Gallagher Girls 5 - Out of Sight, Out of Time Read Online Free Page A

was still reverberating through my life. “Mr. Solomon was willing to die to save me. People were getting hurt because of me, and…I knew that I wasn’t in danger.” I looked down at my hands. “I was the danger.”
    I sat waiting for someone to tell me I was wrong. I wanted them to say that the Circle had started this and the Circle alone was to blame, but those words never came. Being right had never been so disappointing.
    Professor Buckingham was the only one who moved, and she leaned closer. “Cameron, listen to me.” Her voice was like granite, and the Circle seemed almost soft in comparison. “What is the last thing you remember?”
    “Writing my report and leaving it in the Hall of History.”
    Buckingham picked up a bound manuscript and placed it on the table in front of me. “This report?”
    It looked different from the loose pages I’d left on top of the case with Gilly’s sword months before, but that was it. I knew it. So I nodded. “I was in a hurry to finish it. I had to put everything down so I could…leave.”
    Buckingham smiled as if that made perfect sense. “Do you know where you went?”
    As soon as Buckingham spoke, my mother gave her a look. It was nothing more than a glance, really, but something in the gesture made me say, “What? Do you know something?”
    “It’s nothing, kiddo.” Mom reached for my hand, covered it with her own, and squeezed my fingers. They were still raw and red, but they didn’t really hurt. “We just need you to start at the beginning. We need you to tell us if you know where you went when you left.”
    I closed my eyes and tried to think, but the halls of my memory were black and empty.
    “I don’t…I’m sorry. I don’t know.”
    “What about later?” Buckingham asked. “Any flashes or scenes…feelings? It could be anything. Any little thing might be important.”
    “No.” I shook my head. “Nothing. I left the report and then I woke up in the convent.”
    “Cameron, dear.” Madame Dabney sounded very disappointed. “You were gone for four months. You don’t remember anything?”
    It should have been an easy question for a Gallagher Girl. I’d been trained to remember and recall. I knew what we’d had for lunch on the last day of finals, and I could tell from the way she was sitting that Professor Buckingham’s bad hip was giving her trouble—that it was probably going to rain. I knew Madame Dabney had changed perfumes, and Mr. Smith had used his favorite plastic surgeon—the one in Switzerland—to rework his face last summer. But my own summer was a total blank.
    My head hurt, and in the back of my mind a song began to play, lulling me. I wanted to sway with the music.
    “I’m sorry,” I told them. “I know it sounds crazy. I sound crazy. I wouldn’t blame you if you didn’t believe me.”
    “You are many things, Cameron. But crazy is not one of them.” Buckingham straightened. “We believe you.”
    I expected them to push harder, demand more. But then Buckingham took off her glasses and picked up the papers on the table in front of her. “The medical staff is expecting you in the infirmary, Cameron.” I’d thought I’d been good at hiding my fatigue, but the smile she gave me said otherwise. “And then I do hope you’ll get some rest. I think you’ve earned it.”
     
    Walking back through the gleaming corridors of Sublevel One, I felt my mother’s hand on my back, and something about that small gesture made me stop.
    “I’ll remember, Mom,” I blurted, turning to her. “I’ll get better and I’ll fight this and I’ll remember. And then—”
    “No,” Mom snapped, then lowered her voice. “No, Cammie. I do not want you picking at your memories like they’re some kind of scab. Scabs exist for a reason.”
    “But—” I started, just as Mom reached for my shoulders, held me tight.
    “Listen to me, Cammie. There are things in this life…in this world…There are things that you don’t want to