Relax, I'm A Ninja Read online

  I could have left then; I’d gotten the information Stu and Eddie wanted. But I didn’t. With the opportunity staring me right in the face, I couldn’t deny that I was still attracted to Courtney and too curious for my own good. I decided to climb up and see what she looked like sleeping. Not like she would know.

  Besides, the house had so many carved embellishments it begged to be climbed. I hadn’t scaled something that fun since my dad and I broke into Alcatraz (for training purposes only).

  Waiting for a good gust of wind, I left the bush and gripped the thick drainpipe. I pulled myself up past the first story and onto the trim by the bay window.

  The window didn’t cooperate, though. The glass reflected light from a neighboring house, so I couldn’t see her from where I was. I dropped below the pane and swung to the other side. After pulling myself level with the window again, I carefully put my finger on it to test the resistance.

  Before I could process what was happening, a hand pushed the window wide open and grabbed my neck. I flew to the floor, my head hitting hard as I went for the hand. And then she put me in a blood choke—which almost makes you pass out but keeps you conscious enough to hear and kind of talk.

  “Akuma! Shi-ne!” a high-pitched voice cried. I wouldn’t have believed it was Courtney speaking perfect Japanese if she wasn’t sitting on top of me. Had she actually ripped me from her windowsill, thrown me to the ground, and told me she would kill me? The blade hovering a millimeter from my face said so, though my pride tried to deny it.

  “Huh?” I looked into her fierce face. I should have been freaked out, but I couldn’t get over the fact that Courtney Petersen was sitting on top of me in nothing but a low-cut tank top and those tiny cheerleading shorts. That, and I was surrounded by pink bright enough to show in the dark. It didn’t feel threatening.

  She flinched when she recognized me. “Toshiro Ito?”

  “Yeah.” I was embarrassed to admit my identity, but it was better than dead by a lot. She pulled down the collar of my shirt, as if she was looking for something. Weird. When she didn’t find it, she released her hold and stood up.

  “Spying, Tosh? Can you be more pathetic?” She sheathed the sword that had to have come from Japan. It was a typical ninjato—a sword shorter than a samurai blade, but longer than a dagger.

  I did feel like a total loser, but I wasn’t about to admit that. Not when she’d just thrown me to the floor. She took me off guard, that was all. I stood up. “Since when do you speak perfect Japanese?”

  She looked to the side. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Oh, so you didn’t just call me a demon and say you were going to kill me?”

  “No, I didn’t.” She put her hands on her perfect hips, but suddenly I couldn’t muster any nice feelings for her. I didn’t like being lied to.

  “So, you just guessed on that blood choke, too?”

  “Blood choke?” She looked down for a split second. Another lie. She knew way more than she claimed, and I decided to prove it.

  I lunged at her with a punch to the right—she blocked it hard and attacked. I bent out of the way and pushed her to the ground with my foot. She grunted, but was immediately on her feet again.

  She smiled a bit, which made me smile. She would be fun to fight.

  “See, I think you know exactly what I’m talking about,” I said. Courtney was a ninja. I could feel it, though I could hardly believe it.

  “I really don’t, and you’d better remember that.” She sprang at me so fast I barely had time to react. Though I blocked, she pushed me all the way to the open window with her force alone. The moonlight shone on her angry face. A slight bruise colored her left eye, and that wasn’t all.

  I pushed back her hair, revealing the smear of blood on her neck. She must have missed washing it off. “Who hit you?”

  Her face tightened, and she let out a wry laugh. “If you don’t know, you don’t want to.”

  She kicked me hard, and I went flying out the window. A normal person would have panicked, but I’d been trained in free falling since I was seven. I turned in mid-air to prepare for the impact. Rolling to absorb the force, I faced the window. It was shut, and she wasn’t there. Since I just got beat, I figured it was better to leave before I made a bigger fool of myself.

  As I walked to the park to pick up Stu and Eddie, my mind reeled. Every detail was clear as day, but my brain refused to accept it as truth. Not only had I gotten owned by another ninja (something that didn’t happen unless I sparred with my dad), but it was Courtney freaking Petersen. How was I supposed to handle this information? Telling Dad I got beat up by a ditsy cheerleader wasn’t appealing. Okay, it was downright mortifying.

  “So? Did you see?” Eddie asked when I found them on a park bench.

  “Pink.” Like that mattered now.

  “Duuude.” Stu laughed. “Was she hot?”

  “Of course.”

  They went on about how lucky I was, but I didn’t catch much as we headed down the street. All I could think about was getting Courtney to tell me what she was up to, at least until Eddie grabbed my arm.

  “What?” I looked over to find Eddie frozen in fear. Stu had gone pale, his hand over his mouth. I followed their gazes.

  In the shadow of an alley, a guy lay unconscious in a pool of blood. It took a second to recognize the face, but the moment I did my jaw dropped.

  It was Todd.

  While Eddie called 911, I checked Todd’s pulse. He was alive, but not for long at this rate. Blood oozed from his side, so I wadded up my coat and pressed it to the wound to stop the flow. Stu ran around the corner, and an awful heaving noise followed.

  The rest of the night was a blur. Hospital. Cops. Questions. I felt horrible for being mad at him for ditching D&D when he was almost dead in an alley like on some crime show. I couldn’t stop thinking about Courtney and the blood on her neck, how her house was right around the corner.

  My gut said she was involved, but I couldn’t reveal her secret without destroying my own.

  3

  I tried to put Courtney out of my head, tried to tell myself that anyone could have attacked Todd—a mugger, a serial killer, a gangster looking to earn rep—but I couldn’t stop thinking about her suspicious behavior.

  Her window was open. On a cold November night.

  It meant nothing when I first saw it, but now I wondered if she’d just gotten back from some sort of ninja mission.

  By Monday morning I planned to confront Courtney about Todd. I had to at least know if she was involved, though I wasn’t sure what to do if she was.

  Problem was the attack seemed too messy for her. I could tell she was well trained, maybe even better trained than half our Clan. She was doing exactly what my dad and I were: keeping it simple. The girl was short, pretty, and blonder than Barbie—of course the perfect cover would be a cheerleader. No one would question why she could do more backflips than a slinky. Her cover was air-tight. She didn’t seem like the kind to leave tracks.

  Nothing added up. I needed more information.

  As I sat down in front of my breakfast, I worked through what I would say to her in history class. My father sat opposite me, sipping his tea. He’d picked me up from the hospital, but we hadn’t talked since that night. It wasn’t like I knew she’d done it. Even I thought I sounded crazy.

  “Is Amy coming to class today?” he asked. I sank in my chair. With the whole Courtney issue, I’d completely forgotten I had to deal with Amy.

  I gulped. “I haven’t talked with her yet.”

  He glanced at me, which was enough to chill my bones. He was a hundred and fifty pounds of pure muscle stuffed into a little tan package. Even with my extra height and weight, he could kick my butt. “I would like to see her in class.”

  “I’ll try.”

  “One cannot stand on the tip of a spear without splitting in two.”

  I nodded. Trying was never an option to my father, but it was my subtle way of s
aying that I really, really didn’t want Amy in ninja school. I had enough problems keeping my distance from her without being rude. Besides, whether Dad liked it or not, I had to figure out if a particular cheerleader had attacked my friend.

  If you don’t know, you don’t want to. Her words hung in my mind. She made being a ninja sound like something more than stealth, more than running specialty jobs for anonymous employers. That’s what my Clan did. For all intents and purposes, we were a specific brand of mercenaries.

  We even had a special phone in Dad’s office. People who got tipped off to our services would call, only knowing we were people who could get the job done. I figured most thought we were some kind of mafia, which was fairly accurate. We told them where to leave payment, and once we collected we got to work. Sabotage was our specialty.

  Did other Clans do different jobs? Courtney had looked for something under my shirt. And she called me Akuma—a demon in Japanese myth. What was that about?

  After breakfast, I grabbed my backpack and headed downstairs where my bike sat in our garage. No car, just three bikes. Driving in the city was kind of a joke—not because it wasn’t fast, but because you had to pray to the parking gods to find a spot remotely close to your destination. If you were rich, then your driver braved traffic and parking or rounded the block all day. If you were a ninja playing the poor kid of a dojo sensei, you rode ten minutes on your bike to school, grateful your sensei didn’t make you run the hills for endurance training.

  We lived on the border of Western Addition, close enough to Japantown for Mom to get all the good cooking stuff, but far enough for Dad to price gouge the really rich kids in Pacific Heights.

  Though my family didn’t exactly look well-off, Dad’s “side work” paid for my private school tuition. Everyone assumed I was a scholarship kid, which played perfectly into the nerd cover.

  Just as the usual layer of fog eased up, I locked my bike to the one rack in front of Greenburg Academy, the pompous private school in Pacific Heights. Then I headed up the grand front stairs to class.

  Greenburg was like most schools, except that it was once a Victorian library, everyone was rich, and we all wore uniforms. There were your usual groups: athletes, divas, student council, artsy farts, and nerds. It also happened to be pretty dang white for San Francisco.

  Though I could play basketball better than the whole team, being a nerd was better cover. Ninjas not only needed to be invisible, which most nerds are awesome at, but they needed to know a lot of stuff. Advanced geography, chemistry, biology, history, and sociology helped me blend in so I didn’t have to use force.

  Besides, even if I wasn’t a ninja, I’d probably still be a nerd. I was being myself but hiding at the same time. I liked chess, and that would have been true even without the tactical training it provided. And online games were really fun, even if they also aided in finger dexterity.

  “Hey, where’ve you been? No one answered at your house or the dojo,” Stu said as I dumped a few books in my locker. Eddie and Amy came up behind him. I tried not to cringe when I noticed her glaring at me.

  “Family crap. Mom’s freaking out about Todd. How is he?” I didn’t believe in cell phones—like I wanted something that might accidentally ring in the wrong situation, not to mention the possibility of being tracked through GPS.

  “He’s doing better, I think,” Stu said.

  “His mom said we could visit today,” Eddie said. “He’s not so drugged up.”

  “Sounds good. I can’t believe—” I started to say.

  “I know. It’s crazy.” Amy kicked my shoe. “Heard you basically saved him. He barely had enough blood left to survive.”

  “I guess we got lucky,” I said.

  The bell rang. Eddie and Stu headed off to pre-calculus together. Amy had chemistry with me. We usually walked together and said nothing, but not today.

  “That wasn’t all they told me,” she said.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Pink, huh?”

  “Crap, they told you.” I covered my face. I hadn’t wanted to hurt my friends so badly since the community pool fiasco of eighth grade when they pantsed me in front of the entire lap pool.

  “They think you’re awesome. Me? If you hadn’t saved Todd, you’d be getting really close to creepy.” Her dark brown eyes looked forward, but I could see the disappointment in them.

  “They dared me. I don’t back out of dares.”

  She glared. “Do you jump off cliffs when people tell you to?”

  Yeah, sorta. It’s in the job description. “With a bungee cord, sure.”

  She rolled her eyes. “And how exactly did you find out anyway? Her house is huge and definitely alarmed.”

  My dad was right about Amy Sato. She did have the instincts of a panther, and I had to stop fighting his decision. I sighed. “Are you busy tonight?”

  “Excuse me?” She seemed offended—maybe even disgusted.

  I laughed. “No, not a date, if that’s what you’re thinking. My dad wanted to extend an invitation to the competition class at the dojo. I’m guessing you’re interested, since you seemed so jealous the other night.”

  She stopped walking. “Oh.”

  I opened the door to class. Now that she’d criticized me and clearly been repulsed by what she thought was me asking her out, I felt like I could be myself without betraying Eddie. There was obviously no risk. “You can think about it, but Sensei really wants to see you in class tonight. Maybe that will answer all your questions.”

  With her black hair framing her face, she really looked like a panther. I could tell she craved the answers, but she walked into the chemistry lab without a word. At the end she tapped me on the shoulder. “So, I’ll see you at the dojo tonight?”

  I smiled. Sure didn’t take her long to decide. That was a good sign. “Yeah, at eight. You’ll find competition class…enlightening.”

  “Cool. Practice has been a little boring.” She bit her lip, maybe worried that I’d be offended.

  “You definitely won’t be bored.” I waved goodbye, happy to at least have that out of the way. I headed to American history, where Courtney would be sitting on the back row, third seat in.

  I went over my plan: sit next to her, say something in Japanese, and see how she answered. Not a brilliant plan on the surface, but I really had thought it over. She was a terrible liar. If I could get her to slip up big time, then she’d have to explain herself. That was all I wanted.

  My plan would also help me deduce how quickly she’d cave. If she fell apart over a simple statement, I could get it out of her by the end of the week.

  I opened the door and looked to the back. Courtney sat there in a ridiculously short version of our uniform’s plaid skirt, tan legs crossed. Freaking hot. She pushed her blonde bangs from her face and copied the diagram on the board, looking nothing like a possible killer. Her boyfriend, Logan “I’m so awesome because I can put a ball in a hoop” Williams, wasn’t there yet. Perfect time to strike.

  I sat next to her. Before I could chicken out, I blurted the three words I’d contemplated all weekend. “Kunoichi desu ne.” (Which roughly translates to “You’re a ninja, right?” Kunoichi is the Japanese word for female ninja.)

  She sucked at lying. By the way her pencil stopped and her jaw muscles tightened, I knew she’d lie before she even opened her mouth. Courtney lifted her head and stared. At least she channeled disgust well. You’d think I hadn’t showered for two weeks.

  “Huh?”

  “You heard me.” I balled my fists. Why wouldn’t she tell me? She knew I was a ninja too.

  “Duh, I just didn’t understand you. Are you, like, speaking some special geek language? Did you learn how to talk like the aliens?” she asked with a perfect mix of condescension and loathing. Several of my classmates snickered.

  “Baka ja nai yo.” I told her I wasn’t stupid, and I could tell she understood.

  “I don’t watch Star Trek. Could you speak like a normal human bei
ng?”

  More laughing.

  I wanted to punch her, but she was only using her popular girl cover to its max potential. She didn’t have to give me the time of day. Couldn’t, really, without slipping up like I wanted. Courtney was the queen of tenth grade, and every kid in class knew I wasn’t supposed to be talking to her. Nerds and divas didn’t mix, even if they both happened to be ninjas. For some reason, I always pictured ninjas having some kind of camaraderie. We definitely did in our Clan, but I guess the love didn’t extend beyond that.

  “Is there a problem here?” Logan’s booming voice came from behind. The guy had to be on steroids—no sophomore could possibly be that huge. His wild brown hair shaded his dark eyes, making him look that much more brutish.

  “No, Tosh was just speaking alien to me,” Courtney said, smug smile in place. She thought she’d owned me this round, but she hadn’t. I’d gotten plenty of information out of our little exchange. First of all, she was a crappy liar even when she was trying. Second, she had her cover down pat. And third, she had no problem playing dirty. I could work with that.

  “Get out of my seat, dork.”

  I scowled at Courtney. “Don’t think it’s over.”

  She laughed—a tinkling, mocking sound that implied she didn’t take me seriously. And not as the nerd on the outside, but as the ninja on the inside. That was what made me feel like a loser.

  I stood up, moved to the far corner, and sat. Courtney smiled triumphantly and kissed Logan. I didn’t get what she saw in him. He was already a notorious player at sixteen. Watching them pissed me off. If I wasn’t actually a nerd, then she couldn’t just be a mean cheerleader. There had to be more to her.

  4

  The hospital wasn’t far from school. WE could have walked there in under half an hour, but Eddie insisted we pile into his driver’s town car to go see Todd. About seven minutes later we arrived at Pacific Presbyterian Hospital.

  “Todd Baldwin,” Eddie told the nurse.