of picture book is this? Imogen thought. She had forgotten how disturbing the story was.

  Imogen turned the page, expecting some kind of happy ending—wouldn’t a Red Riding Hood character turn up and cut the owl open and release the mice? Wouldn’t it all turn out to be a dream? But that was it. No more pages.

  So that’s why I have recurring nightmares about creatures with massive beaks, Imogen realized.

  But something else about the book made her feel uncomfortable—something other than the creepy plot and horribly realistic colored-pencil illustrations. She felt as though she’d read the story recently. Or had seen some kind of adaptation— Had it been turned into a musical? Or a terrifying Netflix series? Not that she could think of. Probably just déjà vu . . .

  And why did Big Nana hide the book in the secret compartment at the back of her closet, like it was one of her most treasured possessions?

  Imogen flipped back to the front of the book and noticed an inscription on the title page that she’d missed the first time around. An inscription in Big Nana’s handwriting.

  To Elsa, my psychotic little kumquat! Love and kisses from your favorite aunt xxxx

  “Kumquat”?

  “Your favorite aunt”?

  Elsa?

  The hippo?

  What?

  Where?

  Who?

  Why?

  And then it hit Imogen like a ton of imaginary but upsetting bricks.

  BIG NANA IS A KRUK.

  It seemed impossible. She couldn’t believe she was even thinking it. But the more she thought about it, the more she realized that it was the only plausible explanation.

  That was why the hippo had been in the Kruk’s Loot Room.

  That was why Big Nana had such piercing blue eyes.

  That was why—

  Imogen glanced up and screamed. Because Big Nana was standing in the closet doorway, watching her.

  Imogen shoved the hippo and picture book back into the secret compartment and stood up, terrified.

  “Sorry, my broken, little stained-glass window,” said Big Nana, smiling. “I didn’t mean to startle you. I’m just so relieved to see you!” And then she noticed that Imogen didn’t seem that pleased to see her. “Are you all right?” she asked.

  Imogen started backing away, her skin prickling. She hit the back of the closet. So she started backing away in the other direction.

  “What’s wrong?” said Big Nana, taking a step toward her.

  “Stay back!” shouted Imogen, cursing herself for not having a weapon on her. Ava would never have made a mistake like that. “You know what’s wrong! You lied to me! AGAIN!”

  “What?”

  “You’re the mole! You’ve been leaking our secrets to the Kruks!”

  Big Nana looked shocked. “How can you say that to me?” she asked. “What’s got into you? Have you been eating pick-and-mix again? I’ve told you, too many gummy cola bottles make you paranoid. Gobstoppers give you delusions of grandeur—much more fun—”

  “You’re a Kruk!” shouted Imogen.

  Big Nana looked stunned.

  And then she looked ashamed.

  And then she looked angry.

  And then she looked upset.

  She was really very good at conveying her emotions through her facial expressions.

  Imogen was slightly less good at conveying hers, so this is what they were: fear, horror, and revulsion.

  Big Nana looked at the ground. And then she looked up at Imogen, sadness and guilt in her Kruk-like eyes. “You’re right,” she said at last. “I should have known you would figure it out eventually.” She took a deep breath and started to pace the room.

  She’s gearing up for an evil monologue, Imogen realized. She was dreading what she might hear but riveted at the same time. She would finally find out the truth.

  “My legal name is Gerda Kruk,” monologued Big Nana. “I am Luka Kruk’s twin. When I was in my early twenties, the question of who would succeed Niklas Kruk came up. I wanted and deserved to lead the family. But because Luka was the male, Niklas made him his heir. Even though he was a terrible leader! Our father was a great man, and a brilliant shoplifter—also a talented part-time wizard—but he was no feminist.”

  Imogen couldn’t believe what she was hearing. Big Nana is Luka Kruk’s twin? She still stood with her back to the wall, rigid with fear.

  Big Nana stopped walking and put one hand on the mantelpiece, as if to steady herself. “Luka changed the whole structure of the family,” she continued. “He wanted me to start over at the bottom and ‘earn’ my position at the top. Can you imagine? Me! I’d already invented the Beatles and caused the Cuban missile crisis and forged the Sphinx . . . That took a lot of skill and a lot of mud, I can tell you.” Big Nana shook her head. “I was furious, as you can imagine. So that night I walked out of Krukingham Palace and never returned.

  “That same evening—before I walked out on the family forever—I’d started reading Elsa a bedtime story. Lovely book it was—Ten Little Mice in the Woods. I used to read it to you when you were a baby too. But before I could finish it, Luka called me out of the room to talk to him. Just like him—such a selfish man. And I was so upset by his whole start-from-the-bottom nonsense that I decided to leave, right there and then. And I completely forgot to finish Elsa’s story.” She sighed. “I’ve kept the book ever since, as a reminder of the life I left behind. And I’m beginning to think Elsa hasn’t forgotten it, either. . . .”

  Imogen felt a chill. Big Nana—the woman she had known all her life—had once read bedtime stories to Elsa Kruk, the craziest, most dangerous, blondest criminal of her generation. How could Imogen ever trust Big Nana again?

  “I’m not the mole,” Big Nana continued. (She certainly had more monologuing stamina than Imogen.) “Leaving the Kruks was the best thing I ever did. As soon as I started living in the real world, I realized how wrong it was to be violent and terrifying all the time, and so c
ruel to bees. And a couple of weeks after I left, at a Bank Robbers Anonymous meeting, I met Herbert Crim. Your grandfather. We started a new crime family—one that cares about one another as much as it cares about making it onto a Top Ten Deadliest Police Chases list. One that doesn’t cause so much harm. Well, apart from Aunt Bets. But what can you do? I can’t control who marries into the family. . . .” She looked Imogen in the eye. “Believe me, my squashed fruit fly. I grew up in Krukingham Palace. I know the Kruks. And I know that I’m right to be scared of them. Elsa is crazy. Not the way crazy golf is crazy. Not even the way crazy paving is crazy, though what were people thinking in the seventies? Front paths shouldn’t be so stressful to look at.” She shook her head. “No. Elsa’s crazy like Jack the Ripper was crazy, but more so, because at least he had the decency to die in the nineteenth century. I don’t know what she’s going to do to us, but I know that it is going to be unbelievably painful and unpleasant. People are going to make true crime dramas out of this.”

  But Imogen had had enough. “Stop,” she said. Who are you? she thought. She was finding it hard to look at Big Nana, so she closed her eyes for a moment. “I need to be alone,” she said. “I need to absorb all of this.”

  Big Nana nodded, head bowed. “You are the least absorbent of all my grandchildren. The others are like sponges—silly, soggy sponges.”

  But Imogen wasn’t listening. She had thought she knew what it felt like to be betrayed. But she hadn’t. Not until now. “I’m going home,” she said.

  Somehow she managed to stagger upstairs to her apartment.

  She collapsed on the couch.

  She couldn’t seem to move.

  She couldn’t even seem to blink. But then her eyes got very dry, so she did.

  Big Nana. A Kruk?

  What did this mean for her?

  What did this mean for the rest of her family?

  What was she going to do?

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  IMOGEN WAS IN the middle of a dream. A terrifying one—like a nightmare, but worse. A night-stallion, if you will.

  She was dreaming that she was a Kruk, which meant she had lovely blue eyes and was wearing a very nice Stella McCartney shirt, but which also meant she was completely psychopathic and was about to kill Big Nana. She was rooting around in a drawer filled with venomous snakes and child-sized handguns, looking for something . . . and then she found it: a syringe, filled with poison . . .