The Rules for Breaking Read Online Free PDF Page A

jaw drops open a little. As if she wasn’t the one who picked out that horrible dye and forced it on my head!
    “Yeah, I’m sure I look fantastic,” I answer back. “What color are we going with next time…bright red?”
    “Anna,” Dad whispers my name. I get the warning.
    “Start from the beginning and tell me everything, Anna.” Agent Williams sits in a nearby chair and I push deeper into the couch, dragging Ethan with me. I think about waking Teeny—she’ll be pissed if she finds out we left her out—but her face is so peaceful that I let her sleep.
    Agent Parker perches on the back of the couch. I can feel her hovering and it’s hard to resist the urge to knock her off.
    I quickly run through the events—the bumped chair at Will’s, the journal and note left in my pocket.
    “And there was something else in the journal—a single daisy,” I add.
    I feel Ethan stiffen beside me. I hadn’t told him that earlier. It’s the creepiest part, and I hated to even think about that, much less talk about it.
    “A daisy?” asks Agent Williams.
    “Like the little one tattooed on her shoulder,” Ethan says, then jumps up from the couch and starts pacing the room.
    “Did you see him, Anna? Or anyone suspicious?” Agent Parker asks.
    “No. There were a lot of people there, but all of them were kids my age.”
    Ethan adds, “I didn’t see anyone there who didn’t go to our school either.”
    “And what about the break-in today?” Agent Williams asks.
    Dad tells him what was missing or out of place, then Ethan explains having a similar incident with his truck.
    Agent Williams turns to Ethan. “And your truck was parked outside your home all day?”
    “Yes, sir.”
    Dad leans forward in his chair and asks, “Greg, why is he doing this now? If he wanted to harm these kids, he had every opportunity in Arizona. It doesn’t make any sense that he’d risk showing up here knowing Anna and Ethan would recognize him.”
    Agent Williams shrugs and I notice the extra set of wrinkles that seem to have taken up residence in his forehead. “I don’t know. We’ve had agents working this case for weeks and we’ve got nothing.”
    “I just don’t understand how no one else ever saw this guy!” Dad’s eyes jump to me when he asks, “How many times did he come see you when we were in the program…three…four times?”
    “Four,” I squeak out. “In that coffee shop on Front Street, twice in the laundry room, and once at Pearl’s.”
    “Four!” Dad exclaims. I shush him, reminding him that he will wake Teeny, and he lowers his voice a fraction before continuing, “Four times and not one of your guys ever saw him!” And then he turns on me. “And I still can’t believe you never mentioned he was visiting you, even if you thought he was an agent. You didn’t think it was strange?”
    This is a conversation we’ve had a ridiculous number of times. Dad always seems to bring this up out of the blue—at the breakfast table, in the car, just before I tell him good night—it’s the one constant question. Why didn’t I tell him Thomas was contact-ing me?
    And it’s a question I have a hard time answering. Do I get back into how awful Dad was acting back then—all secretive and silent? Do I remind him that Mom was falling down drunk all the time and my main concern was that she not kill herself with a bottle of gin?
    But it’s more than that. And way worse. Every time a suit showed up, I would get nervous and panicked and jumpy, almost like I was allergic to them. But Thomas was so different than the other suits…obviously. He talked to me like I was an adult, not some useless kid. And I felt like I could trust him. That’s the worst part about this. I would have never mentioned him to anyone else because it never occurred to me that I should. He totally played me.
    So I never really answer this question because I can’t bear to explain my stupidity.
    Luckily, Agent Williams presses forward. “When you